Recently, concept art appeared online for Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. This surprisingly featured Ryan Reynold’s Deadpool and Proxima Midnight at the Fight Club.
Proxima Midnight would not have been alive during this timeline, as Endgame was being released in 2019 when these paintings were made. However, Deadpool is more spontaneous, and would be able to show up anywhere at this point.
Shang-Chi Concept art
These Shang-Chi pieces were created by Senior Concept Artist: Andrew Kim. Andrew has worked on many other films, shows and games such as Mulan, Uncharted Franchise and Star Trek Discovery. Also currently working on art for upcoming projects such as The Marvels.
I reached out to see if Andrew Kim could share his input about Deadpool and Proxima Midnight in this concept art. Here is what Andrew had to say:
“Well, long story short, sorry to disappoint you but there was no involvement of Deadpool or Proxima in the early going.
Andrew Kim – Senior Concept Artist.
When I was designing the fight club, my PD mentioned to me that we could see other Marvel characters fighting in the ring when we first revealed the scene.
Deadpool and Proxima was my idea to put in as I thought their dynamic fighting styles could be a perfect fit in the ring like that.(you know, they don’t fly…haha)
And Deadpool’s red was a nice pop against the bluish background.”
Deadpool and Proxima Midnight were basically not a planned idea, it was a fun element to include in the background as the artist tested these scenes with Marvel characters. These characters ended up being Wong and Abomination in the Shang-Chi movie.
There’s still rumours that Deadpool could get his MCU debut afterall; by showing up in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Although, many names of characters are being thrown around for this movie as anything could happen.
Thank you to Andrew Kim for sharing his input on his concept art.