All language subtitles for Dark Side Of The Ring s06e02 The Assassination of Dino Bravo.eng

Ludvig Borga!

The Hell Raiser
from "Hellsinki"!

The look and the presence
he had was world class.

[Indistinct commentary]

He was big, he was tall,
he was muscular.

He was a real life
bad ass.

But the reason why we're
doing this television program

now is not because he was
a great wrestler that was

a standout for years,
but because he was

in wrestling,
and then did...

some other batshit stuff!

[Narrator]
Wrestler Tony Halme,

aka "Ludvig Borga,"

the "Hell Raiser
From Hellsinki,"

lived a life of
controversy...

He made people around
him uncomfortable,

but not in a good way.

And crime.

You don't know
that story?

He got deported from
this country for weapons.

[Finnish news]

Driven by a desire for fame,
Tony took his

strongman persona
to the extreme...

[Speaking Finnish]

He wanted to be the
person that people went,

"Could you believe
he said that?"

"Could you believe
he did that?"

And into the corridors
of political power.

That guy's gonna be
an elected official?

He wanted to be famous,
so that's how

he was gonna do
that in Finland.

[Speaking Finnish]

Until his relentless pursuit
of the spotlight

led to infamy and
ended in tragedy.

Uppers to wake up,
downers to go to sleep.

And now, you've gotta
have something to

make you feel alive
during the day.

[Speaking Finnish]

What more did he
have to live for?

The dream was over.

The image he had
created for himself

became impossible
to maintain.

He looked like a villain,
he sounded like a villain.

But, unfortunately,
in real life,

he was a villain.

?

?

This man is a powerhouse!

Ludvig Borga!

In the summer of 1993,

wrestling fans witnessed
the debut of Ludvig Borga,

an arrogant new villain
from Finland.

Whoa! This guy's
a tough dude!

The foreign heel in
professional wrestling has

been a standby since the
turn of the 20th century.

They were exotic,
they were mysterious.

They were not like us.

"You ain't from around here,
are you, boy?"

?

I'm Jim Cornette,
and I was working for

the WWF when Tony Halme,
aka Ludvig Borga,

made his brief but
spectacular run.

The fans could take their
animosity out by

booing the anti-American.

Maybe you sang that
Russian national anthem

just one time too many.

Vince McMahon loved the

foreign heel concept so much

that if we didn't have a
problem with a country,

he would figure one out.

From "Hellsinki"...

Ludvig Borga!

So, suddenly,
you get this guy

named Ludvig Borga
from Finland,

and because he
had an accent...

that was close enough for
Vince McMahon.

"I can do something
with this guy."

USA stand for
in my continent:

"You stink a lot."

He was gonna get a great
push because it was

easy to position him
as a villain.

I'm Jim Ross, and I was
an on-air talent in 1993

for the WWE.

One way to get a
villain noticed

is you have him
break a streak.

And, Tatanka had
a winning streak.

Tatanka wins the...

Being the Native American
representing America,

the fans just
connected right to me.

I'm Tatanka.
An official legend of WWE.

Here comes the
Native American!

I was running on an
undefeated streak

for two years.

Tatanka with a clothesline!

And the office came
to me, they said,

"We're really looking to
do something big

with Ludvig Borga."

[Cheering]

Locking up now,
Ludvig Borga.

[Tatanka] In our business,
it's called rubbin'.

Oh!

You get out there and you rub
shoulders with Hulk Hogan,

that stardom
rubs off on you.

...over the top rope
to the outside!

I can't believe that!

Ludvig had a
tremendous opportunity.

Oh, no!
Did you hear that?

The best thing for
you to do is sell it,

and they wanted me
to sell it.

So, Ludvig threw me
in the ring,

and then pinned me
with one finger.

Look at this!

His finger on
Tatanka's chest!

[Match bell ringing]

[Shouting commentary]

By beating me,
it instantly puts Ludvig

right at the top
of the ladder.

[Off-screen: Speaking English]

Ah, now looking
at it, no.

?

The power of that
WWF TV is tremendous.

