With its first season not even complete, What If…?, the first animated entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, is an overwhelming success, garnering praise from both fans and critics. However, writer A.C. Bradley discusses her one regret with the fourth episode, “What If… Doctor Strange Lost His Heart Instead of His Hands?”
In a recent appearance on The GOAT Movie Podcast, Bradley discussed some of her frustrations with the different demands in making an animated show compared to a live-action one. “When you’re writing animation, you’re writing so far into the future that you can’t think four years down the line,” she explained.
She continued, adding “That Doctor Strange episode, I wrote in February of 2019. I think I should’ve called it a Nexus Point instead of an Absolute Point. The Loki scripts weren’t even written yet, so that animatic locked before Loki even finished their scripts because you’re always writing about two years ahead of animation. It’s kind of intense and insane.”
While “What If… Doctor Strange Lost His Heart Instead of His Hands?” may have introduced some issues into the MCU in terms of inconsistent terminology, it has not stopped people from loving both What If…? and the Doctor Strange episode itself. In fact, as previously reported, C. Robert Cargill, co-writer of the first Doctor Strange movie, posted on Twitter to praise the episode, writing, “Watching a What If…? of my own movie is truly a career fucking highlight for me. And what great writing. This team is so fucking great. Could not be more in love with this week’s episode.”
Bradley has now introduced the challenge of balancing Marvel’s animation productions with those of live-action projects, an issue that may need to be solved going forward if the studio wants to keep the overarching narrative of the MCU coherent and avoid these small terminology errors. Not only has What If…? already been confirmed for a second season, but Brad Winderbaum, Marvel’s new head of animation, has also stated that more animated shows are in the works, giving no explicit details about what storylines and characters the shows might entail. Moreover, Winderbaum has teased the possibility of crossovers between live-action titles and animated entries in the MCU, explaining that “All Marvel Studios projects are in some way connected” and that “there’s always the potential.”
The first episode of What If…? was released on Aug. 11, 2021 and “What If… Doctor Strange Lost His Heart Instead of His Hands?” premiered on Sept. 7 on Disney+. New episodes release every Wednesday with the Season 1 finale scheduled for Oct. 6, 2021.
Source: The GOAT Movie Podcast, via Comicbook.com
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