A Game in the Making
I don't think we knew where we were going with these at first, they just looked so cool. But as Greg, Sean, myself and eventually my best friend Tim created M.U.S.C.L.E. wrestlers or replicated WWF and NWA wrestlers, Dave spent some time putting together a dice rolling wrestling game for the little guys. Apparently he used to be into the whole Dungeons &Dragons scene prior to this. The game was ok at first, pretty basic as far as the number of moves available, but still fun. After a couple weeks we added the more elaborate moves and worked all the inconsistencies out of the game. From time to time we still needed the unbiased opinion of their sister (my ex-girlfriend) Trish to settle any disputes caused by one half of a double 0 rolling off the table or something like that. Otherwise the game was to the point of perfection (for us at least).

Let the Games Begin
At first we wrestled just for fun, using a large square ashtray for a ring, a soup bowl for the dice and both painted and unpainted M.U.S.C.L.E.. After enough M.U.S.C.L.E. were painted we shortly after made the rule that no M.U.S.C.L.E. may wrestle unless he was completely painted. One time during a match we noticed that Greg hadn't painted the bottom of his M.U.S.C.L.E.'s feet. He was immediately disqualified and harassed for the rest of the night. When a rule was made, we stuck to it. I think we determined our first set of champions in some sort of tournament. We each just picked one M.U.S.C.L.E. for each title or something. After a while we began keeping win records for each M.U.S.C.L.E.. After 5 wins (not necessarily consecutive) a M.U.S.C.L.E. would get a shot at the World Championship Title. After 4 wins, an Intercontinental Title shot and 3 wins for a Tag-Team Title shot. We even had a 3-Man Tag-Team Title at the time for those few sets of three similar looking M.U.S.C.L.E. or just a set of three doubles painted the same. We also tried a Battle Royal a couple of times but no one ever wanted to keep score. We eventually called our M.U.S.C.L.E. wrestling organization MMW, Muscle Man Wrestling.

Consummate Collectors...
Once we filtered through the batch of M.U.S.C.L.E. in the shoe box, the hunt for new M.U.S.C.L.E. was on. Once or twice a week Tim and I would drive to the local Toys R Us store or sometimes the three local Toys R Us stores (it’s Southern California, we’re spoiled that way). We of course bought the 28-packs first and took turns picking our M.U.S.C.L.E. from them one by one. After the 28-packs, finding several new M.U.S.C.L.E. in bulk was a rare find. We were lucky to find more than 3 or 4 new M.U.S.C.L.E. within a 10-pack can and those were a little tricky sometimes figuring out what the figures near the middle of the can looked like. 4-packs were only a buck, but we were only in high school and had to resort to saving our lunch money to buy these things. So a 4-pack would either have to have at least two new M.U.S.C.L.E. or one really “gotta-have” M.U.S.C.L.E. to justify the purchase. I’d say we spent a little fortune in our pursuit of finding the ultimate M.U.S.C.L.E. (not a pun). Then we noticed that the well was starting to dry up. Undiscovered M.U.S.C.L.E. were scarce. We never new exactly how many M.U.S.C.L.E. there actually were to collect. We never kept track of the ones we had and were unable to obtain the M.U.S.C.L.E. poster. By the time we got into collecting them, the poster offer had expired…but I sent it in anyway and received nothing in return.

...and Petty Thieves
Well, desperate times called for desperate measures. One good M.U.S.C.L.E. in a 4-pack, bought. One great M.U.S.C.L.E. in a 10-pack….contemplated for 5-10 minutes and bought. But one great M.U.S.C.L.E. in a 28-pack?...play the Mission Impossible theme, we’re going in.

