Marvel Masterworks: Ghost Rider Vol. 7

Ghost Rider's rampage through the 1970s era of Marvel continues!

The Marvel Masterworks proudly present the finale of the Ghost Rider series that burned through pages for a decade and made the demon biker an icon. In this volume, series artist Bob Budiansky is joined by then-up-and-coming and now-lengendary writer J.M. DeMatteis. They’ll make Johnny Blaze’s struggle to contain the vengeance-obsessed demon as compelling as ever with adversaries like the stunning Steel Wind. The true test comes when Asmodeus compels Mephisto to split Blaze and Zarathos. It’s pedal to the metal from there as Zarathos’ origin is revealed and Roxanne Simpson returns, setting up a final showdown that will prove the high cost of vengeance. Also featuring two rare Ghost Rider What If? tales and an encounter with the Defenders.

COLLECTING: GHOST RIDER (1973) #74-81, MARVEL SUPER-HEROES (1990) #11, THE DEFENDERS (1972) #145 and material from WHAT IF? (1977) #17 & #28 and THE DEFENDERS (1972) #146

A native New Yorker, writer J.M. DeMatteis has been one of comics’ most respected writers for nearly three decades. Ranging from the introspective psychological drama of Moonshadow to the offbeat comedy of Justice League to the autobiographical Brooklyn Dreams, he’s written from nearly every perspective in graphic storytelling. His long list of credits includes Captain America, Defenders, Justice League International, the groundbreaking Spider-Man storyline “Kraven’s Last Hunt," Spectre and more. His recent work includes the acclaimed children's novel Imaginalis and the popular comics-prose hybrid Abadazad books.

Peter B. Gillis began as a 1970s freelancer on Marvel Two-in-One, Super-Villain Team-Up and other titles. Later, he became regular writer on Defenders, Eternals and Strange Tales, in which he subjected Doctor Strange to a soul-searching gamut of good and evil magic. Elsewhere in the Marvel multiverse, he wrote Micronauts: The New Voyages and launched Strikeforce: Morituri with Brent Anderson, telling tales of a universe in which superhumans must embrace death to protect the Earth. He has also written for First Comics, TSR Games and others; he co-created Shatter, the first digital comic.

Steven Grant has written Captain America, Incredible Hulk, Master of Kung Fu, Spidey Super Stories and more. In 1985, he penned the first Punisher miniseries, revisiting the character in several Holiday Special stories and the graphic novel Return to Big Nothing. Grant has also written First Comics’ American Flagg, Shatter and his creator-owned Whisper.

Bob Budiansky began his comics career on Ghost Rider — first as a cover artist, and later as both co-writer and artist. However, he is best known for his work on the Transformers franchise, naming most of the original characters and writing the Tech Specs blurbs for the toys’ packaging. Budiansky soon began writing Marvel’s Transformers comic, which he helmed for nearly 50 issues and several spin-offs. During the 1990s, Budiansky launched Sleepwalker. He also served as a Marvel editor, overseeing the Spider-Man titles.

A creative stalwart that put his all into his work on long-running series like Ghost Rider and Defenders, Don Perlin plied his talents in virtually every discipline in the comic-book field — penciling, inking, creating new characters and sometimes editing and writing. A student of Burne Hogarth’s, Perlin launched his career in 1951, drawing horror comics for various publishers and also penciling Will Eisner’s The Spirit. After serving in the Army, Perlin returned to comics with Harvey in the late ’50s as well as Charlton in the ’60s. In 1973, he began his long association with Marvel, finishing John Buscema’s art on Thor and inking several titles. He took over Werewolf by Night from Mike Ploog, penciling and inking the book for much of the next two years. He also penciled and inked the supernatural adventures of Johnny Blaze in Ghost Rider, his name becoming very closely identified with Marvel’s monster biker. In the ’80s, he drew Defenders for a long run before turning his attention to Marvel’s adaptation of Hasbro’s Transformers. His early ’90s work on Valiant’s Solar, Man of the Atom and Bloodshot was extremely popular, after which Perlin went into semiretirement.

Artist Greg LaRocque is best known for his DC Comics work on titles including Legion of Super-Heroes and Flash. At Marvel, he helped bring the long-running Marvel Team-Up to a close and launched the replacement series Web of Spider-Man. His other credits include Avengers and Power Man and Iron Fist.