flyonthewall2983

Is it WWE's book?

I heard the new Andre book is pretty good. It's written by one of the producers of the HBO doc on him from a few years back.

They just put up a video on Sting, taken from backstage footage of him at Slamboree 95. Just about to watch it, but this is going deep into WCW archives which is interesting for them to do at this point.

The AWA doc that is on the Network from 2006-7 shows Hogan's rise as a babyface and shows that Hulkamania pretty much started in the Midwest. The thing Vince can claim is that his father came up with the name. The ESPN Flair film is mostly about his personal life with the Reader's Digest version of his career to pad it out. They wouldn't need to get Arn for such a thing since they surely have tons of interviews with him for past programs anyway.

I wonder what would have happened if they had more time to change up this match, if they could have gotten Hogan in the Mr. Perfect spot. It could have been a good continuation of his quasi-angle with Flair before leaving earlier that year, and working with a new promising character like Razor could have given him a bit more shine then if it was a babyface Mr. Perfect coming back.

Worth a watch

I'm really interested in just how much backstage stuff they have. Not just recently but going back to the 90's when they would film stuff at MSG, or the behind the scenes stuff at WrestleMania 9. It's so funny I remember someone on reddit just randomly asking for the Network to put up the Yokozuna slam challenge on that aircraft carrier and maybe even the same day the Network announced they were putting up a three hour doc on the Lex Express.

To do that format on individual careers, as opposed to specific eras, would be great. They not only have the footage of entire careers, but by now have done tons of interviews with. All just a matter of doing some editing and maybe new interviews. Guys like Flair and Hogan are the obvious choices, but surely it could apply to a few others like Shawn or Bret as well.

They must have liked working each other enough to have such a more even finish, since they would have a feud nobody remembers at the end of 1992, that took many direct cues from Martel's program with Jake Roberts. The lull in the matches between the two main events are pretty obvious now. I guess it was charitable to such a large crowd to have essentially a long piss break.

There's probably a lot more to this than meets the eye but I don't understand why they just didn't put the belts on the Disasters in the first place, and kept them heels. I am purely guessing that Dibiase wanted to work tag team instead of singles to lighten his load, and that a team with him and Rotunda makes perfect sense because of the gimmicks. Still, Earthquake and Typhoon as dominant heel tag team champs would have been more fun to watch.

Who was the bigger heel in The Last Dance, MJ or Jerry Krause?

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For someone supporting such things I find abhorrent, he seems to me to be a very tolerant person, to have stayed quiet this long. If it's all just in the shirts he wears or subtle tweets like that then I'm good with it. By virtue of the fact he has worked with people of different ethnicities, sexualities, and other social status and almost no one has a bad thing to say about him whatever way he swings politically doesn't matter in the face of that. I'm the one person in my family who doesn't support those views myself so I know all what it means to break bread with "enemies". It is hard not to be cynical of the "rah-rah" stuff and being aware of how much of Vince's Kool-Aid has been imbibed by him. Then again that is a major factor in having fueled his performance and competitive drive. Same with Shawn, Triple H, and plenty of others who came after them too. It's at the heart of the company's success, something that might be lost in all the flash and bang (not to mention "creative") they do in presenting shows like WrestleMania.

Prophetic

Did Flair ever work the UK or anywhere else in Europe before going to the WWF?

First episode of the Undertaker doc went up yesterday. I forgot how awesome the WM 33 set looked. I was hoping this would be more retrospective, but all the backstage stuff and shots of him joking around with the other talent and legends was cool too.

Did he make bail?

He was off of their programming but he was still under contract. More or less an extended vacation for Hulk while he filmed Mr. Nanny. I'm sure part of it had to do with the steroid scandals, and the company not flogging around their biggest name who made a fool of himself on national television the year before. Hindsight being what it is, they should have brought him back for Survivor Series to replace Warrior, but they were under such a time crunch for that it's understandable they might not have been able to get him and that's possibly when the talks started to bring him back the following February.

Jordan saying he'd not want to be a role model if he had it to do over again is refreshing to hear. I like that the last two episodes put his worth in pop culture under the microscope a little bit, counterbalanced by the gambling and the overall competitive alpha-male behavior he displayed on the court and to his own team as well. I have a weird respect for Jerry Krause. He had almost a tribal commitment to the Bulls as a corporate entity rather than a sports franchise. Phil Jackson is the most interesting one of the bunch. An authority figure who also embodied so much of the 60's counter-culture back in the day, a Buddhist known for losing his temper, and just a fascinating dude.

I wonder if WWE puts a spin on Roman leaving at all, or if they just forget he ever existed. This isn't a company above being petty about such things, but given the implications as far as his health it would be good for them in the court of public opinion if they just forgot him, instead of making small attempts at humor of which he is the butt of the joke. Bringing up the difficulties in getting him over would only reflect on how badly they did that. As far as Hollywood goes for either him or Becky, I could see it happening. If Lynch already has training then with the right people/material she could make a niche for herself. And yeah, if Roman is in with Sandler then he'll probably find steady work, if not with Happy Madison consistently then other production companies.

This is probably the heart of the matter when it comes to WWE and where it is right now. While he was taking over the world, and credibly destroying regional competition and making his company so huge while still being privately owned, he was teaching his son along the way. Any doubt I ever had about the potential of Shane being given the key to the kingdom one day was quelled when I watched Arnold Skaaland's Hall of Fame speech from 1994. Mere weeks before the high potential of facing federal prison time, a few points of that speech were squarely centered around Shane being the unquestioned heir to what was even then on shaky ground. His daughter learned while there was only WCW left to vanquish (which ended up being a suicide anyway). Shane saw his father deal more with the outside world, while Stephanie learned from a man increasingly living inside his own bubble. If the Network and PPVs are potentially going to be in other hands, that could be the first loose strand to be picked at before the possibility of being sold off is a more tangible possibility.