The first big news item for you people is that yes, we are indeed running another show soon. It’s a shock, I know, but seriously, it’s happened before, and it may even happen again. Now, a preview:
DARK MATCHES: So dark, very match-like.
MATCH 1: Patience Halliburton-Vanzetti vs. Twilight Princess Zelda: The official debut of Zelda Lucabrasi going through a phase most people go through in junior high. Whoever wins, I’m sure Patience will be very upset, and I’ll have to hear about it.
MATCH 2: The Turd Boyz vs. The Rockin’ Rocksmen – Because sometimes, you just gotta add a random match. Also, there was no First Class Family representation on the card, and Johnny San Diego bitched at me all week after the initial announcement, which I guess is a good argument for wrestlers getting managers.
MATCH 3: Junior Grim vs. Agent Bulldog – With the Pac vs. Fang title match as the co-main, we went with an Evil Administration vs. B.A.R.S. theme for a couple of the undercard matches. So it’s a match between the EA member that First Lady Evil considers dead weight, versus the BARS member that President Evil considers to the the same. It’s Dead Weight Bowl 2022! Yeah!
MATCH 4: Uno Muerte vs. Captain STRUGGLE: Major title implications here, in this match between the two guys Pac beat for his shot. High probability of this being the best match on the card.
MATCH 5: Agent 35 vs. Black Panther Mask – Huh. On one hand, you’ve got a guy who’s emerged as a major main event-level player against a guy who seemingly never wins. But on the other hand, the never-winning guy is a staple-slinging deathmatch ghoul, which is always a wild card in any situation.
MATCH 6: Zippity Duda vs. Screaming Rage Man – This was added at the last minute, like it’s not even listed on most of the posters around town. And it’s such a bad idea. So very, very bad.
(THE SCENE: After a STRUGGLE house show, (we have shows y’all don’t know about, honest) ZIPPITY DUDA is alone in the locker room, and he has taken great pains to assure himself that this is truly the case. He’s looked around every corner and inspected every nook and cranny, and when he’s made absolutely sure that no one else is anywhere nearby, he pulls out a Zip-Loc bag, which contains a small vial of liquid and a hypodermic needle.)
ZIP: (nervously) Okay… It’s okay, you can do this. Okay… Just one quick poke, and you’re on your way… Muscles, money, girls… Your mother will stop yelling at you… You can do this…
(Not having any idea what the hell he’s doing, ZIP starts to tie off his arm like a heroin addict, then slowly inserts the needle into the steroid vial, his hands shaking the entire time. Shaking so hard, in fact, that he ends up dropping it, and upon hitting the floor, it shatters, and its contents are immediately soaked into the indoor/outdoor carpet.)
ZIP: (With the despairing tone of a dude who just lost something he had to sell his XBox to buy, because that’s exactly what just happened) Noooo!
(ZIP drops down to his hands and knees and starts trying in vain to salvage whatever he can, when – to his horror – he starts to hear the sounds of an elderly German filmmaker bickering with a maniacal burnout pseudo-journalist; it’s COBRA HIGHWAY!)
REINHOLD KINSKI: Mein Gott… How is it zat you have come to arrive here?
ZIP: Look, this is -I mean, I-I-I
RAOUL KEMP: Better keep your distance from that one, Adolf. A junkie without his shit is liable to turn on you like a rabid dog. Give him ten minutes and that boy will become a wild-eyed, slavering brute who’d be thrown into a ditch and poked with sharp sticks if this was a decent society.
ZIP: Junkie!? No, no, no, this is-
KINSKI: It is truly an accursed thing we bear vitness to on zis day. His soul screams in agony. God himself looks down upon zis young man, and he gazes upward toward ze heavens, and he knows. Knows zat he has been chosen by the divine Himself. Chosen to be abandoned.
ZIP: No, seriously, you’ve got it all wrong! This isn’t-
KEMP: C’mon, let’s get the fuck out of here. I don’t want to be the nearest potential victim when this freak’s eyes roll over white and he starts thirsting for blood.
KINSKI: Ve should get some chili dogs.
(KEMP and KINSKI disappear in a cloud of grizzly bear fur and amyl nitrate caplets, and ZIP is very confused. He then sadly starts trying to pick the broken pieces of glass out of the carpet, in order o destroy the evidence before anyone else shows up. As with most things in his life, he fails, as he suddenly smells the telltale scent of Icy Hot and regret – It’s disgraced former world’s champion ACE LA GRANGE!)
ACE: God damn, brother! How is it that you have come to arrive here!?
ZIP: Oh no…
ACE: I mean, things got pretty dark back in the day, but even I never messed around with that shit, brother.
ZIP: (sighing defeatedly) Look… It’s not what you think. That was… I was doing steroids.
