10 of the most WTF? storylines in Pro Wrestling

Cafe Society
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I really should have mentioned Kane and Lita’s wedding. The black wedding dress; the pregnant bride decking Trish Stratus and the two of them having to be separated by the groom; Matt Hardy attacking Kane halfway through the vows and trying to run off with Lita, only to be beaten to a pulp by Kane; and finally Kane dragging Lita back to the altar, planting a big smooch on her and then carrying her off like a happy caveman. BEST WEDDING EVER.

  1. Samoa Joe is kidnapped by ninjas

Samoa Joe, one of TNA’s shining talents and stars (perhaps an overly narrow superlative) spends much of his time punching people in the face and having sex with women on CM Punk’s sofa. There is one blight on this sterling career, however. I’m speaking of the time Samoa Joe was kidnapped by ninjas.

No, really. Some ninjas shoved Samoa Joe into a nondescript van and drove off with him. I know you’re thinking, “Wow, this must be leading up to something huge! This is the greatest mystery since that episode of The Simpsons where Mr. Burns was shot!”

You would be wrong. Samoa Joe reappeared on TNA with no explanation as to how he escaped the ninja kidnapping, or why he was kidnapped in the first place. It might as well have never happened. And as for the ninjas… as far as we know they’re still out there somewhere.

  1. Mick Foley thinks he’s a sea captain

Mick Foley is a multiple New York Times best-selling author, radio host, RAINN volunteer, comedian, gay rights advocate, and all-around cuddly teddybear of a man in the form of a 6’2, one-eared, heavily scarred wrestler with a penchant for throwing himself on top of thumbtacks. Basically, Mick Foley is more awesome than you can ever hope to be.

WCW decided that instead of using Mick Foley’s talents as the best promo man in the business, that they’d put him in a nonsensical storyline in which Foley takes a bump to the head, gets amnesia, and becomes convinced that he’s a sea captain. Viewers suffered through the rambling “Lost in Cleveland” skits and Foley suffered through having to repeat dialogue such as, “Don’t worry about Bang-Bang, she won’t throw any depth charges here.”

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I only get TNA here in the UK (don’t subscribe to Sky TV), some recent TNA stories made me go WTF?

  1. AJ Styles in some romantic tryst with Dixie Carter explains all his success in the company.

  2. Eric Young and O.D.B. get married in the ring and take the Knockouts tag championship.

  3. Jeff Jarrett & Karen Jarrett feud with Curt Angle about his ex-wife and kids etc. I know they were actually married once but it seemed a real sleazy plot line that left a bitter taste in the mouth.

  4. The idiocy of Joseph Park looking for his brother Chris (“you know - Abyss”). Supposedly he has been walking about the locker room for weeks on end until he accidentally gets a tip-off that Bully Ray is involved. More weeks go by while they talk at each other before a PPV where Abyss magically arrives to save Joseph.

  5. Sting holds Eric Bischoff hostage with a crow in a bird cage.

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Mick Foley is more awesome than all of us here, the Most Interesting Man in the World, and the Old Spice Guy put together could ever hope to be.

One thing I miss about wrestling (stopped watching round about the HHH/Steph marriage) is ol’ Mick. Is he still around?

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He’s but a shadow of the man he once was. Years of abuse, plus poor conditioning for a wrestler, have taken their toll, yet he occasionally will still try to perform. He wants to be the man who had epic, brutal wars with Sabu and Terry Funk, who got thrown off and later through the Hell in a Cell cage (in the same match) by Undertaker, but Father Time has stolen those gifts from him.

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Mick Foley is currently doing stand-up comedy. Yes, you read that correctly. He was in Columbus and did a stand-up set at a very small venue just a couple weeks ago. I, unfortunately, could not attend, but I heard him plugging it on a local radio show. He said his brand of comedy is really just telling funny stories from his wrestling days.

He also had some disparaging things to say about TNA, although he was gentle about it. I didn’t even realize he was ever there. He’s back with WWE now, but mostly just doing publicity appearances; not much actual wrestling.

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Not only was he in TNA for a while, he won their world title. From Sting. In a steel cage. It’s like, if you’d told me a decade earlier that 10 years from then Foley and Sting would be not only still wrestling, but having steel cage matches for a world title, I would’ve never believed that.

