A big part of professional wrestling (some may argue—the biggest part) are the characters that the wrestlers embody. The story, the myths, the narrative drives the entertainment factors as much as the physical interaction.
So: who is Perry Saturn when he steps into the ring? I used TVTropes.org to help get a sense of this, and share my favourite tidbits below.
📺 Quick TV Tropes primer
TVTropes.org is an amazing character analysis resource. There's this enormous list of terms that helps to categorize and contextualize characters. It's sort of like Wikipedia, but a lot more cheeky! Perry Saturn has a fulsome page which you can read here.
🪐 Notable Perry Saturn "tropes"
- Bald of Evil. When a villainous character has no hair. Apparently a rival faction duped Saturn and managed to shave his head, and he never looked back.
- The Dragon. A term for the Evil #2, the right hand, the Vader to the Emperor. In Perry Saturn's case, he was said second in command of The Raven Flock in WCW.
- Real Men Wear Pink describes when a stereotypically hypermasculine type displays some decidedly feminine behaviour. In Saturn's case, this was when, "he had to wear a dress for a time in WCW after losing a match to Jericho at WCW SuperBrawl IX. He grew to like it."
- Consulting Mister Puppet might be my favourite—it's when a character adopts some kind of puppet or inanimate object as a friend. Perry Saturn apparently became enamoured with a mop named Moppy?
This image, courtesy of lastwordonsports.com, sums that relationship up:
Why not? Mops are cool. And useful. Also maybe it was a way for Saturn to mourn the loss of his hair? I'm sure there's a fun backstory here.
There's a lot more to learn about Saturn's character on his TVTropes.org page, but just this select peek starts to hint at how professional wrestling is elevated by nuanced character traits. Check it out!
