The Forbidden Lore Of El Generico
In the hierarchy of gross wrestling exploitation, Generico ranks very, very low. Sebei played the lesser-spotted fake foreign babyface, which helps; the character did not exist to reinforce and summon hatred. The gimmick, outdated now, was irreverent enough then to deflect accusations of outright stereotyping. Also - and this is most important - El Generico was absolutely incredible.
Sebei is one of wrestling’s nicest and most principled wrestlers, at least, from the outside looking in. This also helps. What matters more - even in a nicer day and age, where Hulk Hogan can’t get a word out for the boos - is if you’re great. El Generico was a generational talent, one of the best pure babyfaces ever, before he even removed the mask.
The list of true wrestling pioneers is short; very few wrestlers have truly invented something. El Generico is one of them. His Brainbustaaah! finish - one of the best wrestling moves ever - was an indie sensation. You’ll have probably seen it by now, since, in a great story beat, he had to resort to it against GUNTHER at WrestleMania 40. Generico would motion to deliver a superplex, climbing to meet his opponents at the same set-up position. He’d then use the top turnbuckle to drill them onto their heads. This was incredible. The turnbuckle had been used as a weapon in previous eras. Bouncing an opponent’s head against it was an old move consigned in the early 2000s to something couched in irony. It was almost impossible to use the turnbuckle earnestly - until Generico best developed the idea to fuse it with a nightmarish, All Japan-style head drop.
Additional context: the indie scene at the time was locked in a competitive race with itself. In the 2000s, WWE didn’t come calling for the “workrate” set, largely opting instead to sign less talented wrestlers who nonetheless boasted Vince McMahon’s preferred look. The super-indie guys learned that, to get over in front of a crowd disillusioned by WWE, they were best off doing stuff you’d never see in a WWE ring at the time. Fittingly, Generico’s wrestling soulmate Kevin Steen understood this and also used a turnbuckle, the middle, as the landing spot for his ‘Steenalizer’ neck-clutch overhead driver. This was too demented even for the less obdurant 2025 era of WWE.
In a famously terrifying and spectacularly ill-advised spot, BJ Whitmer once tried to powerbomb Jimmy Jacobs onto the top turnbuckle as he fell out of the ring. Jacobs however joined him, only clipping the landing spot before the back of his head also smashed the apron on the way down. The principle could be borrowed; Generico’s in-ring mastery could not. All the “boys” wanted to prove that they could get the coolest sh*t in. Generico won that competition.