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What Are You Watching / Last Match, Event or Documentary You Saw
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I've not watched much in recent months, so as I am broke and saving for holidays i said I would play catch up, much to the chagrin of the mrs. I used the 3 room trick though, so as not to get into too much trouble.
Finally watched the last few matches from TPI 2006. I had actually completely forgotten I had this until I was doing a spring clean and realised I never saw the last DVD. 2 notable matches are Josh Abercrombie Vs Tyler Black and the final of the tourny itself. The former is a decent match which is also a loser leaves town affair. I enjoyed this, as I have most of Blacks efforts, but there seemd to b a big back story to this which I do not know of due to my lack of knowledge of IWA:MS. The story is far from over after the match as well. Never seen Abercrombie pre this, and was impressed.
The final match featuringLow Ki, Rod Strong and Arik Cannon was up and down. Now i realise IWA:MS want to push their own product by having their own full timer Cannon involved, but I felt he was far too weak in this match, and indeed in his previous efforts in getting to the final. Low Ki was his usual intense self, and Strong delivered back breaker after back breaker. It is a decent match and well timed at around 30 mins.
Overall, TPI 2006 gets a big thumbs up from me. Some great matches throughout and gives you a decent feel of plenty different styles.
Next up is Night 3 of BOLA. Some fantastic matches here, none moreso that Shelley Vs Sydal. Only problem with this match for me is went about 5 minutes too long. Far too many finishers and kick outs and disbelief that he kicked out etc. Ive heard said it could have been a MOTYC had it went a tad longer. I believe the opposite. Generico Vs Dragon Kid was awful. I skipped Nigel Vs Necro ( I honestly cannot see what the indy hype is for this guy?).
Again, buy BOLA 2007. Its better than 2006 and held in a far better venue. Night one, three and two in that order of appeal.
ROH Honour Nation
Heard this was a big "sleeper" show, so i downloaded it rather than actually buying to hedge my bets. I have only flciked through it, but it is worth it alone for the incredible first installment of the best of three between Danielson and Aries. An absolutly stunning match which constantly had you guessing. These 2 were always going to put on a great show. Dragon certainly shows his A game here, and is easily the best Aries match of 2007 (I didnt see his match with Morris at BOSP).0 -
Kurt Angle vs Rey Mysterio, Summerslam 2002, a cracking opener,a white hot crowd and a quick paced match made this one of the best opening ppv matches in years, love how a new york crowd ****s all over babyfaces at times0
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It amazes me that these two having had this match, that they screwed up Reys title shot at Wrestlemania so badly a few years ago. That match would be hard to beat on any card ffs.0
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To be fair, it wasn't WWE who screwed up Rey's title shot. Rey had deteriorated a lot since 2002, he'd also bulked up a hell of a lot and whereas he had the moves, he didn't have the same moveset he once had say, between 1996-1998. It's like when HHH came back from his quad tear in 2002, he'd bulked up by about another 50-60lbs and just didn't move as well as he did beforehand.
Anyway, seeing as i hadn't posted on this thread in about six months, as i'd taken a break from wrestling to focus on gaming and my work, i went back to it about 2 months ago and have been watching:
WWE RAW January-November 1994:
A truly horrible year for WWE, as WCW were making their first steps to become a contender to WWE on the PPV market. By the time November had come around, WCW had Ray Traylor, Hogan, Beefcake, Shark and Shockmaster, the Nasty Boys and The Road Warriors. That's a lot of ex WWE alumni for WCW who before now, wouldn't have even been considered in WWE's league. There was also a big buildup in WCW for Hogan vs Flair that year, a match that tanked on WWE house shows in 91-92 that it was scrapped for PPV.
I suppose the first feud to note really this year has to be Bret V Owen after Owen had turned at the 1994 Royal Rumble. The weekly promos are hard to watch during this feud, as Bret always was a whiny maggot as far as his promos were concerned, and Owen, as he'd later become the King of Harts this year, the King o' Promos he never was. It was still quite a fun feud to watch, you could tell both guys were really into it and enjoying themselves, and yet the feud still seemed very real at the time. Something that seems to be missing a lot today in my view.
Undertaker took half the year off this year, i'll try to be nice about this guy but it's gonna be hard given the horrible matches he was in. He "died" at the Royal Rumble that year and then after King Of The Ring that year, there are promos week after week from schoolteachers, fire marshalls, subway workers that they all claimed to have seen The Undertaker, which lead to DiBiase claiming that he was the first to bring him to the WWE, and he'll find him and bring him again. Which he does, only Paul Bearer begs to differ, saying that's not *his* undertaker. Well we know what happens at Summerslam that year, being one of the worst matches on the card. Undertaker would spend the rest of the year feuding with Yokozuna and then IRS.
Speaking of King Of The Ring, a couple more Harts came back that year! Bret put his belt up against Diesel in a title for title match at the 1994 King of The Ring. And promises to bring a family member with him to ringside after Shawn and Diesel beat him down on an episode of the Kings Court, Jerry Lawlers talk show. Bret's family member, is none other than his former tag team champion partner, Jim Neidhart. After nearly 25 minutes, Neidhart interferes and causes a DQ, with Bret coming out with his belt. Neidhart bolts and Bret is less than impressed. Meanwhile Owen has made it to the finals against Razor Ramon, and Neidhart comes out to interfere, only he jumps Razor to give Owen his KOTR victory and title. It turned out Neidhart was saving Bret's title for Owen. A few weeks later Davey Boy Smith would also make his return to side with Bret.
