Rourke vs. Jericho

A little while ago on the SAG Awards red carpet, Mickey Rourke made a seemingly throw-away comment about how he was going to “wrestle some guy called Chris Jericho” at WWE’s Wrestlemania in April.” It should come as no surprise then that Jericho, himself one of the most celebrated professional wrestlers of all time, did not take too kindly about being “called out” by some washed up old actor with a face clearly made out of leather and presumably what is some kind of construction paper.

Jericho confronted Rourke on Larry King and you can check the video out ABOVE. I don’t know how this plays to fans of WWE but for non-fans like me, this must be very, very awkward. All I keep thinking is Jericho knows that he wins because the guy who writes the script writes it that way, right? He wins because the other guys lets him. The other dude lies on his back while Jericho lies on top of him and then he is the champion. I know that him goading Rourke and saying he couldn’t “live in his world” is all part of the act, and he does his thing, but man that is awkward to watch. It makes no sense whatsoever. He goes from “immaculate performance” and “I respect what you did in the movie” to “I don’t have respect for you, I really don’t” in literally five seconds.

To his credit though, Rourke doesn’t go for the bait (probably because he is awesome) and takes the high-road. Today Defamer reported a message from his publicist:

“Mickey was very honored to be asked as he has the greatest respect for WWE however he will not be participating in Wrestle-Mania. He is focusing entirely on his acting career.”