- 20/07/2025
You can get WWE and other promotions to do a LOT for cold, hard cash...
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Short filmTranscript
00:00Look, everybody understands that wrestling is a business, and businesses want to make money.
00:05However, it is still astonishing to check out some of the insanity top promotions throughout
00:10history have bugged, just so a movie studio, band, fast food restaurant or soft drink spews
00:16some delicious dollars into company coffers with a handshake and a smile.
00:20I am Gareth from WhatCultureWrestling and here are the 10 most insane things wrestling
00:25companies did for the money.
00:26Number 10, Scooby-Doo backs up Sin Cara.
00:29First, the pro wrestling tag team you never asked for.
00:32Live on the 24th of March 2014 episode of Raw, WWE had someone don a Scooby-Doo costume and
00:39ride to Sin Cara's rescue.
00:40Poor Damien Sandow had to treat the mascot character as if a cartoon dog had come to life.
00:45It was silly and it was over the top, but all Scoob did get a pop from the live crowd at
00:50least, so that's something.
00:51Still, it's wild to look back on approximately 9 years later.
00:54WWE has produced several crossovers with Scooby and the gang over the years, but they've
00:59mostly been animated movies and things like that.
01:02Here, the mutt with the most was hanging around with somebody who'd likely fall over and botched
01:06the search for bad guys posing as ghosts or monsters.
01:09Scooby and Cara even showed up in the mystery machine, which was actually a really nice touch.
01:14Of course, the only mystery was why the Sin Cara gimmick got such a long run in WWE after
01:19his totally crap start.
01:21Number 9, Rick Steiner Feuds With Chucky
01:23The 12th of October 1998 episode of WCW's Monday Nitro will forever go down in history
01:29as the night tough guy pro wrestler Rick Steiner threatened to beat Chucky the Doll's
01:34lil' horror movie heirs.
01:36Bonus points go to absolute pro Mean Gene Oakland for acting like Rick vs. Chuck might be Halloween
01:42Havoc's next main event.
01:43His facial expressions were on point.
01:45Anyone who thinks Vince Russo produced the worst WCW content ever needs to fire up the
01:50WWE Network or Peacock and relive this awkward moment.
01:54Chucky's banter, he was there to promote upcoming movie Bride of Chucky, was pre-taped for the
01:59big screens, so Steiner and Gene had to time their responses as Rick probs weighed up a steel
02:04cage challenge for the next pay-per-view.
02:06It would not have been outlandish for WCW to attempt some sort of match between the pair,
02:11let's be honest.
02:12In fact, it's a bit of a surprise they didn't have someone in a Chucky outfit take some Steiner
02:17lines or suplexes on TV.
02:19I would have definitely paid to see that.
02:20Number 8.
02:21Kiss Demon equals WCW Main Eventer
02:24Here's something so WCW it hurts.
02:27Originally, Eric Bischoff reportedly toyed with the thought of a Millennium Bash that it
02:31included a wrestling show and a Kiss concert.
02:34It was ambitious, but plans changed and WCW cut a deal with Gene Simmons and the band to
02:40introduce a brand new Main Eventer themed on his Demon persona in late 1999.
02:45Journeyman pro Dale Torborg was cast in the role, and he did his best with it.
02:50Hilariously though, WCW's promise to make the Demon a Main Event superstar fell flat.
02:55The company pulled the wool over Gene's eyes here by promoting matches as special Main Events,
03:01but booking Demon on the undercard anyway.
03:03The idea didn't catch on or last long, but the Kiss Demon was actually brought out of storage by
03:08Impact earlier this year.
03:10Because what's old is new, I guess.
03:12Number 7.
03:12WWE Stars Threaten The Muppets
03:15You're still waiting for that mixed tag pitting Jack Swagger and Vicky Guerrero versus Kermit
03:19the Frog and Miss Piggy, aren't ya?
03:21WWE was obsessed with drafting in Celebrity Guest Host to appear on Raw between 2009 and 2010,
03:27and the concept continued beyond that.
03:29But not every single week like it did for around 12 months back then.
03:33By all accounts, The Muppets weren't actually the worst guests,
03:36but they did provide some strange moments on the 31st October 2011 flagship.
03:41Sheamus and Beaker were called family members,
03:44Animal played stand-in timekeeper by furiously hammering the ring bell,
03:48and then there was that standoff between Kermit and Swagger,
03:50that surprisingly topped anything from Jack's dreadful world title run.
03:54Cross-promoting with The Muppets and having burly wrestlers shout at small puppets
03:58was certainly a choice.
04:00Number 6.
04:01Non-fan Jeremy Piven is not prepared
04:04This was absolutely unacceptable.
04:06It perhaps says everything that The Muppets were better prepared for a spot on WWE programming
04:11than Jeremy Piven or fellow guest host Ken Jeong.
04:14They doubled up to promote their upcoming movie,
04:17The Goods Live Hard Sell Hard,
04:18on the 3rd of August 2009 edition of Raw,
04:21and it was a complete and utter car wreck.
04:24Fans were already tired of the guest host idea just a month or so in,
04:28by the time Piven and Jeong hit the scene.
04:31Ken's OTT comedy style looked embarrassing in front of an audience who didn't pay to see him,
04:36then Jeremy went and messed things up by calling upcoming pay-per-view SummerSlam
04:40The Summerfest.
04:41John Cena had to step in to correct him as fans booed,
04:44and it became crystal clear that WWE hadn't prepped Piven for his role at all.
04:48Of course, he should have done some homework himself,
04:51but it was cringeworthy to realise that the company hadn't exactly been hands-on here.
04:55So let's just hope Paramount Pictures paid well, eh?
04:57Number 5.
