Genre: Action / Superhero / Supernatural
Director: Ilya Naishuller
Writer: Mark Newton
Based on Marvel Comics characters
Cast: Aaron Paul, Emma Greenwell, Richard Brake, Eamonn Walker, David Denman, Melissa Barrera, David Duchovny, Virginia Madsen
Plot: Detroit, Michigan. Danny Ketch (Aaron Paul) is in the underground parking garage of a luxury condominium complex. He looks in all directions before popping the lock of a sports car. As the alarm blares, Ketch quickly opens the hood and disables the alarm. He then proceeds to hotwire the car and drive it out of the garage. Just as it looks like he is in the clear with the stolen car, he is surrounded by police cruisers. He tries to outrun them, but is stopped when a long train blocks his path at a crossing. With nowhere to go, Danny puts his hands up and is arrested. While in police custody, Danny is visited by crime boss Stephen Lords (Eamonn Walker). Lords is there to make sure that Danny isn't going to make a deal and tell the police that he was working for Lords' organization. Danny promises Lords that he knows how to keep his mouth shut. Lords says that he truly hopes that is the case as he would hate for anything bad to happen to Danny's beautiful sister.
Three to five years later...
Barbara Ketch (Emma Greenwell) is sitting in a dingy bar down the street from Great Lakes State Prison nursing a rum and coke with an eye on the clock. Off-duty Detroit Detective Michael Badilino (David Denman) sidles up next to her and begins hitting on her. He asks her what brings her to the bar, and she tells him that she's picking up her brother down the road soon. Michael instantly knows that she's picking up from the prison and asks what he was locked up for. Barbara looks him in the eye and tells him it's none of his fucking business. She gets up to leave, but Michael follows her and apologizes for being intrusive. He gives her his business card to show he's a cop and was just curious. He then offers to buy her a drink. Barbara looks at the clock and accepts, realizing she still has a bit before Danny's release will be processed. After a bit of conversation, Barbara gives Michael her phone number and tells him that she thinks he's cute. Michael thanks Barbara for giving him her number and jokes that it saves him from having to find it in the police database.
When Barbara picks Danny up outside of the prison, he asks her to drive him to Lords' wrecking yard adjacent hideout. Barbara asks why and Danyy tells her that he feels Lords owes him a little money for serving the time and keeping his mouth shut. When they arrive at the wrecking yard, Danny tells Barbara to stay in the car while he goes inside the building. Danny knocks on the door, but nobody answers. He walks around the building until he finds an unlocked sidedoor. Danny enters and finds Stephen Lords in the middle of leading a Satanic ritual. Lords chants an incantation in Latin before plunging a dagger into the chest of a woman being held down in the middle of a pentagram. Danny is shocked by the act and turns to leave, but knocks over a candle, alerting Lords and his cult - called Deathwatch - to his presence. Danny tries to talk his way out of the situation, but Lords orders his followers to seize him. Danny runs out of the building and toward Barbara's car. While waiting, Barbara has been texting with Michael. Danny yells for her to start the car. Barbara does, but Lords and his followers open fire on the car with machine guns. With the car undriveable, Danny grabs his sister's hand and begins running into the wrecking yard. As they are running, a bullet hits Barbara in the shoulder. Danny picks her up and finds a hiding place behind a stack of cars. Danny sets Barbara down and tells her to stay put while he tries to find a way out.
Danny silently explores the area until he notices something glowing nearby. He goes closer to the glow until he finds that it is coming from an emblem on a pristine motorcycle with the key in the ignition. Danny touches the emblem with his hands, stained from his sister's blood. The emblem begins glowing brighter until it is engulfed in blue flames. Danny is surprised to find that the flames do not hurt him. He sits down on the motorcycle. His skin begins smoking as the motorcycle's wheels turn into flames. Danny's face turns to ash and fades away as his skull becomes engulfed in blue flames. He rides the motorcycle, leaving a trail of flames in his wake back to where he left Barbara, who is unconscious. Worried for her, her picks up her body and drives off with her body in his lap. He drives toward the exit of the wrecking yard where Lords and his followers are waiting and blocking the exit with cars. Danny revs the motorcycle's engine harder and the flames on the bike grow bigger and hotter. He drives right through the cars, with the bike's flames melting a hole directly through them. Lords looks on in awe. One of his followers comments that the flaming entity must have been Mephisto, who they have been trying to conjure. Lords rejects that, saying what they just saw was something entirely different.
