This is a long term speculation play on where I think Brother Voodoo might end up after Doctor Strange II or even III.

One important MCU trend you need to pay attention to is the passing of mantle from one character to another. It seems that Marvel Studios have chosen this route, rather than recasting, as the way to continuously lengthen the lifespan of a character.

So far, we have seen it happening to:

• Captain America: From Steve to Falcon
• Black Widow: From Natasha to Yelena

We might even see it happening to:

• Thor: From Chris Hemsworth to Natalie Portamn
• Black Panther: From T’Challa to Shuri

One Phase 3 character who might also eventually go through this route is Doctor Strange. I cannot imagine a talented actor such as Benedict Cumberbatch will be handcuffed to this character forever.

My prediction is that we might seen a changeover either during Doctor Strange III or at the end of it.

As with the comics, the most likely candidate to take over as the new Sorcerer Supreme will probably be Brother Voodoo. This is where today’s speculation comes in.

Brother Voodoo as Sorcerer Supreme

There are 2 books to consider when it comes to speculating on Brother Voodoo as Sorcerer Supreme. This is a result of the last panel thingy that happen to Wolverine in Hulk #180 and #181.

The 2 books under consideration are New Avengers #53 and #54. The former contains a last panel appearance by Brother Voodoo as Sorcerer Supreme while #54 has him in the full story. Unfortunately, none has him on the cover so it becomes harder to decide which book the market will favor.

   

The images for these 2 books shown above are all the variant covers. I figure that if cover art cannot help to decide the winner, maybe it will come down to scarcity.

The variant for New Avengers #53 has an incentive ratio of 1:15, which not a particularly high incentive ratio. Coupled with a high sales number of almost 100k, I suspect copies are still pretty common and affordable.

For New Avengers #54, the variant is the 2099 SDCC partial sketch variant. This book belongs to the same category as all the partial sketch variants which have gotten expensive such as Black Panther #1 Sketch, X-Men #510 Sketch and New Mutants Vol 3, #1 Sketch.

I am not saying New Avengers #54 will match any of the above books since they all have better cover art. However, in terms of print run, they should have pretty similar figures.

New Avengers #54 also has a second print which looks similar to the SDCC variant. The only difference is that the second print is 100% in black and white. I am guessing that the print run for the 2nd print should be low as well.

Profit potential

This speculation pick is part of a border trend I am seeing in the market, which is what I called the changing identity speculation. Specifically, markets are starting to put some weight on books that contain the changing of a hero’s identity such as from Ms Marvel to Captain Marvel.

As mentioned in my article on IronHeart key issues, I first noticed this from Avenging Spider-Man #9, which I highlighted in 2016. Then, Black Panther Vol 5, #5 took off and it got me digging deeper into this pattern.

	Sales	Price of Nm	Price of 9.8
Avenging Spider-Man #9	37,134	USD 100	USD 250
Black Panther Vol 5, #5	29,751	USD 80	USD 400
Captain America Vol 7, #25	74,183	USD 10	USD 100

Based on the above, this changing identity speculation is still not a full proof investing strategy. As the table shows, Captain America VOl 7, #25 where Falcon becomes Captain America, is still a pretty cheap book.

While we can interpret this as evidence that an identity change is not a gurantee home run spec, we can also interpret it as Captain America #25 is still undervalued. Maybe once the Falcon and Winter Soldier show kicks off, there will be renew interest in it and prices could rise. Or it might not.

However, since 2 out of the 3 books have taken off, it still means the we have the odds in our favor, when it comes to speculation on Brother Voodoo becoming Sorcerer Supreme. Coupled with a low print run variant, this speculation might turn out to be a winner if this scenario comes true.

Conclusion

This speculation pick is betting on Marvel Studios using its “passing the mantle” strategy for Doctor Strange. It is a very long term pick as I see this happening in 2024-25, IF it happens.

As such, there is no need to rush and buy the books. However, do keep an open eye if you happen to bump into cheap copies, especially the SDCC variant.