Moments pages are for post-viewing discussion; they assume you have already seen the work in question and as such are spoilers off. Please proceed with caution.
Christine says she has a rule against dating co-workers, the "Strange Rule". Doctor Strange is flattered to have something named after him, even if it's not the surgical technique he developed. Christine reminds him that they both developed that technique, together, so he concedes:
Doctor Strange: How about we hyphenate it? The Strange-Palmer technique? Christine:[already walking away]Palmer-Strange!
Strange walks in to Kamar-Taj and, having been told that he will be seen by "the Ancient One," starts addressing an old man...only for the much younger looking actual Ancient One to answer! Bonus points for the audience being surprised as well, as we had only seen her either from the back or under a hood previously.
After Doctor Strange's out-of-body experience:
Doctor Strange: What was in that tea? Psilocybin? LSD? Ancient One: Just tea. [Beat] With a little honey.
Doctor Strange has just spent all of his remaining money to get to Kamar-Taj, he's been broken, beaten, and driven half-mad by his obsession with getting his hands fixed. However, upon meeting the Ancient One, Doctor Strange quickly devolves to chewing her out and yelling about her seemingly phony pitch, including sneering at her book for showing things that he has "seen before - in gift shops!" She brings him down a few pegs by punching his soul out of his body, then sending his astral-self on a trip across the multiverse, telling him about the true nature of reality the whole way through the experience, and when he rejoins with his body, she very drily asks "Have you ever seen that in a gift shop?" On his knees, looking up at the Sorcerer Supreme, Doctor Strange pleads with a simple "Teach me", to which the Ancient One promptly replies "No", and has him thrown out on his arse. It's hard not to feel sorry for Doctor Strange, but it's also Kafka Comedy at its finest.
Then we see that he spent several hours hanging outside the temple, leaning on the door, begging to be let back inside, until he's barely able to stand or speak anymore... Then the door buzzes open and he flops unceremoniously into the threshold, before giving a very weak and pained "Thank you".
When Doctor Strange has just been accepted in Kamar-Taj, Mordo shows him his room. As Mordo is leaving, he hands Doctor Strange a simple piece of card with just the word "Shamballa" written on one side in fine calligraphy.
Doctor Strange: What's this, my "mantra"? Mordo: It's the wi-fi password. We're not savages.
The fact that the Sorcerer Supreme's ancient order of magic users not only use, but embrace technology is hilarious. Later, Wong is shown listening to Beyoncé on earphones.
While showing him the library, Wong informs Doctor Strange that if he steals a book, he would be dead before he left the compound. Doctor Strange coolly asks him if the late fees involve maiming.
From the same conversation, after Wong repeatedly fails to react to Strange's jokes.
Strange: You know, people used to think I was funny. Wong: Did they work for you?
Doctor Strange then steals books to read in astral form, creating portals behind Wong with his arms pulling books off shelves, each portal vanishing before Wong looks up. Oh, and this is while Wong's listening to Beyoncé on his earphones and reading.
Doctor Strange: Wong told on me?
What's even better is that Wong reacts after each book is taken... even the one he was currently reading gets snatched while he's turning round to look, and he jumps in surprise when he realizes.
Anybody who is/was a fast reader in school will get a kick out of Doctor Strange's first meeting with Wong. Doctor Strange is basically a student who sped his way through one unit and is asking the teacher for the next, and Wong's reaction is one of a teacher who is pleasantly surprised that the student is working that fast.
"How is your Sanskrit?" "I'm fluent in Google Translate."
Mordo's "sure, why not?" face when Doctor Strange summons what amounts to a wet towel during weapons training... complete with windup.
The Ancient One tries to expedite Doctor Strange's mastery of the Sling Ring by stranding him on the top of Mount Everest with the gradually diminishing confidence that the life-or-death situation will inspire him to succeed.
There's also Mordo's exasperated "Not again!", indicating this isn't the first time the Ancient One has pulled this stunt.
The Ancient One and Mordo then proceed to literally stand and wait in the middle of a courtyard, staring into space expectantly for a portal to show up. By the time Doctor Strange gets around to actually making one, the Ancient One has started playing with her fan while Mordo is beginning to look tired.
What's especially hilarious is that taken at face value, this conversation is essentially Kaecilius acknowledging that someone called "Kaecilius" has no standing to say that "Doctor" is an unusual surname.