Having a fan base that
buys your action figures

and sells them out.

But remember, we're on
the road 300 days a year.

So, you're in the
locker room a lot.

You know, they want guys
who are gonna be in there,

friendly with everybody,
'cause now you can do

business together.

But, Ludvig was
never that guy.

Not that the guys had
anything against him.

He just never allowed the
guys to get close to him,

let's put it that way.

Borga had a great look.

But, he was a
miserable human being.

People didn't want to
work with him.

He made people around him
uncomfortable.

And then, when we finally
realized he had the

"SS" tattoo on his calf...

things started going
downhill from there.

For the kids out there
who weren't around,

the SS was

Hitler's private army that
committed many of

the atrocities at Hitler's
behest in Nazi Germany.

You can't show something
like that on television in

1990-something in America,
so they said,

"Cover that shit up."

One of the boys, if they
would've seen that,

I guarantee you someone
would've said something.

So, obviously it was
kept under cover.

We made a mistake
in hiring him.

He slipped by us.

Tremendous strength
and agility!

Ah!

[JR] It wasn't done
on purpose.

[Commentary] Ludvig Borga in
complete control!

We just didn't do a good
job of vetting him.

You can imagine how some
of the Jewish talents

in the locker room
reacted to it.

It's not right to impose
upon them such negativity.

We needed to
get rid of him.

The fact that he had it to
begin with indicated that

probably something was going
on up there that maybe

we didn't want to delve
into much deeper.

Drop it!
Come on, ref!

Tony Halme's childhood
was defined by bitterness,

brawls,
and resentment.

One thing to know
about Tony is that

he came from
a broken home.

?

His parents divorced when
Tony was just two years old.

His father had a problem
with alcohol and,

it seems like his
mother did, too.

I'm Mikko Marttinen.

A journalist and
a writer of

Tony Halme's biography.

The other important thing to
note about Tony is that he

kind of struggled between
two language communities.

His mother was originally
a Swedish speaker,

and decided to put
the boys into

a Swedish speaking school.

This made Tony feel
like an outsider

from very early on
in his life.

[Speaking Finnish]

He yearned for respect.

He felt that he was
looked down upon

because of his poverty.

Years before he ever stepped
into a wrestling ring,

Tony constructed a new
ultra-masculine persona

for himself, which he
referred to as the Viking.

As soon as Tony stepped
out to the street,

he became the Viking.

?

He had the word Viking with
a helmet tattooed on his arm.

He started to talk tough.

Robbed people.

And, getting into
street fights.

In the newspaper archives,
I found a very old item.

?

It says that two karate guys
were just beating up

everybody in the bar.

It turns out those karate
guys were Tony

and his best friend,
Christer.

[Laughs]

?

Tony was fascinated
with movies.

One movie that really made
an influence on him was

"Taxi Driver."

Maybe Tony saw himself
as a same kind of

fighter as
Robert DeNiro.

And, when he saw that movie,
he decided that

he will move to the
United States someday.

In 1986, Tony heads
to Los Angeles,

searching for fame, fortune,
and a new direction.

He wanted people
to like him.

People like you because
you're famous.

And I think that was...

a shield for a lot of
insecurities that he had.

?

My name is Deedee,
and I was once

married to Tony Halme.

Size-wise and
personality-wise,

Tony was larger than life.

I fell in love with him
pretty quickly.

When we got married,

he wanted the music to be
"God Bless America."

He wanted to be famous.

In America.

He wanted to be a
movie star in America.

And he heard about
Gold's Gym in Venice Beach.

He attempted to be
a bodybuilder,

but he just didn't have
the shape of a bodybuilder.

He had a big belly.

He was, he was a
big guy everywhere.

[Mikko] It became almost like
an obsession for him.

To be as big as possible.

And steroids helped.

[Deedee]
He had a shoebox,

and it had steroids
from Russia.

?

It was clearly nefarious.

I'll never forget,
one of the packages

was for horses.

?

His ambitions
were to be a star.

Whatever way
that came to him.

