ROH DVD Review: Straight Shootin' With 2 Cold Scorpio

You can call him Charlie Skaggs, Flash Funk or even Flying Wazuma but what you can't call him is unopinionated. For the first time on AngryMarks.com, our ROH DVD review series delves into the Straight Shootin' interview series. Tonight's interview was filmed on July 30th, 2004 and features the one and only high-flying, fast-moving, shit-talking star of WCW, ECW, and WWF himself - the legendary 2 Cold Scorpio.

The presentation on this disc is straight with no chaser. There's no menu feature and no extras so don't go looking for them - when you pop this in it immediately goes to a shot of 2 Cold, wearing a white sleeveless vest half unzipped, earrings in each ear lobe, a piercing in his left eyebrow, a shiny chain around his neck,  and a pair of slimline shades halfway down his nose. Unintentionally or not this gives Scorpio a little bit of a fruity appearance, and his mannerisms throughout the DVD contribute to it, but to be clear I don't mean this as negative in any way - it just is what it is. The interviewer introduces our subject, who kisses his fingers and throws up a peace sign. "Whassup whassup!" Scorpio is asked why he wanted to get into the wrestling business. "I don't even know!" Well we're off to a roaring start. Apparently some friend of his who was "a buck sixty-five soaking wet with a brick in his pocket" was a pro wrestler, he didn't believe him, but one day he got (in his own words) "so high and so drunk" he finally went to a show and watched his friend wrestle. He got into the ring, tried it himself, and got hooked on the action. The interviewer wants to know if that was his first experience with wrestling but Scorpio says he watched the Von Erichs, AWA, and WWF when he was a kid, but his first love was always football. Football fell to the wayside because he got his girlfriend pregnant, got married, and never went to college - he had to support his family and pay the bills. Scorpio claims he trained himself, but that he went to the New Japan dojo to "sharpen his skills." Scorpio says that taking bumps in the ring was easy because he was also a gymnast as a kid and "played all sports" - is there anything the man didn't do?

The interviewer asks how Scorpio's first match was. Scorpio says he had on a pair of boxing boots he colored in with a magic marker, a pair of homemade spandex trunks with two scorpions stitched into either side, and he thought he looked really good at the time but he realizes now just how indie and bush league that really was. His opponent was Magic Michael Star/Jeff Gold, and he says how it at the time it was very physical and just as hard hitting as football or boxing. He got put over on his first night, and he did a 450 that night, and this was back in 1984 or 1985 by Scorpio's memory. Originally Scorpio was practicing the 450 as an entrance in a homemade ring, over rotated and landed on his belly, realized it didn't hurt and redubbed it the Scorpio Splash. Scorpio talks about working the indies for a while and then hooking up with Leon White (Big Van Vader), who said Scorpio would be great in the Super J Cup, and basically got him booked. For two months the NJ dojo put him through hell with squats, push-ups, shoot wrestling, and 200-300 bumps a day. The guy in charge of the dojo was Black Cat from Mexico, and eventually that led to Scorpio getting booked in CMLL. He puts over how he merged the American, Japanese, and "lucha lib-rey" and came up with his own unique style.

Scorpio is asked who he hated to work with in Mexico, and he calls Mil Mascaras an egotistical cocksucker. Scorpio says in his era, he was over, but in the 90's it was time for a new generation. He knocks Kanek and says he did a lot of jobs and made him look good but Kanek never returned the favor. He loved working with Benoit, Guerrero, the Villanos, Silver King, and anybody who really had a passion and gave 110% no matter how drunk or hungover they were. "I smoked so many bombudds back in the day it's hard to remember everybody, so if I didn't mention you, you still know it was a pleasure I enjoyed working with you, thank you much yeah." Scorpio puts over Ricky 'The Steamboat' Dragon (I know, he said it that way) as someone he learned a lot from and how he switched them from Japanese to American style when they got to WCW. He also puts over Colonel DeBeers for his help, and says they both taught him psychology and selling as opposed to all the flips and bumps he had been doing to date, making him well-rounded as an entertainer, and how he learned from Vader and Harley Race too going up and down the road with them.

