Malakai Black says his work has a lot of layers and hopes fans keep finding something new for years to come.
During a recent appearance on Giant FM Real Radio, Malakai Black spoke about the inspiration behind his character and how he pulls from ancient myths to bring his work to life on All Elite Wrestling programming.
“So Malakai Black, you know, the aesthetics, I’ve based off a god from more tribalistic times, one of the lower Celts, so basically any country that has the Netherlands, Belgium and France, but more from the time when Julius Caesar was around. [This] god, Cernunnos, the cool thing about him is that he is, or was, worshipped as a god that was basically in between realms. So he was a gatekeeper of the underworld but he lived within the twilight, so he was not in the day, not in the night, but just right in between. So he was a gateway between both worlds, which I felt very fitting for this character, especially if you look at my entrance. The first thing you see is a streak of light come up behind me like a sunset and then the second light you see is the light coming from above when I’m standing on the turnbuckle, almost like it’s 3 in the afternoon and the last light is almost like it’s a fading light, it’s almost like a moon light. So it goes from the day right into the night when you see my entrance. That character itself [Cernunnos] sits cross legged, there’s a lot of symbolism behind the character itself.”
Black explained that there’s a lot of little nuances he takes from Cernunnos, but then explained that as much as there might be some more “obvious” elements, he does like to keep things shrouded in mystery, at least for now.
“As always I like to keep a lot of things also hidden and there’s a lot of Easter eggs and a lot of stuff for me that I hope that within the next 10, 15, 20 years, people will unravel. The cool thing is that a lot of people have already been unraveling a lot of the stuff and a lot of the symbolism that I’ve been using for Malakai, a lot of references, a lot of Easter eggs. And even like as far back as my WWE stuff, people have been trying to pick it apart, which I think is great. Because that’s what I want people to have with these characters. I want them to have more than just a wrestler. I want them to have something that they can sit and study and dissect, and have it more than just being oh that was a cool wrestler. You know what I mean?
“And the Malakai Black character or me as Malakai Black, you know, I use a lot of references and stuff that happened in my real life exacerbated or you know, emotions that I convey and understand, or people in my life that I know that have certain behavioral patterns that cross-reference to the way I act as Malakai. So there’s a lot of things that I put into Malakai that I haven’t even shown. And the interesting thing is that in the next two weeks, you’re gonna see a very interesting change within the aesthetics and the behavior of said character.”
Black went on to say that there is “absolutely” a plan to expand the House Of Black, but he wouldn’t exactly say fans should expect what’s coming. Check out his comments about putting people in that House at this link.
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