Why Doctor Strange Still Remembers Spider-Man In Multiverse Of Madness
Mia Walsh
Published Mar 29, 2026
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness references Spider-Man: No Way Home, and indicates just how Stephen Strange remembers the latter's events.
Warning: Contains SPOILERS for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness indicates that the heroic sorcerer remembers web-slinger Peter Parker in a specific way after Spider-Man: No Way Home's ending. In Sam Raimi's horror-influenced Multiverse of Madness, Doctor Stephen Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) must stop the Multiverse rampage of the Dark Hold-wielding Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen). America Chavez (Xochitl Gomez), who has the ability to transverse from one universe to another, is Wanda's target in the film. An early scene gives some hints to how Doctor Strange's memory wiping spell in No Way Home worked in eliminating all memory of Peter Parker from the world to stop numerous universes from opening into the MCU.
When Strange and Wong (Benedict Wong) meet America in a café, Strange mentions a previous Multiverse incident involving Spider-Man, which obviously refers to the events of No Way Home. This also provides some context to how Strange's spell functioned, and how he himself was affected by it. In a nutshell, the world and Strange have forgotten about Peter Parker (Tom Holland), while their knowledge of Spider-Man remains intact.
By referencing the existence of Spider-Man and the story of No Way Home as a Multiverse movie, it can be concluded that Strange remembers Spidey and the general events of No Way Home that they experienced together. What's changed is his knowledge that it's Peter under the mask. No Way Home was predicated on the public learning Spider-Man's identity in Spider-Man: Far From Home. With Peter and Strange's efforts to undo that with his spell, and everything that came out of that, Strange must also now remember No Way Home's sequence of events differently. This means that, despite the apparent contradiction, Doctor Strange 2 actually avoids a potential Spider-Man plot hole.
In No Way Home, Peter's mid-spell caveats to Strange's spell to restore his secret identity led to villains from other universe with knowledge of who Spider-Man is being pulled into the MCU, along their respective Spider-Men (with original Spideys Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield returning). Because of the specific nature of how everything came to pass in No Way Home, it can be determined that Strange's memory of why everything happened has been drastically altered. He knows Spider-Man exists and is an Avenger, but his memory of how the Multiverse-breach in No Way Home was initiated no longer involves Peter's identity being public knowledge or any effort on either of their parts to magically reverse that.
In turn, it can be inferred that Strange's memory of the transported villains and other Spider-Men is also different. His recollection of these events in Multiverse of Madness verifies he indeed remembers that it happened. However, the details will have been changed for him to a different spell causing a different event to occur.
No Way Home ended on a big crossroads for the Wall-Crawler, with Peter not restoring the memory of MJ (Zendaya) and re-starting his civilian life while continuing to protect people as Spider-Man. By having Doctor Strange mention a Multiverse event with Spider-Man in Multiverse of Madness, this means that he and the Wall-Crawler might well meet again in Peter's next MCU adventure. What Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness establishes is that Strange will only know him as the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man when they cross paths, with Peter Parker and Stephen Strange also recalling Spider-Man: No Way Home very differently.