Scorpio was asked if he saw anybody in the New Japan and knew immediately they were going to be a big star. He knew Tenzan would be a star, he never knew Kojima would be a star, and he says pretty much everybody who came up in the dojo with him including Yuji Nagata are big stars now. The interview asks why he changed his name from 2 Cold Scorpio to Flying Scorpio in Japan, and how the concept of being "too cold" didn't really translate well in the Japanese language so he got dubbed "Flying" Scorpio and went with it. He's asked how he got his break in WCW and once again puts over Big Van Vader, says how he called up Bill Watts and suggested him as a partner for Ron Simmons, and Scorpio regrets he signed on the dotted line the first night instead of taking in the big picture and holding out for more money. White got him in the door pretty much everywhere he went by Scorpio's recollection. Scorpio remembers hitting that first 450 on TV, tagging with Simmons, being high as hell and having the "bubbling guts" feeling like he'd shit all over himself. He talks about wrestling Barbarian and Cactus Jack, how he thought Catcus was a wild man for real before he got a chance to talk to him. He talks about how he slipped off the top rope and Cactus was in the right place, caught him, "it was like falling on a pillow." He says between being naturally high from the energy of the crowd and everything else, it was one hell of an experience. He says Simmons was concerned about the new kid, whether he'd be able to step up and carry the weight, but after the match Simmons was happy and impressed with his ability.

The interviewer asks if anybody reacted negatively to the 450 but Scorpio says they were all caught up in the moment, but some of the so-called "high flyers" like Sting probably were worried he could do what they couldn't, not to mention the whole thing of them both having scorpions on their tights. "If I was blonde and blue-eyed, I'd probably be making a million dollars right now." He says he went out of his way to tell Sting he was wearing scorpions before him, and would still be wearing them long after him. The interviewer asks Scorpio about Bill Watts. "He was a straight shooter snake in the grass type of a guy, but as prejudiced as everybody said he was, he loved the hell out of me. He was a person in the situation of booking and running things, and when he saw me he saw money, and that was the bottom line. My best run was probably when Bill Watts was down there, but he can still kiss my black ass."

Scorpio goes on to put over Ric Flair, saying he was one of the best shit talkers in the business, but Flair was a bit of a racist and he could only like Flair up to a point - the point he wanted to whoop his ass "up and down left and right" and how his WCW situation was caused by Flair. "As the anger built up, the more hate I grew for Ric Flair, but he probably didn't have as much hate for me as I thought he had, but it was more that he was on top and I was up and coming at the time." Apparently in St. Thomas there was a situation. Scorpio tries to look at the camera, point a finger and get serious, but he still has that constant smug grin on his face that never goes away, even as he's saying you should never be a black man in a room with four white men smoking cocaine, "It's not the thing you should be doing in this business! Second of all you shouldn't be in the room with a Buddy Lee Parker and a Brian Pillman, who has no problem with snitching, or being a stooge as you would say in this business! Me, being the freak that I be, walking the beach in my G-string, 9 inches of limp dick, drugs flying, the problem was it was me who was doing it. Here was his chance to say now I've got something on him. Anyways when I got back the deal came down where I gotta go take a drug test. It ain't been 48 hours, so I'm not gonna go do it. I'm down there doing promos, there gonna come over to me, I got my two boys with me, they gon' come up to me and tell me to take a test. Okay, so I go down there the next day, it's been 72 hours plus. They found no cocaine, but a whole bunch of traces of weed. I got busted for some type of drug, I had to pay this money, go to this class, did a week two weeks, took another test, tested positive. You can't go to a drug rehab class smoking a joint on the way, it doesn't work! You can't leave smoking a joint. If you go, you got to do the whole thing right. Came back, time to do the third test, and they never wanted me to take the test. Later they hit me with a surprise test, and I heard the word was passed through Flair, which is why I got pissed and wanted to whoop his ass. In this business he say she say can come from anywhere, so in this business bein a man about it go talk to the man who you think said it before you get mad and upset and don't understand the situation."

