Scoring
We polled our entire team and ranked every MCU film across six categories. We weighted each category based on their overall value to the success of the movie.
Plot - 25%
Character Development - 20%
Villain - 20%
Action - 12.5%
Intangibles - 12.5%
Supporting Cast - 10%
Overview
Film: Doctor Strange
Release Date: November 4, 2016
Reception
IMDB: 7.5/10
Rotten Tomato - TOMATOMETER: 89%
Rotten Tomato - Audience: 86%
Box Office
Budget: $165,000,000
Opening Weekend: $85,058,311
Gross US: $232,641,920
Gross Worldwide: $677,718,395
Trailer:
Plot
Synopsis: While on a journey of physical and spiritual healing, a brilliant neurosurgeon is drawn into the world of the mystic arts.
Analysis: Don't you hate when you're looking for a simple solution to your physical limitations and you're pulled into an ancient war of magic? Enough heroes in the MCU have used some form of steroids, so it was time to change it up and get a hero who uses magic instead.
Grade: 6.5/10
Character Development
Analysis: Stephen Strange was a brilliant doctor and a highly skilled surgeon who saved many lives. He was always cocky, but it wasn't until he lost the full use of his hands that he became a real miserable jerk of a human being. He had to get over his ego and accept he didn't know everything before he could learn the mystic arts. Even then, he still was doing it just to get his hands back. The Ancient One had to show him he could be more than just a lowly doctor. This was quite the ride in just one film for Mister Doctor.
Grade: 7.5/10
Villain
Name: Kaecilius
Bio: Sorcerer who found out the Ancient One wasn't teaching them everything there is to know about the magic arts, so he went out on his own and formed the Zealots.
Evil Plan: Rip a few pages out of a book of forbidden spells to bring Dormammu, and inter-dimensional being, to Earth and rid the world of that pesky thing we know as time.
Analysis: We can get on board with Kaecilius' plan, in theory. Time is a bitch that controls our lives and comes for us all. Wouldn't it be nice if we didn't have to worry about it? Alas, it's probably for the best that he failed. So Kaecilius is just another one-off MCU villain, but Dormammu is technically still out there...
Grade: 6/10
Supporting Cast
Sherlock Homeless
Dr. Regina George
McLovin
12 Years A Sorcerer
Master Splinter
The Magic Carpet From Aladdin
Analysis: Mark Benedict Cumberbatch as Doctor Strange in the column of perfect MCU castings. Wong brought some low-key humor and would prove to be a formidable side character moving forward as he and Strange join up with the Avengers. Also worth mentioning is the Cloak of Levitation, which is on the short-list of top inanimate object characters in the MCU. Overall, it isn't the deepest supporting cast, but we are intrigued to see Mordo as a villain in Doctor Strange 2.
Grade: 6.5/10
Action
Best Fight:
Analysis: This is a Doctor Strange film, so the action is trippy and different. Still, we feel like they could have taken it one step further. This scene of Strange and Mordo fighting off Kaecilius and the Zealots is cool, but it also looks a lot like Inception. Perhaps their intention was to ease the audience into the mystic arts before they go too crazy with it.
Grade: 7/10
Intangibles
Analysis: Marvel must have had a lot of good will built up from their many box office successes to be able to make a Doctor Strange film. It may seem like a no-brainer now, but this could have been considered a huge risk at one time. We should always be grateful we got to see this character come to life. Despite that, this felt relatively safe, but we hope they can now open up more into the different dimensions and weird possibilities with the character.
Grade: 6.5/10
Best Moments
All The Single Sorcerers
Dammit Mads. Your timing is still off. Let's run it again.
I was there the whole time...
Tag. Who's It.
Final Score
Analysis: Doctor Strange acts as a perfectly fine origin story for the Sorcerer Supreme and Cumberbatch has become the spitting image of the character. Once we get over the novelty of seeing Doctor Strange in a big time movie for the first time, the film falls in the middle of our overall MCU rankings.
Grade: 6.66/10
Image Credits: Disney
