Idris Elba And Johnny Whitworth In Talks For Ghost Rider 2

Earlier today, it was reported that Idris Elba, who will be seen next summer in Kenneth Branagh's Thor, has a multi-picture deal with Marvel that suggests we will see him again in another superhero film. The story raised the issue of playing two characters in the same superhero universe. Whether it's a misguided attempt to cancel them out, however, he's now adding a third comic book movie to his resume, albeit one with Fox.

THR reports that Elba and CSI: Miami's Johnny Whitworth are currently in negotiations to star in Ghost Rider 2: The Spirit of Vengeance for Columbia Pictures. In the film, Johnny Blaze, played by the retuning Nicolas Cage, has gone into hiding in Eastern Europe, but is found and hired by a sect to take down the devil, played by Ciaran Hinds, who "who wants to take over his mortal son’s body on the kid’s birthday." Elba will play an warrior monk with a drinking problem who is assigned to find Blaze while Whitworth plays for the other team as a criminal hired by the devil to find his son. The film will be written and directed by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, who are working based on a story by David S. Goyer.

I'm not sure I know a single person who has asked for a sequel to Ghost Rider (that movie was just plain awful), but adding Idris Elba has never hurt anything. Let's look at this from the optimist point of view: it really couldn't get any worse than this.

Eric Eisenberg
Assistant Managing Editor

Eric Eisenberg is the Assistant Managing Editor at CinemaBlend. After graduating Boston University and earning a bachelor’s degree in journalism, he took a part-time job as a staff writer for CinemaBlend, and after six months was offered the opportunity to move to Los Angeles and take on a newly created West Coast Editor position. Over a decade later, he's continuing to advance his interests and expertise. In addition to conducting filmmaker interviews and contributing to the news and feature content of the site, Eric also oversees the Movie Reviews section, writes the the weekend box office report (published Sundays), and is the site's resident Stephen King expert. He has two King-related columns.