Doctor Strange expands the scope of the Marvel Studios film series. Characters regularly talk about the “multiverse,” a concept tragically central to basically every major mainstream comic book story of the last few decades. And characters frequently take far-out trips to outer realms of sub-reality, into dark macro-micro dimensions beyond space and time. Coming in at the midpoint of the MCU’s Phase 3, Strange marks an important step outward, establishing some core concepts that may point toward the megafranchise’s future.
Marvel's latest superhero movie, Doctor Strange, hits cinemas in a few days, but you can watch its stars Benedict Cumberbatch and Mads Mikkelsen battle it out in a newly-released clip.
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Cumberbatch stars as Stephen Strange, a neuroscientist who is injured in a car accident and subsequently discovers a world of mysticism and alternate dimensions.
Mikkelsen plays villain Kaecilius, a master of the mystic arts who breaks away to form his own sect.
The special effects look as impressive as we've come to expect from a Marvel movie, and the fight is slick and well-choreographed, showing Doctor Strange still finding his feet when it comes to his fighting skills and new powers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yj96BTSJ8yE
WARNING: HUGE SPOILERS AHEAD FOR “SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME”
“Spider-Man: No Way Home” is now in theaters and, like many Marvel movies, it has more than one post-credits scene. Of course, if you’re here, you knew that because you stayed through the very end and need to sort out that true post-credits scene. Well, let’s break down.
Because really, there’s a lot to unpack there, as it sets up what’s to come in Phase Four of the MCU. It’s a bit of an odd situation though, as it’s both a scene and a sort of trailer for “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” So let’s start with the actual story it gives us.
As the post-credits scene starts, we see flashes of different people and locations. Eventually, we wind up back with Doctor Strange, who has tracked down Wanda Maximoff. She’s working outside, though it’s unclear if she’s still at the cabin we left her in at the end of “WandaVision.”
Marvel Studios and Disney released a new trailer for “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” during the Super Bowl on Sunday.
The sequel is the next story in the overarching Marvel Cinematic Universe, and picks up a number of loose threads. As a Doctor Strange sequel, it brings back Benedict Cumberbatch and the co-stars from his 2016 standalone film Rachel McAdams (as surgeon Christine Palmer), Chiwetel Ejiofor (as former Mystic Arts Master Karl Mordo) and Benedict Wong (as Sorcerer Supreme). But as an MCU follow-up, the story finds Strange intercepting Elizabeth Olsen’s Wanda Maximoff, aka Scarlet Witch, who was last seen having an emotional breakdown on the Disney+ series “WandaVision” and who has now fully tapped into her witchy powers.
As the title suggests, the film further expands into the multiverse that was first opened in the Disney+ series “Loki” and then explored in December’s box office juggernaut “Spider-Man: No Way Home” (which also co-starred Cumberbatch’s Strange). To that end, we see there’s a darker version of Doctor Strange to contend with (who was first seen in the Disney+ animated series “What If?” — confused yet?), and some hidden council with what look to be Ultron-like sentinels that lure Doctor Strange in.
Another character that gets more screen time in this trailer than in the teaser is America Chavez (Xochitl Gomez), the denim-wearing teen that is paling around with Strange as he trips the light fantastic. Chavez’s role is crucial to the story and to Strange’s quest. Canonically, Chavez can open wormholes that she then uses to traverse the multiverse. Our guess is that Strange visits her to help him go through the various parallel universes, becoming an unlikely heroic duo in the process. She could easily be one of a crop of new, younger Marvel heroes that could potentially team up later down the road, along with people like Hailee Steinfeld’s Hawkeye and Florence Pugh’s Black Widow. As any scary movie can attest (and this is indeed supposed to be the most horrific Marvel Studios movie yet), it’s always important to have new blood.
The first teaser trailer for “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” introduced us to Evil Doctor Strange, as he will forever be known. We might have seen a version of this character in “What If…?,” the animated Marvel Studios series that aired last year on Disney+. The episode that introduced Evil Doctor Strange was called “… Doctor Strange Lost His Heart Instead of His Hands,” and dealt with Strange trying to change fate after his love Christine (Rachel McAdams) died. Much of this centers on his would-be marriage to Christine, and there’s a shot in the trailer that looks like Christine in a wedding dress, which makes us wonder just how closely this movie will be connected to the animated series.
Another set of characters that were introduced in “What If…?” were the Marvel Zombies. (“Marvel Zombies” is a forthcoming animated series and spin-off of “What If…?” coming soon to Disney+.) We seem to see Zombie Doctor Strange as well, doing a truly macabre version of his Vishnu pose from “Avengers: Infinity War.” (Vishnu is a Hindu god with multiple arms. Doctor Strange, historically, has deep ties to Hinduism.) With Zombie Doctor Strange, his extra arms are skeletal. And they are very cool and scary. Bring on the creep
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