El-P

I thought Teddy Hart was ridiculous, both in look and work. Indierrific spotfu is probably the worst kind of pro-wrestling to me. PPV 61 At least, the two main events delivered, in their own way. Raven vs Shane Douglas in a hair vs hair match was a total veteran minimalistic main event, Douglas being obviously far from his own self physically. It shows whenever he has to bump or do something requiring any speed, so Raven’s offense which is never the strongest doesn’t look that great here. On the other hand, Douglas is a master in getting heat and antagonizing the crowd, which he does in spades. So they don’t do much but make it mean something and managed to get some cool moments like Raven making fans hold a chair for him to bust Douglas, or Shane showing Raven’s blood on his hands to a girl at ringside. And then, well, Dougals pukes in the ring. He puuuuuuuukes ! Yep, not in ring-shape anymore. And then the match kinda goes into stupidity with the tables and run-ins of both factions and finally the lights going out to reveal : the comeback of Sabu ! Fuck. It’s Vampiro. Damn. He looks all Muta-esque and creepy, but he still sucks, as showed by the horrendous, sub-Onita DDT he gives to Raven. The post-match hair cutting was really good though, with Douglas holding a mirror so Raven has to watch his own humiliation. Don West and particulary Tenay totally overselling it was fucking hilarious. AJ Styles vs Jerry Lynn was short, but excellent for what it was. These two were the MVP’s of 2002, hell, they were the only thing worth watching the promotion in 2002, and AJ is even better now. Lynn bleeds a gusher which was a dubious decision considering the main event which had double blood to come. Still great chemistry though, and Trinity is a good working valet. The only other fun match of the show was a casket match, with the casket inside the ring so it can be used as a weapon, between D-Lo Brown & Sonny Siaki. Ok, it’s a ridiculous WCW 00-like Nitro match, but it was dynamic enough and the casket inside the ring prevents a shitty WWF-like match with « rolling people on the apron » spots. And the debut of « He-was-Jamal-of-3-Minutes-Warning-in-WWE-fame ». Just give these guys fucking names already, this WWE fetish is exactly what made this company a joke from the get go. X-division guys have a 6-men spotfest which wasn’t good. Eric Young debuted and bumped on a phantom dropkick, nice idiotic spot that exposed how much these guys work like robots instead of reacting organically. Frankie Kazarian just forgot about the match to hit on a blonde at ringside. Well, I guess there are no babyface in the X-div anymore, and Juvy hasn’t been able to reign these guys at all, on the contrary he’s just doing the same spotty thoughtless style. A pretty poor N°1 contender match between four teams. Only one pinfall, which is always a recipe for crappy matches. So 3 Live Kru are the N°1 contenders now. Not that I wanted to see that feud, but the whole minority against racist Harris Boys has been completely forgotten, 3 Live Kru are just happy-go-lucky now. They’re like a Benetton commercial. And Kid Kash is seemingly feuding with Terry Taylor who screwed up his balls shot. Piper showing up to ramble like an irrelevant old guy, which he was. He can’t even catch the hard cam. Russo, Dusty, whatever. Dusty once in a while is cool. Dusty all the time is quickly tiring. Jeff Jarrett is beating up Chris Daniels minions now. Oh man, we don’t need another evil preacher gimmick with « mind control » for fuck’s sake. Tenay & West already dropped the "mind control" phrase about Jim Mitchell, Raven, Kid Kash... Why is that every Jarrett feud is the worst ? He hasn't been very good himself, he doesn't need shitty angles to boot. 2003/09/17 AJ Styles vs Jerry Lynn 2003/09/17 Raven vs Shane Douglas

Yeah, that one too. It's crazy.

The jokes write themselves.

Rudy Charles, TNA referee. Terrible. Bad positioning, positively distracting, awful at being distracted and looking away. No idea if he improved, but in 2003, this guy was the shits.

