A doctor with a red cape; a young girl with “America” in her name, and a mother who wants her kids that she dreams about, create a revolutionary superhero horror film.

“Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” dropped in theaters on May 6, 2022, and introduced an entirely new genre for Marvel as they have never added horror into their films before. The movie has so far grossed $450 million with its $200 million budget. The horror creation by Sam Raimi is something entirely out of Marvel and Marvel fans’ comfort zone. 

The film had a stacked cast including Benedict Cumberbatch (playing Doctor Strange), Elizabeth Olsen (Wanda), Xochitl Gomez (America Chavez), Benedict Wong ( Wong)  and Rachel Adams (Christene Palmer), along with many other secret cameos. This movie shocked viewers as it included gore and violence from some of our favorite heroes and villains. Power that Marvel has never seen struck this movie; possibly even scaring viewers in moments, which is truly unheard of from a Marvel movie.

Other character appearances include Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) AKA “Professor X” from the X-men franchise, who poses as a leader and teacher for the X-men and his school for the gifted.

Many fans were quite excited for this movie in particular because it was set for a more mature audience with the new violence that Marvel has brought into the MCU. The film also had many fan favorite characters from “Infinity War” and “Endgame” which created hype around the movie.  Fans had not seen these characters and their power levels in so long so it was an exiting surprise when they saw the trailer for “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.”

The trailer revealed so little while also revealing so much. Charles Xavier’s voice was shown for a brief moment in the trailer which got fans excited as he is an all time favorite marvel character for many. The trailer also included aspects from their show “What If”, including a strange variant that got consumed by the darkhold.

Rotten Tomatoes critics have rated it at low 75%, whereas the viewers rated it at roughly 86%.  Critics may have seen this movie as disappointing because it is not suitable towards children and more aimed towards mature audiences. Older viewers may have really enjoyed watching the darker aspects of the Marvel universe which has not yet been seen on screen until now.

Even with the new style of horror, the film was a complete and utter disappointment. The cinematography was inconsistent. Characters were forced. The pacing was terribly fast and the ending was the opposite of game changing.

The plot of this movie followed after the show “Wanda Vision” and  the movie “Spider-Man: No Way Home” in which a spell breaks the multiverse. Wanda has the darkhold in her possession at the end of her show and she can hear her kids’ voices. The darkhold is known to take advantage of its user and turn them evil through the things they love. In this Scenario Wanda is searching for her children and will do anything to get to them because the darkhold manipulated her into thinking they’re in danger. This leads into the multiverse of madness as Doctor Strange asks for Wanda’s help in the trailer knowing how powerful she is and experienced in witchcraft.  

The cinematics were inconsistent in style throughout the film.  The first few fight scenes had beautiful cinematography with lots of color and clear shots, compared to later in the movie when Strange sees another version of himself as seen in the trailer, the scene becomes choppy. Watching the fight scene was similar to the basic Disney Channel special effects. . It eventually was saved with Wanda showing off her effortless red blast of abilities.

In the beginning of the film a new character “America Chavez” randomly appeared right by Strange as he walked down the street. It seemed forced as an interdimensional creature and a multiverse traveler just so happened to stumble across the greatest sorcerer on the planet.  They became friends very quickly. Too quickly.

The movie was also quick in the sense that it was the shortest Marvel movie in phase four at a minimal time of two hours and six minutes. So much was packed into one movie that it needed to be a lot longer for it to not be messy. The movie jumped from scene to scene very quickly and it felt like they were just cramming the movie together.  It was overwhelming and eventually led to nothing.