Leading up to the release of “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” much of the hardcore fan discussion surrounded the suspected cameos in the film. Some were teased in the trailers, particularly Professor X (Patrick Stewart, reprising his role from the “X-Men” films). However, one of the biggest cameos was kept a secret until the film premiered, with John Krasinski showing up as Reed Richards, aka Mr. Fantastic of the Fantastic Four. And it appears that even if Reed Richards didn’t show up as part of the Illuminati, the character was going to be part of the ‘Multiverse of Madness’ in one way or another.
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Speaking to Empire, ‘Doctor Strange 2’ writer Michael Waldron teased his original idea for having Reed Richards show up in the film and it was in a very different scene than what appears in the finished feature. Apparently, Waldron’s love of Reed Richards meant the writer wanted him to have his own post-credits scene.
“I always wanted Reed Richards in this thing,” Waldron teased. “In my very first draft, I wrote a tag just for the hell of it, of the events of the movie being recorded and reviewed by somebody in the Baxter Building, and a stretchy hand coming into frame to run it back.”
He added, “Reed is probably my favorite Marvel comics character, so I was always gunning to get him in here somewhere.”
Obviously, plans changed and Reed’s role was given more meat, with Krasinksi being cast as a nod to the fan-casting that seemed to dominate the discussion. And the post-credits scenes were one throwaway scene with Bruce Campbell and then a surprise appearance by Charlize Theron as Clea in another, teasing a possible sequel.
It would have been fun to see the original Reed Richards scene in some form. Obviously, Marvel Studios is releasing a new “Fantastic Four” film in 2024 and this could have been a way to begin the tease for it, by just including a stretchy hand and not necessarily revealing the person it’s attached to. Alas, Marvel clearly has other plans in mind, so we’ll have to wait a bit longer before we find out the true future of Reed Richards and Marvel’s First Family.