A very long time ago, there were a couple of songs by the Doors that suit this movie to a T— ‘People are Strange’ and ‘Strange Days’. On the basis of the last Spiderman movie I was prepared for the confusions involving the multiverse. That didn’t bother me. I was also prepared for Benedict Cumberbatch to do a good job playing a difficult role— Stephen Strange, as he had before. And he did do a good job, although making him call the young lady America Chavez ‘kid’ as if he was Humphrey Bogart talking to Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca was beyond phony, it actually was belittling to that powerful young woman. Boo.
Of course with all Marvel movies you have to be prepared for suspending your disbelief at points, but this movie was one long requirement for such an approach. Missing entirely was any of the usual wry wit of a Marvel movie, any of the non-sinister light hearted moments. Instead, we got Sam Raimi horror, and demons, and a scarlet witch that turns Wanda of Wanda vision into someone you loathe. Again, Boo. There are many CG special effects, but most of them have to do with adding more wow factor to the violence. Considering the amount of violence and horror in this movie, I do not recommend it for young people under 13. Nope.
And may I just say I am already quite tired of the tendency to interweave all the Marvel story lines into one ongoing story line so that basically you have to watch all their new movies now to keep up with the characters etc. Boo again. This is way over the top. I agree with the increasing number of critics who have panned this sequel to the 2016 Dr. Strange film, which I liked. It was 2 hours and 6 minutes of kaboom and oh no, one right after the other, without a real good plot or character development…. and then there is the trailer in which we run into the three eyed Dr. Strange. Not reassuring. And even the Illuminati, which turned out to be just some other Marvel characters, including Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four (please do not rent or stream the previous Fantastic Four movie— it’s a bomb) do not illumine us about what’s really going on. Their cameo appearance is a waste.
Well you can’t win them all, but let’s hope the Thor movie this summer doesn’t produce the same less than Marvelous effect. This movie was more like something that came from Tales from the Crypt.
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