In 1989, the world of professional wrestling was much different than it is today.

It wasn’t a monopolized, publicly traded empire, dead-set on PG-friendly commercialization.

It was a territory.

It was smoke curling beneath low-hung lights in armories and county fairgrounds. It was cash money at the door, blood spilled on the canvas, and men who lived and died by how loud a crowd could get on a Saturday night. It was regional kings ruling over borrowed kingdoms, each one convinced their patch of earth was the center of the universe.

And the men who ruled those kingdoms?

They weren’t employees.

They were outlaws.

They crossed borders. They worked wherever the money was. One night in Memphis, the next in Dallas, the next in some half-lit building just across the border where the ring ropes sagged and the rules didn’t quite exist. They built their names town by town, fight by fight, reputation carrying further than any television signal ever could.

And for a long time…

…it was enough.

But by the end of the decade, the walls were closing in.

Television deals dried up. Syndication shifted. Contracts started getting tighter in the places that could afford them—and nonexistent everywhere else. The old system didn’t collapse all at once.

It rotted.

Slim Crotchette’s World Wide Wrasslin’ Syndicate -the same promotion that held a twenty-year stranglehold over the Southeastern coastline- folded under the weight of its own excess.

Count Cunty’s Gator Belt Championship Wrestling, once the pride of Florida, watched attendance plummet when its golden boys -Gargantuan Gary Guam and Leland Limón- were dragged through a steroid scandal that bled into the local papers and never quite left.

Pop Waters’ Kentucky Wrestling Alliance shut its doors for good, just two years removed from its highest high -when his daughter, Misty Waters- disappeared from the circuit following the birth of her son, leaving behind a territory that didn’t know how to survive without her.

One by one, the card fliers in grocery store windows disappeared.

And the lights went out over the fairgrounds.

And then there was Ricardo DiVincenzo’s Dixie Dynamite Wrestling.

The crown jewel.

The last one anyone thought would fall.

For decades, Dixie had ruled out of Memphis with a grip so tight it might as well have been law. It produced stars who were larger than life, and meaner than hell. Men who didn’t just wrestle in rings, but carried that same violence into bars, parking lots, and anywhere else someone was stupid enough to test them.

Outlaws.

Every last one of them.

And above them all stood its king.

“The Magnolia Mauler” Jack Marigold.

A brawler dressed up as a wrestler. Or maybe the other way around. It depended on who you asked, and how honest they were feeling. Jack didn’t work a style. He didn’t follow a script.

He fought.

Every night. Every town.

Cutting through the crowds. Swinging a steel chain above his massive 6’7” frame. His head scarred from the deep gashes he’d taken fighting bitter rivals who were just as mean and twice as desperate.

Because that’s what the business had become.

It wasn’t about performers.

It wasn’t even about who was the most athletic.

It was about survivors.

The kind of men the crowd didn’t just cheer for—

…but recognized.

By 1989, with the territories bleeding out and the money drying up, even kings had to travel.

And so Jack Marigold went south. Leaving behind his wife… and son who was supposed to inherit it all.

Not for television.

Not for a contract.

But for an outlaw show just across the border. One of those cash-in-hand, no-questions-asked nights where the ring was optional and the rules were whatever the strongest man in the room said they were.

The kind of place wrestling used to come from.

The kind of place it was trying to forget.

... and Jack Marigold?

He never came back.

Some said he made it through the match.

Some said he didn’t.

Most said it happened in the locker room.

Even more said it happened before he ever made it back there.

They all said a lot of things.

None of them matched.

No one ever agreed.

No one ever paid.

What everyone did agree on…

…was that something ended that night.

Not just a man.

Not just a territory.

But an idea.

Because if a man like Jack Marigold -if the Magnolia Mauler- could walk into a building like that…

and not walk back out?

Then the world those men came from wasn’t dangerous anymore.

It was already dead.

And what came after?

It wasn’t built for outlaws.

Not anymore..

—----------------------------------------------

Thirty-Seven Years Later…In an XWF Locker Room.

Frances Marigold cracks open an ice-cold can of Busch Light.

PSSHHHHT.

Though he’s thirstier than usual, his hand doesn’t shake in the slightest.

He takes a drink. Lets it sit.

The camera pulls back.

Something seems weird, Frances looks older than usual, though he’s no different than when we last saw him. Mid-fifties. Worn down from the years of violence, and drug and alcohol abuse. His hair disheveled. His beard self-inflicted. His crooked nose has been broken more than once.His knuckles look even worse.

There’s a guitar leaned up against the wall beside him missing a string. Dust and grime on the fretboard. Unplayed.

And draped lazily over the back of the chair- - - a length of rusted chain.

Frances doesn’t acknowledge it.

Doesn’t look at it.

Doesn’t need to.

He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand.

