Marty

Actually the first thing I thought of was the Smackdown or whatever gameit was road to wrestlemania storyline All Stars? I think the Streak storyline on SvR was the 2011 game. Somehow, I doubt this storyline will be as good. But it would be awesome if Punk fought a bunch of druids in a darkened, empty arena. Favourite Undertaker storyline in a SvR video was in 2006, when Eddie Guerrero stole the urn and controlled it.

The advertisement on last night’s RAW for the Bret Hart Dungeon Collection was odd. Compare it with the previous two releases: Best Of RAW And Smackdown 2012: “Rock Concert. Brock’s return. And many more. Experience the best in this collection.” Best Of Nitro Vol. 2: “Hogan. Flair. Sting. Goldberg. DDP. Savage. Nash. And many more. Relive more of the best of Nitro in this collection!” Bret Hart Dungeon Collection: “Watch this set because Sheamus watches it in his spare time.”

With Rock-Cena, HHH-Brock and Taker-Punk, it feels like WWE is really going to the next level of taking the safe route in more ways than one. I'll still watch the show, but count me in the group that feels it's very blah. Still a few weeks to go, but the main appeal for me is if the New York weather gets so cold that everyone will be wrestling in track suits or jeans or hoodies that will sure to be unlockable content in WWE 2K14.

I have no idea if this is happening elsewhere, but The Score in Canada, after Big Show's interview, seemed to decide, "To heck with Smackdown, let's show this Rockers-POP match instead!" Bizarre...but I'm not complaining.

I like Mark Henry enough that I think he deserves better than the opening match.

I think part of it is Dutch's scripts make him look more like a street corner activist (e.g. PETA or anti-abortion) who would come across more as annoying at most than as someone who's a bad person. The type of activist that, depending on what your feelings are, you would try to walk by quickly from if you're on the street rather than listen to them. If they're serious about making this work (which is debatable, for as good as Dutch has been here (Swagger hasn't been bad either), this feels like another gimmick booked to amuse Vince), they need to stress that Swagger and Zeb are bad people with a bad message. I like the idea of bringing back Jimmy Golden as Swagger Sr. Hell, I'd have him come out in fatigues, ready to "blow away those people taking advange of our motherland". For the even more absurd, bring back Tennessee Lee! He can come out with doctored photos of people like Mysterio and Sin Cara "taking advantage of Tennessee Lee by living tax-free by mowing his lawn." Zeb: "And how much are you paying them?" Lee: "An excrutiating $2 an hour." Zeb: "You poor man! And those bastards!" The roster is also diverse enough to show they're bad people too. You can even have them go after people for bullshit reasons, like saying a vegan like Daniel Bryan is the reason our American meat factories are losing money, or some such shit. Of course, it's PG WWE and I don't know how well it would be executed in that environment. Then again, this still feels like something Vince imagined during Linda's concession speech or something.

The only thing that bothers me about Henry being temporarily programmed versus Khali is that he already beat Khali cleanly. I understand part of it is Khali avenging Hornswoggle, but then again, the focus seems to be Henry attacking Khali for having a good time most of the time and not being a monster, judging from last night. Thing is, we've already seen that plot with Jinder Mahal in Henry's role. I also don't like how the E has diluted Henry's trash talking. To me, the great thing about Henry's trash talking in the past is how all the stuff he'd say was different, but fit the situation. Now, it's "THAT'S WHAT I DO!" each time. Henry does it well, but I already miss him mixing it up verbally.

HIAC 2010 (Kane-Taker) It was also the highest booked title (for lack of a better term) at TLC 2010 (Edge-Rey-Kane-ADR) but the Cena-Barrett chairs match closed the show.

Someone on DVDVR mentioned this, but fuck, WWE has a great collection of heels right now.

Dutch's promo was great. Strongly helps Swagger's new act, too.

It's funny, just before he attacked Hornswoggle, I told my wife, "If he hits WSS on Swoggle, he'll get cheers." He prolly should've kidnapped Natalya to end the segment just because.

Seconded. Fun thread, cheers for all this El-P.

It's good for all copies of the book. I got mine at Chapters in Canada, and the offer is the same.

