Introducing the
Some might look at the following article and say "Wonderful - Canadian Bulldog just spent 10 bucks on a bunch of crappy wrestling toys and mismatched weapons!" But not me. I prefer to think of it as "Wonderful - Canadian Bulldog just spent 10 bucks following his dreams."
The 10WF derived its name from - and here things get a little technical - the fact that I purchased everything you see packaged here for just TEN DOLLARS!
Think about it - if you've ever purchased any type of wrestling toy before, it would have set you back more than ten bucks.
Yet here, this set has four - count' em, four - figures, a championship belt, a wrestling ring and lord only know what else waiting for me! I've never heard of the company Kid Connection before, but I believe it would be apropos for them to quite literally shut up and take my money at this point.
As a small child, I staged their own action figure wrestling promotions. Mine was based on G.I. Joe and Star Wars figures and a Jabba The Hutt's playset as a makeshift ring.... but you used whatever you had handy to get the job done; am I right?
Here in the 10WF, they take the guesswork out of playtime for you. These are actual wrestling toys, not buff-looking soldiers with a garland of grenades slung around their necks. And here you have an actual wrestling ring, capable of diving off the top ropes, making tags in and out of the ring. Plus the weapons surrounding the ring turns any match into a hardcore match.
The only thing I was confused about was the description: of the four figures, only two are "articulated figures"? What's the difference between those two and the other two? I don't see any.
Before we profile the wrestlers, let's check out the weapons include in this set. You've got.....
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A championship belt that is an exact replica of Brock Lesnar's.
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A silver ladder that lifts your grappler a good 2 - 2.5 " off the ground.
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A brown folding chair so flimsy that most wrestling companies would actually encourage you to get your head bashed in with it ("Go ahead - please try this at home!" the PSA would say).
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A teeny brown garbage can, like the one your mother uses to collect dustbunnies.
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A silver guardrail, because you don't have the money to buy the fancy-schmancy barracades used by WWE.
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A brown traffic cone, used in wrestling matches such as....???
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A silver table you constructed during your final year of high school metal shop.
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A brown.... parking meter? What the hell???
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A brown crutch for your chickenshit heel to fake injuries with.
Now that we've thoroughly displayed the weapons available to our workers, let's take a look at the workers themselves.
COWBOY BOB PUNK
Don't let his tattoos of a scorpion and.... well, something else... fool you, Cowboy Bob Punk is a veteran of the squared circle. This ain't his first rodeo. In fact, before he was in the 10WF, CBP was a veteran of the rodeo!
This equals trouble for anyone who messes with the cowboy in the powder blue trunks and silver boots. Sometimes you'll get nailed with a superplex from the top rope; sometimes it will be a move that wasn't invented more than 40 years ago!
You just never know when you're facing off against Cowboy Bob Punk.
REY REY SIN GUERRERA
Full disclosure: Rey Rey Sin Guerrera is the 10WF's token luchador. But how else do you expect us to get ratings from the much-sought-after Latino demographic???
While RRSG (as those in the know call him) is clearly more buff than most luchador, he has a mask that was given to him by real-world wrestling legend Rey Mysterio. And then spray-painted silver, for some reason.
Love him or hate him, one thing becomes overwhelmingly apparent when you cross paths with Rey Rey Sin Guerrera: he must have gone to the same tattoo parlor as Cowboy Bob Punk.
BARON VON GOLLUM
Baron Von Gollum is the 10WF's monster heel because... well, he kind of looks like a monster. Talk about a mug only a mother could love!
Beyond his fiendish features, BVG is an accomplished grappler, putting away many a foe with his iron claw submission hold. Don't let the lack of tattoos fool you, either - Baron may well be the toughest S.O.B. in the 10WF.
Just one small thing, and we probably should have warned you about this earlier... Baron Von Gollum has taken to calling the 10WF spinner belt his "precious" and will do quite literally anything to get his hands on the plastic strap.
MICHAEL DAVIDSON
Look.... we here at the 10WF could have invited comparisons to a variety of African-American wrestlers, including Dennis Rodman, Titus O'Neil (it's hard to see in this picture, but he is bald), or.... if we really want to stretch things and ignore his six-pack, The Junkyard Dog.
But ever since a certain defamation lawsuit was filed against us for the Italian-American character "Mafioso" Sal Pizzatini, we've decided to be carefully what we name our grapplers.
Anyways, Michael Davidson (a/k/a The Funky Soul Brother) is climbing up the ladder in the 10WF and could surprise a lot of critics. Yes, we're referring to Meltzer.
And finally, how could our 10WF be complete without a regulation-size wrestling ring that comes complete with.... wait a second. This is ALL it comes with!
No ropes, no corner posts, not even a turnbuckle pad or twelve. What the hell??? The photo near the top clearly shows ropes, turnbuckles and the whole nine yards. And there's no disclaimer on the bottom of the box along the lines of "Warning: Ropes - which you actually kind of need to make this thing complete - aren't included."
Great! Where am I supposed to go for miniature ring ropes now? I'm guessing Target doesn't have any in stock because, once you've opened this bad boy, you're probably unlikely to upgrade it.
Anyhoo.... this is from the 10WF's first foray into pay-per-view, a show called Barely Lethal. The main event was a one-on-one hardcore match between Michael Davidson (for this show, he was known as David Michaelson for some reason) and Cowboy Bob Punk.
Of course, Rey Rey Sin Guerrera and Baron Von Gollum had to interfere, and this changed the tone of the match dramatically.
After a long and bloody brawl, it appeared as though Cowboy Bob was going to get the win and the prestigious 10WF Commonwealth Championship (did I mention Michael Davidson was champ? does it matter at this point?), but fate intervened. A hole formed in the corner of the ring and who crawled out, but.....
"Mafioso" Sal Pizzatini. Now THAT was a show!