King Loke's Kreepshow - The Undertaker – Ode to the Dead Man

If you’re my age (35) or older, then you know Mark Calaway, better known by his wrestling persona, The Undertaker, and less well-known by his other persona, The American Badass (still technically called The Undertaker). The type of professional wrestling popularized by the likes of the WCW, WWF, and finally the WWE and their ilk gave rise to all sorts of big names, meant to burst on the scene and thrive like tyrannosauruses. Macho Man Randy Savage (the “snap into a Slim Jim!” guy), Hulk Hogan, The Ultimate Warrior, and “Stone Cold” Steve Austen are just a few of the gigantic characters unleashed like a barbarian horde by the scripted, live-stunt shows of the wrestling scene of the late-80s-early ‘00s. Towering above all of these characters is but one man: standing just under seven feet (the boots add two inches), long hair falling over his pallid face, black circles around his glazed eyes, dark, wide-brimmed black hat pulled low, and a heavy over-coat wrapped around his humongous, supernatural frame, it can only be one person. The Undertaker isn’t in a class of his own. He’s in a world of his own, on the level of cultural relevance held only by characters like Superman and Hercules, transcending his own creation and medium.

Where to even start? The Undertaker found himself wrestling against jokers like Jerry “The King” Lawler, introducing his signature move of the Tombstone Piledriver, wherein he lifts the other man so that his head is facing down, and drops to one knee, slamming the unfortunate wretch’s head into the ground, presumably putting so much stress on his opponents neck and body that he’s rendered inert. This usually followed with Taker’s “Rest in Peace” pin, where he would cross the limp arms of his foe over their chest, holding them in place as his eyes rolled demonically back in his head. Wrestling fans didn’t know what hit them. He held the Hulkster in place with his “Gloved Hand Smother” move, which is exactly what you think it is, crushed the humongous sumo wrestler, Yokozuna, trapping him in his own coffin, and threw Mankind off the Hell in the Cell, causing him fall sixteen feet through the announcers’ table.

He was a force of nature, capable of performing monstrous feats of strength usually reserved for comic book superheroes. He battled his own doppelganger in ’94, emerging from a crushing defeat at a royal rumble from his own coffin to re-claim his name and identity. There were times when he would get suplexed, choke-slammed, or otherwise laid out, and before he could get pinned, Taker would abruptly sit up, as if he had just snapped back to life, his eyes rolled back in his head, his tongue hanging out like Marvel’s Venom. And then there was his ability to appear and disappear, seemingly at will. One minute, The Rock is talking trash, and then the lights go dark. When they come on, behold! There’s the Dead Man, right behind him. He was supernatural in a way that wrestlers of today simply aren’t allowed to be anymore, and it’s a real shame that the spectacle has died down, leaving the drama and action, but missing a good deal of the art that keeps people coming back.

If you haven’t watched any professional wrestling and don’t know what I’m on about, then go hop on YouTube and watch the absolute menace of Mark Calahan, looming over his foes, suddenly climb to the top rope like a nightmare given physical form, before pouncing like Batman, delivering a sidewalk slam that would floor even the most threatening of opponents. There’s a physicality and a variety of iconic moves that really made The Undertaker stand out and linger, giving him an aura of menace that only built and built over the decades, not breaking until his disastrous match against Roman Reigns at Wrestlemania 33 in 2017. But that is a story for another essay.

The point being, The Undertaker is immediately recognizable to people the world over for a reason. Even people like me, writers, poets, the sorts you wouldn’t expect to look up to professional wrestlers, see in Mark Calahan’s wrestling persona a hero. He’s as iconic as Jason Voorhees or Michael Myers, and when you bring in his brother, the masked, similarly undead Kane and all the amazing shit that went down between them, well, you have a mythology as exciting and ridiculous as any trashy horror movie series with more installments than common sense. The Undertaker is a wrestler that other wrestlers tear up over; watch any documentary about the guy, you could consider the merchandising of Taker’s image as a franchise within the WWE itself at this point, so there are tons to choose from. Heck, it’s 2025, and while Calahan has been officially retired (this time for real, I hope!) for five years, he’s still featured heavily in the marketing for the newest WWE 2K game. While I’m not sure appearing in a direct to video Scooby-Doo movie is the kind of notoriety anyone wants for their career, meeting the Mystery Machine gang is something The Undertaker has in common with the Harlem Globetrotters and KISS, and that’s got to mean something to someone.