Expy / Pro Wrestling

aka: Professional Wrestling

• The Great Kabuki is an expy of Rey Urbano, using face paint to imitate Urbano's "scars" and using similar cheats. Kabuki himself spawned several expies, some of whom spawned expies of their own.
  • The first was Kendo Nagasaki(the one in Stampede, not the World Of Sport wrestler), who was followed by The Great Muta, Kwang the Ninja (Savio Vega in a mask), "The Japanese Buzzsaw" Yoshihiro Tajiri (who used the mist cheat but not the face paint) and "Tokyo Monster" Kahagas. TNA's Kiyoshi was an expy of Muta as well. Jun Hado was a Chinese expy of Muta who went so far as to claim to be from Muta's home town, until he teamed with Japanese wrestler "The Great Akuma" and embraced his Chinese roots instead to be his foil. Then there's "The Great Sanada", where James Storm tried to Brain Wash Seiya Sanada into becoming a Mutah duplicate.
• Mil Máscaras and Huracán Ramirez were both fictional characters created to be stand ins for El Santo when he was not available to film a movie. Both of these characters would be turned into real luchadores by EMLL, though Ramirez was distinguished by not wearing a mask and the real luchador became even less like Santo by inventing a new wrestling move (the Huracánrana)
• Bruiser Brody spawned several expies
  • Particularly both Barbarians (Sionne Vailahi and John Nord. Vailahi's biggest difference was as a Tongan, his Hard Head was attributed to his ethnicity. Nord went all out on the Brody imitation, particularly as The Berzerker in WWE, wearing the furry boots and doing the "HUSS" chant. IWA M-S and ROH's Jimmy Jacobs was an expy of Brody with aspects of Brody's expies Nord and Vailahi on top of it as "The Barbaric Berzerker." Though Jacobs eventually became more associated with a Kevin Sullivan like rail road spike. It helps that Jacobs is not a super heavyweight and closer to Sullivan in size.
  • Brodie Lee, who besides the name looked about as much like Brody as a man possibly could without surgery. Less so after he got that scar on his head and joined Jimmy Jacobs's campaign against the American healthcare system.
• Chief Jay Strongbow was one for Chief Wahoo McDaniel after McDaniel got into an altercation with a promoter and ended up not returning to the WWWF as planned. Strongbow was given the American Indian gimmick and McDaniel's planned push.
• When John Tenta first arrived in the WWF, he was known as Earthquake Evans, an expy of Haystacks Calhoun, down to the jeans, flannel shirt and rope belt. This only lasted for a couple dark matches, and by the time he was put on TV he was the Natural Disaster he's best remembered as.
• "Nature Boy" Ric Flair was an expy of "The Nature Boy" Buddy Rogers.
  • Flair would later get an expy of his own in "Nature Boy" Buddy Landel.
• "Superstar" Billy Graham is the direct influence of Hulk Hogan, Scott Steiner, and Jesse Ventura in image and mannerisms, which all three have alluded to in the past (Hogan in shoot interviews, Steiner by briefly using the name "Superstar", and Ventura by claiming Graham copied him!)
• The Rock 'n' Roll Express (Ricky Morton and Robert Gibson) perfected the underdog heartthrob pretty boy babyface team role in the 1980s and spawned several expies, most notably the Rockers^note The Rockers were even originally called the Midnight Rockers, a combination of names of the Rock N Roll Express and their longstanding rivals, The Midnight Express. (Shawn Michaels and Marty Jannetty) and, later, the Hardy Boyz (Matt and Jeff.)
• The Road Warriors were a huge smash hit in the 1980s, changing tag team wrestling forever. The various companies couldn't rip off their gimmick (that being "huge face-painted tough guys who smashed-up everyone and didn't care who they beat on") fast enough. The Powers of Pain (The Warlord and The Barbarian) were formed to feud with the Warriors, and the WWF threw a couple of solid midcard performers together creating Demolition. All of these teams ended up feuding with each other at various times.
  • Road Warriors expies the Blade Runners didn't have much success as a tag team but both members broke out to become major singles superstars: Sting and the Ultimate Warrior.
