Rachel McAdams Archives

Review: ‘Send Help’ (2026), starring Rachel McAdams and Dylan O’Brien

January 26, 2026

by Carla Hay

Dylan O’Brien and Rachel McAdams in “Send Help” (Photo by Brook Ruston/20th Century Studios)

“Send Help” (2026)

Directed by Sam Raimi

Culture Representation: Taking place in Thailand and briefly in the United States, the horror comedy film “Send Help” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with some Asians and a few African Americans) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A socially awkward woman (who is an underappreciated and mistreated employee at her corporate job) and her terrible boss are the only survivors of a plane crash and are stuck on a deserted island where she has survival skills, and he does not.

Culture Audience: “Send Help” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of stars Rachel McAdams and Dylan O’Brien, director Sam Raimi, and gruesome horror movies that have dark comedy and social commentary about workplace abuses and power imbalances.

Rachel McAdams in “Send Help” (Photo by Brook Ruston/20th Century Studios)

The viciously funny horror comedy “Send Help” is not a typical “stranded on an island” story. The movie taps into rage that employees can feel when they have a horrible boss and shows what can happen when a downtrodden person gets the upper hand. Rachel McAdams gives a delightfully unhinged performance.

Directed by Sam Raimi, “Send Help” was written by Damian Shannon and Mark Swift. The movie takes place primarily in Thailand and briefly in an unnamed part of the Untied States. “Send Help” was actually filmed in Australia.

“Send Help” begins by showing protagonist Linda Liddle (played by McAdams), a bachelorette in her 40s, who works in a mid-level management job: She’s a strategy and planning executive in a corporate consulting firm called Preston, which is in the control of a family whose last name is Preston. Linda is intelligent and friendly but a socially awkward loner at work. She has been working at Preston for seven years.

Linda lives alone, and her closest companion is her pet bird named Sweetie. Linda is a hard worker and a skillful employee. She’s also a people pleaser who tries to avoid confrontations. Linda has workaholic tendencies and doesn’t hesitate to work longer hours than her peers, so she can do work that is impressive. Her fashion style can be described as “unassuming” and “bookish.” Other people might describe Linda’s style as “frumpy.”

Linda is passionate about two things outside of her job: She loves the music of Blondie, and she’s a huge fan of the American reality TV series “Survivor.” The Emmy-winning “Survivor” (which launched in 2000, and is based on the Swedish reality show “Expedition Robinson”) takes a group of contestants from various backgrounds, puts them in a remote location without any comfortable amenities, and requires the contestants to live outdoors in competing tribes. The contestants are voted out by tribe members until two or three finalists are left. The eliminated contestants vote for the winner, who gets a $1 million prize.

In the recent past, Linda made an audition video to be on “Survivor,” but she was rejected. However, that hasn’t deterred Linda. She still hopes that she can be chosen for “Survivor” and has kept up with the type of survival skills needed to live outdoors in a remote location, such as how to make a fire and how to find food. You know where this is going, of course.

At her job, Linda is feeling optimistic because the company’s CEO, who was her boss but who is now deceased, had promised that she would be promoted to vice president. (Bruce Campbell has the role of this unnamed CEO, who is seen in a flashback.) Linda now has a new boss: the deceased CEO’s arrogant and callous son Bradley Preston (played by Dylan O’Brien), who has replaced his father as the company’s new CEO. Linda will soon find out that Bradley has no intention of giving her a promotion. In fact, he wants her to leave the company.

The first time that Linda meets Bradley, she is a little nervous and flustered. Linda had been eating a tuna fish sandwich at her desk when Bradley was introduced to her. During their conversation, a little but of the tuna fish is still on the side of Linda’s mouth. Some of the tuna fish also ends up on Bradley’s hand when Linda shakes his hand. Bradley can barely hide his disgust, but Linda (who doesn’t know how to read social cues) doesn’t seem to notice.

Bradley has a subordinate executive named Franklin (played by Dennis Haysbert), whom Bradley orders to smell his hand and tell Bradley what the substance on his hand smells like. It’s an example of how Bradley treats his employees like his personal servants. Franklin dutifully tells Bradley that the substance smells like tuna fish. Later, Bradley uses this tuna fish faux pas as a reason to lie to Linda with a verbal reprimand saying that her co-workers have been complaining about the odor of the food she eats at her desk. Bradley tells Linda in a condescending way that she should stop eating food at her desk because she’s alienating her co-workers.

Bradley, who is very materialistic and superficial, thinks mousy-looking Linda doesn’t fit the image of the type of vice president he wants to have. Even if Linda fit that image, it wouldn’t have mattered because Bradley has already made up his mind to give the vice president job to his golf buddy Donovan (played by Xavier Samuel), who was in the same college fraternity as Bradley. Needless to say, Bradley has a “men’s club” misogynistic attitude where he gives preferential treatment to men in the workplace.

