Meet The New MCU Ghost Rider. It's Ryan Gosling

Turns out, Tom Holland isn't the only one who manifested himself into a superhero role when he first appeared as Spider-Man in Captain America: Civil War. Now Ryan Gosling has pulled off the same trick. At this year's San Diego Comic Con, the Project Hail Mary actor pulled up at the Ghost Rider movie announcement, proving that if you just want it long enough, you might as well get the dream role (cue Om Shanti Om award scene dialogue).

The internet has been manifesting this casting for over a decade. Gosling has been the fan-cast answer to "who should play Ghost Rider" long before Kevin Feige made it official on Sunday.

So when Suicide's Ghost Rider hit the speakers and Gosling walked out on that Comic-Con stage, it wasn't a surprise so much as a long-overdue arrival. Gosling himself put it out into the void during an interview with Josh Horowitz on the Happy Sad Confused podcast in July 2022. Ghost Rider, he had said, was his ultimate dream superhero role. This would ultimately prompt a positive response from Marvel boss Kevin Feige and eventually led to his official casting.

Director Shawn Levy, who put Gosling through his paces on Deadpool & Wolverine, is back behind the camera for the Ghost Rider movie, landing in theatres in 2028. Gosling announced that Shawn Levy, director of Black Panther 3 (also announced on the same day), will also be helming the project. The two just wrapped Star Wars: Starfighter together, due in theatres May 28, 2027. The Ghost Rider pitch reportedly took shape between takes on that set, according to Levy. Jonathan Tropper, who wrote Starfighter's screenplay, is writing this one too. However, production isn't expected to start until 2027, once Starfighter clears post-production.

The Ghost Rider comics revolve around Johnny Blaze, a stunt motorcyclist who trades his soul tothe devil and comes back as a flaming-skulled enforcer of the damned. Nicolas Cage held the role across two Sony films, 2007's Ghost Rider and 2011's Spirit of Vengeance, which combined for more than $360 million worldwide. Gabriel Luna played a separate version, Robbie Reyes, on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. before a planned spinoff got shelved in 2019. Gosling becomes only the second actor to headline the role on a movie screen, and the first to do it inside the MCU.

Marvel hasn't confirmed whether Ghost Rider surfaces in another film before his solo debut (ahem, Avengers: Doomsday, although it's really unlikely). At most, you could expect a cameo in Avengers: Secret Wars. But then again, if it's a Marvel movie, just good ol' manifestation can bring about anything. Just saying.