PPV 60 « You should give up when you get to the X Cup Tournament in September 2003. » I should have listened. Easily the most boring, clusterfucky show of all. Stage 1 : A godawul opener with Mad Mickey vs Lazz. No idea what the fuck Lazz is supposed to be. Dressed as a woman with odd facepaint, does homoerotic spots that are supposed to be comedic. Fast forward. I don’t want to see either of these two ever again. Stage 2 : The Super X Cup aka the shittiest Super J Cup ever. A tournament of eight guys in about one hour. A bunch of Nitro cruiserweight quickies at best (Nosawa vs Juvy / Lynn vs Sabin) awful indierrific wankfest with contrived moves, stunts, no-transition and shit selling (everything else). First look at Teddy Hart. Hope I won’t see him ever again, his match with other spotmonkey Jonny Storm was embarrassing. Kazarian is extremely annoying. Shane & Sabin have the most potential, but even the final of Sabin vs Juventud, which was the best match of all for a while, was still sloppy with no psychology at all and after an horrible Eddielenko sequence just went straight down the sewer when, after being dropped right on his head and kicking out of it, Sabin got back on offense like nothing happened because it was his turn to do a finisher. And a kick-out from Juvy. Rince, repeat. Total false epic. I gotta state again how terrible Rudy Charles is as a referee, he’s downright distracting at times. Juvy wins, whatever. Don’t do that again, please. Micheal Shane got beat in the first round, despite being the champ. Brillant booking too. Stage 3 : Well, that Wargames-like match wasn’t a good idea after all. One cage only, too much people and the weapons inside turned it into a Gangstas vs Public Enemy match circa 1995. Total clusterfuck, got boring quick as soon as the ring got saturated. Jarrett wins. Heels cut Raven’s hair. And a Interrogators segment with « The red shirt security guys », which are bad guys. How fucking exciting as character. The red shirt security guys. Feel the money dropping. Can’t wait to see a bunch of matches with The red shirt security guys. The X tournament could have been watchable if not for indy spotwank matches all over, and the final was almost good. Juvy has regressed a lot as a worker. The cage match was a complete mess.

Yeah, his promos and interactions were so good in WCW and TNA. I mean, so damn good.

That's the old mentality of "He didn't really love da buziness" that painted Lex Luger or Goldberg in a bad light. Yeah, that Goldberg guy who is a militant for animal rights surely deserves shit for not loving da buziness like those sleazebags who drug raped "rats" and used to shit in bags. (I guess all this talk should be transferred in "pro-wrestling as a cult" thread though). But yeah. If John Laurinaitis wanted to recruit lingerie models, why blame any of those women to try and make a buck out of it ? This is show business. The whole "getting new fresh meat" for the boyz is another issue entirely, although I wonder if that's not also a case of slut shaming. If some of these girls flirted with the boyz, what's the big deal about it ?

Who ? No disrespect, but I don't think it's seen exactly like being the child of a former mainstream WWE/NWA guy, especially to those guys in Titan Tower. Foley's daughter is wrestling ?

I realized today that I can't hear "enough is enough" without thinking "and it's time for a change". Thanks Owen.

Who are they ? Ric's daughter. Neidhart's daughter. Snuka's daughter. Tully's daughter. Who else ? And about sexism, since we're at it, gotta "love" Corny's latest rant about female wrestler (who paid their dues) vs hoes of Total Divas. And by hoes he meant girls who are using pro-wrestler as a way to get into the entertainment business and don't really love pro-wrestling and don't pay their dues by travelling, earning shit and suffering for da buziness… you know the drill. And then, he adds about Charlotte "okay, she didn't do it that way, but she's go the genes". Oh. So that's why A guy like Randy Orton is revered by co-workers despite being a black hole of charisma and work. But back to the women, he talks about Stacy Keibler who "sucked dicks to her way to spousing a millionaire", to which I really can't disagree that much, since Stacy really dind't showcase very much talent at all except having great legs. But that's another matter. Beautiful people, you know how it works. But yeah, those "second generation" girls who "got the genes", it's no big deal they get straight into WWE's contracts. But a girl like Nikki Bella who at one point improved a lot and became a really good heel shouldn't get any respect, if you follow his diatribe. Double standarts anyone ? So yeah, maybe, from the perspective of the people in the business, it plays into this whole new vision of women's wrestling.

