I’m no Marvel Cinematic Universe megafan, but it really pains me to say that I did not at all like “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” Why does it hurt so much to say this? Well, because it’s the great Sam Raimi directing and he hasn’t given us a new movie in over 10 years, so for him to come back with this movie hurts like hell.
I was promised, and it’s still being mentioned in some of these reviews, the first horror movie of the MCU. That turned out to be untrue. Yes, Raimi plays around with genre elements here and there, but the Disney-led PG-13 constraints kind of numb the whole thing down. There’s nothing tense or thrilling about ‘Multiverse of Madness.’
The whole film just hammers you down with its CGI-obsessed hijinks. I should have known better to think that Raimi would get some kind of voice in this film — instead, his familiar auteur imprint gets buried somewhere in the endless rubble of this very bad movie.
Clocking in at a pummeling 126 minutes, Raimi basically sticks to the formula of the predecessor, which was directed by Scott Derickson. He just can’t seem to break out on his own here like Taika Waittiti did with “Thor: Ragnarok” or James Gunn with his “Guardians of the Galaxy” films.
Regardless, the embargo has been lifted and “Doctor Strange into the Multiverse” is getting mixed-to-positive reviews — a 62 on Metacritic and an 80% fresh score on Rotten Tomatoes.
NOTE: Instead of watching this latest crass commercial product, and unless you’re a huge MCU fan, I’d recommend you watch some of Raimi’s best films and those include “A Simple Plan,” “Drag Me to Hell,” “Darkman,” “Army of Darkness,” and “Spider-Man 2.”