Loss
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Everything posted by Loss
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Bischoff has been put on bathroom detail. These skits are nauseating and horrible and overdone. Plus, again, I hate the way WCW shoots them. A cameraman is just hanging out in the bathroom. Larry Zbyszko's sudden switch flip to freaking out after rambling on with usual windbag analogies is awful. The payoff to this was Bischoff giving Hogan bleach to throw in Mongo's eyes later in the evening, who we would never see again. -
Again, WCW with the awful point-of-view. The payoff comes at SuperBrawl, but in the meantime, she's seducing a cameraman and it's pretty stupid. We later learn that the camera point of view was supposed to represent a specific person, but this is just lousy. I will add though that even I can admit Torrie Wilson looked great early on. In fact, she looks much better than she did after she got into WWE.
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Hulk Hogan wants Brian Adams to take over the black-and-white guys of the NWO. Then he separately tells Stevie Ray and Vincent the same in later vignettes. This is far worse than the WWF vignettes with the unexplained camera, because WCW has no concept of point of view when they shoot vignettes. Are we to assume no one in the NWO is watching the show that they are on?
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Raven's mom begs Kanyon to stay with Scott since she has to leave for a board meeting. Raven reveals that he's been acting depressed in order to annoy his mom, but actually enjoys living the high life. They end up going shopping for clothes and Kanyon gets a makeover in a skit Hulk Hogan apparently called the dumbest thing he'd ever seen. That's rich coming from the Hulkster, but this was definitely Wrestlecrap worthy.
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The matwork in the opening minutes of this is absolutely fantastic - as good pro-style matwork as you're likely to see anywhere in wrestling at this point. The match takes a turn I don't expect when blood starts spewing on the white section of Sasuke's mask from his nose, but I'm willing to see what they do with that, as a sportsman's wrestling match just took a violent turn. Then Sasuke puts Tokyo on a table and I expect to really hate the spot and for the match to nosedive, but it doesn't, because first, the struggle to get Tokyo in position for that table spot is so drawn out and dramatic that the end justifies the means and second, because the table doesn't break, which makes it a unique move within the context of the time. I'm not saying I'm crazy about them doing that spot, but if they were going to do it, they executed it in just about the best way they possibly could. From there, the match escalates into a series of bombs dropped and falls attempted and I expect to not like that because it feels like a sudden sharp turn from the type of match they were building, but I do and it works. I love this match because I feel like they're fucking with me. They teeter on the edge of falling apart for the entire match and never cross the line. But in a weird way, they have a better or at least more interesting match by pushing that idea as far as it can go. Tokyo wrestling as Sasuke's equal right out of the gate feels like a missed opportunity to create a long-term rivalry, but that doesn't seem to be something they are pursuing anyway. This isn't a MOTYC for me but it was a hell of a rollercoaster. Someone should explain the post-match angle involving Crazy Max and Sasuke to me, but they are laughing in his face about something before attacking him. The beatdown looks great. Taka Michinoku shows up in street clothes and makes the save. I'm guessing the mic work is about Taka telling Sasuke he'll see him later and will be challenging for the belt, but I may be off on that. Ultimo comes in to celebrate Sasuke's title victory and he and Tokyo have a sportsman-like post-match celebration. They hoist Tokyo on their shoulders like he's the one who won the match. Wow, early Toryumon is interesting stuff.
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Randy Hales introduces a taped promo from Jim Cornette. Cornette has the SMW backdrop in what I'm guessing is his home office. Corny hates Bruce Pritchard and supports Hales in his feud. He also has words for Brandon Baxter. He'll be joining Hales on 2/12 as his tag team partner, and Brandon Baxter will have a mystery partner. Meanwhile, Brandon Baxter shows a taped promo of Michael Hayes announcing that he's returning to Memphis to team with him. Well, Power Pro suddenly interests me, if only because we'll hopefully get a bunch of Hayes promos. This is mostly old Freebird catchphrases, but it turns out to be great, and I *LOVED* this because it seemed like he'd been sitting on this promo for five years just aching to get it out of his system.
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I'm getting bored with this feud. Lawler is on his way to cutting a great promo until Sean Stasiak interrupts him from a different part of the studio. I hate Power Pro doing all of these angles not in front of the studio audience. It feels like Vince Russo copying and the switch in camera angles is always jarring. Lawler goes after Stasiak and tries to throw him off the top of a balcony, but Power Pro officials restrain him. A shame, because he was cutting his first strong promo in a long time.
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I realize after posting that that Hogan is really more of the symbolic face of a wrestling philosophy I don't particularly care for than he is anything else. It's possible some of the cross to bear belongs to Vince McMahon more than it does Hulk Hogan, because Vince was the guy who had that vision. I can't and won't deny his success, but it's really difficult for me to separate Hogan from Vince. Without Hogan, Vince doesn't have his initial success. Without Vince, I think Hogan would have just been a wrestling star in the long run. Maybe a wildly popular one, but a wrestling star nonetheless, like Flair or Dusty or the Road Warriors. The promotional machine backing Hogan was so integral to his act that it's hard for me to separate the two.
