Stephen Strange: Doctor Strange Appreciation 2021

[Albert1981]

What if the story context is entirely magic-centric? Say it involves magic user vs magic user to solve a magic-induced threat, rather than magic used against a non-magic character to resolve a non-magical threat?

THAT would be a very different circumstance and context. And SOME rules about magic could be discarded. I mean, I would still want limits, but if the story took place in a magical world, like in Alice in Wonderland, things could be permitted to get VERY weird!

[MadFacedKid]

I like how magic seems to be portrayed in media lately where there’s nature magic that seems like you manipulate the environment around you kind of like the Witcher universe or Vampire Diaries.



I like the idea of being able to draw energy from yourself as well and being able to draw power from deities, hell lords and other dimensions like the crimson bands of cyttorak. I could see stuff like that done and it not coming off as being ‘broken’ in terms of power set.

I feel like as The Sorcerer Supreme Doctor Strange should have some liberties though.

[Clea]

THAT would be a very different circumstance and context. And SOME rules about magic could be discarded. I mean, I would still want limits, but if the story took place in a magical world, like Alice in Wonderland, things could be permitted to get VERY weird!

This is why Doctor Strange and the rest of the Marvel magical universe characters work best when they're off in their own silo. Magic vs magic to solve magic-related problems. Could be on earth, could be in other dimensions, but when the story stays focused on magic user vs magic user/being, the 'rules,' costs, and consequences automatically make sense because of the story context. (In the hands of a good writer, of course.) Marvel did that for decades with Strange. They produces a lot of fabulous stories but the audience overall was small. Marvel wants to integrate Strange into the regular superhero crowd and use him against non-magical opponents. That alone defeats the whole point of him being Sorcerer Supreme, the person who is supposed to be 100% devoted to protecting earth from dimension-level magical threats. On the other hand, readers really liked seeing Strange on the Avengers team, and Marvel wants to please their audience and keep their trademarked characters popular and profitable for as long as they can. I assume that Marvel will eventually have to come up with some sort of rule set for their magic users in non-magic stories. Others here have already pointed out that Marvel did have some guidelines for their writers in place. Maybe start there instead of letting a writer like Aaron come along and impose a lot of nonsensical 'rules' that just don't make any sense in the context of the Marvel magical character set. Marvel just needs to decide who they want Strange to be now, and the rules for magic should be easy to define. All I know is, they can't continue much longer with the depower/repower cycle they've been stuck in with Strange for the last couple decades. That is so boring.

[MaximoffTrash]

I like how magic seems to be portrayed in media lately where there’s nature magic that seems like you manipulate the environment around you kind of like the Witcher universe or Vampire Diaries.



I like the idea of being able to draw energy from yourself as well and being able to draw power from deities, hell lords and other dimensions like the crimson bands of cyttorak. I could see stuff like that done and it not coming off as being ‘broken’ in terms of power set.

I feel like as The Sorcerer Supreme Doctor Strange should have some liberties though.

I kinda always wonder if it involves some "relationship management" if you know what I mean.
Vishanti are Stephen's "bosses", so unless he got fired as SS, he can rely on lending their strength for the most part.
The Octessence feel pretty neutral, while they can be dangerous to humanity and Earth, they don't have that malicious of intents, they just want a good game with each other and their mortal champions. So I guess Stephen just needs to stay competent, make good use of their favor and "please the gods".
Or it could be those spells don't really need the dimension rulers' approval, those spells are actually straight up "stealing" **** from their dimensions, that would be hilarious.
Hell lords are a tricky bunch and they would demand more specific price, in return they can also offer more detailed and complicated services.

[Daedra]

