Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness — Benedict Cumberbatch anchors a careening creepshow

Witchcraft and corpses and blood, oh my. Such is the stuff of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, fresh off the Fordist production line of Marvel Studios. Many people will already see every Marvel film as a horror movie. Here the further adventures of urbane mystic-superhero Stephen Strange, played again by Benedict Cumberbatch, come the closest the company has to outright genre scares. Check the credits. If Marvel directors are often merely first among hired hands, Hollywood veteran Sam Raimi is allowed a creative signature, delivering a family-friendly take on the chills that first made his name with 1981 cult favourite The Evil Dead. 

Keep a less gory classic in mind as well: The Wizard of Oz. Raimi’s tale too is one of multiple identities and furious witches. (His last film as a director was a belated prequel, 2013’s Oz the Great and Powerful.) For Judy Garland’s Dorothy, it was all a dream. For Strange, vice versa. His nightly visions are revealed to be glimpses of actual alternate realities.

Life remains a step ahead of art. Cumberbatch and Strange have crossed dimensions already, a quirk of intellectual property rights meaning the character was last seen in the till-ringing Spider-Man: No Way Home. That movie was produced by Sony in a different corner of the business multiverse from Marvel’s parent company, Disney. The new film indulges in what could seem like pointed corporate muscle flexing. Watch for the appearance of a major figure from another rival superhero franchise, bought up in Disney’s 2019 acquisition of Fox. (Spoiler warning: takeovers can be brutal.)

The film also reflects the newest phase of Disney’s dominance, lacking the disbanded Avengers but bestriding the media landscape. A sprawling cosmos of parallel realities makes a neat likeness for the Marvel model — one that increasingly spans movies and TV. In an assertive bit of cross-pollination, the antagonist here is witchy Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen), herself last seen in streaming spin-off WandaVision. Another spoiler warning: her double-edged persona has now turned wholly wicked. You will need a Disney+ subscription to understand why. Anything less will only heighten the nagging feeling that so often comes with the massed backstories of Marvel, that of sitting an exam after not enough revision. 

Even Cumberbatch at times looks confused. His spry performance holds the movie together, the coiffured arrogance of his former surgeon landing in the sweet spot between comic preen and lonely pathos. Despite the dead weight of assumed knowledge, the basic plot is so simple — one long chase — as to leave Raimi space to have fun as well. Visually, the first Doctor Strange came with a psychedelic tint. The sequel nudges into the far-out too. At one point, Cumberbatch plummets through a string of oddball universes, morphing en route into a gloop of brightly coloured paint. 

You want more of that kind of madcap invention. What you get instead still feels novel for the context, a haunted house of horror imagery from a gumbo of sources: Raimi’s own filmography, Carrie (a lot), even Cumberbatch’s role in the celebrated Danny Boyle stage production of Frankenstein.

It can be easy to get carried away with signs of independent thinking from a Marvel movie. The house style remains sacred: headachy green-screen, grunting battles, knowing quips. “We’ll get you back on the lunchbox,” a sweet-talking Strange tells Wanda. It all comes back to merch. But Raimi’s affable creepshow at least tweaks the formula — and 10-year-olds may now pause unnerved for just a moment before retrieving their carrot sticks.

★★★☆☆

In UK and US cinemas from May 6