Rolling 2014 Haunted Rocking Chair Thread

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Been dipping in and out of these as a bit of light bedtime reading and they are bringing me improbable amounts of joy.

"the last bit was good even if at first I was like "oh, these guys; alright I guess." I liked Angle/Benoit *a lot* and Triple H/Freakzilla was not without its odd pleasures and oh yeah Torrie Wilson and Dawn Marrie wrestled because *Dawn Marrie married Torrie Wilson's father Al and fucked him to death* so on the whole this was a solid show

So I’ve barely touched the whole Network thing since like March (actually forgot I had it for a while there) but I’m on holiday at the moment, still waiting for the new term to start, so I’ve finally gone back and started watching some stuff. This has all been pretty revelatory for me, cause beyond a certain point (end of ’99, start of 2000 maybe) I’ve always read way more about wrestling than I’ve ever bothered to watch, aside from a few isolated shows and matches. But boy, there’s some pretty fucking cool shit available on this service.

I just finished watching Great American Bash ’92, chosen pretty much at random because a tag team tournament sounded like super fun, although tbh as it turned out most of the tag team stuff on this show just sort of floated by without leaving very much impression. But man, Sting - Vader was something else!

One of the things I liked most was the way the crowd sounded, particularly when the little Stingers were getting riled up a bit - dunno if it was the acoustics or the way it was mic’ed or what, but I found it highly evocative, reminded me of barely remembered swimming galas in provincial swimming baths, those ones where the seats were all up in the rafters and the noise didn’t quite travel right. struck quite an emotional chord with me. also had the effect of making these guys seem less like internationally-renowned film-star celebrity demigods, more like slightly amateurish pantomime performers or children’s entertainers being recorded on VCR with kids sitting at the front and the parents standing at the back - Sting playing to the adoring screams of his pre-pubescent acolytes, Vader mugging to the hissing and the roars of the mob.

Best bit was maybe the test of strength spot where Vader and Harley Race try to goad Sting into locking up and Sting keeps looking to all the kids in the audience for help in deciding what to do, before eventually going for it (NO STING YOU IDIOT WHAT ARE YOU DOING YOULL NEVER BEAT THIS GUY THAT WAY) and losing, only for consternation to turn to delight as HA HA! Trickster Hero Sting jabs the eye of the Monster and draws delighted laughter from the multitude, only for delight to turn back to consternation as Vader immediately bodychecks him, killing the momentum and reminding all the little kiddies out there that this ain’t no fucking pantomime and there ain’t gonna be no happy ending, and no song and dance number to follow neither.

I’m rambling now but something about all this just feels so different to the wrestling I’ve been used to watching in my lifetime. Less like television performers playing a role or video game characters wearing down the opponent’s health bar. As I say, more like a pantomime; two dancing bears being sent out before a crowd of pissed-up parents and excitable infants to provide some good wholesome Sunday night entertainment for all the family before moving onto the next town and doing it all again. I realise that this is what pro-wrestling always was and still is, but this felt rawer, somehow, then a lot of the stuff I’ve watched before. Anyway, I loved it.

Match itself was fucking tight, especially interesting to watch in the context of the recent Lesnar / Cena monster vs champ ding-dong. Sting’s comeback spots were really well timed. They didn’t overdo it, gave Sting just enough to make you believe that there could be an outside chance while always being pretty much up-front about the fact that Vader had got this one in the bag. Not like the first Cena / Lesnar match from Extreme Rules where they barely had Cena land a punch throughout the entire match, making Lesnar look like a total punk when he got pinned out of nowhere to finish. Another little spot I really enjoyed here was when Vader went for a massive slam and Sting had started to wriggle out just as he got planted, meaning that to escape the pinfall he didn’t have to actually throw massive fucking Van Vader off of him but could just use the momentum of the slam to roll through and out of the pin. It’s the little things that make the difference, especially when the commentators are allowed to draw attention to them.

Anyway, those were some of my thoughts, very much looking forward to watching their Starrcade match tomorrow night now. Anyone else been enjoying the network recently?

If you didn't see it before, I really enjoyed Clash 19, which was the earlier rounds of that tag tournament a bit before the PPV. It has Joe and Dean Malenko representing 'Europe' because they're fake-Hungarian, and Gordy and Williams massacring an Australian father-son jobber tag team on the way to a great match with the Steiners in the main.

