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Comic book creators have created all kinds of team-ups over the years, and that means more than just teams of heroes like the Avengers or villains like the Suicide Squad. It also means teaming up superheros people wouldn’t normally associate with each other. 

Marvel fans are doing that by wishing for a team-up between Spider-Man and Doctor Strange, and both of them have movies coming out in close proximity — though not as close as originally planned.  

Why do fans suggest Doctor Strange and Spidey?

Tom Holland on the red carpet
Tom Holland | Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images for Disney

Fans discussed team-ups on Reddit, with a picture of Blade and Wolverine kicking off the conversation. Between Wolverine’s claws and Blade’s sword, that’s a lot of sharp metal flying around. However, fans are eager to see the wall-crawler work together with the Master of Mystic Arts. One reason? Location.

“Doctor Strange and Spider-Man. Both are native New Yorkers and friends in the comics despite being so different,” one fan pointed out. Another fan suggested teaming up Spider-Man with the Fantastic Four, which would be a dramatic way to introduce the latter into the MCU.

Spider-Man and Marvel’s first family crossed over in the comics several times. It was Mister Fantastic who told Spider-Man that his snazzy new black costume was an alien symbiote who would be known as Venom.

Other suggested team-ups included Spider-Man, Human Torch and Shadowcat, and Daredevil and Spider-Man. There has been unconfirmed speculation that this could kind of/sort of happen in the third standalone Spider-Man movie with Tom Holland, via an appearance by Matt Murdock, played by Charlie Cox of the Daredevil Netflix series.

Doctor Strange and Spider-Man have sequels coming up

Until very recently, Doctor Strange and Spider-Man were going to have movies coming out almost back to back. Marvel’s original Phase 4 schedule had Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness coming in May 2021, with Spider-Man 3 slated to follow in July. There had been no reports that Spider-Man and Doctor Strange would connect, but now the pandemic has pushed their movies farther apart. 

According to Deadline, Sony announced that the third MCU Spider-Man movie would be pushed back to November 2021. That would have brushed it up right against Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, which had moved from May 2021 to November 2021.

Now, with Spider-Man taking November 2021, Multiverse of Madness has been pushed back again to March 2022, so that means it now closes out Phase 4 instead of Thor: Love and Thunder, which comes out in February 2022. 

It had been widely reported that the series Wanda Vision would somehow lead into Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Whether this also pushes back WandaVision’s release date has not been made clear. 

Marvel had a comic series just for team -ups 

As it happens, there was a Marvel comic series that was devoted to team-ups. Just as DC frequently paired Batman and Superman in a comic called World’s Finest, Marvel had its team-up series, and most of the team-ups featured Spider-Man. The first featured Spidey working with the Human Touch to fend off the Sandman. 

Marvel’s official website put together a list of the best team-ups, placing the Human Torch one first. Other featured teams were Spider-Man, Yellowjacket and the Wasp. Spider-Man and Captain Britain, and Spider-Man and the X-Men. 

Perhaps one of the reasons fans suggested Doctor Strange was because that was one of the comic team-ups. The website reads, “Doctor Strange was a werewolf in this tale, but that’s not why it made the list. Instead, it was the redemptive turn of Satana, the daughter of Satan, that makes this story so special. Strange’s soul was imprisoned and imperiled, and only Spidey and Satana had a chance to save him.”

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