World Championship Wrestling would have a great decade in sports entertainment in the 1990s. The Ted Turner owner company would compete head-to-head with Vince McMahon and the WWE. Some of the most famous professional wrestlers of all time would hold the WCW World Heavyweight Championship. Names like Hulk Hogan, Bill Goldberg, Ric Flair, and Randy Savage would spend much of the 1990s in WCW.
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WCW would also be home of some of the most legendary paint jobs of the 1990s. One sure way a sports entertainer could get noticed by fans, especially in the 1990s was by painting their face. The face paint would be the exterior of their interior character. The paint an extension to their very own professional wrestling gimmick.
10 G.I. Bro
Booker T is a legendary sports entertainer and his legend began in World Championship Wrestling. As a member of Harlem Heat, Booker T would win 10 WCW World Tag Team Championships with brother Stevie Ray. Booker would also be a 5 time United States Champion and 6 time WCW Television Champion.
Yet, just before Booker made the rise to the main event, the New Blood storyline would see Booker embrace an old gimmick for a short amount of time. As G.I. Bro, Booker would wear military fatigues and camouflage his face. This return gimmick didn't last long, but Booker showed the character depth to move up the card.
9 KISS Demon
The KISS Demon was a terrible wrestler and the gimmick never got over in WCW. Yet, the face paint and overall presentation of the character looked very cool. The KISS face paint was legendary well before Dale Torborg let out his inner demons.
The KISS themed wrestler was originally planned to be Brian Adams, who first embraced face paint as a member of Demolition in WWE. Yet, when Adams passed on the gimmick, it went to relatively new, former baseball player Torborg.
8 The Zodiac
Brutus Beefcake's run in WCW is absolutely humorous as a fan looking back. Brother Bruti would go through gimmick after gimmick to no success at all. As The Zodiac, Beefcake would paint his face and eventually become a mole in the Dungeon of Doom. The storyline was hokey, and it led to Beefcake becoming an even worse gimmick as the Booty Man.
While The Zodiac didn't work, the face paint at least showed effort from Beefcake. The truth is Beefcake only truly got over in WWE as the Barber.
7 Renegade
The Wrestling Observer would name the Renegade the Worst Wrestler of 1995. Yet, Hulk Hogan's "ultimate surprise" did have some nifty face paint. The truth is the Renegade was booked into an awful position.
Hogan got fans' hopes up that the Ultimate Warrior would debut in WCW in 1995 and instead the unknown Renegade showed up; with similar hair, arm tassels and face paint of Warrior. Renegade was a disappointment to fans out of the gate, but his face paint popped on tv and in magazines.
6 Ultimate Warrior
Eventually (1998) Hogan would get the Ultimate Warrior into World Championship Wrestling. While WCW's run of the Warrior was a complete disaster, the Warrior did show up with his trademark face paint. Ultimate Warrior with his incredible physique, energy and face paint would transcend to the top of WWE in 1990.
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Yet, eight years later in WCW, Warrior's character was more bizarre than cool. In most fans' opinion Warrior was only booked to allow Hogan to enact revenge. Still, the face paint was cool.
5 Damian
The Beast of the Apocalypse would join World Championship Wrestling in the fall of 1996. Even though Damian painted his face, he initially did not stand out among the plethora of colorful masked luchadors WCW would bring in. Damian would work three World War 3 pay per views for WCW.Yet, his face paint begin to stick out on screen when Damian joined Eddie Guerrero's Latino World Order.
In the original LWO, Damian would paint the Mexican flag on his forehead with the L W O letters. His face paint in WCW was vastly underrated, as was Damian.
4 Vampiro
While Vampiro would sign with WCW in 1998, he wouldn't truly start his run in the company until the Spring of 1999. As the face painted goth freak, Vampiro became a popular anti-hero on WCW television.
His skeleton-esque face paint enhanced Vampiro's overall presentation. Vampiro would have a memorable feud with his brother in paint, Sting. His most success in WCW would come when he won the Tag Team titles with yet another brother in paint the Great Muta.
3 Great Muta
Keiji Muto would express his alter ego the Great Muta by applying some of the most legendary face paint in professional wrestling history. Add in the mythical Asian mist, and you have one of the greatest character in World Championship Wrestling history. Muta would make multiple stops in WCW throughout the 1990s. In most stops, he would feud with Sting.
Along the way, Muta would claim an NWA World Championship, the Television Championship and the WCW World Tag Team Championships.
2 Road Warriors
The Road Warriors would popularize the face painted gimmick in the 1980s. The larger than life, muscle-bound tag team with the spiked shoulder pads made face paint look cooler than cool. As one of the toughest tag teams in professional wrestling history, the Road Warriors would dominate competition wherever than went.
RELATED: 10 Tag Teams With The Most Impressive Looking Physiques In WCW History
In 2003, Pro Wrestling Illustrated would name the face painted duo the best tag team of the PWI years. To this day, the Road Warriors have merit as the greatest tag team of all time. And the best face paint!
1 Sting
The Man Called Sting could easily have been one and two on this list. Sting would begin his WCW career as the neon face painted "surfer" Sting. The bright colors led to Sting being the ultimate baby face and the franchise of WCW. Yet, during the nWo invasion storyline, "crow" Sting appeared with his black and white face paint.
This version of Sting was more anti-hero than babyface, yet he still became Pro Wrestling Illustrated's Most Popular Wrestler of the Year in 1997 an award that "surfer" Sting won three times in the early 1990s. While these two versions of Sting are legendary, the red-faced Wolfpac Sting could have easily been the worst face paint in WCW history.
