DOCTOR STRANGE Teaser Trailer

As someone who literally knows nothing about the character Doctor Strange, I was not expecting a bald Tilda Swinton to punch Benedict Cumberbatch out of his body in this trailer. It was the first time anything about this project reached out and made me interested, so, good job teaser, you served your purpose.

I’m certainly not the only one in the dark about this less-than-prominent superhero, whose name is not as self-explanatory as Ant-Man or the Guardians of the Galaxy. That makes Doctor Strange more of an uphill battle than most in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but people were quite mystified by the talking raccoon in Guardians of the Galaxy, too, and now everyone loves Rocket.

In all seriousness, though, this production could be in serious trouble. It’s led by director Scott Derrickson, who’s had a string of misses culminating in the cliché-ridden Deliver Us from Evil. There’s not much in his filmography to balance out the bad, and screenwriter C. Robert Cargill only has the two Sinister movies under his belt, both of which he co-wrote with Derrickson. Nothing about this team’s filmography indicates to me that they’re ready for a Marvel movie, particularly one that absolutely must sell its character to the masses so his continued use doesn’t seem forced.

Perhaps I wouldn’t be as concerned if this teaser didn’t feel so familiar, like The Matrix with a splash of Inception, or if the very premise of a white guy learning mysticism in Asia wasn’t a tired and mildly offensive trope. They tried to sidestep that last one by casting Swinton as the Ancient One, who is a Tibetan man in the comics but is now an androgynous white woman for the film. Tried is the key word there, because that casting choice both doesn’t make the premise disappear and opens themselves up to accusations of whitewashing.

The flip side of the whitewashing controversy is the casting of Chiwetel Ejiofor as the traditionally Transylvanian nobleman (and enemy of Doctor Strange) Baron Mordo. Plus, Swinton’s presence does mean there’s one more female in the Marvel universe, so it’s hard to accuse the production of moving towards homogeny.

What it does indicate, though, is just how scattershot this whole project looks. I’m hoping it cobbles itself together, because there are elements here that were genuinely unexpected and could add a refreshing spin to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Doctor Strange is directed by Scott Derrickson and stars Benedict Cumberbatch, Tilda Swinton, Rachel McAdams, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and Mads Mikkelsen. It will be released in the U.K. on October 28th, 2016 and in the U.S. on November 4th, 2016. For international release dates, click here.

For those who know about Doctor Strange, do you have a different take on the teaser trailer? How do my fellow novices feel? Let us know in the comments below!