Multiverse Of Madness is honestly not that bad
Now, I completely understand why so many people were very disappointed by this film. Because of how great Spider-Man: No Way Home was, I’m sure a lot of us went into the movie with very high expectations and ended up being disappointed. I’ll admit that I felt that way on my first viewing.
However, I’ve grown to enjoy the film more and more on rewatches. Now, it still has issues. I’m not a fan of how they made Wanda the villain and I think the story feels a bit rushed. But I think the cast is really good, the visuals look amazing, it was interesting to see how Doctor Strange was still handling the aftermath of Infinity War and Endgame, I like that Christine had a much bigger role and they kinda expanded on her relationship with Strange a bit, Sam Raimi’s directing style really shines in a good number of scenes, etc.
Honestly, this movie should not have been called “Multiverse of Madness”. I think that title made most people think that this movie was gonna be about them exploring the multiverse and then there’d be dozens of surprise cameos, when that’s really not what the movie was about at all. Had they given the film a different title, there probably wouldn’t have been such high expectations.
However, I’ve grown to enjoy the film more and more on rewatches. Now, it still has issues. I’m not a fan of how they made Wanda the villain and I think the story feels a bit rushed. But I think the cast is really good, the visuals look amazing, it was interesting to see how Doctor Strange was still handling the aftermath of Infinity War and Endgame, I like that Christine had a much bigger role and they kinda expanded on her relationship with Strange a bit, Sam Raimi’s directing style really shines in a good number of scenes, etc.
Honestly, this movie should not have been called “Multiverse of Madness”. I think that title made most people think that this movie was gonna be about them exploring the multiverse and then there’d be dozens of surprise cameos, when that’s really not what the movie was about at all. Had they given the film a different title, there probably wouldn’t have been such high expectations.
Commentaires
There should've been a battle made out of an acid trip and fever dreams. Instead you get Strange summoning monsters and running down hallways.
Would have been even better if Raimi had been less limited by universe buidling requirements. He's not the director for that. He needs to have his own vision.
[DS2 Writing](https://thedirect.com/article/doctor-strange-2-sam-raimi-rewrites)
[Raimi Comment](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/G8KcADjXYAEHPs0?format=jpg&name=medium)
Some Raimi fans still cling to the idea he had no say in the film-making & wasn't allowed to cook to excuse anything or everything they didn't like regarding the film. Despite both Waldron & Raimi saying that they made the film they wanted.
Script: Middling.
Director: Excellent
Dialog: Absolutely horrid.
(I do not have great taste)
How much do these writers get paid, again? That was literally the *most* compelling idea they could think of? That beat out all their other ideas??
It was phenomenal
( yes I’m a huge Raimi fan)
They should've shown us 3 alternate universes. Then the title would've actually made sense.
Maybe had Wanda dreamwalk another variant and fight another alternate superhero team.
The film had barely any action. It was just Kamar-taj, Illuminati, Sinister Strange and that joke of a final battle at Wundagore. Most Marvel movies have significantly more action and exploration.
sure, only 3 universes (inlucuding MCU 616) are prominently shown, but there are several others shown through-out.
but also, this is from the same cinematic universe with a movie titled "Age of Ultron". I rlly dont think its meant to be more than a cool name.
Shame we will never get that and a competent version of Love and Thunder. These two movies killed the goodwill of the franchise in hindsight
Way too often the criticisms I read are basically people pissed that Marvel didn't tell the story they made up in their head.
For me anyway, I was let down that it didn’t tie in to any of those things, plus also WandaVision - outside of the single post credits scene with the Darkhold which I personally didn’t find sufficient to replace an entire story with her going from good (end of WandaVision) to bad (start of MoM)
Really it just felt disconnected from the other relevant parts of the MCU which is why I was disappointed
Yep, so many people just want to make it all about them. Probably watched the movies while scrolling through their phone too.
It was a move that made a great marketing stunt in the moment, but the resolution was poorly handled. In a way it kinda broke peoples trust that the payoff will be worth sitting through the setup.
It's going to happen again with Doomsday, especially if Doom is alt Tony Stark.
By that I mean mystery as a plot device is really compelling, it hooks people, but if you’ve got a long running show and you keep adding new mystery, it’s great in the moment but you get to a point where no answer will ever be satisfying.
I do wish that this movie had catapulted Wanda into being the villain for a couple movies though. Elizabeth Olsen played it so well. At least we got Marvel Zombies :)
Hate how they made Wanda a villain plot wise, but Elizabeth Olsen did a good job portrtaying it.
The original script had her has an ally that slowly turned towards badness as the movie went on. But they threw that idea out when they rewrote the movie.
Besides that, WandaVision ended with her having the darkhold and hearing her kids.
