The Wrestling Episode is our cleverly-named feature wherein we watch non-wrestling shows with wrestling episodes and try to figure out what the hell’s going on in them. You’d be surprised how many there are. You can watch the episode on Hulu here. If you have any suggestions on shows that need to be featured in The Wrestling Episode, let us know in our comments section below.
I’ve Never Heard Of Step By Step. What Is It?
The Brady Bunch if you ran it through a TGIF filter and set it in Wisconsin in the ’90s.
The premise of the show is that a man named Brady Patrick Duffy met a lovely lady Suzanne Summers on vacation, fell in love with her, and got married. But wait just a minute, folks: Duffy is busy with three boys of his own has three children. And OH MY MEDICATION, Sommers is ALSO raising three very lovely girls three children. Her family is smart and uptight. His family is slovenly mid-westerners! How will they work THIS out??
Uh, So It’s The Brady Bunch
Yeah, except their Cousin Oliver is a stupid teen who lives in a van in their driveway and combines Joey Lawrence’s signature “whoa” with 50 additional instances of Joey Lawrence saying “whoa.” He’s also a scab Jean-Claude Van Damme.
And There’s A Wrestling Episode?
Yes. Well, there’s an episode about what someone who’s never seen professional wrestling thinks “wrestling” is.
Meet Frank Lambert and his almost Buzz from Home Alone son J.T. They love the Green Bay Packers and want to go to a Super Bowl so badly that they’re willing to dress up like cheerleaders and pick up the tickets at a local sports bar per the rules of a radio contest. Which is weird because the Packers weren’t in the Super Bowl that year — it was the Dallas Cowboys and the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1996, when this aired — and the game wasn’t even in Wisconsin, it was in Arizona. But hey, this local radio station’s got “50-yard line” seats somehow, and these guys get them for calling in at the right time because they’re on a TV show.
The Lamberts head over to “Dave’s” as cheerleaders and do a routine to The Commodores’ ‘Brick House,’ but as you probably guessed because it’s the 1990s and this is a column on a pro wrestling site, there’s a swerve.
The radio host told them they’d get their tickets from “two beautiful ladies,” but he didn’t tell them they’d be two beautiful ladies … OF WRESTLING.
These extremely believable pro wrestlers are Assault and Battery. They represent the Beautiful Ladies of Wrestling, which is a parody of the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling but spells out “blow” instead of “glow.” Pretty PG-13 joke you’ve got there, Step by Step. They’re also using the name before multiple companies decided to use it in real life, including the very real promotions of “Bombshell Ladies Of Wrestling” and “Beautiful Ladies Oil Wrestling.” It’s like the sex thing!
The redhead (Battery) is played by Spice Williams-Crosby, a stuntwoman you’ll see pop up in a lot of these Wrestling Episodes because she’s the one they get to play a “sexy lady wrestler” when they have no idea what wrestling is, but need it as a joke. The blonde (Assault) is Charli Haynes, who has some G.L.O.W. cred as “Salt” from the team Salt & Pepper. If you’ve never seen them, they are — I’m shitting you not — a white lady and a black lady who hate each others’ guts but are a tag team because their names coordinate. I swear to God I thought that clip was going to break out in an Apartment Wrestling match.
You Keep Saying They “Don’t Know What Wrestling Is,” Are You Being A Smark
No. I mean, yes, always, but no.
The radio host tells them they’ll get the tickets if they last “10 rounds” with the Beautiful Ladies, and there’s a high school gym-style scoreboard that keeps track of points. You’re awarded points by executing takedowns. You know, just like in pro wrestling. I remember when Hulk Hogan defeated Andre the Giant by two points after shooting a double-leg on him at the end of round nine during WrestleMania 3, held at Cooter’s Sports Bar.
Unlike Steve Urkel and Carl Winslow, Frank and J.T. never get a comeback. There’s no real story to the match, it’s just the quote comedy unquote of watching lady wrestlers do snapmares to Patrick Duffy while he makes cartoon owie faces (pictured).
The highlight is either Duffy getting an elaborate nutshot via the Beautiful Ladies tying him up in the ropes and quickly spreading his legs — with crunching sounds! — or J.T. selling an airplane spin by facing his own mortality and wishing he’d been able to get all up in the curds of some Wisconsinite:
After watching them get arm-dragged and airplane spun for like ten minutes, Frank says uncle and “concedes” — wrestling terminology! — causing the radio house to announce Assault and Battery as the “undisputed champions.” Of what, beating up unprepared radio contestants in a bar?
Anyway, there’s one final swerve. Despite failing to get ten rounds with the Beautiful Ladies of Wrestling, it turns out the radio station’s going to give them the tickets anyway, because that’s the joke! None of this mattered! And now I’m writing about it 25 years later … oh God. OH GOD.
Hahaha, What’s Wrong With You?
brb gonna see if college will take me back
So That’s The Entire Episode?
Surprisingly, no. 10 minutes of watching Bobby Ewing and Original Hobie from Baywatch‘s stunt women get beaten up by faux-GLOW stars didn’t fill the 22 minute run-time required by TGIF’s Great Doctrine, so there are three (3) subplots:
The first involves Mark, the brainy middle child on the Suzanne Sommers side, played by Bradley Hitler-Smith. Mark needs to study hard so he be the smartest kid at a prestigious school, but it turns out he’s studying SO hard that he’s up all night “abusing coffee,” ditching his friends and storming off when someone suggests he have fun. His mom has to give him a speech about how he’s no longer a “one-dimensional kind of kid” — lampshade for one, please — and how he should chill out a little because he’s “got a girlfriend and is taking karate lessons.” Mark has Never Thought Of It That Way™, so he stops studying to hang out with his friends.
Good … lesson? I think?
The final two plots can be summed up in a sentence each.
- Family Urkel “Cody” invents edible clothing, then goes camping in it and gets attacked by a bear, because he’s a fucking moron
- Hot older daughter Karen hates her name and wants to change it to “Hakuna Matata,” because she’s a fucking moron
So, What Have We Learned?
1. Nobody at Step by Step knew what wrestling was.
2. Nobody should watch Step by Step.
3. I should pick better Wrestling Episodes.
(Check out our must-listen McMahonsplaining podcast with WWE superstar Braun Strowman. Subscribe on iTunes or Google.)
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