Sam Raimi
Credit: Featureflash Photo Agency / Shutterstock.com
Sam Raimi is in talks to direct Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness following the previous departure of director Scott Derrickson, according to Variety.
The Hollywood trade reports production is scheduled to begin in May, necessitating a quick hiring for whoever takes the job.
Raimi is no stranger to superhero films, having directed the original Spider-Man trilogy (on all of which Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige worked well before his current position). That can’t help but call to mind the comic book connection between Spider-Man and Doctor Strange, who once helped Spider-Man magically conceal his secret identity after it was revealed to the world – as it recently was in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Also, both were created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko.
And of course, there’s the question of Sony’s Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, which not only drew on story elements of Raimi’s Spider-Man films, but also introduced its own version of a Multiverse – central in concept to the Doctor Strange sequel. And of course, this also raises the question of how Sony’s Marvel Universe characters and their seemingly at least partially separate world may play in.
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is due out in theaters May 7, 2021.