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The poor sportsmanship of Hulk Hogan


rainmakerrtv

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I was thinking about this thread the other night when I was watching some Bugs Bunny cartoons. I think Hogan is just how Americans like their good guys. Look at Bugs as an example. He was a poor sport, he was a jerk, he started shit with people, he treated his friends poorly, etc. Yet you still rooted for Bugs in the cartoons even when he was the antagonist to Elmer, some random hillbilly or Daffy. I think Hogan might just be a cultural product.

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I was thinking about this thread the other night when I was watching some Bugs Bunny cartoons. I think Hogan is just how Americans like their good guys. Look at Bugs as an example. He was a poor sport, he was a jerk, he started shit with people, he treated his friends poorly, etc. Yet you still rooted for Bugs in the cartoons even when he was the antagonist to Elmer, some random hillbilly or Daffy. I think Hogan might just be a cultural product.

True, but Bugs probably had more instances of being willing to sell for somebody and he did reverse roles several times with Elmer. :)

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Bob Clampett speaking as a self aware and reflective Bugs Bunny (only part of which made it into the Wiki citation):

 

"Some people call me cocky and brash, but actually I'm just self-assured. I'm nonchalant, imperturbable, contemplative. I play it cool, but I can get hot under the collar. And above all I'm a very "aware" character. I'm well aware that I am appearing in an animated cartoon. If you think I'm kidding, obsoive all my asides to the audience: "Funny situation, ain't it?" or "I do dis kinda stuff to him all through the picture" or, in the middle of my fake dying scenes, "Hey! Dis oughta win me the Academy Award."

 

And when Elmer Fudd comes sneaking up to my wabbit hole for the umpteenth time dressed as a hunter, carrying a hunting rifle, and I ask him, "Ehhh, what's up, Doc?" does anyone in the audience for one teensy weensy moment think that I don't know the answer to that question??? I'm usually just toying with him. And I sometimes chomp on my carrot for the same reason that a stand-up comic chomps on his cigar - it saves me from rushing from the last joke to the next one too fast. And I sometimes don't act - I react. And, I always treat the contest with my pursuers purely as "fun and games." When momentarily I appear to be cornered or in dire danger and I scream, don't be consoined - it's actually a big put-on. Let's face it, Doc, I've read the script and I already know how it all comes out."

The other thing you have to give it up to Bugs is that his heels sold their ass of for him. Some of the best drawing stooge heels in cartoon history: Daffy, Elmer and Wile E. Bugs was such a monster face that he was able to get over often previously babyface Daffy as a definative monster stooge heel to draw some of Looney Tunes' biggest gates with the Hunting Trilogy.

 

But you have to give bugs all the credit in the world, as when it was time to go heel, he totally laid out for the baby face. It's not like Cecil was one of the monster faces of Warner Brothers, but they worked a three match series, and by god if Bugs *never* got his face heat back in any of them:

 

Tortoise Beats Hare: Bugs jobs to 9 turtles

 

Tortoise Wins by a Hare: Cecil tricks the Bunny Mob to taking out Bugs, then taking out themselves

 

Rabbit Transit: tricking Bugs into cheeting to win, and then getting dragged away by the Coppers

 

It was as if in the last match they used the Dusty Finish... to screw over the Heel Wabbit!

 

:)

 

John, Bugs Bunny Fanboy

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Daffy had been a heel so often that folks didn't have any sympathy on Daffy in that to go face. When it turned out that Bugs was the one screwing him over, wasn't that a Face spot for Bugs? It would be as if the same thing happened to Hollywood Hogan, and in the end it turned out that Flair had been the one fucking over.

 

"Ain't I a stinker?"

-Bugs Flair

 

:)

 

John

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Yeah. That's actually a perfect example of Bugs pulling a Hulk Hogan.

 

I find it interesting Sam didn't get mentioned. But he seemed to be more of the monster heel variety than the stooge heels that Bugs had faced off with. Though, again, the Hulk Hogan comparison holds up well with Sam as Bugs wasn't afraid to use dirty tactics. And there was the cartoon where Bugs dug his way into the prison and Sam was just some poor schmuck doing his job that Bugs essentially fucked over.

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And nobody cares. Are we REALLY supposed to start feeling bad for Wally Walrus because Woody Woodpecker fucks with him? Are we supposed to feel bad for Muraco cause Hogan scraped his back with his nails? Are we supposed to feel sorry for Margaret Dumont when Groucho is insulting her? What a pussy way to look at things.

"All Wally Walrus was trying to do was to have a barbeque."

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I find it interesting Sam didn't get mentioned. But he seemed to be more of the monster heel variety than the stooge heels that Bugs had faced off with. Though, again, the Hulk Hogan comparison holds up well with Sam as Bugs wasn't afraid to use dirty tactics. And there was the cartoon where Bugs dug his way into the prison and Sam was just some poor schmuck doing his job that Bugs essentially fucked over.

I didn't mention him because I never found him super compelling as a heel. I'd agree that he was pushed as a monster heel, but... he's against Bugs, so you never really buy Sam has a chance. Kind of a loudmouth heel, but unlike Daffy where you wanted to see Daffy get his come uppance, with Sam... I don't know... didn't take off regularly.

 

Wil E. didn't work with Bugs a ton, but was an awesome stooge. Of course his unending Buzz Sawyer vs Tommy Richesque feud with the Road Runner was more famous. But the Bugs feud gave us a deeper insight into how Wil E. viewed himself.

