Doctor Strange 2 Hires Rick and Morty Writer to Rewrite Script

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is undergoing even more change. Days after news surfaced Marvel Studios was circling Sam Raimi to take over the director’s chair from Scott Derrickson, the mystical sequel has landed a new writer as new reports from THR suggest Michael Waldron is being tasked with overhauling the script. Waldron currently serves as showrunner and creator for Loki, the Disney+ series featuring Tom Hiddleston’s Asgardians God of Mischief. Prior to that, the scribe worked in the writer’s room for Cartoon Network’s Rick and Morty.

Waldron takes over for Jac Schaeffer, the showrunner for Disney+’s WandaVision. And prior to that, rising screenwriter Bartlett was attached to the project. Now, it’d appear Marvel Studios has complete freedom to overhaul the script as need be.

Before, Derrickson has pushed through the idea Multiverse of Madness was going to be Marvel’s first scary movie, a comment that ended up resulting in more than one explanation from studio head Kevin Feige. One of those comments came at the New York Film Academy last October, when he suggested the movie would have scary moments, rather than being a full-on horror flick.

“Multiverse of Madness is the greatest title we’ve ever come up with, by the way, which is one thing that’s exciting about it,” the mega-producer said at the time. “I wouldn’t necessarily say that’s a horror film, but … it’ll be a big MCU film with scary sequences in it.”

He added, “I mean, there are horrifying sequences in Raiders [of the Lost Ark] that I as a little kid would [cover my eyes] when their faces melted. Or Temple of Doom, of course, or Gremlins, or Poltergeist. These are the movies that invented the PG-13 rating, by the way. They were PG and then they were like, ‘We need another [rating].’ But that’s fun. It’s fun to be scared in that way, and not a horrific, torturous way, but a way that is legitimately scary … but scary in the service of an exhilarating emotion.”

The move is very on-brand for the Marvel Studios umbrella and promoting within. Most executive producers on the flicks now, such as Trinh Tran, Johnathan Schwartz, and like, started at years ago as assistants before working their way up.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness hits theaters May 7, 2021.