Back in the day, Marvel’s sales guru David Gabriel teased “one death a quarter” — I’m not sure who has been dying the most recently in the MCU, but according to a teaser sent out by Marvel today, it’s Doctor Strange who is next on the chopping block.
“The final saga of Marvel’s Sorcerer Supreme begins this September.“
Apparently we learn more about the time and nature of Dr. Stephen Strange’s demise next week.
The last Doctor Strange comic, written by Mark Waid, ended last year after six issues. Since then he’s co-starred in Strange Academy, a series by Skottie Young and Humberto Ramos about young magic users of the MCU training with more experienced sorcerers, in a story not at all influenced by other highly popular magic academy stories.
But with the eagerly awaited Sam Raimi directed Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness film coming out next year, interest in the character will be going up again, so it’s as good a time as any to kill him.
Will this be the Sorcerer Supreme’s first death? CBR has a helpful list of 10 Times Doctor Strange Has Died, so no.
However, every single death listed is of an alternate earth/universe/timeline Doctor Strange – zombies, Venoms, Neil Gaiman, and so on — or even a film Strange (like, the Benedict Cumberbatch version died in the Snappening) so if this is an actual death in the mainline 616 Marvel U, it could well be a first. Although according to ANOTHER article on a Valnet site, Doctor Strange was slain by Doctor Doom in Secret Wars. And although that universe was then made a side universe, it did happen. I think.
Doctor Strange debuted in Strange Tales #110 in 1963 and was co-created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. A resident of Greenwich Village, Strange found himself in early tales confronting a number of eldritch beings, in battles lovingly rendered in some of Ditko’s finest work ever. Since then he’s been an on and off again star or the Marvel Universe, as their number one magical superhero. But he hasn’t really had a break-out classic you must read this run.
But maybe slaying Strange will be his breakout story! We will find out more next week so keep it locked to The Beat!
Wait what? Why Doctor? Is everything coming to its end.
Another gimmick story. One can’t entirely blame Marvel as DC started this in 1992 with the death of Superman, which sold a lot of comics. Marvel saw the dollar signs and have been imitating the idea ever since. Another reason many of today’s comics are not worth bothering with. The mainstream press finally got wise and stopped reporting these stories after the so-called death of Captain America several years ago as they soon found out they’d been suckered.
Comments are closed.