Newly-released concept art for Deadpool 2 shows an earlier design for Cable’s cybernetic arm, which featured glowing red lights underneath the metal. Though the design didn’t end up being used in the movie, it’s a cool look at an alternative take on Cable’s powerful metal appendage.
Unlike most cyborgs, Cable’s arm isn’t the result of replacing a missing limb with a mechanical replacement or deliberately “upgrading” his body. The character actually has a techno-organic virus that is gradually turning his body into a machine. In the comics, Nathan Summers was infected with this virus as a baby, and it would have killed him if his parents hadn’t made the difficult decision to send him 2000 years into the future, where he could be treated. The treatment doesn’t reverse the damage done by the virus, but does prevent it from taking over his whole body.
In one scene in Deadpool 2, Cable is seen without his shirt, showing the seam where his organic body ends and his metal arm begins. In a piece of concept art put together by Creative Character Engineering, which was shared by makeup artist Bill Corso, the skin around the metal is shown looking considerably more inflamed and infected than it was in the movie, and Cable’s cybernetics have glowing red lights underneath them. In the caption, Corso expresses disappointment that this design didn’t end up being used for the movie, since he thought it was “really neat.”
The version of Deadpool’s arm that ended up in the movie wasn’t completely dissimilar to this concept art, but was more streamlined and didn’t have red or blue lights underneath it. At one point Cable demonstrates the raw strength of his cybernetic arm when Deadpool swings a pipe at him and Cable’s blocks it with his arm, the pipe bending around it. The design of skin overlapping metal on Cable’s chest seen in this concept art did make it into the movie, but it looked more scarred-over than infected.
Cable will next be seen in Drew Goddard’s team-up movie X-Force, which will also feature Deadpool and Domino, and possibly even some other members of the original X-Force line-up. Deadpool 2 didn’t go into detail regarding Cable’s origin story or how he ended up being part-man, part-machine, so there’s an opportunity in X-Force to explain to general audiences who Cable’s parents are (his father is Scott Summers a.k.a. Cyclops) and exactly how he ended up in the future.
More: Deadpool 2 Extended Cut: All The Deleted Scenes To Expect
Source: Bill Corso (via ComicBook)
