Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness has finally arrived on Disney + and Marvel fans are now able to watch the crazy multiverse chaos provoked by the Scarlet Witch, Doctor Strange, and America Chavez as many times as needed. Horror movie director and producer Sam Raimi was in charge of Doctor Strange’s sequel and was not shy in adding references to classic horror movies that creeped audiences out.
Although according to Murphy’s Multiversehe has only confirmed Evil Dead‘s influence on the film, there were other scenes throughout the movie that shared an uncanny resemblance to other iconic horror movie moments.
Carrie
Scarlet Witch is not the only woman with telekinetic powers and dripping with blood that has killed everyone in a room. Carrie was the first one to do it in 1973 in the film adaptation of Stephen King’s debut novel. The movie itself is not that scary, but the iconic scene where a bucket of pig’s blood is dropped on Carrie is certainly spine-chilling.
Just like Wanda, Carrie was a good person, but the cruelties of other people drove her to become homicidal and, in a fit of rage, decided to slaughter everyone at reach. The scene where Maximoff enters the Illuminati facilities seems to honor Stephen King’s eponymous character with Wanda’s pose, blood stains, and close-ups of her bleeding face.
IT
Every appearance of Wanda in Doctor Strange in The Multiverse Of Madness is constructed in a way that viewers can associate her with a monster, a ghost, or a demon. The scene where Wanda is trapped under the rubble is not the exception and bets audiences will remember from previous horror movies that anyone inside a dark hole underground is bad news.
When Xavier comes to talk to Wanda, there is an extreme resemblance to the scene in IT in which Georgie talks to Pennywise inside the sewer. Viewers can easily associate Maximoff with Pennywise and other scary shape-shifting monsters in horror, who, just like the Scarlet Witch, have the ability to be in different dimensions and is considerably evil.
Twilight Zone
This short scene in the Twilight Zone: The Movie scared a number of viewers, and maybe Raimi was one of the people who was so terrified by it that he wanted to make a tribute to it in one of the most brutal deaths in Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness.
Black Bolt’s mouth vanishing looks significantly similar to that of Sara’s in Twilight Zone. Like most viewers who watched the movie in 1983, Bolt could not help but scream at the horrible occurrence. It was really unfortunate that his superpower was his demise, but most would agree that to survive without a mouth (like Sara) is not a good way of living either.
The Exorcist
It’s likely that Raimi was not aiming for Chavez to look exactly like a possessed Linda Blair in The Exorcist because, in the end, Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness is still a movie for all ages. The truth is, however, almost all horror movies that depict a possession are inevitably based on the 1973 classic horror movie, and Chavez shared a lot of similarities with it.
Just like Linda, America was levitating, with her arms wide open, white eyes, and a slightly opened mouth. Most importantly, both were being controlled by an evil entity. Furthermore, in The Exorcist it is explicitly explained that Blair is possessed by a demon called Pazuzu, and it is said multiple times throughout Doctor Strange 2 that Wanda is or looks like a demon.
The Ring
A lot of fans were able to catch the similarities between the iconic scene of The Ring in which Sadako Yamamura crawls out of the TV and Wanda dragging herself out of a gong in Kamar-Taj. The way Maximoff squirms until she gains composure scared many viewers, just like Sadako first did in 1998.
It is interesting to see how one of the scariest horror movies based on Japanese legends made its way to the MCU, but for horror movie fans, it is no surprise that the country known for mastering horror film storytelling was hinted by one of Sam Raimi’s movies. .
Resident Evil
In the 2002 version of Resident Evil, the Red Queen traps Umbrella Corporation agents in a room where a laser trap kills them all. The character James “One” Shade is then grimly sliced into squares.
Although in the early 2000s that scene was shocking enough to traumatize audiences, it seems young viewers have the stomach to see Doctor Strange separated into pieces 20 years later. Even though the scene in Doctor Strange 2 does not imply any harm and it is defragmentation and not a murder, it still seems to hint at the disturbing aspects of being sliced up.
Drag Me To Hell
It is said that Sam Raimi usually hints at his own movies, and that seems to be the case in the scene where the Scarlet Witch is chasing America Chavez through Kamar-Taj and uses reflections to see where she is. Raimi frequently includes unusual eye shots in his movies and he successfully gives viewers the creeps when he adds that to the movie.
In Drag Me To Hell, one of the best films directed by Sam Raimi, there is a scene where the protagonist, Christine Brown, is eating dinner and suddenly, an eye appears on her cake, which is quite similar to Wanda’s eye appearing in a puddle. Although this moment in Drag Me To Hell is also very comparable to the memorable eye scene in Black Christmas.
The Mist
When the Scarlet Witch arrives in a huge cloud form at Kamar-Taj, it seems to be referencing the 2007 horror film. The Mist. The way said mist arrives at the grocery store in the movie can be compared to how Wanda appears at Kamar-Taj. Also, the way the masters of the Mystic Arts stare in horror at the fog upon its emergence is incredibly similar to the same suspense build-up in The Mist.
When the strange fog arrives at the grocery store, there is a siren alarm that goes off and sounds in the background. In Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness, when the Scarlet Witch arrives as red smoke where Xavier is helping Wanda, a siren alarm can be heard too, which further suggests again that Wanda’s fog is a reference to the mentioned horror movie.
The Grudge 2
Ju On: The Grudge is one of the best Japanese horror movies of all time and Sam Raimi produced many of the American remakes of the franchise. When Xavier is talking to Wanda and is trying to save her from her alternate self, the Scarlet Witch’s red fog approximates and Maximoff takes Xavier from behind to kill him.
The way Wanda holds Xavier by the head seems to imitate a scene in The Grudge 2 in which Miyuki gets suddenly taken by the iconic and terrifying ghost, Kayako Saeki. The Scarlet Witch and Kayako put one hand on the forehead and another one on the mouth or chin, and pull their victim to kill it.
Evil Dead
In all of the Evil Dead movies, Sam Raimi has participated as a writer, producer, and director, so it seems that many scenes from Doctor Strange In The Multiverse of Madness are similar to the ones of the famous franchise. Bruce Campbell is always cast by Raimi, and in the Doctor Strange sequel, he had to make a cameo.
The spell Doctor Strange does to Pizza Poppa is a reference to Evil Dead II. There is a scene in the movie where Ash’s hand (Bruce Campbell) is possessed and he has to chop it off with a chainsaw. Although it did not come down to that in Marvel’s movie, the hand did beat him up as badly as in the second title of Evil Dead.
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