Marvel's What If...? concept art shows Mahershala Ali's Blade as Moon Knight; a preview of Marvel Zombies? (2025)

The fact that there was going to be aBladereboot as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, starring Mahershala Ali in the title role, came as a huge surprise when the announcement was made at the San Diego Comic-Con back inJuly of 2019… but we’re coming up on the six year anniversary of that announcement, and we still haven’t seen a newBlademovie. The closest we’ve gotten is Ali making a vocal cameo as the character at the end ofEternalsback in 2021 – and a glimpse of the character in animated form.The third season of Marvel’s animated seriesWhat If…?(read our reviewHERE) was released through the Disney+ streaming service back in December, bringing that show to an end. During a montage in the series finale, there was a shot of a version of Ali as Blade that imagined, “What if Blade were the Fist of Khonshu?” Or, in other words, “What if Blade became Moon Knight?” Artist Justin Kim drew the concept art for the Blade-as-Moon-Knight character, and has shared his artwork on Instagram. You can check it out in the embed at the bottom of this article.

In a way, this concept art could also be taken as a preview of the Marvel Zombies animated series, which is set to premiere on Disney+ onOctober 3rd. Because the Blade Moon Knight is a character on that show! As can be seen in this image:

It’s crazy that these animated images of Blade as Moon Knight, the avatar for the Egyptian moon god Khonshu, are still the closest we’ve come to seeing Mahershala Ali as Blade, six years after it was announced that the role was his… But that’s how it has gone.

TheMarvel Zombiesvoice cast includes Simu Liu (Shang-Chi), Awkwafina (Shang-Chi’s best friend Katy), Elizabeth Olsen (Wanda Maximoff / Scarlet Witch), David Harbour (Red Guardian), Florence Pugh (Yelena Belova), Randall Park (FBI agent Jimmy Woo), Hailee Steinfeld (Kate Bishop), Dominique Thorne (Riri Williams / Ironheart), Iman Vellani (Kamala Khan /Ms. Marvel), and Todd Williams, voicing an unspecified character. Other characters known to be showing up in the series are Ten Rings assassin Death Dealer, Ten Rings founder Xu Wenwu, zombie versions of Clint Barton / Hawkeye, Steve Rogers / Captain America, Emil Blonsky / Abomination, Ava Starr / Ghost, Carol Danvers / Captain Marvel, Ikaris fromEternals, and Okoye of Wakanda’s Dora Milaje.

We don’t know whether or not Mahershala Ali has provided the voice of Blade for Marvel Zombies. We do know that his face was used for the Moon Knight Blade design for What If…? season 3, because the concept art can be seen right here: