Well creating the character was easy enough, as I just picked my own name and my own real-life nickname. Yeah, real original, huh? The idea to make The Boy your typical cocky heel was made because, well...I don't know why exactly. I've always loved the cocky character; if it's done right it can be a thing of beauty. It just somehow felt right.

I often hear wrestlers say that the most successful characters are those that are logical extensions of their personality. Well the fact remains that The Boy and I are completely different; we are the same in name only. The Boy is beyond egotistical, he is cocky and arrogant. Me? I'm actually a pessimist with little confidence in my abilities sometimes and I think I'm pretty down to earth and modest. Actually, it can be almost therapeutic to roleplay with The Boy, since I can sort of live vicariously through him.

Originally, I envisioned The Boy as sort of like Kurt Angle; a little bit dorky, maybe even a little bit goofy, but definitely focused on winning and a very credible threat. Eventually, PSI (and my roleplays I did with in particular) changed me into more of a comedic character. Thus, anytime I was with any one member of PSI the two of us became very much so like the old Edge and Christian team. You could almost hear us saying things like "tubular" and "heinous" and "reeks of awesomeness." After a long time of doing that, I finally returned to my roots. For a while there (during the Jay Zee feud in RWW) I felt like The Boy was more like a heel Chris Jericho. The Boy definitely became more and more insane during this time. All these influences are still a part of my character, although I feel more comfortable with the character than ever before, finally able to flesh out now that I'm on my own.

I like both the comedic and serious styles because they are both so different and so fun to do, but I am definitely happy doing the more serious thing now. That's not to say that The Boy is not still an idiot, nor are my roleplays without humour, it is just that the focus is serious (I am concentrating on wrestling, not just being comedic relief).

Both styles have their advantages. Doing the comedy thing helps because it's easier to set up the roleplay for me; the comedy thing really requires someone else there to play off and it doesn't take much to come up with a roleplay if there is someone else there. Why? Because all you have to do is have a conversation between the two (or more) characters and tell bad jokes. I did it for like a year, so trust me it works. A lot of my roleplays (not the ones you find on the roleplays page ironically enough, but the average of what I was writing back then) took place in hotel rooms in the city that RWW was having their next show in. That was all I needed and from there you could do whatever. Because with just two people it could be both funny and interesting. These days I do roleplays where I am alone, without even an interviewer. And that works well for my character now, but it is harder coming up with original, creative ideas as to where I should set my roleplay and how that ties into what I am talking about. And I like doing the comedic side, because I love comedy - it is my passion. In fact, in my spare time I write my own sitcom just for my own amusement. And it's definitely fun trying to set up jokes and whatnot. But I still think the serious thing is working and that is suits the character more than the comedy thing.

But the downsides are definitely there too: no one takes you seriously when you're joking around all the time and you feel a pressure to always be funny (serious roleplays seem to be a bit of a letdown to those reading them when they expect comedy on a constant basis). There were actually weeks when I wouldn't roleplay at all just because I couldn't come up with a really witty, wacky roleplay and I felt like it would disappoint those looking for something entertaining. And when you do come up with ideas, sometimes they just don't work out and become really, really weird. It doesn't help that I have a more twisted sense of humour than some either. Not only that, but you also can't deal with the actual task at hand as much in that style. You will notice that a lot of my roleplays on the roleplay page don't actually deal with wrestling as a whole. The overall idea does, yes, but the rest of it is just jokes or setups to jokes, with any necessary exposition thrown in. And that goes against my personal belief that roleplays should be about wrestling as much as possible. But I think my main problem with the comedy act was that I felt I came across as a total joke. I always wanted to be the kind of heel that acted like an idiot, was a goofball outside of the ring, but was actually quite effective inside the squared circle (hence my original Kurt Angle inspiration).