  • The Road Warriors themselves made an expy of their own named Power Warrior (Kensuke Sasaki) in Japan, who formed the Hell Raisers with Hawk when Animal was injured and later formed the Hell Warriors with Animal when Hawk passed away.
  • The Ascension is an expy team of Demolition, the Legion of Doom/Road Warriors, and the Powers of Pain — an asskicking team of large dudes who wear facepaint and come to the ring with intimidating gear. Following their main roster debut they repeatedly almost-lampshaded this — they would mention all of these teams, but only in the context of "well-known and dominant tag teams the Ascension is better than", without directly noting that they share many similarities with those teams.
  • Meanwhile, Chikara had the Devastation Corporation, who are closely analogous to Demolition - including a johnny-come-lately third member. Unlike the other teams, they even included the manager, with Sidney Bakabella doing his best imitation of "Precious" Paul Ellering. In fact, their CHIKARA debut was in a gauntlet match. They mowed through several teams Demolition style... before the real Demolition showed up and showed them how it was done.
• Paul Heyman created Mikey Whipwreck as an expy of "The Wrestling School" Dropout Jim Mulkey, a character from the late 1980s-1990s New England promotion ICW/IWCCW.
  • Mikey gained an expy of his own in Colin Delaney of WWE's mediocre version of ECW.
• Chris Benoit was an expy of Dynamite Kid. Which is why the otherwise renowned technical wrestler did so many risky high flying moves, and why Benoit was so obsessed with his size, or lack there of.
• Bryan Danielson began his career as an expy of The Dynamite Kid, Chris Benoit, or possibly both before some Divergent Character Evolution. Although Danielson's problem was less size (you're big, I'm not, you suck) and more on pastyness and facial hair. Otherwise he was the same on the mat pit bull who also liked to jump around a lot.
• Davey Richards has also been viewed as an expy of Dynamite Kid, and he fit the overly muscular angry short man better than Danielson while in Dragon Gate. To the point Danielson tried to name Richards as a successor in DG USA.
• Dramatic Dream Team: Sanshiro Takagi himself is an Expy of "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, right down to having the same glass shattering sound that begins his entrance music.
• Goldberg was seen by many people as an expy of "Stone Cold" Steve Austin due to his bald head and similar outfit (basic black trunks and boots), and how Eric Bischoff had famously told Austin that a guy wearing such an outfit wasn't marketable. Goldberg's streak of squashes and the fact that he usually said very little, as opposed to Austin's usual involvement in 20-minute interviews, served to get him over and give him his own identity. Despite the appearance, Goldberg was much closer to 1980s Foreign Wrestling Heel "The Russian Nightmare" Nikita Koloff, though what he was going for was a Captain Ersatz of Dan Severn^note Eric Bischoff thought he could book a fake MMA fighter better than the WWF could book a real one. As it turns out, he was right. In a pretty funny coincidence the real Dan Severn was N.W.A world champion right around this time, which isn't so obvious because Goldberg looks nothing like him, no matter how closely he tries to copy his mannerisms.
  • Goldberg seems to have gotten an expy of his own in Ryback, who shares his quiet intensity, short Catchphrase, baldness, and goatee. Not that smarks would let anyone forget that.
• The Renegade was an Expy of The Ultimate Warrior, and a pretty poor one at that. In fact, he was WCW's THIRD attempt at creating their own version of UW.
  • In 1991, WCW created "Heavy Metal" Van Hammer, essentially UW as a heavy metal guitarist who didn't or couldn't actually play. He'd bring his guitar to the ring and do Air Guitar. Despite a really good match with Cactus Jack at WCW Clash of the Champions XVIII on January 21, 1992 and his real-life friendship with Diamond Dallas Page, he never accomplished much of anything, never winning a title in any promotion.