Until he corrects him, Kaecilius continues to call Doctor Strange "Mister Doctor".
When Doctor Strange is trying to flee from Kaecilius and his followers down a hallway, Kaecilius casts a spell that makes the floor and walls shift, with Doctor Strange trapped on the spot, running for a few moments before he gives up.
Doctor Strange creating a pair of energy shields during his fight at the New York sanctum, only for one of them to fizzle out and disappear. This is followed by him shaking his fist and hoping it'll come back on.
Kaecilius' general puzzlement at Doctor Strange's antics, which border on magical Strategy, Schmategy (because he generally has no idea what he's doing or because of the Cloak of Levitation, which has a mind of its own), is continuously entertaining.
When Doctor Strange tried to wield a glowing urn against Kaecilius, the latter pauses as if he's wary of what's to come, then...
Kaecilius: ...You don't know how to use that, do you? Doctor Strange shrugs sheepishly, attempts to just bludgeon Kaecilius with the glowing urn.
The Cloak in general gets a whole bunch of fantastic moments, since it quite clearly has a mind of its own.
Doctor Strange and Kaecilius' sheer bafflement when the Cloak thwarts Kaecilius's attempts to kill Doctor Strange by blocking his blows.
Mid-fight with Kaecilius, Doctor Strange keeps trying to reach an axe, but the cloak keeps pulling him back and, with a palpable sense of exasperation, to a device that temporarily imprisons Kaecilius.
The last portion of the above moment is possibly worth noting as well, if only for the exaggerated motions the device puts its prisoner through before fully immobilizing them.
Then, to buy Doctor Strange time to get to the hospital and have his stab wound attended to, it pounces on the Zealot attacking him and starts banging him against the floor. While the injured Doctor Strange is struggling to create the portal, it carries on beating up the Zealot in the background. The whole scene can be summed up as "Cloak incapacitates man, fights him to a standstill."
A whole scene later after Doctor Strange comes back to the Sanctum, the cloak is still beating him up. Doctor Strange's Cloak Of Levitation is currently more badass than the character wearing it.
Just before the final battle, when Doctor Strange is psyching himself up, his face is still wet from crying at the Ancient One's death. The cloak notices and starts helpfully wiping away his tears, prompting an exasperated Doctor Strange to ask it to stop.
Doctor Strange's banter with Kaecilius when the latter is restrained is pretty funny, especially when Doctor Strange keeps threatening to put the gag back on.
When Kaecilius is trying to talk Doctor Strange into the righteousness of his cause he actually seems to be having some success with his reasoning, until Doctor Strange points out a rather obvious thing in the most hilariously direct way: namely that Dormammu can't be that great a guy if becoming his disciple involves having your face horribly disfigured and having to murder people.
When Doctor Strange reunites with Christine, he has problems making her understand what the Masters are:
Doctor Strange: I went to a place called Kamar-Taj and I talked to someone called the Ancient One and... Christine: Oh, so you joined a cult? Doctor Strange: No I didn't, no, well not exactly. They did teach me to tap into powers I never even knew existed. Christine: Yeah, that sounds like a cult. Doctor Strange: It's not a cult. Christine: Well, that's what a cultist would say.
Then, as Doctor Strange insists on getting up and going as soon as his Hollywood Healing is finished, while Christine insists he needs to rest, the Rapid-Fire Comedy starts;
Doctor Strange: I'm late for a cult meeting. Christine: This is insane. Doctor Strange: ...Yeah. Christine: Where are you going? Doctor Strange: ...Uhm... Christine: ...Just tell me the truth? Doctor Strange: Well, a powerful sorcerer who gave himself over to an ancient entity, can bend the very laws of physics, tried very hard to kill me. But I left him chained up in Greenwich Village, and the quickest way back there is through a dimensional gateway, that I opened up in the mop closet. Christine: Okay. Don't tell me. Fine. Doctor Strange:[opens door, shows portal, steps through] ...I really do have to go.
Christine just stares at the spot where the sling portal used to be, then slowly turns around trying to get a grip on what just happened, obviously scared half to death. Then a mop falls over behind her and she screams like she's in a horror movie, even going up on one leg. Best part is that this is again the work of the great ally of all MCU movies; the unscripted hilarious accident — Rachel McAdams was just supposed to walk out of frame dumbfounded, but the mop just happened to fall over, scaring the shit out of her.
