I’m following the trail of one of my favorites and tucking in to watch Drake Marcos bring a fantastic new authenticity to W4H. Not that I think W4H hasn’t always featured sensationally authentic sell. It just hasn’t always read “homoerotic” as much as I think it’s supposed to. That’s officially old news as of right now, because Drake is the gay wrestling avatar for all of us when he stares down beefy Brad Barnes and muses out loud about playing “tops and bottoms” once this oil wrestling match is over.

“Brad Barnes here, master of the oil wrestling!” Brad lubricates his flexing muscles slowly and seductively, bragging about being the king of this sub-genre. No one can argue with his well-established position in the pantheon of homoerotic wrestling stars. He’s not as big nor as ripped as we’ve seen him in the past, but damn, he’s every ounce as tasty as always. The beard disguises his ridiculous beauty. Maybe he’s cottoned on that being too pretty is a liability in this business.

Drake strolls in and shakes hands respectfully. Hell, he even offers (and is welcomed) to finish oiling up Brad’s bulging physique in those hard-to-reach spots where Brad’s massive muscles get in the way of him reaching around. You know how, when we’re watching wrestlers apply oil, you can tell when they aren’t into it?  How many times have we noticed probably straight grapplers look a little bored and engage in the least possible bodily contact while still, ostensibly, being able to claim to have oiled an opponent up? Drake, on the other hand, is happy to help. He’s the Cheshire Cat for a reason, so just watch the corners of his mouth curl in delight as he liberally coats Brad’s mile wide back, then drop to his knees to get the backs of the bodybuilder’s monster thighs (Brad’s meaty ass right at eye level, of course). Drake reaches around from behind and palms Brad’s abs, slides his hands slowly and expansively up and all over Brad’s juicy pecs. If a wrestling match wasn’t in the offing, I’d say Drake just might have kept this up until he was pounding out a load across Brad’s gorgeous muscles.

But Brad pulls away, looking uncomfortable. That bitch. Right then and there, I want to see Drake kick his mother fucking ass. Drake is the everyman on the mats here. More precisely, he’s you and me and every gay guy who’s been told he should apologize for getting turned on by a hot, cocky gym bunny flaunting himself provocatively and then pretending he wasn’t cock teasing all along. They shove each other in the chest, the aggression coming to a quick boil. Brad’s got a lower center of gravity and a ton of power advantage, and our gay avatar looks momentarily like he’s about to get muscle bullied (….again….). Then, suddenly, Drake swings his open right palm and lands a cracking, hard, wet slap across Brad’s way too pretty face. Oh, fuck yes, this is going to happen!

I’ve wrestled Drake, so I’m not nearly as surprised as Brad appears to be when the Cheshire Cat deftly slides to the side when the muscle tank comes charing in a rage. Smoothly, Drake lassos a side headlock and efficiently muscles the bodybuilder to the mat. “Master of oil wrestling?” Drake asks, cranking hard and making the bodybuilder whimper. “Looks like master of shit right now.”

I’ve faulted Brad for being flat-footed in the past. I’ve chided him for lacking initiative, for rolling over and taking it too quickly. And, honestly, this match could have easily been pulled down by that same dynamic if it weren’t for one thing: Drake makes him hurt.

Brad actually mentions out loud at one of his brief moments in the driver’s seat that Drake is working the match way stiffer than Brad expected. Read: Drake is actually, genuinely, pushing the pretty bodybuilder baby-ass right up to the point of seriously hurting him. He repeatedly tries to wrench Brad’s left shoulder out of joint with a severe hammerlock. He threatens to snap his oil-lubricated spine in multiple camel clutches. Hell, he looks like he nearly rips Brad’s massive pectoral muscles off the bone in long, deep, vicious pec claws. Fuck, Drake does us proud, gay wrestling fans.