04:58Shawn Michaels equals KFC's Colonel
05:00This image here is probably how WWF fans in 1995 thought Shawn Michaels would look
05:06during his retirement tour in 2023.
05:08It's actually HBK as the Colonel of KFC fame.
05:12He was dressed like that,
05:13so the fast food restaurant padded company bank accounts with a healthy wedge of moolah
05:17at SummerSlam 2017.
05:19Keep in mind that this daft nonsense happened before Shawn returned to rings
05:23for a disastrous bout in Saudi Arabia the following year.
05:26So the first real glimpse fans had of Michaels striking his familiar poses in years
05:31happened as he cosplayed a chicken restaurant's mascot.
05:34This wasn't the first time KFC had paid WWE Megabucks to promote their food either.
05:38Dolph Ziggler also played the part in 2016.
05:41But Michaels is more memorable because, well,
05:44Shawn was retired and people were desperate to see him wrestle again at the time.
05:48Ric Flair was apparently earmarked for the gig at first,
05:51but health problems prevented that.
05:52So HBK did some posing and folks awkwardly applauded whilst hating on corporate shilling.
05:58Number 4.
05:58Mountain Dew sponsors Bray Wyatt's first match back.
06:01Money talks, baby, and it shouts down WWE's better instincts.
06:05They had to know that promoting Bray Wyatt's first match back at the 2023 Royal Rumble
06:10as a Mountain Dew special was a bad idea.
06:13The soft drink company were willing to pay up though,
06:15and that's why Wyatt vs LA Knight, yeah, became a pitch black match.
06:20What did that mean?
06:21Well, the lights were dimmed and everything was soaked in neon flair
06:24to make it resemble a can of the dew.
06:26Yes, yes, Bray's first major match since returning the prior October
06:30was turned into a hollow advertisement for some soft drink.
06:33Worse, the spectacle flat out sucked,
06:36and seemed to turn Wyatt into a neon-drenched version of his old fiend offshoot.
06:40The whole thing lasted around five minutes bell to bell,
06:43was a struggle to watch for those live at the Rumble,
06:46and didn't really do much of anything for Bray or Knight.
06:48A bizarre decision for what would ultimately be the last ever televised in-ring match
06:53fans would see from the late, great Wyatt.
06:55Number 3.
06:56WCW has Robocop save Sting.
06:59Wrestling traditionalist and he who loves touting college sports Jim Ross
07:03must have thought he'd gone to industry hell when he shouted
07:05here comes Robocop at WCW's Capital Combat 1990 pay-per-view.
07:11The Unstoppable Crime Fighting Machine's second movie was set to come out one month after the show,
07:16so he rocked up to the DC armory and saved Sting's beacon.
07:20The Stinger was locked in a mini steel cage by the four horsemen,
07:23and he needed rescuing.
07:25Out came Robocop to robo-help his robo-pal,
07:28as robo-fans celebrated in the robo-stands,
07:30and WCW surely patted themselves on the back,
07:33for thinking they'd just earned Orion Pictures a tidy sum.
07:37Instead, the angle was roundly criticised by viewers,
07:40and people feared the character might return for some actual in-ring stuff
07:43that'd kill off Ric Flair's stable for good.
07:46That didn't happen,
07:47but Robocop's tie-in did become stuff of legend,
07:50and show up in worst-of lists about WCW and pro wrestling generally forevermore.
07:55JR probably didn't go and see the flick, presumably.
07:57Number two, Vince McMahon's special egg?
08:00The team behind Dwayne Johnson's Netflix movie Red Notice,
08:03repeatedly paid WWE a shedload of cash to cross-promote at Survivor Series 2021.
08:09That's why a beaming Vince McMahon arrived at the building,
08:13clutching a priceless golden egg,
08:15one of the treasures from the film,
08:17and WWE stars were forced to act amazed.
08:20Ridge Holland's awestruck reactions were particularly enjoyable.
08:23Later, McMahon claimed the egg wasn't a prop from some movie,
08:27it had been gifted to him by The Rock,
08:29and was worth $100 million.
08:31And after that revelation, it went missing,
08:34and the hunt was on.
08:35Vince was furious,
08:37various stars scrambled to find the thing for a reward,
08:39and wrestling fans wondered why they were supposed to care about any of this.
08:43It didn't need to make sense.
08:45WWE had already pocketed a substantial sum for agreeing to show off the egg at all,
08:49so their hokey hunt was background noise to company tills a-ringin.
08:53And it made for some horrendous TV, too.
08:55Wonderful stuff.
08:56Number 1.
08:57Zombies invade WWE and devour The Miz
09:00Here it is, people.
09:01The undoubted kingpin of take-the-money-and-run cross-promotions in wrestling history.
09:06And a reminder that WWE will do anything to make cash.
09:10Apologies in advance if you'd somehow managed to eject this from your brain since it happened.
09:14I know I did.
09:15Damien Priest beat The Miz in a zombie lumberjack match,
09:19when various extras, including former favourite Scotty 2 Hottie,
09:22dressed up as the undead at WrestleMania Backlash 2021.
09:26This was a tie-in with Batista's Army of the Dead movie,
09:29and it was downright horrible to witness.
09:32At one point, the zombies even devoured Miz,
09:34as the announcers wondered if he'd make it out of the Thunderdome alive.
09:38Then, Miz showed up on TV soon after, like nothing had happened.
09:42The match was genuinely torturous to watch,
09:44and made you wish you were being eaten to death like the awesome one.
09:47So, now you can go and try to forget this horrific thing all over again.
09:51Now go and enjoy a can of Mountain Dew,
09:53some golden scrambled eggs,
09:55and a side of zombie.
09:57Bye-bye!
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