Ultimate Avengers 2 #4 - Marvel

The Avengers are hunting down the Ghost Rider? Only in the Ultimate Universe. And with all their combined might . . they don't really stack up very well against him. We find out this issue that all of these deaths . . the important people that the Ghost Rider has been knocking off, all go back to his origin. This one is a little bit different from the one we know. Johnny Blaze and Roxanne were out riding, about 20 years ago, when he came upon a biker bar. Everything appeared to be ok, but actually the gang that resided there ending up using Johnny as a sacrifice to Lucifer. Because of that sacrifice, they ended up becoming some of the most powerful and richest men in America. These are the men that the Ghost Rider has been killing. Which is because when Johnny ended up in hell, Satan offered Johnny a deal also. He wanted to double-cross his disciples and offer Johnny a chance for revenge. But Johnny wanted to make sure that Roxanne was ok, so . . he sold his soul to the devil, literally, for her safety. And the last 20 years have been spent by Satan preparing Johnny for this conflagration. 'Now he's back . . to do Satan's work . . and send his killers to hell.' And one of this gang . . the one who issued the executive order for the Avengers to go after the Ghost Rider . . 'Who do you think passed down that executive order? That memo came straight from the White House . . he's the Vice-President of the United States.' That could cause a bit of a problem. Even if Johnny is righteous in what he's doing. Which I'm not saying he is, but . . he certainly has cause. Anyways, another interesting development in this story is that all of this information is being given by . . the Spider. He's a Spider-man from the future that they're holding in the Triskelion, and apparently has come back with a warning for humanity. In the future he's the love-child of Spider-man and Charles Xavier. Hmmm! Very interesting. While Nick is back at the Triskelion talking to Carol, we also finally see Tony come face to face with his brother Gregory. 'At least now I know where all of my contracts have been going.' Nick tells him that Gregory has always handled black-ops. To which Gregory says, 'Just ignore him General. He's always been a whiny little bitch.' Oh yeah, and this guy that we've seen around that kind of looks like Remy . . apparently he's Satan. It's not enough that he's got Johnny up here doing his business. It appears that he has to muck about in things as well. It's probably just in his nature. Anyways, I thought it was a great issue. And I really love the way that Mark Millar is handling these characters. I also like the way that he's put a unique twist on things. I like this Tyrone Cash as the first Hulk. And Bruce's clone, the Nerd Hulk, is awesome. I can't wait to see how this mini-series wraps up. I like the way that they're doing these in installments . . like the Ultimates, rather than a continuing series. Also, Leinel Francis Yu contributes some fantastic art. I still maintain that these Ultimate books are one of the most exciting line of books in comics right now. They're all fantastic.