The Global Wrestling Federation (GWF), started off so well…and then proceeded to go down so hard, so fast. With talent such as Jerry Lynn, Booker T, Eddie Gilbert and Cactus Jack making their way through the fed, there was never a lack of talent. But somewhere in there, the promoters decided to fight fire with fire against Vince McMahon (maybe they were importing some of that laced ganja that the Memphis bookers seem to be so fond of), and began to imitate the cartoony gimmicks of the WWF. Rasta The Voodoo Man (or Voodoo Mon, if you prefer) is probably one of the most notorious of these.
Thing is, Rasta came before the WWF’s Papa Shango, by about a year. However, the characters were almost identical in too many ways. Big, built black guy with a skull painted on his face, and all that, y’know. Rasta even cast spells on his opponents. Here he performs a short ritual, and after finishing, Brian Adias starts feeling pains in his knee:
Never mind the fact that by the 90’s, this sort of gimmick came off as seriously anti-PC, it was just too damned goofy to get any credit. Top that off with a wrestler who didn’t exactly light the industry on fire with his talent, and you’ve set yourself up for disaster. Seriously, where can you really go with this type of gimmick? Then again, when competing in the same promotion that had Marcus Bagwell doing a Chippendales gimmick and another guy lifting his entire schtick from a Pee Wee Herman character, it’s not like he was totally bottom of the barrel.
It should be noted that this Rasta is in no way connected to another wrestler that ripped off the gimmick and is better known today as Terry Tate, the Reebok character who likes to put office workers through walls. Now THAT is funny stuff.
Rasta, like most of the rest of GWF’s gimmicks, fell by the wayside, along with the company itself. In their short existence though, they gave almost as many bizarre gimmicks as an entire year of Russo, so you can look forward to more entries in the near future.