While AJ Styles’ influence on Will Ospreay is well known, he was also inspired by the WCW Cruiserweight division…and Spider-Man!
Watching him in the ring, you can definitely see the superhero influence in Will Ospreay’s work.
He drew controversy for his “gymnastic routine” match against Ricochet, which involved the famous “superhero landing” pose spot.
Well, as it turns out, he was heavily influenced by Spider-Man in his life, using his love for superheroes to help craft his in-ring style.
Speaking with Colt Cabana on “The Art of Wrestling Podcast“, Will Ospreay revealed that he was inspired by both the WCW Cruiserweights and Spider-Man early in his life.
“I was a dancer, but like my mom, I obviously had a trampoline in my back garden. While watching the WCW Cruiserweights, I would obviously perform flips. There was a swimming pool near my trampoline, surrounded by a ledge.”
“So, I would just do a shooting star press off the ledge. I had the ability to do it effortlessly.”
“I thought they were cool, but I was always a fan of their ability to be like Power Rangers and Spider-Man. Spider-Man had a huge influence on me as a kid.”
He also hilariously revealed how he used to think he was Spider-Man, and would climb buildings, like his school hall, in an attempt to imitate the Marvel superhero.
“I believed that by imitating him, I could become more like Spider-Man. I genuinely thought I was Spider-Man when I was a kid.”
“Okay, there’s actually a story from my school that my mom hates. It’s about me climbing up a goalpost, like a soccer ball post, and doing a moonsault off it, landing on my feet.”
“I even managed to climb on top of my school’s assembly hall roof once. I had a habit of climbing on everything, including the sides of buildings.”
“I remember being on top of a five-story building, standing on the roof.”
If you use any quotes from this article, please give a H/T to BritWrestling for transcription
Will Ospreay Became A Wrestler Because Of AJ Styles
It was because of former TNA star AJ Styles that Will Ospreay became a wrestler in the first place.
He cites watching AJ Styles on The Wrestling Channel as the reason for his fandom, and used him as inspiration to become as good as he has been in the ring.
Will Ospreay spoke to Chris Van Vliet, and said;
“I am mad at how I stumbled across it. I liked the way WCW, ECW, and WWF ended. Of course, I was watching, but I didn’t really understand it in a weird way.
I just saw them as the enemy. As they were coming in, I still think it’s cool, even though it wasn’t the WCW that we kind of wanted. I still thought, as a kid, that was cool. But after a while, I just got bored, you know what I mean? It was just kind of like the same guys over and over again.
Yeah, I can seriously remember it. It was me, my friends, and we would all just chill. I was scrolling through Sky on Sky Broadband, and we had the wrestling Channel. And then, on this random Sunday, they had TNA playing.
So, we were just like, ‘Why is this?’ And we watched this action coming in with a six-sided ring. I can’t remember who else was on that card for the life of me, but I just remember it was like one match, one match. And then AJ came out, and I just thought, ‘Guy in a red hood coming down, the spark was coming.’ I was just like, ‘That’s it. You are a sick music.’”
“I thought it was the scoreless guy, I liked coming out, and then he wrestled. I’ve never seen anybody wrestle like that, at all. It was just that moment where he’d do his crazy moves, and then he just jumped to the top rope and executed a shooting star press. I had never seen it before in my life, so I just freaked out. I was like, ‘That’s it. That’s what I want.’