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Wait. Last time I watched any more than 30 seconds of pro wrestling at a stretch (admittedly we are probably talking about 35 years ago) it comprised some big guys doing faux fighting in a ring. Plus some incoherent mock angry yelling at one another before and after.

How the hell do all these storylines play out? Is this all done in the ring or told by commentators or by mock fly on the wall documentary or what?

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A friend of mine posted this video on Facebook the other day and I simply must share it with you.

The Most Illegal Move In The History Of Wrestling

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What the hell was that???

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In Japan one of the most popular wrestlers is an inflatable doll.

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Wrestlers spend more time playing out the story line these days. The guys are bigger, and the wrestling more oriented around big moves than style. This leads to more injuries, so they spend as much time promoting as they can. In the olden days most story lines were pushed by a wrestler’s manager in quick promos, now they have to do most of the talking themselves. Since all the old simple storylines have been used too many times, they add in these dramatic, and usually idiotic plots. It’s not wrestling anymore, now it’s Sports Entertainment.

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There was a little girl wrestler in Japan a few years back who looked like Wendesday Addams who used a chokeslam for a finishing move. She was supposed to be spooky and supernatural, but I thought the chokeslam just looked so fakey and bad.

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  1. AJ Styles accidentally marries Kurt Angle’s wife somehow

So if you know anything about Kurt Angle, you know that a big part of Kurt Angle’s on-screen character is his egocentrism and his drive to achieve, even at the cost of his personal life; the championship comes first, his Olympic gold medals come second, and his wife and kids are somewhere waaaay on down the line.

In an attempt to keep his unreasonably hot wife Karen, Kurt Angle decides to have a vows renewal ceremony with her on national television, in the middle of a wrestling ring, with fellow TNA wrestler AJ Styles as his best man. Because there’s no way that can end badly.

Samoa Joe and Kevin Nash interrupt the ceremony and attack the groom, stripping Kurt Angle out of his clothes in the process. In the ensuing chaos, AJ Styles is knocked into Karen Angle. As they stumble to their feet in front of the altar, the priest (probably just to fuck with them) declares them man and wife. AJ gleefully plants a big one on Karen as her outraged husband looks on, clad only in his boxers and bowtie.

Later, Kurt stumbles across Karen canoodling on a couch with AJ and its set up to make it look like they’re having an affair. Except that he naturally assumes Karen has come to win HIM back when she is clearly there to ride the AJ Train, full steam ahead, toot-toot. This segment is meant to portray Kurt as a career-driven asshole, but it comes across more as Kurt Angle is so emotionally maladjusted that he doesn’t comprehend other humans.

KURT: Did you come here to win me back?!
KAREN: [is clearly about to say, “Uh, no, not really…”]
KURT: Karen, I’ve told you for the last time! As long as there’s a ME and [Samoa] JOE, there CAN’T be a ME and YOU!

He then chases her into AJ’s arms, stopping just short of saying, “AJ, fuck my wife for me! I’m too busy for her ~womanly nonsense~!”

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The best thing that has come out of TNA is Jay Lethal’s impression of Ric Flair.

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5.** Lord GaGa**

This might be a little long, because Goldust is one of my favorite wrestlers ever, period, and I get a little excited to talk about him and his great gimmick.

Long long ago, in 1995, a Texas hick named Dustin Rhodes (son of “Da Amewican Dweem” Dusty Rhodes, a famous wrestler in his own right) showed up in the WWF with a WHOLE NEW LOOK and an attitude to match. Now called Goldust, and claiming to be an L.A. sophisticate and cinephile, he wore flamboyant gold outfits that made him look like the Oscar statuette come to life with a blond wig atop his head.

Make no mistake, Goldust was not a weakling gay stereotype. He was a 6’7 wrestling tank and a master of the mental mindfuck who kissed opponents to break out of holds and then beat them harder than *Avengers *beat box office records. When Rowdy Roddy Piper was like, “Bring it, homo!”, Goldust ran him over with his car.

Then in the midst of a red-hot storyline with Brian Pillman, Pillman died suddenly of an undiagnosed heart condition. With the storyline derailed, Goldust went off the deep end, dumped his manager/real-life wife, and took up with bad girl Luna Vachon. In a parody of musician Prince’s controversial name change, Goldust re-named himself The Artist Formerly Known As Goldust and, if possible, got even weirder.

