'Doctor Strange 2': Both Post-Credits Scenes, Explained

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Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness hit theaters Friday, pinacle and sent the Marvel Cinematic Universe's charmingly grumpy sorcerer on a reality hopping adventure. The movie brings director Sam Raimi back to Marvel for the first time since 2007's Spider-Man 3, leans hard into his signature horror style and one of its two post-credits scenes riffs on a moment from early in his career.

The movie takes place after the events of Spider-Man: No Way Home, which saw Strange offering Peter Parker some magical help as the teen dealt with the entire world knowing his secret identity.

Let's step into a portal and netent explore a universe full of SPOILERS. We also have a separate ending explainer, a deep dive into the Illuminati and a list of WTF questions the movie left us with.

Another sorcerer

In a mid-credits scene, Strange is happily strolling through Manhattan's streets, having seemingly accepted the corruption caused by his use of the Darkhold. He's intercepted by a blonde sorcerer in a purple and liverpool pink costume (Charlize Theron). She opens a portal to the Dark Dimension, the hellish reality ruled by 2016 Doctor Strange big bad Dormammu.

"You created an incursion and we're gonna fix it... unless you're afraid?" she says.

"Not in the least," he responds, his Darkhold-induced third eye opening.

Clea has been among Doctor Strange's most reliable allies in the comics.
Marvel Studios

What does it mean?

She isn't named until the credits start rolling after this scene, but Theron's character is Clea -- a Dark Dimension magic wielder who's been in the comics since the '60s.

She's the daughter of Dormammu's sister Umar and Dark Dimension Prince Orini, and became fascinated by Strange during one of his early adventures in that reality. Their paths have crossed many times in the years since, with Clea becoming Strange's student and later his wife.

Following the events of 2021's Death of Doctor Strange miniseries (you can imagine the premise), Clea replaced Strange as Sorcerer Supreme of Earth. Stephen will undoubtedly be resurrected and return to the role soon though, since status quo shifts like this seldom last long in the comics.

You might have been too busy reeling or screaming with joy when Reed Richards (John Krasinski) explained what incursions were earlier in the movie, but they're catastrophic events that occur when a multiversal reality crashes into another. (In the comics, this happened in 2015 event Secret Wars.)