Stephen Lords goes back into his office where he finds a man sitting at his desk, who introduces himself to Lords as Mephisto (David Duchovny). Lords is surprised to see him, but Mephisto comments that he shouldn't be since Deathwatch's ritual is what alerted him to come here - well, that and the presence of Zarathos, the Spirit of Vengeance. Lords asks about the Spirit of Vengeance. Mephisto explains that Zarathos is a spirit that escaped from his realm as an inanimate object. Whoever comes into possession of that object will become host to the spirit - becoming the Ghost Rider. That is the presence he felt when he arrived. Lords, in awe, bows down before Mephisto and asks how he and his Deathwatch cult can serve him. Mephisto ponders that for a moment before saying that Lords can help bring the Ghost Rider to him - if Lords can help with this act, Mephisto will give him anything in his wildest dreams, but if Lords fails Mephisto can demand anything of him he wants. Lords agrees and asks how to go about this. Mephisto offers him a little help. He then rips the souls from a few of Lords' followers, and uses them to form the pale body of Blackout (Richard Brake), a demonic bounty hunter. Blackout's eyes glow white as everything around them turns to complete blackness. Blackout glares at Lords and demands to know the human name of the new Ghost Rider. Lords thinks for a moment and says that it could be Danny Ketch, a car thief who used to work for him years ago.
Danny Ketch as the flaming Ghost Rider drops Barbara off in front of a hospital before driving off. Driving down the Detroit streets, Danny feels like he loses control of his body as it turns down a dark alley following the sounds of a scream. In the alley, a woman is being raped by some thug. The Ghost Rider steps off of his bike, the blue flames from his skull and motorcycle illuminate the attacker. Ghost Rider grabs the thug by his neck. He stares into his eyes - the Penance Stare. The thug begins feeling all of the pain he has caused in his lifetime. The thug begins screaming out in agony as his flesh begins melting away, leaving only a charred, lifeless skeleton behind. As the sun begins to come up, the flames on Ghost Rider burn out and the flesh and appearance of Danny is restored back to its normal state. He pulls over the motorcycle, which is also back in its normal appearance, next to a vacant house on the outskirts of Detroit. He breaks into the house and passes out from exhaustion.
Det. Michael Badilino arrives at the hospital after receiving a call from a nurse who found his business card in the pocket of Barbara Ketch. He's there when Barbara wakes up. She asks him what's going on, and he says he could ask the same thing. He asks how she was shot. Barbara has trouble recalling what exactly happened other than the image of a flaming skeleton. Michael then asks her what happened to her brother she was picking up. Barbara then remembers that she drove to some wrecking yard so Danny could talk to someone about some money he was owed. Michael asks where the wrecking yard is, but Barbara can't seem to remember. Michael issues an AOB for Barbara's car over his radio with the suggestion that officers search areas at or around wrecking yards within the Detroit city limits.
Danny wakes up late in the afternoon. He is disoriented and unsure where he is or how he got there. He exits the vacant house. As soon as he sees the emblem on the motorcycle again he has flashes of memory from the night before. He then notices the dried blood on his hands. He gets onto the motorcycle and drives away in a hurry.
Stephen Lords gets a call from a source within the police department that nobody knows where Daniel Ketch is, but his sister was admitted to the hospital in the middle of the night. Mephisto tells Blackout and Lords that he will leave them to their task and disappears in a plume of smoke and flame. Blackout's eyes glow white and he then disappears into a dark shadow. Lords orders his remaining followers to grab their guns and get ready to go to the hospital.
While racing down the streets of Detroit on the motorcycle, Danny is hit by a pickup truck. The driver, Alejandra Jones (Melissa Barrera), gets out and apologizes profusely, but does point out that Danny ran a red light that caused the accident. Danny is barely conscious and has dislocated his shoulder. Alejandra is about to call for an ambulance when Danny asks her not to. Alejandra looks at his arm dangling from his shoulder and offers to at least help him pop his shoulder back into place. She resets his shoulder as Danny grimaces. She then asks where he was speeding off to. He says he needs to see if his sister is in the hospital. Alejandra tells Danny that she coincidentally was on her way to work as a nurse at that very hospital. She then offers to help him get his motorcycle into the back of her truck and drive him to the hospital.
Michael is still at the hospital keeping Barbara company when he receives a call that they have found her car and it is riddled with bullet holes. He tells them he will be there shortly. Michael tells Barbara to stay in the hospital where it is safe. He asks a couple of uniformed officers to guard the room as he leaves. Michael drives to the wrecking yard, unknowingly passing Lords and his followers on the road as they drive toward the hospital. Michael quickly finds Barbara’s bullet-riddled car. He enters the building at the wrecking yard and finds the grisly site of the satanic sacrifice and the body of the dead woman. He calls in the body and continues searching the premises until he finds a computer screen with a map to the hospital pulled up. He runs back to his car and speeds away calling for backup to head to the hospital immediately.