There a good chunk of photos. I have a hard copy and I think a hard copy is worth a look. Slightly biased though, I'm in Ottawa, which is basically an extension of the Montreal territory.

I don't think Bruno fell for it. He was lying his way through the various pieces as well, talking about how he's watching the show a lot and how cleaned up the WWE is now. The WWE wanted Bruno in. Trip took the lead on it, and played nice. Bruno set a price. Vince agreed to the price. Bruno and Trip are playing nice. Yeah, I've heard a couple Bruno interviews that convinced me he's not some old guy who can get the wool pulled over him easily. Still comes across pretty sharp to me, and I'm guessing he knew what he was doing.

Any reliable footage of Yvon Robert and Whipper Billy Watson?

Jerry has a point about younger fans possibly not knowing who Bruno is, but things like HHH being the bridge mender between Bruno and WWE, as well as ESPN covering it, would well overshadow any factor going against Bruno headlining.

Simply put, this place is -- BY FAR -- the best place I've seen for wrestling discussion ever. A huge credit goes to Loss, Will, Dylan and anyone else directly involved with the running of this board. There are also so many guys who've posted at places like DVDVR, tOA, and others that I continue to enjoy reading, as well as relatively newer posters. This place has also allowed for a mix of posters, in terms of level of fandom, viewing experience, age, etc. I enjoy reading Loss' defense of Flair as much as I enjoy TomK's bee-keeping analogies as well as Johnny's overall fandom. It's everything I enjoy about wrestling mixed into one place. I also like the expanded layouts. The really amazing part is that there's potentially room for more in the future given the material available, but the time for greater expansion will come when it does. I've thanked and congratulated Loss in private, but everyone that has a strong amount of involvement deserves it too. I probably mainly lurk here more than anything, but I learn a lot too. No complaints about this place whatsoever and, again, cheers to Loss, Will and anyone else involved on some level.

Henry's return was badass. On SD this week, they need to have take out Great Khali for his spot at EC. It'd set up Mania nicely.

Lanny Poffo's also stated time and again that Randy wanted the Poffo family (Randy, Lanny and Angelo) all inducted like the Von Erichs. It makes me wonder if this year wouldn't be a bad time to do that, if they come to an agreement of course. In the past, if Savage was alive and accepting/speaking, it would be a main event induction, but Lanny? Not so much (hell, Lanny himself says this). However, the Poffo family induction wouldn't be a bad midcard induction with this HOF class being as stacked as it already is. After Bruno being confirmed yesterday, I read a great line elsewhere: If Ole ever got the call and there was a deal that he accepted, it's a sign that Vince's health is shot.

Ole Anderson once claimed that Ric Flair never got over unless he was with someone else, or with a group of people. I don't necessarily agree with that argument of Flair (especially considering the builds for Starrcade '83 and '93), but I think it's a valid criticism of HHH, and also something that may factor into, as you stated, his constant changing of characters, since a group of guys can only stay over and fresh for so long, particularly in the Crash TV era.

It never ceases to amaze me how many people will spend endless amounts of time bitching about a wrestling product, but because it's wrestling on TV they can't stay away. What they CAN do, however, is decide not buy PPVs. See: TNA. May be funnier than the cartoon: At least it wasn't one of Will's comps that he broke in anger.

Morrison and Benjamin teaches young guys how to work is the most unintentionally funny thing I've heard in a while.

Best Lawler match in the WWF I've seen was probably this one: http://www.thehistoryofwwe.com/93.htm To me, it was some really good heel work by Lawler, but Owen was also quite game too, as it was arguably his best WWF babyface work. Good match/angle to build the Bret-Jerry feud. Agreed about the Bret matches. I don't think they were good. In fact, if you watch the '95 PPV ones back to back, you may wind up wanting to gouge your eyes out. I can't think of too many PPV matches that Jerry was in that might be considered good. I recall enjoying the Tazz one at SS2000, but it's been forever since I've seen it.

Jeremy Piven and David Arquette were heel guest hosts. Morton Downey Jr. was obviously a heel at WM5. Can we consider Thea Vidale a heel too?