Essay on Vince Russo

I decided to write an essay on my role model and inspiration as a writer Vince Russo and how he's influenced me.

I’m writing this essay because my biggest writing inspiration is the former head writer of WWE, WCW, TNA, and current head writer of JCW Vince Russo. Ever since I was a child I’ve loved the WWF Attitude Era. Even though I’m technically older Gen Z, I was exposed to the Attitude Era thanks to my dad and my older brothers. Even during the 2010s I preferred the Attitude Era over the PG Era (for anyone who wants to argue you like what you grew up on). I always knew that the Attitude Era and current WWE are different even if I couldn’t put my finger on exactly why until a few years ago. Since 2000, WWE has gradually been positioning their product like a superhero epic like Marvel rather than a serialized men’s soap opera. Just compare Attitude Era stars like Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock (before Hollywood), and Mankind, to the stars WWE has produced after 2000 like John Cena, Batista, and Roman Reigns.

Why am I talking about this? So I can tie Vince Russo into how he affects my own writing style. Even though Raw is War is wrestling, I still consider it my favorite show ever, even more than Spongebob, Cowboy Bebop, Death Note, or King of the Hill. I like that Vince Russo gets the audience emotionally invested in a wrestling show for the entire two hours instead of it being like WWE now where it’s made for clips and highlights on social media. I want writing where it’s too interesting to even think about looking at your phone while watching it. I mean yeah it’s kind of a balance between keeping someone interested who has a short attention span while also not being like Instagram where everything is bite-sized and sensationalist, because I want people to be thinking about my writing for more than a minute.

As you can probably guess, Kingdom Saints Wrestling is heavily inspired by Vince Russo’s Attitude Era, and the character Commissioner Manuel Bruno is like Vince Russo the person not Vince Russo the character. And Vince gave me the best advice while listening to his podcast, that to be a good writer you need to start with that blank page. I mean, in The Manipulator And The Maniac, the first line “Just get the words on the page.” is a reference to that. And that’s the hardest part is to just start. Get the ball rolling so that way you have something to work with. When I emailed Vince Russo in 2025 and asked him if I should write a novel about wrestling, he replied with “If that's what you want to do---go for it!”, so that’s pretty cool that he replied to me.

The biggest reason why Vince Russo is my inspiration is because he’s a Christian and has Jesus Christ as his moral center. That was discouraging to me about TV and Hollywood writing that they’re not only indifferent to Jesus Christ, but oftentimes hostile, and they send the message that the devil is cool and God is uncool. I don’t want this essay to come off as preachy (but I don’t mind that Vince Russo gets religious in his book Forgiven), but yeah I want to have a just balance between, on one hand yeah I hate stories that are all sunshine and rainbows, but I also don’t like stories that are nihilistic and don’t have Jesus Christ as the moral center either.

Another thing is my sense of humor is tragicomic and at any given joke you can either laugh or you can cry or get angry. The WWF Attitude Era is filled with that, like Dude Love for example. Yeah Mick Foley is dancing around and being silly, but underneath it there’s the story of, Mankind is who Mick Foley is and Dude Love is who Mick Foley wants to be. Or how about the fact Paul Bearer talks about death a lot and his “Oh yes!” can be interpreted as scary or funny? Same with him being fat, that can be either funny or sad.

The Attitude Era is also filled with “so bad it’s good” moments and “so good they’re great” moments. For “so bad it’s good” you have Vince McMahon as the higher power which is one of my favorites, Mosh as Beaver Cleavage, Brawl For All, X on a pole matches, Undertaker’s hybrid attire between Ministry of Darkness & American Badass in September 1999, DX’s self-aware bad acting, and so on. For “so good it’s great” moments, you have Austin vs. McMahon, The Rock turning heel at Survivor Series 1998, Mankind winning the WWF Title on January 4, 1999, and many more great moments. I like to have a mix of “so bad it’s good”, “so good it’s great”, along with the tragicomedy. And Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler were the greatest commentary team ever I don’t care what anyone says otherwise.

I’m sure most people’s first experience with Vince Russo was from when he was at WCW, so if you know about that then I’m sure you’re aware of his mutual hatred for Eric Bischoff. I’m gonna be honest, I don’t really watch WCW that much. I find it to be kind of boring and I mostly just watch it for Hulk Hogan. So with that in mind, I’m mostly on Vince Russo’s side here in the debate between Russo & Bischoff’s different philosophies, because WCW was presented as a “sport” and not like a TV show.

