Consider this: if you’re a fan around my age who started watching wrestling at the typical age of 8 or 9, there’s one wrestler who has spanned your entire fandom. I don’t want to start a technical debate here—yes, other wrestlers have competed for nearly 30 years, but none have done it consistently at the top level like Dustin Rhodes. Not Scott Steiner (who spent ten years in independent wrestling), not Jerry Lawler (whose returns were gimmicky rather than full-time). Rhodes, on the other hand, has been with WCW, WWF/E, Impact (TNA), and AEW during the majority of this time, and rarely spent more than a year on the independent circuit between stints with these major promotions.
I realize I might be creating criteria for greatness tailored to the wrestler I want to highlight, but hey, that’s wrestling for you. And yes, I agree: being in a big promotion doesn’t necessarily make someone the best wrestler. Just ask Dave Meltzer about Kenny Omega…
So why do I feel so attached to Dustin Rhodes? Why, after AEW’s recent announcement that Cody Rhodes’ opponent at Double or Nothing will be his older half-brother, do I feel compelled to shout out the underappreciated greatness of Dustin Rhodes?
It’s because, beyond his endurance throughout my fandom, Dustin Rhodes has been a constant touchstone, linking me back to my first days as a wrestling fan around 1990. His character and in-ring performance have evolved alongside my own evolution as a fan.
When I was a fresh-faced, young wrestling fan, Dustin Rhodes was “The Natural” on WCW Saturday Nights, the first weekly show I fell in love with. He wore cowboy boots and hailed from Texas, just like me. I gathered that his dad was the big, blond guy on the broadcast team who sounded like my stepdad with that familiar Texas drawl. Dustin was a little chubby, too, just like me. We had so much in common.
WCW seemed to like him as much as I did. While his first short run in the WWF (1990-91) was largely marked by tagging with his father and staying below the mid-card, WCW booked him to the moon. He won Tag Team Gold with former NWA World Champions Ricky Steamboat and Barry Windham and claimed his first US Title by defeating Steamboat. His second US Title win came in a two-out-of-three falls match against Rick Rude. Dustin was being booked over some real legends, and I just knew he was destined to be a world champion, surpassing even his father’s legacy.
But then, something changed. I got older, and for some reason, the pure babyfaces didn’t appeal to me as much anymore. I wanted a little edge in the wrestlers I liked. It seems Dustin felt the same way. After losing his US Title to the future all-time great WWF champion, Steve Austin, at Starrcade ’93, Rhodes began a long feud with Col. Rob Parker’s Studd Stable. This rivalry culminated in the infamous King of the Road match at WCW’s first Uncensored pay-per-view in 1995.
The match is infamous for its many WCW shenanigans. The gimmick involved Rhodes and Blacktop Bully battling in a semi-trailer as a truck hauled them down the highway, with the winner being the first to ring a bell at the front of the trailer. The trailer itself was a wire-mesh cage on a platform filled with hay. The match was pre-taped, though the announcers called it as if it were happening live, leading to awkward silences since no microphones picked up the action, nor was there any audience feed to fill the gaps. The match is a big nothing, as the wrestlers struggled to stay stable while moving on all that hay. The roads of rural Georgia had been blocked for this spectacle, but hilariously, a church bus emerged, slowing the big rig and the wrestlers down considerably.
Apparently, Rhodes and Bully had planned to blade during the match. Though there’s blood, it’s not excessive, yet WCW decided to edit the match anyway, despite claiming it was live. The big jump cuts ruin the end of the match. Eric Bischoff fired Rhodes and Darsow the next day for violating WCW’s strict no-blood policy at the time, though it’s worth noting that Hulk Hogan had bladed two weeks earlier against Vader without facing any consequences. It’s likely Bischoff was trimming the budget, given Turner Executives had given him a “cut half a million in budget or else” ultimatum around this time. Firing Rhodes, Darsow, Paul Roma, and manager Harley Race conveniently saved that exact amount. More importantly, this feud and the blading hinted at the dark turn Rhodes was about to take with his wrestling persona.
As a kid, I had two garage-sale TVs stacked in my room, with a cable splitter so I could watch both Monday Nitro and Monday Night Raw simultaneously without flipping back and forth. I didn’t want to miss a minute. I could literally watch wrestlers move from one TV to the other. The top TV was for WCW, the bottom for WWF. I watched Lex Luger appear on the bottom TV in ’95 and then suddenly on the top, back in WCW. I watched as Scott Hall, Kevin Nash, and the 123 Kid jumped from the bottom TV to the top in 1996. I watched Rick Rude do the same in one night in November ’97, mustache on the bottom TV, sans mustache on the top TV.
But Dustin’s dismissal from WCW in ’95 was a few months before Nitro ever kicked off, pre-Monday Night Wars. I assumed he would return to the Nitro TV eventually. I wasn’t prepared for him to show up on the WWF TV—and I certainly wasn’t ready for how he showed up. Goldust debuted in WWF in August 1995, a month before the first Nitro. I wasn’t a fan. I didn’t like it.
