Unique and unconventional style, but lacks the substance to make it better than it could've been.

Rating: 7/10 (28 October 2016)

Probably everyone's biggest immediate perception at what's so amazing about this film is of course the visuals, and yes there's no denying it was such an extravagant experience especially considering watching it in 3D and 4DX. The mind-bending, intergalactic, space time continuum trippy-ness of the film makes up most of the chunk that makes this film a cut above the rest of all the Marvel films and it's a breath of fresh air that it remains that way through out the film. Benedict Cumberbatch is well cast, if Marvel is indeed planning on making the new "RDJ- like" character archetype then they're lucky to find another Sherlock actor to fill in that role because his arrogance, charisma and elegance were all translated so fluidly in the film. In fact, the actors in this film are all individually strong and there's no surprise since almost all of them have been given Oscar nods and recognition to be well rounded actors.
Nonetheless, style over substance is never usually a good thing, and I'm not making an exception here even if I do concede that the film looked hella cool. My biggest con in the film is probably how everything is either just so one or two dimensional (ironically, in a film about mind-bending stuff). If you take a step back and remove all the visuals, you get a run by the numbers generic plot with minimal impact. The plot leaves little to no tension with yet another "world ending" and life threatening plot line which will obviously be solved by an already existing deus ex machina. There are obvious and predictable foreshadowing hints wherein it really didn't feel like they were trying to be subtle anymore and force dialogue unto your face saying "Remember this thing I'm telling you, it's going to be used in the future and you'll totally know when". Also, the lack of tension in the film is quite appalling, sure it's executed beautifully, but that doesn't mean I'm going to fully appreciate the scene for what it truly is and what it means for the whole plot. Since the film focuses too much on the visuals, the audience is led to really forget about the tension and the possible stakeholders that might happen because cool unorthodox things are showing up on your screen. This makes it rather hard to relate to the characters and have slow and development heavy moments to be overshadowed. The second con is how we have no actual grasp of the extents and limitations of the powers in play here, IM NOT SAYING MAGIC IN THE FILM WAS A BAD THING, Magic can definitely be a good and special thing to do, but only if it is executed well enough not just in visuals but in substance as well. Sadly, the film glosses over that after such a strong first act. Suddenly after a span of reading montages, you sort of just have to accept he's this good and pro at this now. Even though from the start the film does show him struggle, the next few scenes, he's shown being able to handle toe to toe with a dark magic user who's way more experienced than him, and that's exactly the point. Sure there are quick explanations like him reading all the books in library etc etc, but it then leaves us with no grasp or knowledge as to what are the extents of the magic in this film, what are the strengths and weaknesses of each sorcerer or what are the possibilities for magic in battle and why do they even move God damn architecture. The point isn't that the visuals and the magic were horrible per say, but we had no grasp of what they truly are and are only left with ambiguity and cool scenes. Like the final battle was solved by such a convenient plot device that you even wonder why that wasn't even used before to prevent horrible events from ever happening, oh well they only explain that with a crappy one liner that doesn't work as well as it does in Doctor Who ("Time is Relative"). Lastly, the villain and the rest of the film is quite underwhelming and forgettable. It's a trend for Marvel films to have quite lackluster and monochrome villains, this isn't an exception even with Mads Mikkelsen as the actor. Not much to say about the musical score as well, ever since the "Marvel Symphonic Universe" essay made by Tony Zhou(Every Frame a Painting) it wasn't quite a surprise to have a rather generic and even non- existent Doctor Strange theme, odd considering solo films like Iron Man 1 and Ant-Man had their own distinct musical scores you can attach them too.
Overall, it's not a great movie, not a bad movie either. It's perfectly up to you whether or not you will absolutely adore this film mainly because of it's unconventional visual style and not care about the lack of substance and a run by the numbers safe origin plot. It's definitely not as good as Civil War and debatable if we compare with Ant-Man, but nonetheless it's a solid and unique Marvel entry.
Verdict: 7.6/10