The Marvel Cinematic Universe is ever-expanding and all-consuming. It contains in itself all media that can be imagined. It has 23 movies in its roster, numerous comics, animated films, graphic novels, TV shows, and much more. Now the studio has set its eyes on the online streaming media channel and they plan to dominate that segment with the advent of Disney+ shows.
In a show of magnificent force, Marvel released a slew of trailers for its Disney+ shows including one for the much anticipated “What if…?” series. The “what if…?” will most probably be a collection of anthropology episodes focusing on stories that might have never left the drawing board in the normal course of things. “What if…?” is set to release on Disney+ and the 3D animation trailer promises us the contemplation of that very question in the voice of the watcher.
Some of the interesting things noticed in the trailer include Captain Britain, a zombie Captain America, a rogue Winter Soldier, and most importantly an evil Dr. Strange battling our resident Sorcerer Supreme. It was quite evident that marvel did not want to give too much away in the trailer but the introduction of an evil version of strange has flipped the entire recipe on its head. Now it makes us (the fandom) question that whether the content presented in the “What if…?” show is going to be canon and if it is going to be canon how will it fit in the larger narrative of phase IV of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Fan theories have been buzzing the pages of Reddit and Facebook, bloggers have been at it all week and yet no one has a clue as to what will actually happen after “What if…?” will release and the contents of the show transpire.
Well, I have a theory so absurd, and so abundantly crazy that it just might be true. There is a huge possibility that Marvel will try to pre-empt the expectations of the fans and choose to tell us a story that we could never expect or even predict. The introduction of Evil Strange, for example, sets the stage for a series-long battle between the two sorcerers. It is a normal convention at this point to set up a conflict for the hero and give him a villain to defeat. But the theory I am proposing suggests that there is more to Evil Strange than meets the eye in the trailer. Let’s look at the evidence for one second.
The next Dr. Strange movie is named Madness in the Multiverse and the show in which Evil Strange will be introduced to us is “What if…?” where we explore different Multiverses. Did you have a Sherlock moment, because I did?
I propose that Dr. Strange will encounter Evil Strange during the events of the “What if…?” show on Disney+. Evil Strange will most likely be trying to harness the power of the Multiverse to meet his own ends but Dr. Strange will choose to oppose this malicious doppelganger and his nefarious schemes. It would be this very attitude that will be the end of Dr. Strange in the show. What I mean to say is that marvel has evolved well past the point of linear storytelling, that is what “What if…?” is, a declaration of a completely new kind of storytelling and with bold new experiments of all sorts. So it is more than likely that marvel will look to create a lasting effect from the events of “What if…?”.
It is completely likely that during the Disney+ “what if” evil strange will beat and possibly kill our resident sorcerer supreme. This might be done to establish Evil Strange as a more powerful villain than we could have ever imagined. It is also possible that the Strange that will be killed would not belong to the prime universe, but any sort of kill will make Evil Strange hell of a villain and that is exactly what Marvel wants, they want to establish this villain so his story can meet its final resolution in the events of “Madness in the Multiverse”. I know. It sounds absurd and yet completely in the realm of possibility. I just hope that Marvel has had the foresight to do things like this. Disney+ shows come out soon, until then keep watching this space for everything Marvel.
