I never watch a trailer until after I’ve seen the movie. Then I compare them. Let’s find out if what we see is what we get. (There will be spoilers.) Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance Cast: Nicolas Cage, Idris Elba, Ciarán Hinds

Movie: Moreau (Elba) wants to help save a kid. Apparently, he's important. Bad guys (of the no-nonsense variety) want the kid as well. For now, the kid's mother (Violante Placido) is keeping him safe. Moreau decides to enlist the help of Johnny Blaze/Ghost Rider (Cage). Why would he bother? Because Moreau knows some pretty important religious guys who will rid Johnny from the Ghost Rider curse. Johnny is in, and actually saves the kid in no time flat. They have some odd bonding, including pissing fire (haven't we all?). The key to Ghost Rider seems to be turning every vehicle he touches into fire. Bad guys are no match. It's like Superman fighting an ordinary teenager. Big action sequences keep showing the fire trick. Since the kid is safe, Johnny Blaze pulls a Superman II and rids himself of his super side. Finally we realize the kid is spawned from Satan (aren't we all?) and now Satan/Roarke (Hinds) wants to meld with him to walk the Earth. Moreau tries to help, but is no match. The kid grants Johnny his powers back, so Johnny can save the day. Oh yeah, there's a Christopher Lambert cameo of sorts as well.

Trailer: "There seems to be good and bad in all of us." Man, it's like Cage is trying to defend his post-Oscar career. After some Johnny Blaze voice-over focus, we get to Moreau's quest to save the kid. Wow, we cut to the chase by showing the devil and the kid melding. Johnny Blaze deadpans an anti-Christ line and the trailer finally picks up some steam. The two big action sequences (daylight motorcycle chase & construction equipment on fire) get highlighted. A couple of more lines from crazy Cage, more action, and then the tease of tangling someone up in chains and thrusting them into the ground.

Trailer Truth: No moment is left out of this trailer. What you see is what you get in that regard. The possible humor you'll get from the film is definitely from the mouth of Cage. Johnny Blaze seems to take everything with a grain of salt. There's also plenty of hell/devil references, even as simple as "Hell Yes." If those two action sequences discussed above don't do it for you, you're kind of out of luck. I knew the guys behind Crank made this film, and my hunch was that the trailer would not only focus on that, but mislead you on the speed of this film. That's not the case. Ghost Rider has slow stretches, but at least the trailer doesn't fool you. The main issue here is the amount of third-act scenes. We see the devil and the kid melding, we see Ghost Rider kill the circle of holy evil men, and worst of all, we see the final "kill" at the end of the trailer. If you watched the trailer, remembered the trailer, and then saw the film there's a big chance you'd think, "Hey, how come I haven't seen that Mortal Kombat 'get over here' kill scene yet?" What am I saying, if you're seeing Ghost Rider, you don't care about stuff like "thinking."