Y'all Ready to Rumble???

Photo Credit: Drafthouse.com

Ready to Rumble

2000

PG-13

            Sewage workers Gordie Boggs and Sean Dawkins, two of the most dedicated wrestling fans of all time, attend an episode of WCW’s Monday Nitro.  It is there they witness Jimmy King, WCW World Heavyweight Champion, robbed and cheated from his title.  Titus Sinclair, WCW president and mastermind behind King’s downfall, proceeds to fire him from the program forever.  Gordie and Sean are devastated by what they witness and in that state of devastation, total their sewage truck on the way home.  Then and there, on the side of the road, it is decided.  They will find their hero Jimmy King and bring him back to glory.

            I remember my dad renting this on VHS for me as a kid and I loved it.  Remember those days before all this fancy, internet streaming?  Those were the days.  Here I am, in my mid-twenties, and I still love it.  Now don’t get me wrong, you need to be a fan of cheesy, early 2000s comedies and being a wrestling fan will help too.  I mean, what a movie.  They say never to meet your heroes and Gordie and Sean learned the hard way.  They both thought wrestling was the real deal and expected King to match his in-ring persona.  It didn’t take long for reality to set in (kind of).  King was just a washed-up wrestler, a drunk, dressed as a woman, and hiding out in an old RV.  Wouldn’t that be terrible to meet your hero and he or she be the exact opposite of your expectations?  Most people I feel would have given up and went home.  Not Gordie and Sean.  They stuck by King’s side and never gave up.  I don’t know about you, but that makes me want to climb to the top turnbuckle and crown somebody baby!

            I know I’m most likely in the minority when it comes to this review in general, but I don’t even care.  I think the movie is hilarious.  I drop a Ready to Rumble reference on what seems like a daily basis. One of my favorite lines comes when Sean is talking Sting.  I forgot to mention that many WCW wrestlers participated in the action and the acting. He says, “You love Jimmy King.  I love Jimmy King.  We’re men and we’re not afraid to say that we love other men.  I love you.”  Sting stares and proceeds to punch Sean right in the face.  That’s art.

            Word on the street is David Arquette (Gordie Boggs) is making a comeback in the wrestling world.  To my knowledge, his last stint in the business was for WCW and was somehow made World Heavyweight Champion.  That move would be labeled as one of the final daggers to WCW as it would ultimately lose the Monday Night Wars to WWE.  However, that is a story for another day.  With Arquette’s resurgence in the ring, will there be a Ready to Rumble sequel?  We can only wait and hope.  My biased rating would obviously be 5/5.  In all reality, it’s a 2/5.

By: Randy