Let’s be clear: Goldust is one of the most ahead-of-his-time, radical wrestling characters ever conceived. I was twelve in ’95 and still very insecure about the idea of homosexuality, owing to a fairly conservative Christian upbringing. Goldust made me uncomfortable. I didn’t like the veiled innuendo, the lurid touching in the ring—it all made me nervous.
Gay and sexually ambiguous characters weren’t new to wrestling. Adrian Adonis had portrayed a cross-dresser in the 80s, but Goldust’s portrayal was serious, not comic fodder (though it’s been taken there many times). That seriousness was something very different. For this seriously ambiguous and menacing portrayal alone, Dustin Rhodes could be considered one of the most culturally impactful wrestlers of the last quarter-century.
But the move set was still there too—still the patented Dustin Rhodes style, and far more entertaining than anything Dusty could ever pull off wrestling-wise. The skin-tight full-body spandex accentuated his uniquely long physique, and the gloves heightened the intensity of his chops and slaps. WWE put the Intercontinental Belt on him in early ’96 when he beat Razor Ramon at the Royal Rumble, and he defeated big-timers to retain it, including the Ultimate Warrior. I thought then that Rhodes might become WWE Champion soon.
WWE wasn’t ready to put the belt on Goldust, though, and in hindsight, it wouldn’t have been popular, especially in the southern U.S. in 1996. Instead, the character began to crumble after his Intercontinental run, with the only real payoffs being shock and scandal (see “The Artist Formerly Known as Goldust” managed by Luna Vachon). The most innovative turn came when Dustin broke kayfabe, playing a born-again Christian who spoke out against the lascivious nature of the Goldust character. By the time Dustin was decrying Goldust, I had finally accepted him and cheered for him. Perhaps this was even because Dustin decried it—I was an angsty teen by then and firmly left of the Christian right.
Unfortunately, Rhodes’ personal life, conflicts, and struggles with substance abuse derailed him at key moments. His marriage to Terri Runnels (aka Marlena) estranged him from his father, who stayed with WCW until its demise in 2001, and his divorce from Terri and subsequent issues estranged him from the WWF. In 1999, when Goldust should have risen to prominence alongside The Rock and HHH, Dustin returned to WCW.
WCW created a character named Seven, inspired by the film Dark City, with a painted white face who stared at children through their bedroom windows. WCW executives didn’t like the child-abductor angle, and the character was quickly abandoned. Rhodes did a worked shoot on Nitro, expressing his disdain for such made-up characters and a desire to wrestle as himself. He took on the persona of the “American Nightmare,” a nod to his father, and stayed with WCW until it folded, wrestling on the last WCW pay-per-view, Greed, in March 2001. Ironically, this WCW run ended the same way his first WWF run did—tag-teaming with his father on a pay-per-view.
When WWF bought WCW in 2001, they couldn’t wait to run vignettes hinting at the return of Goldust and officially brought him back at the start of 2002 in the Royal Rumble. This second Goldust run was marked by his rivalries in the Hardcore division, where he won the Hardcore title nine times (though that title was often won and lost multiple times in a single day).
In 2002, a new side of Goldust was revealed: he was funny and made great tag teams. His first partnership with Booker T is one of the most beloved tag teams of that era. During the Invasion storyline, the characters engaged in countless comedic segments, showcasing Booker’s deadpan responses to Goldust’s flamboyance and propelling Goldust back to mid-card prominence. Dustin left WWE in 2003, seemingly for good this time, and he moved on to the independent circuit.
WWE created the DVD The Rise and Fall of WCW in 2004, and a key highlight was the Rhodes family, including Dusty’s highly anticipated return to WWE. Dusty’s legacy loomed large, and Dustin and his half-brother Cody began carving their own paths in the industry.
When Goldust returned to WWE again in 2008, it was as part of a generational tag team with Cody, capturing the WWE Tag Team Championships in 2013. The Rhodes brothers became a fixture in the tag team division, with Goldust once again showcasing his talent, resilience, and ability to evolve with the times. Their storyline culminated in a heartfelt feud in 2014, where Dustin’s unwavering commitment to his character and wrestling legacy was on full display.
Dustin Rhodes has been a part of AEW since its inception, continuing to perform at a high level and connecting with fans across generations. His match against Cody at AEW’s Double or Nothing in 2019 was a testament to his enduring skill, storytelling, and the deep emotional resonance he can bring to the ring. From “The Natural” to “Goldust” to his current role in AEW, Dustin Rhodes has shown remarkable adaptability, consistently delivering memorable performances and forging a legacy that transcends gimmicks and eras. Despite the ups and downs of his career, Dustin remains a beloved and influential figure in professional wrestling, representing resilience, innovation, and the enduring power of storytelling in the squared circle.
