Robbie Reyes, a.k.a. Ghost Rider, makes his smoking hot debut in a band new image from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 4.
Robbie, played by Gabriel Luna, may be known as the Spirit of Vengeance when the flaming skull of Ghost Rider overtakes him. But based on the evidence from this new still photo, we think Robbie is more like the Spirit of Extreme Hotness.
Look, check out the image from EW if you don’t believe us.
The still photo from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 4 features Robbie in a dark junkyard, rocking a leather jacket and racing gloves. Ghost Rider’s famously badass car is nowhere to be seen, but we have no doubt that the Hell-raising street racer will look perfectly sizzling in the flashy wheels.
According to showrunners Maurissa Tancharoen and Jed Whedon, Robbie Reyes represents an incarnation of Ghost Rider that better suits Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. than the original Johnny Blaze. As a young Latino man charged with caring for his younger brother, Robbie should fit seamlessly into the series, which does much of Marvel’s heavy-lifting when it comes to diversity.
But regardless of his identity, introducing Ghost Rider is guaranteed to throw the scientifically-oriented series for a loop — something Tancharoen and Whedon are counting on.
With the premiere of Doctor Strange looming in November, “a different side of the Marvel Cinematic Universe [is] going to be opened up,” Whedon says, and Ghost Rider “plays in that world.”
“It’s not exactly the spy world we live in, but we feel like, with [magic] entering the MCU, this is us sort of dipping our toe into that world as we open things up,” he adds.
But with the S.H.I.E.L.D. team already grappling with a new Director (played by Jason O’Mara), the disappearance of Daisy Johnson, and loyalties splintering among the group, magic and mystery may just be a bridge too far for our embattled agents.
Don’t look for acceptance of the supernatural too early on in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 4. Tancharoen says that the team (along with the audience and most of the MCU) will “basically be trying to science, “Why?””
Update: The car has been spotted! Marvel has released a found-footage style teaser of Robbie’s wheels, set against an appropriate backdrop of flames. Consider our appetites whetted!
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 4 premieres on Tuesday, Sept. 20 at 10:00 p.m. on ABC.