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I'm willing to give Hogan his due for a lot of things, but he is pretty much the sole reason someone will always chime into a discussion about ring work by making it more about drawing money or being a superstar. I realize that's not his fault personally, but I do feel like he dumbed down wrestling in many ways and made it too cartoonish and stupid. He was wildly successful and he's headed some of the biggest runs any wrestling companies have ever had, but I would argue that neanderthals like Hogan keep just as many would-be fans away (because they see roided up wrestlers screaming at each other and think that's all that wrestling is) as it does draw them in. Give the same promotional machine, consistent booking, television production, favorable/meticulous match construction by a team of agents and merchandising savvy to pump up good in-ring work, Southern-style wrestling and stars who seem like actual real people. Would it work? Maybe, maybe not, but because of dudes like Hogan, we will probably never know. And while I like him way more than I did at one time, the wrestling fan in me who just likes what he likes and makes no attempts to step outside of that at all will always hold that against him. His success is the reason wrestling companies try to build around guys like Roman Reigns with 100% faith instead of guys like Daniel Bryan with 100% faith. So yeah, he has some good qualities, but fuck him too.
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Spotfests are best when they are able to get the cool stuff over. Moving on too soon (or not moving on soon enough, for that matter) can break the entire rhythm the match has going and take something away from it. I think doing a great spotfest-type match takes more than just athleticism. It also requires timing and a sense of peaks and valleys. I think that's the big difference between the good ones and bad ones. There have been too many good balls-out moves-based matches to write them off completely, and I totally agree with Tim's first post. The cool thing about wrestling is that there are so many ways to do it that work. I have yet to meet a wrestling fan that doesn't like Michinoku Pro glory days stuff, and rightfully so.
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I wouldn't be surprised at all if that's the reason Kofi hasn't been cut when other guys at his level have been. Also, it's possible that happened around the time he feuded with Orton (which did get over at the time, but was dropped quickly for some reason).
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This got better as it went along, and I love Negro Casas as more of a babyface. Really great fire and energy. Santo took more of a backseat in this, but I don't want to be too critical of that, because there may have been some storyline reason why that happened. Scorpio was probably good, but something was off about him. He's not a very smooth wrestler. This was a good effort but I didn't love it. I was hoping to love it. Hopefully lucha libre from 1999 starts connecting with me more as the year goes on.
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Leave it to Toshie Uematsu to keep showing up in an annual, out of nowhere great match. This is the third year in a row that has happened. This is an awesome match with lots of tremendous matwork and aggression, and a really nice demonstration of what Satomura was all about. But I don't want to give Satomura all the credit, as Toshie has shown her versatility in these three matches, all of which have been worked pretty differently. Here, she goes hold for hold with Satomura and does a great job keeping up with her while also selling the knee attack really well.
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A series of vignettes on location in Texas. Patterson and Brisco dress like Texas stereotypes and look hilarious. Brisco says he's been beating up Texans all his life in a hilarious moment. Patterson tells a woman in his best horrible Texan accent he looks prettier than a spotted puppy and I can't stop laughing. Vince plays it straight and doesn't understand why people just going around from place to place being Vince doesn't get him everything he wants. Vince hates brisket. Brisco is covered in BBQ sauce and says "This is Mr. McMahon from Greenwich, CT!" The waitress dumps food on him for being a jerk. Vince makes clear his plan to provoke Austin into hitting him so the PPV match is off and then the Stooges can jump him. They seem unsure of this little plan. Patterson and Brisco are a riot! Vince thinks he's found Austin but he ends up finding another guy with a bald head and his back turned, and he has a gun! Finally, Vince finds Austin in a bar and gets in his face and Austin isn't taking the bait, but cuts a promo on Vince anyway. Vince keeps calling him a chickenshit. Austin leaves Vince and friends to the other angry bar patrons. Good stuff. I don't want to see on location stuff every week, but it seems like we never get it at all now.
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Luger makes fun of Konnan and Rey having the nerve to challenge him and Nash to a match. They want Rey's mask on the line against the hair of both Luger and Nash. Holy fuck if that isn't a case where Nash and Luger should have done the job and made huge stars out of Rey and Konnan. They decide to accept the match but it will be Liz's hair on the line instead. Liz is shocked by this but Luger and Nash promise they have her covered. Nash's booking run so far is about setting up interesting premises and not following up on them properly. Nash and Luger aren't taking this match seriously at all, which would be pitch perfect if they were going in to do the job.
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Luger is much better in this role, but Liz shouldn't be put in a position to talk. They laugh about her actions the night of the Fingerpoke of Doom getting Goldberg out of the building. Luger has a slide listing Goldberg's strengths. That's a feud we didn't get until 2000 when Lex was useless.
