(no subject)
We saw Doctor Strange last night, and I'm... ambivalent. I wanted to like it, because Doctor Strange was one of the first (and the only Marvel) comic I collected regularly, back in the day, and I loved it, cheesy alliterative spells and all. I started reading it during the Steve Englehart renaissance of the 80s, and picked up the classic Ditko issues in reprint collections (even then the originals were far out of my price range.) But I was pretty meh when they cast Benedict Cumberbatch (he's OK, but he's in freaking EVERYTHING, and I would rather have seen a lesser-known actor in the role) and the whitewashing of the Ancient One did not thrill me, either.
So...the special effects were stunning. The story was by-the-numbers. Cumberbatch was all right, but I felt as if the writers didn't really have any idea who Steven Strange was, outside of being the Sorcerer Supreme in training. Part of this, I think, is that Doctor Strange is just not as iconic a character as someone like Spider-Man, and his origin story is not terribly original. Nor does the original character have much in the way of defining relationships with other characters, friends or family. The only recurring non-villain characters I can remember from the comics are the Ancient One, Wong and Clea, and in those comics, Strange's relationship with the first two is pretty impersonal, and the third doesn't appear in the movie. So Cumberbatch's Strange came off as a sort of weaksauce Tony Stark rather than a character in his own right.
I did like that they made Wong a fellow sorcerer in the movie, and I liked the actor very much. But that said, I was annoyed that having done that, all Wong got to do was be defeated offscreen. And given that the Dread Dormammu is like the classic Strange villain, he was curiously bland and unthreatening in this one.
Rants Talk to me
So...the special effects were stunning. The story was by-the-numbers. Cumberbatch was all right, but I felt as if the writers didn't really have any idea who Steven Strange was, outside of being the Sorcerer Supreme in training. Part of this, I think, is that Doctor Strange is just not as iconic a character as someone like Spider-Man, and his origin story is not terribly original. Nor does the original character have much in the way of defining relationships with other characters, friends or family. The only recurring non-villain characters I can remember from the comics are the Ancient One, Wong and Clea, and in those comics, Strange's relationship with the first two is pretty impersonal, and the third doesn't appear in the movie. So Cumberbatch's Strange came off as a sort of weaksauce Tony Stark rather than a character in his own right.
I did like that they made Wong a fellow sorcerer in the movie, and I liked the actor very much. But that said, I was annoyed that having done that, all Wong got to do was be defeated offscreen. And given that the Dread Dormammu is like the classic Strange villain, he was curiously bland and unthreatening in this one.
Rants Talk to me