The movie has quick glimpses of Bradley being a sexual harasser of women. Bradley pretends to be a “good guy” to a lot of people, including his fiancée Zuri (played by Edyll Ismail), who seems very pleased that she’s engaged to a rich man who gave her large diamond engagment ring. Zuri is friendly to Linda when Bradley introduces Zuri to Linda. Zuri is shallow but she doesn’t have Bradley’s snobbery. She seems to be a blinded by his wealth and doesn’t know how awful Bradley can be.

Donovan, who has been working at Preston for only six months, isn’t nearly as experienced or as qualified as Linda. Donovan also has a sleazy sense of entitlement toward Linda. He deliberately sidelines Linda by taking credit for her ideas and blocking her from attending the meeting where she was supposed to present the ideas as her own. And then, when Bradley tells Linda that Donovan is getting the vice president job promotion that was promised to Linda, she almost reaches her breaking point.

Bradley uses corporate double-speak to tell Linda why she didn’t get the promotion. Bradley says that she’s good with numbers, but not every good with people. Bradley also says that she’s not ready to be a vice president for the company because the vice president job requires someone who’s more of a “people person,” who can “charm a room,” and who can “play golf.” Translation: “I’d rather promote an unqualified golf buddy than a qualified but nerdy woman like you.”

Bradley thinks Linda will quit over this promotion snub. But she doesn’t. Privately, he tells Donovan: “She makes me sick.” To test Linda’s character, Bradley invites her on an exclusive business trip to Bankgok, Thailand, with himself and other Preston executives, including Donovan and two other men in Bradley’s work clique: Chase (played by Chris Pang) and an unnamed employee (played by Aaron Shore), who is described as “Office Bro” in the film’s end credits. They are taking a small private plane for this business trip, where they are supposed to meet with clients.

On the plane, Bradley and the other men are gathered around a laptop computer because one of them found Linda’s “Survivor” audition video. The men openly laugh at the video and make insulting comments that are loud enough for Linda to know what they are doing. She is embarrassed but pretends not to notice. She’s affected enough to delete her work that she had been preparing for their upcoming business meeting.

The plane gets caught in a electrical storm and crashes in the ocean at night. The plane crash scene is very graphic, but it’s also the first indication that this movie’s comedy is going to be very dark because of what happens in the frantic attempts by everyone on the plane to stay alive. Let’s just say that Linda’s survival instincts and karma kick in massively.

Linda manages to swim to shore, she wakes up on a beach on a deserted island somewhere in Thailand, and she thinks she’s the only survivor of the plane crash. It’s not long before she sees that Bradley ended up on the beach too. And he’s alive. Bradley has a severe injury on his right leg. This injury makes him disabled for most of the story. And unlike Linda, Bradley does not have any survival skills. Bradley has to rely on Linda for food, shelter and recovery from his leg injury.

The rest of “Send Help” shows how Linda and Bradley react to this flip in their power imbalance. Sensitive viewers should be warned: There are some intentional “gross-out” scenes that might be too intense for people who easily get nauseated. An indication of what’s to come is in a scene (which is briefly hinted in the “Send Help” trailer) when Linda kills a wild boar for food. Her exhilarated reaction shows that her bloodlust has been unleashed.

Although there are some very gory and bloody scenes in “Send Help,” the movie is really more about the psychological aspects than the physical aspects of surviving this ordeal. Even though Bradley is physically incapacitated for a good deal of the movie, he still has the audacity to bark orders at Linda, as if she’s his lowly servant. One of the best lines in “Send Help” (which is already revealed in movie’s marketing materials) is when Linda snaps back: “We’re not in the office anymore.” There’s also a plot twist that isn’t very surprising because a big clue was given long before the plot twist is revealed.

McAdams is clearly having fun in the role of Linda, who is unlike any other character McAdams has played before and is destined to be one of McAdams’s most memorable performances. O’Brien’s accurate depiction of a corrupt CEO jerk with sociopathic tendencies isn’t entirely a parody because there are bullies who are this toxic in real life. The movie gets a little repetitive with the back-and-forth mind games and fight battles between Linda and Bradley. However, “Send Help” succeeds in being a no-holds-barred horror story where a mistreated employee who can “outwit, outplay, and outlast” (the slogan of “Survivor”) is a terrible boss’s worst nightmare.

20th Century Studios will release “Send Help” in U.S. cinemas on January 30, 2026.

Review: ‘Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.,’ starring Rachel McAdams, Abby Ryder Fortson and Kathy Bates

April 20, 2023

by Carla Hay

“Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret.”

Directed by Kelly Fremon Craig

Culture Representation: Taking place in 1970, in New Jersey and New York City, the comedy/drama film “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” (based on Judy Blume’s 1970 novel) features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: In a period of time when Margaret Simon goes from 11 to 12 years old, she worries about making friends at her new school, reaching puberty, and dealing with family issues that have to do with her parents’ interfaith marriage.

Culture Audience: “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” will appeal primarily to fans of the novel on which the movie is based and family-friendly movies about adolescent girls.

Abby Ryder Fortson, Amari Price, Elle Graham and Katherine Kupferer in “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” (Photo by Dana Hawley/Lionsgate)

Even though Judy Blume has authored many bestselling novel (most in the young adult genre), not many of these books have been made into feature films. The movie adaptation of Blume’s 1970 novel “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” is a delightful and faithful version of the beloved book. It’s not edgy, but it has accessible and well-done depictions of family angst, adolescent self-discovery and personal growth.

