Since July 1996, Stevie Richards (Michael Manna) and The Blue Meanie (Brian Heffron) had been making parodies of various wrestlers from the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) and World Championship Wrestling (WCW). In early 1996 Raven was forming a stable called Raven's Nest and was gathering new members. He called upon Stevie and Meanie along with an independent performer from New Jersey, Nova (Mike Bucci). These three would often come to the ring together before Raven made his entrance, imitating rock bands or pop culture references, most notably The Jackson 5 and at The Doctor Is In in August 1996 as the rock band KISS. The latter received a great ovation from the ECW fans before The Sandman abruptly entered the ring and caned them. Backstage after the event, Bubba Ray Dudley told them how great it was and the only thing greater would be a parody of the nWo. After clearing things with Paul Heyman and Raven, it was decided that they would form the bWo at the next big event, November to Remember '96. Over the next few months, members were added and members left just like the group they were imitating. Initially meant to be a one-off parody, the Blue World Order became immensely popular and elevated Richards to the main event level in ECW.
Hollywood Nova
The height of the bWo's success came at the first ECW pay per view, Barely Legal. The event saw the debut of bWo Japan (with members Taka Michinoku, Terry Boy, and Dick Togo), and Big Stevie Cool was part of the 3-Way Dance main event for the #1 contendership for the ECW World Title. Just weeks after this event Richards suffered a severe injury to his neck courtesy of Terry Funk and a metal guardrail which left him temporarily paralyzed for over an hour. In July 1997, Nova had a match against Taz in which Taz vowed to kill the bWo. He squashed Nova, and although Meanie and Nova continued to tag over the next few months, the bWo was indeed dead in November 1998.
World Wrestling Entertainment (2005)
The bWo reunited in 2005 at WWE's ECW reunion show, ECW One Night Stand,[1] coming to the ring before the Dudley Boyz versus Tommy Dreamer and The Sandman match. During their entrance, Joey Styles (laughing hysterically once they entered) said that "If any gimmick never deserved to make a dime and made a boatload of cash, this is it! And the best part is that they (WCW) couldn't sue us, 'cause it's a parody!"
On the July 7, 2005 episode of SmackDown!, the bWo reunited once again, this time to confront JBL. During the group brawl at the end of ECW One Night Stand, JBL sought out The Blue Meanie and legitimately assaulted him after Meanie called him a "backstage bully". The attack by JBL caused Meanie to tear some recent stitches and bleed. JBL then taunted the bWo and called Meanie a "fat little bitch". This led to a Meanie versus JBL no-disqualification match. Richards delivered a stiff chairshot to JBL during the match that busted him open. The Blue Meanie won the match after he hit his finisher, the Meaniesault, and Batista ran in and gave a spinebuster to JBL and threw an out-of-it Meanie on top of JBL.
Later, the bWo challenged The Mexicools to a match at The Great American Bash, with Stevie Richards saying the bWo was tired of the Mexicools interfering in people's matches, saying they were going to take over and rise up against the gringos because "We invented that!" - which then prompted Hollywood Nova to say "Actually, we never said we were going to rise up against the gringos". The three members appeared on WWE Velocity in a six-man tag match against 3 jobbers to prepare themselves for their tag match against the Mexicools. At The Great American Bash, the bWo and Mexicools met in a six-man tag match. They even drove into the ring on tricycles to parody the Mexicools' usual ring entrance on John Deere lawnmowers. The bWo lost the match after Super Crazy hit a moonsault and Psicosis hit the guillotine legdrop on Big Stevie Cool for the win. As the month of July ended, the bWo faded from the scene. Stevie Richards went back to his old gimmick, as did Hollywood Nova, while Blue Meanie was never officially contracted by WWE.
Sporadic reunions (2008–2010, 2015, 2017)
There were some bWo reunions in later years in different independents. When Richards went to TNA, Bucci and Heffron took part in a couple of shows.
On April 18, 2009, Nova and Blue Meanie unsuccessfully challenged for the British promotion One Pro Wrestling tag-team titles, losing to Project Ego (Kris Travis and Martin Kirby). That was Bucci's first in-ring performance in nearly 3 years.[2]
On August 8, 2010, the bWo reunited on the TNAHardcore Justicepay-per-view event. Heffron couldn't attend the show due to personal responsibilities to take care of in Philadelphia prior to going on his vacation the next day;[6] still, his promo was aired on PPV and in the arena he was replaced by Big Tilly. Steve Richards, accompanied by Nova and Tilly, defeated Peter Polaco and later in the night Tilly and Nova attacked Tommy Dreamer during his match with Raven.
On June 29, 2015, the Chikara promotion announced that Big Stevie Cool, Da Blue Guy and Hollywood Nova would be reuniting as the Blue World Order for the 2015 King of Trios tournament.[7] They were eliminated from the tournament in their first round match on September 4 by the Devastation Corporation (Blaster McMassive, Flex Rumblecrunch and Max Smashmaster).[8]
On March 30, 2017, the bWo made a one-night reunion at WrestleCon in a six-man tag team match, defeating the team of Kevin Matthews, Mario Bokara and Pat Buck.
