Somewhere, a leather jacket is being tailored, because Ryan Gosling just got handed the keys to Marvel’s Ghost Rider, and the reaction has been exactly as unhinged as you’d expect.
The announcement dropped during Marvel Studios’ Hall H panel at San Diego Comic-Con, and it came with a setup so elaborate it practically deserved its own trailer. Podcast host Josh Horowitz had reportedly been ribbing Kevin Feige for weeks about why Gosling wasn’t Ghost Rider yet, so Marvel turned that running joke into the actual reveal, calling Horowitz out from the crowd before bringing Gosling on stage to a wall of noise.
Gosling didn’t play it cool for even a second. “Wow, is this really happening?” he asked the crowd, before admitting this is a role he’s wanted for a long time. That tracks. He was reportedly in the mix for Green Lantern years ago, so watching him finally land a comic book lead as Ghost Rider feels like a decade-long bit finally paying off.
The Ghost Rider movie will be directed by Shawn Levy, who Gosling has now worked with twice over, first on Star Wars: Starfighter and now on this. Levy joked on stage about the déjà vu of standing in that same Hall H spot two years after unveiling Deadpool & Wolverine, and credited a lot of the Ghost Rider idea to conversations the two of them had while filming Starfighter together. Somewhere between lightsabers and flaming skulls, apparently, a whole movie got pitched.
This marks Marvel’s first live-action swing at the character since Nicolas Cage played Johnny Blaze across two very divisive Sony films back in the 2000s and 2010s. Whether Gosling’s Ghost Rider connects to Robbie Reyes, the version Gabriel Luna played on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., is still unclear, but fans are already speculating about a Midnight Sons team-up, something even Oscar Isaac has said he’d be into.
The film is set for a 2028 release, and yes, that is a painfully long wait considering Gosling also has Starfighter dropping in 2027. Between the two, the man is quietly building himself a full-blown blockbuster era. Ghost Rider might be the one with actual flames involved, but going by the volume of reaction posts already flooding timelines, fans have been waiting for this kind of casting news for years, and Gosling landing the role feels like the internet collectively exhaling.
Also Read: Ryan Gosling’s Kade Auberon Jacket From Star Wars Starfighter