Toys R Us stores now a days are like mazes and there‘s a customer or clerk around every corner. But back then Toys R Us had 2 sets of long, highly stacked isles. One could be all alone in an isle for a good 10 minutes at times. I never had enough nerve so I would stand watch, casually pacing the isle from end to end. Tim was the designated jewel thief. Nervous himself, he too paced the isle, but within a 2 foot radius of the targeted 28-pack. A rip of the tape and a slip of the tray and the highly desired little pink guy was ours. I think we only did this on a couple of occasions, but we got away with it EVERY SINGLE TIME BABY! Oh, we were good. We were damn good! We got away with about 50 cents worth of merchandise and evaded a possible slap on the wrist. It’s a wonder we never did any hard time later in our lives.

Our Little Creations
Quite a few of our first batch of wrestlers were M.U.S.C.L.E. versions of WWF wrestlers. Most used WWF names like "The Macho Man", "The British Bulldogs", "Jake the Snake" and the obvious "Hulk Hogan" M.U.S.C.L.E.. Later on "The Ultimate Warrior", "Ravishing Rick Rude", "The Honky Tonk Man" and NWA's "Ric Flair" and "The Road Warriors" were made among others. Parodies like "The Trash Foundation" (The Hart Foundation but with trash can bodies) were also made. Don't get us wrong, we were heavily into originality as well. Though Dave and Greg made a lot of generic originals like 'The Masked Marauders", "Death Stalker" and "The Gladiator", Sean, Tim and I got pretty damn creative.

Sean's greatest creation had to have been a M.U.S.C.L.E. version of his annoying little brother Greg. This was made from the M.U.S.C.L.E. with the poked in eye and Band-Aid on his forehead. The real Greg also did a bad imitation of my bad imitation of a deaf person, which Sean also incorporated into the character. A situation with the M.U.S.C.L.E. Greg and his best friend Andre Jr. would go something like this:

Andre Jr.: "Hey Greg, let's get out of here before we get beat up."
Greg: "I cannot hear you I am deaf."
Andre Jr.: "Come on Greg!"
Greg: "I cannot hear you I am de..."
Dexter: "Hey you little crappers, give me your lunch money or I'll beat the heck out of you!"
Andre: "Leave us alone you stupid Hulkamaniac!"
Greg: "Ya, leave us along you a--hole!"
Dexter: "What did you call me?"
(Andre Jr. socks Dexter in the belly and runs away.)
Andre Jr.: "Hurry up Greg, let's get out of here! RUN GREG RUN!!!"
Greg: "I cannot hear you I am deaf."
(Once again Greg is left to fend for himself. Dexter then proceeds to beat the hell out off Greg, as usual.)

Another, and yet ironic creation of Sean's was "Sukaru". Sean had been doing a terrible paint job with this one. Frustrated, he threw Sukaru into the cup of murky water we used to wash out our paint brushes and left him for dead. About an hour later, Sean pulled him out from the depths of the now browned and disgusting cup of water and replied "There, that's my paint job!" and Sukaru was born. He looked like crap but he WAS fully covered in paint. The ironic part? Sukaru went on to be the all-time king of double 0's and the most feared M.U.S.C.L.E. in MWA history. All that, considering he was once left for dead at the bottom of a cup. Sean is also credited for "They Call Us Bruce" (now known as The Dragons of Misfortune).

Tim wasn't really known for his art skills, he was more of the jock type. But boy did he come up with some funny ones. As I think back, it turns out he created alot of my favorites I'm bringing back. "Ravishing Rick Rood"- same cocky attitude, same huge ego but with a big 'ol gut (see SINGLES). "SW26"- a wussy, pea-green wrestler who never wanted to wrestle. And "Ernest and Julio Gallo" (after the famous wine company). I don't know, that's just funny to me. (Note: Bret Gallo used to be Ernest Gallo while Ernest Gallo used to be The Blue Blazer. I've change the names and history around for the best interest of Bret Gallo and The Gallo Foundation. Not that anyone cares.) Tim was a huge fan of horror movies at the time. I thought I would impress him, so with three M.U.S.C.L.E. figures and a razor blade I decided to make a Freddy Krueger M.U.S.C.L.E.. It was awesome I must say! Head and torso of Lod, hat of Cowboy and a pair of pants. This spawned a whole line of custom M.U.S.C.L.E. horror figures Tim and I worked on: Friday The 13th's Jason, Michael Meyers, Chuckie, Pinhead and the cast of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, even Franklin in a wheelchair, all made out of M.U.S.C.L.E.. But his pride and joy was The New and Improved Real Ultimate Warrior (see "Will the True Ultimate Warrior Please Step Forward" below).