Like, you said it too, she had the Darkhold at the end of WandaVision and it corrupted her. Do people not remember that? Yeah she had a moment of being rehabilitated at the end of the series, but she hardly had time to reflect on the events of WV. Cause she gets the Darkhold right away and it starts messing with her morality. She pretty much relapsed because it taunted her with her children in another universe. Of course she’s going to stop at nothing to get what she desires. How does this get lost on people?
no i'm not joking, it's literally what he said on video for the 'marvel assembled' behind the scenes of the movie
> “All of WandaVision, we get to see her go bad, as the best villain ever, the Scarlet Witch. [...] We knew that we wanted Wanda to be in it. I think originally, there was a version where Wanda was maybe gonna turn bad at the end. That was a big change that I made and had a strong perspective on. Making her a villain from the get-go. It was always like, 'Well, that'll happen in an Avengers movie or something.' My perspective was, 'Why are we letting some other movie get the best villain ever?'”
This is a case where Feige needed to take a complete step back and let Sam Raimi make a movie — make it weird, make it gothic, make it a Sam Raimi movie.
Why you’d hire Sam Raimi to do the conveyor belt “get us some footage and Feige will edit it together in the backend” model is beyond me.
It’s like hiring Tim Burton to make a Peter Pan movie, but rather than allowing him to go all in on the weirdness of the books and make a proper Tim Burton movie around it, Disney takes over on the backend and turns it into a pretty bland remake of the cartoon stripped of all but a tiny bit of his Burton-esque charm.
Just a waste.
*thunderclap*
I love this movie
Is it an enjoyable movie to watch? Yes.
I wish strange had more focus, he almost felt like a side character in his movie thanks to Wanda.
All in all though I loved it
I guess I avoided the Film Bro sphere opinions on that one.
Edit: Lol downvotes. People are so defensive of their annoying mediocre YouTubers that do their thinking for them.
DS2 could have been ten times as good as it was, and there would still be trolls complaining, calling it "woke", accusing it of being fan service, saying it had bad CGI, etc.
Thankfully, the Internet is a very overrepresentative echo chamber that I don't take into account when watching something in interested in.
The movie was fun, and I loved all the little Raimi touches. I don't think it needed to be the cameofest many predicted it would be.
It's worse. It's worse than that bad. It's terrible in pretty much every way. So many characters to assassinate, and only 2 hours to fit them all in.
1. Whatever direction Benedict Cumberpatch was given on his role was really odd. He was flipping between being an annoying jokester to serious as his car wreck from the first movie pretty randomly. He came off as very annoying mostly, instead of his usual grave, commanding presence with perfect timing on his occasional joke in earlier appearances.
2. Multiverse of Madness.... we only spend time in the 616, the one with the Illuminati and the convergence one. Aside from that we just got blink and you miss it glimpses of others. It really should have leaned into that "madness" a little more. Just taking another minute or two plowing through universes would have solved it.
3. If you are just going through a chronological movies-only rewatch, Wanda reappearing suddenly as a maniacal villain trying to steal her variants children is so jarring and unearned. So the whole inciting incident makes no sense without the context of sitting through about 7ish hours of show content in Wandavision. I feel pretty strongly that movie plot beats need to be established and supported in the story we are watching.
Other than those, the movie was packed with really cool Sam Raimi visuals. Which was its strongest redemption. However those other factors caused it to be the movie I soured the most on.
It’s also jarring if one watched WandaVision. She was grieving, had a bit of a mental break, and then snapped out of it. She was ok enough. Mere presence of Darkhold and suddenly in Strange 2 she is basically mustache twirling evil right away. It’s unearned. They skipped a bunch of development.
The sudden jump to "I'm going to use the magic force to break every bone in your body and roast you to death" afterwards seems a bit backwards, no?
Then next appearance very early on is murdering random wizards by the dozens in horrible ways because the wizards won’t let her abduct and abuse a kid.
So yeah goes from unwittingly trapping people and making them very uncomfortable, to horrible bloodthirsty mass murdering psycho. With no in between. It was like flipping a switch except we didn’t even see the flip switching part lol.
Then suddenly mustache twirling villain out of some old silent movie in next appearance.
Yes we all understand how the Darkhold theoretically could corrupt someone eventually (even though Agatha seemed the same with it).
But she jumped from A to G without showing B C D E and F.
And then she jumps the shark to "I'm okay torturing hundreds /UNNECESSARILY/ in my path to kidnap my alternate's kids"
She always wanted her kids back on some level, which is why she started reading it, and the Darkhold twisted that desire. It was Wanda at the wheel but it also wasn't.
Only when she saw her kids, the thing she cared most about, cower away from her did the Darkhold lose its hold over her as it obviously couldn't deliver on what she wanted.
The self-sacrifice at the end, that's the real Wanda free from the Darkhold's corruption.
