# Wrestling Gimmicks



## Yaoi Huntress Earth (Jan 7, 2015)

You ever looked a character or an episodes and thought this character could've been done better or you could come up with better gimmick? Or was there a gimmick you really loved? Here's the thread to talk about it: ideas, improvements, favorites, guilty pleasures, etc.

To get the ball rolling, I was inspired by this article on movie characters that would make good wrestling gimmicks. I think a diva based off Angel Baby from The Devil's Rejects would be neat. Throw in a little Jeanette from Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines and you'd have a sexy, very deranged, fun-loving, child-like character. (Though a little toned down in some parts for the PG rating.) She'd be a fitting member of Wyatt Family


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## XYZpdq (Jan 7, 2015)

La Parka

Whether it's LA Park, La Parka AAA, La Parka Negra, whoever. Dancing Skeleton is great.


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## Frank Rizzo (Jan 7, 2015)

dcisp said:


> La Parka
> 
> Whether it's LA Park, La Parka AAA, La Parka Negra, whoever. Dancing Skeleton is great.



Couldn't agree more. The "Chairman" is the fucking man!


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## CatParty (Jan 7, 2015)




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## Strewth (Jan 7, 2015)

I loved Sean O' Haire's 'Devil's Advocate' vignettes. It's a real shame the gimmick never went anywhere.


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## Frank Rizzo (Jan 7, 2015)

Good call on the Waylon Mercy gimmick CatParty. I really feel like, had Dan Spivey not had a career ending injury, he could have become an upper tier heel.


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## CatParty (Jan 7, 2015)

Frank Rizzo said:


> Good call on the Waylon Mercy gimmick CatParty. I really feel like, had Danny Spivey not had a career ending injury, he could have become an upper tier heel.




in his matches, you can see how much trouble he was having moving around with a bum back. the character is so ahead of it's time, but you can tell he didn't have much longer left


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## Frank Rizzo (Jan 7, 2015)

CatParty said:


> in his matches, you can see how much trouble he was having moving around with a bum back. the character is so ahead of it's time, but you can tell he didn't have much longer left



It's true, it really is true. Really makes you wonder "What if"? What if his back wasn't as bad? I really would have loved to see how they progressed and moved the character along/


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## CatParty (Jan 7, 2015)

Frank Rizzo said:


> It's true, it really is true. Really makes you wonder "What if"? What if his back wasn't as bad? I really would have loved to see how they progressed and moved the character along/




he was so good in his prime. he absolutely killed people when he was in japan 
just imagine mercy moving around like this:


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## Frank Rizzo (Jan 7, 2015)

CatParty said:


> he was so good in his prime. he absolutely killed people when he was in japan
> just imagine mercy moving around like this:



Spivey moving around like that, plus the Waylon Mercy gimmick?

Forget about it, the man would have basically written himself a ticket into main event (or at the very least, upper midcard) status.


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## CatParty (Jan 7, 2015)

Frank Rizzo said:


> Spivey moving around like that, plus the Waylon Mercy gimmick?
> 
> Forget about it, the man would have basically written himself a ticket into main event (or at the very least, upper midcard) status.




and that brings us bray wyatt lol


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## Frank Rizzo (Jan 7, 2015)

CatParty said:


> and that brings us bray wyatt lol



I might be alone on this, but I'm actually enjoying his matches with Dean Ambrose.


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## Yaoi Huntress Earth (Jan 7, 2015)

Strewth said:


> I loved Sean O' Haire's 'Devil's Advocate' vignettes. It's a real shame the gimmick never went anywhere.


I would've loved to have seen him become a corrupting force (have him manipulate a face into a heel).

Here's a few I've enjoyed that weren't mentioned...













I know some people thought this one was racist, but I thought when Kai and Tai would talk and act like badly dubbed kung-fu villains was funny. (And I'm a quarter Japanese myself.)


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## Strewth (Jan 7, 2015)

INDEED.