Written and directed by Kelly Fremon Craig, the comedy/drama “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” has the benefit of a very talented cast that does justice to all the complex emotions that are described in the book. Because the story takes place in 1970, it recalls a simpler time in America, when children did not have to deal with the traumas of cyberbullying and school mass shootings. At the same time, children back then had less resources and less options on how to get information on issues about growing up. Despite the “quaint” aspects of the story, “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” still has relatable topics that are timeless, especially to girls and women.

The movie “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” begins with the title character Margaret Simon (played by Abby Ryder Fortson), who has no siblings, feeling uprooted and unsettled. Her father Herb Simon (played by Benny Safdie) has gotten a job promotion, so he and his wife Barbara Simon (played by Rachel McAdams), who is Margaret’s compassionate mother, have decided to move from their New York City apartment to a larger home in New Jersey. The move is only a less than 50 miles away, but it might as well be a long-distance move, as far as Margaret is concerned.

Margaret, who celebrates her 12 birthday during the course of the story, worries about leaving her current friends behind and whether or not she’ll make friends in her new school. The move also means that Margaret won’t be able to spend as much time with Herb’s widowed mother Sylvia Simon (played by Kathy Bates), who lives in New York City and has a close emotional bond to Margaret. Sylvia is the only grandparent in Margaret’s life.

It’s later revealed that Barbara’s parents (who are conservative Christians) disapproved of Barbara marrying Herb, just because Herb is Jewish. Barbara’s parents, who live in Ohio, practically disowned Barbara because of this difference in religion. Barbara has been estranged from her parents for years. As a result, Herb and Barbara have decided not to raise Margaret in any religion and have told Margaret that she can decide which religion (if any) she wants to choose when she’s an adult.

Margaret is worried about other things besides moving to a new place. Many of her female peers are starting to grow breasts and get their menstrual periods. Margaret hasn’t had those biological developments yets, and she’s terrified that she’ll be a considered a “freak” if she’s a late bloomer. Much of the story is about Margaret getting involved in some hijinks (and a lot of talking to God) about wanting to become biologically developed by the time she becomes a teenager.

The movie also prominently features Barbara’s self-discovery and coming to terms with her family issues. Because Herb is earning more money from his job promotion, Barbara has decided to give up her job as an art teacher and become a homemaker. It allows her to spend more time at home and notice more of what’s going on with Margaret, who goes back and forth between confiding in her mother and hiding her true feelings from her mother.

On the day that the Simon family moves into their New Jersey house, a talkative neighbor girl with bossy and elitist tendencies comes over unannounced and invites Margaret to play in the yard sprinklers with her. Nancy Wheeler (played by Elle Graham) considers herself to eb the “queen bee” of her small clique at the school that she and Margaret attend. Nancy invites Margaret into a “secret club” that includes two other students from the school: easygoing Janie Loomis (played by Amari Price) and slightly nerdy Gretchen Potter (played by Katherine Kupferer).

Margaret makes fast friends with this group of girls. But she finds out that being part of this “secret club” comes with a social price. One of the club’s “rules” is that all of the members have to tell each other very private things, such as which boys they have crushes on and when they get their menstrual periods. Nancy is also a catty gossip who spreads unfounded promiscuity rumors about a classmate named Laura Danker (played by Isol Young), who is taller than most of the students and has all the physical developments of a woman.

A lot of stories with these types of adolescent would make a lot of the conflicts center on rivalries to get the attention of boys. There’s a small subplot about Margaret seeming to have a mutual attraction to a “nice guy” classmate nickname Moose Freed (played by Aidan Wojtak-Hissong), who is a friend of Nancy’s bratty older brother Evan Wheeler (played by Landon Baxter). However, the movie is much more focused on the female bonding, such as the relationships that Margaret has with her new friends, as well as those with her mother Barbara and grandmother Sylvia.

If these female relationships are the heart of the story, Margaret’s evolving relationship with God is the soul of the story. Just like in the book, Margaret talks to God during moments when she feels the most hope, fear, confusion and joy. She has to reckon with her evolving feelings about religion when a teacher named Mr. Benedict (played by Echo Kellum) encourages her to choose religion as her subject for an assigned class project where the student can choose which topic to research.

Ryder Fortson gives an utterly charming performance in “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” She isn’t overly perky, not is she an insufferable grouch. She’s completely convincing as the Margaret character in the way that Blume depicted her in the book. McAdams and Bates also have standout moments in their roles as family matriarchs who are very different from each other but share a similar fierce love for Margaret.

The movie gets occasionally dull and repetitive. This story is not going to endear itself to anyone who will get tired of hearing Margaret mope about how her breasts aren’t growing as fast as she wants to them to grow. And there’s a useless subplot about Barbara volunteering for too many parent-teacher association committees that are overseen by Nancy’s mother Jan Wheeler (played by Kate MacCluggage), who likes to think of herself as the high-society maven of the mothers in the community. (Blume has a cameo in the movie as a dog-walking neighbor.) Jan ends up overloading Barbara with work.

“Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” is certainly told through the lens of middle-class privilege, because it’s about girls who go to summer camp and never have to worry about being homeless or not having enough to eat. If people want a dark and depressing movie about adolescents, this isn’t it. But “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” delivers what it intends in offering a wistful and nostalgic look at adolescent girlhood in early 1970s America but remaining relatable to anyone who goes though a journey of self-identity.

Lionsgate will release “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.” in U.S. cinemas on April 28, 2023. A sneak preview of the movie was shown in select U.S. cinemas on April 19, 2023.

Review: ‘Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,’ starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Elizabeth Olsen, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Benedict Wong, Xochitl Gomez, Michael Stühlbarg and Rachel McAdams

May 3, 2022

by Carla Hay

“Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness”

Directed by Sam Raimi

Some language in Spanish with subtitles

Culture Representation: Taking place in New York City and various parts of a multiverse, the superhero action film “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans, Latinos and Asians) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: Superhero sorcerer Doctor Strange, also known as surgeon Stephen Strange, goes on a quest to save teenager America Chavez, who has a special superpower that a villain wants to steal.

Culture Audience: Besides appealing to the obvious target audience of comic book movie fans, “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of Benedict Cumberbatch, Elizabeth Olsen and the Disney+ superhero series “WandaVision.”

Elizabeth Olsen in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” (Photo courtesy of Marvel Studios)

The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has now become the world’s first cinematic franchise where you need encyclopedia knowledge of certain comic books to know what’s going on and to fully enjoy the movies and TV shows in the franchise. There are many MCU fans who’ve invested years of watching every Marvel movie and every Marvel TV show that comes along. And that investment has its rewards in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.”

But what about people who aren’t die-hard Marvel fans and just want to see a good superhero movie? Simply put: “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” is a convoluted but entertaining experience that should not be a viewer’s first MCU movie. It’s a movie that can be considered the tipping point where at least one Marvel show on Disney+ is essential viewing to understand the entire film.

For “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” that essential Marvel show is “WandaVision.” It also helps, but it’s not crucial, to watch the Disney+ animated series “What If…?,” which explored alternate storylines for Marvel characters. If you don’t want to watch any of these Marvel shows, then “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” has this message for you: “Too bad, because you will be left behind, and you will feel ignorant about storylines and nuances in any upcoming MCU movies.”

Viewers also need to see (or at least know what happened in) the following movies to fully appreciate “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” and its complex plot: 2016’s “Doctor Strange,” 2018’s “Avengers: Infinity War” and 2019’s “Avengers: Endgame.” If you don’t know about the supervillain Thanos or the five-year “disappearance” that he caused, some of the dialogue in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” will not make sense to you. Viewers who have no prior knowledge of any Marvel movie will just be hopelessly lost and will just have to try to enjoy “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” for the movie’s high-energy action scenes and compelling visual effects.

The movie’s screenplay, written by Michael Waldron, keeps transporting characters from Multiverse scene to Multiverse scene with such dizzying regularity, the best way to know these characters is by seeing them in previous MCU stories. “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” is just like very eye-catching and detailed icing on a cake. It will appeal to many people but be completely unnecessary to others.

Sam Raimi—a filmmaker known for helming the first three “Spider-Man” movies and horror classics such as the first two “Evil Dead” films—directed “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” as someone who is clearly an ardent fan of the MCU. But he also directed “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” as an ardent fan who expects everyone watching to be all caught up in almost everything related to Marvel on screen prior to the release of “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” And that includes some of the Marvel movies released by the studio formerly known as 20th Century Fox, because some characters from those movies make cameos in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.”

Here are the basic things that people need to know before watching “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness”: New York City-based superhero sorcerer Doctor Strange, also known as brilliant surgeon Stephen Strange (played by Benedict Cumberbatch), is going on another “good versus evil” quest. Fights and chase scenes ensue. And the “Multiverse” in the MCU is really just another word for “different versions of comic book characters existing in different universes.” After the blockbuster success of 2021’s “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” which had three different versions of Spider-Man interacting with each other in the same movie, there’s no point in being coy about what “multiverse” means if it’s part of a Marvel story.

However, there’s a reason why spoiler-free descriptions of “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” are so vague: The movie is filled with more spoilers than a typical superhero film. And those spoilers include describing which characters encounter different versions of themselves in the Multiverse. It should come as no surprise that viewers can expect to see more than one version of Doctor Strange, whose rescue mission in the movie is to save superhero newcomer America Chavez (played by Xochitl Gomez), who’s about 16 or 17 years old, from being robbed of her extremely rare superpower.

What is her superpower? She can travel through the Multiverse with ease. But in this movie, she doesn’t know how to control the power. All she knows is that she can exert this power in moments when she feels extreme fear. America doesn’t know yet that she’s a superhero, so “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” can be considered the introduction to her discovering her superhero identity. One of the things that America knows about herself is that she has not found other versions of herself in the Multiverse.

