Spider-Man: No Way Home – Every Easter Egg you probably missed in the teaser trailer
By Mike McNulty
Why is the Sanctum Sanctorum is filled with snow?
If you recall Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Bruce Banner, as the Hulk, crashed through the ceiling. Then Doctor Strange fought the Black Order, was captured, and Iron Man and Spidey went off to space to rescue him. Then, after fighting Thanos, Dr. Strange and Spidey ended up getting snapped out of existence and didn’t come back until five years later. During all that time, there was still a gaping hole in the Sanctum Sanctorum’s ceiling. And since Wong was also snapped, nobody was around to fix it. Hence why the inside now looks like the “ice palace” from Doctor Zhivago (1965).
Where’s Wong going?
One curious thing is that we see Strange’s assistant and fellow Mystic Arts practitioner, Wong (Benedict Wong) heading through a sling ring portal with a pair of suitcases. The other side of the portal appears to be Kamar-Taj, which is the training grounds for would-be sorcerers, wizards, and other magic users.
Does this mean that he’s leaving Strange for good? That’s highly unlikely given he’s part of the cast of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Also, keep in mind that if the Sanctum Sanctorum is in disarray, then what about Kamar-Taj and Wong’s precious library? It also makes sense for Wong to return there to make sure if any grimoires are missing, and if there’s any students left there who need his instruction. We also know that Wong has been making the rounds throughout the MCU post-Endgame, thanks to his appearance in the upcoming Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.
It’s also rather convenient as far as plot goes. Since Strange clearly doesn’t heed Wong’s warnings about casting the mindwipe spell, having Wong temporarily out of the picture removes that obstacle. And speaking of which…
Doctor Strange’s Spell
When it comes to the scenes showing Doctor Strange weaving his spell to erase the knowledge that Peter Parker is Spider-Man, there’s quite a lot happening. For starters, the way Strange begins the spell is very similar to the one he cast to find Odin in Thor: Ragnarok (2017), which required a lock of Thor’s hair. Seems the erasure spell also requires something of Peter’s, though he’s pouring it from a bottle into a basin. That suggests he’s using Peter’s “radioactive spider blood,” or at least something far more potent.
As for this particular plot point, it comes right out of the Spider-Man comics. During the 2006 event, Civil War, Peter revealed his secret identity to the entire world, a decision which lead to his Aunt May getting shot by an assassin. This lead to one of the most controversial (and still hotly debated) Spider-Man stories, 2007’s One More Day. Desperate to save her life, Peter ended up making a deal with Marvel’s version of the Devil, Mephisto, at the cost of erasing his marriage to Mary Jane from existence.
However, because One More Day also retconned a significant portion of Spider-Man’s history, artist and Marvel’s current creative director, Joe Quesada, ended up doing a four-part follow-up titled One Moment in Time. That story revealed that Peter also went to Doctor Strange to restore his secret identity. The spell worked, with only MJ remembering, with the added effect that anytime anyone came close to figuring out Peter and Spider-Man were one and the same, a “psychic blindspot” would prevent them from doing so. Seems in the case of No Way Home, Strange’s spell doesn’t have the intended effect.
Which leads to Strange telling Peter how they “tampered with the stability of space-time.” But anyone who watched the Disney + series Loki knows there’s more to it than that. If you look carefully, there are what appear to be quick flashes of the Void and prismatic tunnel effect when one travels through the “Sacred Timeline.” Perhaps the fact that Strange’s spell didn’t work isn’t just because Peter broke his concentration. Perhaps it also didn’t work is because the timeline has already been fractured into a “Multiverse of Madness.”