Deadline New York is reporting that Marvel Studios has hired the screenwriting duo of Thomas Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer to adapt DOCTOR STRANGE as, potentially, the company's first film to be released via Disney. Donnelly and Oppenheimer have been getting a great deal of work lately - writing CONAN for Marcus Nispel, DYLAN DOG: DEAD OF NIGHT for Kevin Munroe, and taking a crack at COWBOYS AND ALIENS for Jon Favreau - but their previously produced scripts for SAHARA and A SOUND OF THUNDER weren't exactly crackerjack stuff. Also, I've read their CONAN draft, and it is the primary reason why I've never been interested in Lionsgate's forthcoming reboot. So there's that.
The Deadline story doesn't mention whether DOCTOR STRANGE will be one of Marvel's modestly-budgeted films, but I'm guessing it will. If they had larger aspirations for the character, they would've already hired DOCTOR STRANGE superfan Guillermo Del Toro to bring Steve Ditko's magnificent illustrations to life. But who wants to see that?
