Cultural Crossovers #14: Doctor Strange

A quick pre-note: while suspension of disbelief is needed to believe in magic, of course, it’s not an unfamiliar context to the audience. The eldrae have a fine old hermetic tradition of their own, even if it’s regarded these days mostly as philosophy and “how we scienced before we learned how to science”.

Sadly, however, that both doctor and wizard mean “wise man”, in a sense, will be a little lost: long-term readers will remember that *there* doctor is a purely medical title, and the learned in other fields are generally titled academician.

• This folding of space is exceedingly impressive. Especially since everything isn’t collapsing.
• Doctor Strange, we presume.
• My, someone has an ego. (Not that that’s a bad thing when you can so obviously back it up.)
• Well, okay, maybe that’s going a little far. Also, “Strange Technique”? Snerk.
• Avoiding a challenge, Mr. Ego? Makes your perfect record a little meaningless, no?
• …and that would be the world taking your valxíjir from you.
• That avoidance bites back.
• I’m not sure that’s mania so much as a very familiar kind of despair. And yet, that’s still no excuse for such discourtesy.
• Always at the far end of the world, the wisdom is.
• Hiding in plain sight, I see. Promising.
• (Only some of the audience have the cosmopolitan experience to understand why it’s odd that the Ancient One doesn’t look ancient, because…. well, all the Ancient Ones they’ve met look like that.)
• You know, much as the audience might be inclined to agree with him, being punched right out of your body should really be awfully convincing. Even without the free trip through the Realm of Forms.
• …or maybe the Realm of Hands. What the hell, other plane?
• Ancient Snark from the Ancient One. Also, seriously, you show him the true nature of the universe and then throw him out? That’s a real dick move.
• Wi-Fi, indeed. Heh. Although the audience is unlikely to understand the whole Magic vs. Science trope this is playing off.
• Especially since the Ancient One’s spells-as-programs metaphor is exactly how they’d be inclined to think about magic anyway.
• “No knowledge is forbidden, only certain practices.” Ooh, we like you.
• Okay, as a general rule of thumb, rituals that make your eyes all charred-looking are probably not from the puppies and rainbows side of the force.
• The “sling ring”? I mean, the device is nifty enough, but it needs a much cooler name.
• Yeah, control by surrender doesn’t make much sense to these guys, either. Harmony vs. Discipline trope, and all that.
• No educational methods quite as effective as the ones ending “or death” anywhere, I see.
• Didn’t take you long to figure that out. But really, the one on his desk? That’s just trolling.
• A mirror dimension? That’s awfully convenient – artificial, we suspect.
• One does wonder who exactly the Living Tribunal are.
• Ah, the shiny green pupil of the Eye of Agamotto. No-one’s in any doubt whatsoever as to what that is.
• Oooh, time rewinding. We want one. Well, actually, we want quite a lot, because Just Think of the Potential Applications.
• …ah, yes, “don’t screw around with time”. That’s a universal everywhere. Alas.
• Extradimensional invasions, parasite universes. Gotcha.
• Yeah, that’s something that could have done with a little explanation up front. Maybe one of those cute sayings about great power and great responsibility?
• Hey, you don’t need to look surprised. You have the Ring of Everywhere-Going, and all.
• …best windows ever. (The Claves in the audience grin smugly.)
• Got to love the old infinite passage trick.
• Man, I hope that wasn’t expensive.
• Best cloak!
• Nice portable prison.
• Also, Kaecilius, I like your ambition and your distaste for time and death, but someone should really have explained to you the charred-face thing and the fundamental problem with borrowing power from extradimensional assholes.
• See, he gets it! Easy principle, right?
• Still best cloak!
• And now for an astral asskicking. Astkicking?
• From remote viewing to remote electrocution. I bet that application wasn’t in the library.
• Well, your world’s been thoroughly upended. Was the bigger revelation that the world works completely differently, or that Strange grew up?
• You know, people with the powers to alter natural law defending natural law per se is remarkably ironic, inasmuch as complete devotion to that principle would require doing absolutely nothing.
• The architects in the audience really, really want to be able to fold space like this. Such possibilities!
• (Also, is there really only one Dark Dimension? Or is Dormammu just kind of Spell-My-Name-With-A-The pretentious.)
• Well, her method evidently sucks less than theirs.
• …the audience hisses. Their lives have plenty of meaning without the prospect of death hanging over them, thank you so very much.
• Awww. Best cloak really is best cloak.
• Steal centuries of life from a giant abomination? Not the worst deed ever.
• Always nice to see a too late arrival from time-to-time. Especially when there’s a convenient rewinder.
• Heh. Stuck in a fish tank as time unwinds. What an embarrassing way to go.
• Listen to Wong. Wong understands the rules of ethical singularities.
• A time loop to trap a timeless being? Strange, you magnificent bastard!
• …and getting killed over and over again how many thousand times? Dammit, man, we have to offer a standing salute to your collection of moon-sized orichalcum balls!
• Yeah, they really should inscribe those the other way around.
• Oh, for frak’s sake, Mordo, the whole damn planet was about to get eaten. How could there possibly be a bill larger than that?
• Called it!
• Well, hello. So, there weren’t wizards on Midgard before? (And, even more importantly, Asgard doesn’t have self-refilling steins?)
• You walking away makes you undutiful. Going around taking away everyone else’s powers, starting with those which allow such unnatural acts as walking? There aren’t words for how much that makes you suck.
• And what’s wrong with the world is that not enough people subscribe to the naturalistic fallacy? You cosmic jackass.