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## Le Bateleur (Jan 7, 2015)

Frank Rizzo said:


> I might be alone on this, but I'm actually enjoying his matches with Dean Ambrose.


I've liked it, too. Less for some of the gimmicky matches, more because it's two young guys who can go in the ring and on the mic, getting main event exposure.

I think that the Bray Wyatt gimmick has so much potential. He just needs to actually have a real impact on someone he feuds with in order to be a credible threat, rather than the guy who threatens people on the big screen for a few weeks. It's looking like he might face Undertaker at Wrestlemania - if he retires Taker then that might be just what he needs.

It also wouldn't hurt if he brought out his dead-on English accent now and then


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## BatNapalm (Jan 7, 2015)

Kung Fuk Naki (actual typo on the WWE website that instantly eclipsed this amazingly tone-deaf gimmick, which lasted all of a few weeks in 200






And my favorite wrestling gimmick of all time....The Yeti



Spoiler: Pronounced YET-TAY












And why is he a mummy and not a mythical snow-beast like his name would suggest? Because _fuck you_. That's why.

He broke out of a block of ice, did a run-in, dry-humped Hulk Hogan in the ring for an uncomfortable amount of time, and the character was never seen again.


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## Strewth (Jan 9, 2015)

Watching Halloween Havoc.

Completely forgot about this lunacy.


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## Cuck Norris (Jan 9, 2015)

Some of my favorite, albeit, awful gimmicks came during that weird time period when WCW was just starting to pull ahead in the Monday Night Wars. It's like they had a dartboard full of adjectives and pop culture references and threw darts to pick their gimmicks.

This video does a pretty good job of summing it up.



Spoiler: Wrasslin'







In this corner, Victorian Kenny Rogers! In the other corner, White Sub-Zero From Mortal Kombat!



EDIT: And it's a shame too, the guy who was Glacier kept getting shit gimmick after shit gimmick, but he had real potential. It's a shame Vince values beefcake looks over in-ring ability.


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## CatParty (Jan 9, 2015)




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## cypocraphy (Jan 9, 2015)

best gimmick


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## Strewth (Jan 9, 2015)

CatParty said:


>



I actually really like the first incarnation of Doink. When he was a slightly sinister heel and was portrayed by Matt Borne. By the time Dink arrived, much of the appeal was lost.


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## XYZpdq (Jan 9, 2015)

Strewth said:


> I actually really like the first incarnation of Doink. When he was a slightly sinister heel and was portrayed by Matt Borne. By the time Dink arrived, much of the appeal was lost.


Borne Again, his crazy Joker-ish Doink in ECW was some great stuff.


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## Frank Rizzo (Jan 9, 2015)

dcisp said:


> Borne Again, his crazy Joker-ish Doink in ECW was some great stuff.



He was paired up with Shane Douglas as Borne Again, IIRC, yes?


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## XYZpdq (Jan 9, 2015)

Frank Rizzo said:


> He was paired up with Shane Douglas as Borne Again, IIRC, yes?


That seems likely, but I have no idea if he did or didn't, sorry.


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## Frank Rizzo (Jan 9, 2015)

dcisp said:


> That seems likely, but I have no idea if he did or didn't, sorry.



It's cool, I'm just going by memory. IIRC, Douglas and Borne teamed up, and the storyline was that Douglas wanted to show the world that Borne was more then a "wrestling clown", that he was sick of being looked at as a joke, and wanted to show how dangerous a man he was.


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## Yaoi Huntress Earth (Jan 10, 2015)

This gimmick shouldn't have worked, but it did.





I just love this little douchebag.





Now that he's coming back, I hope we can see a more sneaky and vindictive streak. Like maybe getting a foreign character who could beat him (like Cesaro) almost deported so he won't have to risk losing in a big event. Then play dumb when called on it.


