Doctor Strange's Cut Death Scene May Rattle Marvel Fans But Cast & Crew Loved It
One of the most tragic moments of Doctor Stephen Strange's (Benedict Cumberbatch) life was cut from the MCU and will likely never see the light of day. The scene in question depicted the death of Donna Strange, Stephen's younger sister. In the comic book issue "Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme, Vol 1 #45," a 17-year-old Donna drowns while out on a lake with the 19-year-old Stephen. The first "Doctor Strange" movie reportedly shot scenes depicting the heartbreaking events of that fateful day, but it was ultimately considered too tonally dissonant to make the final cut. The scrapped sequence isn't even available as an extra on the digital Disney+ edition.
The part of Donna Strange is played by Lulu Wilson, best known for her work in horror films like the "Becky" series. Since Wilson, who spoke to ComicBook about the role, would have been quite young when she shot the scene, it's clear that the MCU version of Donna's death would have slightly altered the source material, meeting her tragic fate as a small child rather than a teenager. "I was in fifth grade and was really, really young," Wilson said.
"Doctor Strange" director Scott Derrickson spoke to Collider about the scene in 2016, noting, "We shot that scene, and I loved that scene. It was a really great scene. It just didn't fit in the movie. It felt like ... it just didn't work. But the self-contained scene by itself, I thought it was great."
Multiverse of Madness referenced the death of a Doctor Strange comic book character
Despite the Donna Strange scene's omission from "Doctor Strange," the former Sorcerer Supreme still references that traumatizing day in "Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness." While traveling through the multiverse, Strange winds up in an alternate reality experiencing an incursion — a collision of two universes that destroys both. There, he meets Sinister Strange, a variant of himself. Sinister Strange asks for proof that he's talking to another variant, to which our version of the doctor replies, "We had a sister, Donna. She died when we were kids ... We were playing on a frozen lake, and she fell through the ice. I couldn't save her."
Donna's drowning may not have been put to screen, but this line confirms it's still canon for the MCU version of Strange. "That had a real significant effect," Scott Derrickson told Collider, "and was probably instrumental in him becoming a doctor." It's also a significant "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" Easter egg and proof there's a lot of backstory fans don't get to see, even for the most central characters in the franchise.
As for Lulu Wilson, she's disappointed it was kept in the vault. "So I died and remember being a little bit pissed because, come on, that would have been a good moment and would have been good for me," she told ComicBook.