Posted on by bdamage1
Brian Damage
In a world that has larger than life characters, flashy outfits, over the top promos and often times outrageous physical violence…it can become easy to associate professional wrestling being a real-life cartoon. During the 1980s into the mid-1990s, the then World Wrestling Federation was synonymous with being compared to one. It, of course, would only be natural for pro wrestlers and the industry to be associated with actual animation. In this piece, we will take a look at the various cartoons that have graced our eyes that had some sort of pro wrestling influence to them.
Capturing professional wrestling in drawings and art has dated back for quite some time. You can look back to the days of Georg Hackenschmidt versus Frank Gotch and see newspaper comics depicting their rivalry in 1910.
From newspaper comics came actual comic books where you could read the likes of legendary wrestler Antonino Rocca squaring off against Superman in 1962.
Drawing the likeness of a professional wrestler was one thing, but actually taking that drawing and bringing to life in animation was quite another. One of the very first cartoons depicting professional wrestling in animation goes back to a cartoon short in 1951 entitled ‘Bunny Hugged.’ It was put out by Warner Brothers, animated by the iconic Chuck Jones and featured the rascally rabbit named Bugs Bunny.
The cartoon had a character based on real-life wrestler who was named ‘Ravishing Ronald’ who was based on the Gorgeous George. It also had the villain in this short named ‘The Crusher’ and of course Bugs who wore a mask and called himself the ‘Masked Terror.’
Warner Brothers weren’t the only movie studio to get into the ring so to speak. In 1953, Universal put out their own wrestling themed cartoon called ‘Wrestling Wrecks’ featuring Woody Woodpecker. In this six-minute short, Woody cheers on his favorite wrestler nicknamed ‘Precious Percy’ against his arch nemesis nicknamed ‘The Bulldozer.’ Woody Woodpecker gets involved in the match after Precious Percy was sent to the hospital and after some cartoon hijinx…pins The Bulldozer himself to become champion.
The character would return to the ring in 2000 (an updated version of the cartoon) in an episode entitled ‘The Contender’ to challenge a wrestler named The Granulator. I guess he forgot he was already a wrestling world champion nearly 50 years earlier and wanted to beat the Granulator to win $5,000.
Disney wanted to get into the act and produced their own short that featured their top character Mickey Mouse in a short called ‘Tapped Out’ in 2013. In this short, Mickey is volunteered by his buddy Goofy to take on the evil Pete in a wrestling match.
Of course, we can’t mention cartoons without mentioning Saturday mornings in the 1980’s. Back then, it was tradition as a kid to wake up early, turn on the television and watch your favorite cartoons. In 1985, Vince McMahon and the WWF got into the Saturday morning cartoon business with a show called ‘Hulk Hogan’s Rock N Wrestling.’ While the show featured all of our favorite babyface and heel wrestlers of that time period like Hulk Hogan, Andre the Giant, Hillbilly Jim, Wendi Richter, Roddy Piper, The Iron Sheik and Big John Studd…it wasn’t necessarily about wrestling.
It was more of a cartoon that focused on all the heel wrestlers causing trouble all over and Hulk and his friends saving the day. The cartoon wrestlers weren’t even voiced by the actual wrestlers, but by professional voice actors. Most notably, actors like James Avery (Uncle Phil from the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air) and Brad Garrett ( Robert from Everybody Loves Raymond) voiced the Junkyard Dog and Hulk Hogan respectively. The show only lasted two seasons (1985-1986) and was subsequently cancelled.
Speaking of the 1980s, our cartoon viewing wouldn’t be complete without watching them after school. One such show was called G.I. Joe where Joe battled the evil terrorist group known as Cobra. The show ran from 1983 to 1986 and featured popular wrestler Sgt. Slaughter as a member of G.I. Joe. Slaughter was not only played himself on the show but also did his own voice acting for it too.
Seeing how successful Sgt Slaughter was in voicing a cartoon, it certainly opened doors for other wrestlers to voice animated shows. One such personality was Captain Lou Albano as he would lend himself and his voice to the live-action/cartoon called The Super Mario Bros. Super Show in 1989. Albano voiced the lead character Mario and also starred in the live action portion of the show. While not a show about pro wrestling, it was a huge opportunity for the famed wrestler/manager.
At the height of his popularity in 1997, Bret ‘The Hitman’ Hart would be featured in an episode of The Simpsons entitled, ‘The Old Man and the Lisa’ in which Hart buys Mr. Burns mansion. Bret would also provide the voice of a wrestler named the Hooded Fang from a Canadian cartoon called Jacob Two Two.
Seth MacFarlane, the creator of such animated shows as Family Guy, American Dad and The Cleveland Show must be a closet wrestling fan. His shows have mentioned and have featured such wrestlers as ‘Macho Man’ Randy Savage, Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair. He also had The Rock appear in a live-action cutaway gag and an episode of Family Guy where Peter Griffin’s long lost sister was a professional wrestler.
‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin made a cameo appearance on the short-lived animated show ‘Dilbert’ in 1999 as a judge. He of course also made appearances on MTV’s Claymation show Celebrity Death Match.
‘Macho Man’ Randy Savage lent his voice to a few animated shows including Dexter’s Laboratory, Space Ghost Coast to Coast and King of the Hill.
Jake ‘the Snake’ Roberts appeared on the animated show Lucas Bros Moving Company in 2013.
Hulk Hogan and his daughter Brooke voiced characters on a Cartoon Network show called ‘China, Illinois’ from 2013-2015.
Rowdy Roddy Piper provided the voice for Don John the Flame Lord in 2011 for the Cartoon Network series ‘Adventure Time.’
Another Cartoon Network show called The Regular Show had an episode entitled “Really Real Wrestling” in 2011.
The WB network had an animated show called ‘Mucha Lucha’ which ran 3 seasons from 2002 to 2005. It was about 3 kids living in a place called Luchaville and they all wore Luchador masks and got into many different adventures.
The WWE would get back into the cartoon game with several endeavors including Camp WWE and Story Time as seen on the WWE network. They also formed partnerships with Hanna Barbera and had animated movies with the likes of the Flintstones, the Jetsons and Scooby Doo.
Japan is also no stranger to animated wrestling either. There are several shows that have featured wrestlers from Japan or from here in the States. For example, there was a series in 1988 called ‘Kinnikuman’ which was about a superhero named Suguru Kinniku who has to wrestle various characters in a tournament to retain the title of being the prince of his planet. There was a character named ‘Beauty Rhodes’ and as you can imagine…was a depiction of the ‘American Dream’ Dusty Rhodes. Samoa Joe became a big fan of Kinnikuman while he was wrestling over in Japan. As a matter of fact, Joe developed his move, ‘The Muscle Buster’ after seeing it used in this show.
Tiger Mask W is another show with a wrestling theme to it. It has featured several wrestlers that are currently or formerly a part of the New Japan roster. For example, the leader of Los Ingobernables de Japon Tetsuya Naito had an animated version of himself on this show.
Lastly, there were rumors floating around that WCW also had plans to do their own animated show in 1999. While nothing was ever officially greenlit, there was concept art that showed something was at least planned. The artwork had pictures of both Bret Hart and Eric Bischoff and a character known simply as Tex-Mech. When asked about this cartoon, Eric Bischoff had no recollection of it. With that said, however, there were a lot of projects floating around the company at the time.