Other minor fun parts were the infamous Sumo match on RAW between Yokozuna and Earthquake. The match is somewhat interesting, but it's not one of those easy on the eye jobs. Crowd still manages to go totally bat-sh*t for it. Something that would be snoozed at today (Big Slow vs Akebono anyone?)
The Headshrinkers turn face as Lou Albano gets them a title shot against then champions, The Quebecers. The Quebecers and Johnny Polo (Raven) spend weeks mocking and making fun of the legendary Lou Albano, who has made more tag team champions in the history of the WWE. Lou challenges to bring a team out next week if they put the belts on the line, so they accept and the week after, out come the Headshrinkers! Bye bye title reign! It wouldn't last long as Samu is forced into retirement. They get in a third headshrinker in the form of Sionne (The Barbarian) and the crowd sh*t all over him. He finds his way to WCW months later and Fatu turns into about 20 different characters before settling on Rikishi in 1999.
The Headshrinkers drop the titles to Shawn and Diesel the week before Summerslam that year, for political reasons (they didn't want to drop them to a makeshift team like Bam Bam and IRS at Summerslam, and felt Shawn and Diesel had more continuity and made more sense), however Shawn causes Diesel to lose his IC title at Summerslam by accidentally kicking him in the face. Shawn is still out injured at this point but is hanging around Diesel to interfere in his matches, Shawn had worked very few matches after the ladder match in 1994. Which takes us to Survivor Series 94.
Lawler and Doink vs their midgets. I'm not gonna spend all year on this one folks, each week both get on each others nerves so Lawler gets a new midget one week, then Doink gets a new midget. Lather rinse and repeat for a few weeks. This is exactly why i can't watch WWE now. I said it before and i'll say it again, I want to see Hornswaggle wished the best in his future endeavors!
Tatanka sold out to Ted DiBiase at Summerslam and turned on friend, Lex Luger. Luger, who choked earlier in the year while he was being groomed for Wrestlemania main event finds himself in midcard hell. So the two end up captaining their respective teams for Survivor Series and Luger gets buried again.
Shawn ends up kicking Big D again at Survivor Series and the results were pretty disasterous, as Diesel chases Shawn out of the building, as the team split up and the tag titles are vacated. And finally an interesting turn of events took place in 1994.
One year earlier, Bob Backlund returned to the WWE to return in the Royal Rumble at 43 years old. He lasted a fair amount of time in there as well but just faded into obscurity after his Wrestlemania match against Razor Ramon. But he challenges Bret Hart to a match and Bret accepts. Now the plan was to Backlund to turn heel after being put under a spell by Papa Shango as WWE hadn't tested Backlunds heel mic skills in decades. However he was able to get over by himself. So the match takes place, Backlund loses. Bret offers the handshakes and Backlund snaps and acts like a man possessed. Enter Mr Backlund, the crazy old man, a character Backlund still portrays up til recently in TNA.
So it set up for Backlund v Bret at Survivor Series, towel submission match. Davey Boy in Bret's corner, Owen in Backlund's corner. Most of you know the deal here, after over 35 minutes, and Davey posting himself, Helen Hart grabs the towel and throws it in on Bret's behalf. Days later, Big D wins the title from Backlund in 8 seconds to start the most financially disasterous title reign in WWE history.
1995 will certainly be interesting to write about!
VR!0 -
^ You never gave us your 1995 write up.0
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^ You never gave us your 1995 write up.
Yeah, back in April when i watched all that, i was on a six week hiatus from work due to a delay in contract, so it meant i got to sit at home and watch this stuff all day and night.
Around the time i had posted that, the contract had arrived, i'd watched about the first two months of RAW 1995. Not exactly a lot to write home about. Now, that said, i'm gonna need something to remind me that no matter how bad things are in wrestling today, that they can (and probably never will) not get as bad as they did in WWE in 1995. So i might get through some of it over the weekend. But to wet your appetites, here's some of the farces to remind you, straight from my own memory.
- Diesel as WWE champion, a testament that hard work pays off later. However he topped it by letting everyone know that laziness pays off now. A horribly booked champion with about three good matches to his entire reign that year, being with Michaels and 2 with Bret. God awful promos, and the wretched "Dudes with Attitudes" era.
- Horrible gimmick wrestlers like Iasaac Yankem DDS, Jean Pierre LaFeite, Kama, Mantaur, and Sparky f*cking Plugg appearing on TV every week to little or no fanfare.
- PPV's drawing something in between jack and sh*t that year (see Nash, Kevin)
Are you sure you still want me to do this write up, folks?
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validreasoning! wrote: »- Horrible gimmick wrestlers like Iasaac Yankem DDS, Jean Pierre LaFeite, Kama, Mantaur, and Sparky f*cking Plugg appearing on TV every week to little or no fanfare.
It was sh1t like this that would make me turn my back on wrestling for another ten years, missing the attitude era in the process while all my friends basked in fairweatherness. I was only 11 in 1995 and the charachters and gimmicks were waaaay too childish for me. Isaac Yankem in particular makes me want to puke. I'm a sucker for storyline consistency and continuity and it always pisses me off how WWE can just turn a crazy dentist into the Undertakers long lost brother. Watching from the corner of my eye, that storyline worked but charachters like that annoy me to this day.0 -
It was sh1t like this that would make me turn my back on wrestling for another ten years, missing the attitude era in the process while all my friends basked in fairweatherness. I was only 11 in 1995 and the charachters and gimmicks were waaaay too childish for me. Isaac Yankem in particular makes me want to puke. I'm a sucker for storyline consistency and continuity and it always pisses me off how WWE can just turn a crazy dentist into the Undertakers long lost brother. Watching from the corner of my eye, that storyline worked but charachters like that annoy me to this day.
