Sam Raimi in talks to direct Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Well, this is certainly interesting. A month after DOCTOR STRANGE director Scott Derrickson stepped down as the director of the sequel, DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS, comes a report from Variety which says that none other than Sam Raimi is in talks to take his place. Should Raimi take the gig, it would be his first time returning to the world of superheroes since 2007's SPIDER-MAN 3. Needless to say, I think a great many of us would be quite pleased with Sam Raimi returning to Marvel for the DOCTOR STRANGE sequel.

Production on DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS is expected to begin in May, so we'll likely hear something more official before too long as Sam Raimi will no doubt need to get up to speed. Even if you remove his previous superhero experience, Raimi is still a great fit for the DOCTOR STRANGE sequel as Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige and previous director Scott Derrickson, who will remain onboard as an executive producer, have said that the film would be the first horror movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. "When I came and talked to [Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige] about doing a sequel, I said, ‘I don’t want to do just another sequel. If I’m going to do it, it needs to go into the territory that drew me into the Doctor Strange comics in the first place’ – which is how they dipped into the gothic and the horror and the horrific," Derrickson said while speaking at San Diego Comic-Con last summer. "And we’re going to make the first scary MCU movie." Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige also recently teased that the sequel will feature the debut of a few Marvel characters new to the MCU.

The next Doctor Strange film, for instance, features some new MCU characters which will be making their debut in that movie. You won't expect or won't guess who it is but we found a cool way to make it work because we want to make a particular type of movie there. And there was a character who we always wanted to do something with who will fit really well there.

The DOCTOR STRANGE sequel will see the return of Benedict Cumberbatch and Benedict Wong, with Elizabeth Olsen also set to star as Scarlet Witch/Wanda Maximoff. However, although Rachel McAdams was expected to reprise her role of Christine Palmer, Variety's report states that she will not be back. DOCTOR STRANGE IN THE MULTIVERSE OF MADNESS will hit theaters on May 1, 2021.