Ghost Rider is perhaps the most powerful earthbound antihero in the entire Marvel Comics catalog regardless of the demon’s host, though that isn’t to say merging with an inherently powerful host isn’t beneficial, as the Spirit of Vengeance’s ultimate form was made possible by DC’s Flash.

While technically the first Ghost Rider host was Carter Slade (who was later rebranded the Phantom Rider before settling in his position as the Caretaker), the first Ghost Rider as fans know the character today was Johnny Blaze. After that, the Spirit of Vengeance inhabited Johnny’s long-lost brother, Danny Ketch, who would bring Ghost Rider’s aesthetic into the realm of leather-bound biker as opposed to Blaze’s ‘stuntman’ look. While these two Ghost Riders take up most of the character’s fictional legacy, they are far from the most powerful. Currently, the most powerful Ghost Rider is Robbie Reyes as it was revealed that he was the All-Rider (the strongest Ghost Rider in the multiverse). However, the demonic entities inhabiting these hosts have also taken many others on a much more temporary basis, including the Punisher, Red Hulk, and even the Venom symbiote. However, none of them–not even the originals–can match the power offered by the Flash.

Flash/Ghost Rider Mash-Up ‘Speed Demon’ is Powerful & Unique

Speed Demon.

In Speed Demon #1 by Howard Mackie, James Felder, Salvador Larroca, and Al Milgrom, readers are shown how the creation of the Amalgam Universe has impacted Ghost Rider and the Flash. In the Amalgam Universe, the DC and Marvel worlds were merged into one, which includes the characters within them. In this comic, fans meet Blaze Allen–the amalgamation of Johnny Blaze and Barry Allen. This new character derived from two classic ones binds his soul to the demon Etrigan. While the demon was able to keep his original DC name, Etrigan himself was essentially merged with Marvel’s Zarathos, in both form and function. These two separate amalgamations then merged themselves, and they became the ultimate versions of both Flash and Ghost Rider: Speed Demon.

The very nature of this character’s existence is incredibly unique, making it unlike any other mash-up character outside the Amalgam Universe. Usually with a character like this, one established superhero is imbued with the powers of another, but that’s not the case here. The Spirit of Vengeance didn’t possess the Flash, the character ‘Ghost Rider’ merged with the character ‘the Flash’, resulting in the creation of Speed Demon in a more meta sense than traditional mash-up characters in comics. While different, however, the result was exactly the same. Speed Demon is effectively the Flash as fans know him with the powers of Ghost Rider, even if that’s not exactly his in-world origin within the Amalgam Universe–and the stuff he can do is absolutely insane.

In the opening page alone, Speed Demon uses the combination of hellfire and Speed Force to take out this univere’s versions of a Watcher and a Green Lantern before literally defeating the Spectre himself. The level of villains Speed Demon can take down is charted on a cosmic scale, which isn’t really that shocking. Ghost Rider is otherworldly powerful and the Flash once literally outran death. Therefore, it’s no secret that, through the Flash, Ghost Rider found his ultimate form, while simultaneously bringing to life one of the more creative ways to combine the powers of established comic book characters.