Swerve Strickland‘s trajectory in All Elite Wrestling changed for the better thanks to his rivalry with Hangman Page.
All Elite Wrestling‘s Swerve Strickland recently sat down with Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful. When asked how his feud with Hangman Page came to fruition, Strickland said it came from a Will Washington idea to pair the two men together following AEW All In.
Strickland said he saw Page as a main character of AEW, and he needed to put Hangman “in turmoil” because he was so pure.
In the same interview, the leader of The Mogul Embassy explained the depth of his character.
“And to me, it was just having pure water and just adding iodine in it,” Swerve Strickland continued. “It’s just the whole thing is starting to turn and slowly just take over the entire glass of water. And that’s what I wanted. To me, that’s how characters are truly defined. What elements of another character is going to alter the show? It alters a character, a main character. It kind of shifts the mood, the tempo, and the theme.
“So now music when it’s a positive thing, but there’s dark elements coming behind it. Nana’s… It’s luring you in, into a false sense of security like, ‘Oh, Nana’s here. Oh God! Wait. Then there’s this other guy coming behind you that’s just trespassing and going into Nick Wayne’s wrestling school and going into Hangman’s house.’ That was the point of those things. It’s like a candy-coated painting of things.”
“Hangman is just the elements of like, ‘I’m dragging you down to hell. We’ll see who comes out at the end of it.’ And it seems like we both came out, but somebody came out differently. So, I came out of it like, ‘Oh man! I think this evil, this resentment I’m holding in me is holding me back from achieving my goals.’”
Swerve Strickland explains the concept of why he is a really evil person
“They see a guy, like I said, I go back to Demolition Man and Wesley Snipes concepts all the time. They’re seeing a guy that has been underground for so long. And we know how… He needs to eat. We know he’s starving, and he’s just coming up on the surface. And if you are the rich watching this underground dweller come up to steal his food, you just look at him it’s like, ‘This is a thief. Oh my god! This is… Oh! This is a really evil person. Like… What are you doing? You are stealing from us. We earned this. But you don’t deserve this.’
“You’re just looking at them as a criminal, a wrongdoer. But if you really follow their story and watch how and why they’re under the ground and why they’re coming up to try to take from the rich so they can eat and they can provide and they can do these things.
Swerve Strickland wanted to have everything that Hangman Page had
At his core, the character of Swerve Strickland wants everything that people like Hangman Page have.
“Because if you watch, if you go back to Hangman dressing me down, right before Texas Death Match, he was telling me like, ‘That’s why your wife left you, that’s why your kids don’t talk to you. That you’re a child, you don’t deserve these things.’ I’m like, ‘That’s why I’m trying to get to where you are. So I can have those things,” Swerve Strickland revealed. “I want what you have, Hangman. You have the house. I’ve been in your house. You have a lovely family; you have your wife. I want that. But the only way for me to get that is to get to where you’re at.
“And the only way I know how to do it is to steal from you. The people in the above. From the people from below. So there’s a lot of… Also… It’s almost like the movie Parasite. It’s the people below who want to get what the people above have. The only way they know how to do it, they have to exercise their skills, which is thieving, and stealing, and conning, and taking advantage of things to be just up there with them. And I’m trying; that’s what my character is. And I think the people are seeing that like, ‘This guy works hard, he’s talented, he’s good. We want to see him succeed now.’”
It appears that Strickland will get another opportunity to challenge Samoa Joe for the AEW World Championship next month at Dynasty.
READ MORE: Swerve Strickland Is Honored That Fans Want Him To Face Will Ospreay At AEW All In 2024
Would you like to see Strickland win championship gold in 2024?
If you use any of these quotes, please credit Fightful with a link to this article for the transcription.