But for other viewers (and in reality w/ the production of the show), it was a 20 second scene slapped onto the end of a great show of her "reading" and not much else. So it felt like whiplash.
idk the self sacrifice felt so cliche to me, and really didn't feel satisfying considering the many many many people she hurt (under the spooky book's control sure)
“Darkhold slowly corrupted them now they twirl mustache and are pure evil - this all happened off screen surprise!”
Oh and
“PS - Agatha seemed pretty much the same with and without Darkhold, just ignore that.”
Jarring if you only know Wanda from the previous films? Sure. Unearned or out of nowhere? I don’t agree. Cooler to have other multiversal villain characters and not just former bad guy turned good guy turned bad guy again? Maybe.
Very next appearance, full on evil.
The narrative skipped a lot.
The original plan of having a different villain in Strange 2 and Wanda slowly turning sounds much better.
I thought it was fine, but these are exactly why I found it underwhelming. But to expand point 3, even with Wandavision it's nonsense. That was even the discussion at the time, that the movie didn't match the ending of the show at all. And according to BTS, this was because nobody was talking to each other.
As a DS fan, I was disappointed & had nothing to latch on to beyond thinking Benedict Cumberbatch looked good.
His character revolving around Christine is irksome for me atp. And many DS fans I talk to ate also tired of Christine, especially when she took what should have been Clea's spot as Strange's true love & the leading lady of his lore with a lot to unpack as a character.
I think I brought up this same complaint on twitter about how bad MCU Strange's writing has been and that MoM didn't develop him in any way that was meaningful. Then I listed off the unchange in his character.
1. He was unhappy at the start of MoM, and tells Wong at the end of it that he's still unhappy.
* 2. He didn't have Christine at the start of MoM, and still didn't have her at the end.
* 3. He wasn't Sorcerer Supreme at the start of MoM, and still wasn't at the end.
* 4. He's lonely and friendless at that start of MoM, and is still walking the streets alone & friendless at the end of it. Lmao
And folks wanna reply about #4 saying Wong is his friend. No he's not. Wong acts like he doesn't wanna be bothered with Strange half the time. Wong has shown to be a fun-loving guy who likes to party. He doesn't act that way around Strange. Wong shows how he is around friends when he's with Madysnn. Strange is just a co-worker he tolerates. If they were meant to be close friends, then the MCU did not do a good job executing that relationship - par for the course.
His lack of depth not helping either. We know nothing about him on a deep level and are not shown anything beyond "MUH CHRISTINE!" who he didn't have much respect for in DS1 and treats like shit. And we are supposedly to invest in him being heartbroken over this woman he only ever took advantage of? I was not invested & did not sympathize with his character.
Benedict Cumberbatch has done numerous interviews talking about how Strange haa psychological issues, but we get no depth on those. We never explore his feelings or trauma beyond not getting over his ex which is such a first-world HS level struggle that it males him look like the most vapid character in the MCU.
Nebula & Yondu got more depth & development in 1 film than anything Strange has been given in 7.
We ought to be further along in Strange's character than we are now, imo. Sadly, we're not & he feels more like a plot device for the real characters rather than a character in his own right.
Then there's all the parts of his lore that got utterly wasted when Derrickson's left. Mordo, his conflicted friendship with Strange, Clea, her relationship with Strange, Donna's influence on Strange, and his trauma regarding her death which is why he struggles with not being in control. All things I expect in a DS2. And I got nothing good.
They focused more on Wanda losing her kids than anything relating to Strange, who got a worse-written, shallow romance rehash with a woman he already said goodbye to 6 years prior. For all of what that relationship amounted to in this film, there was no reason for it. DS1 was all the goodbye we needed.
Having Strange getting rejected 4x by 2 versions of Christine accross 2 films before he *FINALLY* takes the hint that she does not love him anymore is excessive asf. And it makes Strange look like he never developed beyond the emotional capacity of a 14-year-old. Especially when the fucker tries to confess his feelings AT HER WEDDING.
All the DS story potential & DS1 plot points to continue, and yet they picked the most uninteresting thing to focus on that didn't need a follow-up.
There's also the issue of him being nerfed asf the whole movie where he ran from Wanda or got one-shotted. Not to mention, needing the human non-sorceress, CHRISTINE to fight off the Souls of the Damned for him, then having to hold his hand to coach him on the Mystic Arts before he could actually do anything.
This film shat all over Strange so bad, he almost seems like a Parody of the character he's supposed to be.
His narcissism dialed up to 11. His feelings for Christine turning into an unhealthy obsession. His horrible dialogue. His utter incompetence. And his complete lack of emotional, social, and self awareness.
I have a hard time recalling a film I watched where the titular protagonist was torn down this much. To the point that you add into the film that his problem is he needs to learn to take a backseat. EVEN IN HIS OWN FILM.
