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From the Bowery: WWE Countdown: Greatest Villains

May 8, 2014 | Posted by Robert Leighty Jr.
WWE Countdown Image Credit: WWE
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From the Bowery: WWE Countdown: Greatest Villains  

From the Bowery: WWE Countdown: Greatest Villains

-The Tag Countdown from last week sparked quite a bit of anger from the IWC with the lack of some teams (Steiners, Hart Foundation), so let’s see if anything this week draws the same kind of wrath.

-As usual we start with the talking heads and in this case they talk about what makes a great villain. Having confidence, being a dick, and doing the opposite of what people want are a few of the things mentioned. Heyman says it best that the greatest villains have proper motivation which is a take on the adage that a villain has to believe in everything he says and does. They wrap up discussing how much fun it is to be the villain and to get people to hate you.

10: “Ravishing” Rick Rude

-CM Punk pops up (eventually thinks will catch up and he won’t be appearing which will be a sad day) and calls Rude every woman’s fantasy and guys hated him for that. We get a montage of the insults (Pennsylvania peons) and they are glorious. The various talking heads try to move their hips like Rude and it’s pretty hilarious. They talk about his tights and how they would often get over an angle and the story of the match. Jericho brings up Rude putting Jake Roberts’ wife on his tights and how much of a dick you had to be to pull that off. Heyman gushes over Rude as you would expect (Dangerous Alliance for Life).

9: JBL

-This one I can buy because JBL always came off as a cartoon super villain to me for some reason. Cole says JBL was just being who he was in real life, only turned up to a much higher degree. They cover the angle with him and Eddie where he was chasing people back across the Mexican border. Heyman calls him a loud mouth and that’s saying something considering the source. JBL wins the title from Eddie and even Barrett says it was kind of strange at first, but then he got it over with a 9 month reign. That is rather impressive even if Batista, Cena, and Punk have all topped that since.

8: The Iron Sheik

-Dude should probably be higher because it is hard to think of too many people that were hated more than he was in the 80s. Xenophobia runs deep in this country and evil foreigner talking crap on America will always draw crazy heat when booked right. They discuss the US conflict with Iran and how the Sheik was the perfect person to stir the pot. The spiked boots are talked about and those things always freaked me out as a kid. Next they talk about Sheik ending Backlund’s six year reign as the WWF Champion in what had to be a pretty shocking upset at the time. It is pretty cool seeing some footage with Sheik sporting the title because history basically has shown him winning the title and then immediately losing to Hogan (which was basically the case, but still nice to see him with the title).

7: Ted Dibiase

-Thankfully he is ranked above JBL or I would have questioned the fans. Dibiase was a straight bad ass villain solely because he was a rich bastard that thought he was better than everyone else. Vince shows up and talks about how he hated people like the Million Dollar Man character and I get a chuckle when he says he still hates rich people. They cover Dibiase offering money to fans if they could do simple tasks and then cheating them out at the last second. Daniel Bryan brings up him kicking a basketball away from a little kid who was about to win a $100. Sadly they don’t mention that RVD was one of the kids that Dibiase cheated at one point. Talk shifts to Virgil and how he was perfect in his role. Dibiase Jr. says that Virgil was a great guy that would make his lunch and do whatever his dad said. He couldn’t win the WWF Title, so he made the Million Dollar Title. Bryan says he thought it was a cool idea and couldn’t hate Ted for it. Jericho calls the character one of the greatest creations in WWE history and it’s hard to argue that one.

6: “Rowdy” Roddy Piper

-Seems way too low, but perhaps his face runs over the year clouded the fans judgment. “You do not throw rocks at a man with a machine gun,” is still one of my favorite quotes of all time. Some of the stuff he was able to do in the 80s would not fly in this era and would have been cutting edge even during the Attitude Era. Piper himself mentions that he tried to break every rule there was. The coconut to Snuka is covered and that gets a chuckle from Piper. Punk brings the awesome as he brings up how he shaved the head of midget wrestler, The Haiti Kid. Great stuff! The heat between Piper and Mr. T is discussed and that stuff was legit as they hated each other. Piper mentions that the reason people came to WrestleMania was to see him get his ass kicked. He says he became an expert at getting personal and they show him mouthing off to Andre which isn’t the smartest thing in the world. Cena gets the last word saying that no matter how much evil Piper did, you could see how passionate he was about the wrestling business.

-Recap to this point.

