![]() You can be a dork and say “because he was a great wrestler,” or you can lean into his status as one of wrestling’s all-time greatest heels, whether he was tagging with Art Barr, portraying Tiger Mask’s arch rival, ripping at the mask of Rey Mysterio, psychologically torturing his nephew Chavo, or disingenuously romancing Chyna. It was rude, that mullet, which is why Octagón and El Hijo Del Santo cut it off in 1994, and presumably why he went with the frosted Midwestern mom look a decade later when he won the WWE Championship-how, after so much time spent with a sneer framed by those magnificent locks, could anybody cheer a mulleted Eddie Guerrero? Years away from picking up the hot guy nickname “Latino Heat,” late-nineties Eddie Guerrero’s mullet elevated the man from being good looking to being one of the hottest wrestlers-one of the hottest men-on the planet. As a babyface, his mullet said “I’m one of the best wrestlers in world history and don’t have time to clean up my bangs.” As a heel, his mullet said “This is intentional, just like how I’m grinding my boot into your face is intentional.” It’s the intentionality of Eddie Guerrero’s heel mullet that is terrifying to behold, as there is functionally no difference between it and its babyface brother beyond the degree to which it was wet down. WWEĮddie Guerrero wore a mullet for most of his career in professional wrestling, and it was always great. It is a beautiful haircut, a marvelous coif, one deserving as much attention and praise on its own merit as a good match or promo. The most famous mullets in wrestling tell you something about the wrestler who grew it, and even more if it is eventually shorn as a consequence of losing a match. The wrestling mullet is unique among haircuts in popular culture in how expressive it is. ![]() Mullets of various quality have appeared in the sport for at least five decades, longer than we’ve had the word we call them by, and outside of NASCAR and mid-ninties country music, I can’t think of many modes of cultural expression as closely associated with them. It knows no country, no gender, and does not discriminate between heels and faces. The mullet is the pro wrestling hairstyle. I love bad mullets and mediocre mullets, too-really the mullet spectrum runs from “person who gives no fucks to a degree that scares me” to “person who gives no fucks and is really really hot”-and that love, like too many things in my life, has its roots in professional wrestling. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |