Watch: C-3PO and R2-D2 throw down in 1979 ‘All Japan Pro Wrestling’ match
File under: glorious, glorious nightmare fuel.
Star Wars has been branded on nearly every kind of product, from towels to blankets to cups to toasters and much more. And while stereotypes would have you believe that Star Wars is just for nerds, there are plenty of athletes who just the sci-fi saga.
In fact, in the summer of 1979, the blockbuster hit from George Lucas was such a sensation that it inspired two wrestlers in Japan to dress as C-3PO and R2-D2 for an All Japan Pro Wrestling match. Yes, it’s just as strange as you would expect it to be.
This isn’t exactly the kind of video where you have to watch the whole match to understand what’s going on. After all, if you don’t speak Japanese, the audio is pretty worthless. But the guys dressed as C-3PO and R2-D2, looking like some kind of luchador robots, came to fight. And their opponents can’t even shake a stick at them in their red and blue spandex underwear.
So take the weirdness of Japan, the oddness of wrestling, and throw in some Star Wars flare, and you’ve got an athletic event for the ages. Uproxx notes that one of the wrestlers here is Atsushi Onita, one of the fathers of what has become deathmatch wrestling. So these are just some schmucks in an amateur wrestling ring screwing around (though sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference here).