This is why Doctor Strange and the rest of the Marvel magical universe characters work best when they're off in their own silo. Magic vs magic to solve magic-related problems. Could be on earth, could be in other dimensions, but when the story stays focused on magic user vs magic user/being, the 'rules,' costs, and consequences automatically make sense because of the story context. (In the hands of a good writer, of course.) Marvel did that for decades with Strange. They produces a lot of fabulous stories but the audience overall was small. Marvel wants to integrate Strange into the regular superhero crowd and use him against non-magical opponents. That alone defeats the whole point of him being Sorcerer Supreme, the person who is supposed to be 100% devoted to protecting earth from dimension-level magical threats. On the other hand, readers really liked seeing Strange on the Avengers team, and Marvel wants to please their audience and keep their trademarked characters popular and profitable for as long as they can. I assume that Marvel will eventually have to come up with some sort of rule set for their magic users in non-magic stories. Others here have already pointed out that Marvel did have some guidelines for their writers in place. Maybe start there instead of letting a writer like Aaron come along and impose a lot of nonsensical 'rules' that just don't make any sense in the context of the Marvel magical character set. Marvel just needs to decide who they want Strange to be now, and the rules for magic should be easy to define. All I know is, they can't continue much longer with the depower/repower cycle they've been stuck in with Strange for the last couple decades. That is so boring.

I think if magic is left unregulated, stories, and thus the world will break. How are you supposed to have any sort of conflict if they're some dudes that can warp reality so it simply doesn’t exist? I believe having a hard magic system immerses readers and makes the world more believable. When magic is used to resolve threats, readers won't feel as anxious because of the assumption that magic could be used to intervene. I'm not sure how the MCU will deal with this issue in the Multiverse of Madness!

As sorcerer supreme I don’t expect Stephen to meddle in every mundane issue of the marvel universe, his role is to use magic in order to protect our dimension not oppress it with the tyrannic rule of a magic dictator, to solve each issue with magic is counterproductive to the evolution of humanity because some obstacle are meant to be overcame by progress and science, science is collective, a tool for everyone due to its very nature (always true...reproducible results...not influenced by feelings or belief...dependable) while magic is individualistic, just as good as the person (or selected elite of individuals) using it and offers nothing but riddles and troubles for 99% of earth inhabitants (its results are the subjects of will, intention, mood, emotion.... mutable and fickle depending on the caster himself).

These are the determinations I expect the sorcerer supreme to make, he should exercise self moderation due to his own role and be vigilant others don’t use magic to hamper earth’s inhabitants progress and evolution, allow humanity to find the cure for a disease and you have solved that problem forever......go around using magic to eliminate the same disease and you have made humanity dependent on you, your specific spells, your ability, your unique connection to higher powers and mystic entities..... can you see why Stephen is supposed to self regulate?

Magic is supposed to be regulated by hierarchies of power, systems put in place by treaties, agreements, guardians...... if on the other hand you start to write down a set of unbreakable rules, always true.....always valid....always dependable and at the same time independent then Congratulations are in order ......you just turned magic into science, something it should not be for obvious narrative reasons.

[Clea]

As sorcerer supreme I don’t expect Stephen to meddle in every mundane issue of the marvel universe, his role is to use magic in order to protect our dimension not oppress it with the tyrannic rule of a magic dictator, to solve each issue with magic is counterproductive to the evolution of humanity because some obstacle are meant to be overcame by progress and science, science is collective, a tool for everyone due to its very nature (always true...reproducible results...not influenced by feelings or belief...dependable) while magic is individualistic, just as good as the person (or selected elite of individuals) using it and offers nothing but riddles and troubles for 99% of earth inhabitants (its results are the subjects of will, intention, mood, emotion.... mutable and fickle depending on the caster himself).

These are the determinations I expect the sorcerer supreme to make, he should exercise self moderation due to his own role and be vigilant others don’t use magic to hamper earth’s inhabitants progress and evolution, allow humanity to find the cure for a disease and you have solved that problem forever......go around using magic to eliminate the same disease and you have made humanity dependent on you, your specific spells, your ability, your unique connection to higher powers and mystic entities..... can you see why Stephen is supposed to self regulate?

Magic is supposed to be regulated by hierarchies of power, systems put in place by treaties, agreements, guardians...... if on the other hand you start to write down a set of unbreakable rules, always true.....always valid....always dependable and at the same time independent then Congratulations are in order ......you just turned magic into science, something it should not be for obvious narrative reasons.