A gimp-suited and ball-gagged Goldust was led to the ring on a leash by Luna, in a scene a lot of people would describe as “disturbing” or “controversial”, and what I call “Tuesday”. At about 2:10 you can actually see parents dragging their kids out of the arena! Another memorable segment had Luna and Goldust in fetching matching pink ensembles (with Goldust wearing a sparkly codpiece) whileGoldust reads Dr. Seuss’s “Green Eggs and Ham” aloud to the crowd.

The Artist Formerly Known As Goldust gimmick didn’t last that long, and eventually Goldust would be watered down to a purely comedic and kid-friendly character, but while it lasted, it came as close to bisexual fetish porn performance art as the WWF/WWE would ever come, before or since.

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Combat Zone Wrestling loves to do wacky ass shit like this. I think it’s great, a reminder that pro wrestling is supposed to be fun.

Chikara Pro is also well known for goofy antics, like this.

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You gotta finish the story!

They eventually dropped the Goldust routine (he literally burned the costume during a promo)and used him as a born-again Christian, wrestling under his real name–not even his “real” wrestling name. He actually went by Dustin Runnels. At the end of his promos he’d say “He’s coming back” ostensibly to refer to Jesus, but when it was clear he wasn’t getting over with the crowd–it meant Goldust.
Goldust returned had some decent feuds and then left for WCW.

Where he was promoted in videos as a new even creepier character called Se7en. a kind of Hellraiser’s Pinhead mixed with a cowboy and riding a spooky horse who watched children sleep…really–watch it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWtXAtGJ4JQ
His in arena debut was actually pretty cool–it was very much akin to the more elaborate WWF entrances. He levitated down the entrance ramp and into the ring…and then proceeded to give a fake real speech about how stupid unrealistic and stupid gimmicks like this were. He then wrestled as Dustin Rhodes for awhile and then returned to WWF to be Goldust again.

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Which included a time when he was electrocuted, and when he returned from the “injury,” he came back with Tourette’s Syndrome.

I shall not speak of Black Reign…

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Oh, I could talk all day about the Goldust character, which still has people talking and debating to this day, almost 20 years later. I think Dustin Rhodes is one of the best *actors *in wrestling, and the success of Goldust was all about how much he threw himself into it. If he had just gone through the motions, or let on that he was uncomfortable or thought it was beneath him, the gimmick would’ve crashed and burned. Also, the further he went with it the bigger the “Fuck You, Dad” would be to his estranged father, Dusty Rhodes.

While I’m on that, everyone needs to check out Dustin/Goldust’s hilarious parody of his dad Dusty from 1998, it’s like an untapped fountain of memes. “I beat Ric Flayah TWENTEH FIVE THOUSAND TIMES inna row! Hadda legendary feud widda TERREH FUNK but Terreh Funk whupped my ASS so I don’t wanna tawk about that right now” and the bit at 1:25 when Goldust struts towards the camera in ladies black lingerie while Dustin-as-Dusty’s goofy voice says “So PROUDA mah SON, yeah! Comes straight from mah LOINS!”

One last bit: did y’all know the reason Goldust got fired from the WWF the first time was that he asked Vince McMahon to buy him breast implants? As much of a bible-thumper as Dustin Rhodes is, it seems like he came up with half the crazy shit Goldust pulled on his lonesome.

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  1. Big Boss Man feeds a chihuahua to Al Snow

Al Snow would carry a mannequin head into the ring with him and talk to it before matches, in the sort of sensitive portrayal of people with mental illnesses the WWE is known for. However, this idea was dropped after parents started complaining about the Al Snow action figure that came packaged with this accessory, complaining that it looked like a severed head. Deeming the action figure “too gruesome”, parents opted instead to walk three aisles over in the Wal-Mart to purchase shotguns and ammunition.

So Al Snow started carrying a chihuahua named Pepper around with him, and talking to Pepper as he had to the mannequin head. Big Boss Man (who before his wrasslin career took off, had been a real prison guard in Georgia) dognapped Pepper. Al Snow tried to get Pepper back, which results in Big Boss Man cooking and feeding Pepper to him.

So much better than a tiny mannequin head!