As noted earlier, for a time The Boy had a real psychotic side. That was the angle where he was obsessed with his "TV Time." The whole gimmick was that I was trying to destroy every other RWW superstar, regardless of their affiliation, so that I would one day be the last remaining superstar, ensuring maximum TV time. It seemed like a logical progression for the character. It was interesting because I still tried to act conceited, but at the very heart of that idea is someone who is really insecure and vulnerable. Obviously, The Boy was very intimidated by his peers and wanted to demolish them. If I felt I was truly that confident in my abilities, I should have been unconcerned, since theoretically the best people are always at the heart of the show. Of course this whole angle surrounded a bunch of the legends of RWW like Legend Inc and Bombtrack making comebacks and I think that is where that insecurity comes from. I never faced Legend Inc, but it is only logical that The Boy would perhaps be afraid of him. And Bombtrack was another guy who was unstoppable when I joined, but I didn't face him for a long time. So...it was subtle, but a logical progression and an interesting side of the character.

These days the character isn't quite so deranged, but I think because of a clumination of everything before has now become even more egotistical than ever before (!!). The logical progression is that he should want to break free from wrestling, but every attempt he makes fails because of his poor attitude. The latest attempt, The WorldWide Publicity Tour, is sort of a rib against Paris Hilton, who is just sort of famous for the sake of being famous. The Boy is trying to gain this sort of celebrity status because he believes that someone of his ability deserves to be a huge star.

You can also see that The Boy has some scars from the past, as when he was in NEW, he refused to help out Rob Gamble or the rest of RWW. He also refused to align himself with anyone, and still does to this day, as he is afraid of getting hurt the way he was by PSI. That's what is great at the heart of this character: he is very vulnerable. Despite being so cocky, he's really quite vulnerable. Why did he become such a huge egomaniac in the first place? Because the people in The Dungeon mocked him and he was tired of getting picked on. I think he just burries himself in his wrestling and is so focused on winning so that he can ignore his pain and sensitivity.

There was a long period of time where I wwas the Intercontinental Champion in RWW and during this reign I ran an angle in which I was supposedly in love with my title. It was inspired from Owen Hart, a fellow Canadian, always carrying around those stupid Slammies, even though no one cared about them. I thought a similar gimmick would work for me, and I think it really did. I only wish I was able to follow through on a plan for the angle that I had: Hardcore Babe had just come into RWW as part of The Renegades, one of the "invading" factions. I immediately did a roleplay where I claimed I had a thing for her, because like The Boy, she was rather egotisitical. I wanted to do a really stupid love triangle between me, her and the belt. I think it would have been fun.

That was supposed to lead to me dropping the title. I was quite proud of the way it eventually happened though. I dropped it utter disgust of Rob Gamble's actions at the HonoR PPV, thus turning me as face for a short while. The turn was really short-lived and I was still more of a "tweener," but it was a nice change though.

A great angle I ran with in my roleplays for a long time was the whole "Boy needing to study up on his opponents thing." This brought out some of my most memorable promos, including "PSI in Jolly Old England." Of course now that gimmick isn't really needed, becase these days The Boy just assumes he is that much better than everyone else and doesn't need to study for a match. Still, it was a gimmick I absolutely loved and enabled me to do some great stuff. I think the reason I used it for so long was because it was a really cheap way of coming up with ideas. I mean how basic is it to go "Lancelot is English, I will go to England and make fun of British culture." And yet people seemed to love this formula back in its time.

Another angle I loved doing was the whole "Sickness" thing with Mercy. I just figured if he wanted to call his finisher The Sickness, it might be funny if someone pretended to actually get sick from it. Then, of course, it became that Mercy himself made people sick (because, supposedly, he sucked so much). As a heel, I can always use cheap heat and this was an easy way to get some. Also, it helped make The Boy look like an idiot. The great thing about it was that a few other people in RWW picked up on it too.

Another angle I really feel as though I mmissed out on was a proper feud with Jay Zee. Don't get me wrong, we did have a killer feud, but it would have been even better if Josh had more time to devote to roleplaying. Still, I really enjoyed it. Likewise, I also missed getting a good chance to feud with Tommy Dee. It was natural and we had teased it a lot, but nothing ever major really happened. Which was too bad, since I thought it would have been great. Again, time played a factor in this and I understand that totally. I think my favourite feuds have been: 1. White Dragon 2. Stupac 3. Mercy 4. Jay Zee and 5. Simon Phoenix. My feud with Jake Hero in NSW would have been up there I'm sure if the fed hadn't died so suddenly.