From there the interviewer asks Scorpio about the night Sid and Arn got into a fight that night at the hotel. This might be the high spot of the entire interview. Scorpio starts screaming: "AHHHHHHH! AHHHHHH! AHHHHH! Blood everywhere, it was like going to a horror show. It started out being a fucked up day on a fucked up planet." Scorpio relates how the travel situation was crazy, long flight, long ride to the venue, and how everybody was mad about working overseas right after getting off the airplane the same day. On the busride coming back from the venue it was a whole bunch of guys drinking beers, a whole lot of big egoes, and everybody was talking shit before they even got to the hotel. The hotel leaves out some food and leaves the bar open, it's three or four in the morning, everybody's half drunk already. Sid starts talking shit to Arn, Arn starts talking shit back, "You'll never be the star, you'll never be the man Ric Flair is" and so forth. They start arguing about Ric Flair's money and who's friends with who and all this. Scorpio: "Nobody don't give a fuck about that damn shit! All I wanna do is make some of the money he made. But the bottom line is they're sitting there drinking beers, Sid said something, and Arn got mad. At first Sid got mad threw the first beer, first glass of beer threw it across the room, beer all over - Arn Anderson moved, bottle just missed him. They jumped up now they're ready to fight. Doug Dillinger jumps in stops the guys settles them down. Everybody calms down for a minute, they're still talking shit. Next thing you know Sid said something about Flair being a punk, Arn gets mad and upset, defends his friend, throws a beer at Sid! Now everybody done had enough of this beer throwing shit in the God damn hallway by grown-ass men, acting like a couple kids. Now Doug says hey everybody go to your room." At this point Scorpio thought it was over. "Sid goes on to his room. Everybody leaves. Me and Maxx Payne shit we're down there, trying to make a homemade pipe, hashing out, all of a sudden I hear this boom bam bam bam boom. I'm thinking damn Vader's kicking somebody's ass, I got to go calm his ass down again."

Scorpio goes to investigate. "I go over to Vader's room, I stop and I hear ZZZZZZZ he's snoring. I walk down the hallway, go down the steps, I get out to the corridor and there's just blood shot everywhere, blood all up and down this wall. Sid's got Arn by the head, he's stabbing him with the scissors, kicking him in the face, both of these guys was bleeding profusely. How the hell you gon' be in a street fight and have blood six or seven feet up and down the God damn walls on both sides? Here I am 5-11, 245 pounds, these two big ol' bubble boys, I'm gonna step in there and break it up. I go down there, when Sid stuck him in the back of the neck and kicked him in the face, and you see Arn Anderson nose do a 360 and turn upwards, I decide it's time to jump in. I push Sid one way, I push Arn the other, Arn's half out from the drinking and the loss of blood. He stumbles back against the wall, Sid's all hyped up so I go after Sid, no no stop. Looks at me, kicks the door, cracks the glass door, he runs out the door. Now Arn, blood's squirting from all over the place, I'm yelling nobody's coming out, I get him back to his room where the scissors and the broken chair was. Now first of all, Flair and Steamboat, y'all got to be some of the best wrestlers I've seen in my life, but some of the most chickenshit motherfuckers I know. This was on the first floor, y'all was on the first floor too, but not one of y'all come out to break it up. We're grabbing sheets and towels off the bed, they're soaking up blood in a matter of seconds. Now Sid's trying to get back in, but after 12 or 1 they lock the doors, he runs around, runs right into the glass, the door doesn't open, he boots the door and the whole glass just shhhshshhhh shatters all the way up. Thank God Vader happened to be standing there in the lobby in his underwear, talking on the telephone, he sees Sid run in sees that he's bleeding, tackles him and holds him down - Sid what's going on? I come to the front desk yelling call an ambulance. I jump in the ambulance, I'm not even an office guy, I'm just a damn wrestler. The damn office people say yeah Scorp, you go too, I'm going to the hospital with these guys trying to sign everybody in get they name right. All I wanted to do was go to the damn hotel and shit, smoke me some damn hash, take my ass to sleep, get ready for the next bus ride! Y'knahmsayin, but brother I got to take my hat off, Sid and Arn was both real thankful, Arn called me at the house said thank you for saving my life. Well Arn I've been trying to give you that call for a while now, so whassup, don't you wanna help a brother out?" You have to keep in mind this was at least two years before he got signed to help out with WWE developmental, maybe Arn did finally give him that hook-up, but it sure took a while.

