Ryan Gosling wants to play Ghost Rider in the MCU

Ryan Gosling has gone viral for his role as Ken in the Barbie movie. Why not parlay that press into a role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe?

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has always involved A-list actors in lead roles, starting way back when Robert Downey Jr. was cast as Iron Man, who need I remind you wan’t a particularly noteworthy superhero at the time. Could history repeat itself with Ryan Gosling, who says on an upcoming episode of Josh Horowitz’s Happy Sad Confused podcast that he’s interested in playing Marvel second stringer Ghost Rider?

In Marvel Comics, Ghost Rider is the name given to a few antiheroes whose powers generally involve super-strength and invulnerability. But the main draw is the style: do you want to see a motorcycle-riding superhero with a flaming skull for a head? You want Ghost Rider.

Nicolas Cage played Ghost Rider in a pair of movies in 2007 and 2012, but he wasn’t part of the MCU. Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige, for reference, is fully on board with the idea of Gosling as Ghost Rider, although he stopped short of saying that there were any plans for such a thing. “Gosling’s unbelievable,” Feige said during an interview with MTV News. “Ryan’s amazing. I’d love to find a place for him in the MCU. He’s dressed up as Ken on Venice Beach and gets more press than giant movies coming out that weekend. It’s amazing.”

Feige is referring there to Gosling’s role as Ken in the upcoming Barbie movie, which has indeed gotten a lot of press.

Marvel has a lot on its plate right now, and so far as we know there are no plans for a Ghost Rider movie or TV show at the moment. But hey, heroes come and heroes go. Actors exchange their Malibu dream houses for a life on the open ride with nothing but an iron chain and a yen to punish the evildoers of the world. Stranger things have happened. For instance, did you hear that Ryan Gosling is playing Ken in a Barbie movie?

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