The holding the knife thing is fine if Strange is trying to take over in another character's film. Then that's a good lesson. But in his own film, he should get to hold the knife & get shit done. Not painting your titular character in a good light when you send the message that they never need to be in the spotlight cuz they suck & can't be trusted to handle shit......Really?.......😒
He went from and asshole doctor who wants Christine to an asshole sorcerer who wants Christine. That's his development. A job change. No actual depth or real exploration with his character that tries to develop him beyond being a shallow, vapid, one-note asshole.
If anyone is familiar with Harry Potter, Strange's character after becoming a sorcerer should be like Remus Lupin. But MCU-wise, he's just a worse written version of Snape.
Strange being a plot device is so accurate. "We need something funky to happen in our movie, call in Benedict"
The OG avengers were the focus of 4 avengers movies, I hope they give the same attention to the other characters like Strange and make him one of the leads for doomsday or secret wars and not use him as a device to move the story forward.
I don’t know how much PR / interview media you consume, but from the few I have seen it seems Benedict shares your frustrations. There were a lot of vague and not so vague comments about how Strange 2 was rewritten, a lot of pointed looks about it between him and Olsen on the press tour. Benedict seemed like he liked the original concept for Strange 2 much better
People who wanted it to revolve around the ilumanati just bitch about it allot
On the other hand, I then watched Wakanda Forever (which I found pretty weak the first time I saw it) and enjoyed it much more on my second watch.
Compare this with Doctor Strange 1, and you can clearly see a night and day difference in lots of aspect (even in visuals. DS2 looks wonky and cheap as hell in a lot of places).
I understand that the fans' Sentiments were all over the place, but when your movie grossed the highest weekend for a non- avengers movie, but also suffered the worst crash thereafter, it means the trust of audiences broke completely. I still put Doctor Strange 2 as the beginning of general audience's disdain and apathy for MCU
I don't know how was this sub before covid and during the Infinity saga, but currently its just a cesspit of echo chamber and delusions. Kinda reminds me of the worst aspects of DCEU from the 2010s.
The only takes you can have about the MCU's quality on here now are the most milquetoast critiques like "they should have used Shang Chi more" or "Thor 4 had too many jokes."
NO. That is the complete opposite of what I wanted from the film. The worst sequence in the film is the stuff with the Illuminati.
More importantly, EEAAO came out around then and was the superior multiverse movie.
How do you call a movie Multiverse of Madness and then show like 3 universes with a quick 10 second “what if we were paint?”
I argue a big reason it got murdered by the very vocal very online fanbase is because for over a year leading up to the release of the film every ComicBookMovieNews or SuperheroInfo "news" accounts on social media would create bullshit fake stories like "Tom Cruise to show up as a Tony Stark variant" or "Eric Bana to return as the Hulk from the 2003 universe" and so on for easy clicks. And they all went viral with no evidence backing them up.
If you tangentially followed movie new on social media Multiverse of Madness sounded like the most packed and cameo heavy movie ever made. And then it never delivered on any of that because the film was never made to be that.
Looks like Doomsday is going to give the fans that film now.
It's definitely a little lackluster and suffered a little more from "Superhero fatigue" but it's still fun and it still has all of the Sam Raimi-isms and over pretty decent.
It was a weird time in the MCU where they tried to bring in these big events and then they cop out hard in the end, but they did okay with it.
This is definitely the tipping point for when following the MCU started to feel like homework
All you had to say was "she's hypnotized by an evil book and wants to get back her hallucinated children", because everything else in Wandavision is immaterial to her sequel movie. How fun!
There’s imo nothing enjoyable about the film.
Strange is nerfed and made useless, Wanda is character assassinated into a generic MCU Villain with utterly stupid motivations, Wong’s turned into an idiot that completely fails as sorcerer supreme in every way and America Chavez is a borderline plot device who could almost be replaced with an inanimate object.
The fight scenes mostly suck as well, the massive downgrade that was Strange in MoM compared to Strange in infinity war is staggering.
A movie like Quantumania may be a mediocre mess but at least there’s some fun to be had with it even if it’s still kinda shitty.
Watching Ant-man storm down Kang’s city as Giant Man IS fun and cool. Dr Strange gets nothing like that.
For a franchise that heavily relies on affection for characters, this movie does nothing to further popularize new and old characters. Wanda got launched into a limbo state, Stephen got a rehashed arc that leads him to nowhere, America is a nothing burger character.
This symptom continues in later movies. The loss of T'Challa, the new Captain America failing to give Sam anything substantial, Kang failing to be a compelling villain on top of the Jonathan Majors drama, now we are at the door of a new Avengers movie and the hype is around completely unrelated characters not even built up in previous movies.
You CAN have fun watching this movie in a vacuum, but as soon as you try to tie it in with any movie that came before or after, it just gets worse.