'Loki' Showrunner Hired To Rewrite 'Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness'

Michael Waldron, who's currently serving as the showrunner of Marvel Studios' upcoming Disney+ series Loki, has been hired as the new writer of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, the upcoming feature film sequel which is said to have narrative links to his streaming series. Get the details below.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Waldron has been hired as the newest Doctor Strange 2 writer, replacing up-and-coming screenwriter Jade Bartlett, whose involvement with the follow-up was announced last October. This comes just a few days after the announcement that Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, and Spider-Man 3 director Sam Raimi has entered negotiations with Marvel Studios to come in and helm Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Raimi is still in talks to direct the upcoming sequel, and if a deal is made, he'll replace Scott Derrickson, who directed 2016's Doctor Strange and recently left the director's chair (Derrickson will stay on board as an executive producer).

There's been rampant speculation (including from me!) about whether Derrickson walked away over disagreements about the horror elements of the story, since Doctor Strange 2 has previously been hyped as the first "scary" movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. /Film has since heard the horror elements were not the cause of those creative differences. But this announcement obviously indicates that Kevin Feige and the rest of the producers were not thrilled with the film's current incarnation, and I'm curious to see if the horror angle will remain in Raimi's version (assuming he officially comes on board), since that was tied to Derrickson's pitch for what he wanted to do with the sequel. Considering his filmography, Raimi may want to lean into the horror of it all...or he may have a whole different approach in mind. It's still too early to know for sure.

In any case, Michael Waldron is no stranger to the narrative complications of multiverses. He worked on Community and HarmonQuest before becoming a writer/producer on Rick and Morty, and has since gone on to get the coveted job of Loki showrunner. Marvel must like what he's done with that series thus far, which follows Loki hopping through the time and the multiverse using the Tesseract he stole during Avengers: Endgame. Feige has previously said the events of Loki will factor into Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, but he's also been very proud of how most of the Marvel movies try to tell their own individual stories, so we're still not sure if there's going to be a major connection between the show and the movie or if it will be more of an easter egg for fans paying close attention.

Doctor Strange 2 is currently slated for release on May 7, 2021.