When the NSW Blues and Queensland Maroons collide at 8:17pm on a school night, it’s more than just a game of rugby league. It’s decades of pent-up tension, a raging inferiority complex, and cultural warfare on a molecular level. It’s also CTE and pokie money.

However, Origin is wobbling on the precipice as it faces scrutiny from all-comers. Is the concept’s treasured tapestry under threat from loose immigration laws and rigged refs? Can it survive the cultural axemen of contemporary times (that being the modern wowsers of the green-left thought police, and science)?

Where are the characters in modern footy? Tommy Raudonikis? Alfie? Fatty? "The Axe"? "Spud"? "Dishhead" Dowling? "Grasshopper" Gomersall? These days players are dancing to K-Pop at media events. Is the demise of larrikinism (and evocative nicknames) tied in to the demise of State of Origin?

Featuring the unapologetically biased viewpoints of award-winning comic and social commentator Luke Heggie.

Spicy stings courtesy of audio maestro Tim ‘T-Dog’ Eldridge . Graphic design by Julia Edwards.

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