Tooned In: Hulk Hogan’s Rock ‘n’ Wrestling (1985) and a salute to Body Slam

That’s Sports Entertoonment Revenge Tour

Happy Saturday Morning! And okay, okay, in honor of that, I’ll do that one Hulk Hogan’s Rock ‘n’ Wrestling segment I excluded last time, plus I have some extra stuff for fans of a certain cult wrestling movie of the ‘80s that we enjoyed on HBO back in the day. Everything is available on YouTube (if you know where to look…)

DRIVING ME CRAZY

If. Col. Rob Parker, Abobo, and Bobby Heenan screwed, had a baby, and shat on it.

Except, of course, for this, which you have to Dailymotion, as established last time. So this would be the Sheik and Volkoff Comedy Show. Nikolai is doing a disastrous job of driving the Sheikmobile, and it sounds like Sheik warns him to “Look out for that bitch!” So we CAN have vintage Sheiky Baby…oh wait, he said “bench”. But they take the elderly lady on the bench who chews out Volkoff so maybe he DID say “bitch.” They all crash in a fountain, and wah-wah music plays as Sheik is being molested by an animatronic billboard. Since he is tired of putting his life in Nikolai’s hands, Sheiky decides he’s going to get his own driver’s license. And to help him is, no…it can’t be who they say it is. Whoever this pumpkin headed guy in Boss Hogg’s clothes, who screams like all of his lines is, it couldn’t be Bobby Heenan. But…I have to give DiC the benefit of the doubt I suppose. Sheik says if he helps him learn how to drive, he’ll turn his and Nikolai’s contracts over to him, and he can be their manager instead of Freddie Blassie (who we never see on Rock ‘n’ Wrestling, he probably saw that he’d be drawn like Mr. Magoo and have, I don’t know, Rob Paulsen randomly voicing him and he probably FKH. DIC CARTOONS IS TRAAAAAAAAASH…) Bobby robotically says “Bobby…the Brain…is classier than Blassie!” as if he was being AI’ed into the Not Gorilla Monsoon videos, only Joe Marotta did a more authentic job with those.

The heels are off to a bad start when Bobby tells Sheik to put on his seat belt, and he ends up taking Heenan’s, whose pants comically fall down. No wonder Vince tried to stop people from saying “belt,” it IS too confusing! He then proceeds to hot rod Bobby’s car through a narrow alley like it was going to turn into a torpedo like the Batman Returns Batmobile, wrecking “The Brain’s” ride, and finishes with his version of parallel parking (as in, driving between two cars and ramming them apart. I feel Sheiky’s pain, though, as parallel parking was the one thing I was allowed to fail at and still pass my road exam…) Since it’s clear that there’s no way he’d pass, though, Sheik decides he’s going to do what he does best: cheat. And Bobby, despite having his car totalled, goes along with it! He’s worse than all the law that kept letting Sunny go! I’ll also add that Bobby Heenan should be a comic foil. Here he’s a straight man to Sheik and Volkoff’s buffoonery. Anyway, Bobby has a hidden speaker that picks up Sheik yelling what the instructor wants him to do, and he uses a remote control to do it. But then Nikolai sees a kid with an RC airplane and asks if he could try it out, and the kid has no problem with it despite it being a well-known WWF bad guy and enemy to the American Way to boot. So Volkoff winds up with his own remote. Which somehow also controls Sheik’s car? Hilarity ensues, and Sheik fails the road test. So he has to keep relying on Nikolai, who got his license driving in desolate Siberia where he couldn’t hit anything, to do the driving for him. Which would have kept him from doing anything stupid like driving with his sworn enemies while impaired, to be honest. This gets ** for Sheik and Volkoff being goofs, but I am docking them one star for relying on Temu Bobby Heenan. So *

Now, to continue the rock ‘n’ wrestling theme, it’s time for an overhead BODY SLAM of bonus reviews! If you pieced together little references I made in the past, it’s no secret that I loved the 1986 movie of that same name. Maybe one day given the materials, streaming or otherwise, I’ll do it justice here. For now, since I made an AMAZING DISCOVERY on one of WWE’s WCW YouTube channel uploads, I thought I’d round things off with a few homages to Body Slam. Make sure Mr. Kim and his Samoan henchmen were paid, and sit back and enjoy the following…

AX AND HAMMER, IS THAT YOU?

