As something of a joke, my future brother-in-law picked this book up for me at a second-hand store. As I am oft to do, I took the joke too far and actually read it. It was a weird experience. By no means is this a good book, and I only finished it out of a desire to prove to myself that I could. I haven't actually finished a book since about halfway through my last semester at university
Side note: Should the word "university" be capitalized? I like the look of University better, and it makes me feel like I actually accomplished something by going there, but it also makes me look like a snob... which I am... but then I turn around and write a review of a pro wrestling "autobiography." I am envious of Americans who can simply say "my last semester at college" because you can just skip the whole capitalization thing and have it mean the same thing. As opposed to here in Canada, where Universities and Colleges are two different things. The difference is that people who graduate from University insist on using the word "University" because it makes them feel better about themselves, despite the fact that the people who "just" went to "College" are now making about twelve times as much as they are because they actually learned how to do something. But enough about my education frustrations, the point is, even when I was in school, I was notorious for writing essays about books I didn't know the ending of. So, it would appear that "I'm Next" is what was going to break the Goldberg-esque streak.
My first bone of contention was with the book's subtitle. The cover actually reads I'm Next: The Strange Journey of America's Most Unlikely Superhero. To me, this sounds like a challenge to come up with more preposterous superheroes than a Jewish-in-name-only former football player who becomes a professional wrestler. So far, I've come up with
1) "The Platypus Kid," who after a freak accident has the ability to lay eggs, survive underwater, and whose tail contains a poisonous barb.
2) "The Creeper," whose superpowers include the ability to be pathetic enough to get invited to big parties, but latches onto individuals, engaging them in fiercely awkward conversation, and immediately comes to believe that you are best friends.
3) "Captain Prejudice," an incredibly adept crime-solver, but who always wraps up cases by uttering ethnic slurs. "Book em, Dago."
See? And that only took twenty minutes. Most unlikely superhero, my ass.
Moving forward, I also didn't really appreciate hearing as much as I did in the early chapters about Goldberg's penis. He even includes what appears to be an actual doctor's report on the state of his groin, including the junk, after a football injury. Thanks for the overshare.
To be honest, I've read a lot of wrestling books. Most of the time, the story of a wrestler starts with being inspired by wrestler a, getting trained by hard-ass wrestler b, before hitting it big and winning all sorts of accolades. For me, the most enjoyable part is when the "autobiographer" starts meeting people whose names I recognize, giving us a glimpse of the real personalities behind our favourite characters. Instead, I'm Next tells the story of a guy who only got into wrestling because he couldn't play football no more on account of him being hurt. Instead of falling in love with the theatrics or athleticism of wrestling, he falls into it because he feels bad mooching off of his brothers, and has the inclination to get back into the work force.
Rather than stories of hardcore training, we get the inside scoop on Goldberg's cookie-cutter training at the WCW Power Plant. There, he develops a "unique" character, which even he admits, is quite similar to other pro wrestlers. He concedes that there are similarities to "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, Ken Shamrock, and Dean Malenko, but, that it's okay because it wasn't intentional. Throughout the book, Goldberg tries to have it both ways, saying that there's nothing worse than stealing someone else's gimmick, but thrives on the unoriginal concepts that make up his own. It's like he's oblivious to the fact that the rules apply to him too. It's kind of like when Chuck Klosterman asked Britney Spears about "Slave 4 U" and she said that it wasn't about sex.
From there, he talks about his rise to the top, without any real mention of how he got there. He briefly mentions who he likes and who he doesn't, but it's pretty clear that he's only really doing this gig because football didn't pan out. Pro wrestling has been a way for him to get a steady paycheck, and allowed him to meet all sorts of famous people. He even devotes a chapter of the book to a series of name-drops of people he has met since becoming famous himself.
About the last half of the book is dedicated to talking about his football career. Not having ever really followed professional (to say nothing of college) football, I started to care even less. The name-dropping continues as we hear about playing with this person and this person and this person, and coached by this person, and played against this person and, and, and how he's even more famous than all of them. I hadn't heard of any of them before, so I was particularly impressed.
Something the book makes a huge deal about is Goldberg's status as a Jewish hero. He admits himself that he hasn't attended any kind of ceremony since his Bar Mitzvah, and that he doesn't really practice any kind of faith. I'm not saying that he doesn't deserve to be someone's hero (although the fact that he proudly recounts the story of peeing in someone's milk before hitting them with a frying pan makes me a little suspicious), but does the fact that he was raised in a particular religion make him a fixture of that community? I'm probably splitting hairs here, but I don't think that having a hero who happens to be Jewish is the same as admiring someone whose faith is a crucial part of their personal experience.
At the end of the day, this book was probably just a cash-grab, capitalizing on the success of other wrestling "autobiographies", like The Rock Says or Mick Foley's Have A Nice Day. All you learn from it is that Goldberg's actually kind of a dick, but that he likes animals, so it all kind of comes out in the wash. If you're still curious, you can have mine, or you can buy it on Amazon for a penny.
Rating: 1.0 star
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