CGI Deluged Boring Story

Rating: 5/10 (2 November 2016)

Marvel's Doctor Strange is a very high profile, and expensive, train wreck. That is if you haven't drank the Cool-Aid and relish everything Marvel. For the acolytes it's likely to be imbibed just as ravenously as all the other Marvel cocktails.
Dr. Stephen Strange is a egotistical neurosurgeon who chases his own hype at the expense of a real soul. Oh, he's brilliant in his realm, but he's a victim of his own success and self- centered selfishness. He's not saving lives, he's notching another victory for his personal scorecard. He faces his mortality after a horrific car crash ends his career. Due to his lack of depth beyond his ego he falls into a mean depression. He can't accept his lot to no longer feed his ego as a brilliant surgeon. Hearing of one man who beat the hard science that said he'd never walk again he seeks him out to find how he did it. That leads him to Nepal and, more specifically Kamar-Taj a mystical place where The Ancient One (a strikingly bald Tilda Swinton) trains warriors to defend Earth from a dark force.
We get the predictable "Rocky in training" sequence where Strange learns to harness power from teachings of The Ancient One and her band of mystics. It's all quite boring and rote. In fact it's a deluge of CGI the viewer was already hit hard with in the opening James Bond like big entrance. It was too much there and it only ramps up beginning with Strange's multi- dimensional boot camp where he learns to forget all he's learned. Science is crap and the mind is all that must be re-booted. The fallen warrior who stole secrets from books of The Ancient have become the Darth Vader of the dark other universe. If there's an original idea here please let me know because it's been done with far more flair and the love of humanity it seeks to preserve. This is stuff only a Marvel maven and CGI junkie could find compelling.
Sure, Strange survives to win a truce and save Earth, at least until the dark forces regroup and we get a sequel. That is something I, for one, will not be anxiously awaiting. Only for die-hard fans of the Marvel universe.