From the 2/15/86 episode of World Championship Wrestling, as uploaded onto the WCW Vault channel…during this, Paul Jones is interviewed after Baron Von Raschke’s match and introduces his newest Army member Teijho Khan, and…wait…Khan is in the same faction as The Barbarian now? THE CANNIBALS FROM BODY SLAM WERE REALLY ON THE SAME TEAM! Mind blown. And I always found it funny that Barbarian’s movie name was “Ax,” because when I finally saw Body Slam, we just had the Demolition vs. Powers of Pain feud in the WWF. Anyway, as usual Baron says a lot of stuff, but ends with That Is All The People Need To Know, so it’s all good.

(Incidentally, the same episode includes the match that essentially gave us the Big Bossman. Because Dusty saw super heavyweight jobber Ray Traylor go up for Tully Blanchard’s slingshot suplex, and figured a big guy who could bump like that could probably be made into a star. Thus Traylor was taken off of TV, and weeks later Jim Cornette introduced us to his new bodyguard, Big Bubba Rogers. The rest is history. And sidenote… “Big Bubba, no trouba” is a severely underrated catchphrase. As was “Even if you can’t see Bubba, Bubba can see you.” John Cena wishes he could be invisible and threatening at the same time!)

NWA PRO WRESTLING 7/19/86 : ROCK ‘N’ ROLL EXPRESS vs. TEIJHO KHAN AND BARBARIAN (w/Paul Jones)

And even IRL (or worked life, just not a movie), Khan and Barbarian want to stop rock and roll! Jim Cornette is complaining about Ricky and Robert as he is doing commentary with Bob Caudle, wonder if that’s foreshadowing somehow? Jones is now totally leaning into his army leader/Hitler image, riding crop and fatigues, and all. “T.J. Khan” as Caudle puts it starts with Ricky, who ducks a telegraphed punch and suplexes “Hammer,” and then both RNR’s team to double suplex the Ballbearin. Come on, I had to say it at least once. RNR celebrate and shout at Jones, and on commentary I’m reminded that at this point in the feud, the Midnight Express are still the tag team champions. The Army corners Robert but he fights his way out as Cornette talks about purposely scheduling an appointment during the Super Summer Sizzler tour so he doesn’t have to put up with the Rock ‘n’ Roll and their fans. Barb’s in, and an eyepoke has Gibson reeling, and if you’ve seen Gibson you may question how that works. But he outmanuevers him as well, and Barb gets ping-ponged in the RNR corner. Barb cheapshots Morton into playing himself, and press slams him and drops the elbow for two. Kick of Fear, and Morton is a total ragdoll. Double clothesline, Khan slams him, but Ricky changes another slam attempt to a small package that Barb breaks up. Four way breaks out, Ricky is thrown out but I believe is still legal….hmmmmm…and yep, he sunset flips Khan for three at about 4:45 in. And Jones, appropriately enough, is all William Shatner “KHAAAAAAAAN’ing” over his loss. So I was wrong about a Midnights run-in being imminent. Not only that, but I was hoping that RNR would use their finisher, so I could make a joke about Barbarian and Khan being vulnerable to “Kick”. Really abbreviated RNR Formula match for TV that I could see used on a ‘90s Monday Night show. * ½