He got some small roles
for Little Caesars.

Tip.

He was in a national ad
in some beer commercials.

Get back to work!

And eventually, some, some
small roles on TV as well.

No one argues with Curly.

-[Laughing]
-Ah, yeah.

Hanging in the Gold's Gym,
a lot of people told him that,

"You should go
into wrestling.

You could really earn some
money with this,"

and they got
Tony interested.

He did some wrestling shows
with Herb Abrams, UWF.

?

[Deedee]
He had a costume made,

and it was Tony
as the Viking.

I told you, I'm gonna
hurt every pencil neck,

every pipsqueak who
steps in my way.

And there's only one way
they're gonna leave the ring,

is on a stretcher,
hurt.

I think UWF should start to
sell life insurance too.

[Deedee] It was silly,
it was very silly.

Japan was probably his first
big wrestling shows

that he did.

Tony Halme!

Tony told everybody that he
was a successful boxer

in Finland, and none
of this was true.

He had never had a
boxing fight in Finland.

But New Japan made his
gimmick about that.

[Japanese commentary]

Tony Halme had become a
star in wrestling in Japan,

where they liked big guys,

giant monsters
battling it out.

King Kong and Godzilla.

[Japanese commentary]

The Japanese wrestling
circuit is really tough.

It was very punishing
for the wrestler's body.

And Tony was very candid
about starting to use

strong painkillers during
his time in Japan.

It really became
a habit for him.

Somewhere along the line,
Tony's opportunities

in Japan started to
dwindle a little bit.

His attitude was not great.

When I met Tony,

the way that he spoke
to you made you understand

that he really held himself
to be somebody.

But, you have to know
who else is in the room.

My name is
Michael Majalahti,

alias the "Rebel Starbuck."

I'm the pioneer of Finnish
professional wrestling.

Tony would wrestle tags
alongside guys like

Scott Norton against the
Japanese contingents.

From what I've heard,
Tony Halme

rubbed some people the
wrong way, ah, ethnically.

He had sympathies
towards the

white brotherhood.

He had a lot of friends
who were skinheads

and whatever else.

The wrong thing came
out of his mouth,

and a fight broke out
between Scott Norton

and Tony Halme
at the bar.

?

I think that
enough was enough.

And now,
it was judgement day.

Tony had a very famous
incident with Scott Norton,

an American wrestler.

Some people say
that Tony kind of

sucker punched
Scott Norton.

Then, again,
Scott Norton says that

he cleaned
Tony Halme's clock.

This was a problem
for New Japan.

You know, two of their
foreign stars

were not getting along.

[Speaking Finnish]

And that was the end
of Tony in Japan.

With Tony back
in California,

his wife rethinks their
three-year marriage.

There were a lot of things
going on at the time

that I overlooked.

But, it wasn't until

he cheated on me
that I knew

what kind of person
I was married to.

As much as I didn't want
to be with him anymore,

you know, I still
loved him.

And, at the point that I
decided I needed

to divorce him, he got
very emotional and,

"Oh, my god, I'm so sorry
I did this to you," and,

"I'm gonna take my truck
and drive off the pier."

And I just said,
"I can't do this anymore."

I woke up to...

a lot of things
that he lied about.

But I never imagined that
he would turn into

the person
he turned into.

As soon as we split up,

that's when he
became Ludvig Borga.

[Cheering]

We're back,
ladies and gentlemen!

[Cheering]

In 1993, Tony joins the
World Wrestling Federation

as a main event villain,

but his run with the company

lasts less than a year.

[Match bell ringing]

After they gave him that
push of defeating me,

they were building him up
for Lex Luger.

But, the fans never
got behind it.

?

They were giving him all
the vignettes and

all those interviews,
and bringing him into TV,

but his interviews
were just like...

Blah.

This time it's gonna be
hard and tough,

and I'm gonna finish this
American so-called hero

once and for all.

Sometimes he's speaking
Finnish to the camera.

He says things like...

[Speaking Finnish]

Which is Finnish for like,
"I'll rip your ass off,"

or something like that.

