Doctor Strange’s Portals Ring Just Got A Massive Upgrade In The MCU

Doctor Strange’s famous portal-generating Sling Ring received a major upgrade in Deadpool & Wolverine . Introduced in 2016’s Doctor Strange, the Sling Ring is a notable instance of the Marvel Cinematic Universe creating its own unique lore for a character that does not originate in Marvel’s comic universes. Sling Rings are magical artifacts that allow their users to create portals for long-distance travel. While Sling Rings are shown to have an incredibly effective range, Deadpool & Wolverine makes one Sling Ring go well beyond its usual capabilities.

With proper training, the Masters of the Mystic Arts can use Sling Rings to connect two locations via inter-dimensional portals. Characters like Doctor Strange and the Ancient One can instantly travel to any part of the world using the portals, but their range was shown to be even greater in Avengers: Endgame. Following The Hulk’s resurrection of everyone killed by Thanos, Doctor Strange and the other Masters of the Mystic Arts transport various heroes to lower Westchester, New York to battle Thanos, with Strange creating portals connecting Earth to the distant planet Titan.

How Cassandra Nova’s Sling Ring Created Multiversal Portals

While Sling Rings are demonstrably capable of connecting two distant planets, Deadpool & Wolverineshows one Sling Ring connecting two planes of reality, an unprecedented in the MCU. Cassandra Nova took a Sling Ring from a Doctor Strange variant she murdered long before the events of the film, using the ring to transport Wolverine and Deadpool to the latter’s home reality – and later traveling there herself. This incredible feat is achieved thanks to her ring being augmented by two Infinity Stones: the Reality Stone and Time Stone, as confirmed in an image posted by Ryan Reynolds on Instagram.

One red gem and one green gem are visibly attached to Cassandra Nova’s Sling Ring.

Attaching two Infinity Stones to a Sling Ring, while justifying its ability to create multiversal portals is somewhat questionable. A single Infinity Stone is extremely dangerous and destructive, and six stones must be housed in a specially-made vessel, such as the Uru Infinity Gauntlet, so it might be a stretch to suggest that even an item as powerful as a Sling Ring could withstand two stones. Cassandra Nova’s Sling Ring is from another reality, however, and therefore might be made of a material that can harness the power of two Infinity Stones.

No, The Spider-Man Variant Getting To The Sacred Timeline Isn’t A Sling Ring Retcon

Some viewers might mistakenly assume that Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man variants traveled to the main MCU timeline in Spider-Man: No Way Home via multiversal portals. While an understandable assumption, this is not the case, as dialogue from Garfield’s Spider-Man revealed that he was transported to the main MCU reality by the same botched spell that transported his and Maguire’s villains (and Maguire’s variant).

Before Deadpool & Wolverine, Sling Rings could not make portals that connect different universes, and it took the addition of two Infinity Stones to make this feat possible. That means Cassandra Nova joins the horde of MCU characters who wielded an Infinity Stone in the MCU and survived.