Ryan Gosling is set to play Johnny Blaze, aka Ghost Rider, in a new Marvel Studios movie, with Shawn Levy directing. Marvel made the casting real during its Hall H presentation at San Diego Comic-Con, bringing Gosling onstage and turning a long-rumored project into an official announcement.
The film is planned to open in 2028, giving Marvel a new big-screen take on a character who first appeared in Marvel Spotlight No. 5 in 1972 and was later played by Nicolas Cage in two movies, in 2007 and 2011. Kevin Feige delivered the news at Marvel's Comic-Con panel, and the studio framed the project as Ryan Gosling joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe in Ghost Rider, directed by Shawn Levy, only in theaters in 2028.
That last part matters because Ghost Rider has already lived different lives on screen. It appeared in Sony movies before being brought into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and Gabriel Luna also played the character in Agents of SHIELD. This new version gives Marvel another shot at a figure with built-in recognition, while giving Gosling his first superhero or comic book movie role after years of circling bigger franchise projects.
Gosling and Levy had just wrapped Star Wars: Starfighter, which made the pairing feel less like a surprise than a line they had been heading toward for months. The open question is not whether Marvel is serious about Ghost Rider; it is how the studio plans to handle Johnny Blaze this time, after a character history that has already gone from Marvel Spotlight No. 5 to Sony to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