Danny and Alejandra arrive at the hospital. Alejandra helps Danny find his sister’s room, but the police officers guarding it won’t let him in. Blackout suddenly appears out of a shadow inside the hallway. All of the lights on the floor then go out. The police officers pull out their flashlights, but they don’t work in the presence of Blackout, who grabs the cops by their throats and rips their vocal cords out, killing them. Danny tries to figure out how to transform into the Ghost Rider, but Blackout laughs at the attempt, pointing out that it is day time. Danny grabs one of the dead cops’ guns and opens fire at Blackout, but the demon is unaffected. Barbara, who is hiding behind the bed, calls out to Danny when she realizes it’s him out in the hallway. Danny and Alejandra run into her room and hide with her. Danny opens the window curtains, which causes Blackout to flinch. Danny realizes that Blackout doesn’t like direct sunlight. Danny tells Alejandra and Barbara to follow him close behind as he has an idea on how to get out of there. They run down the hall ripping down every curtain along the way as Blackout chases after them, trying to avoid the sunlight. They finally make it to the hospital’s glass sky bridge, which Blackout doesn’t follow them onto. Blackout tells them that Deathwatch will be there soon, and while they lack his abilities they don’t share his aversion to the bright light.
Lords and his Deathwatch followers arrive at the hospital and begin making their way floor by floor to find Danny and Barbara. Michael arrives at the hospital in time to hear gunshots coming from Deathwatch. Michael loads up a shotgun from the trunk of his car and runs into the building. He shoots his way through some of Lords' followers as he makes his way up the stairwell toward Barbara's room. Michael eventually finds the group on the sky bridge. He fires a shotgun blast at Blackout’s face, which blows halfway off in a pulp of black goo. The shot doesn’t kill him though and his face starts regenerating. The group uses it as a chance to make it down a stairwell at the other end of the sky bridge. Several more police cars arrive. Lords' Deathwatch followers are killed in a shootout with the police. Lords jumps out a fourth floor window and starts limping away, but he is arrested by the police on the ground.
Danny thanks Alejandra for all her help. Danny tells the group that he's pretty sure that whatever that Blackout thing was, it's after him. He asks Michael to protect Barbara for him while he figures out what to do. Danny drives away from Detroit as the sun begins setting. Once nighttime has taken over the skies, Danny transforms into the Ghost Rider. The spirit of Zarathos takes control and leads the Ghost Rider along a highway north to a rural church along the shores of Lake Huron arriving just before dawn. Ghost Rider turns back into Danny, who collapses on the front steps of the church where he is found by the nun who runs the church, Sister Clara (Virginia Madsen). She quickly recognizes Danny as her son that she left behind nearly 30 years prior. Danny sleeps for several hours while Clara treats his injuries and cleans him up in the back of the church. When Danny finally wakes up, Clara tells Danny who she is. Danny becomes angry, but Clara explains that she believed a demonic spirit was always following the family around. She assumed it was her fault and thought that Danny and Barbara would be safe from evil if she left. Now she realizes though that it was all for naught as clearly the spirit has found Danny and attached itself to him. Clara apologizes, offering assistance in the fight against evil he finds himself drawn into. She gives him an old gun that belonged to the church’s former priest, explaining that he had blessed the gun many years ago just in case. Danny loads the gun as Clara prepares buckets full of holy water which she places strategically throughout the church. Finally the sun begins to set.
Blackout has followed the spirit energy of Zarathos and arrives at the church. He walks toward the building, the outside lights are all dampened but Blackout's skin burns as he gets to the doors. Frustrated, he calls out for the Ghost Rider to come out and fight him and to stop hiding like a coward. Ghost Rider bursts through the doors of the church on the motorcycle. The hellfire that comprises the bike's wheels leaves a large burn mark across Blackout's pale body. Blackout tries to psionically extinguish Ghost Rider’s hellfire flames, but even with all of his power the flames only flicker. Blackout hides in the shadows between stretches of moonlight. He manages to sneak up on the Ghost Rider. He rips a tree from its roots and hits Ghost Rider with it, sending him flying into the icy waters of Lake Huron. Blackout jokes to himself about always finding a way to extinguish light. The ice in the lake begins to melt and steam begins rising from the water. Ghost Rider then bursts to the surface on his motorcycle. He grabs a chain from the back of the motorcycle. He drives fast circles around Blackout, wrapping him up in the chain. Once Blackout is restrained, Ghost Rider hits Blackout with the back of the motorcycle, sending him crashing through the walls of the church. One of the buckets of holy water is knocked over, pouring over Blackout’s body, melting away at his dead, pale skin. Blackout screams in agony as Ghost Rider drives into the church. He then pulls out the priest’s gun and fires a shot at Blackout’s chest. When the bullet hits Blackout, it causes his body to explode in a mess of chunks of black flesh. Clara comments on the smell of sulfur. Ghost Rider stares into Clara’s eyes with his Penance Stare. She begins crying, before the Ghost Rider tells her that her soul is clean. Ghost Rider then gets back on his motorcycle and drives away from the church. Clara watches as the blue flames get further and further away.
Post-Credits: Stephen Lords sits in a jail cell. The lights flicker. Mephisto then appears before Lords and asks him if he’s ready to pay the debt he owes for failing to help bring the Ghost Rider back to him.
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