Film

Doctor Strange

Name: Doctor Strange
Genre: Fantasy, Adventure, Action
Released: 2016
Cast: Benedict Cumberbatch, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Rachel McAdams, Benedict Wong, Mads Mikkelsen

A dazzlingly confident neurosurgeon loses the use of his own hands and goes hunting for a miracle cure, stumbling instead into a hidden order of sorcerers who bend space, time and Manhattan's skyline like origami. It's Marvel's most visually inventive entry, all kaleidoscopic city-folding and astral projection, wrapped around a familiar arrogant-genius-learns-humility arc. Good for anyone who wants their superhero spectacle laced with a little real mysticism.

TMDb rating

7.4

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But It demands you already know a dozen other characters, and its cliffhanger ending is deliberately, punishingly unresolved.

Thor: Ragnarok2017

Same cosmic scale and the same willingness to get genuinely strange with its visuals, but filtered through Taika Waititi's candy-coloured humour — proof the MCU can be silly and sincere at the same time.

But The jokes-per-minute rate can undercut the stakes, and it leans hard into comedy over dread.

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Another MCU outsider learns to be a hero alongside strangers, swapping mysticism for space opera and a killer soundtrack — same warmth, wildly different flavour of weird.

But If you came to Strange for the eerie occult tone, this swings fully into comic irreverence instead.

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

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Strange's story starts exactly where this one lives — a brilliant man defined by his hands loses their use in an instant. Here there's no sling ring, no mystic fix, just the raw work of rebuilding a self from nothing.

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But This is real grief with no cape and no rescue — a slow, unsentimental sit that will wreck you rather than thrill you.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly poster

Inception2010

The other great reality-bending, rule-heavy blockbuster of the era — dreams instead of dimensions, but the same pleasure of watching a genius explain impossible physics while the world folds in on itself.

But It's colder and more cerebral, with none of Strange's jokes or warmth to soften the puzzle-box plotting.

The Matrix1999

The reluctant-chosen-one, reality-isn't-what-you-think template Doctor Strange borrows heavily from — a mysterious mentor, a red pill of enlightenment, and fight choreography that rewired what action could look like.

But Its philosophy-lecture stretches and late-90s effects will feel dated next to Strange's slicker multiversal gymnastics.

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The direct sequel, and it goes further and stranger — horror-tinged visuals, higher stakes, and Strange confronting versions of himself across a shattered multiverse.

But It leans on knowledge of other MCU shows and films, and its tone swings into full horror at points.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness poster

Constantine2005

Keanu Reeves as a chain-smoking exorcist navigating demons and angels — the same regular-guy-stumbles-into-a-hidden-war energy, but grimier, meaner, and soaked in noir atmosphere.

But It's a much bleaker, R-rated take on the genre with none of Marvel's polish or humour.

Sherlock Holmes2009

Robert Downey Jr.'s arrogant-genius-meets-mystery flavour pairs oddly well here, with Guy Ritchie's kinetic style standing in for Strange's spell-fu and a plot built on the same fish-out-of-water arrogance.

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A cocky hero stumbles into a hidden mystical underworld full of sorcerers and ancient rules he doesn't understand — the pulpy 80s ancestor of Strange's fish-out-of-water setup, played for maximum campy fun.

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The Sorcerer's Apprentice sequence is the direct ancestor of Strange's whole arc — an unqualified student grabbing at magic beyond his understanding and nearly drowning in the consequences, eight decades before the Cloak of Levitation.

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But It's a scrappy, low-budget documentary, and its central prank makes some viewers uneasy rather than delighted.