I really enjoyed here was when Vader went for a massive slam and Sting had started to wriggle out just as he got planted, meaning that to escape the pinfall he didn’t have to actually throw massive fucking Van Vader off of him but could just use the momentum of the slam to roll through and out of the pin. It’s the little things that make the difference, especially when the commentators are allowed to draw attention to them.

The Starrcade Vader-Sting is great too, has a lot of of similar well-executed small details like Vader punching himself out, subtly fucking up the execution of his moves and delaying the pin etc

On a semi-related note, the Steiners vs Curtis Hughes and Vader at Clash 18 is an insane, insane power match I would never have known existed without the WWE network for just £6.01 per month

I recently watched the three Flair v. Steamboat title matches from '89. Stupidly good.

I really need to sit down for a Sting-Vader marathon one of these days. I think I've seen only one or two of their matches.

I’m rambling now but something about all this just feels so different to the wrestling I’ve been used to watching in my lifetime.

WWE has almost always been about the babyface superhero champion, they really have no idea how to do book monster heels. The best example I can think of would be Yokozuna. They could have done it with Brock's comeback in '12 but they didn't. Even during HHH's reign(s) of terror (2002-6), which was the only time they ever ran with a heel champion for an extended period, it was more in the style of Flair in the 80's (barely escaping with the title every night), he was never really dominant.

Not got round to Sting vs Vader from Starrcade yet, but I did rewatch a couple of my fav matches from the last few years yesterday afternoon to see how they held up, and man, I'll be amazed if I can ever find a better monster vs underdog match than Punk vs Lesnar from Summerslam 2013. I loved it at the time but I think watching Bryan beat Cena 30 minutes later kinda took some of the shine off. On a second viewing this just blew me away. the kimura / triangle choke / powerbomb / still triangle choke / elbows / running powerbomb reversal sequence was out of this world.

It was a great match, but Lesnar bumped like a madman for Punk and for me it took away some of the believability. Putting it another way, Punk went toe to toe with Lesnar and would have beat him if not for Heyman's interference, but now one year later, Cena gets literally no offense against Lesnar at the same PPV.

idk, i take the point, but if you look at the shots that Punk actually lands on Lesnar (going high to take him by surprise, lightning knee strikes to the head, low blows, biting) I think if anything it goes to show that Punk, the smaller man, knows how to box clever, while Cena, as a bigger guy who's not needed to fight dirty in years, didn't have any response.

gotta remember that Punk was just coming off the back of the longest title reign anyone had had since Hogan-times, and had also gone the distance with The Undertaker at WM, which in recent years had become a spot reserved for the likes of HBK, HHH and so on. I don't have a problem with him looking competitive in this match, he still gets the shit beaten out of him and loses in the end.

It was probably the importance placed on the Heyman interference that hurt it most

They had Lesnar need Heyman's help to beat HHH and Punk, then he had that weird chairshot-heavy non match with Show then at WM it was suddenly all I'm ending the streak clean btw

If only Taker had been a three stripe jiu-jitsu white belt :(

good match though yeah, fuck it

kenta is debuting on NXT this thursday (Takeover 2). also bayley v. charlotte and fatal 4way adrian neville, sami zayn, tyler breeze + tyson kidd. should be great!

the sign in hebrew says "mah," 4x which means 'what' in hebrew i lol'd

http://i58.tinypic.com/m9rre0.png

cac123ish 3 days ago
I've seen matches where the loser had to have their heads shaved. I was always hoping that Mongo or Jeff Jarrett would lose a match, Debra would have to have her head shaved. I would picture in my mind Debra having to sit in a chair in the middle of the ring and have her crown taken off her head, and have all her gorgeous blond hair shaved off and see her bald and running back to the dressing room crying and covering her bald head while her hair was being thrown out into the audience, and hearing the announcer saying, "Debra is about to lose her beautiful hair!!"

just cutting and pasting this Youtube comment from a Debra Marshall shoot interview for no real reason, thanks

slightly surprised no one at WCW thought to book that angle

btw it is nxt takeover 2 tnite and i highly recommend it. i think the championship four way between sami zayn, tyler breeze, adrian neville and tyson kidd will be really good. i think charlotte v. baylee for women's championship will be really good too. also they're debuting kenta and apparently another new NXT star so that'll be cool

all NXT eps are on hulu the next day, idk if they'll post the takeover too

yeah this should be quite fun.

maaan, checking the NXT roster, it really is about time they brought back the cruiserweight division - zayn, neville, kidd, kenta, devitt, justin gabriel, kalisto, sin cara, zack ryder.... etc. etc.

those guys could be smashing the undercard week-in week-out if anyone was at all inclined to let them do it.

lol Prince Albert has really had a very strange career, how long's he been doing this roving sportscaster bit?

