Spider man no way home benedict cumberbatch

Benedict Cumberbatch still thinks Doctor Strange did the right thing in Spider-Man: No Way Home.

Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, the 45-year-old Doctor Strange star once againdefended his character's actions when it comes to that severely broken spell...

“He’s a human being, and I think it was a very human error,” he explained. “He saw Peter as a fellow foot soldier and then as a teenager going through a very formative experience of not being able to be his true self because of being exposed, and having lost a mentor, [Strange] decided to step in with a gesture of pretty good intention.”

Although Strange clearly had good intentions, he’s come under fire from fans who think his actions were remarkably blasé for a spell that could shatter reality itself. But Cumberbatch insists it wasn’t all Doctor Strange’s fault.

“I think the spell, on its own, might have been all right,” he said. “Everyone forgets that Peter interrupts the spell so many times, and that’s what corrupted it. That’s what lets it in. Peter, through the ability he has with his powers, affects the spell with his words. It’s not really Strange’s mistake.”

The big question is really, should Doctor Strange have cast the spell in the first place? Cumberbatch has an answer for that, too.

“He’s right to want to help Peter. What kind of superhero would he be if he didn’t want to help another superhero? That’s kind of questionable. That avuncular love, that genuine love, which, by the end, is another cause for a near mistake, but he rights the correction there in accepting Peter’s idea of channeling the forgetfulness into the identification of him as Peter Parker so that everyone forgets who Peter Parker is. And it’s costly to [Strange] because he cares for the guy.

"He says, 'We. Everyone who loves you. We [would have no memory of you],' and in the use of that pronoun, which was my idea to put in, he allies himself with MJ [Zendaya] and everyone in that universe who loves Peter.”

“I think somebody who cares about somebody can be forgiven for doing something that has consequences,” he added. “But in that moment, it takes a teenager to adjust him to doing the thing for the greater good rather than the selfish thing, which would be to not do that spell so he can carry on a friendship with the guy that he cares about.”

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness - New Trailer Screenshots

Ironically, Cumberbatch says it’s all about his humanity – interesting for a superhero who’s often considered a bit aloof. That said, he has already stated that this infamous spell wasn’t all arrogance.

“I empathize very much with the idea that a superhero can make a mistake because of their humanity,” he said. “I’m glad that I’m playing one that does.”

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Doctor Strange, alongside Elizabeth Olsen as Scarlet Witch. They’re joined by Chiwetel Ejiofor, Benedict Wong, Rachel McAdams, and Xochitl Gomez.

Sam Raimi directed the movie from a script by Michael Waldron, based on characters created by comic book legends, Steve Ditko, and Stan Lee.

Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.

Spider-Man: No Way Home star Benedict Cumberbatch has never really had any doubt that the movie was going to be a hit. When he was confronted with rumors that he was initially nervous about the Spider-Man 3's success, he cleared things up and explained how that particular talk got started

Spider-Man: No Way Home was released in December of 2021 and while there were some who wondered if it might do big numbers because it was in the middle of a resurgent COVID pandemic, it turns out those worries were unfounded. The Tom Holland and Cumberbatch-starring movie turned out to be a massive box office and critical success.

While appearing on the red carpet for the Screen Actor's Guild awards two weeks ago, Cumberbatch was cornered by an interviewer with Entertainment Tonight about the rumor that he was worried about Spider-Man: No Way Home when he first got into it. When he was first asked whether he thought Spider-Man: No Way Home might struggle, he appeared to be genuinely taken aback answering no very quickly. After a beat, the actor appeared to have realized where that talk came from, explaining that it was born out of a conversation with Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige. Cumberbatch said that Feige told him that No Way Home was "the future of cinema in this period."

Cumberbatch went on to explain that at first he thought that Feige was being a bit extreme until it was explained to him that Spider-Man: No Way Home would have to succeed only based on box office results because it couldn't lean on a streaming service, since Sony didn't have a dedicated platform to put the movie on. It was then that it dawned on the actor that this was indeed a bit of a test balloon to see if movies that were being screened in theaters could really have the kind of success they had in the past. It was a test to see if audiences were ready to go back in large numbers.

Of course, it's well known now that Spider-Man: No Way Home was indeed a massive success despite not having the kind of parachute that movies like Mortal Kombat or Wonder Woman 1984 had with HBO Max. But Cumberbatch wants everyone to understand that while there might have been some trepidation about whether people would be coming to the theater in the way they had in years past, he always knew that the cast and the script were more than good enough to make a very successful movie.

Spider-Man: No Way Homeis currently in theaters.

MORE: Who Was That Bull-Man In The Doctor Strange 2 Trailer?

Source: Entertainment Tonight/Twitter