I agree with you 100%. I'm not sure the majority of the Marvel audiences agree, unfortunately. I've seen this same complaint from traditional superhero-based readers that there are no 'rules' for Marvel magic pop up repeatedly over the years. The superhero character set are easy to rank and quantify. It's easy for readers to suspend their disbelief just enough to assume that the superheroes and mutants ultimately derive their abilities from the same rules of science that apply to the real world. None of those rules apply to the magic users. The rules that apply to magic are internal, mental, metaphysical, even spiritual. They're invisible. How do you list those sort of rules on a trading card so that fans can rank the magic users in terms of who is strongest? How is drawing energy from an earth-based pantheon of deities differ from drawing energy from the Vishanti? How much mental and spiritual self-understanding and self-mastery does it take in order to master even the simplest of spells in order to use that spell as you intend and not have it backfire on you or others because the magic user didn't understand the energy that was fueling that spell, or got a bit distracted? All of these sorts of factors are invisible and internal. In the context of a magic-based story setting, writers are free to explore these aspects of magic. In a regular superhero type story, the writer simply needs a magic user to show up, mumble something mysterious, and do some hand-wavy laser beam stuff, and move on. The reader/movie viewer has zero idea how or why the magic user was able to do what they just did. In the comics, ever since they turned Strange into an Avenger, they got stuck in a mode of depowering/rebooting him endlessly so that every new writer could come along and make up new rules for Strange's abilities. In the movies, they nod towards the metaphysical but then turn the Eye of Agamotto into an Infinity Stone and give the magic users cool tech like Sling Rings to allow them to teleport, which implies that there is some sort of science underlying magic that ties the magic users to the rest of the Marvel science-based characters. I don't know how far Marvel will push that approach. As I said in an earlier post, I look to the MCU to get clues for what Marvel plans to do, because that is where Marvel is building its 21st century audience. I know what I'd like to see them do with Strange and the other magical characters, but Marvel may need to handle the characters differently in order to mainstream them to a wider audience.

[Lee Stone]

If they want to make magic more realistic, they could also make the effects of a spell take longer to manifest. Like from a few hours, a day or a week. Or longer.
Then have everything occur in ways that could be explained as ‘coincidence’, to keep the illusion that it may or may not have been magic.
But that wouldn’t be appealing to superhero readers.

[Albert1981]

As sorcerer supreme I don’t expect Stephen to meddle in every mundane issue of the marvel universe, his role is to use magic in order to protect our dimension not oppress it with the tyrannic rule of a magic dictator, to solve each issue with magic is counterproductive to the evolution of humanity because some obstacle are meant to be overcame by progress and science, science is collective, a tool for everyone due to its very nature (always true...reproducible results...not influenced by feelings or belief...dependable) while magic is individualistic, just as good as the person (or selected elite of individuals) using it and offers nothing but riddles and troubles for 99% of earth inhabitants (its results are the subjects of will, intention, mood, emotion.... mutable and fickle depending on the caster himself).

These are the determinations I expect the sorcerer supreme to make, he should exercise self moderation due to his own role and be vigilant others don’t use magic to hamper earth’s inhabitants progress and evolution, allow humanity to find the cure for a disease and you have solved that problem forever......go around using magic to eliminate the same disease and you have made humanity dependent on you, your specific spells, your ability, your unique connection to higher powers and mystic entities..... can you see why Stephen is supposed to self regulate?

Magic is supposed to be regulated by hierarchies of power, systems put in place by treaties, agreements, guardians...... if on the other hand you start to write down a set of unbreakable rules, always true.....always valid....always dependable and at the same time independent then Congratulations are in order ......you just turned magic into science, something it should not be for obvious narrative reasons.

Yeah, I don't think science and magic should be "one and the same" like it was described in an earlier phase of the MCU. And the way you describe magic is so elaborate and exotic I think they should keep those elements in fantasy stories. But I do like the idea of self-regulation. I mean, I don't mind him changing tea into beer. That's fun. Rules shouldn't apply there. It's using magic as plot devices that takes me out of mystical tales in general. I do believe some "guidelines" should be adhered to on that front, with SOME flexibility in magic's uses in those instances.