 

John

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And nobody cares. Are we REALLY supposed to start feeling bad for Wally Walrus because Woody Woodpecker fucks with him? Are we supposed to feel bad for Muraco cause Hogan scraped his back with his nails? Are we supposed to feel sorry for Margaret Dumont when Groucho is insulting her? What a pussy way to look at things.

That's the point though. We as Americans tend to root for assholes because they're funny, do what we want to see, etc. That was what I was getting at. Hulk Hogan is the pro wrestling equal of Bugs Bunny. So the negative qualities he showed as a face make perfect sense in that kind of context.

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Bugs and Wile E. only worked that one cartoon right? That really did introduce a certain arrogance to the character that never really was shown in the Road Runner cartoons. But those were really just big spotfest type shows. No real substance other than the big spots.

Looking at Wiki:

 

The Coyote appears separately as an occasional antagonist of Bugs Bunny in five shorts from 1952 to 1963: Operation: Rabbit, To Hare Is Human, Rabbit's Feat, Compressed Hare, and Hare-Breadth Hurry. While he is generally silent in the Coyote-Road Runner shorts, he speaks with a refined accent in these solo outings (except for Hare-Breadth Hurry), introducing himself as "Wile E. Coyote—super genius", voiced by Mel Blanc.

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"Hare-Breadth Hurry" was the one where Bugs pinch hit for the Road Runner, making it a hybrid between the classical WEC vs RR spotfest short and the classical BB vs Stooge Heel short. It's a Chuck Jones short, it's Bugs, and it's Wil E... so I'm a mark for it. :)

 

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All the other ones are more traditional BB vs Stooge Heel shorts, all by Jones. The first, "Operation: Rabbit", was terrific. The others had their moments.

 

The Wil E. opposite Bugs in these is of course similar to the Wil E. opposite pure babyface Road Runner, but against Bugs he gets some time on the stick to try to work the fans. I think we both agree that it does help get across Wil E's personality well. Rather than just being a coyote obsessed with eating that damned Road Runner, we see a coyote who thinks of himself as quite a brilliant fellow. He probably could find simpler prey, and easier ways to kill them. But he has a need to prove just how smart he is.

 

Problem?

 

No one is smarter than Bugs. :)

 

John

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Foghorn was a full blown heel. He was funny but you rooted for shit to blow up in his face because that was going to be funny. All of the main characters in the Foghorn cartoons were heels minus the Widow Hen. I've seen Foghorn compared to Sanford from Sanford and Son and I think that's really accurate.

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Yeah, Foghorn was a total heel. Such an asshole heel that like MD says, you rooted for the Dog and Henrey to fuck over Foghorn.

 

Tweety was closer to the old school Tweener Face, or more accurately a forerunner of the Modern Kick Ass Heel like Stone Cold.

 

Tweety had a nasty and evil streak of beating the shit out of the various cats, especially Sylvester. Yes, the cats deserved an ass stomping just as much as the heels deserved Stone Cold opening up a can of whip ass on them. Bugs was a thinking man's bastard babyface. Tweety... that innocent "babyface" grill of his... yeah it fooled Granny, but we all knew he was one nasty motherfucker. :)

 

A Face vs Face match between Bugs vs Tweety would have been a war. One suspects that Bugs would have decided at the start of the feud to sell and bump for Tweety like he did for Cecil, since Bugs would do what was right for the promotion. But Tweety is such a nasty little bugger that at some point Bugs would have snapped off on his arrogant two faced no selling ass and just put the Bird down.

 

Bugs was like Hogan: he was far smarter and more dangerous than people inside Warners thought he was. If Tweety got a big head and didn't let Bugs get his heat back, Bugs would have booked Tweety into a corner, and when the Bird thought he would be going over, Bugs would have shot on him and gotten the fall. He also would have turned the entire Warners front office on Tweety, and gotten the little fucker fired.

 

At that point, where could Tweety have gone?

 

Disney wouldn't have wanted him. No way Mickey would work with him, Goofy wouldn't have wanted to stooge for someone so nasty, and Daffy would have spread rumors about Tweety with Disney Creative because Daffy wouldn't want any real competition in being the top bird on the Disney pecking order.

 

MGM? Tom and Jerry would have had none of it. They still were pissed off over Tweety stealing the 1948 Oscar from them, one of only three Oscars the legendary duo failed to win between 1943-52... and the one that broke up their streak of four straight wins.

 

Folks may think that Tom & Jerry were a laid back pair off camera, but they were competitive as all hell, and took their "art" serious. I mean... Jerry worked with The Man of Dance Gene Kelly, and Jerry busted his ass to hold up his end of the match. T&J saw Tweety & Sylvester as a cheap rip off of Cat & Mouse dressed up as Cat & Bird. They would have walked out of MGM before letting Tweety join the promotion.

 

Tweety would have been forced to work with the garbage animation promotion of the era: Walter Lantz Studio. And let's be honest that Lantz, the Paul Heyman of Animation, would only have brought Tweety in to put over Woody before moving down the card to job to Chilly Willy.

 

Yeah... it's too bad that Tweety wasn't booked with Bugs. By the 60s, Tweety would have been out of the business, pawned his Oscar to support his booze habit, and eventually caught trying to poison Granny to inherit her money. No one from the business turned out to be a character witness in his defense at the trial, and he got sent to the slammer.

 

Bugs always would have pointed out to anyone who listened that all Tweety needed to do was work an even steven program and he would still be in the business making money.

 

"Tweety was always all about Tweety. He didn't respect the business or the people in it. In the end, no one wanted to have anything to do with him."

-Bugs

 

"I never say anything bad about anyone, even that annoying Duck. But Tweety... he was a nasty little bastard. No one was sorry to see him leave the promotion."

-Porky

 

:)

 

John

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