COVID has made quite a mess out of many things, and a franchise that builds upon itself being shifted around willy-nilly may have faced many more consequences than it initially expected. We’ve heard in the past that the release schedules between Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Spider-Man: No Way Home ended up forcing their hand to rewrite both projects to better fit the overarching narrative. Still, it made many wonders how that exactly impacted the production.
In a lengthy interview with Rolling Stone, director Sam Raimi got a chance to sit down and talk bout his experience working with Marvel Studios and within the MCU playbox. He has already praised the work in the past and is even open to returning for a future project. Yet, he also highlighted how the pandemic’s influence on two interconnected releases, previously-mentioned No Way Home and the Disney+ series WandaVision, impacted the writing process.
Yes, it was all on the fly. “Now this is happening. Now that’s happening.” It was a fun juggling game. I guess it must be like that for all of the directors and writers of these very big Marvel properties that now have a long history. It was a very chaotic, wonderful, creative — I don’t want to use the word “mess,” because that’s unfair — but it was just a cascade of ideas. We’d take the best ones and quickly weave together the fabric of this universe. It was very exciting, actually.
Sam Raimi
In a way, it sounds like they were able to weave their story even with the “cascade of ideas” weaving out of these projects. One has to admire the work these creatives go through to bring an entire franchise to life and the way Raimi is praising it sounds like it helped them become even more creative. It seems that WandaVision also only became a factor during the writing process, as that series was also facing changes and delays due to COVID.
I’m not really sure what the WandaVision schedule was or how it changed. I just know that halfway, or maybe three-quarters of the way into our writing process, I’d first heard of this show they were doing and that we would have to follow it. Therefore, we had to really study what WandaVision was doing, so we could have a proper through line and character-growth dynamic. I never even saw all of WandaVision; I’ve just seen key moments of some episodes that I was told directly impact our storyline.
Sam Raimi
As he highlights, things changed a lot behind-the-scenes and it’s to be expected when any projects are currently in development,w which also influence each other on a character and story basis. Raimi highlighted that these changes created a potential for creativity, which highlights a core aspect of these story elements. He highlights that he was heavily involved with the writing process alongside Loki‘s Michael Waldron and it makes the exciting prospect of what story they ended up within that playfield
Source: Rolling Stone
