Much like many of the Disney+ content, “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” favors quantity over quality. The movie progresses by starting and abandoning different plot points and characters, even introducing new and powerful wizards only to kill them off three minutes later. 

Very few character deaths actually feel meaningful in any way. It becomes apparent throughout the movie that rather than waste the time on character development, the film uses death and shock value to substitute content. 

The plot suffers the same fate. Many items are introduced simply as cameos before they are destroyed or forgotten entirely. This includes one of the most important spell books referenced throughout the film, and yet its destruction meant nothing because it was apparently “just a copy.”

The movie uses gore, over exaggerated music scores and flashy scenes to grab at attention spans rather than formulate a real plot or likable characters. The journey the main characters experience is stunted by flashbacks that have no real emotional weight, and the overarching theme boils down to “having confidence and trusting yourself.” For a movie that tries to deal with toxic attachments and moving on after trauma, this falls painfully short of what it felt like they were trying to achieve.

However, Disney does experiment with this movie in ways unseen in their previous comic adaptations. The gore is more intense and well visualized in the film. The special effects are visually striking, and the movie features a few actors who make cameos that carry an exciting twist. The villain is unexpected, and the musical score is experimental and different from prior films, but in a way that is unenjoyable and fragmented.

Overall, the movie feels like a flashy collage of what high paid executives thought would appeal most to their audience, and it is a little insulting. Bright colors, gore and death, incoherent guitar riffs and two dimensional characters would be fine elements spread throughout a film, but when they make up the entirety of a movie, it becomes difficult to enjoy. It is seemingly scraped together from random comic pages, fanservice and disingenuous experimentation. This movie is fine if you need to kill time, but is a largely dissatisfying watch. 

Rated 4/10