Four cameos kept appearing in Spider-Man: No Way Home leaks ahead of the movie’s release. We saw rumors detailing Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man variants repeatedly. Charlie Cox’s Daredevil and Tom Hardy’s Venom also popped up in rumors from time to time. That’s not going to be the case with Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. The upcoming MCU movie is a lot bigger than No Way Home, and it’s supposed to feature several massive cameos. It’s not just two significant co-stars joining Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) & co. for the sequel. It’s seemingly anybody worth having in a Marvel movie. And the leaks are about to get crazier and crazier. For example, the image you’ll see below might give us our first look at a Doctor Strange 2 Iron Man variant.
Beware, major spoilers might follow below, assuming the information is accurate.
Doctor Strange 2 rumors dating back to early 2020 talked about Iron Man possibly returning to the MCU after the character’s heartbreaking death in Endgame. The speculation made sense for a movie about the multiverse. Strange could always meet with a different Iron Man from another reality.
Iron Man’s return in Doctor Strange 2
We hoped at the time that Robert Downey Jr. would give us a different interpretation of the character, provided that Marvel would convince the actor to reprise his Tony Stark role so soon after Endgame. But two years later, the multiverse events in Loki, What If…?, and No Way Home taught us that variants don’t have to be identical. And Marvel did give us different Iron Man versions in What If…? that did not have RDJ’s voice.
That said, we do have a crazy leak that says RDJ will return to Doctor Strange 2 as an Iron Man from a different reality, one where Tony Stark wasn’t the one to sacrifice his life in the battle against Thanos (Josh Brolin).
But there’s a different actor that fans want to see as Iron Man in the MCU. That’s Tom Cruise, the actor that Marvel wanted to play Iron Man more than a decade ago. Cruise confirmed turning down the role in recent interviews, but that didn’t stop fans from fan-casting him as an alternate Tony Stark.
It so happens that some of the recent Doctor Strange 2 rumors say that Cruise will cameo as an Iron Man version from the multiverse. Specifically, Cruise will play a Tony Stark that supports the Illuminati, a group of superheroes that defend the multiverse. Either that, or he’ll be one of the Illuminati in the movie. But, as expected, other reports say that Cruise won’t be in the film.
The purported Tom Cruise scene leak
Things are about to get a lot more complicated. If the image in the following tweet is accurate, then we might be looking at Tom Cruise’s Iron Man version for Doctor Strange 2. Cruise is supposedly wearing a motion capture suit that will be used for special effects in post-production.
While the image is of the blurry variety, it does seem to show Tom Cruise featuring the Tony Stark mustache and goatee combo that we’re so familiar with.
It could also be a fan-made image based on the recent Doctor Strange 2 Iron Man leaks.
We will remind you that back in September, we saw purported Doctor Strange 2 scene leaks featuring various characters. We had Strange in cuffs, something we already saw in the trailer (below). But we also had a Wanda (Elizabeth Olsen) variant wearing a bloody shirt and a Professor X (Patrick Stewart) variant in a familiar wheelchair design.
This Iron Man is different
Like the Iron Man image above, those scenes lacked visual effects. But all of these images might come from the universe where the Illuminati reside.
It so happens that the same Moth Culture Twitter account posted additional details about Tom Cruise’s Iron Man from that universe.
Iron Man “controls the Iron Legion, having effectively put a suit of armor around the world,” the Twitter account said. “He wears the helmet most of the time but lifts it for the reveal. He is a bit deranged and an outcast among the Illuminati for his obsessive, controlling nature.”
The image above also shows Tom Cruise in an Iron Man suit for Doctor Strange 2, but it’s a fan-made render.
As with other leaks, there’s no way to confirm any of this. But it all sounds incredibly exciting. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness premieres on May 6th. But we’re hardly done talking about Doctor Strange 2 leaks.