5: “Hollywood” Hulk Hogan

-Lawler says that Hogan was a better villain than he was a good guy which is saying something. Steph calls him one of the most iconic superstars of all time. Then July 7, 1996 happened and Hogan turned his back on the fans to help form the n.W.o. Roman Reigns discusses the heel turn and I can see that he was crushed when it happened. While Hall and Nash were the cool heels that would often get cheered, Hogan was the anchor that kept the n.W.o hated (though I never turned my back on Hogan). Lawler thought Hogan resorting to cheating was ground breaking as it was something you thought you would never see. We jump to Hogan’s return to the WWE in 2002 and the near murder of the Rock on World Wide TV that was soon forgiven in a few weeks. The beat down in the ring was perfect and things went a little too cheesy with the 18 wheeler and the ambulance, but whatcha gonna do?

4: Triple H

-HHH mentions that his goal was to be the most hated guy in the company and really that is what he became in that run in 2000. They put over that what made HHH a great villain was how vicious and violent he was. Great point! Steph stops by to bring up the wedding, and Gene gets a shoot comment that probably wasn’t meant to be a shoot comment: HHH would do anything to get to the top including marrying the boss’ daughter. We get the footage of Steph joining HHH at Armageddon, and Steph looks pretty good during that time period before she got more muscular (my personal taste though). They discuss Evolution and really just HHH’s fantasy of being a Horseman. That leads to HHH turfing Orton from the group and Cole calls it one of the most memorable nights in the past 20 years in the WWE. What the hell is Cole smoking with that comment? I really hope they just edited that comment into this piece on HHH. Anyway, yeah HHH is a hated villain…with the IWC. All kidding aside, HHH deserves a spot on this list though not sure if Top 4.

-We take a break to talk about female villains: Luna Vachon, Sherri, and Lita (Edge era) get discussed. Ambrose was a fan of Lita during his Edge run and yeah, he’s not the only one. She was smoking hot during that period and they make sure to include a lot of shots of her cleavage.

3: CM Punk

-Speaking of Lita’s cleavage….we have CM Punk. Daniel Bryan says that at his core, CM Punk is an asshole and that’s what makes him a great villain. Punk doesn’t know how to respond to being on the list as he isn’t sure if he should bury himself, make fun of himself, or brag about himself. Cody calls him the meanest person he has ever met and Road Dogg mentions he has the balls to say whatever he wants. Holy Shit, don’t let AJ Lee see this as Michelle Beadle pops up and talks about how her dad wouldn’t let her bring home someone like Punk. Oh man, I don’t even know where to start with that one considering all the rumors that floated around about Punk and Beadle. If they are true then congrats to you CM Punk as she is only reason I started watching Sports Nation again. Getting off topic so we get back to talk of Punk having people shave their head to join the SES. They then discuss his monster title reign and Jericho says he wanted anyone to beat him just so didn’t have to hear him talk about how long he had been champion. Punk is a great villain, but I wonder if even he thinks he should be ranked above Piper (knowing how much of a fan of Piper he is).

2: Randy Orton

-Apparently any heel from 1980 or earlier need not apply on this list. I understand all fan voted, but when the fans voting are all teenagers this is what we get. I love me some crazy ass Orton, but #2, really? They discuss the legend killer run and yeah it was strong way to get him over, but he really hit a new gear when he started hearing voices in his head. The Punt Kick of Vince McMahon is still spectacular and then the best of all was the DDT to Steph (not shown as violence against women is wrong), but they do cover him making out with an unconscious Steph while HHH was handcuffed. Awesome! The Face of the WWE run is touched on and we are out.

-A recap of the all evilness before we get to the top spot.

1: Mr. McMahon

-Yeah, kind of a no brainer here as really, who is a bigger villain than your rich, asshole, boss? This should prove great as we get a bunch of Vince’s best quotes and they are glorious. “Life sucks and then you die,” is probably still my favorite. Beadle once again as she talks about Vince being perfect in his role and I lose my train of thought as Renee Young pops up right after Beadle. I truly appreciate hot blondes popping up as some of the talking heads, but I kind of lose focus. Bryan calls Mr McMahon one of the most fascinating characters of all time and mostly because of how organic the character developed. Renee gets to cover the Kiss My Ass Club and we get to see each and every member of the club and the moment they joined. Thanks for that. Swagger calls him pompous and that leads to them covering McMahon vs. GOD and while it was rather asinine, I did find parts of it hilarious. Each talking head does their best impression of Vince’s walk and they all look more ridiculous than Vince. Beadle sums things up buy saying it’s just to easy to hate him.

-In the credit scene they show Vince in the church asking “who am I,” while drinking Holy Water and then spitting it out like HHH. Tremendous!

The 411: A topic like this should cause less issues than last week, though still lack of anything prior to the 80s kind of hurts things. I know I grew up with WWF in the 80s, but even I know that Freddy Blassie was and is one of the greatest and most hated villains of all time. Outside of that, most of the people on here to deserve to be on here, so congrats to the voters on that one. Also in the end they got number 1 right in my opinion, but would love to hear what others think.
Final Score:  7.2   [ Good ]  legend

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Robert Leighty Jr.

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