Doctor Strange Almost Had a Shockingly Different Villain — Writer Reveals the Original MCU Plan

Doctor Strange almost had a very different first dance with a Marvel villain. Writer C. Robert Cargill says the plan was to pit Benedict Cumberbatch against Nightmare right out of the gate, and then Marvel nudged them in another direction.

Nightmare was the original big bad

Cargill told The Direct that he and director Scott Derrickson initially wanted Nightmare as the main antagonist of 2016's Doctor Strange. Marvel liked the pitch, but pushed back on timing.

'We wanted Nightmare as the villain of the first movie. Marvel loved the idea, but they said it felt more like a second movie character.'

Instead, the movie went with Mads Mikkelsen as Kaecilius, while the core cast introduced the world to the MCU version of the Sorcerer Supreme: Cumberbatch as Dr. Stephen Strange, Chiwetel Ejiofor as Karl Mordo, and Benedict Wong as Wong. The film hit U.S. theaters in 2016 under Derrickson.

The dream logic that got put on ice

This is the inside baseball part: Cargill says he and Derrickson are big on alternate realities and dream logic, and they wrote sequences that dove into that 'psychonaut' space for the first movie. The idea was to carry those concepts forward and fully unleash them in a sequel, with Strange battling Nightmare, the master of dreams whose realm literally bends to his whims.

What happened with the sequel?

Cargill never made it onto Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. He says he was not brought on before Derrickson exited the project, so their Nightmare plans never got out of the dream journal. He is still hoping Marvel circles back to the character at some point, and says he would happily write that script if asked.

• Plan A for Doctor Strange (2016): Nightmare as the villain
• Marvel feedback: Great idea, but better suited for a second movie
• Pivot: Kaecilius (Mads Mikkelsen) becomes the first film's antagonist
• In the background: Cargill and Derrickson develop dream-world concepts for a potential sequel
• Sequel reality: Cargill never boarded Multiverse of Madness after Derrickson left, so Nightmare stayed on the shelf
• Where it stands: Cargill still wants Marvel to use Nightmare down the road

Both Doctor Strange (2016) and 2022's Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness are streaming on Disney+ if you want a refresher before Marvel (maybe) finally lets Strange take on the lord of bad dreams.

For the paper trail folks: Cargill's comments came via The Direct, with the initial report credited to Brandon Schreur at SuperHeroHype.