Dave was an off and on wrestler. When he did wrestle he took the game very seriously. Even his M.U.S.C.L.E.s were all business in the ring. If I remember correctly, it was DAVE that we always argued with about rolling the dice off the table. I would go on about Dave but other than putting the game together he wasn't very creative. Sorry Dave.

Poor little Greg... Greg was only 10 at the time and at our age we could be pretty harsh. If Greg took a cool WWF wrestler and we either liked the wrestler or hated the M.U.S.C.L.E. he picked for it, his little M.U.S.C.L.E. he worked so hard on was either gullibly forced into trading for a lesser M.U.S.C.L.E. or ridiculed back into the shoe box altogether. Things would get a lot worse when Greg chalked up a few wins with these guys. Sadly, Greg's biggest claim to fame is Sean's "Greg" M.U.S.C.L.E. character.

You'll eventually see most of my creations on my MCW webpage so I'll just talk about the dumb ones that won't make it here. I once cut the head off a M.U.S.C.L.E. painted it and called it "Head". Tim hated wrestling Head, it was just so stupid. I later sliced a sliver of a piece off a M.U.S.C.L.E., painted it yellow and called it "Chip". Then Tim hated ME. "Bastard"- half man half record player with his thumb up his butt. And "Boner The Barbarian" who had a weenie the size of his arm. He was only allowed to wrestle when the parents weren't home. On second though, maybe I will bring back these guys. I do want to go on about Andre Jr. though. Andre Jr. was made out of a simple little M.U.S.C.L.E. that looked like The Beaver from "Leave It To Beaver". He of course, is the son of Andre The Giant who we also had with the use of some slightly larger generic M.U.S.C.L.E. monsters. Like I said, he was a simple and cute little guy but what a character. Imagine Andre The Giant (post-Hogan feud), his French accent, at 9 years old, inhaling helium, thinking everyone's a Hulkamaniac. "Ok all you estupid Hulkamaniacs out derrr. You better leave me alone or I'll getta my daddy on ayou and he'll beat ayou up like a dat a one!"

Will the True Ultimate Warrior Please Step Forward
I just had to throw in this useless piece of information. You might find it humorous... Back then "The Ultimate Warrior" was well, the ultimate warrior! The greatest, most intense pro-wrestler we've ever seen at the time. I'm not sure why none of us jumped at the chance to own the rights to the M.U.S.C.L.E. version of him sooner than we did, but Greg got there first. Greg first made The Ultimate Warrior using the big, beastly, lion-headed M.U.S.C.L.E. with the Tarzan outfit and bare feet. Prior to this Greg called him "The Beast". Now like I said before, Greg's M.U.S.C.L.E.s were sometimes ridiculed back to the shoe box, this was one such case. A while later The Ultimate Warrior resurfaced thanks to Tim. However this time it was the M.U.S.C.L.E. with the headband and leg and forearm pieces that actually in our opinion most resembled the actual Ultimate Warrior. Later on I decided to play a little joke and bring back the beastly Ultimate Warrior as "The ORIGINAL Ultimate Warrior" with his original Greg-paint job. Tim was not amused. A week or two later I came to his house to wrestle and in an attempt to make his Warrior more "Ultimate Warrior" than mine, he had repainted his Warrior in bright orange and green complete with arm-ties and renamed him "The REAL Ultimate Warrior". I studied the colors on his Warrior and then repainted my Original Warrior the same colors that night. The next day Tim was once again pissed off at me. From that point on Tim seemed to accept The Original Ultimate Warrior and thus began a long run rivalry. Tim eventually repainted his Real Warrior one more time and once again altered it's name to "The New and Improved Real Ultimate Warrior".