BARBARIAN AND TONGA KID REMEMBER BODY SLAM
HANNIBAL TV, 2019 and 2020

Man, Barbarian sounds like Master Splinter now. (Still waiting for official word on when OG Ninja Turtles hit MeTV Toons. And I KNOW I can see it on streaming, but – whiney voice — it’s not the same!!!) He recalls that he never really saw Teijho Khan after it, but as for him retiring just after? For my sins, I do at least remember him being in the AWA for awhile 1-2 years after. Hannibal and Barb agree that Tonga Kid could have been a bigger star, with Barbarian saying he could have had the Superfly role. Hopefully just the in-ring role. I will say that I agree that Tama was a revelation especially after the Islanders turned heel. He was kind of ahead of his time as his depiction (and really, both him and Haku) were more like how Samoan wrestlers are presented now, instead of the primitive beasts they normally were back in the ‘70s and ‘80s. His charismatic interviews helped the matter.

And I’ll be darned, he talked to Tama too. I’ll only address the Body Slam relevant part, which begins at 1:13 if you knew where to look on YouTube. He does name drop his son Jacob though, saying he’s been wrestling with him and “wrestling with myself,” TMI. Hannibal says most people remember him for the movie….eh, honestly I still see him mainly as an Islander. He wishes he could have done more movies, and the best thing to him was tagging with “Rowdy Piper” instead of wrestling him. Hannibal’s plug is sadly dated, since I believe the movie is not on YouTube that I know of. Kid remembers being “hand picked” to star in it because casting saw him wrestling Piper, and Hannibal was surprised Kid got no super push after. Well, first, I don’t think Body Slam had a wide theatrical release. It wasn’t like Jesse Ventura and Predator. Second, didn’t Tonga Kid leave the company after his series with Piper, and only returned in later ‘86 to form the Islanders? They didn’t even mention the movie at all with Piper! Anyway, Tonga believed there was a pecking order with the island guys, and Snuka was first. Not in the company by ‘86, Tama, so would have nothing to do with stopping you from getting a push because of the movie. Though it’s kind of sad that when he did leave, they didn’t somehow go to the Tonga Kid and instead created…Sivi Afi. Roddy Piper was a great guy to work with on the movie’s set, etc. etc.

CAPTAIN LOU AND RODDY PIPER FOR THE BLOCK
HOLLYWOOD SQUARES (1986)

Oh man I forgot about this! So any time I can mash up my two interests, I’m willing to pay a little attention. This is the John Davidson (or to put it in Shadoe Stevens’ words, JOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHN DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAVIDSOOOOOOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!) hosted Squares, of course, which sadly has not seen the official light of day since being rerun on USA Network. Wink Martindale’s legacy YouTube has a few episodes, though. And I will remind you all that Nick Bockwinkel appeared on the Peter Marshall original as a contestant, and he wiped the floor with his opponent. The video I found online only keeps the times Lou and Roddy were called on.

In the first question, Lou actually does what Brian Zane turned into the “Billy, Billy, Billy!” meme when he says “John, John, John!” before plugging Body Slam. The question is, “What is the most romantic movie of all time? Captain with the zinger, “Rambo!” Piper insists that he knows about love as he unbuttons his shirt while Albano looks lovingly…not that there’s anything wrong with that. Piper’s answer? Love Story. But the contestant disagrees, and good, it was a bluff to the real answer, Gone With The Wind! Circle gets the square and the game!

Next question leans into more of the variety show atmosphere Davidson Squares leaned into, as John insists that the wrestlers show a softer side and start singing. Lou and Roddy put on silly hats and sing “On The Good Ship Lollipop”, well, Roddy tries, Lou mumbles a lot of it which is disappointing considering “Do The Mario.” Anyway, John asks, what did Shirley Temple become ambassador to: China, Netherlands, or Ghana? After a conference, Lou and Roddy come up with “China,” and the same contestant disagrees, and again gets the square, because Temple became ambassador to Ghana. And unintentional nightmare fuel to anyone who watched Cartoon Network and saw her movie box set commercials. And gee whiz, we only got two questions that day.

So yeah, see you later, Body Slam is awesome, Hogan’s cartoon not so much.