Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness may turn out to be one of the defining movies of the Twenties. The red pill–blue pill reality dichotomy of The Matrix is no longer sufficient in explaining the crazed and hectic shattering of perceived truth into an infinite number of shards. When male swimmers stuff their junk into a ladies’ one-piece and declare themselves women, who’s to say they aren’t exercising their sci-fi right to slip away into an alternate universe? When Marvel presents alternate slates of superheroes, it feels like a nod to all those who thought there were alternate slates of 2020 presidential electors out there.
If we can’t even agree on which reality we’re in, civil society could become as frenzied and fractured as this fascinatingly overblown movie. “Is America okay?” someone asks near the end of the chaos carnival. America, in the movie, is a teen girl, not a country, but the question is still pertinent. Is America okay? The legitimacy of three of the last four presidents is hotly disputed, and halfway through the screening, someone leaked a draft Supreme Court opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade. The leaker evidently hoped that the premature appearance of the document would jolt us all out of one reality and into another.
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