Perhaps the one thing I think was the worst one to miss out on was an angle I had planned for WPW. I had entered the fed, then went away immediately after, due to school getting in the way. So, on my return I had planned to do an angle where I would say I was away writing my memoirs. Which was actually quite perfect for the character, since only The Boy would think he deserves to have his life story published (which is also a bit of a shot against WWE for pumping out tons of books no one really cares about). This is especially true since The Boy has never been a huge success, is still young, and had only been in WPW for a few weeks prior. It was perfect. Then my idea was that I would pimp out my book each and every week on the show, which would bump one of the wrestlers off the card. This would happen week in and week out, always bumping the same wrestler off. Finally, he would have enough and attack The Boy. The Boy, in turn, retaliates. Thus, the two are forced into a match.

The Boy then pulls some strings and gets the type of match he wants though. It's a "Pen is Mightier Than the Sword" match, which is basically just a 2/3 falls match (the theory being you have to be mentally strong-the pen-in order to win three matches in a row). The first fall would be a straightup wrestling match, which The Boy would win because I feel heels need to legitimately beat an opponent to have any kind of heat. The second would be a submission match (more The Boy's style). Naturally, The Boy would cheat. After a ref bump, The Boy would nail his opponent with the book, which would be revealed to be "loaded" with a brick. The Boy then locks in his sharpshooter as the ref comes to. He sees my opponent is out cold and calls the match. Thus, we get ingenious booking (or at least original...winning in 2 straight falls) and we make both competitors look strong, since the face never gave up.

Then, I would be forced into the match I was dreading, the third fall after The Board of Directors determined I cheated. So, the following PPV would involve a ladder match between us, with a briefcase suspended above the ring, containing legal documents. If I won, I would get to keep pimping out my book. If my opponent won (and he would), it would prevent me from promoting my book on WPW television. I really liked the idea and thought it had some interesting booking behind it. Julie, the head of WPW, wasn't so thrilled so it didn't get much of a green light. I understand her concern; it was all pretty much predetermined and thus roleplays wouldn't play a factor really, but to me I wouldn't care. Because, in the end, both people get big wins and get to look strong. Besides, it would be fun - for EVERYONE involved. Maybe one day I'll get to run this angle or something similar. Hopefully.

Other angles that have been lost (thus faar)? In WPW I was going to have a heel manager known only as Mountie Bob (named after the song "The Last Saskatchewan Pirate"), who would help me cheat and whatnot. I never stayed there long enough to incorporate it. I plan to eventually though. The idea was that the Canadian government had declared me one of "Canada's Seven Natural Wonders," and therefore felt the need to protect me and thus assigned me "Canada's finest RCMP officer" to protect me. It was cheezy, but I liked the idea. I was never going to reveal what the other six natural wonders were either (although I once revealed that poutine was the fifth).

Another angle that died took place while I was (ever so briefly) in TWC. Again I ran the idea of me having my book, this time with me literally writing THE Book on Wrestling. I would come out and constantly talk about it and how it was "only $19.95, available at every major retail outlet." I declared that it was the "second-highest selling nonfiction book in Canada," with the first being Anne Murray's autobiography. You can see that I was hoping to do the aforementioned book/ladder match angle, but it never panned out because no one seemed to want to work with me in TWC and so I left shortly thereafter because I felt like there was nothing there for me other than random matches with no realy meaning behind them.

While I was in between feds I did some creattive brainstorming and I decided that I was going to name myself "a god on earth." I thought that there would be a great contrast there with my last name being HELLings, suggesting something much more devlish perhaps. So I was going to give myself a second finisher, known as The Divine Intervention. The idea would be that I would decide whether I would send you to heaven (by giving you The Divine Intervention) or by sending you to hell (with the Highway to HELLings). Cool idea, huh? Yeah, I was really looking forward to it too. But then one night JBL just started calling himself "a wrestling god" and now that idea is shot. I absolutely refuse to be remotely associated with JBL.