The movie also has a brief flashback to America, when she was about 7 or 8 years old (played by Aliyah Camacho), being separated from her two lesbian mothers—Elena Chavez (played by Ruth Livier) and Amalia Chavez (played by Chess Lopez)—who were involuntarily yanked into a portal that took the mothers into another universe. Ever since then, America has been looking for her mothers, and she fears that her mothers might be dead.

America feels a lot of guilt because she caused that portal to appear after she became frightened by a bee, not knowing that her parents would be taken away from her. In the Marvel comic books, America is openly a lesbian, but her sexuality is not mentioned in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” She’s too busy running around trying not to get killed to think about dating or having a love interest.

And who exactly is targeting America for her Multiverse superpower? It’s Wanda Maximoff, also known as Scarlet Witch (played by Elizabeth Olsen), a character who is a hero or a villain, depending on which version of this character is in the scene. And because this movie is all about the Multiverse, the Wanda/Scarlet Witch character can sometimes be a hero and a villain in the same scene.

In “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” Wanda is a single mother to fraternal twin boys Billy (played by Julian Hilliard) and Tommy (played by Jett Klyne), who are about 8 or 9 years old. Billy and Tommy have superpowers in “WandaVision” that might or might not be on display in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” Wanda’s motherhood is crucial to her motivations in almost everything she does in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” Her motherhood is used as a way for her to manipulate people and how she is manipulated herself.

Viewers who last saw Wanda in 2019’s “Avengers: Endgame” without knowing what happened in “WandaVision” might be utterly confused over when she became a mother. “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” explains (in a “WandaVision” spoiler alert) that Wanda/Scarlet Witch used her magical powers to create these children. She quips in response: “That’s what every mother does.” Doctor Strange scolds Wanda/Scarlet Witch for using her magic to mess with reality, which is completely ironic and hypocritical considering what he does later in the movie.

What “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” doesn’t explain adequately is why Wanda created these children. The twins were raised by Wanda and her superhero love partner Vision (played by Paul Bettany) up until a certain point in “WandaVision.” People who know what happened in “WandaVision” also know what happened to Vision, which is not explained in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” What happened in “WandaVision” helps people understand why Wanda, as the Scarlet Witch, has turned to the “dark side,” which in this universe is called the Darkhold, an ancient book of spells.

Don’t expect this movie to have any meaningful “WandaVision” flashbacks to further reveal Wanda’s family situation in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” but her family motivations are supposed to make her look more sympathetic in doing the things that she does in the movie. It also gives her character more emotional depth to viewers who know her family history, compared to viewers who don’t know. It’s all part of a cross-marketing plan for Disney-owned Marvel Studios to get people to subscribe to Disney+ to watch the Marvel shows on Disney+ so that viewers can fully understand Marvel movies. It’s also called creating viewer FOMO (“fear of missing out”) to full effect.

Certain characters from 2016’s “Doctor Strange” make their return in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” Stephen’s ex-girlfriend Christine Palmer (played by Rachel McAdams), a surgeon who worked with him at the same hospital, gets married to a man named Charlie (played by Ako Mitchell), who is a fan of Doctor Strange. Stephen is invited to the wedding, where he privately tells Christine that he regrets not trying harder for them to stay together. (They broke up because he’s a workaholic and because all those superhero duties got in the way.)

Christine responds, “Stephen, it was never going to work out between us. Because you were always going to be the one holding the knife. I could respect you for it, but I could never love you for it.” And there are more heartbroken and emotionally wounded moments for Stephen/Doctor Strange in the movie, with some of those moments involving Christine.

Doctor Strange’s loyal superhero colleague Wong (played by Benedict Wong) also makes his return. Wong is now the Sorcerer Supreme, who oversees sorcerer training in Kamar-Taj, which is located in another dimension. Doctor Strange and Wong fight side by side in some scenes, but there’s a stretch of the movie where Doctor Strange and Wong are not in the same universe and have to fight separate battles. There’s no story arc for steadfast and dependable Wong in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” which is a missed opportunity, because Wong deserves to have more character development in the MCU.

Also returning is Karl Mordo (played by Chiwetel Ejiofor), who became an enemy of Doctor Strange in the first “Doctor Strange” movie, but Mordo might or might not have the same type of personality or life story in other parts of the Multiverse. Dr. Nicodemus “Nic” West (played by Michael Stühlbarg), the surgeon who operated on Stephen’s hands after Stephen was in a near-fatal car accident in the first “Doctor Strange” movie, makes a brief appearance (less than five minutes) in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” where Dr. West is a guest at Christine’s wedding. In this scene, Dr. West sits next to Stephen and smugly tells Stephen that although Doctor Strange likes to think that he is the “best surgeon and the best superhero,” in the end, Stephen/Doctor Strange “didn’t get the girl.”

Other than America Chavez, “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” doesn’t do much with new characters in the MCU. These new MCU characters include mystic artists Sara (played by Sheila Atim) and Rintrah (played by Adam Hugill), who are both disciples of Wong in Kamar-Taj. The purpose for Sara and Rintrah in the movie is exactly what you think it might be in forgettable roles. As far as introducing new characters, “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse” is all about making America Chavez a newcomer star of the MCU.

