Just before the dawn of the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2008, big screen icon Nicolas Cage stepped into his first Marvel Comics film adaptation: 2007’s “Ghost Rider.” Cage stars in the overall not very well-received movie as Johnny Blaze, who goes from a troubled stuntman to the titular fiery hero. Though the story leaves much to be desired, especially in replicating the source material, Ghost Rider’s design looks like it leaped straight off of the page. His flaming skull head and iconic chain weapon are present, in addition to his legendary flaming motorcycle, which has gone down as one of the most famous Harley-Davidsons seen in movies and TV.
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When not in Ghost Rider form, the bike Blaze rides around is a custom Harley-Davidson Chopper with a Panhead V-twin engine – one of many engines Harley has constructed throughout the years. Coincidentally, the bike is actually a tribute to the Captain America bike from “Easy Rider.” The late Peter Fonda, the actor behind Mephistopheles in “Ghost Rider,” rode said motorcycle as Wyatt, a.k.a. “Captain America,” in the 1969 film. Blaze is also shown in the film to ride his stunt motorcycle as part of his death-defying non-superhero act, which Cage shared in an interview with SuperHeroHype.com back in 2005 was a Buell. More specifically, the base is a 1999 Buell X1 Lightning, which is among the fastest Buell motorcycles ever made.
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There’s actually one more motorcycle Cage rides in “Ghost Rider,” that being the Panhead Chopper’s more demonic alter-ego, the Hell Cycle.
Ghost Rider’s Hell Cycle was a whole other two-wheeled beast
Bringing Johnny Blaze’s Ghost Rider form to life in live-action can’t quite be done safely using practical effects. He is a flaming biker with a skull for a head after all, so CGI post-production effects were needed on “Ghost Rider” to keep his look true to the comics without harming Nicolas Cage. Meanwhile, his motorcycle was a different beast entirely. The general look of the Hell Cycle was able to be constructed practically with only some CGI enhancements, resulting in an appropriately monstrous yet awe-inspiring bike.
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The Hell Cycle version of Blaze’s motorcycle required even more extensive customization than his standard Panhead Chopper. The Australian-made chopper was covered with a hulking chrome-looking fiberglass shell that brought it to approximately 11 feet in length and over 500 pounds. Thus, it wasn’t street legal by any stretch, with it taking the efforts of multiple people to even turn it around. Not to mention, it couldn’t run for too long without the heat of the engine melting the fiberglass. Four versions were made for filming (only two with working engines) amounting to a bill of roughly $450,000 for Sony.
Naturally, “Ghost Rider” is full of motorcycles, some solid street-legal rides and others impressive, studio lot-confined props. With the MCU welcoming in legacy actors as part of the Multiverse Saga, perhaps Nicolas Cage will saddle up as Johnny Blaze one more time. If he does, it’ll be interesting to see if he gets a new set of wheels, or if the old bikes will come out of retirement.
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