[Albert1981]

This is why Doctor Strange and the rest of the Marvel magical universe characters work best when they're off in their own silo. Magic vs magic to solve magic-related problems. Could be on earth, could be in other dimensions, but when the story stays focused on magic user vs magic user/being, the 'rules,' costs, and consequences automatically make sense because of the story context. (In the hands of a good writer, of course.) Marvel did that for decades with Strange. They produces a lot of fabulous stories but the audience overall was small. Marvel wants to integrate Strange into the regular superhero crowd and use him against non-magical opponents. That alone defeats the whole point of him being Sorcerer Supreme, the person who is supposed to be 100% devoted to protecting earth from dimension-level magical threats. On the other hand, readers really liked seeing Strange on the Avengers team, and Marvel wants to please their audience and keep their trademarked characters popular and profitable for as long as they can. I assume that Marvel will eventually have to come up with some sort of rule set for their magic users in non-magic stories. Others here have already pointed out that Marvel did have some guidelines for their writers in place. Maybe start there instead of letting a writer like Aaron come along and impose a lot of nonsensical 'rules' that just don't make any sense in the context of the Marvel magical character set. Marvel just needs to decide who they want Strange to be now, and the rules for magic should be easy to define. All I know is, they can't continue much longer with the depower/repower cycle they've been stuck in with Strange for the last couple decades. That is so boring.

Yeah, Strange, Wong, Voodoo, Loki and Wanda could really let loose and get VERY creative in their uses of magic in their own magical corner of the Marvel Universe. But let's be honest, comic book readers and movie fans LOVE Strange interacting with other Avengers. Look how much more popular Strange got after he traded quips with Stark and Parker. Infinity War, and NOT the first Strange movie, made Cumberbatch's character a star in the MCU. But then naturally, they nerfed him and Wong in Endgame. And of course, now Strange is trying to out-Stark in the comic books AND the movies. Even down to the drinking.

[Daedra]

I agree with you 100%. I'm not sure the majority of the Marvel audiences agree, unfortunately. I've seen this same complaint from traditional superhero-based readers that there are no 'rules' for Marvel magic pop up repeatedly over the years. The superhero character set are easy to rank and quantify. It's easy for readers to suspend their disbelief just enough to assume that the superheroes and mutants ultimately derive their abilities from the same rules of science that apply to the real world. None of those rules apply to the magic users. The rules that apply to magic are internal, mental, metaphysical, even spiritual. They're invisible. How do you list those sort of rules on a trading card so that fans can rank the magic users in terms of who is strongest? How is drawing energy from an earth-based pantheon of deities differ from drawing energy from the Vishanti? How much mental and spiritual self-understanding and self-mastery does it take in order to master even the simplest of spells in order to use that spell as you intend and not have it backfire on you or others because the magic user didn't understand the energy that was fueling that spell, or got a bit distracted? All of these sorts of factors are invisible and internal. In the context of a magic-based story setting, writers are free to explore these aspects of magic. In a regular superhero type story, the writer simply needs a magic user to show up, mumble something mysterious, and do some hand-wavy laser beam stuff, and move on. The reader/movie viewer has zero idea how or why the magic user was able to do what they just did. In the comics, ever since they turned Strange into an Avenger, they got stuck in a mode of depowering/rebooting him endlessly so that every new writer could come along and make up new rules for Strange's abilities. In the movies, they nod towards the metaphysical but then turn the Eye of Agamotto into an Infinity Stone and give the magic users cool tech like Sling Rings to allow them to teleport, which implies that there is some sort of science underlying magic that ties the magic users to the rest of the Marvel science-based characters. I don't know how far Marvel will push that approach. As I said in an earlier post, I look to the MCU to get clues for what Marvel plans to do, because that is where Marvel is building its 21st century audience. I know what I'd like to see them do with Strange and the other magical characters, but Marvel may need to handle the characters differently in order to mainstream them to a wider audience.

Very good observations Clea, thank you, at the end of the day the movies will set the roadmap regarding the way magic works in the marvel universe, I enjoyed the Ancient schooling Stephen and then Bruce and I like to think that a sling ring in the hands of a common human would just work like fancy nutcracker.
Magic is supposed to be for the most part unknowable and unfathomable comics should just embrace the oddity of its inner working and go along with it, 2+2 will never be equal to 4 but sometimes it could depending on how strongly the Sorcerer feels about the result in that particular hour of the day.

[Daedra]

Yeah, Strange, Wong, Voodoo, Loki and Wanda could really let loose and get VERY creative in their uses of magic in their own magical corner of the Marvel Universe. But let's be honest, comic book readers and movie fans LOVE Strange interacting with other Avengers. Look how much more popular Strange got after he traded quips with Stark and Parker. Infinity War, and NOT the first Strange movie, made Cumberbatch's character a star in the MCU. But then naturally, they nerfed him and Wong in Endgame. And of course, now Strange is trying to out-Stark in the comic books AND the movies. Even down to the drinking.

