Book Review: The Squared Circle: Life, Death, and Professional Wrestling by David Shoemaker (Deadspin's "The Masked Man")

In the last year, I've been roped back into the world of professional wrestling. A rite of passage for any preteen boy as is, it's decidedly uncool as a thirtysomething, but being older now I've come to appreciate a lot of the unique storytelling aspects that go along with the goofy lowbrow craziness that comes with the sport format.

David Shoemaker is best known for his Deadspin "Dead Wrestler of the Week" pieces as well as writing a regular column for Grantland on the ins and outs of the WWE. It's probably my favorite feature on Grantland these days if only because he appears to be the only mainstream writer taking wrestling seriously, and giving him a full length book opportunity to discuss the topic was something I had to jump at.

WWE Raw Powerslams Perth

The WWE is about as close to real life comic book superheroes as you can get. Cheesy storylines, impossibly buff men, ridiculously gorgeous women, square jawed heroes and diabolical villains all exist in the flesh here.

I've personally been a WWE (well then WWF) fan since I was 13, waaaaaay back in 1998. So that's about 15 years. Crazy. You can tell me its fake all you like. I'm well aware and I don't care. It's just so much damn fun. Try and think of wrestling as a musical. When emotions run high in a musical the characters break into song, here when emotions run high the characters fight.

The WWE Australian tour hit Perth on Tuesday night and my little brother and I went along. We've gone to every WWE show that's been here so far. It's tradition now.

So what shenanigans unfolded during the night? Did John Cena overcome all the odds? (Spoiler, he always does). Hit the jump for my WWE Perth recap!

Thursday Threesome: Three Things the WWE is Getting Right

When we did our month of wrestling posts for Marchmania in March of 2012, I was at a bit of a loss. I hadn't really kept up with it at all, having completely missed the Attitude Era and only knowing a few things secondhand through friends and such.

Shortly after we did Marchmania, however, a semi-personal connection got me hooked back in: Damien Sandow. I graduated from high school in the same class as Sandow, and while we were never really friendly (never saw each other out of school, only had a handful of classes together), I realized how serious he was about it when he showed me a picture of himself and Killer Kowalski, who was training him at the time. I always kept my eyes peeled for him as he went through the independent ranks, and while he had a quick run in 2007, it's only now that he's getting the push he's worked for since the late 1990s when he would organize independent events in Worcester.

So what started as YouTubing his matches has resulted in my setting the DVR for Raw and Smackdown, and what started as being a fan of some guy I once knew has resulted in my being a fan of wrestling again. Having watched somewhat regularly for about 6 months now, I have opinions! So that's what we do here, right? Here, for Thursday Threesome, are three things I think the WWE is really getting right:

Lucha!

Keeping up with the wrassling posts here are some animation shorts by Yann Ben Alluch

MarchMania: The Art Of Wrestling

Wrestling has always been about the iconic characters for me. I grew up in the 1980's with such colorful, over-the-top WWF personalities as Brutus The Barber Beefcake, Jake The Snake Roberts and Captain Lou Albano. The weirder the character, the more I liked them.

In celebration of MarchMania, I've gathered some of my favorite classic wrestling inspired artwork. 

Much more after the jump (including a semi-NSFW one all the way at the bottom).

Hulk Hogan's Rock N' Wrestling Runnin' Wild

During the mid-1980’s, two major trends collided: professional wrestling and Saturday morning cartoons. As the World Wrestling Federation (now WWE) made its move to become the premiere name in wrestling, Hulk Hogan was already a household name, through his cameo in Rocky III as Thunderlips, and his victory over Rowdy Roddy Piper in the first WrestleMania.

Capitalizing on this success is the 1985-87 cartoon Hulk Hogan’s Rock N’ Wrestling. This cartoon takes place in an alternate universe where half the WWF’s stable lives in the same town and get into hijinks. Even the theme song is different from the more familiar “Real American” which Hulk would later enter the ring to, and was remade by composer/producer Jim Steinman into the Bonnie Tyler song “Ravishing”.

Nerd History: The Trials and Tribulations of Sgt. Slaughter

I'm 30 years old today, so when I was growing up, my pro-wrestling "phase," as it were, was in the very late 1980s into the early 1990s. I remember being a big fan of the Bushwhackers and the Ultimate Steroid Warrior (more on him later this month), but, living outside of Worcester, Massachusetts, this meant that I could see the WWF pretty much every time it came through the area. I got to see a few tapings, any number of weird occurances, and the weirdest thing that I didn't realize was weird at the time - the return of Sgt. Slaughter to the WWF. I was at the old Boston Garden during the height of the bizarre Gulf War-era storyline of Slaughter when he feuded with Hulk Hogan. While there are some significantly bizarre stories to exist in the weird world of professional wrestling, this is one of the few cultural touchstones that bled over into the "real world," as it were, and continued to have repercussions.

Introducing "MarchMania"

Fruitless Pursuits is proud to present MarchMania, a month-long tribute to professional wrestling’s connections to popular culture.

Pro wrestling’s “golden era” of the 1980’s introduced a lot of children to the spectacle of the squared circle, and muscular, huge, or just plain overweight men in Spandex were every bit our heroes as athletes, firefighters and Sports Illustrated swimsuit models. And now that we children who said our prayers and took our vitamins are grown adults, we can look back fondly of WWF, NWA and WCW wrestling and still smile, and maybe laugh.

You Got Your Mupppets in My Wrestling

So if you missed it, the Muppets appeared on WWE Raw (that's wrestling, you guys!) on Halloween night, because if there's one group of people that the producers of the upcoming Muppet movie want to get into theatres these holidays it's wrestling fans! And if that mash-up sounds as strange to you as it does to me, then why not sit back and watch a clip from the show! I like to call it... Out-Acted by Muppets! For realz!

Actually all this clip does is convince me that wrestling is in fact 100% real! I'm just pissed that no one jumped in the Sweetums suit and pile-drived an oily sociopath!