Scarlet Witch is the movie’s main villain, but there are some monsters that also cause mayhem. One of them is a giant one-eyed octopus that appears during Christine’s wedding. It’s a somewhat awkwardly staged scene, where the octopus suddenly appears on the streets of New York City, and Doctor Strange quickly puts on his magical cloak (don’t call it a “cape,” according to him) and jumps off of a balcony to fight the monster. Some generic-looking demons also make appearances during the fight scenes.

Visually, the movie has its dazzling moments. In terms of its story, “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” is a mixed bag. At times, it gets repetitive and jumbled as you think it can be when people jump through portals and enter different universes during chase scenes. And that’s not the only repetition: “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” repeats the MCU formula of superheroes making wisecracking jokes during action scenes. There are also parts of the movie that repeat a scenario where someone has to “prove” their identity and show evidence that what they’re saying is the truth, because the Multiverse is supposed to make people feel disoriented about what’s real and what isn’t real.

The movie also repeats a theme of the main characters looking for their definition of happiness. More than once in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” someone is asked, “Are you happy?” And then it’s followed up with some version of saying, “Are you really happy? Don’t lie to me because I can tell you’re not really happy.” Is this a superhero movie or a therapy session?

Other times, the movie works very well when it comes to laying the groundwork for developing the story of America Chavez and how she became an ally of Doctor Strange and Wong. Some horror movie elements kick into high gear in the last third of “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” which handles horror better than 2022’s “Morbius” movie, the origin story of Marvel’s vampire anti-hero Morbius. Raimi’s experience as a horror filmmaker greatly benefits “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.”

There’s nothing really spectacular about any of the acting in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” but the acting isn’t terrible either. Stephen Strange/Doctor Strange is known for his arrogance and impatience, but in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” he shows more humility and emotional vulnerability than in previous Marvel movies, and Cumberbatch plays the part accordingly. McAdams doesn’t have a lot to work with for her Christine character, who has a stereotypical action movie role of an ex-girlfriend thrown back into an ex-boyfriend’s life so she can be in the action scenes too.

Olsen is very good in her role as Wanda Romanoff/Scarlet Witch, but she was better in “WandaVision,” which required her to show a wider range of personalities in vastly different scenarios. Viewers’ reactions will largely depend on how emotionally connected they feel to Wanda Romanoff/Scarlet Witch, considering she has presented many different sides of herself in the MCU. Gomez portrays America with credibility as someone who is an awkward, slightly rebellious teenager who feels like a lost soul. She and Doctor Strange eventually learn to trust and respect each other, but their clashes just retread the “smart-alecky kid paired with a reluctant adult mentor” formula that’s been in many other movies.

The most emotional moments in”Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” will have the greatest resonance with people who’ve seen “WandaVision” and the aforementioned MCU movies. Everything that has to do with Wanda/Scarlet Witch can best be understood by people who know what happened in “WandaVision.” And when you need to watch a TV series first to understand a movie’s chief villain, that could be a problem for “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.”

“Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” also has the expected mid-credits/end-credits scenes that tease what will happen in other movies or TV shows that are part of the MCU franchise. Charlize Theron is in the mid-credits scene as a character who becomes a very important part of Doctor Strange’s life, based on this character’s Marvel Comics storyline. The movie’s end-credits scene is a throwaway joke that has no bearing on subsequent storylines, but it’s a reference to a spell that was cast on someone in “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.” Some of the “surprise” cameos just further establish that certain franchise characters that were kept separate from the MCU have now become a part of the MCU.

If you yearn for a time when watching a new superhero movie sequel didn’t have to entail seeing at least three other movies in the franchise and possibly a TV series related to the franchise, in order to understand what happens in the sequel you’re watching, then get used to this MCU reality, because that simpler time is over. Also long gone are the days when having a maximum of five superheroes in a movie sequel was considered too much. Nowadays, not only has the MCU raised expectations for each MCU movie sequel to have numerous superheroes (as main characters and as cameos), but “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” has also ensured that viewers can expect different versions of these superheroes to pop up at any time. It’s a superhero party for superfans, but regular fans or casual fans will feel like they’re at a party where only certain people understand the inside jokes.

Disney’s Marvel Studios will release “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” in U.S. cinemas on May 6, 2022. Disney+ will premiere the movie on June 22, 2022.

Review: ‘Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga,’ starring Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams

June 26, 2020

by Carla Hay

Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams in “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” (Photo by John Wilson/Netflix)

Culture Representation: Taking place in Iceland and Scotland, the musical comedy “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” has a predominantly white cast (with some black people, Asians and Latinos) representing the middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: An Icelandic male/female pop-music duo called Fire Saga aspire to on the annual Eurovision Song Contest, but they come up against naysayers in their home country as well as competitors from other countries.

Culture Audience: “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” will appeal primarily to fans of stars Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams, as well as to people who like good-natured satires of fame seekers and hokey TV talent contests.