Scorpio goes on from there to talk about how he got in a fight with Road Warrior Hawk while they were there for a show in North Korea. All the wrestlers had a choice to go by bus or take a Mercedes Benz, all the boys got on the bus, but Ric Flair and Hawk took the Mercedes limos. They go sightseeing on the bus for 5-6 days, sweating it out together, Steiners were already on the bus, Scott Norton's there too, suddenly Hawk decides he's gonna take the bus instead. Flair's standing around, checking his Roley, combing his hair, looking around a bit. Hawk says: "Hey I think Flair's looking for somebody. Maybe he wants me to ride with him again today." Scorpio: "Me, being the too cold motherfucker I be, I said FUCK THAT PUSSY let him ride by himself." Hawk questioned him - what'd you say - Scorpio repeated himself. Hawk: "Fuck you nigger!" Scorpio says he threw one punch, it whistled through the air, and Scorpio was on him right away like white on rice. All the Japanese boys try to pull them apart, Hawk's trying to hit him, he's being held down and still can't hit him, blood's running down his face from where Scorpio hit him. Scorpio tries to make the peace at this point, Hawk's still talking shit, they get to another sightseeing spot and get out. Hawk still keeps talking shit about how they'll roll when they get back to Tokyo, and all of a sudden swings with a right. "DAMN! That's all you got my sister hit harder than that!" They go back to the hotel. Benoit keeps telling him they gotta break it up, but Norton says he wasn't in the wrong because Hawk called him out and called him nigger. "Hawk can't fight, he's a one punch guy, if you gotta throw with him you'll take him every time." They get face to face in the hotel. Hawk asks if he wants to finish it, Scorpio reminds him we're there on a peace treaty mission, so Hawk says we'll get back to Tokyo and do it there. They go down from the hotel to dinner, it's assigned seating, and they end up sitting across from each other. "I can't get rid of this motherfucker! We got these stainless steel chopstick, one just happened to slip out of my hand, the brother I be I slip one in my pocket, ask the waiter to bring me some clean ones, happen to drop another, now I got one pair on me and another pair eating. But we squashed that shit. When we got back to Tokyo, he wanted to smoke some weed with me!"

Scorpio was also in Germany with Foley when he lost his ear, but this story is relatively short compared to the two fights he just got done relating. Scorpio is asked about Raven says he had fun working with him, he has fun working with everybody for the experience, but Raven was not that great of a wrestler. Scorpio puts over his title match with Barry Windham at Clash of the Champions saying it was one of the hardest he ever had. The interviewer asks him about Buff Bagwell, and Scorpio describes him as being "really sweet" and "if you were that gay type" you'd like him a lot because he had that look and was "so nice." Scorpio tried to get him to roll with the black fans, go to the hood, go eat soul food with him, but he says Bagwell was such a chickenshit scared motherfucker he'd never do it. "Bagwell while you're at it, why don't you tell it like it is, every tag team move we did was my idea. You didn't have a brain that worked right! Tell the truth, Bagwell's just another punk motherfucker. You're scared, you're a little punk, you're a momma's boy. If you hear this interview and you wanna fight me, I'll meet you in the states or in Japan or wherever you wanna be. I'll be more than happy to whup your ass for you - FREE OF CHARGE." Ouch!

Scorpio talks about working with the Nasty Boys, how they were real party animals, and how they hit hard but they were old school so if you gave them a receipt in return there was no heat, so he enjoyed working with them a lot. He puts over the matches with the Hollywood Blondes, but says that Austin was easy and Pillman was like pulling teeth, probably because he was jealous of Scorpio. He also notes being dissapointed at how the tag title reign with Bagwell was so short - 20 days on TV, but a lot less than that by taping time. Scorpio puts over Pro Wrestling NOAH as a great company to work for, and Bill Watts as a great booker to work for, and Paul Heyman was great too but "too smart for his own good." Still he puts over Paul E. as giving people the time to cut promos and for having really good storylines. As for Vince, "Vince is an asshole, but you gotta be an asshole in this business to make money! Vince was a guy I could adapt to as well." Then he goes back to talking about Bagwell and their tag team some more, and how Bagwell would always get finishes changed on him. Scorpio goes on to relate he had no idea ECW would become a big thing, it seemed like just another indie to him, but he loved working the indies so it was no big thing. "If you can go out there for a crowd of a hundred and make them hoot and holler, five thousand is gonna be easy, cause a hundred is the hardest thing to do."

