Professional wrestlers are known for their over the top charisma and flamboyant personalities. For decades, performers have worn colorful attire to match their colorful personas. Wrestlers also use face paint to enhance their character and personify their gimmick. In WWE today, Finn Balor will use face paint to turn himself into the Demon, as a way to take his character to another level.
In the 1990s, WWE and WCW would have a plethora of stars to go under the face paint brush. Some of the biggest main event stars of the decade would use face paint to enhance their personalities. While in most cases, fans loved the face painted superstars, there are some cases where face paint just didn't work.
10 Best: Vampiro
Vampiro would join World Championship Wrestling in 1998 and receive main stream exposure. As popular culture began to embrace gothic trends, Vampiro became a popular goth figure in professional wrestling. Vampiro used his face paint to personify his gothic lifestyle. His off-white, somewhat skeletal face paint was a hit for his WCW fans. Vampiro would even have a feud with brother in paint, Sting during the dying days of WCW. Vampiro's paint job was one of the best in the 1990s.
9 Worst: The Blue Meanie
The Blue Meanie would receive his most fame as a member of the JOB Squad in WWE during 1998. Yet, Meanie started out in ECW. Meanie's paint job consisted of painting a pair of "glasses" on his face. Meanie would play the part of Da Blue Guy in ECW's Blue World Order, a spoof of the nWo. Speaking of parodies, Meanie would go on to become Bluedust (spoof of Goldust) in WWE with an even worse paint job. Meanie as Bluedust was one of the worst paint jobs of all time.
8 Best: Great Muta
The Great Muta would join WCW on numerous occasions in the 1990s. During his time there he would captivate the audience with his charisma and face paint. With the language barrier, Muta would use his face paint as a way to connect with the fans.
Muta would start the 1990s decade holding the WCW Television title. While Muta would spend much of his career in Japan, he would join (the aforementioned) Vampiro to become WCW World Tag Team Champions.
7 Worst: Papa Shango
Papa Shango had the poor man's version of the Vampiro face paint. Shango, who debuted in WWE in 1992 with a skull-esque face paint looked much more hokey than evil. Shango had the ability to curse his opponents and make them vomit, yet never really caught on in WWE. Papa Shango would be caught in the middle of a generational transition as WWE moved from Golden Era to New Generation. His face painted character didn't fully fit into either generation.
6 Best: Road Warriors
Professional wrestling fans of the 1990s loved the Road Warriors. Animal and Hawk had a no nonsense attitude. The duo would beat you up and look cool doing it. Their spiked shoulder pads and elaborate face paint made the Warriors pop in front of audiences and on television screens. The Road Warriors are on the short list of any conversation about the greatest tag teams of all time and on an even shorter list of the greatest face paint tag team of the 1990s.
5 Worst: Doink The Clown
Professional wrestling has seen many performers dress up as Doink the Clown, yet the original version was portrayed by Matt Borne. The clown costume and face paint was just so easy to mimic that many fans never even realized when Borne was replaced on WWE television.
Borne would take his clown gimmick to ECW whereas a deranged clown he would call himself Borne Again, losing some of the face paint. Doink's basic clown face paint makes it some of the worst of the 1990s.
4 Best: Ultimate Warrior
At WrestleMania 6, The Ultimate Warrior looked like he would become the biggest wrestling star of the 1990s. Warrior cleanly pinned the Immortal Hulk Hogan and become WWE World Heavyweight Champion. His neon face paint, muscle tassels and energy made him an exciting superstar that looked like a superhero. Fans could not get enough of The Ultimate Warrior. Yet, his career in the 1990s never lived up to the initial potential. Warrior would return to WWE in 1996 and have a run in WCW in 1998, his face paint was still over, but not so much his character.
3 Worst: Tatanka
The Native American Warrior, Tatanka would give out replacement Ultimate Warrior vibes when debuting in WWE. Tatanka was a large muscled up babyface character with arm bands, and a head piece and tribal war paint. Tatanka would go on a babyface winning streak from February 1992 until October 1993. Tatanka would wrestle for WWE until the spring of 1996. While he was a popular star in the 1990s, Tatanka never won a WWE title. He was most definitely not winning best face paint.
2 Best: Sting
The man called Sting would be the franchise for WCW in the 1990s. Sting would start out the decade with his neon face paint that popped on screens similarly to the Ultimate Warrior. Yet, Sting would drastically alter his face paint during his mid/late 1990s feud with the New World Order. Sting would debut his "Crow" face paint and embrace his dark side. While fans loved the neon surfter Sting, his dark side Crow Sting would become his trademark. A trademark he still uses today in All Elite Wrestling.
1 Worst: Roddy Piper
At WrestleMania 6, Roddy Piper would paint half of his face and body black for his match. The face paint was not good at all. Yet, making it worse was that Piper was in.a match with African American Bad News Brown. Piper's look gave off racial undertones that WWE should have avoided. The match has not aged well, making Piper's paint job the worst of the 1990s. Peacock even took the Mania match off their streaming network because of the face paint.
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