Dan Stevens in “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” (Photo by John Wilson/Netflix)

“Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” is an entertaining parody of the famous annual Eurovision Song Contest that feels retro and contemporary at the same time. The contest, which began in 1956 and is televised in numerous countries, has singers (usually performing pop music) competing from different countries around the world, as a sort of an Olympics for aspiring music stars. Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams portray the earnest but naïve Lars Erickssong and Sigrit Ericksdottir, a musical duo from Iceland who perform under the stage name Fire Saga. Ferrell, who co-wrote the original screenplay with Andrew Steele, is one of the producers of this comedy. And it’s one of Ferrell’s best movies in years.

Although “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” (directed by David Dobkin) takes place in the present day, a lot of the musical sensibilities and costumes seem to be stuck in a previous decade, especially the 1980s or 1990s. The movie’s running joke, although not explicitly stated, is that certain parts of Europe are “behind the times” in pop music, because these countries rarely produce groundbreaking pop superstars on a worldwide level. Therefore, the performers who represent these countries at Eurovision are often ridiculed by Eurovision haters for looking and sounding outdated.

The trailer for “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” already shows that Fire Saga made it to the contest. Therefore, the first third of this 123-minute movie has no suspense, since it’s all about the obstacles that Fire Saga encounters in the quest to make it to Eurovision. Iceland has never had a Eurovision winner, so that immediately makes Fire Saga the ultimate underdog act.

The movie begins in Húsavík, Iceland, on April 6, 1974, when a pre-teen Lars (played by Alfie Melia), his stern widower father Erick (played by Pierce Brosnan) and other members of the family are watching Eurovision in the living room. The Swedish pop group ABBA is performing “Waterloo,” and Lars is transfixed. (ABBA won Eurovision that year and has remained Eurovision’s most famous winning act.)

As Lars dances along to ABBA performing on TV, he announces to his family that someday, he’s going to be a contestant on Eurovision. Several people scoff at the idea, including Erick, who says he’d rather be dead than to have his son sing and dance on Eurovision. Well, you know what that means.

About 45 years later, Lars is still living with his father, who makes a living as a fisherman, while Lars has a job giving parking tickets. Lars and his musical partner Sigrit (who is a music teacher) are longtime friends. They are singers and multi-instrumentalists, but they’ve been floundering in the dead-end local music scene. Fire Saga’s music “career” consists of rehearsing in the basement of Erick’s house and performing at a small local bar.

A running joke in the movie is that the patrons of this bar don’t want to hear any Fire Saga original songs (such as the trash-tastic “Volcano Man”) and would rather hear Fire Saga perform a very childish, nonsensical tune called “Jaja Ding Dong.” The audience is so fanatical about “Jaja Ding Dong” that they will often demand that Fire Saga perform it more than once in a single set. Is it any wonder that Lars and Sigrit think Eurovision will be their ticket out of this backwards town?

Erick isn’t the only one who thinks Lars is a loser and that it’s a delusional lost cause for Fire Saga to be on Eurovision. Sigrit’s single mother Helka (played by Elin Petersdottir) vehemently disapproves of Sigrit chasing this dream and tells Sigrit that she’s wasting her time with Lars. Although it’s not shown in the movie, it’s mentioned that Sigrit used to be mute as a child, until she met Lars and he helped her find her voice through music. And Lars and Sigrit have been friends ever since.

But now that they’re adults, Sigrit wants to be more than friends with Lars, because she’s secretly in love with him. Lars has the maturity level of a teenager (like most characters Farrell tends to play), so Lars is completely oblivious to Sigrit’s true feelings for him. As if to make the point that Lars and Sigrit don’t exude sexual chemistry with each other, throughout the movie, people who meet Lars and Sigrit for the first time mistakenly assume that Lars and Sigrit are brother and sister. Later in the story, when Sigrit and Lars almost kiss romantically, he stops it from happening because he says they can’t ruin their work relationship with a romance, and they have to stay focused on winning Eurovision.

But getting to Eurovision won’t be so easy. First, Fire Saga has to win the Icelandic Song Contest. Neils Brongus (played by Ólafur Darri Ólafsson), the president of Icelandic Public Television, leads a committee in charge of deciding who will be contestants in the Icelandic Song Contest. And he already has a favorite to win: Katiana Lindsdottir (played by Demi Lovato), from Kefalvik, a ready-made pop star with a powerful singing voice.

Neils tells his assembled team after watching Katiana’s audition video: “Without being dramatic, I think it might be the best audition tape we ever had in the history of the Icelandic Song Contest.” (In the movie, Lovato sings the original song “In the Mirror.”) Compared to Katiana, Fire Saga looks like a bad joke.

Meanwhile, Victor Karlsson (played by Mikael Persbrandt), governor of Central Bank of Iceland, is worried about a contestant from Iceland winning Eurovision, which has a tradition of the winning contestant’s country hosting the contest in the following year. Victor fears that Iceland doesn’t have the infrastructure to accommodate the hundreds of thousands of people who would come to Iceland for Eurovision. And he thinks that all those visitors during a short period of time could bankrupt Iceland.