Erm Glen Jacobs was taken off TV for about 9 months before he redebuted. Even before that he was a different character who in turn was taken off TV before it debuted.0 -
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I'm a sucker for storyline consistency and continuity and it always pisses me off how WWE can just turn a crazy dentist into the Undertakers long lost brother. Watching from the corner of my eye, that storyline worked but charachters like that annoy me to this day.
It could be worse, they could have tried to turn him into Kevin Nash!
Oh wait..
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Half the reason I looked up this thread again today was because i watched McGuiness v Danielson from DRIVEN at lunchtime today, knowing I would watch the ROH 6th Anniversary show in its entirety this evening. Therefore, I could compare and contrast.
And I don't think I have seen 2 matches between 2 great wrestlers which could have been more different. And with that being said, both were amazing, in their own way. The DRIVEN match was certainly more 'wrestling', while 6thA was more a fight. The latter also served a purpose of legitimately turning Nigel heel. I was disgusted when i started watching this show (a few weeks ago, had to start over today) first at how they started the turn, but I am happy now that they turned it too a good angle.
All in all, 6th Anniversary is a great show, but has some big minuses (should that be minii?). The first being the god awful segment with Dempsey and Alison Danger. The second being The Vulture Squad. And thirdly the 3 way for the FIP title. I just cannor get into anything Necro is involved in. I will never ever understand the hype around him. But the pros far outweigh the negs here. Shiosaki Vs Aries is a masterpiece, as is the main event. Steen Vs Joey Mathews aint half bad either.0 -
Just watched The Beiscoes vs Ibushi/Nakajima from NOAH's Shiny Navigation last wee. Great junior tag match. The briscoe's stylistic change is a change for the beter in my book. The newstiff-punching, ass kicking style plays into their redneck persona much more than the fancy double tams of which I had tired of late. They're WAY over with the Japs as well.
Ibushi is his usual awesome else and Nakajima i=s just ungodly talented. Hard to believe he's not long out of his teens. His kicks are brutal.:eek:
Great little tag match. In a year of great tag wrestling, this'll be an outsider for match of the year honours.0 -
^^^^
I haven't caught that match yet, but i look forward to it. I've noticed that about the Briscoes too. They've condensed alot of their intricate double-team sequences into tougher, more suitable stuff and it plays up to their personas definitely. Still crazy though...0 -
WWF Monday Night RAW: January - April 1995
Spent the last few days sifting through this stuff, and believe me, a root canal without the injection would have been easier, more tolerable and not as mentally scarring. So i'll get to recapping the highlights, if there are even any.
This seemed to be more of an era of all filler and no killer. Although Hakushi did make his debut against a very young and very green Matt Hardy, when he was probably v0.18 beta! For all the hype and TV time WWE spent on Hakushi though, it was fairly forgettable and Hakushi was pretty much gone within nine months. Lex Luger and Davey Boy Smith both found themselves feuding with seperate members of the Million Dollar corporation, so after a few occasional tag matches, they ended up being paired together as the Roidrage freak's on a leash... oops, i mean the Allied Powers.
Speaking of tag teams, Shawn and Diesel ended up vacating the belts a few weeks earlier to 1995 after Survivor Series, so there was a tag team tournament set up to determine the new champions, a true example of how bad the tag team situation was, when the 123 Kid and Bob Holly (subbing for the Smoking Gunns), Well Dunn, Bam Bam and Tatanka, The Heavenly Bodies and Headshrinkers mark II to name a few. The winner getting their shot at the 1995 Royal Rumble. 123 Kid and Holly win, but lost the belts on RAW the following night back to the Smoking Gunns. They shake hands and continue on the babyface routine. Had that happen today in WWE, Kid and Holly would have turned on them, and then continue to turn between face and heel about six times by the time they got from the ring to the back!
Shawn wins the Royal Rumble, and is now so busy that he drops his commentary position (i believe he suffered a hand injury after Survivor Series and needed time off), in preparation for Wrestlemania. Of course, his main event spot was hogged by the celebfest that was Wrestlemania XI, and Bam Bam Bigelow vs LT. After weeks and weeks of what seems like endless promos between Bam Bam and LT's "lawyers" and "agents", a match is eventually signed.
Oh i'd be completely insane if i had forgotten about the final nail in the coffin for the wretched feud that Harvey Whippleman and Howard Finkel were having. For the guts of three years, Fink received allsorts of verbal abuse from Whippleman, And this was the blowoff. A tuxedo match! This isn't pretty by any stretch of the imagination, and i'm imagining that it's the brainchild of Russo, as he pulled the same crap with Lethal/Dutt in TNA 13 years later.
We roll into February, and get the debut of Man Mountain Rock! Vince Signed Maxx Payne from WCW for reasons, probably best known to himself, he'd already had the grunge rocker gimmick down in Atlanta, but to even further gimmick him, they gave him a WWF shaped guitar, which he would play in the ring prior to his matches! Of course, the crowd didn't give a flying f*ck, and he found himself relegated to Superstars after a week or two.
The reason i'm recapping this rather than focusing on matches or many feuds, is because there actually wasn't any happening at the time! This is how bad the New Generation era was!