Yeah, New Jack was funny and cut good promos, but his matches were the shits. Should have been kept a character on-air though. PPV 59 Wait. Another good TNA PPV ? WTF ? Gotta give some kredit to 3 Live Kru. They aren’t good in-ring workers, but they actually put some effort in creating some cool tag team moves, and they are over. Konnan wish the audience would let him speak on this too. Heated opener against Slash & Sinn ending in a schmozz. D-Lo Brown vs Sonny Siaki was as good as a Siaki match gets. Trinity is now a undercarder valet. Female empowerment. Well, she did hit a nice spot on D-Lo, giving Sonny the win. Wait, how long before Trinity gets sick of this again ? Jeff Jarrett runs in and bashes a guitar. Abyss vs Sandman was decent enough as a JTTS match. Kinda sad Sandman is reduced to this role though, Abyss' whole gimmick is so low-rent. Now, the good stuff, Jerry Lynn vs Michael Shane was the best straight X-div match in a while, with Lynn controlling the pace. Shane is now a heel apparently, after his babyface performance the week before. Make sense, in a WCW way. And his entire gimmick is to be Shawn Micheals' cousin. Yes, Russo, always promoting WWE. He’s a plant booker. Shane shows quite decent heel character though, including teasing an elbowdrop and not doing it, which always pisses off fans. Don Callis at ringside is doing a good job on color as, even as a heel, he actually puts over Lynn. Take notes JBL. Simon Diamond & Swinger vs AMW in a tag title match was yet another good bout. This feud has been going on for long now but it does not drag yet, and this time the heels finally wins thanks to Gilberti, so AMW can chase the title again. This leads into a pretty decent, all things considered, Dusty Rhodes vs Glen Gilberti bullrope match. Better than the Corino one in ECW I believe, so kudos do Disco on that one. The only bad stuff on this show was Terry Taylor as a backstage interviewer, in which he sucked a dick, contrary to Goldylocks. Plus, if we believe Cornette, Taylor is a stooge. If we believe Missy Hyatt, Taylor has a small dick. Jeff Jarrett runs in and bashes a guitar at some point too. And a terrible Mad Mickey segment with Tenay. Since he showed up, he’s been the worst part of the show every week. And then Raven vs AJ Styles in maybe the best single match of the year thus far. And probably Raven’s best single match ever, and it’s not like he’s been carried, although Styles is great no matter what. Lots of cool stuff here, excellent bayface work by Raven despite a few shaky executed spots (but Raven has never been the smoothest guy around, and who cares at this point ?) and a hot finish with run-ins that are used to their best effect (as opposed to a stupid Double J Special). Douglas finally screws Raven who loses the match to the outrage of the other babyfaces while James Mitchell looks evil as Hell. Jarrett runs in and gets booed. Erik Watts runs in and gets cheered. Next week, some sort of Wargames match. Awesome. Two weeks in a row, TNA delivers the goods. Was Russo still booking ? If not, who was ? Mantell ? Dusty ? Oh yeah, they have been promoting Roddy Piper for two weeks now. Hopefully he does like Negro Casas and don't show up. 27/08/2003 Jerry Lynn vs Michael Shane 27/08/2003 AMW vs Simon Diamond & Swinger 27/08/2003 Raven vs AJ Styles

BTW, I've gotta say, I love the southern accent drawl. Maybe that plays a part in why Dutch Mantell and Lance Russel are two of my all-time favourite announcers.

