Lovecraftian and Horror Comic Roots in 'Doctor Strange 2'

Credit: Pixabay

Ever since "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" released last weekend, there’s been a lot of media hype about it being Marvel's “first horror movie”. Well, to those people who have been saying that, I have news: it's not Marvel's first horror movie, 2007’s "Ghost Rider" is. It's not even Marvel's second horror movie if you count the 2011 “Ghost Rider” sequel and 2020’s “The New Mutants”. There’s actually been some debate whether the sequel to 2011’s “Doctor Strange” is horror to begin with. 

Do I consider “Doctor Strange 2” a horror film? Well, if it isn’t, it at least comes pretty close to being one. Doctor Strange is a character who already had roots in the horror genre. However, director Sam Raimi adds to the movie’s dark elements with his style of directing, a style that has been influenced by many of H.P. Lovecraft's story concepts. It’s a style that he used in his Lovecraftian horror movies that he was already well known for such as "The Evil Dead" and "Army of Darkness". I saw "Doctor Strange 2" on its opening weekend and really liked it. When I found out who the director was, I watched “Evil Dead” so I could see the comparison between Raimi’s past work and his most recent. “Evil Dead” is one of the worst horror movies I've seen, I don't care if it's been dubbed as a “cult classic". It was almost nothing but gore and violence for their own damned sakes. Still, all cliché scenes aside, Raimi did a great job on "Doctor Strange 2" in which both the comic book and director's Lovecraftian horror influences can be seen for sure!

Lovecraftian Horror Influence on Doctor Strange Comics 

If you’re familiar with the Doctor Strange comic books, it shouldn't be that surprising that "Doctor Strange 2" was made into a horror movie. The character has his beginnings in a comic book series that had traditionally been a horror anthology.  The series was "Strange Tales" which began in the early 1950s and before it regularly featured superhero stories such as "Doctor Strange", it mostly consisted of horror and high fantasy tales. They were stories that had their roots in the pulp fiction of the preceding decades, fiction that H.P. Lovecraft's horror stories significantly influenced. That said, historian Bradford W. Wright says that Doctor Strange was inspired by the pulp fiction of co-creator Stan Lee’s, childhood. 

Like much of Lovecraft's horror fiction, the "Doctor Strange” comics featured plots that dealt with interdimensional monsters and the occult. Dr. Strange himself has been given the attribution of “Master of Black Magic” although that may be a contradiction since he has regularly used his magic for the good of humanity rather than for evil. Yet the attribution connotes the evil magic found in much horror. 

Overall, if “Doctor Strange” has never been straight horror, it's come very close to being so. The comic book series has always fallen into the genre of dark fantasy which share many elements of horror such as black magic and netherworld monsters that threaten both the lives and souls of humans. Also, because the villains and monsters in "Doctor Strange" have been threats to the existence of humanity, many of the stories can be specifically classified as cosmic horror. 

Lovecraftian Horror Influence on 'Doctor Strange 2'

The Lovecraftian horror elements come to "Doctor Strange 2" via Sam Raimi's style of directing. The story to this movie is that the Scarlett Witch (played by Elizabeth Olsen) of the Avengers goes villain as she seeks out a book of the dead called the Darkhold and attempts to abduct a teenage girl named America Chavez (Xochitl Gomez). America has the power to transport herself to different universes, including our own. And so the Witch wants her so she can conquer all the universes, ours included, which she can do with incantations from the Darkhold. Dr. Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) rescues America from an attack and through this discovers the Scarlett Witch's evil scheme. So, he teams up with America and his partner in magic, Wong (Benedict Wong), to go after the Witch and prevent her from taking over all of the universes, collectively known as the Multiverse. 

The movie’s title alone, “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness”, is a play on the title of Lovecraft's novella, "At the Mountains of Madness". According to an article at Canadian news website, CBC, “The film borrows from H.P. Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness, a novella which itself had enough interstellar weirdness to fit a Marvel movie. . .” Raimi's "Evil Dead" movies and "Army of Darkness" involved the Necronomicon which is the book of the dead referenced in many of Lovecraft’s stories and that the Darkhold is similar to. The living dead and demon possession that have been featured in Raimi’s past films are found in this one too.  There’s also a giant tentacled eyeball creature that is somewhat reminiscent of Lovecraft's Cthulhu. Since the Witch is trying to rule the entire Multiverse and change all of existence into a hell, “Doctor Strange 2” can definitely be classified as cosmic horror. Yet, Raimi does not over-do the Lovecraftian elements, making "Doctor Strange 2" independent of Lovecraft's Mythos and so making it its own story. 

"Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" is made really good both in terms of story and visual effects. Raimi does a great job directing this film that shows his style reminiscent of his past Lovecraftian horror movies such as "Evil Dead" and "Army of Darkness" while keeping the dark roots of Doctor Strange that go all the way back to "Strange Tales" comics where the mystic superhero started. And he does all this without having to use the gore exploitation of many of his other movies. For a person like myself who cares about story and suspense more than graphic violence and gore (although some stories make these two necessary), this is probably Raimi's best movie yet.

Have you seen "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness"? If so, do you consider it horror, or, more specifically, a Lovecraftian horror movie?

Until next time . . . 

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