Therefore, Victor is not enthusiastic about Katiana or anyone from Iceland winning Eurovision. When Victor expresses his concerns to Neils and the team at Icelandic Public Television, the rest of the group immediately shoots down Victor’s pessimistic prediction, because they think Eurovision coming to Iceland would be great for the Icelandic economy.

Lars’ dream of wining Eurovision becomes even more desperate when he finds himself homeless. His father Erick is having serious financial problems and has a choice to sell his house or sell his boat. Since Erick needs his boat for his fisherman income, he decides to sell the house.

Meanwhile, Sigrit has a quirk that Lars finds a little irritating: She believes in elves and thinks that elves can grant wishes. A recurring joke in the movie is that she visits a group of tiny houses built for elves and offers food and other gifts to the unseen creatures, as a way to entice them to grant her wishes. Two of her biggest wishes are to win Eurovision and to get together with Lars and start a family with him.

Through a series of unpredictable events, Fire Saga ends up representing Iceland at Eurovision, which is being held in Edinburgh, Scotland. How the usually hapless Fire Saga got to Eurovision wasn’t necessarily because Fire Saga was voted the best act, so Iceland’s support is lukewarm at best. Still, Iceland has given Fire Saga enough support that the country has hired a creative team to help Fire Saga win with Fire Saga’s chosen song “Double Trouble.”

The artistic director of this creative team is the very fussy and flamboyant Kevin Swain (played by Jamie Demetriou, in a scene-stealing performance), who sometimes clashes with the creative vision that Lars and Sigrit have for Fire Saga. During Eurovision rehearsals, Lars and Sirgit also meet another flamboyant character: Russian contestant Alexander Lemtov (played by Dan Stevens), a singer who flaunts his wealth and gives the impression that he will sleep with anyone to get them to do what he wants. Alexander’s Eurovision song is called “Lion of Love,” and his bombastic performance of the song includes a homoerotic choreography with male backup dancers wearing skintight gold lamé pants.

Alexander (whose frosted 1980s hairdo is reminiscent of George Michael in his Wham! days) immediately sets his sights on Sigrit to target as a sexual conquest. Meanwhile, Lars attracts the amorous attention of Greek contestant Mita Xenakis (played by Melissanthi Mahut), a singer who’s like a cross between Ariana Grande and Cher. Not surprisingly, some jealousy situations ensue.

In between all of the backstage drama and hilariously tacky performances, the movie has a standout musical ensemble number that takes place at a contestant party thrown by Alexander. In this scene, numerous contestants (including Lars, Sigrit, Alexander and Mita) do an extravagant medley of Cher’s “Believe,” Madonna’s “Ray of Light,” ABBA’s “Waterloo” and the Black Eyed Peas’ “I Gotta Feeling.”

Savan Kotecha, the musical director for this movie, assembled the team that wrote the film’s original songs that were deliberately kitschy. His background in writing and producing hits for real-life pop stars serves this movie very well. Among the hits that Kotecha co-written and co-produced include The Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face,” Grande’s “God Is a Woman,” One Direction’s “What Makes You Beautiful” and Lovato’s “Confident.” The musical score by Atli Örvarsson complements the pop tunes without being overbearing.

The movie’s Eurovision performance scenes, which includes footage from real Eurovision arena shows, are among the comedic highlights of the film. Just when you think an act couldn’t get campier or more pompous, another one comes along to surpass it. Graham Norton (portraying himself) adds an element of satirical realism with his cameo as the sardonic TV commentator for Eurovision.

For “Eurovision Song Contest,” McAdams and Ferrell have reunited with their “Wedding Crashers” director Dobkin, whose previous experience as a music-video director is an asset for this musical movie. As for the singing in the movie, Lovato and Mahut are professional singers in real life, so they did their own vocals. Adams’ vocals were either her own or a combination of McAdams and those of Swedish singer Molly Sandé. Alexander’s operatic singing vocals were provided by Erik Mjönes.

“Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” has plenty of lowbrow jokes that are actually laugh-out-loud funny. For example, there are several penis jokes and jokes about naked men in the movie. The jokes are crude but not offensive. In one scene, Lars comments: “I think of my penis like a Volvo—solid, sturdy, dependable, but not going to turn any heads.” Comedy is all about delivery, and Ferrell delivers the line in such a good natured, self-deprecating way, that it will make people laugh.

The movie doesn’t just poke fun at tacky aspiring pop stars from Europe. Americans are also the butt of many jokes in the film. During the course of the movie, Lars and Sigrit keep encountering the same group of college-age American tourists. Lars makes it known that he dislikes Americans, by taunting the tourists with the worst “ugly American” stereotypes. His insults aren’t too far off from how many non-Americans perceive Americans.

Make no mistake: “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” is by no means an Oscar-worthy movie. (Ferrell has never starred in that type of movie anyway.) But it is a cut above some of the stinkers that Ferrell has been headlining in recent years. At its heart, “Eurovision Song Contest” has a sentimentality to it that just might win people over in the way that Fire Saga earnestly tries to charm audiences—not by being the most talented but by being their unapologetically corny selves.

Netflix premiered “Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga” on June 26, 2020.