Until March, when Shawn and Davey are booked in a match to settle the score from the 95 Rumble. Shawn as usual carries the match, but we were lucky to even receive a match like this on RAW at this period of time, while Diesel was stinking up the ring with Jeff Jarrett. Bret might have taught Nash a few things about ring work, but he didn't teach him how to make chicken salad from chicken sh*t, unfortunately for all of us.
RAW gives us another decent match a couple of weeks later, with Bret Hart vs Owen Hart in a no holds barred match. It actually looked like a lot of work went into the match, which was somewhat risky considering they were both booked for Wrestlemania in seperate matches six days after the match. This particular match would be on the special Pre Wrestlemania RAW. Which had Vince McMahon and Todd Pettingill in suits discussing most of the PPV. Pettingill's mullet is shockingly bad at this stage (and to make matters worse, he TIES IT BACK for the occasion). Even I never did that! (yes, i had a mullet in 95, so did a lot of people but at least i didnt have The People's Mullet in 2002!)
By this stage Shawn needs another bodyguard due to 29 jealous wrestlers over his Rumble win making him a marked man. Shawn employs two weeks before Mania, and again, crowd doesn't give a f*ck, until the day after Wrestlemania when Diesel offers Shawn a rematch and Shawn accepts, in seperate interviews on the same night. When Shawn gives Sid the night off, Sid responds in kind by giving Shawn about 3 or 4 powerbombs, severely botching the first one where Shawn lands on the side of his neck and shoulder.
Dibiase needs a replacement for Bam Bam after the embarrassing defeat to LT at Wrestlemania, so while Bam Bam turns face and chums with Diesel and Shawn, DiBiase has recruited Sid into the corporation. Problem there is he still has Hasbeen Volkoff, an angry Native American and a MMA style wannabe in Kama. DiBiase had several crowning achievements in his WWE days, but his stable wasn't one of them.
Introducting IN YOUR HOUSE! A new PPV being hyped up now that Wrestlemania is over and done with, but June is too long to wait for King Of The Ring, so we'll throw on a PPV in May too! And what more incentive to tune into a PPV, than to get a competition going where you can win, you guessed it, a house in Orlando, Florida.
TNA might wanna think about this for future plans... I'm sure Dixie Carters pop won't mind shelling out the money like he has done for the last three years.
Thats me done for now, if i can get through more in the next few days, i'll post up.
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validreasoning! wrote: »TNA might wanna think about this for future plans... I'm sure Dixie Carters pop won't mind shelling out the money like he has done for the last three years.
All that TNA bashing is a turn about face from two days about talking the TNA PPV. Anyway...0 -
I really couldn't watch anymore of RAW 1995, so i switched to PPV's recently as i got upgrades of all the In Your House PPV's from 1-18, so I watched 1, and thought i'd share some musings on 'em.
In Your House
(May 1995)
What older fans may remember about this particular PPV, was that the objective of the PPV, and the title of it was centred around Vince McMahon giving away a house on PPV, in a desperate way to get people to tune into WWE and away from WCW, who were already on seven PPV's per year at this point whereas WWE were only on five. It didn't particularly work to the point where it was three steps short of a failure of epic proportions.
The buildup:
This was the period of time where Bret fans felt that Bret was being f*cked over by Vince and the Kliq, and to a certain extent, they were right, as buyrates tanked under Nash as champion, Shawn was still easing his way back to full time status after being out for a good bit of time over a hand injury, essentially only working Royal Rumble and Wrestlemania that year, while doing stints of Heartbreak Hotel and commentary on RAW. However as a rematch was to be rescheduled for Nash v Michaels, Shawn's bodyguard, Sid powerbombed Shawn several times, botching the first one. So that set up Sid v Nash for the PPV, while Bret was relegated face Hakushi in the opening match. Bret's feud with Lawler had been sparked up again (making it last nearly two years on and off), so he was also scheduled to face him later in the night.
Razor Ramon dropped the IC title to Jeff Jarrett at the Royal Rumble, and the Wrestlemania rematch ended in interference by the Roadie. The original match penciled in for here was Razor & The Kid, but Waltman was jumped by the heels the previous week and it turned into a handicapped match. King Of The Ring was coming around the corner and it was qualifying match time, so they decided to throw Mabel v Adam Bomb for whatever reason. Mabel had turned heel (along with his partner Mo, when they fired then beat down their manager, Oscar after turning on the Smoking Gunns), and Bryan Clarke was serving notice from WWE after being given his ticket to Turnerland to become Wrath.
Yokozuna and Owen Hart had won the tag titles from the Smoking Gunns, and their rematch was pencilled in for this card, while Bret had apparently injured his knee during his match with Hakushi, Lawler demands it goes ahead. So with all that, we start with.
Bret Hart vs Hakushi:
This was a pretty decent opener, it's just a shame that Hakushi turned into a lazy sh*t not long after this PPV. Many people on the internet at the time felt he deserved better, but once he turned face shortly after Summerslam, he really did get a lot worse. So this match would have been pretty much a day off for Bret as for one of the few times in 1995 where he didn't have to carry someone. Match ends under the 15 minute mark with Bret going over via pinfalling. This would mark Hakushi's first defeat since his debut the previous December.
Razor Ramon vs Jeff Jarrett & The Roadie:
This wasn't so good, Jarrett wasn't quite King Of The Mountain at this point, especially with the glowing cowboy hat. But at least Scott Hall appears sober, either way, it didn't give me the 10 odd minutes or so of my life back watching this. Token appearance by Aldo "Justin Credible" Montoya to make a run in for the face in trouble, along with the first appearance of Savio Vega. If you don't remember him, don't worry too much about it, you didn't miss much.
