Dr. Strange 2: Multiverse of Suckitude
I have a very important announcement: I’ve been diagnosed with Time Displacement Fatigue. Ashley and I are reeling right now but we appreciate your Ts and Ps as we navigate this new world for me.
We’re still running tests, but our doctors are fairly certain that this is a result of almost 50% of all movies, TV shows, and books having some kind of timeline or multiverse plot orientation
I knew something was up after seeing Doctor Strange 2: Multiverse of Mediocrity. I felt emotionally extinguished but I just thought it was:
the result of watching a movie that had the same special effects department as Napoleon Dynamite.
the result of watching a movie with a lead actor who has the charisma of a doctor of urology
the result of watching a movie where the main supporting character, America Chavez (not Rachel McAdams because god-forbid we give Rachel McAdams anything interesting to do other than be the object of active or passive desire for a hype-beast discount time lord) is a teenager who exists as a multiverse-hopping plot point made manifest and the daughter of two lesbians. I point this out because all the movie seems interested in telling us about America is that she’s not white and she’s the daughter of lost lesbians. A good start but this can’t be the totality of someone identity.1
the result of watching a movie that functioned as an illogical conclusion to the arc of the Scarlet Witch and undid all the most interesting parts of Wandavision so that she could become the mass-murdering mother-Golem narrative engine of a movie in serious need of some kind of dynamism.
the result of watching a movie where the overall aesthetic and story-telling stakes felt more like a fast food commercial than a movie. I’m made to want something and everything looks interesting, but it’s all mostly stripped of any other meaning or purpose beyond passing the story baton to whatever comes next.
This genre of story used to be compelling because time-travel or universe hopping tended to come with a sense of unintended consequences. If you time-travel back two hundred years and honk a loogie on a butterfly’s wings, it would like eventually cause a tsunami in Surinam and make it so Gordo from Lizzie McGuire becomes President instead of Dubya or Obama.
But now, the ramifications around time travel are just details to be finessed, as is universe hopping. Nothing really means anything anymore especially in Marvel. To this point, Dr. Strange 2: Multibutt of Vapidness does go out of its way to set up the ramifications of inter-universe “incursions,” but it does so in an opaque way, mostly just communicating that this will be dramatic for everyone else BESIDES the core group of Marvel people most involved in this phase. The intimacy of consequence has been eschewed in favor of scale and optionality and in doing so, it more and more feels like everything isn’t really anything.
I’m reminded of the first short story I ever read about time travel, A Sound of Thunder by Ray Bradbury because it is a story interested in the consequences of time travel in a way that a lot of our stories, both Marvel-affiliated and beyond, don’t seem very interested in parsing through anymore, much to our detriment.
PICTURE SECTION
READS SECTION
LISTEN SECTION
Over Under Achievers #56: Can You Bring Your Own Chicken Tenders To a Fancy Restaurant?
Jason and I talk about Tom Brady’s new future gig, Giannis’ Disney movie, and whether or not it’s okay to bring chicken tendies to a nice restaurant as an adult…
GOOD DOG SECTION
INTERESTING FACT SECTION
There was a brief period in which Abe Lincoln (died 1865) could have sent a fax (invented 1843) to a samurai (abolished 1867).
TWEETS SECTION
i know this is a character from the comics so they are just following the canon here but you can motivate the presence of this character with giving her some kind of base level humanity beyond demographic allegiance and plot point purpose.
I read this out to my husband and he laughed out loud (he literally said the same thing about dr strange’s personality) great points. I wish it weren’t so but totally true.
Have you seen Everything, Everywhere, All at Once? Also a multiple timeline movie but WOOOWW. So much more interesting than anything else I’ve seen. Except Spider-Man into the Spiderverse which is it’s own thing.