Doctor Strange 2 Writer Talks Marvel Studios’ Multiverse

“There was always the notion of her as part of the ensemble and this discussion of does she go bad at the end? I mean, it’s always been in the cards because it’s who the character is in the comics, building to “House of M” and all that stuff, there’s Wanda descending into madness. We were excited about the idea of making her the primary antagonist in the film because it felt like there was no stronger antagonist. And it felt like to have her as just a member of an ensemble only to turn bad at the end would actually be shortchanging both versions of that journey. You’d get maybe a lousy version of her fall from grace, and also maybe a lousy version of her being a villain, as opposed to the really fun version of her being the villain. And you know there’s the feeling that the door had been open for us. She opened the Darkhold at the end of “WandaVision” and that’s the Book of the Damned. So it was there for the taking.”

“My feeling was that “WandaVision” pushed her to the place where she reckoned with this grief, but maybe what she hadn’t reckoned with was her anger over all of it, and that was something that I discussed with Lizzie. And I think that that’s what the Darkhold seized on, was that anger, and that really clouds Wanda’s decision-making. I also think she’s making good points throughout the movie. Stephen did give Thanos the Time Stone. Did he have to? Could there have been another way? That question is posed a lot throughout the movie. If he hadn’t given Thanos the Time Stone … I mean Wanda killed Vision. The Mind Stone was gone. It’s just to say, I think that she’s making good points and it just felt like a really delicious conflict to explore.”

“It wasn’t a seismic change. For us, it just meant that Strange had more of an awareness of the multiverse, and that he had been on a prior adventure with teenagers. He knew how to relate to America a little bit better than he would have if our movie had come first. They got to do the ‘Scooby-Doo this shit’ jokes and I didn’t, but that was that was okay.”

“Fortunately, I was the ‘Loki’ guy, which helped. I was like, okay, the very least I can make sure I’m not screwing over ‘Loki’.
Yeah, that’s the gift I can give myself is make these things congruous. It remains to be seen – how did the events of this movie play out through the lens of the TVA? What would they look like on a chronomonitor? I don’t know. We’ll have to find out.”