Mabel vs Adam Bomb.
Short and painless as Mabel (literally) squashes Adam Bomb in less than two minutes to advance to the King Of The Ring, and we know what happened there, and even if you didn't, Shawn gave it away halfway through the PPV when the crown was waaaaaay too big for his head.
Owen & Yoko vs The Smoking Gunns
Five minute junkfest here, but it helped solidify Owen and Yoko as tag champions in the sense that the Gunns had their title shot and blew it. This ends around the six minute mark when Bodacious Bart gets a big Yoko legdrop of death to end the misery.
Jerry Lawler vs Bret Hart
Bret's already wrestled a 15 minute match about an hour earlier, so don't expect miracles here. Five minute fest which was the Standard Hart/Lawler, Lawler taunts Hart, Hart destroys lawler, then Hebner gets caught in the ropes in which time, Hakushi nails a diving headbutt and Lawler wins for the pin. At this point, Lawler still hasn't been beaten by Bret on PPV (save for Summerslam 93 but the decision was then reversed). Kiss My Foot match on the way though!
Sid v Diesel:
And wasn't the world waiting for this?, At this time, Sid can barely work, and Nash has just about learned how to work after Bret spent most of the last year schooling him on ring work 101, with tutorials ending at the 1995 Royal Rumble. We get over 10 minutes of slugfest. Diesel gets the win over Sid by a DQ after interferance by Tatanka, but Bam Bam comes in to make the save as he'd just defeated Tatanka earlier in the night.
... wait, what?!
Yep, Coliseum had thrown in two bonus matches that didn't appear on the actual PPV, Four dark matches took place that night, two made it to the Coliseum release, one was a KOTR qualifier which aired on RAW a couple of weeks afterwards, and the other was forgotten about.
Bam Bam Bigelow beats Tatanka. A match set up after DiBiase fired Bam Bam from the Corporation and turning him face in the process.
Undertaker beats Kama, a match set up after Kama had stolen the urn at Wrestlemania XI during the Taker/Bundy match and then to add insult to injury, he melted it down into a gold chain to wear. WWE: Feeding stereotypes! Nice to see that 13 years on, they still haven't changed.
Also some kid won the house, from what i remember reading, the family had to sell it within a year because the taxes in Florida were too high.
Worth checking out the Bret/Hakushi match, the rest is a strong recommendation to avoid.
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Nice little treat on the otherwise awful Fight Network. This weeks ROH installment is Joe Vs Punk I & II. It was my first time seeing their first effort, and I thoroughly enjoyed it, even if it was slightly edited, and had to put up with ad breaks. Punk played the heel quite well in what seemed to be a babyface match (if that makes any sense?). It really was a great showcase of what these two could actually do.
Must watch II over the weekend and decide which of these two epics was better.0 -
Nice little treat on the otherwise awful Fight Network. This weeks ROH installment is Joe Vs Punk I & II. It was my first time seeing their first effort, and I thoroughly enjoyed it, even if it was slightly edited, and had to put up with ad breaks. Punk played the heel quite well in what seemed to be a babyface match (if that makes any sense?). It really was a great showcase of what these two could actually do.
Must watch II over the weekend and decide which of these two epics was better.
Punk was a lot more over as a face than Joe in that match..Some bumps on the basketball court looked sick0 -
I felt Punks mocking of Joe worked very well in the match. I got the impression that Punk was booked as the heel, that is not to say he went fully over as it (the opposite to pretty much every Cena match in the last few years, booked heavily as the face, but gets a big heel reaction from large parts of the crowd).
What was the name of the show this match happened on?0 -
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Dragongate Challenge II
I really liked this show, but having similar speedy tag matches back to back hurt it somewhat. It would have been better had the singles matches broken up some of the tags. Still, after watching the incredibly dull shows that were Double Feature and Take No Prisoners this was a breath of fresh air. Loved Steenerico Vs Speed Muscle and I really liked the main event as well. This is in no small part due to the interactions of Go Shiosaki and Davey Richards.
Easily the best ROH show of 2008 so far though. Looking forward to watching SCOH III next.0 -
WCW Nitro - January - February 1997
"It wasn't so much day to day business, it was more like day to day chaos"
Escaping the borefest that is RAW from 1995, i decided to skip ahead a few years and have a look at what the opposition had to offer. Now i hadn't watched a lot of Nitro prior to this, The entire of 95 and the first four months of 96 and to be honest, it was da sh*t back then to watch, primarily because you didn't know what was going to happen. One of the many reasons why Ted Turner was handing Vince McMahon his ass to him on a plate on a weekly basis. That and the fact that Vince was so flustered that none of his boneheaded ideas were working that he could no longer tell his arse from his elbow.
But Jesus Christ, did WCW drop the ball by the time 1997 rolled around or what? Every week was the same old garbage in a different arena. Some of the matches were still pretty decent to watch but the format was exactly the same. DiBiase, Nash, Hall and Bischoff coming out every week invading the commentary desk, boring us to death with NWO progaganda and hype, especially for it's abortion of a PPV Souled Out in January, with the only bright spot on the card being Syxx v Eddie Guerrero in a ladder match, with both guys stating in seperate interviews that they ended up hating the match years later.