Two things, in particular, Drake does that seriously bring excellent notes to the W4H catalog. One, he gropes the meat salaciously. The dragon sleepers lay Brad out best for Drake to use his free hand to slide his palm all over Brad’s fantasy man body. Brad bucks and kicks (more than usual, again making me believe the subplot that Drake is working this match harder than Brad is used to), and the Cheshire Cat just smiles brightly as he squeezes and feels up all of those bulging gym muscles. “You’re the kind of guy I admire at the gym,” Drake muses out loud at one point, treating himself to gently kneading, and then hard slapping, Brad’s muscle ass cheeks. “But, it looks like it should be the other fucking way around!” Drake narrates this drama beautifully, pointing out in both word and deed that Brad’s impressive muscles are nothing but fuel for Drake’s lustful fire. “This has got to be humiliating for you, right?,” he asks, mostly rhetorically. “I mean, look at your big ass! I’m destroying you!”  More to the point, the relatively average physique on Drake is equipped with everything he needs to not just neutralize the pin-up boy, but to so completely break him down as to leave him wide open for an erotically turned on opponent to familiarize himself with Brad’s body the way we’ve all fantasized about taking possession of those hot muscleboys strutting and grunting and posing for themselves (though, really, you and me) in the mirror at the gym. He strokes the writhing bodybuilder’s pecs. His hand slides down to Brad’s lower abdomen. He drags his hand, fingers stretched wide, down Brad’s quivering inner thigh, and then briefly, but unmistakably, takes an appreciative squeeze of Brad’s vulnerable crotch.

The other thing that Drake brings to the table that is a sensational addition to W4H is the narrative itself. It’s hard for me to describe this match without dipping extensively into the dialogue (Drake’s), because it’s accentuating and counterpointing every move and reversal. “You say you’re the king of oil,” Drake crows, saddling up across his upper abdomen and diving in deep with double pec claws, “but it looks like oil might be your kryptonite.” The reference to Brad as Superman, to the medium that the bodybuilder was convinced showed him and his skills off to perfection as his ultimate weakness, is multilayered and a loving nod to the comic geeks among the gay wrestling fan audience. “In some circles, I’m known as everyone’s favorite jobber,” Drake explains in an obvious reference to this blog. “But it looks like you’re about to be my favorite,” he sneers, nearly decapitating the man of steel with a camel clutch until Brad frantically taps out. Again. And again.

It isn’t quite a squash. Brad actually fights back, which isn’t always something we can count on from the pretty boy. His most successful offense is trying to snap Drake off at the neck with monster headscissors and an angry showering of oil. If he were half the wrestler Drake is, he’d have ridden those moments of momentum and the crushing weight of gravity all over the Cheshire Cat until he shut the prattling provocateur up decisively.

But let’s face it, while Brad is undeniably gorgeous, while his muscles are magnificent, while that cleft chin is straight out of a comic book, while his body is the perfect, living rendition of my Stretch Armstrong doll from my childhood (which, yes, so got me off), he is not half the wrestler Drake is. I’ve long fantasized about Drake living into the moment and unleashing the heel within. I’ve told him, frankly, that he’s got all of the makings of a sensationally nasty, cruel, incredibly effective erotic heel. But this is the first time I’ve really seen that brilliance shine through quite this openly and directly.

No shit, Drake accidentally sleepers the bodybuilder out cold. Now, if it were you or I, what would we do with Brad Barnes, flat on his back, unconscious and completely at our mercy? Yeah, Drake drizzles on more oil and feels this side of beef up one last time, just to make his own crotch swell that much more and enjoy the spoils of victory.

Super sweet drama. The gayest thing I’ve seen on W4H, and believe me, I’ve been watching and hoping for them to highlight the “homo” in their bid to stake out more territory in the homoerotic wrestling market. Brad as the big, bulging, pretty muscle boy all shut up and humiliated and possessed by an unapologetically gay, obviously, superiorly skilled opponent is delicious. And seriously intense mat wrestling sold this hot and furiously is rare, and incredibly so when it comes to that most homoerotic of all contexts, oil wrestling.

The king is dead. Long live the king!