MCU: 10 Fascinating Facts Behind Doctor Strange (2016)

Writer and director Scott Derrickson had been a huge Doctor Strange fan for all of his life and desperately wanted to be a part of this mystical chapter of the MCU. So much so that he spent a ton of his own money vying for the spot and wound up designing a setpiece that is in the feature film.

In preparing for his pitch with Marvel, Derrickson looked to the comics and envisioned a setpiece in which Strange would take to his astral form and have to fight a fellow sorcerer, all while his real body was being operated on by his love interest, Christine Palmer, in the hospital. Derrickson pitched this to Marvel, who loved the idea so much that they insisted it be worked into the script.

Derrickson’s fandom and intense research during this period paid off immensely, leading to some truly head-scratching Easter Eggs and some of the film’s best moments.