  • In late 1993-1994, WCW introduced "Jungle" Jim Steele, essentially a cross between UW and Tarzan. While his time in WCW didn't add up to much (he defeated the Equalizer [William Dannenhauer, best known as Kevin Sullivan's dyslexic brother Dave] at WCW SuperBrawl IV and never had a WCW PPV match again), he would go on to success in All Japan Pro Wrestling and the World Wrestling Council in Puerto Rico under the names Wolf Hawkfield and the Lacrosse. He won the WWC Television Title, the WWC Puerto Rico Heavyweight Title and the All Japan Pro Wrestling All-Asian Tag Team Title with Johnny Smith.
  • The Renegade went beyond being an Expy to an outright Captain Ersatz for UW, as videos were shown of him acting very much like UW, and he had similar facepaint, screamed, no-sold and was billed from Parts Unknown. He defeated Arn Anderson for the WCW World Television Title at the Great American Bash in June 1995 and lost it to Diamond Dallas Page that September. He never got another push, being reduced to Jobber status. The man who Hulk Hogan had said would take "Hulkamania into the 21st Century" never got to see it. WCW released him in late 1998 and he committed suicide on February 23, 1999 at the age of 33.
• Dave McLane will use similar character types repeatedly in his various promotions GLOW, POWW, and WOW, which will in turn be used by whatever promotions that imitate them (ex:Wrestlicious)
• Kane spawned TNA's Abyss, who was vaguely Kane like in NWA Wildside but a combination of Kane and Mankind in TNA.
• Cryme Tyme (Shad Gaspard & JTG) of the Gangstas (New Jack & Mustafa) in Smoky Mountain Wrestling and ECW, though, because they worked for a big-money worldwide promotion and not, originally, a small independent in eastern Tennessee, Cryme Tyme were Played for Laughs rather than to provoke racial anger, worked a more traditional in-ring style as opposed to the hardcore style of the Gangstas, and without the success. (New Jack & Mustafa were 1x SMW Tag Team Champions and 2x ECW World Tag Team Champions. As Shad Gaspard & the Neighborhoodie, they held the OVW Southern Tag Team Titles in WWE's then-developmental promotion Ohio Valley Wrestling for two months.)
• Beer Money Inc. was an expy of the APA, they even had the same manager.
• And TNA did expy versions of much older WWE characters. Orlando Jordan's playing with gay stereotypes bore a few similarities to Goldust. Mr. Anderson was the same type of loudmouth as The Miz (who is an expy of Anderson back when he was Kennedy).
  • Orlando Jordan is actually bisexual in real life. The gimmick was supposedly his idea, though who can say if he wanted it to be taken as far as or in the direction it was.
• WWE and TNA have been having a little game of back and forth with the same types of characters. Granted, they're common tropes, but one tends to pop up a few weeks or months after the other, making it look more like a blatant combo of expy and Follow the Leader. Some Examples:
  • Alpha Bitch: Vince's Devils, The Beautiful People, LayCool, Dollhouse, the SLayers.
  • Annoying Foreigner: Drew McIntyre and Desmond Wolfe.
  • Arrogant Pretty Boy: "Dashing" Cody Rhodes, Zack Ryder, and Magnus.
• Psycho!AJ was extremely similar to Psycho!Mickie James from circa 2005. Both got rejected from their respective love interests and acted erratically in retaliation while descending into insanity. Mickie took the the Women's Title from Trish at WrestleMania while AJ strung along Daniel and two of his rivals, then-current WWE Champion CM Punk and future tag team partner Kane for months^note Punk and AJ would later marry in real life. The only really differences are how they reacted and the lesbian overtones of Mickie's storyline. One could deign to say that the main reason AJ became so popular is because her psycho gimmick is extremely similar to Mickie's, who became popular due to the gimmick.
• Jack Swagger was basically a whinier, lamer Kurt Angle - both are former amateur wrestlers that use the Ankle Lock as a finishing move, dress in the traditional singlet and are very very proud of their amateur accomplishments. Both use of American patriotism in their gimmicks.
• Alberto Del Rio and John "Bradshaw" Layfield are both expies of Ted DiBiase, in so far as being richer-than-thou characters who flaunt it in the face of the audience (given that a recession is always either around the corner or already in full swing, this always gets heat).