There's a stigma against southern accents because states in the Deep South, where you'll find the thickest accents in the country, happen to also be the poorest, least educated, and most obese. Combine that with the region's history with the civil war and the rampant racism and it's a pretty easy region to make fun of. Half those guys you listed as being able to work around a southern accent are from Texas. I think, given the area's wealth and popularity as a vacation destination, there's not much association with the neighboring Deep South, so that's what makes it possible for people get a Texan accent over without getting branded as a southern guy. Same thing for Florida. RE: the "rampant racism" of the South, singling out the South for racism is one of the laziest stereotypes there is. I saw more overt racism growing up in the Cincinnati area than I do now in Dallas. Partially that could be the changing times, of course. OTOH, I saw some dude just waving the Confederate flag on a busy street corner a couple weeks ago in Dallas, so what do I know. I'd dream of a southern heel coming out to "Rednecks" by Randy Newman. Of course the subtleties of the song would fly over 90% of the pro-wrestling audience I guess, but it would be amazing, still.

I just saw the finish. She's the one getting pinned.

Is this just wrestling related though ? How many people with Southern accent do you hear on national TV and programs ? It's kinda the same thing in France. Regional accents are erased from TV, except on shows with regional flavors or sports-broadcasting that have an historical attachment to some regions like the south with rugby. Language is getting streamlined.

That seemed so fresh and exciting at the time. No idea what I'd think about that now, but yeah, it was some damn good TV back then. Most fun I had watching WWF TV was during that time, up until SummerSlam 98.

Never saw Perry Saturn without a stache. Feels oh so wrong. He kinda looks like a giant cock too. Which. Well. I probably shouldn't have said that though.

No shit. He's getting a shoot interview contract yesterday.

PPV 58 TNA, the company with the idiotic concepts, next episode. This week, the debut of the Ultimate X. Well, if we’re going for imbecilic stopfests, might as well go for broke. The whole concept makes it clear that the purpose is acrobatics to begin with, so it fits Chris Sabin, Micheal Shane & Frankie Kazarian. And… holy shit, it’s actually as fun as it is ridiculous ! Sabin shows good heeling, Shane bleeds bucket like his cousin would. Kazarian still sucks, but there’s enough stupid spots to make up for it and… the belt falls in the middle of the ring. Hilarious. The ref looks stupid for a few seconds before calling guys in the back to put it back up. More ridiculous action and… the belt falls again. This match had me rolling with laughter. And really, despite Kazarian sloppiness and poor instinct, I loved the ending with Shane rushing to the belt, which also means he steals the show. This may not be that stupid of a concept after all. Well, it is, but it could be really fun too. AMW vs Simon Diamond & Johnny Swinger in a double bullrope match was decent but they didn’t use the gimmick that well, especially since a false finish involves a chairshot and the actual finish comes after a belt shot. You had those bells, you know… No blood, which kinda hurt a bit, but we already had Micheal Shane and Raven (in the requisite babyface beatdown opening segment) bleeding like pigs. Still, this feud has delivered every week thus far, and the heels stealing a win re-heats the whole thing. Another surprisingly good match with Legend & Chris Daniels vs Jeff Jarrett & Erik Watts. The heels works very well, I kinda like Legend as a less intense Rhyno rip-off. Daniels makes Jarrett look better than he is and Watts brings fire and big power spots. What the hell is happening this week ? Hey, babyface beatdown with Russo. Ok, back to shitty business. And an actual fun angle involving Sonny Siaki. What ? So he brings a casket at ringside to celebrate the death of D-Lo’s career and it’s obvious to anyone who’s ever watched wrestling how it is gonna end. Trinity is sporting a porn lingerie dress that would make Francine proud. Of course, D-Lo jumps out of the casket and locks both heels inside, to a huge pop. Hey ! A babyface getting the last laugh without any swerve ! Fun little segment. Julio & CM Punk vs the New Church, now Slash & Sinn (ex-furry boot JTTS of the previous week now full fledge member of the evil camp) was sloppy but pretty watchable, Alexis killing it again befire getting killed by Shane Douglas, who’s been a terrific heatseaking asshole. So, the final Gauntlet match to determine a N°1 CONTENDER must suck, right ? It must. Kid Kash, Ron Killings, okay… this will be boring before a clusterfuck final… except it doesn’t ! The only annoying part was Mad Mickey showing up at ringside. A true awful gimmick. But the match itself really built well, Jarrett not showing up after the beatdown, Abyss getting the Diesel push and looking good, finally, Daniels conforting his spot as the most reliable guy in the undercard, D-Lo going straight after Siaki like he should and Raven showing up last for a cool one on one final against Douglas, who’s really making for his lack of physicality with terrific facials and maneurisms. They have a cool little match and, holy shit, Raven wins clean and becomes the n°1 contender. Very good match, well booked with an excellent ending and the right guy winning like he should. Wait, am I watching TNA ? Maybe the best TNA show thus far, even the most ridiculous stuff ended up fun, no bad match nor awful segment, just a short Erik Watts sit-down interview which was quite dull, but he made up for it later during his match. And as a Scott Levy fan, I’m so glad I’m watching this stuff. TNA fucking rules after all ! For now. 2003/08/20 Chris Sabin vs Frankie Kazarian vs Micheal Shane 2003/08/20 AMW vs Simon Diamond & Swinger 2003/08/20 Jeff Jarrett & Erik Watts vs Legend & Christopher Daniels 2003/08/20 Gauntlet Match