WCW was just coming off the Starrcade PPV, which had Hogan v Piper in it's main event. WCW's boneheaded format for their main events at the time on PPV was to take a main event from nearly ten years earlier and have a rematch with the loser of the original going over, and that's exactly what happened here. They had Piper go over Hogan, despite Hogan having DiBiase in his corner. However this wasn't 1985, and after a couple of hip surgeries later, Piper was now a shell of who he was. The aftermath of this pretty much had Piper's win overturned by the NWO (don't ask!), and Piper was written out of the script and terminated from his contract, which Piper later took WCW to court for, but not before an embarrassing match at Superbrawl VII. Hogan would then go on to feud with Giant for Souled Out. Of course, this had already been done before too and as a result, nobody cared.
Meanwhile the likes of Eddie Guerrero, Ultimo Dragon, Dean Malenko and Rey Mysterio were winning the crowd over left right and centre in their matches. With Ultimo Dragon fresh off a win from Dean Malenko and Eddie Guerrero over DDP, who was also teasing a turn to the NWO. Unfortunately by the time Souled Out came along, it had been teased too many times to the point where nobody even cared anymore.
The Four Horsemen are around at the time with the lineup of Flair, Arn, Benoit, & Mongo, with Jeff Jarrett coming in and out trying to either steal Benoit's or Mongo's spot. Jarrett is probably the only one who went from WWE to WCW and somehow ended up worse off! Benoit is in and out of his feud with Kevin Sullivan also, as Sullivan ends up bringing Jacqueline into WCW. When Benoit isn't feuding with him, he's having decent enough matches with Jarrett. Nothing too earth shattering or anything, but watchable TV.
Steiners are still around as a team here, but that's on the verge of cracking. They defeat Hall & Nash at Souled Out for the WCW tag team titles but referee Randy Anderson is fired by Bischoff for stupid reasons (he wasn't assigned the referee for the match, Nick Patrick was but Patrick was out and Anderson was in the front row), and changed the titles. After Patrick is discovered that he got the tickets for free by the office, he's fired for accepting a gift which is against company policy. And this was BEFORE Russo was booking folks, if you can imagine this. The icing on the cake here is for Bischoff then to order the Steiners to hand back the belts to Hall and Nash
My head is already hurting trying to comprehend all of this really! And i haven't even gotten to the Jay Leno and Dennis Rodman years yet!
Syxx and Dean Malenko end up providing entertaining TV leading up to their match at Superbrawl though which is probably just as well because the crowd is snoring through Hogan and Piper at this stage. Buff Bagwell is still trying so hard to get over as a heel, but splitting up the American Males only served to have the crowd not give a crap about either of them. WCW once again, showcase the hell out of the likes of La Parka, Villano IV, Juventud Guerrera amongst others to build up to a six man at Superbrawl, Jarrett moves back to feuding with Mongo, and Benoit is back to feuding with Kevin Sullivan while the rest of the horsemen are left to rot.
This was about as far as i've gotten so far. I'm actually not really sure if i should stick with it or go back to RAW 95 though.0 -
They're some good write ups Shawn. I've only seen this thread now but i'll go back through it for other posts. I saw all them PPVs and RAWs through rose coloured glasses. I was about 10-12 and assumed that WWF was the only wrestling there was!
In hindsight there was some awful sh*te back then and Diesel was lousy. There were a few good matches, usually involving Bret or Shawn!0 -
ShawnRaven wrote: »WCW Nitro - January - February 1997
"It wasn't so much day to day business, it was more like day to day chaos"
Escaping the borefest that is RAW from 1995, i decided to skip ahead a few years and have a look at what the opposition had to offer. Now i hadn't watched a lot of Nitro prior to this, The entire of 95 and the first four months of 96 and to be honest, it was da sh*t back then to watch, primarily because you didn't know what was going to happen. One of the many reasons why Ted Turner was handing Vince McMahon his ass to him on a plate on a weekly basis. That and the fact that Vince was so flustered that none of his boneheaded ideas were working that he could no longer tell his arse from his elbow.
But Jesus Christ, did WCW drop the ball by the time 1997 rolled around or what? Every week was the same old garbage in a different arena. Some of the matches were still pretty decent to watch but the format was exactly the same. DiBiase, Nash, Hall and Bischoff coming out every week invading the commentary desk, boring us to death with NWO progaganda and hype, especially for it's abortion of a PPV Souled Out in January, with the only bright spot on the card being Syxx v Eddie Guerrero in a ladder match, with both guys stating in seperate interviews that they ended up hating the match years later.
WCW was just coming off the Starrcade PPV, which had Hogan v Piper in it's main event. WCW's boneheaded format for their main events at the time on PPV was to take a main event from nearly ten years earlier and have a rematch with the loser of the original going over, and that's exactly what happened here. They had Piper go over Hogan, despite Hogan having DiBiase in his corner. However this wasn't 1985, and after a couple of hip surgeries later, Piper was now a shell of who he was. The aftermath of this pretty much had Piper's win overturned by the NWO (don't ask!), and Piper was written out of the script and terminated from his contract, which Piper later took WCW to court for, but not before an embarrassing match at Superbrawl VII. Hogan would then go on to feud with Giant for Souled Out. Of course, this had already been done before too and as a result, nobody cared.
Meanwhile the likes of Eddie Guerrero, Ultimo Dragon, Dean Malenko and Rey Mysterio were winning the crowd over left right and centre in their matches. With Ultimo Dragon fresh off a win from Dean Malenko and Eddie Guerrero over DDP, who was also teasing a turn to the NWO. Unfortunately by the time Souled Out came along, it had been teased too many times to the point where nobody even cared anymore.