<3 Renee Young a little bit.

they're really working hard to sell these two Ascension schmoes, but does anyone actually want to see these guys on the main show? one of them looks kinda like evil Matt Hardy. can't place who the other one reminds me of. Tomko maybe?

woooooo!

evil Matt Hardy and bigger evil Matt Hardy.

i'll be happy when they go to the main show. there are so many good tag teams in NXT (kalisto + sin cara, vaudevillians, enzo + amare) that are so much more entertaining to watch.

ascension have been the nxt tag champions forever tho

i dunno, i feel like that the one aspect of this NXT experiment that is a wee bit bullshitty is the tag division, although that might just be me being butthurt about how badly they've screwed up the tag division. in most other respects they've pillaged the indys pretty successfully but when you think that at various points over the last however many years they could've been going in for American Wolves, Motor City Machine Guns, the Beer Money Guys, the Briscoes, the Young Bucks etc. etc. etc. i can't help but think 'fuck those Ascension dudes'.

sorry that was all phrased terribly, trying to watch that squash match at the same time

basically ALL of the best tag teams since WGTT haven't gone near WWE and it fucking sucks and it's a bit weak that they try to sell that The Ascension or Amore and that other dude are as exciting as e.g. American Wolves

this is egregious bcuz they really have been signing all of the best talent up outside of the tag division, this was happening even before the current NXT format

yeah you'd know much better than me. i watched some of the tag stuff from chakira and loved it (like those slow motion dudes were hilarious, or the baseball mime) but NXT is generally much more interesting to me than RAW tag which, with the exception recently i guess of star+golddust, has been pretty boring imo.

enzo is hilarious tho. he's a great talker. you don't like that promo they just did w/ the poodle? i lol'd.

"i'll give you a bob"

sawft is admittedly dumb

ok yeah, these guys giving me a kind of alternate universe HBK / Kevin Nash vibe in that promo - little, colourful and obnoxious / big and laidback with ponytail, I actually don't mind it

this Sylvester dude is getting shaved, lol i love hair vs hair stips

so wait, did no one get shaved? well that is some bullshit.

would like to see tyler breeze fight fandango, would be fabulous

yeeeah KENTA squash these hosses

pretty dumb that they'd make such a song and dance over signing "major international sensation KENTA", introducing him as such, getting the fans chanting his name, only to have him 'reinvent' himself and change it to something totally lame and unmemorable within 30 seconds. thought this might've been the one they broke their own rule for

was it just me or did that bull dempsey jump from the ropes look totally ridiculous? omg he did it again. he can't reach him. it's embarrassing.

Bull Dempsey struck me as a less charismatic Rhino.

And they need to stop that diving headbutt. Too Benoit, and associated with a lot of his brain damage.

if they ever wanted to turn Bayley heel she could be loads of fun paired with Bo Dallas

Bayleyve!

the american wolves are really, really bad btw and wwe signing them is probably the wisest indie non-pillaging they've made

wwe NOT signing them rather

each to their own, i really enjoyed some of their ROH stuff a few years back. Had good matches with quite a few already signed guys (Bryan, Rollins, Steen, Zayn)

I've grown to really like Breeze.

i like all those other guys tbh, i'm just being a hater

(this show was a total blast btw)

i'm going to watch the nxt show lataz but just came to say lolz at signing the briscos (nothing like hiring people who are racist and homophobic to your multinational corporation) and the wolves (wrestlers still need to sell and not just drop people dangerously on their head). also iirc when the young bucks were close to being signed, they were such dicks backstage that they never got invited back, was dirtsheet buzz for a while etc. supposedly they really pissed off booker t and holla holla tag match teddy long.

is that one appalling superplex gif representative of Davey Richards' general work? I have never watched one of his matches because of it

http://i43.tinypic.com/2poyw6u.gif

I unironically enjoy the corny fake sport of pro wrestling and this is the dumbest shit I've ever seen

I have watched a lot of the ROH PPVs he was kinda on top for (10-12ish period) and yeaaaaaah... that gif is about right. He takes himself waaay too seriously, he makes Bret Hart look like a guy who knows its fake.

Fair fair fair, I was unaware of much of the backstage shenanigans wrt briscoes and young bucks, I was simply reeling off tag teams where I have watched and enjoyed a couple of matches that came recommended, I am not and never have been an avid fan of independent wrestling