I LOVE the idea of The Red and White Ribbbon campaign. The red and white was chosen for the colours of the Canadian flag, but also because there really isn't an actual red and white ribbon campaign (well there sort of is I guess, but it's a Canadian thing and no one really knows about it). It is just so great because it is so beyond egotistical that it fits the character perfectly. The fake press release I wrote up to go along with it is also awesome. Once again, just another angle that came about while typing. Because I like working with Photoshop, I've often wanted to associate my character with various images. So I use a devil graphic for my character, because of my last name. Also, the icon on mens room signs works great too. I've often tried using some sort of animal, but that has yet to work out for me, since I have no idea which animal to use. But the idea of the ribbon is really great. Again, if I were a real wrestler it would be a really great, marketable thing. You could almost invision WWE.com selling these ribbons on their site and seeing fans wear them to shows and stuff. So it's a lot of fun to do and works so brilliantly for my character, that I couldn't resist doing it.

The North American Legend invitational thhing was another angle that I felt just had to happen after I won the US Title. Jon (Damon Gest) helped me flesh it out. The alternative was that once I became US Champion I was going to allow people from all across the US to write into me, begging me to be their hometown hero. Which would then of course involve me trashing their town and stuff like that. Instead, I determined I couldn't rightfully call myself The North American Legend without beating someone from Mexico. A logical extension of the idea of me referring to myself as The Canadian Legend, I insisted that I "expanded my legend status" to America because "Americans need a real hero." Cheap heat that suits the character. You can't get any better than that.

The inclusion of Nurse Laurier into my roleplays when I was in NEW was a decent idea, but I never felt comfortable with it. The idea was that she would hate me initially but end loving me and being a heel too. I liked the idea of having someone else to play off once again, but it just didn't feel right.

I liked the idea of the political career in theory, but again I don't think it worked well. The only reason I did it was because I was told that they expected you to have some sort of angle going on outside of the wrestling ring when you were in NEW and this was one I had never tried. The debate roleplay was great (that's actually using real stuff they said, just edited together poorly to make them say things out of context), but I just didn't know where to go from there. That, plus the fact that I just wasn't enjoying my time in NEW as much as I had hoped and the ever-present problem of roleplaying while in school made me have to leave. Too bad it never got to play itself out.

The whole "making quotation marks with his fingers" was an idea that just hit me. It is so annoying to see someone make quotation marks with their fingers, and I felt that it suited The Boy's character perfectly. Aside from that, you will also see my many catchphrases including, "I am The Boy and that means I am The Best;" and "I know it, you know it, the whole damn world knows it" and so on. The first was something I just made up and it has stuck with me ever since. I wanted to delve myself as deeply as I could into this role and I felt if I were to be a real wrestler, I would need some sort of catchphrase to get me over. Rather than just stealing or bastardizing a real wrestler's catchphrase like some e-fedders do, I chose to make up my own. The second catchphrase is something I used to say a lot. I just stuck it into a roleplay once and it seemed to fit. Before long, it became a staple of my roleplays.

Another thing you might notice is how I used to quite often make fun of other people by doing an impression of them. It is usually described as "in a bad impression of..." I might also sing "really off-key." Basically, they are both designed to make The Boy look like a jackass and somewhat childish.

I also often make a reference to beating people 3,247 times, or that number in general. It started when I would reference White Dragon back in RWW. The number just came out while I was typing and from there anytime someone mentioned White Dragon's name I made a point of noting I had supposedly beat him 3,247 times. Since then, it has transferred over to anyone I've faced. I also use the number 27 a lot, as there used to be a site on the 'Net about some sort of conspiracy surrounding that number. My good buddy, Weird Al Yankovic, heard about it and apparently explicitly makes references to 27 in a number of his songs. For me, it usually shows up as me saying that someone isn't 1/27 as good as The Boy.

