Nicolas Cage Says Original ‘Ghost Rider’ Script Was R-Rated

To say that Nicolas Cage‘s Ghost Rider films were poorly received would be an understatement. It would be difficult to point to just one issue that caused these movies to struggle, but it sounds as though the scripts are a good place to start.

While speaking with JoBlo.com about his new film The Humanity Bureau, Cage was asked about his time as Johnny Blaze for Marvel. While the actor certainly seemed to enjoy his time as the Ghost Rider, he did reveal that the movies were originally intended to be much, much darker.

In fact, Cage said in the interview that David S. Goyer, writer of Batman Begins and Man of Steel, penned the original, R-rated script for Ghost Rider, but Marvel had other plans.

“I think that when the Ghost Rider movies were happening Marvel hadn’t gotten the entire process worked out yet and now they have and they know exactly where to go and what to do and it’s working beautifully for them,” Cage said. “Y’know, Ghost Rider was a movie that always should’ve been an R-rated movie. David Goyer had a brilliant script, which I wanted to do with David and for whatever reason they just didn’t let us make the movie. But that movie is a still a movie that should be made, not with me obviously, but it should be an R-rated movie-heck, Deadpool was R-rated and that did great. Ghost Rider was designed to be a scary superhero with an R-rating and edge and they just didn’t have it worked out back then.”

Marvel fans have long thought the Ghost Rider to be a more gritty, R-rated character. In hindsight, this likely would have turned out to be a movie fans would have enjoyed, in the vein of films like Blade and TV shows like Daredevil and The Punisher.

However, just as Cage noted, most superhero films at the time were more whacky in nature, and studios weren’t used to branching away from that method. Now that Deadpool and Logan have blazed the trail for R-rated comic book movies, it may be time for Ghost Rider to get another try.

Would you want to see Ghost Rider in an R-rated movie? Would you rather see the character join the ranks of Marvel’s Defenders on Netflix? Let us know your thoughts by dropping a line in the comment section below!