Vince Russo has said him and Eric Bischoff are like oil and water. However, I do give credit where credit’s due. I remember watching an Eric Bischoff shoot interview, where Eric Bischoff criticized Vince Russo’s approach to writing characters as real people, by Eric saying every story has protagonists and antagonists. So from there I’ve wrote stories based on someone playing the role of the hero versus someone playing the role of the villain, whether the villain is a person or the environment. However I agree with Vince Russo that every character should be written as if they’re a real person with flaws and redeeming qualities, because like I mentioned earlier I don’t like nerdy, chosen one myths like Star Wars or Marvel that strictly follow the Hero’s Journey so the story becomes predictable from that point. There needs to be surprise, having the audience think you’re gonna go left but you go right, and vice versa. Not to mention cliffhangers at the end of every episode, and the production itself needs to be structured and like a well oiled machine so the presentation is controlled chaos not aimless chaos.

Another thing I actually agree with Eric Bischoff more than Vince Russo about is Bischoff not seeing any potential in Raven, however I look at this from a real world perspective in general whereas Bischoff thinks more like a boss. Like when I watched Raven & Chris Kanyon vs. Chris Benoit & Steve “Mongo” McMichael on WCW Thunder from 1998, all Raven did was sit in the corner uninterested, and I was thinking “If you’re not gonna do your job then why are you here?” I also really didn’t like the ECW crucifixion angle with Raven & Sandman, and Kurt Angle, another one of my childhood heroes, was offended too. Raven gave more of a “Sorry you didn’t like it” apology.

Moreover, Vince Russo likes Randy Savage more than Hulk Hogan although Russo respects Hulk Hogan as the Babe Ruth of wrestling. Most of the hate from the Internet Wrestling Community towards Hulk Hogan seems to be out of jealousy because Hogan is a bigger star than everybody and made more money than everybody. I also thought that Randy Savage’s promos made no sense and his voice is annoying, whereas Hogan’s promos, goofy as they are at times, felt like it was coming from a man who connected to the audience, his Hulkamaniacs. So yeah I agree with Eric Bischoff more here that he loves Hulk Hogan, but on one hand it seemed necessary to keep Hogan out of the spotlight in the WWF Attitude Era to let younger stars develop like Austin, Rock & Foley, but also later in the Attitude Era especially in 2000 when Austin & Taker were gone I wish Hulk Hogan could’ve showed up to fight Corporate-DX.

The South Park writers have cited Vince Russo as an inspiration, but I don’t really like South Park because like I said I think King of the Hill is better, and that’s because South Park seems to be superficially inspired by Vince Russo. Like they just see the shock value and irreverent humor like DX saying “suck it” or Stone Cold flipping off his boss but don’t see the soul or the substance behind the Attitude Era. Most of the wrestlers in the Attitude Era were Christian after all, and I’d say wrestlers in the Attitude Era have a better lifestyle than wrestlers in the 80s for example which is considered the most morally clear era, because wrestlers in the 80s had substance abuse issues and they cuss like sailors and would rib other wrestlers to humiliate them or something. But yeah this brings me to my next point which is about Ted Dibiase’s criticism of the WWF Attitude Era, particularly antiheroes/villains. He said that society’s mentality now is if the bad guy can get away with it, then he’s cool, so for me I don’t want my villains to get away with some heinous act they did forever. They get punished either externally like Patrick in Spongebob x Death Note or internally like Katrina in The Manipulator And The Maniac. However, villains not reaping what they sow was more of an issue in WCW and ECW than in WWF during the Monday Night Wars.

Best-selling author Brandon Sanderson said antiheroes are basically heroes who wear black, and for me when I look at Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, Undertaker, and Mick Foley, he’s right. I consider those heroes who wear black. On the other hand, mainstream society especially since the 2010s considers Deadpool an antihero because he makes dick jokes and breaks the fourth wall or whatever, but he’s still within the bounds of an archetype. Stone Cold Steve Austin is way cooler to me than Deadpool because Stone Cold is a disruptor and doesn’t care for what society says is good and evil. You can’t put Stone Cold in a box and that’s also why Marvel & Star Wars nerds don’t know how to react to him. And that’s the bottom line.

To wrap things up, yeah Vince Russo was secretly one of my childhood heroes since I watched the Attitude Era, but I didn’t actually know much about Vince Russo until like 2022. The wrestling marks want to cover him up like he never existed. And I made the distinction here in this essay, before someone claims Vince Russo is my “god and guru”, I actually have disagreements with him even if I agree with Vince Russo 92% of the time.