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## XYZpdq (Jan 10, 2015)




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## Cuck Norris (Jan 10, 2015)

Frank Rizzo said:


> It's cool, I'm just going by memory. IIRC, Douglas and Borne teamed up, and the storyline was that Douglas wanted to show the world that Borne was more then a "wrestling clown", that he was sick of being looked at as a joke, and wanted to show how dangerous a man he was.


Borne is a perfect example of WWE eschewing talent in favor of beefcake.


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## cypocraphy (Jan 10, 2015)

Frank Rizzo said:


> It's cool, I'm just going by memory. IIRC, Douglas and Borne teamed up, and the storyline was that Douglas wanted to show the world that Borne was more then a "wrestling clown", that he was sick of being looked at as a joke, and wanted to show how dangerous a man he was.



imo the heel Doink might have worked in ECW. Yeah he's a clown, but if he's an evil psycho clown then it's ok.


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## Flowers For Sonichu (Jan 10, 2015)

(I'm pretty sure Muta has no idea what's going on)


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## Yaoi Huntress Earth (Jan 10, 2015)

This had the potential to be a great gimmick with a cool-looking character and a great theme, too bad it didn't work out.





I'd like to see them bring this gimmick back with a new light where the wrestler is a face who punishes heels for their sins by striking fear into their hearts. Whistling could be his calling card (not unlike the Whistler from The Wire) which would be the first 17 seconds of Rammstein's "Engel." Sorry, sometimes my imagination runs away with me.


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## Strewth (Jan 10, 2015)

Yaoi Huntress Earth said:


> This had the potential to be a great gimmick with a cool-looking character and a great theme, too bad it didn't work out.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I was a massive fan of the Mordecai gimmick. If he'd been around in the early attitude era he could have done great things with Undertaker.


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## XYZpdq (Feb 13, 2015)




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## For The Internet (Feb 14, 2015)

CatParty said:


>



Ha ha omg I got to see Chavo Gurrero live during his Kerwin White gimmick. It was magical.

I kind of love Santino Marella's kung fu cobra gimmick, speaking of Kung Fu(k) Naki. One of the few wrasslin' shirts I ever bothered to buy. Not sure if it counts since the kung fu part was more something on a t-shirt than it was something incoporated into his tv gimmick. I can't help but enjoy Santino Marella. I know, I have no credibility.


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## XYZpdq (Feb 14, 2015)

I dug the hell out of Santino. As much as his Russia asskicker gimmick was neat I think Santino got way more mileage than the Russian probably would have.
Cobra was a good twist on the gimmicky finish. I liked the times it couldn't be turned off, or the time there were the dueling snake charming flutes trying to control The Cobra.

And they need to remake King of the Zombies with Santino replacing Mantan Moreland.


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## For The Internet (Feb 14, 2015)

I have been called out so many times for saying I enjoy Santino Marella I just expect to encounter hostility whenever I say it, LOL. I just think he's a lot of fun and I agree, his cobra gimmick made an otherwise pretty unremarkable (other than being a sort of rip off of Mr Socko) finisher something entertaining. I've seen him live and he is fantastic, really works off the energy of the crowd and does a ton of interaction.

Since I live in a place that only gets visited once a year by the WWE at the most so they bring out the big guns for us. I've been lucky enough to see Ric Flair, HBK, Edge, Undertaker, Kane (they were in a brothers of destruction tag match, which made me mark out so hard), Rey Mysterio before his injuries limited him... a whole bunch of great wrestlers. I enormously regret not going to the Hulkamania Tour, though. I also wish I'd discovered wrestling before 2005.


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## Flowers For Sonichu (Feb 14, 2015)

anybody remember this exceptional shit?


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## GS 281 (Feb 14, 2015)

CatParty said:


> he was so good in his prime. he absolutely killed people when he was in japan
> just imagine mercy moving around like this:


He reminds me a lot of Baron Corbin.



