Inclusion of the literal magic into MCU after what they've done to Mandarin is a shameless ignorance.
I don't understand how you do Dr. Strange without magic. That's his whole thing.
The asgaurdians HAVE magic. This has potential to get complicated quickly, so i'll TRY to keep it as simple as possible.
"any sufficiantly advanced science will appear as magic to the uninformed" is a relatively famous quote. It's the basis for what we see in Thor, and as the auidence are all humans, we can count ourselves amongst the "uninformed". This means we can see them ALL doing FANTASTIC things, and are needed to be given an explanation.
MANY Genre's that use magic tout it as a sort of pesudo-science.
The "magician" or "wizard" simply has a greater understanding of the "true" rules of the universe. and as such he has the Power to bend those rules to his will.
The Force in Star Wars is a good example of this. "the force" is a natural part of nature that the jedi train and learn how to harness. But it's STILL a completely natural phenomina, and part of the universe as a whole. It's sciecne, albieit werid science.
Another example of this is the cosmic cube from First avenger and Avengers. It was a "magic" power source with nearly unlimited potential.
In Dr. Strange, his powers are focused through the Eye of Agamatto.
I expect this will carry over to the movie as well, in that the eye lets him tap into the " cosmic power of the universe" or something like that, and through complex equations focused in the form of incantations(spells), he is able to work wonderous "magic".
And then in the end, when Mordo steals the eye from him we learn that he dosn't NEED the eye to work his magic, and Stephen Strange saves the day.
This way, we keep the status quo of "magic is advanced science" but we get to wrap it up in the mumbo-jumbo of traditional mysticisim.
As well as potentialy open the door for Mandarin to make a character-accurate return.
