On November 4th 2016, Sherlock and Star Trek Into Darkness star Benedict Cumberbatch will play Doctor Strange, Marvel’s master of the mystic arts, in a big budget cinematic spectacular of the same name. The film will be directed by Scott Derrickson of Sinisterand Deliver Us From Evil, suggesting there may be a considerable horror flavor with the magical adventures.

Naturally, seeing as he’s been kicking around in the Marvel universe since the 1960s, this is far from Doctor Strange’s first rodeo. As an intrinsic character in Marvel lore, with his fair share of quality stories, multiple movies based around Doctor Strange have been in the works before. In fact, a Dr. Strange TV movie does actually exist, from the 1970s, predating a lot of the live-action Marvel adaptations. The whole thing is on YouTube, if you want to treat yourself.

However, the story of Strange’s big screen ambitions has been struck by something of a curse. Several attempts have been made to get his sorcery on the silver screen, but none have succeeded so far. We’ll start with a particularly peculiar one…

Doctor Mordrid

“In a Manhattan apartment, Doctor Anton Mordrid has stood guard between our world and the dark dimensions. Now, after centuries of waiting, evil’s ultimate warrior has arrived.”

That’s the introductory voiceover featured in the trailer embedded above. It also ends with the tagline “Doctor Mordrid – master of the unknown.” Does all that sound awfully familiar? Incredibly Doctor Strange-esque? Well that’s because it is – the 1992 movie Doctor Mordrid was made by B-movie experts Full Moon Entertainment (Killjoy, Puppet Master, Subspecies), but it was originally planned as an official Marvel-licenced Doctor Strange movie.