Marvel fans are shell-shocked after seeing the newest Marvel movie, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. We’ve seen it and can confirm that this new Marvel movie is very much a horror movie, and commits to the genre in a very surprising, nightmare-inducing way — but apparently, even though the new movie has a lot of shock value and is executed well overall, it’s not receiving anything close to the positive responses that many other Marvel movies have received!
Forbes has reported that, even though the movie is doing well in theaters and receiving positive feedback from Marvel fans, it is actually one of the lowest-performing Marvel movies to enter the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Forbes referenced the movie’s rating on Rotten Tomatoes, saying that “currently, with well over 200 reviews in, Doctor Strange has a 77% on Rotten Tomatoes. That has it tied with the original Thor as the sixth worst-reviewed movie in the MCU, out of a total of 28 movies”.
Forbes listed all of the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies and their Rotten Tomatoes rankings for comparison.
- Black Panther – 96%
- Avengers: Endgame – 94%
- Iron Man – 94%
- Spider-Man: No Way Home – 93%
- Thor: Ragnarok – 93%
- Spider-Man: Homecoming – 92%
- Guardians of the Galaxy – 92%
- Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings – 91%
- Marvel’s The Avengers – 91%
- Spider-Man: Far From Home – 90%
- Captain America: Civil War – 90%
- Captain America: The Winter Soldier – 90%
- Doctor Strange – 89%
- Ant-Man and the Wasp – 87%
- Avenger’s Infinity War – 85%
- Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 – 85%
- Ant-Man – 83%
- Captain America: The First Avenger – 79%
- Captain Marvel – 79%
- Black Widow – 79%
- Iron Man 3 – 79%
- Thor – 77%
- Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness – 77%
- Avengers: Age of Ultron – 76%
- Iron Man 2 – 72%
- The Incredible Hulk – 67%
- Thor: The Dark World – 66%
- Eternals – 47%
This low ranking will be surprising for many Marvel fans, but those fans might be people who haven’t gone to theaters and seen the Marvel film yet. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness has a rather simplistic but vivid plot with several crowd-pleasing moments, and its cast still excels in their respective roles just as they did in the first Doctor Strange film.
However, the big factor that seems to be turning people off from this Marvel film is the same factor that has made it such a talking point: Evil Dead director Sam Raimi chose to really focus on horror movie elements for the movie, and he committed one hundred percent. The movie is chock-full of insanely horrific scenes, unsettling jump scares, and a deranged, genuinely creepy threat that has everyone talking about a particular cast member’s performance.
While the commitment to horror movie tropes and horror references is one that many Marvel fans are finding commendable, it’s really not what Marvel fans go to Marvel movies to see — and that seems to be the flaw in Raimi’s plan. Yes, Marvel fans are leaving the theater feeling unnerved and impressed…but (to paraphrase a line in the film) ‘are they happy’? This movie is absolutely a horror movie, but it seems to have lost some Marvel style along the way…and since the movie is one of Marvel’s worst-reviewed films, it seems that fans have really noticed that absence!
Have you seen this Marvel movie yet? Let us know on Facebook if you liked the film’s commitment to horror tropes, or if you’d rather have seen a more run-of-the-mill addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe!
