WandaVision: Kevin Feige Explains Why Doctor Strange's Cameo Was Axed

Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige is opening up about why Doctor Strange (played by Benedict Cumberbatch) didn’t appear in WandaVision.

The Disney+ series had ample opportunity to introduce the Sorcerer Supreme: Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) is set to appear in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness — scheduled for release on March 25, 2022 — and he was referenced by name in the finale.

Although Cumberbatch actually struck a deal with Marvel to appear in WandaVision‘s final episode, he was written out late in the process because “it would have taken away from Wanda, which is what we didn’t want to do,” Feige revealed to Rolling Stone.

“We didn’t want the end of the show to be commoditized to go to the next movie — here’s the white guy, ‘Let me show you how power works,'” he explained. Per Rolling Stone, this meant that the Doctor Strange sequel also had to be rewritten to accommodate Cumberbatch’s appearance getting cut from WandaVision.

Plus, head writer Jac Schaeffer noted some of the ideas pitched about how to incorporate Cumberbatch into the show, including having Doctor Strange appear in one of the show’s Easter egg-filled ads and making it so that those commercials were actually messages from the Sorcerer Supreme to Wanda.