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Flair's new plan for Bischoff is to put him in an employee dunking booth. Interesting tactic since it's clearly cold outside, as you can see their breath when talking. Bischoff is rightfully concerned that he'll get pneumonia. Flair gets in a bunch of references to things Bischoff made him do through the years which are inside but not to the point that none of this makes sense. ("Remember when you sent me to do the radio show in South Dakota?") I sort of like that in this context. JJ takes the first shot and Bischoff goes in the water for the first time. La Parka is hilariously there cheering JJ Dillon on. Now it's Bobby Heenan's turn. He wants to hand the balls to Bischoff so no one else can dunk him, but he slips on the wet ground and dunks him by accident. Heenan has lost his penchant for physical comedy. The Horsemen are out next. Bischoff vows that he will have the last laugh. Bischoff shivers and asks Flair where David is.
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January: #1 - Yuki Ishikawa & Alexander Otsuka vs Daisuke Ikeda & Mohammed Yone (BattlARTS 01/12/99) ****3/4 #2 - Mitsuharu Misawa vs Toshiaki Kawada (AJPW 01/22/99) ****1/2 #3 - Hayabusa & Jinsei Shinzaki vs Tamon Honda & Jun Izumida (AJPW 01/16/99) ****1/2 #4 - Mr. Gannosuke vs Hisakatsu Oya (FMW 01/05/99) ****1/4 #5 - Yoshinari Ogawa vs Masahito Kakihara (AJPW 01/15/99) ****1/4 #6 - Chikayo Nagashima vs Meiko Satomura (GAEA 01/08/99) ****1/4 #7 - Hardy Boys vs Serial Thrillaz (OMEGA 01/29/99) ****1/4 #8 - Magnum Tokyo, Dragon Kid & SAITO vs Shiima Nobunaga, Judo Suwa & Sumo Fuji (Toryumon 01/31/99) ****1/4 #9 - Naohiro Hoshikawa, Masato Yakushiji & Masaru Seno vs Shiima Nobunaga, Judo Suwa & Sumo Fuji (Michinoku Pro 01/10/99) **** #10 - Kenta Kobashi & Jun Akiyama vs Toshiaki Kawada & Akira Taue (AJPW 01/07/99) **** #11 - Mariko Yoshida vs Mika Akino (ARSION 01/17/99) **** #12 - Volk Han vs Hiromitsu Kanehara (RINGS 01/23/99) **** #13 - Sabu vs One Man Gang (ECW 01/23/99) ***3/4 #14 - Super Delphin & Gran Naniwa vs Naohiro Hoshikawa & Masato Yakushiji (Michinoku Pro 01/13/99) ***1/2 #15 - Mike Modest vs Christopher Daniels (APW 01/15/99) ***1/2 #16 - Hayabusa vs Tetsuhiro Kuroda (FMW 01/05/99) ***1/2 #17 - Bam Bam Bigelow vs Scott Hall (WCW Monday Nitro 01/25/99) ***1/4 #18 - Hiroyoshi Tenzan & Satoshi Kojima vs Genichiro Tenryu & Shiro Koshinaka (NJPW 01/04/99) *** #19 - The Rock vs Mankind (WWF Royal Rumble 01/24/99) *** #20 - The Rock vs Mankind (WWF Halftime Heat 01/31/99) *** #21 - Fit Finlay & Dave Taylor vs Disorderly Conduct (WCW Saturday Night 01/09/99) #22 - Atlantis, Emilio Charles Jr. & Felino vs Black Warrior, Blue Panther & Dr. Wagner Jr. (CMLL 01/22/99) #23 - Sid vs Skull Von Krush (ECW House Party 01/16/99) #24 - Jerry Lawler vs Brian Christopher (PPW TV 01/02/99) #25 - Jerry Lawler vs Sean Stasiak (PPW TV 01/30/99)
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Vince calls this match as Mr. McMahon and wow has his voice been missed at the booth. Vince loved putting Foley in his new concept matches. WWE should really do a halftime show every year. This was an excellent and very intense brawl before the sports entertainment production got carried away. When the action is filmed up close like this and you can hear the wrestlers, everything seems so much more physical. Mick takes a crazy rolling bump down the steps. They end up brawling into the building kitchen and Rock talks trash, which is pretty hilarious. Then he burns Mankind on the oven and asks him if he wants to smell what The Rock is cookin'. Rock is all about getting himself over match be damned, but that's probably the best choice considering the novelty of this. Mankind wins the title after putting Rock under a crate on a forklift (check out those camera angles!) and then pins him. As wacky as this is, it certainly works on its own terms and I have to give them credit for doing something very ballsy and different. I didn't hate it. I'm surprised.
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This is an ambitious and admirable effort from guys who seem much better than their experience level. I give them credit for doing an exciting match that held the crowd's attention for over 35 minutes. I never got bored watching this, and I think that's a major accomplishment when this had the potential to fall apart. This would compare favorably to most junior multi-mans of the 90s except the very, very best Michinoku Pro matches. I don't have a ton to say about this, but I will give them credit for surpassing expectations and doing something really good. It probably ran a little long, but I'll forgive that. It was an elimination match after all.