You heard that didn't you?
Whatever you say.

Most people in the US don't
even know where

Finland resides
on the world map.

So, why should anybody feel
threatened by who you are?

America stinks.

Lex Luger stinks.

So, Americans
choke on this.

He lacked the ability to
connect with the audience.

The nuances of being
a pro wrestler,

he did not possess.

And then, we saw the
SS tattoos on his calf,

and understood
his philosophies.

They were not very healthy.

How do you justify it?

How do you justify
an SS tattoo,

based on what that stood for,
and still to this day?

I think the reason he got the
tattoo on his leg was because

he got attention for
being fascinated

by the Nazi thing.

I remember he spent
some time in Russia and,

he came back with all kinds
of military memorabilia

that was used by,

I guess Nazis,
or I don't know.

But one of the things
was this creamer pitcher,

and on the bottom it had
a swastika on it.

And it was dated like 1941.

And, I had used it as a
flower pot in our house.

I didn't know that they
were Nazi material.

I was just a young,
naive person.

I didn't know shit from
shinola at that age.

[Laughing]

?

But, why would
somebody get an

"exit only" tattoo
on their rear end?

Why?

?

What the -- would
propel a man

to tattoo "exit only"
above his asshole?

Especially when you're
the size he is and

looked like that, do you
really need to have

written instructions
for people

not to -- you
in the ass?

Does there have to be
a written warning?

What the --'s
going on with that?

And who are you making
that statement to

when you're walking
down the street?

You're so anti-homosexual
that you have "exit only"

tattooed above your asshole.
Who's gonna know?

"Ah, don't -- him
in the ass."

[Cheering]

While wrestling at
Madison Square Garden,

Tony injures his
ankle in a match.

With Tony being injured,

he was unceremoniously
dropped and,

I don't know if any of
the audience

really missed him either.

Whatever the
reason became...

was good to get rid of him.

I'm glad he didn't get
hired on my watch.

And he pretty much
self-destructed

once he left WWE.

?

So, if WWE is no
longer an option,

where do you go from here?

So, Tony's
looking for work.

And he gets signed
to fight in UFC.

And now he tries to make
the transition to the UFC.

And Tony doesn't take the
training very seriously.

[Speaking English]

His opponent ends up
being Randy Couture,

who will become a
legend of the sport.

Two first-timers
to the UFC.

Let's go!

And we're looking at a
big size difference here.

Prior to the fight, he had said,
"I will never tap out.

I would rather get out of
there dead."

But, you know, as soon as
the choke is on...

[Indistinct shouting]

And he's out,
very quick.

He ends up losing
in one minute.

That's the end of
his MMA career.

?

Tony went back to LA.

He was getting
married again.

This time with
a Finnish woman.

The police came and
raided their house.

?

The SWAT team, and...

guns and bullet proof vests,
and shields.

?

Tony was charged
with trafficking

controlled substances,
which was steroids.

And, possession of
an illegal firearm,

an Uzi.

When we were together,
Tony liked to shoot guns,

'cause they
gave him power.

I never imagined that
he would become

a guy that got in
trouble with guns.

[Speaking Finnish]

The laws were very clear.

If you have been convicted
of a firearm felony in

the United States,
you should be deported.

And that's what they did.

And, he could never go back
to the United States again.

He went back to Finland

to chase the big
and famous dream.

Tony's quest for fame
in America is cut short,

forcing him back to Finland

to pursue his
dream once more.

I think it was a really hard
blow for Tony to

be forced to leave
the United States.

He wants to be famous,
he's a showman.

So, he's ready to
try everything.

He was the famous
heavyweight

professional
boxing champion,

and all of us kids loved
his character in the

Finnish version of the TV
show "Gladiators."

[Speaking Finnish]

?

And then, Tony gets his
segment in a Finnish

talk show where he
records a single.

Hoo-hah!

Where he, in a
very comical way,

brags about how
manly he is.

[Speaking Finnish]

It sells very well,
and eventually

he will record
a whole record.