The Four Horsemen are around at the time with the lineup of Flair, Arn, Benoit, & Mongo, with Jeff Jarrett coming in and out trying to either steal Benoit's or Mongo's spot. Jarrett is probably the only one who went from WWE to WCW and somehow ended up worse off! Benoit is in and out of his feud with Kevin Sullivan also, as Sullivan ends up bringing Jacqueline into WCW. When Benoit isn't feuding with him, he's having decent enough matches with Jarrett. Nothing too earth shattering or anything, but watchable TV.
Steiners are still around as a team here, but that's on the verge of cracking. They defeat Hall & Nash at Souled Out for the WCW tag team titles but referee Randy Anderson is fired by Bischoff for stupid reasons (he wasn't assigned the referee for the match, Nick Patrick was but Patrick was out and Anderson was in the front row), and changed the titles. After Patrick is discovered that he got the tickets for free by the office, he's fired for accepting a gift which is against company policy. And this was BEFORE Russo was booking folks, if you can imagine this. The icing on the cake here is for Bischoff then to order the Steiners to hand back the belts to Hall and Nash
My head is already hurting trying to comprehend all of this really! And i haven't even gotten to the Jay Leno and Dennis Rodman years yet!
Syxx and Dean Malenko end up providing entertaining TV leading up to their match at Superbrawl though which is probably just as well because the crowd is snoring through Hogan and Piper at this stage. Buff Bagwell is still trying so hard to get over as a heel, but splitting up the American Males only served to have the crowd not give a crap about either of them. WCW once again, showcase the hell out of the likes of La Parka, Villano IV, Juventud Guerrera amongst others to build up to a six man at Superbrawl, Jarrett moves back to feuding with Mongo, and Benoit is back to feuding with Kevin Sullivan while the rest of the horsemen are left to rot.
This was about as far as i've gotten so far. I'm actually not really sure if i should stick with it or go back to RAW 95 though.
I'm watching the exact same Nitros at the moment from jan-feb 97. I have to agree that nWo Souled Out was one of the worst ppvs Ive ever seen apart from the ladder match.
The Piper-Hogan feud is just silly. Piper beats Hogan at Starrcade with a sleeper (exactly what the match was) but Hogan comes out on Nitro and says he beat Piper. Bischoff then destroys the tape of the match how no one will ever know that Piper beat Hogan even though people watched the match on ppv. I also found it silly when Piper brought out his son on one Nitro. Stupid stuff.
The Four Horsemen feud involving Jeff Jarrett is crap. Mene Gene interviews them at the stage every week and they basically just repeat themselves. On another note Steve "Mongo" McMichael is terrible in the ring.
The storyline were Syxx steals title belts is also a bit stupid.
There's three things I like from Nitro at this time.
1) Is the sting storyline. A bit confusing but if I was watching Nitro at the time id be intrigued by this storyline and couldn't wait to see what happens next.
2)Is the matches involving Rey, Eddie, Ultimo Dragon, Malenko etc. The matches are usually on the short side on Nitro but are still very good.
3)Is the DDP storyline. I'm actually enjoying this storyline and he does get a great pop when he gives Scott Hall the Diamond Cutter after putting on the nWo shirt.0 -
alan dunne 27 wrote: »They're some good write ups Shawn. I've only seen this thread now but i'll go back through it for other posts. I saw all them PPVs and RAWs through rose coloured glasses. I was about 10-12 and assumed that WWF was the only wrestling there was!
Cheers.
I'm actually gonna be taking a 2 week sabbatical from the internet soon, so i'll have watched a good bit of stuff to post up on this thread. I'm not doing it as religiously as i used to thanks to my interest in House, Heroes and MMA overtaking Pro Wrestling.
The RAW 95 one has been an absolute chore though, i won't deny that.0 -
ShawnRaven wrote: »WCW Nitro - January - February 1997
"It wasn't so much day to day business, it was more like day to day chaos"
Escaping the borefest that is RAW from 1995, i decided to skip ahead a few years and have a look at what the opposition had to offer. Now i hadn't watched a lot of Nitro prior to this, The entire of 95 and the first four months of 96 and to be honest, it was da sh*t back then to watch, primarily because you didn't know what was going to happen. One of the many reasons why Ted Turner was handing Vince McMahon his ass to him on a plate on a weekly basis. That and the fact that Vince was so flustered that none of his boneheaded ideas were working that he could no longer tell his arse from his elbow.
But Jesus Christ, did WCW drop the ball by the time 1997 rolled around or what? Every week was the same old garbage in a different arena. Some of the matches were still pretty decent to watch but the format was exactly the same. DiBiase, Nash, Hall and Bischoff coming out every week invading the commentary desk, boring us to death with NWO progaganda and hype, especially for it's abortion of a PPV Souled Out in January, with the only bright spot on the card being Syxx v Eddie Guerrero in a ladder match, with both guys stating in seperate interviews that they ended up hating the match years later.
WCW was just coming off the Starrcade PPV, which had Hogan v Piper in it's main event. WCW's boneheaded format for their main events at the time on PPV was to take a main event from nearly ten years earlier and have a rematch with the loser of the original going over, and that's exactly what happened here. They had Piper go over Hogan, despite Hogan having DiBiase in his corner. However this wasn't 1985, and after a couple of hip surgeries later, Piper was now a shell of who he was. The aftermath of this pretty much had Piper's win overturned by the NWO (don't ask!), and Piper was written out of the script and terminated from his contract, which Piper later took WCW to court for, but not before an embarrassing match at Superbrawl VII. Hogan would then go on to feud with Giant for Souled Out. Of course, this had already been done before too and as a result, nobody cared.