Sniffs once.

Y’know what’s funny…

No one asked, but yet he nods anyway.

They got a word for fellas like me now. Guys allegedly like you, ‘Tucky.

A guzzle of the beer. now

Outlaw.

O
U
T
L
A
W

A crooked grin, almost amused that he could spell it.

Used to be that weren’t a special thing.

Another guzzle.

Used to be that was just the job.

His eyes drift. Not far, but just enough to suggest something else is there.

One town’d quit payin’…

He shrugs.

You moved on.

One promoter’d screw ya…

A small chuckle.

You made an example outta his top boy in the ring, and took a booking two states over.

A pregnant pause.

Sometimes Mexico.

That sits there even longer.

Heavy.

Unexplained.

He doesn’t blink.

You wasn’t owned.

He lifts the can toward the camera.

You wasn’t protected by some stupid union neither… but that’s different.

He leans back. Chair creaks.

They got contracts now, ‘Tucky.

He squints.

Media trainin’. Smile for the camera. Watch your mouth. Don’t bleed too much. Don’t hit too hard. Don’t scare nobody important.

A pause.

Then:

Hell… half these boys in the XWF look like they’d apologize for winnin’.

A grin.

Gone just as quick.

Me?

He taps his chest.

I come from somethin’ older than all that.

His thumb runs along the rim of the can.

Meaner, too.

My daddy used to go town to town with a chain in his fist…

He stops.

Not dramatic.

Just… stops.

Like he lost the thought.

Or chose not to follow it.

…crowd loved him.

A shrug.

I liked him alright.

He takes another guzzle.

Crushes it.

Swallows.

Cracks another can.

Moves on.

Thing is…

Leaning forward. Chair legs scraping.

They think the outlaws died.

He shakes his head.

No.

A guzzle.

They just got old. Hell…

He looks up at a picture of Scoops McGee in the locker room.

Some of em’ got soft.

A chuckle.

Some of us got fat.

He pats his stomach.

Some of us got stupid.

Raises the beer.

Some of us got real talented in all the wrong directions.

His eyes drift to the guitar.

And then, without thinking…his hand drops to the chain.

He wraps it once around his knuckles.

Absent-minded.

Like muscle memory.

Like it’s always been there.

He doesn’t look at it.

Doesn’t notice it.

Some of us…

He trails off.

…walked out.

He leans in.

Eyes finally locking onto the camera.

Outlaw meant you might not come back.

Then he grins- - -and ruins it.

Listen, ‘Tucky… I’ve been in worse places than this company. What about you, boy?

I’ve been “escorted” outta a Waffle House in Puducha with fifteen-hundred dollars up my nose.

A belch.

He nods. Satisfied.

Then suddenly- - -

He stands from his seat, his tone shifts.

LIKE - - - FARRR-ERPH- - - LIKE FATHER, LIKE SON!”

He points, vaguely.

At Kentucky. At the XWF. At the world. At something.

LIKE - - - FARRR-ERPH- - -

He gags.

Swallows it back.

Eyes roll for a second - - -

then snap forward.

- - -LIKE IT USED TO BE!

He steadies himself. Points again. This time it lands closer to Kentucky.

You hear that word… ‘outlaw’…

He chuckles.

You think it means you’re tough?

A step forward.

Big hands… bar fights…  Slap boxing little baby boys around?…

He nods.

Yeah… I believe all that. I believe you can hurt somebody.

Then he shakes his head.

But that ain’t it, boy.

Let that breathe.

Outlaw ain’t what you do when the crowd’s watchin’---

He taps his chest.

---it’s what you survive when nobody is looking- - -

He lifts the chain slightly, still not really noticing it.

Outlaw ain’t winnin’ a fight…

It’s walkin’ outta one you weren’t supposed to… or not walkin’ out at all.”

Now the grin comes back.

And buddy boy…

He points again.

You ain’t never been in one of those.

He suddenly strums an invisible guitar. Closing his eyes. Thrashing his head around. Making a chucking sound with his mouth, almost similar to Metallica’s Fuel. It’s all very awkward and badly paced.

I’M GONNA BEAT YOUR BIG OLD KENTUCKY ASS!

- - -AND EVEN IF YOU’RE AN INBRED HILLBILLY PRICK- - -

- - -FRANCES' SONG ABOUT ‘TUCKY THE SUCKY WILL STILL BE A HIT!

He stops. Opens his eyes, and squints.

Then leans-in one last time. This time he’s quieter, sounding more dangerous than ever…

You think you’re an outlaw ‘cause you fight…

I’m an outlaw ‘cause I’m still here.

He crushes the beer can in his hand.

Chain still wrapped.

He still doesn't notice. And he still doesn't need to.

COUNTRY MUSIC SUCKS, AND SO DOES KENTUCKY!