At this point, Tony Halme
is one of the most

famous people in Finland,
in fact.

Everything Tony
touches is gold.

To the Finnish people,
he really was superhuman.

[Cheering]

He achieved something.

He was,
he was in Hollywood.

He went to do Die Hard 3.

Wait, well, Jesus,
don't open it.

It's a bomb.

Even though it was a
side role, he was a goon,

that broke the news
barrier as far as

making Tony Halme a
household name.

?

He had learned in wrestling
how to sell his character,

and he decides to write

an autobiographical book.

Almost like a
political manifest.

It's Tony's life story,

with a lot of violence,
a lot of sex.

But, a lot of it's made up

and embellished.

A lot of the stories are
offensive to many people.

He uses the
"N" word a lot.

He's very traditional
when it comes to

roles of men and women.

There's a lot of people
who hate him,

but there's certainly a
big segment of the

Finnish population that
really looks up to him.

Tony's polarizing infamy
attracts Finnish

power brokers eager to cash
in on his natural charisma

and headline
-grabbing antics.

[Speaking Finnish]

They contact Timo Soini,
who is the leader of

the very small
True Finns party,

which is really struggling
at that time.

He joined the political
party in Finland that

were the trouble makers.

And he was a trouble maker.

[Speaking Finnish]

But, let's say
the SS tattoo.

How it didn't play into
his political career is-

I think it's a
question of timing.

During that time,

Finland changed in
a number of ways.

The Cold War ended,

we joined the
European Union.

Immigration began rising.

And this coincided with
an economic recession.

As you can guess, a lot
of these immigrants became

scapegoats for the
troubles that people had.

?

I think that
a lot of Finns were

very proud of being Finnish.

So, when you do away
with national identity,

a lot of people
saw it as a threat.

So, that's why I believe
that he was forgiven.

Let's take care of our own

before we take care of
anybody else.

We weren't as liberal then
as a nation as we are now.

And he had charisma,

especially for the
Finnish people,

for the Finnish audience.
They understood him.

The closest equal to
Tony Halme

as a politician is
Donald Trump.

The feelings they evoke
in their audience

are much more important
than facts.

And if you look at it,
so many parallels

in pro wrestling
and politics.

It's all about how to
manipulate people's emotions.

Tony said what he thought,
and he didn't have

any regard for political
correctness.

[Speaking Finnish]

He also didn't care if the
things that he said

were true or not.

Didn't he say that
Tarja Halonen,

our president at the time,

didn't he say that
she was a lesbian?

[Speaking Finnish]

He talks about immigration
in a way that is

actually extremely
offensive and racist.

[Speaking Finnish]

[Cheering & applauding]

Following a campaign fuelled
by nationalist pride,

Tony Halme stuns Finland's
political establishment

with a landslide victory.

Incredibly good numbers.
It was gangbusters.

People just voted for
this guy en masse.

[Speaking Finnish]

If you had said in the
locker room at the time,

"See that guy over there?

He's gonna be elected to
political office,"

you would've said, "Somebody
needs to treat this guy."

If you'd have said,
"He's going to be a

nationalist right-wing
lunatic," I'd 'a said,

"Okay, I'll buy that,"
but politician,

I wouldn't have
got that far.

Now in office,

Tony escalates his
divisive rhetoric.

[Speaking Finnish]

A lot of people hold
Tony Halme to be a...

I guess a white supremacist
would be the correct term.

[Speaking Finnish]

?

[Speaking Finnish]

At this point, he had
already developed a serious

alcoholism problem on top
of his drug addiction.

[Speaking Finnish]

By 2003, Tony's increasing
substance abuse

becomes impossible
to ignore.

[Speaking Finnish]

?

Tony had promised to have
an exhibition match

against his old friend and
sparring partner.

The fight became
quite brutal,

especially for Tony,

who really got a
beating in that fight.

After the fight,
Tony starts drinking.

?

He goes to Tampere
where he has some friends.

Keeps on drinking.

After about two weeks
of this binge,

he finally returns home
to his wife.

