MCU: 10 Fascinating Facts Behind Doctor Strange (2016)
5. Magic As Science
The first Thor film memorably saw Thor explaining the magic of the MCU away as “science you don’t understand yet”. Turns out, that motto came directly from Kevin Feige himself.
In an interview during the lead-up to Doctor Strange, Feige described the studio’s approach to magic, saying;
“Have you watched the Cosmos series? That's magic, the quantum physics. If somebody knew how to tap into that stuff, what's the difference between that and magic? You don't get into it in Harry Potter, but if a scientist went to Hogwarts, he'd find out how some of that stuff is happening! We're not going to spend a lot of time on it, but there will be some of that, particularly for a character like Doctor Strange, who goes from a man of science to a man of faith and who traverses both worlds. And sometimes there won't be an answer! Sometimes he'll want an answer--'How is this happening?'--and nothing!”
In other words, Feige wanted there to be concrete reasoning and logic behind every spell. Yes, building bend in on themselves but only because they’ve entered the Mirror Realm. Yes, Kaecilius and his followers are gifted with powerful magic but only because of their allegiance to Dormammu. Everything has a rhyme and reason to it and that’s because of Feige.