Image: Marvel Studios
Marvel dropped a new look at the Doctor Strange sequel, featuring many new faces and some surprisingly familiar ones too.
Marvel Studios dropped by the Super Bowl today to release a mind-bending new trailer for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. The sequel has Benedict Cumberbatch and Elizabeth Olsen reprise their roles as Stephen Strange and Wanda Maximoff respectively, with the latter’s storyline picking up from the events of WandaVision on Disney+.
Watch the trailer below:
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness takes place right after the events of Spider-Man: No Way Home, with the multiverse cracked wide open. It looks like the ex-Sorcerer Supreme’s actions have had harsh consequences, with variants from alternate Marvel universes causing chaos in his world. A zombified Doctor Strange appears at the tail end of the trailer, giving us a sense of exactly how much trouble Strange is in.
Joining Cumberbatch and Olsen in the movie are Benedict Wong, Rachel McAdams and Chiwetel Ejiofor from the first movie. There are some newcomers to the cast as well, such as Xochitl Gomez who plays America Chavez, a young hero with the ability to punch her way into other universes. Michael Stuhlbarg will also play Dr. Nicodemus West, a rival surgeon to Stephen Strange.
Potential spoilers ahead: The trailer seemingly reveals another newcomer to the cast: Patrick Stewart, who might be reprising his role as Professor Xavier from 20th Century Fox’s X-Men movie franchise. He appears as part of a mysterious council sitting on high chairs, saying, “We should tell him the truth.” Strange is taken to this council by an army of robots, confirming absolutely nothing besides the fact that this movie is going to be bonkers.
Fan speculation points to this council being the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU)’s version of the Illuminati, a secret society of high-ranking superheroes tasked with protecting their multiverse from disaster. Seeing as Strange has, in the words of Baron Mordo, “desecrated reality,” it’s no wonder that he’s gotten their attention. Xavier’s appearance also implies that Fox’s X-Men movies take place in a canonical universe next to Strange’s.
Disney+’s Loki introduced the MCU to the concept of alternate universe versions of existing characters, called variants. We see plenty of them in this trailer. One Doctor Strange variant looks very similar to Matt Fraction and Terry Dodson’s take on the character in 2011’s Defenders comic series. Strange Supreme and zombie variants from the Disney+ series What If…? also seem to return in this movie.
Sam Raimi, director of the original Spider-Man and Evil Dead trilogy, returns to the Marvel universe to direct this sequel with a script by Loki’s showrunner Michael Waldron. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness will hit theaters on 6 May, 2022.
