Will (Good Will Wrestling) is joined by Kris Zellner (Exile on Badstreet), Dylan Hales (Wrestling Culture), Pete and Johnny Sorrow (Titans of Wrestling). They run down the entire show, the best Mania moments the greatest matches and the surprise ending! This show has more false finishes than Return of the King!

 

http://placetobenation.com/ptbn-wrestlemania-xxxi-reaction-show/

I'm anxious to listen to this show on my way home from work. From listening to other shows like Shake Them Ropes and Lapsed Fan to reading the reactions on this board, the Squared Circle Reddit and Twitter, Mania has been panned as either a great show or a really bad show.

The Rousey talk mainly has me annoyed that they didn't bring Paige up with her NXT badass character.

Bowie sucks? No Johnny!

45 minutes in and Kris is winning, especially with the whole "Starts with an A" jump-in.

Jesus Christ, Dylan, almost crashed my car at that moment. Laughed very hard.

Diva match review was hilarious. Johnny's glazed donut line. Ha ha ha. Great feel on this show.

Also, quite possibly the only time in the podcast's history that a moose was mentioned that many times.

Listening now, another great reaction show. I loved hearing the giddy excitement from everyone about how awesome the main event was.

You guys have me laughing my ass off here. Kris's line about Steph making HHH "look like a cuckold". Ha ha ha ha ha. Another genuine lol.

Dylan laying out the following (paraphrased):

 

"Triple H got an hour on the show. He got to associate with Ahnold. He basically had his own terminator movie. He went over for no reason. He took the bump from the big time star in Rousey. He's now in the feud with Rock, so he's potentially in the biggest match next year at Mania, and his apprentice went over as champ."

 

And then Johnny going. "Ehhhhhh, that's an interpretation, doc."

What the hell is happening in the final hour with all those audio drop ins?

The Back and to the Left bit on Brock blading was good too.

There's no point in saying stuff like "Harper isn't at Bryan's level."

 

Bryan's now said that he wants to elevate guys like Heath Slater.

The difference between the IC and US Title and why they did the Bryan bit and nothing with Cena, its that the IC IS WWE. While they do touch upon the US TItle's legacy going back to the JCP days, they've never treated it with any sort of historical reverence that they've done with the IC title through the years.

Johnny's rant at Pete 2:17 in. Laughing so much. Oh god, this might be one of my fave shows ever boys.

Really good reaction show, I have no idea about the Double A line, but holy shit I was dying in my cubicle.

 

I thought pretty much everything was pretty much spot on how I felt about the show. I was a bit higher on the Divas, but I am generally higher on Paige/Nikki than most and I genuinely think it is the feud of their year so far. I liked the Cena/Rusev Fast Lane match better because I thought they built to the Cena comeback better and I LOVED that Fast Lane finish. I am a bit lower on Lesnar/Reigns than most. I thought it was a tremendous, physical encounter. I thought the Brock beating was too severe for anyone to make a comeback. Rather than making Reigns look resilient, it felt forced and unnatural. Reigns gave one helluva performance and if he did not win people over last night then I do not know what the fuck people want because Roman Reigns was a badass. Loved the Rollins booking, made perfect sense, I am definitely higher on Rollins than most. I think he and Rusev are the only ones that work hard IN THE RING to get booed by selling vulnerability and shining up the babyfaces. I think Rollins will have a solid reign.

 

I think this was a great Wrestlemania especially given the card they laid out. That being said I was mildly shocked people thought this was better than Wrestlemania 30. I am a lot higher on Bryan/HHH and I think that is clearly a level above the Brock/Reigns match, but even if people don't I would think that's a wash. The Wrestlemania 30 main event clusterfuck (in a good way) was an amazing feel good ending, which was definitely better than anything on 31 besides the main event in a wrestling quality way, but the Daniel Bryan finish puts it over the top for me. Looking back on the card, I guess what 31 has going for it over 20 is that everything was relatively short where the Taker/Brock and Cena/Wyatt went way too long. It is close, but I still give the nod to 30 for the excellence of Bryan/HHH and the Bryan narrative.

 

Also, I am 99% my brother and I are going to Wrestlemania XXXII. Even the 0.00001% chance of Austin wrestling is enough to get me to go since I never saw Austin live.

Also I totally agree with keeping Rusev the fuck away from Cena. Ryback and Wyatt still have not recovered. I am Cena fan through and through but these multiple jobs are killer.

I have enough Mania reax shows to last the week, but this is tops on the list.

The argument I'd have for WM 31 to be in the top tier of WM's is that every match was a decent to good type of "that" match.

 

The opening tag match was a fun tag spotfest ala the opening junior tags in New Japan.

 

The battle royal was a perfectly fine battle royal.

 

The ladder match was a good ladder spotfest with a really fun finish.

 

Orton-Rollins was a great 'WWE' style match.

 

The Diva's tag was probably the best diva match on WM since Trish-Mickie. Low bar to clear, but hey.

 

Sting-Triple H was nostalgia overdrive, but that's what people who wanted that match in the first place wanted.

 

Cena-Rusev was a very good WWE main event style w/ all the overblown theatrics.

 

Bray-'Taker was fine to me, even though it was the worst 'type' of match, but I never thought Bray ever had a chance to win, so I enjoyed it as a 'Taker killing his midcard opponent type of match against somebody like Kama or King Kong Bundy in the 90's, and that was a good version of that.

 

And of course, the main was an awesome stiff as hell showdown.

Loved the show, all almost 3 hours of it, but you saved the best for last with that Danny Meltzer recap. Had to stifle my laughter hard as I sit here in my cubicle.

Danny Meltzer was the highlight of Mania weekend honestly.

My Danny Meltzer background story included him borrowing Dave's id to get into some wrestling party . Drinking a ton of booze. Meeting some of the NXT Divas. To drunk to drive, he takes a cab. He shows the cabby Dave's ID. Cabby drops him off at Dave's . Still drunk he thinks it's his place. So of course the keys don't work . The rest is on WO audio.

This was the first show I've listened to, and it was great. Good job guys!

That was a fun listen and I tend to agree with Dylan on why he liked the matches and didn't like the booking. The actual finish to the podcast was far better than Will thought it was. Turns out Will is the curmudgeon, not Pete. Even if he's dead right about the IC champs congratulating Bryan.