How Many Duplicates Did Doctor Strange Make Fighting Thanos In Infinity War

Doctor Strange used a couple of spells during the Battle of Titan in Avengers: Infinity War, including one where he created clones of himself to fight Thanos – but how many duplicates did he make? After building up the arrival of Thanos and the existence of the Infinity Stones in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the heroes joined forces in Avengers: Infinity War to stop the Mad Titan from collecting the Stones and thus fulfilling his chaotic plans: wiping out half of life in the universe with just the snap of his fingers.

The Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy, and the rest of the heroes of the MCU couldn’t stop Thanos from getting all the stones, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t fight to prevent a major catastrophe. The characters were divided into two groups as they battled Thanos and his army: there were those who fought the Battle of Wakanda against Thanos’ followers, and those who fought against the Mad Titan himself in his former home planet, Titan. As part of that second team was Doctor Strange, who in order to protect the Time Stone from ending up in Thanos’ hands, used various spells, including one where Thanos had to face an army of Stephen Stranges.

After failing to take the Infinity Gauntlet away from Thanos, Strange confronted him, using a stream of energy and later blocking Thanos’ attack with a gateway to the Mirror Dimension. After using a spell that transformed a black hole from the Space Stone into butterflies, Strange began to prepare a duplication spell. Strange first raised into the air with the help of the Cloak of Levitation, and then the spell began with various arms coming out of Strange’s body, a pose taken from the comics and reminiscent of that of the Hindu goddess Durga. After that, various Doctor Strange clones appeared around Thanos, increasing in number every second. While there’s no exact number of clones, as there were others off-screen (as seen in how many strings of energy are thrown at Thanos), it’s referred to as an “army” of duplicates, so there might have been around 100,000 and 150,000 Doctor Strange clones at that moment.

Doctor Strange multiples himself to fight Thanos in Avengers: Infinity War

The cloning was possible thanks to the “Images of Ikonn” spell, which allows Strange to create visual duplicates of himself to cause distractions and/or evade attacks. The spell is done by invoking Ikonn, Lord of Illusions, who can create extremely believable illusions, but like everything, Strange and the rest of the sorcerers who summon it have to be careful. If Ikonn takes control over a world, it can make its illusions real, which can unleash a lot of problems. Ikonn is represented as a greyish insectoid/humanoid with dark green spines and pupil-less grey-green eyes, though being the master of illusion, this might not be its actual form. Thanks to the combined powers of the Space and Power Stones, Thanos was able to break free from the strings of energy and all the Doctor Strange clones, leaving him with the real one.

Unfortunately, the Images of Ikonn and the army of clones were not enough to prevent Thanos from taking the Time Stone from the Eye of Agamotto – although when remembering Strange’s words after seeing all possible outcomes, this was supposed to happen in order for the MCU heroes to succeed at some point in the future. There are still a number of spells the MCU can explore through Doctor Strange, and the Images of Ikonn are just a taste of what he can achieve.

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