Pro wrestling legend Raven appeared on “Insight With Chris Van Vliet” to discuss various topics, including how he created his character’s name.
Raven said, “I was watching The Crow for inspiration, and the character’s name was Eric Draven. I go, ‘Draven. Raven. Quote The Raven. Nevermore.’ All right, I got a name and a catchphrase. Boom, now I need an outfit. I put the outfit together in like two minutes, because it wasn’t hard to figure out. Then I came up with the idea of a concert t-shirt, because I’m a big believer in ring jackets. You gotta have a bunch of ring jackets, because to be a star, you gotta look like a star. But Raven’s character wouldn’t care about looking like a star. I had to get an anti-star look that still was a star, made me look like a star. So I figured with the concert shirts, I’d have a different shirt every day. So every match I could have a variety without having to change my jacket. Plus, I had no chest. I always wanted to be a bodybuilder, but I never had the genetics for it. So I had a thick waist, no abs, flat chest, but I had big arms and shoulders at the time, until injuries took their toll, but that’s a long story. So I figured I would wear a concert t-shirt with sleeves cut off and show off the arms. You want to accentuate your strengths and hide your weaknesses. And I hid my weaknesses. And another weird thing about that is I had really good legs, like really good thighs, but I had such a thick waist that it took away from it, but my thighs were really good. But for the look I needed to cover them, because if I would have wore short shorts, I would have looked like Steve Richards. So sometimes you have to pick one or the other, you know what I mean. But it’s such a unique thing, trying to get the most out of everything you can with the least amount of effort.”
On whether a WWE return was on his mind during his stint with ECW:
“I was really happy at ECW, but yes, I wanted to go back to WWE. I wanted to be the top guy in the top promotion. I got to be the top guy in the number three promotion. And for a long time, I felt like my career was a failure because of that. I think I talked about it in the movie, in the documentary, but it took a lot of time on a therapist’s couch to let myself off the hook. Because you hold yourself to such a high standard that I can’t see the forest for the trees. If anybody would have came up to me and told me what my career was, and it was theirs. I said, Man, you got a really successful career. But I couldn’t count it as with that for me, because I didn’t get to be a World Champion of the WWE.”
On whether he feels he was underutilized in WWE:
“They should have pushed me. They didn’t really push me at all. I should have been used, at least as a strong mid-carder, if not a main eventer. But that’s me. I mean, I could be biased, and I’m sure I am, but looking at it objectively, I think I could have drawn money for them.”
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(H/T to 411Mania.com for transcribing the above quotes)
