Thread:Jaga 321/@comment-1359657-20170501215808

Here's my first draft of the Doctor Strange movie plot:

Doctor Strange: Master oif the Mystic Arts is NOT an origin story. The structure is more like the 1989 Batman movie, with Strange still new to the job, but establishing himself as a sorcerer as the thrust of the main plot.

Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) is already a mystic student in Kamar-Taj at the start of the film, but not yet Master of the Mystic Arts. It does feature his origin, in flashbacks and nightmares, but the crux of it is devoted to the story of how he goes from a decent sorcerer to a great one.

The New York Sanctum Sanctorum is breached and its master, Daniel Drumm, murdered. This is followed swiftly by the deaths of the Three Ancient Ones: Arianrhod (Tilda Swinton), Yao (Cary Higeyuki-Tagawa), and Hamir (Topo Wresniriwo), and the theft of the artifacts in their custody. These artifacts are the now-famous Regalia of the Sorcerer Supreme: The Cloak of Levitation, the Book of the Vishanti, and the Eye of Agamotto (which is a powerful divination and scrying tool, like it is in the comics, but does NOT possess the Time Gem or any time-related powers).

Strange and his fellow sorcerers: Karl Mordo, Wong, and Tina Minoru (all with their cinematic casts) must investigate and find out who killed their beloved teachers, in the process fighting The Order Of He-Who-Sleeps. It is learned that this cult, who worships an Outer God from before the dawn of time, killed the Ancient Ones and stole their relics in order to use their power to revive their god. However, the Order can't use the artifacts for some reason, and so they turn to darker magics, searching for the Darkhold, the counterpart to the Book of the Vishanti and the most evil spellbook in all of creation. In the subsequent fight against the Order, we see the others' uniique weapons and powers, including Tina's Staff of One.

Before they can claim victory, however, the cult leader, Belasco (Robert Knepper) invokes the Rite of Banishment, sending Strange and his alllies into the Realm of Nightmares, a dimension ruled by the demon called, fittingly enough, Nightmare (Jeremy Irons, or a CG model with his voice). Smooth, seductive, and sinister, Nightmare at first tries to tempt Strange off the path of justice, but then tortures everyone with their worst fears and failings, monsters and realms that beggar the imagination. Strange himself relives his past: the career he held as a neurosurgeon in New York, the car accident that maimed and traumatized him, and watches as, one by one, lives he would have saved as a doctor end withot him. He also sees horrors beyond imagining invade the world because of his failure as a sorcerer: ancient evils like Dormammu, Blackheart, and...in a brief, terrifying glimpse...Shuma-Gorath, whose monstrous, tentacled form covers the entire sky over Manhattan for a moment.

Suddenly, the nightmares halt, and Strange is visited by spectres -- the apparitions of the Three Ancient Ones, his teachers. It is revealed that the Ancient Ones were not simply killed, but their souls were trapped in this horrific world, with the intent to drive them mad. But each of them has fought Nightmare before, and all of them together can hold him off...but not defeat him, not without Stephen's help. Stephen, guided by the souls, escapes the nightmares and  reunites with his friends, though Mordo and Tina seem somewhat changed by the experience.

Finally, expending nearly all his power, Stephen saves the Ancient Ones' spirits, and they pass on peacefully, leaving behind portions of their own mystical energy as keys to the artifacts they once guarded. Fueled by their passing, and by his own trials and the strength they have given him, Stephen leads the sorcerers back to their home dimension, to finish what they started with the Order.

Stephen and the other sorcerers eventually defeat the Order of He-Who-Sleeps and overpowering their lord, Belasco. Strange is about to strip him of his powers, when Tina and Mordo instead open a "stepping-disc", a circle of light, that sends him to another dimension. Strange is appalled, but forgives them, understanding how they suffered in Nightmare's realm.

They return to Kamar-Taj, where Stephen takes on the mantle of New York's Sanctum Master. Keeping the Eye, the Cloak, and the Spell, he bids his friends farewell, and steps into his sanctum, with a dramatic long-shot of his back against the Mystic Window right before we cut to credits.

MID-CREDITS STINGER: Strange is sitting at a massive crystal ball -- the Orb of Agamotto -- and seeing glimpses of events yet to come, threats that he cannot face alone...and friends and allies he has not yet met.

But someone has to gather them. So he rises to his feet and swirls his Cloak about himself, ready to start the task of Assembling.

POST-CREDITS STINGER: Tina Minoru and Karl Mordo are sitting cross-legged across from each other, chanting in a strange language. Abruptly, their eyes turn red, and green tentacles of energy spread from one to the other, as the phrase they repeat translates into English for the audience:

SHUMA-GORATH IS COMING...SHUMA-GORATH IS COMING...

(NOTE: I didn't use Shuma-Gorath himself as an antagonist for this film, because I want to save him for a Thanos-style Bigger Bad of the universe). 