Absinthe said:


> I've liked it, too. Less for some of the gimmicky matches, more because it's two young guys who can go in the ring and on the mic, getting main event exposure.
> 
> I think that the Bray Wyatt gimmick has so much potential. He just needs to actually have a real impact on someone he feuds with in order to be a credible threat, rather than the guy who threatens people on the big screen for a few weeks. It's looking like he might face Undertaker at Wrestlemania - if he retires Taker then that might be just what he needs.
> 
> It also wouldn't hurt if he brought out his dead-on English accent now and then



Bray Wyatt would have been bad ass in ECW. 

These are all good gimmicks, but I am surprised no one mentioned the "Stone Cold" gimmick. It's just so basic and easy to relate to. A pissed-off redneck that talks a lot of trash, who wasn't ever given a chance and gets obstacles placed in front of him because he can't conform? The Stone Cold character has got to be one of the most basic but effective gimmicks of all time.

Most outrageous one, I liked this...





It's like a normal looking Chris and Barb.


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## Flowers For Sonichu (Feb 14, 2015)

who else was into wrestlecrap back in the day?


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## Strewth (Feb 14, 2015)

hurrhurrhurr said:


> who else was into wrestlecrap back in the day?



I've read the books, like the Death of WCW and the Book of Lists, but never used the site much.


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## cypocraphy (Feb 14, 2015)

Beaver Cleavage was awesome in a bad way. I remember they pulled the plug on it after like 2 weeks? Then he did that dumb worked shoot thing and became Chaz.


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## _blank_ (Feb 14, 2015)

I got a few gimmicks for ya...

Behold Mantaur... essentially some fat guy they convinced to wear a bull's head to the ring and go "Moooooooo!!" for his entire match.





Next up, Phantasio, whose gimmick was so bad that he only appeared in the ring once.





Sometimes, the people who write the wrestling scripts decide to bring in other properties from outside the ring. Like homocidal dolls...





...or Robocop.





...and if all else fails, a wardrobe change may be in order.


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## Le Bateleur (Feb 14, 2015)

I mark out hard for Misutero.


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## CatParty (Feb 14, 2015)




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## XYZpdq (Feb 14, 2015)

CatParty said:


>


Did you read the Kane book, Journey Into Darkness? It mashes together all the Taker/Bearer/Kane continuity to date with bits of irl Glenn and Mark, and adds a frosting of its own insane shit too, like Paul Bearer's ice cream addiction.


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## CatParty (Feb 14, 2015)

dcisp said:


> Did you read the Kane book, Journey Into Darkness? It mashes together all the Taker/Bearer/Kane continuity to date with bits of irl Glenn and Mark, and adds a frosting of its own insane shit too, like Paul Bearer's ice cream addiction.




Oh really? Like they tried to explain his kane career from a character standpoint?


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## XYZpdq (Feb 14, 2015)

CatParty said:


> Oh really? Like they tried to explain his kane career from a character standpoint?


Sorta.
It's also about his ancient witch ancestors and how their magic powers flow through him.


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## Le Bateleur (Feb 14, 2015)

dcisp said:


> Did you read the Kane book, Journey Into Darkness? It mashes together all the Taker/Bearer/Kane continuity to date with bits of irl Glenn and Mark, and adds a frosting of its own insane shit too, like Paul Bearer's ice cream addiction.


Did they determine whether it was, in fact, Snitsky's fault?


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## XYZpdq (Feb 14, 2015)

Absinthe said:


> Did they determine whether it was, in fact, Snitsky's fault?


It's been years since I've read it and never since I've read it sober, but iirc Lita / Matt / Kane / etc wasn't in there.


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## CatParty (Feb 14, 2015)

Absinthe said:


> Did they determine whether it was, in fact, Snitsky's fault?


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## CatParty (Jun 18, 2015)

this never made it to tv but the vignettes were great


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## CornetteFace (Jun 18, 2015)

Dalton Castle has his gimmick down to a T.

The exotic/weirdo gimmick is a hard one to pull off without being offensive/downright crude.

Dalton is money.


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