Meanwhile the likes of Eddie Guerrero, Ultimo Dragon, Dean Malenko and Rey Mysterio were winning the crowd over left right and centre in their matches. With Ultimo Dragon fresh off a win from Dean Malenko and Eddie Guerrero over DDP, who was also teasing a turn to the NWO. Unfortunately by the time Souled Out came along, it had been teased too many times to the point where nobody even cared anymore.
The Four Horsemen are around at the time with the lineup of Flair, Arn, Benoit, & Mongo, with Jeff Jarrett coming in and out trying to either steal Benoit's or Mongo's spot. Jarrett is probably the only one who went from WWE to WCW and somehow ended up worse off! Benoit is in and out of his feud with Kevin Sullivan also, as Sullivan ends up bringing Jacqueline into WCW. When Benoit isn't feuding with him, he's having decent enough matches with Jarrett. Nothing too earth shattering or anything, but watchable TV.
Steiners are still around as a team here, but that's on the verge of cracking. They defeat Hall & Nash at Souled Out for the WCW tag team titles but referee Randy Anderson is fired by Bischoff for stupid reasons (he wasn't assigned the referee for the match, Nick Patrick was but Patrick was out and Anderson was in the front row), and changed the titles. After Patrick is discovered that he got the tickets for free by the office, he's fired for accepting a gift which is against company policy. And this was BEFORE Russo was booking folks, if you can imagine this. The icing on the cake here is for Bischoff then to order the Steiners to hand back the belts to Hall and Nash
My head is already hurting trying to comprehend all of this really! And i haven't even gotten to the Jay Leno and Dennis Rodman years yet!
Syxx and Dean Malenko end up providing entertaining TV leading up to their match at Superbrawl though which is probably just as well because the crowd is snoring through Hogan and Piper at this stage. Buff Bagwell is still trying so hard to get over as a heel, but splitting up the American Males only served to have the crowd not give a crap about either of them. WCW once again, showcase the hell out of the likes of La Parka, Villano IV, Juventud Guerrera amongst others to build up to a six man at Superbrawl, Jarrett moves back to feuding with Mongo, and Benoit is back to feuding with Kevin Sullivan while the rest of the horsemen are left to rot.
This was about as far as i've gotten so far. I'm actually not really sure if i should stick with it or go back to RAW 95 though.
I liked this write up. But Im surprised the elevation of DDP didnt make the cut.
I need to rewatch that Ladder match as I remember it being ****e. I dont think either man liked it either.
Im guessing you are hating hearing the NWO theme at this stage. It was really crappy that your only reprieve from them (the crusiers) only served as a backdrop for Tony & Co to talk about the NWO.
The booking really worked against the Steiners, Horseman & Piper. This very clear rewatching it.Deleted User wrote: »3)Is the DDP storyline. I'm actually enjoying this storyline and he does get a great pop when he gives Scott Hall the Diamond Cutter after putting on the nWo shirt.
Great anglePost edited by Boards.ie: Mike on0 -
I liked this write up. But Im surprised the elevation of DDP didnt make the cut.
I'm saving that one for March-AprilI need to rewatch that Ladder match as I remember it being ****e. I dont think either man liked it either.
Yeah you said before you didn't rate it. They didn't like it either. I wasn't trying to overpraise it though. I was using it as a comparison to the rest of the card, which was an abortion for all intents and purposes, and that was the brighter spot on the card, regardless of how good or bad the match was.Im guessing you are hating hearing the NWO theme at this stage. It was really crappy that your only reprieve from them (the crusiers) only served as a backdrop for Tony & Co to talk about the NWO.
The NWO wore out it's welcome by this stage, and the bookers knew it as well which is why they tried splitting em into the Wolfpac and Hollywood as it wasn't winning any fans over, nor was it winning over anyone backstage. However it did sell merch, to me, it was the only reason the NWO lasted as long as it did. But by February 1997, it got very boring.The booking really worked against the Steiners, Horseman & Piper. This very clear rewatching it.
I think the Steiners were as good as done as a tag team by this point anyway, The Horsemen were only brought back in by Bischoff as a nail in Vince's coffin because the NWO sure as hell weren't doing that by themselves (regardless of what marks out there choose to believe), and I'm not sure what they could have done with Piper after the angle with Hogan? They basically rehashed a 12 year old angle with one of the biggest star of the company, the same company that was a revolving door for Flair at the time so putting Piper against him next wouldn't have worked.
Piper knew it as well. The company was a mess.0 -
Got the best of Necro Butcher vol 1+2 so ive been watching that.Some very entertaining matches with some pretty mental spots.Is Butcher the stiffest worker in the business today?
And before anyone jumps on me and goes on a little rant about how Necro is nothing but a spot monkey and yadda yadda yadda,I know,but I find this variety of wrestling a damn sight more enjoyable than virtually anything WWE have produced over the last 2 years or so.0 -
A "spot monkey" ? Did you make that one up yrself or has that been doing the internet rounds ?0
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To be fair, he didn't say he was a spot monkey, he said "before anyone jumps on him and calls Necro a spot monkey", which would imply that it's been doing the rounds for years.
No more 5am finishes for you Alan, it's affecting your train of thought.0
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