No, you foreigners don’t know who Matti Nykänen is. Finns know only too well. Matti Nykänen is the most useless, sad celebrity in Finland and quite possibly in the world.
Once, Matti was a good (great) ski-jumper and a national hero. He won 4 gold metals in Olympics and numerous other awards in other championships. Then he started going downhill. Steeply downhill. And no, there hasn’t been a ramp yet.
Here are some of his career "high"lights, taken from here:
marrying/divorcing/re-marrying/divorcing his wife Sari Paanala
marrying/divorcing some other lady in between
changing his surname 2 times
confessing to being an alcoholic
falling asleep at the wheel and driving off a bridge
attempting to return to ski-jumping, failing miserably due to his lousy skill in V style
suffering a heart attack
trying out his wings as a pop vocalist while possessing no singing talent, releasing two albums
recording a third album, which was (fortunately) never released
venturing into politics, resigning from the city council after attending 1½ meetings
planning to open a restaurant in Helsinki
working as a male stripper
posing for a hardcore porn magazine
getting engaged to a 17-year-old Estonian girl and weaseling out of the whole deal a week later
selling his vast collection of medals for a ridiculously cheap price, getting them back afterwards
getting into a relationship with a rich heiress, subsequently breaking up and trying to get back together again
drunk driving
finding god
beating up a female stranger, in public, without provocation
drunk driving again
committing himself into a mental institution
facing 4 charges of assault and battery against his fiancee (the aforementioned heiress)
hiding from the police who have issued a warrant for his arrest
giving interviews from his secret hideout
proclaiming on TV that he is the greatest ski jumper of all time, and nobody is going to beat him in the foreseeable future
getting married once again to the heiress he has beaten up several times, and having a bachelor party with “celebrity” guests including Henry Saari. (“Henry the Great” is a famous Finnish porn star.)
once again beating up his missus, after learning she had filed for a divorce (I bet you didn’t see that one coming!)
Getting his own brand of cider. I’m not kidding. Only in Finland would they use a wife-beating drunk to sell cider. The bottle even comes with a famous quote from Matti, “Elämä on laiffii”.
showing no signs of any originality by once more engaging into some good old wife-battering fun. probably due to drinking a bit too much of that sweet, sweet Matti-Cider.
returning to music business by recording a new single “Elämä On Laiffii” and a forthcoming album
Breaking up with his wife after getting a restraining order, then getting back together with here. Repeat approximately 10 times. Really.
planning to move to Spain
As you can guess, Matti is a regular tabloid fodder.
But now. Today. The magazines have headlines - “MATTI NYKÄNEN STABS HIS WIFE!”
Yes. Stabs. With a knife. Apparently, beating them is no longer enough for our national loser ass-bastard fuckhead. The wife (who clearly had a black eye in the pictures) was shown pointing at the wound and declaring that she loves Matti and “he’s a nice man when he’s sober”. Unbelievable.
Matti Nykänen. Finland’s Michael Jackson, except drunken and violent. And I’m not being fair at all to Michael Jackson here, really.
It’s not a crazy name for a Finn - Matti is one of the commonest first names (sort of like John for Americans - “Matti Meikäläinen” is the Finnish equivalent of “John Q. Public”) and Nykänen is a perfectly fine surname, at least if the assbutt in question hadn’t drawn it to mud with his actions.
But the guy is… well, crazy is not quite what we’re looking for… violent, abusive, lunatic wad of fetid monkey testicles, yes.
Well, see, it’s hard to translate in a way that will convey it’s utter inanity. I’ll try.
“Elämä”= Life
“on” = is
“Laiffii” = life, except that it’s clearly a twisted word-mutant taken from English, and it hasn’t ever been used by anyone except Matti Nykänen. Not to mention it sounds very, very stupid.
In other words, it means “Life is life”, except it’s even stupider.
Lol, his website still hasnt opened properly? I remember laughing at it with some friends many years ago 4 if I remember correctly.
Hes a wanker, has been for many years. I remember that once he was a good ski-jumper, now he is just something to fill tabloids.
Its what tabloids do, make something “interesting” to the front page to get people to buy it, how “has-been” the celebrity in question is doesnt matter. Oh well, I’m sure we can read some more wonderful news of his life again soon…
Wait a minute, shouldn’t your counteroffer include less stupid celebrities, not more?
I mean, if we have to take John Rocker, you’ll have to take Tony Halme (racist wrestler) and Mikko Alatalo (think of him as a straight Elton John, except with a guitar and worse).
IIRC this fella made world champion at a young age and has been lauded for it.
He was handed wealth and fame right at an age when most other young men are just starting to make their way in the world.
Quite simply, he was not given the room, or the time to grow up properly, celebrity is a cruel master, relentless, it can work for you, or it can still sell sell sell as a freak show for a prurient public eager to lap up every last tidbit morsel in asteady decline from grace.
Once upon a time there was a good reason why someone had achieved fame and celebrity, they were either born into positions of power, or they had created something, discovered something, but usually they had a goodly number of years behind them.If you were to talk to a clebrity of say two hundred years ago, there was a reasonable chance that you might learn something, that they might have something of interest and relevance to say.
The modern culture of celebrity simply consumes individuals unfortunate enough to not be equipped to cope, those whose achievements may be based on trivialities such as appearance, or marketable commodities such as youth.
This character is one of those that has been used up, he has no personal hinterland of experience or knowledge, he only has the fact that he could jump on a pair of long skis to carry him through his life.
Pretty pathetic really, but the show was put on by the media for us, and how we lap it all up!
There are Finnish porn stars? Is the dialogue in Finnish? Do Finns have any particular sexual proclivities that you really need a Finn to star in it to serve that (one would think, relatively small) market?
Well, here’s Henry (it’s not an explicit picture, don’t worry), and here is a picture of Matti, taken from his website.
One of the most ironic pictures I have ever found is a bumper sticker from the 80’s. It’s a picture of a young Matti Nykänen, in partnership with Raittiuskasvatusliitto, a society which promotes sobriety in Finland. Matti Nykänen promoting sobriety. Nearly broke my heart.
Oh, and if you give us Strawberry and Rocker, you have to take Timo T. A. “I’m known solely for being a celebrity” Mikkonen as well.
I make good money every year betting that the guy representing the U.S. will not win the World’s Strongest Man competition, and this could really mess up my system.
Hmm. My friend sent me a link to an article in today’s Ilta-Sanomat (a Finnish tabloid magazine), in which Nykänen claims that he has no idea what happened at home. He says he was at a local pub and when he came home, the floor was covered in blood.
On a different note, we were just discussing the Finnish celebrity “life cycle”, i.e. things every Finnish celebrity will, at some point, be interviewed about in tabloid magazines. The list includes
*getting married/divorced
*having a baby
*going through a religious awakening
*announcing the beginning of a singing/acting career (this is an especially common one)
*going public with their alcohol problems/depression/suicidal tendencies/marital problems/stress/other, or the alcohol problems/depression/suicidal tendencies/marital problems/stress/other of their children or parents.
*drunk driving or other misdemeanor charges, usually stemming from alcohol
Really, the only thing Nykänen hasn’t done is become a father. I sincerely hope he doesn’t.
And, as a final aside before I start heating up the sauna: Mikko Alatalo.
You forgot running for Parliament, aUra. I mean, he’s done city council (what party did he represent there, anyway?), but I don’t think he’s run for the Parliament yet.
4 if I remember correctly.