(ACE pauses for a moment, as though the hamster wheel in his brain cannot process this information, then can’t help but laugh)
ACE: Ha ha ha ha ha, bullshit, brother! You ain’t on the gas! Look, I spent the entire 2000s on enough gas to fuel a fleet of buses, and that ain’t the body of someone who’s juiced up.
ZIP: It was my first time! Or.. You know… It would’ve been.
ACE: Then why’s your arm tied up like that, brother? You just stick yourself in the butt, or, you know, wherever.
ZIP: What, really? Son of a…
(ACE reaches down and picks up the piece of the vial with the label, then looks shocked.)
ACE: I’ll be damned, you weren’t lying. Brother, what the hell are you doing this for, anyway?
ZIP: Well, you know… To get bigger.
ACE: Brother, you’re a cruiserweight. You’re like four feet tall.
ZIP: i know, I know, it’s just, you know…. My mom…
ACE: (in a very serious tone) Brother, be honest with me… Are you trying to bulk up to beat up your mom?
ZIP: No! It’s just, you know, she just doesn’t respect me, and I thought that if I could win more matches…
ACE: Really? Hell, brother, you don’t need muscles to kick ass. Well, I mean, you do, but not asses as small as the ones you’re trying to kick. Come on, brother, I’m taking you under my wing.
ZIP: Do what now?
ACE: Look, brother, I’m a former world’s champion. If there’s one thing I know, it’s kicking asses professionally. And trust me brother, taking the kinda shortcuts you were gonna take is no good. Sooner or later, you’re gonna end up all messed up, like I did, or like Rockin’ Roland or Alex Kane or Damien Nova.
ZIP: Who’s Damien Nova?
ACE: Aw, brother. Probably the biggest “never was” in the history of Tri-State Area Wrestling. Huh… Heard he just got outta prison, come to think of it. Wonder what he’s up to…
(THE SCENE: Inside Gorgeous Gummo’s Casa De Butts, the local establishment, beloved for providing the community with liquor, chicken wings, and naked women, owned and operated by STRUGGLE Pro Wrestling mainstay GUMMO NAKAMURA. It is a place of total sensory overload, with loud music blaring and garish pink neon seemingly everywhere, in addition to the occasional topless dancer. Diminutive cruiserweight wrestler ZIPPITY DUDA anxiously makes his way through the main room, clearly overwhelmed and intimated by all of this, not to mention by the monstrous bouncers posted at regular intervals and the oily sketchiness of the patrons that frequent the place during the day shift. Seeing as how she is neither monstrous nor in a state of undress, Zip decides to approach ROSA THE BARTENDER to inquire of Gummo’s whereabouts.)
ZIP: Um, hello? Excuse me? Ma’am?
(ROSA doesn’t notice that he’s there, as she is busy wiping out glasses and distracted by the TV mounted on the wall behind the bar, which is currently showing a car insurance commercial featuring a CGI mouse.)
(THE SCENE: Outside the Vito Genovese Memorial Bingo Complex and Auction Barn, THE PHANTOM ROCKER approaches her car – a sweet 1987 IROC-Z. After she unlocks the door and prepares to get inside, she hears a familiar, angry voice…)
DONITA: HEY!
(ROCKER turns around to see her alleged older sister DONITA ZAPATA.(“alleged” sister, as in confirming such things would reveal a masked wrestler’s identity, which is illegal – but c’mon, that’s totally what the deal is) DONITA is conspicuously wearing her own early 90s-esque clothing, as opposed to the glam rock themed stuff she was forced to wear as a result of losing the “Hair Metal vs. Mask” match a while back)
ROCKER: Whoa, whoa, whoa! What the hell are you doing!?
(DONITA angrily shoves a piece of paper into ROCKER’s hands)
ROCKER: Wait… What is…
DONITA: It’s from the Tri-State Area Athletic Commission. And it’s says that you can fuck off, Lita.
ROCKER: But-but-but-
DONITA: A lucha de apuestas contract can’t be open-ended, unless it’s a mask or a loser-leaves-town situation, and how long I had to wear that bullshit was never specified. Add in your abuse of the situation, all your goddamn Skittles or whatever, and the commission ruled that- like I said – you can fuck right off.
ROCKER: So… Are you just going to…
DONITA: What!?
ROCKER: Well… I mean… I just thought that…
DONITA: Lita, if you are about to tell that you had hoped this would be bring us together or some shit, don’t bother. I am fucking done with you. Congratulations.
(ROCKER, looking like she’s on the verge of tears, angrily throws the car door open, gets inside, and starts the engine. DONITA smugly looks on, then starts to turn around, before being interrupted)
ROCKER: I guess you’ve got a point, Donita. I mean, being forced by someone from your own family to look and act a certain way against your will? Why, that must have been awful.
(ROCKER guns the engine, recklessly backs out of her spot, and tears ass out of the parking lot, squealing tires and throwing rocks and shit everywhere. DONITA just stands and stares as she drives off, suddenly with a very distraught look on her face)
