By now any self-respecting Marvel fan has squealed over the 2nd full-length Deadpool & Wolverine trailer at least once. The highly anticipated team-up has been at the top of fans’ must-see list since the first abysmal edition of the Merc with a Mouth appeared in X-Men Origins all the way back in 2009.
So far the trailer hasn’t disappointed. Packed with one-liners and cheeky nods, it takes multiple watches to see all of the glorious easter eggs director Shawn Levy has added to every exceptional second. Which one is the best? The kind of comic book deep cut only the most dedicated Marvel fans will recognize.
Rob Liefeld: Lover of muscles, hater of feet
There are few comic book artists as prominent as Stan Lee, but Rob Liefeld has secured his own place in the Marvel Hall of Fame. Since he burst onto the scene in the late 80s, he’s done everything from rescuing the floundering New Mutants to masterminding Deadpool and his favorite frenemy, Cable. He even co-founded Image Comics to help comic artist maintain control of their darling creations.
Despite his many award-winning comics and his tenure as an artist – he got his start at Marvel before he had even reached 20 – Liefeld’s skills with a pen are contentious in the comic book world. Fans and critics alike can’t seem to agree on whether or not he’s actually good at drawing. And most arguments, as well as this deep-cut Marvel joke, hinge on his Achilles heel – or maybe we should call it an Achilles foot.
“Liefeld’s Just Feet,” a destroyed store that only appears briefly on screen, is a nod to Liefeld’s controversial problem in drawing, well, feet. Since the late 80s, Liefeld has been singularly untalented when it comes to drawing feet. For years, he’s found clever ways to hide the pesky appendage behind supporting characters, rocks, fire hydrants, weird angles, the edge of the frame, and basically any other appropriately (and inappropriately) placed objects he can fit in a scene.
Whenever a tootsie does happen to make it into a frame, it tends to have more than a few issues. His foot sizes are hilariously inconsistent with character size, the left feet turn right, and women appear to walk through life like a ballerina with a perfect point. It’s almost a signature at this point, and clearly, Liefeld is already in on the joke.
He took to Twitter to laugh about the jab and fully embraced it by cropping out Wolverine and Deadpool’s tosie-wosies for the post. After decades of being lambasted for his peculiar art style, Liefeld is just as impervious to the criticisms as Wolvie and Wade are to mortal wounds. After all, what damage can a playful dig about feet do when industry veterans like Barry Windsor-Smith – the man behind Red Sonia and Conan – have absolutely dragged him? Windsor-Smith once said of Liefeld’s art:
“He has nothing to offer. He cannot draw. He can’t write. He is a young boy almost, I would expect, whose culture is bubble gum wrappers, Saturday morning cartoons, Marvel Comics; that’s his culture.”
It must sting to have someone like Windsor-Smith bash your hard work, but Liefeld is certainly laughing all the way to the bank. At the end of the day, the Deadpool movies have a massive fan following and sit comfortably in the 80% range on Rotten Tomatoes, while 2011’s Conan the Barbarian bottoms out with a measly 25.
