Eric Bischoff Clarifies His Plan With The Fake Death Angle In WCW
As previously reported, former WCW star Buff Bagwell had a recent conversation with Sitting Ringside podcast where he recounted a silly angle that Eric Bischoff had presented to him in the heydays of WCW. Bagwell claimed that Bischoff wanted his character to die in a scripted plane crash and then haunt the WCW roster as a ghost. The potential angle gained enough momentum that Bagwell even called his close family members to warn them that they may see him "die" on TV.
On a recent edition of After 83 Weeks, Bischoff directly addressed Bagwell's comments and shed some light on the situation involving his supposed fake death storyline in WCW. According to Bischoff, the original idea was actually to see Bischoff "die" in the fake plane crash. Bischoff believed that his status as a real life pilot would make the angle seem more believable.
"I'd hate to call bulls–t, but, I used to have an airplane. I was a pilot. I had my instrument rating as a pilot," Bischoff said. "I had my own airplane as a pilot and everyone knew I flew around a lot. So, when I orchestrated that death by airplane, it was my death. It wasn't Bagwell's. Now [Bagwell] may have a story where he thought maybe he was going to be one of the guys on the plane or something like that. But in order for that story to have worked it would've had to have been plausible. And the audience knew that I flew my own plane."
Bischoff went in depth about the further details surrounding the storyline, including his idea to "crash" his plane near Mexico. Bischoff believed that it would take a longer time for any news to come out of Mexico. This would allow him to show up in time for the next Halloween Havoc and shock the roster with his return. Before he could ultimately follow through with the angle, Harvey Schiller shut it down.
"And my original plan was for me to crash in Mexico, because I knew it would take at least four or five days to get any news out of Mexico," Bischoff explained. "So I was going to fake my crash in Mexico and then I was going to show up at Halloween Havoc. And perhaps I shared it with Bagwell after the fact, because by the way, my wife didn't know. It wasn't until the last minute when I told Harvey Schiller, because I was technically an officer of Turner Broadcasting and it was a publicly held company, so I had to kind of divulge it. Much to my chagrin, which I wouldn't have. Harvey [Schiller] shut it down. But I can tell you definitively if Bagwell was going to be on the plane it was an incidental effect, not the major storyline."
You can watch the full interview above. If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit After 83 Weeks with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.