Cosmic chaos reigns in new trailer for 'Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness'

These are strange times indeed! During the Super Bowl this past week, fans were zapped with a mind-warping new trailer for Marvel Studios' upcoming "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" (May 6) and the far-out preview perfectly captures the Sorcerer Supreme's trippy dimensional-hopping insanity.

Stepping in for "Doctor Strange" helmer Scott Derrickson, who did a bang-up job on the first feature starring the Master of the Mystic Arts, director Sam Raimi ("Evil Dead," "Spider-Man") brings his time-tested instincts for the macabre and terrifying to the comic book material. 

Raimi's irreverent style is a phantasmagoric match for Marvel's cosmic wizard, played with scintillating style and singular wit by Benedict Cumberbatch. If you're wondering where "Multiverse of Madness," Marvel's second Doctor Strange film, falls in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, check out our guide on the Marvel movies in chronological order.

The poster for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (Image credit: Marvel Studios)

Doctor Strange was created by Steve Ditko and Stan Lee and saw his first spell cast back in 1963 in "Strange Tales #110." He's been a mainstay of the Marvel Universe for over 50 years, yet until recently, had been oddly absent from the House of Idea's flagship slate of superhero flicks.  

That all changed in 2016 with Doctor Strange's first solo film outing, which did a respectable box office by taking home $677 million worldwide. (You can stream it on Disney Plus if you want to catch up.) He's since been a pivotal part of "Avengers: Infinity War," "Avengers: Endgame," and this past December's "Spider-Man: No Way Home," which is where this upcoming "Doctor Strange" movie picks up as portals-a'plenty have opened.

Hang onto your sanity and have a peek at the new teaser at the top of this page.

In this fresh trailer for "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness," Dr. Stephen Strange is enveloped in the severe havoc caused by his meddling with the natural laws of the Multiverse and now our planet is paying the price as the time/space continuum is in complete chaos.

The horror-tinged visuals Raimi has conjured up are truly like something out of an acid-induced surrealist painting. Doctor Strange must answer for his careless "desecration of reality" and might not go unpunished if Professor X (teased with a distinct Patrick Stewart voice-over) and the Illuminati have any say in rebalancing the Multiverse. With the aid of Scarlet Witch and more magical colleagues, Strange embarks on a wild journey through the nightmarish Multiverse to clash with a villainous new threat to all existence.

Arriving in our realm on May 6, "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" stars Benedict Cumberbatch, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Elizabeth Olsen, Benedict Wong, Xochitl Gomez, Michael Stühlbarg, and Rachel McAdams.

You can catch up on the entire Marvel Universe of films with our guide to the best Marvel movies and expand into the final frontier with the best space movies, too. If you're looking for most of the Marvel movies (including the space-y Guardians of the Galaxy films), you can find them, on the Disney Plus streaming platform.

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Jeff Spry
Contributing Writer

Jeff Spry is an award-winning screenwriter and veteran freelance journalist covering TV, movies, video games, books, and comics. His work has appeared at SYFY Wire, Inverse, Collider, Bleeding Cool and elsewhere. Jeff lives in beautiful Bend, Oregon amid the ponderosa pines, classic muscle cars, a crypt of collector horror comics, and two loyal English Setters.