10 Insane MCU Rumours Everyone Wanted To Be True
2. Tom Cruise Plays A Variant Of Tony Stark - Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness
The Rumour
The single most pervasive rumour doing the rounds ahead of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness' release was that the film would feature a cameo from one of the biggest movie stars on the planet not yet involved with the MCU - Tom freakin' Cruise.
Word spread like wildfire online that the production had secured a small role for the Mission: Impossible mega-star as a variant of Tony Stark who would appear briefly during the film's chaotic journey through the multiverse.
Beyond the sheer entertainment potential of seeing Cruise playing around in the MCU sandbox, as alt-Iron Man no less, it would've served as a cute in-joke for hardcore MCU fans, given that Cruise had expressed interest in starring in a solo Iron Man film in the late 1990s.
If there's any movie that could've pulled it off, it was surely this one, especially with Cruise spending a lot of time in London last year shooting Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One at the same time that the Doctor Strange sequel was in production.
What Really Happened
Cruise didn't turn up in Multiverse of Madness, though the film did at least deliver a bevy of crowd-pleasing - and then, totally horrifying - cameos in its already-iconic Illuminati sequence, namely Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and Mister Fantastic (John Krasinski).
In a post-release interview, screenwriter Michael Waldron stated that he did float the idea of bringing Cruise in for a cameo after reading about the rumour online.
However, the actor was apparently on a tight schedule while shooting Mission: Impossible, no doubt further impacted by its numerous pandemic-related shutdowns.