Scorpio talks about running out to work with Benoit after Sabu got his neck injury, and how one the one hand you're horrified because one of the boys is hurt but on the other hand you've got to go out there and put on a show. The interviewer says was it hard to call on the fly but Scorpio says Benoit was easy because they had history knew each other well and could work well together. This part of the DVD is largely memories of ECW and who was fun. He liked Missy but he was "mad she never sucked his dick or gave him any pussy. Missy I'm sorry I missed out, but thank God I did!" He also says Sandman was a big time drinker, and a lot of guys didn't want to work with him because they were afraid he'd injure them in the ring by being drunk, but most of them were too afraid to say anything to him about it. Scorpio says the drugs and partying in ECW was like the Strip in Vegas, 24/7 non-stop. He says he's amazed they pulled off the matches they did, but then again he wonders if maybe they hurt each other so much in matches because they were all so fucked up they didn't know what they were doing, and it's lucky it wasn't much more than chairshots and a few stiches. He says it's probably for the best ECW came to an end when it did because it was so bad it was like getting drugs in the hood, and how some guys had to work for free because they owed the drug man so much money. He says it the lockerroom the worst one for how much drugs, nevertheless nearly everybody got along with everybody. "The best lockerroom, and the most fucked up at the same time!" He also says you never take a check from Paul E. - straight cash only!

Scorpio puts over his matches with The Public Enemy, and says that he knew Ted Petty (Flyboy Rocco Rock) from all the way back in the WCW days, working another gimmick he can't remember. From here it's memories of moonsaults, flaming tables, all sorts of insane crazy type things they were willing to do in ECW including Mikey Whipwreck stories about how he was so small but so nuts and would do any type of stunt. He says the "Loser Leaves Town" series was really emotional for him, especially with the fans chanting please don't go, and how nobody expected him to do the job for Louie Spiccoli but Spiccoli was a really nice guy so it was a great opportunity and how happy he was to put him over. Kind of sad when you think about how many of the people Scorpio is talking about during this part of the DVD who are no longer around. As for Rob Van Dam: "There's something wrong with him! There's something not right in the head with him!" He talks about how before a match they had a big fat sack of bubonic chronic, then Rob told him once they got out in the ring to hit him as hard as possible, and Rob said he'd work just as hard back in return - they were SUPER snug. He also has memories of working him on the indies back in the day over 10 years ago, and how through it all Rob has stayed the same guy, still smokin'!

For the last part of the DVD Scorpio slows down, he's getting a little more tired (you would be too as this interview is almost 3 hours long) and he speaks about his memories of favorite guys he worked with and has the best chemistry with - Chris Benoit, Eddie Guerrero, how Chris had a great clothesline and Eddie had great punches and chops. Scorpio once again puts over Vader getting him in the door at WWF, and how Paul E. accepted his decision and understood it was an opportunity to make more money, and how the Steiners had told him "It's something you have to experience for himself." Scorpio liked the Funkettes and wanted to fuck the shit out of them, but never got the chance even though his wife thought he DID. He enjoyed the James Brown rip-off, thought the gimmick was good, liked how long the entrance was, but his wife bitched too much at WrestleMania and the Funkettes had to get gone. Eventually he understood the WWF wasn't really going to push him, took their money, and decided to go back to ECW. By this point the lockerroom had changed, people were worried about doing jobs, stooging off on each other, and how Paul was increasingly more jive-ass about money (his words) and would constantly come up short and owed too many people too much. From there he went to All Japan, and apparently Johnny Ace helped him get a foot in the door (wow Ace actually did something good for someone). Scorpio concludes that he should have gotten a lot further with the talent that he has, and that he's always wanted to work with Bret Hart and Curt Hennig (R.I.P.) but never got the chance, and puts over Low-Ki and AJ Styles as new and upcoming guys he'd like to work with. Overall a good shoot video, you probably have to be a hardcore Scorpio fan to watch this though, because three hours is a LONG time and it does drag in places. A cautious thumbs up largely because Scorpio does have so many good stories and a lot of insider knowledge about important places and events in wrestling history.