Ghost Rider (2006 Series) Annual #1

November 13, 2007

Quick Rating: Average
Title: The Eleventh Hour
Rating: Parental Advisory

A new player enters the war between Ghost Rider and Lucifer.

Writer: Stuart Moore
Pencils & Tones: Ben Oliver
Colors: Jose Villarrubia
Letters: Joe Caramagna
Editor: Axel Alonso
Cover Art: Ben Oliver
Publisher: Marvel Comics

This self-contained story fits in during Ghost Rider’s hunt for the broken pieces of Lucifer’s soul. When a man that’s been around for a few thousand years encounters a piece of Lucifer, he sees a change to rejoin the everlasting war between Heaven and Hell – and the Ghost Rider is his key to doing it.

This isn’t too bad an issue – certainly better than the recent issues of Ghost Rider’s own series. The problem is one of relevance – the days of throwaway annuals are (or at least should be) over. These days, we expect an annual to be of real significance or to knock out one heck of a story. This does neither. Oh, there are some hints here that some of these story threads will be picked up on later, but that’s not really enough to latch on to.

Ben Oliver and Jose Villarrubia’s artwork is quite strong. It’s not quite dark enough to make it out to be a horror title proper, but it’s distinctly different from typical superhero artwork, which is important here.

This wouldn’t have been a bad standalone issue of the comic book (and it easily could have been shortened to a standard 22 pages), but it’s not quite important enough to merit the Annual treatment.

Rating: 5/10