Lights, Camera, Action!
With my dad's video camera at my disposal, it was inevitable that we'd put the two together. The only problem was getting these little guys in focus. A $30 lens set took care of that.

Our first attempt at a M.U.S.C.L.E. movie was a 15 second amateur production titled "Junior -vs- Godzilla". It starred an unpainted "The Rock" from MCW as Junior and an 18" tall Godzilla toy from the 70's "Shogun Warriors" toy line. The plot was simple, Junior meets Godzilla, they exchange grunts, Junior kills Godzilla, the end. Really primitive special effects at the time as well. Junior made a flying attack via a recklessly controlled fishing line.

Then came our first of four big productions. But because we were too anxious to sit around and come up with our own story lines, we ended up making movie sequels, starting with Predator 2 (this of course was before the real Predator 2 movie was made). It starred Avalanche as the stalking Predator amidst the camouflage of my bedroom's brown rug and seven or so of my favorite M.U.S.C.L.E. as the helpless victims. Some of the highlight scenes were using a really tiny basket as the hot air balloon that crashes, which leaves the stranded in the first place. We they decide to search for food, they leave little Niku to watch camp as night falls. We had a great shot of Niku's big frightened eye's in the dark. Another was a very effective metamorphic scene transforming Avalanche into a giant beetle using one of those spinning fireworks things cut in between the two shapes.

After that came, in no particular order: Big Too (Andre Jr. and Andre the Giant in the starring roles), Predator 3 (Sukaru as the Predator) and The Exorcist (Lester and the possessed little girl, he was a woman back then). I could go on for hours about the highlights and special effects each movie, but I'll spare you all an hour or two of your time. Besides, they're mostly those "Had to be there" kind of situations.

Why Oh Why?
It couldn't have been more than a year after our last wrestling match when that dreadful day came. Tim and I had since drifted apart and he had by then given all his M.U.S.C.L.E. to me. The Kelly brothers were long out of the picture due to the fact that their sister and I had broken up.

I remember it vividly. It was a cool summer day at about high noon. I was in the process of cleaning my room when I came across that slightly unattractive wooden box. I opened in up and began to ponder "Should I keep these? I don't really hang around Tim anymore. And if I did, he'd probably never want to wrestle again." I gave them each a good look over, thinking back at one of the funniest chapters in my life and maybe a little upset that I could never relive those moments. We all had to move on... I had to move on. In one hesitant movement, I dumped all my M.U.S.C.L.E. in the trash.

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Photos from the Past
Below are some photos of Tim and I painting our M.U.S.C.L.E. and playing our game back in '88...
(click to view larger image)

		Here we proundly display our little creations. (Tim's on the left, mine on the right.)
		Here I am hard at work as Tim takes a quick T.V. break. Hey look! It's SW26, Bret and Julio Gallo and Avalanche in the lower left corner!
		Not sure what's happening here. Either Tim is making a challange as my Original Ultimate Warrior and his Real Ultimate Warrior stand face to face atop a couple of paint containers or Tim is demonstraiting the street lingo used by his newest wrestler Akeem, a white guy from the ghetto who has rediscovered his African roots... and of course we have the WWF on T.V. in the background.
		On another evening, it's all buisiness in the ring. This appears to be a battle royal tournament of some kind. Seen here is Akeem once again strutting his stuff.
		Later on in the match, Freddy and The Original Ultimate Warrior join in. "The Original Warrior on the top rope!" Also seen is the dice rolling game that's now on my website and in the background are our win/loss records.

For a few months, this was our life... and I'd do it all again if I could.