Her freakout to Doctor Strange's astral projection is pretty funny, and during the fight, they bump into a vending machine Nic was just buying from and knock over some of the items inside. He promptly takes the free extra bags of chips.
Later when she finds Doctor Strange, she sees his cloak hanging in mid-air. She stares at it for a beat, before getting a priceless "of course it floats" look on her face as she just carries on walking. With the day she's had, her reaction is no surprise.
Doctor Strange and Mordo get chased by Kaecilius and his zealots in the Mirror Dimension after Doctor Strange traps them there, but they're a lot more powerful there than in the real world, able to shift the entire city of New York into a four-dimensional labyrinth. When Doctor Strange admits that he made a huge mistake, Mordo just silently glares at him because Mordo had already deduced and told Doctor Strange this at the start of the chase, with Doctor Strange only now admitting that, yeah, this wasn't so successful.
In the midst of Doctor Strange and Mordo's chase through the Mirror Dimension by Kaecilius and his Zealots, the two sorcerers fall against the side of a bus. Inside, Stan Lee is reading Aldous Huxley's The Doors Of Perception and laughing himself silly.
Also funny as an MCU Call-Back to the scene in Thor: The Dark World, when it was Thor and Malekith who landed sprawled-out on a window during a physics-warping chase through portals.
When Doctor Strange comes to the hospital with the dying Ancient One, he calls out for Christine. She lets out a clearly exasperated "Are you kidding me...?" before the mortally wounded patient comes into her view.
Doctor Strange manages to revive Wong after he dies from the Hong Kong Sanctum attack by turning back time.
Doctor Strange: Breaking the laws of nature, I know. Wong:[looks back at the metal bar he was (or is about to be) impaled on] Well don't stop now!
The fact that Doctor Strange beat Dormammu through inducing a metaphysical Rage Quit is both Awesome and this. He essentially annoyed a giant god into submission with five words.
Doctor Strange: Dormammu, I've come to bargain!
His facial expressions during that scene are priceless as they get more and more cocky as it goes on. By the last one, he's basically reciting the Ear Worm with a shit-eating grin on his face.
During the first few time loops, and despite its otherworldly appearance, you can tell how utterly bewildered Dormammu is just from its facial expression.
During the third loop after Doctor Strange explains time to Dormammu, he is so mad instead of throwing crystals or magic at him he tries to squash him with his hand. Doctor Strange's Precision F-Strike just seal the deal.
At the end, Dormammu is literally begging Strange to let him go. Strange just smirks a little and says, "No. I've come to bargain."
After "making the bargain" with Dormammu, therefore stopping the crisis and having Kaecillus and his zealots dragged back to the Dark Dimension...
Once all the damage is taken care of and Doctor Strange finally puts the Eye of Agamotto back on its pedestal, Wong casually drops a bombshell on the audience by revealing the Eye's power source is an Infinity Stone... which is entirely lost on Doctor Strange.
Doctor Strange: A what? Wong:[sounding nothing short of fed up with Doctor Strange's ignorance] You might have a gift for the mystic arts, but you still have much to learn.
The Mid-Credits scene (also in Thor: Ragnarok): Thor visits Doctor Strange, who gives him a cup of tea. When he says he doesn't drink tea, Strange turns it into a giant mug of beer, which Thor stares at with fascination. He proceeds to chug nearly all of it in less than five seconds, then gawks as it magically refills itself.
There's also Doctor Strange just wanting to get Thor, Loki, and every other Asgardian or otherworldly visitor the hell off his planet, as he has enough problems to deal with.
It's a bit more black comedy than anything else, but the end credits end with a short PSA line about the dangers of distracted driving. It even fits in with the Running Gag about the warnings coming after the main material.
With a name as silly as "Sling Ring", you'd think they were taken from Silver Age comics. They aren't, Sling Rings were created for the film, yet they still ended up with that name in 2016. Even better, subsequent films give them the nickname of "Slingy".
Benedict Wong rallied for the role of Wong as hard as he could after learning the character’s name was Wong.
on his earphones and reading.Doctor Strange: Wong told on me?