• Zeb Colter and Jack Swagger essentially replayed Sgt. Slaughter's early 90's gimmick (used for a few months before he became an "Iraqi sympathizer" during the Gulf War). Slaughter targeted Tito Santana, Zeb and Swagger went after Alberto Del Rio, each basically claiming their opponent were in the United States illegally. And then Swagger even had a foreigner, Antonio Cesaro, as a partner, much as Slaughter eventually teamed with Col. Mustafa (Iron Sheik repackaged as an Iraqi instead of an Iranian).
  • Colter had a little bit of JBL in him as well, particularly doing the same anti-immigration angle that was done with Eddie Guerrero with Alberto Del Rio. Ironic, considering Uncle Zebekiah was JBL's manager at one point.
  • The Swagger-Cesaro team being called "The Real Americans" brings to mind the NWA "Real American Heroes" Joey Ryan and Karl Anderson. For added bonus WWE group feuded with "Los Matadores" as the NWA group had with "Los Luchas".
• What do you get when you cross the promotion dominating goals of the nWo with the youth of the Natural Born Thrillers? The Nexus.
  • Nowadays, it seems every new team that debuts just attacks random people for no real reason like the nWo. In the New Tens, we have had the aforementioned Nexus, the Corre, the Aces And Eights in TNA, The Shield, and the Wyatt Family.
• Mason Ryan not only looked very similar to Batista, but his role in the New Nexus was similar to the role Batista played when he was part of Evolution (namely, being the largest, most physically imposing member of a four-man heel stable).
• CM Punk's world champion turn made him an expy of Harley Race in the way of stating himself as the very best and how people MUST admit that they respect him. This is very similar to Race's heel run as "King" Harley Race where he told his opponents and detractors to bow and kneel before him. Whereas Race had Bobby Heenan, Punk had Paul Heyman. Punk even went as far as trimming his beard much like how Race's looked and wearing colors matching Race's at the time.
• Masa Kitamiya of Pro Wrestling NOAH was portrayed as the second coming of Masa Saito — he used Saito's name, dressed like him in the ring, and did all of his moves. There isn't a great facial resemblance between them, though, so it's hard to say where this character came from.
• For a period during 2010 and 2011, WWE tried turning Michael Cole into a new version of Vince McMahon's "Mr. McMahon" character. Unfortunately, it failed spectacularly, mostly because McMahon actually was the boss of WW(F/E), while Michael Cole was simply an announcer. Thankfully, WWE ended the experiment at Over The Limit 2011, with Cole returning to his neutral Chew Toy announcer role on Raw the night after — though he does still show a tendency to root for the heels.
• YAMATO of Dragon Gate debuted as a successor to then-retired Yasushi Kanda, wearing Kanda's gear and performing his moves.
  • Kzy's rapper character was partially based on "brother" Yasshi, including the use of the running Blockbuster move. The two had an amusing interaction when Yasshi returned to Dragon Gate in early 2016.
  • Kotoka once wrestled as CIBA, a knockoff of CIMA. This gimmick was poorly-received and therefore short-lived, but Kotoka still uses the Meteora-based Caldera double stomp as his finishing move.
• The mysterious personas, penchant for random out-of-nowhere gang beatings, and 'outsider' gimmick of The Undisputed Era recall the early days of The Shield — or, if you want to go back even further, the original nWo. Even more appropriate would be Bullet Club, since Adam Cole was a member.
• Willie "Da Bomb" Richardson of Da Soul Touchaz calls himself "The Urban-American Dream" after "The American Dream" Dusty Rhodes, is Acrofatic like Big Dust was and sometimes uses Dusty's Bionic Elbow.
• Lakay operated on early Latin American Wrestling Entertainment shows in a very similar manner that Carly operated early in his WWC career, dressing just like Carly, carrying a shovel like Carly and having the same attitude, if for different reasons than Carly. The biggest difference between the two is that Lakay wears a straw hat, like Carly's father, while Carly usually did all he could to distance himself from Carlos, but besides that, Lakay is basically to LAWE what Carly was to WWC back then.

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