At The Flea Pit: Ghost Rider (2007)

As superhero movies go, Ghost Rider is more Fantastic Four than Spider-Man, but still with enough wiggle room for some trademark Nic Cage gestures and goofy cool. It is the stereotypical Faustian tale of a young motorcycle stunt rider - Johnny Blaze (Cage) - selling his soul to Mephistopheles (Peter Fonda) to save a loved one, and becoming the Devil's bounty hunter as a result.

In his new supernatural role, Blaze gets one of the most striking and iconic make-overs of the Marvel Universe - the flaming skull, the twisted Gothic motorbike, the chains etc - and takes to his role as Ghost Rider with great gusto.

While Fonda's Devil is the main antagonist, he's not the one getting into fisticuffs with Ghost Rider, that's left to his son, Blackheart (Wes Bentley) and his super-powered goons. Unfortunately these minions make the schoolboy error of trying to take on our flaming hero one-at-a-time, leading to inevitable defeat.

Sam Elliot (Thunderbolt Ross from The Hulk) also turns up as the enigmatic Caretaker, a mentor figure for Blaze who surprises no one in his ultimate revelation of his role as the previous Ghost Rider. What is strange - and a bit pointless - is his spectacular cross-country ride alongside Blaze to the final showdown with Blackheart. Then, once he gets there, he turns round and says: "Right, I'm going now" and disappears off. What was that all about?

Another area where style won out over content is the amount of collatoral damage that Ghost Rider's "hellbike" causes - burning up roads, blasting out windows, incincerating small animals etc Although it looks really good, it does rather limit Ghost Rider's ability to perform as a hero!

Ghost Rider isn't the smartest of comic book flicks, but it doesn't insult your intelligence. It does just what it says on the tin. This is more your Saturday morning serial kind of storytelling than the indepth character stuff we get from, say, Spider-Man. It's all about the action and thrills and in these departments it certainly delivers.