Declaring myself "The Canadian Legend" was just something I had to do...I felt I needed a nickname. I mean, every popular wrestler has some sort of nickname. Look at the biggies: The Rock is The People's Champion, Stone Cold is The Texas Rattlesnake, HHH is The Game, Kurt Angle is The Olympic Hero, Randy Orton is The Legend Killer, Ric Flair is The Nature Boy, and so on and so on. So, needless to say, I felt I needed something. So, I came up with The Canadian Legend. I wanted something to express my pride in being Canadian, but also something that fit the character. Declaring myself THE Canadian Legend suggests I'm better than the likes of Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit, Edge, or even Lance Storm. It also suggests I'm better than the likes of Bret and Owen Hart (which I think is actually a sin here in Canada). I love the nickname and I think it fits the character perfectly (he acts like he's so patriotic and everyone in Canada loves him, yet deliberately offends everyone by automatically claiming himself the greatest). The idea is by saying he's better than everyone in Canada, it would make even fans in Canada want to boo him, which is rare since Canadian fans usually cheer for their fellow Canadians whether they are heel or face.

Along similar lines was the idea of becomming the self-proclaimed (I love how wrestling announcers ALWAYS use that term) "one and only UBERstar." It just hit me while typing up a RP. The idea is simple enoughl; The Boy is so much better than everyone else (at least according to him) that he is so above the term "superstar" which is so often applied to wrestlers. I quite often use the word "uber" to describe things myself, so I really like the gimmick. In a way I must give credit to Mick Foley for the idea actually. I got the idea from a story he included in one of his books. In it he got one of the flight attendants on some overseas trip WWE was making to address the plane, welcoming "the WWF superstars...and Al Snow." The idea that Al Snow wasn't a superstar was hilarious. So I took that and warped it to fit my character. So there you have it - in a way I ripped off Mick Foley. I'm sorry Mick. So if you too want a gimmick for your efed character, just read Mick Foley's books!

I also liked the idea of coming up with tthe whole notion of The Boy Scouts, the term I gave to my fans. Hey, every great artist has their name for their fans. In wrestling, you have "The Hulkamaniacs," The Rock's "People," "The Christian Coalition," "The Chain Gang", and "The Jerichoholics." So, I figured The Boy needed something too. I'm always making references to my "fans", so they needed a name. The Boy Scouts just sorta hit me. Originally, I was going to insist that because I was so great, The Boy Scouts of America were named after me. Then I figured, why not just name my fans The Boy Scouts? Coming up with an idea like that is I think pretty impressive, since I really didn't have much to work with calling myself "The Boy." It's also really cheezy, but oh so perfect, because it gives my character a taunt: doing The Boy Scout Salute to the fans. I love it.

Since deubting in NSW, I've begun incorpoorated all sorts of other great stuff into my character. Now I refer to myself as "the marquee player, the franchise saviour and the number one monkey maker." The catchphrase just kinda came out one day and I started using it. As well, the way I used to refer to myself as The Dream Crusher was something I had never thought of before until just shortly after joining NSW. But it suits my character so well and it is that much more perfect since I have actually been told in real life that I really am a dream crusher. I sort of think of this current era in my character's history as "The Age of 3,237 Nicknames and Catchprhases."

For those that don't know...PSI stood for Pure Style Incorporated. It was started by my friends Josh and Thom (Mr. Style Jay Zee and MC Tommy Dee) as a tag team. I joined shortly thereafter. Eventually our friend Jon (Damon Gest) joined. Later, Stu (Stupac in RWW) joined as well. We were probably the most dominant stable in Rampage World Wrestling for a long time.

Being in PSI was so much fun. It really allowed to me to be as wacky as possible. You might notice a pattern on how I wrote those promos. I was the wacky/cocky/sometimes serious guy. Tommy Dee was the goofball. Tommy Dee really added the comic relief for those roleplays. Although The Boy would try to be serious, he would almost always go along with whatever Tommy Dee came up with; the two played off each other so well. Then you had Damon Gest. Damon is unique, just by the manner in which he speaks. Damon was quite wacky himself, but he was also a bit of a psychopath in the sense that he would attack anyone at anytime. He was also kind of like our lackey. Then there was Jay. With so much tomfoolery going on, you absolutely need a straight man. Jay Zee was perfect for that role. He comes across as hating every second that they were are all together, even though he really was not above any of it. Then when we added Stupac, I sort of paired off PSI: Tommy worked well with Damon and Stupac and I worked together. I absolutely loved writing "Stu and The Boy exchange a high five" in my RPs.