Well, I did say I was getting carried away! However, I do think there is a distinct shift from say, Dusty Rhodes the working class hero, standing up to the Man yet also looking out for others, making saves, mentoring young guys and Steve Austin, who stands up to the Man but essentially has no loyalty or empathy for anyone else. He did save Stephy from the deadly hands of Evil Taker though.

So he should have come out to Tom Sawyer, not KVE.

PPV 57 I guess a fine second half makes up for the stupidity. To jumpstart a single push, let’s have Elix Skipper lose clean again to Jerry Lynn in less that five minutes. That’s the third fall in a row. Match was fine for what it was. Is it possible to further kill the ladder match gimmick ? Yes. By having a N°1 contender match (remember how much TNA loves N°1 contender matches, when you don’t know how to book shit it’s an easy way out) in a ladder match. Yep. Isn’t that supposed to be the big gimmick match for the title ? Anyway. And then, have Micheal Shane and Frankie Kazarian do stupid spots and dives with no selling, stuntman show-style. And have Chris Sabin run in and screw up the match anyway. Kid Kash has another bad match, this time with Bobby Eaton who tries less than Ricky Morton so he doesn’t look as old. Still, this is going nowhere. Again. Well, this is going toward a match against Dusty I guess. So, yeah, nowhere. Let's have a TNA title match with former heel and SEX member Low-Ki returning as a babyface, insurring a dead crowd for a seriously excellent match against AJ Styles, the second best of the year after the tag team cage match. Exactly what TNA should be. These two know how to use their athleticism in a positive, creative but thought out way. More of this, please. But Ki returning as a babyface without any explanation just doesn’t cut it. AMW & Dusty vs Simon & Swinger & Gilberti was quite fun for what it was, those two teams really have a chemistry at this point and Dusty didn’t overworked himself. Gilberti is better in small doses and in a spot where he doesn’t think he’s Kurt Angle. Good stuff, and the feud continues next week. Never though Simon Diamond & Johnny Swinger would actually have their moment of glory. Finally, Raven vs Shane Douglas was a perfect instance of getting the most out of the least. Douglas is awesome at getting across as an asshole and getting heat, which he did in spades, with Raven working wonderfully as a bloodied babyface. Douglas confronting a woman in the crowd was old-school gold. However, in term of timing and bumping, it’s obvious Douglas has lost quite a few steps as showed by a few blown spots. But really, as far as doing a heated brawl without doing much of anything, this was good. This is working, people. Jim Mitchell tricks Raven again and the white hand mystery man stuns Raven again. I’m intrigued and I enjoy this feud although Douglas is obviously not going to bring much physically anymore. Russo blabbing, Jarrett running in, more Mad Mickey awful vignettes, 3 Live Krew debuting against JTTS Vampire Warrior, Devon Storm and some furry pants tattoed guy named Sinn. And they’ll feud with white supremacist Harris Boys it seemed. Cool, more fast forward coming in. Raven vs Mitchell and AMW vs Gilberti’s boys are carrying the show. AJ Styles has no real challenger anymore since Jarrett will feud with Daniels it seems, which could get interesting in the ring but the angles promise to be as dull as ever. The X-div is doomed with these young spot monkeys, and the following week is the debut of Ultimate X. Here' hoping we get totally ridiculous with it. 2003/08/13 Raven vs Shane Douglas 2003/08/13 AMW & Dusty Rhodes vs Simon Diamond & Swinger & Glen Gilberti 2003/08/13 AJ Styles vs Low-Ki

