While I understand why some people didn’t like the movie and some people felt the movie was…lacking something. Well I can shed some light on why that is.
Short answer: COVID
Doctor Strange 2 Reshoots – https://gamerant.com/sam-raimi-doctor-strange-2-reshoots-reason-explained/
Long Answer: The original plan was for Doctor Strange 2 to come out BEFORE Spider-Man No Way Home. The events of Doctor Strange spill over to No Way Home. COVID screwed that plan up. The results were schedules got conflicted and a lot of changes had to be made.
One major change and this hasn’t been confirmed to be true or false, is that the young lady playing America Chavez, Xochitl Gomez, was not the original actress chosen to play America. Apparently some concept art had leaked prior to production which showed America being played by a differnet actress making an appearance in a scene in Spider-Man: No Way Home. Yes, america was supposed to show up in both movies, allegedly.
#SpiderManNoWayHome
— Moth Culture (@Moth_Culture) January 8, 2022
Official Concept Art Shows America Chavez Originally Making Appearance
(Via @maciej_kuciara) pic.twitter.com/rWlaBdKw7P
What eventually happen is Ned taking America’s place in Spider-Man: No Way Home.
America Chavez replaced in Spider-Man: No Way Home – https://thedirect.com/article/spider-man-no-way-home-marvel-replaced-america-chavez
So, the movie released dates were flipped. Meaning whatever narrative that had already been planned had to be re-written to accomodate any changes. Hence the reason why Doctor Strange 2 had to do reshoots and cameos were cut.
Now prior to shooting, the original director for Doctor Strange 2, Scott Derrickson, left the movie due to creative differences along with one of the writers for the movie. Scott was replaced by Raimi. Of course, things had to be changed and re-written and with limited time its safe to assume that things had to be rushed in order to keep costs down and meet deadlines.
Scott Derircikson leaves Doctor Strange 2: https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2568025/doctor-strange-2-why-scott-derrickson-and-c-robert-cargill-left-marvel-sequel-mcu
Hopefully, you now understand why some things didn’t feel right.