You will notice a couple of things. Other than myself, Tommy Dee probably has the most dialogue (until Stupac arrived). Jay has slightly less, to go along with the idea that he doesn't like hanging out with us, and Damon hardly has any at all. Truth be told, there were some times when I struggled to work Damon into a conversation. Why? Look at the way he talks! You try coming up with a different suffix every few lines! Only Jon himself can truly master that skill. And, alas, I am not Jon.

One hard thing about being with a partnerr or in a group is that, obviously, you have to deal with being aligned with other people. I am a bit of a control freak with my character, so I don't like people messing with my character too much. So when I was in PSI, Thom would do roleplays with me in them, as would Stu. And they were usually pretty accurate as to how to portray me, but there was often little things I would notice where I would think, "The Boy would never say that." For example, if you'll notice The Boy never swears (other than damn, if you even count that. I hardly even say hell and instead usually say heck). So that can be tough to swallow sometimes. But the worst part was the symbiotic nature of the relationship; I felt you always had to acknowledge what your teammates were doing, storyline-wise. If Thom had a match as well as mine, I felt the need to bring that up. So what happens is you're trying to do your own roleplay, but you're also trying to almost roleplay for the other person too and that just takes away from what you're doing and saps your creativity. So it was fun while it lasted, but I think I'm happier being a sort of one man army. The way my character acts now, there is no way he would have any friends anyway.

Aside from the aforementioned move to serious style from the comedic, my roleplaying style has changed dramatically. Heck, my writings style has changed a lot too. Now I have a standardized way I write things and it took a lot of effort to make sure everything on this site conformed to my current standards. I've also learned a great deal about writing and spelling and grammar, so sometimes things really stick out like a sore thumb to me. But generally, my style is much different.

Initially I relied on having an interviewer, like Michael Cole in my RWW days, to dictate the form and style of my roleplay. Once I was in PSI, I played off the other members of the group. As I mentioned before, this became more comedy than anything else though, so sometimes actual relevance to anything wrestling-related often fell by the wayside. Now I do things quite differently, in what I like to refer to as "the single camera monologues." Basically this is where The Boy stands in front of a lone camera by himself and just speaks (for a good example of this you can pretty much read any one of my roleplays under the NSW section). I like this new style because, in a sense, I don't want to worry about anyone else or playing off another person so I can really let the character take over things. I think one reason I'm coming up with so many new catchphrases, nicknames or really great quotes these days is because I just let the character loose in this new format. It also challenges me a little bit; before it was easy enough to have someone interview me and there would be the roleplay. Now I like to think of some way to incorporate what I want to talk about into my setting. I think this new style is a lot of fun and produces some of my best material. I've even explanded on it since joining EWA, adding the "Diary" style before some roleplays even really begin, as well as the WorldWide Publicity Tour promotional videos. Both really help to make the roleplay that much better and help to get the character over even more. It also, more than anything, helps me pad out my roleplays a bit. What? Sue me.

As a final note on style, you'll notice that with this new style brings a more intellectual side to The Boy. Whether I'm quoting Freud or Carl Jung or discussing the history of The Alamo, The Boy definitely seems a lot better educated these days. Basically this is just because I myself am better educated, having gone to university for a number of years now and sometimes these ideas I read about in class somehow worm their way into my roleplays. I really like it though because I think it is not only creative but clever, and it also fits the character's inflated opinion of himself to talk as though he is some sort of great intellectual.

• Celebrating a victory before it occurs
• Gold
• A hatred of rookies and veterans
• Using film references, in particular Back to the Future
• In connetion with the above, there is a recurring theme of time travel
• History. The Boy quotes historical events, whether real (such as the Alamo or World War II) or those that took place previously in the efedding world
• The notion of the underdog, the comeback, or the "Cinderella Story"
• Darwinism/Survival of the Fittest
• Quoting music. Usually through a bastardized version of a song, with slightly rewritten lyrics. Use of a rhyming scheme in general.
• Children and childhood