Maybe, but it's still a ridiculous name. You just get used to it. Can't help translating it and saying it with a quebec accent, it's even funnier : "Le grand spectacle !".

WCW Nitro, the nWo wrecking havoc backstage at Disney.

PPV 56 Total Nonstop Action has officialy stopped, as the sign used to say. For like twenty minutes, the time to set the cage up. So, to kill time, a very boring and long, looooong Chris Daniels promo, now completely into evil preacher mode in a way that reminds me of a mid-90’s WWF gimmick. Then Jeff Jarrett shows up to bore the audience even more. Seems like the two « red shirt » security guys are heels. How thrilling. AJ Styles vs D-Lo Brown was a pretty good cage match though, but it never got the time to build and the finish was both anticlimatic and kinda stupid, as Erik Watts pushed Russo, whom he was attached to via handcuffs, into the cage, making D-Lo fall from the top and crash down to a loss. Watts, the Head of Authority, looked like an idiot. Best match of the show was another gimmick match (never ever enough on one show, remember ?), AMW vs Simon Diamond & Swinger in a Rawhide Strap match, whatever that is. Beats the Yappapi version anyway. Really good stuff. Swinger is actually pretty good for the first time in his career as his pretty pedestrian offense just looks fine in a context where he simply has to heel up and get heat instead of trying to work highspots like he was in ECW or in various cruiserweight divisions. Diamond & Swinger lose again but they steal the belts. Later on, AMW beatdown, because every babyface has to get beaten down, every week. That’s never boring, you see. Even the best angle how the show ended up with babyface Raven getting a beatdown too. But cool stuff, as Raven, for the first time of his career, shows actual empathy and chooses to go save his Gathering friends instead of « finishing » Shane Douglas. Strong promos by Douglas & Mitchell again too. This is the best feud in the company and I like the fact the Raven character actually matures as a babyface. Rest of the show, well, a nothing spotmatch between Micheal Shane, Danny Doring, Joey Matthews (it’s an ECW Reunion show at this point) and Shark Boy until Elix Skipper just beats them all (so WCW), after what Micheal Shane pins the three guys in succession. So ironic the way this guy gets pushed. As I feared, more Kid Kash vs legends, this time Larry Z. in a pretty bad match with usual Abyss run-in. Crowds chants « Get a walker ! » to Larry, who then proceed to mimick using a walker to make fun out of them. Larry looked quite decent overall. Funny how today, he would get a « You’ve still got it chants ». But these were still the ECW/smarks assholes crowds. Frankie Kazarian almost wins the X-div title on a shit finish, with a pissing contest between three referees. The match with Chris Sabin was a bit better than usual, but it’s still pretty much video-game wrestling with poor selling and transitions. I really won’t care at all about the X-div if it gets filled with these kind of indy guys. 3 Live Kru in the trailer park stalked by a white trash perv and awful Attitude Era like vignette for Mad Mickey, whom I hoped he was a one shot. All the downtimes meant we had tons of Lollipop’s ass this week. Just realized that the other cage dancer was April, the « bad girlfriend » of Brian Lawler. 2003/08/06 AJ Styles vs D-Lo Brown 2003/08/06 AMW vs Simon Diamond & Swinger