They develop an argument.

The wife says,
"We are through.

I have had enough of
your drinking."

Tony grabs...

a handful of medicine,
swallows them.

The wife, of course,
wants to call the 9-1-1.

At some point,
Tony gets hold of a gun.

The wife tries to grab
the gun away from Tony.

And, during the struggle
the gun goes off.

[Gunshot]

[Gunshot]

To this day,
we're not sure

whose finger was
on the trigger.

But, the wife flees
the apartment,

calls 9-1-1.

She goes back inside
the apartment and

she finds that Tony's
unconscious.

He has swallowed
some of his own puke,

and doesn't really show
any signs of life, really.

[Speaking Finnish]

At this point,
Tony is in a coma.

There are all kinds
of infections,

and he has suffered
from lack of oxygen,

so he's in a pretty
critical condition.

[Speaking Finnish]

He really struggled
for his life

for the first
couple of weeks.

Eventually they managed
to revive him.

But, by this point it's
clear that he has suffered

some serious
brain damage.

He can only talk like
one word at a time,

and he starts the slow
process of recuperating.

[Speaking Finnish]

But, he's never back
to his old, colorful,

quick-thinking self.

People could
see that he was

not the
old Tony at all.

His marriage ended.

That made things
only worse.

He was depressed.

[Speaking Finnish]

Tony resigns from
parliament,

and receives a four-month
suspended sentence.

Now on disability,
his health struggles

push him deeper
into isolation.

[Speaking Finnish]

Things were getting
bleaker all the time.

He was really addicted
to pain killers.

Used a lot of alcohol.

He continued to do
steroids as well.

But obviously
they don't help you

if you cannot do the,
do the training.

[Speaking Finnish]

He kept doing these
appearances in little bars

around Finland, and that
was the only really...

thing that got him out of
the house at that point.

[Speaking Finnish]

It appears that he
got in debt also

because of
the drugs that

he had to buy
from the black market.

[Speaking Finnish]

?

You've been to the
mountaintop and you have to

come down 'cause there's
nowhere else to go.

For a lot of people,
I think it's too much.

You'd rather end it...

than become
nobody again.

?

[Speaking Finnish]

?

?

?

?

[Speaking Finnish]

On January 10th, 2010,

Tony Halme is found
dead by suicide,

bringing a sudden end to
his turbulent life.

Why did he arrive
to that decision?

Obviously, we can
only speculate.

But, it must have been
very hard for him

to see himself in the
condition that he was,

which was so far removed
from the ideal that

he always held of a
big, strong man.

[Speaking Finnish]

Not surprised.

Didn't shed a tear.

What does a person do
to another person

where you don't even get
emotional about that?

And there is the big end!

'Cause he was a piece of shit
and he burned the bridges.

You know?
He treated people horribly.

?

[Speaking Finnish]

When the man hates
like this man,

you're not gonna
beat this man.

So, what is his legacy?
[Sighing]

Here comes Borga,
and... oh!

Ludvig Borga
stumbles a bit. Oh, no.

He was best known
as Ludvig Borga.

A nondescript heel

from Finland,

who never really connected
with the audience.

I was ringside.

Can't remember a
Ludvig Borga match.

Because...

he just didn't stand out
in that environment.

He was an asshole.

And, that's where
I'll leave it.

?

Tony brought everything
that he had learned in the

American show business
and wrestling to Finland

at the right time, and
really revolutionized

Finnish politics in a lot of
the same ways that

Donald Trump changed politics
in the United States.

And this really
paved the way

for a lot of politicians
that ran on

anti-immigration themes
everywhere in Europe

during the next
couple of decades.

[Crowd chatter]

[Effort grunting]

[Speaking Finnish]

-[Cheering]
-1, 2, 3!

[Match bell ringing]

? [Triumphant] ?

? [Somber] ?

I want people to know that
there was a good side to

this person, you know, and I
wouldn't have fallen in love

with somebody that was
a complete monster

the way that we
know of him now.

But I think he
destroyed himself...

in every way that a
person could do that.

?

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