Very true, writing about magic users and Doctor Strange in particular interacting with the rest of the marvel universe requires the presence of a skilled writer, I don’t see why this should be regarded as an issue, writers are supposed to be skilled and the money we spend on these comics is not cheap either, good stories dont get written with a “lets trow **** at the wall attitude...” and this is why for instance I don’t buy Avengers comics anymore at the moment.

[MadFacedKid]

I kinda always wonder if it involves some "relationship management" if you know what I mean.
Vishanti are Stephen's "bosses", so unless he got fired as SS, he can rely on lending their strength for the most part.
The Octessence feel pretty neutral, while they can be dangerous to humanity and Earth, they don't have that malicious of intents, they just want a good game with each other and their mortal champions. So I guess Stephen just needs to stay competent, make good use of their favor and "please the gods".
Or it could be those spells don't really need the dimension rulers' approval, those spells are actually straight up "stealing" **** from their dimensions, that would be hilarious.
Hell lords are a tricky bunch and they would demand more specific price, in return they can also offer more detailed and complicated services.

It would be nice to introduce and explain a lot of that stuff to new readers. In a way that doesn’t beat a dead horse if it’s been covered already. I definitely think it would be funny if we got an arc saying Strange was stated to have been stealing magical energy from some of these hell lords and dimensions.

[Daedra]

It would be nice to introduce and explain a lot of that stuff to new readers. In a way that doesn’t beat a dead horse if it’s been covered already. I definitely think it would be funny if we got an arc saying Strange was stated to have been stealing magical energy from some of these hell lords and dimensions.

why should magical energy be restricted to the exclusive province of hell lords? this is the kind of edgy stuff I usually avoid

[MadFacedKid]

why should magical energy be restricted to the exclusive province of hell lords? this is the kind of edgy stuff I usually avoid

Never said it should we were talking about when Strange cast spells invoking the names of these dark lords or Dimensions like Cytorrak, Vishanti, Cinnibus and whatnot

[Clea]

Yeah, Strange, Wong, Voodoo, Loki and Wanda could really let loose and get VERY creative in their uses of magic in their own magical corner of the Marvel Universe. But let's be honest, comic book readers and movie fans LOVE Strange interacting with other Avengers. Look how much more popular Strange got after he traded quips with Stark and Parker. Infinity War, and NOT the first Strange movie, made Cumberbatch's character a star in the MCU. But then naturally, they nerfed him and Wong in Endgame. And of course, now Strange is trying to out-Stark in the comic books AND the movies. Even down to the drinking.

I love Strange and the other Marvel magic users so I'm delighted to see him/them become more popular with new fans. I want fans to love the magic users because that means Marvel will have a vested interest in writing new stories for these characters. But, I don't want Marvel to turn Strange into magical Tony Stark just to appeal to fans. At a fundamental level, Strange needs to be the exact opposite if Marvel wants to maintain any real continuity with what it means to be Sorcerer Supreme vs. other magic users. As Sorcerer Supreme, his main core strength is his mental discipline and clarity, so he's not going to go out carousing and drinking. He'd be more likely to turn a beer into tea, not turn tea into beer because he needs to stay alert and keep his mind clear at all times. Having him revert to his pre-magic playboy lifestyle also undercuts what it means to be the Sorcerer Supreme vs. other magic users. He sacrificed all of that to become earth's defender against forces that are constantly probing for the slightest crack in earth's defense. The self-sacrificing aspect of being Sorcerer Supreme is something that Strange wrestled with constantly. Even when he allowed himself to have a steady love partner in his life, he even kept them at arm's length emotionally because he viewed even that to be a potential vulnerability. That's one reason why I think Clea is better off without him. He was brilliant and sarcastic in his pre-Sorcerer Supreme days and he remains brilliant and sarcastic now, but he's also tempered himself and thinking about much more than just how to land a quippy zinger on somebody.

Marvel has many skilled writers who could portray Strange well now in a way that would be consistent with his back cannon and established personality and still mix him in with the Avengers and other non-magical characters. I just don't know if Marvel wants to do this, or if they're happier turning him into magical Tony Stark. Time will tell.