Throughout pro wrestling’s history, there have been many classic moments that we’ll remember forever. But just as often, a promotion will make some choices that are…let’s just say interesting. It’s those moments that WTF?! is going to cover in this series. For the first article, let’s cover (unintentional pun, sorry) some of the stranger WWF Magazine covers.

Background: The WWF Magazine started as WWF Victory for a show-stopping, legendary…2 issue run. Yay. Then it was rebranded as WWF Magazine in April 1984 with Hulk Hogan on the cover because of course.

The WWF Magazine would change to SmackDown! Magazine during the first brand extension, rebranded further to WWE Magazine in 2002, and spawn spin-offs like RAW Magazine (1996-2006) and WWE Kids (too long) before recognizing that the internet exists and stopped publishing in October 2014. Yes, 2014. During its 30 year run, the WWF had many classic covers. Who could forget the classic covers with the Ultimate Warrior or Hulk Hogan in their tanned, sweaty, steroided prime?

But, as with everything in pro wrestling, for every great and memorable cover, there are some more bizarre choices that don’t really scream “cover material”. And those are just the covers we’re going to c0v-….uh….look at in this article. So sit back and enjoy our look at the odd WWF Magazine covers.

Note: Many of these images were acquired through an amazing resource, Hoffco-inc. Check them out here

 Now let’s get to the covers.

Jesse…Rocks?

Our first cover is one of the strangest of an entire decade. Despite the 1980s being a decade where a large white guy played the “African Dream” and Captain Lou Albano was a pretty normal sight, WWF Magazine covers during the 80s were relatively normal. Which is why this cover featuring Jesse “The Body” Ventura, shown here in his post-steroids, pre-state governor glory stands out. What was this supposed to convey to the reader? No idea. Is it probably one of the reasons Ventura eventually left the WWF? Maybe. All we know for sure is that Ventura found a way to blame it on Hulk Hogan (and the government).

King Kong Santa

 As long time fans know and new Attitude Era fans are shocked to learn, early 90s WWF were simply a Hogan-less extension of the 80s campiness. Gone were the snakes, bulldogs, birds, dragons (dang, there were a lot of animals, weren’t there?) and in their place were hockey players, garbage men, and dentists. Oh, and King Kong Bundy was still there. Yup, in the mid 90s, Ted Dibiase, now in a managerial role, built his Million Dollar Corporation, truly the weirdest hodge-podge of misfit toys this side of the Dungeon of Doom. One of the members of his corporation was King Kong Bundy, who headlined WreslteMania 2, is wearing a Santa Suit pulling a nerd out of a bag. How the mighty have fallen.

Sure….”Slop”

Every once in a while, WWF Magazine would use a live shot on their cover photo instead of a posed photo. Not only do these live shots offer no context to anyone outside of the weekly viewing audience, they often don’t come off as all that enticing. Case in point, Phineas I. Godwin (PIG, get it?) pours a bucket of “slop” onto Sunny during an angle in 1996 as Henry O Godwin (HOG because….yup, it was 1996 alright). Sunny had a gold digger streak where she jumped from tag team to tag team depending on who won the WWF Tag Team Titles at the time, managing such luminaries as Skip and Zip, the Bodydonnas, The Godwins, and pre-breakup Smoking Gunns. During this time, Sunny convinced simple, poor Phineas that she actually liked him. This charade lasted about as long as you’d expect until the payoff where Phineas poured supposed “pig slop” onto Sunny. Pig slop is in quotations because of the backstory behind the incident. According to Dennis “Phineas Godwin/Mideon/Naked Mideon” Knight himself, the “slop” actually had some…extra ingredients thanks to the WWF locker room, who didn’t necessarily like Sunny for one reason or another. Let’s just say it’s not just pig food in there and leave it at that. Suffice to say, this is the first, and to my knowledge only time the WWF Magazine featured actual human feces on the cover. Just think about that for a second. Then take a shower.

Hi There

When choosing a photo to put on the cover of your magazine, you want something that’s eye-catching and doesn’t give you screaming nightmares. This cover photo of Sycho Sid Vicious from 1996 does one of those things. It’s eye-catching for sure, but more in a “oh god, he’s staring at me” kind of way. How this was made the cover of the the WWF’s flagship magazine amazes me to no end. I don’t know what else to say about this. It’s Sid…staring at you….via picture. It’s hard to convey a shudder through text, but here we are.

Send in the Clowns

By late 1998, the WWF was firmly in the Attitude Era, but that doesn’t mean the goofy train came to a full stop (Mick Foley wore a sock on his damn hand, for crying out loud). There’s no better example of this than the short-lived faction The Oddities. This figurative and literal freak show started as a parade of human oddities managed by The Jackal (ECW’s Cyrus) before they dressed Kurrgan in a beanie and tie dye, put him with the only guy on the roster bigger than him (Paul Silva), added Luna Vachon and the Insane Clown Posse, and hired back a slimmer John Tenta, giving him a gimp mask and a Cartman doll. That had to have been the worst gimmick the former Earthquake ever had.

Anyway, this cover happened. WWF made it happen, we all let it happen, and there’s nothing any of us can do about it now.

All Oiled Up and Nowhere to Go

After spending the final few years wearing a chainmail headress and yelling at everyone who was not his wife, Scott Steiner patched himself up and spent a short run in the WWE. Steiner came in and immediately started feuding with Triple H. Scott Steiner also couldn’t raise one of his feet at the time. Both of these statements are completely true. Needless to say, the Steiner-Triple H feud went terrible and only lasted a few months (as opposed to their feud in real life, which is still going strong). Steiner’s next feuds were with Test and Chris Nowinski, a feud in which Steiner…and I’m not joking….debated, in the ring, about the Iraq War. Because their writers were on Thorazine. Steiner was gone shortly after that, but left us with this oily, homoerotic testament to the one thing Scott Steiner was amazing at: doing a lot of steroids.

Well there you have it, some of the most WTF?! WWF Magazine covers of all time. Did I miss one? Do you remember more awful magazine covers from your youth? Leave a comment below and join the discussion.