Celebrity Deathmatch back.
Well, it will be, thanks to Ice Cube. Many of us remember sitting down in front of the TV and watching stop-motion animated bloody fights between celebrities as part of our wildest fantasies. It gave us the opportunity to see what would happen if celebrity beefs were transported to the ring in Pay-Per-View style.
According to Deadline, MTV Studios will be bringing back the popular and bloody animated series, with Ice Cube set to star and executive produce through his company, Cube Vision. Series creator Eric Fogel will return to his baby as executive producer.
“Happy to once again be working with Viacom and MTV on a fan favorite like Celebrity Deathmatch and to continue our success together,” Ice Cube said.
Ice Cube will host, but will his animated version ever get inside the ring? Has he ever? The legendary gangsta rapper has pivoted over to the family man identity in recent years, so maybe he’s trying to up his street cred again? Who knows, but I know one thing: nostalgia is all up and through this decision.
Celebrity Deathmatch premiered in 1998 and was subsequently canceled in 2002. A revival premiered on MTV2 in 2006 and lasted for two seasons. There was a failed attempt to reboot it for MTV2 in 2015, but Fogel confirmed it actually hadn’t been picked up for a pilot on Twitter.
This is a good time to revive the show since social media wasn’t around during Celebrity Deathmatch’s origin. Imagine the celebrity beefs that could literally be squashed with a Claymation clash. Twitter fingers could turn to broken fingers—in the safety of fictional television, of course.
A few matchups we’d love to see:
Drake vs. Pusha T
Kanye West vs. Everybody Black
Cardi B vs. Nicki Minaj
Azealia Banks vs. Anyone With A Twitter Account
Beyoncé vs. Jay-Z (The BeyHive, who still ain’t really here for Jigga, but simply tolerates him for their queen, would live for this; let’s be honest.)
Mariah Carey vs. J. Lo
The Kardashians vs. Anonymity
Kevin Hart vs. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson
Cardi B vs. Offset
Nicki Minaj vs. Remy Ma
Will Smith vs. Janet Hubert
Michelle Obama vs. Donald Trump (y’all know she secretly wants to knock off that misshapen wig.)
T’Challa vs. Killmonger (Editor’s note: Wait ...)
50 Cent (and his strap) vs. Ja Rule
Rihanna vs. All The Salty Makeup Brands
Issa vs. Lawrence
Tariq vs. The Power Audience
Mo’Nique vs. Lee Daniels
Kevin Hart vs. Unemployment
(Just to name a few)
Cube and company will be shopping the reimagined series to air on premium and streaming networks in 2019.