NEWM

Yeah, I just thought this was some fantastic booking. Knock a super quick introduction video for a couple of weeks to create Insta-buzz, then you've made somebody with an iota of credibility for Joe to knock about instead of some jobbers or some actual established talent.

Is the Mania of Wrestlemania documentary on the network, or is there anywhere else I could watch it?

 

Aye its on the network in Beyond the Ring (I think). I watched it on there just last week because I fancied seeing all the cracking WM9 behind the scenes stuff again.

I was at the talk-in in Manchester where he told that tale, and his delivery of it felt as though he expected a big chuckle at the end. Done as if it was the punchline to the tale. Bit awkward all around, and it was the only thing people seemed to be talking about when everybody was leaving. Well of course it was.

Soon to be made redundant from an admin job in the North East, and privately a bit frightened. Only 31, but skills all lie seemingly in jobs being gobbled up by corrupt apprentice schemes paying 10 grand a year or less.

 

Can somebody tell me it'll work out okay in the end please? Or at least how best to suffer while it's not fine. cheers.

2016 is bonkers isn't it. It feels like a payoff to things happening in the background the last 3 years or so with NXT, WWE's more flexible approach in general, and TNA's unending descent somehow harvesting arguably the character of the year in the industry. For me personally, having Chris Jericho, Matt Hardy and The Usos as three of my favourite acts in the game was absolutely unthinkable, and I mean a complete 180 from what I previously thought of any of them. Utterly detested seeing any of them shit up the show. And in Nakamura, a Japanese wrestler I'd never seen until March this year is my favourite thing in wrestling and already one of my all-time favourite wrestlers. Broadly speaking, no matter how talented he is, the ascent of AJ Styles is remarkable and unprecidented. And importantly sets a new and more exciting template for future wrestlers than they've had for donkeys. The 03-13ish period of horrific talent development looks even worse by today's standards. Rightly or wrongly, it doesn't half look like John Lauranitis made an endless fucking cock-up of things in his job.

 

The other side of the coin obviously is the old debate of no stars and a world-beating midcard, but then I suppose it's one battle at a time.

 

I watch on that amazing Raw in 10 minutes Youtube page

 

Link please?

 

 

Their channel is called Wrestling Reality, but on inspection this morning, it looks like they've been caught out by WWE and won't be back for a while. Shame, it was amazing. John Lister first mentioned it on here and I've watched both Raw and Smackdown that way ever since.

Without going spoiler crazu obviously, is 'Welcome to Night Vale' worth it? I'm a bit of a completist twat so I'd need to go back to episode 1 and start from scratch, even though as I understand it, there's only a loose thread between stories even at the best of time.

Fucking hell, TNA's had a lot of these false finishes hasn't it?! I still remember the death rattles when it was only available online, and even when it got hoofed off Spike the other year, and yet here we are, on course to make it to Christmas 2016 at very least. It's remarkable that money is constantly found at the last minute to bail out something of seemingly so little value.

Adam Bomb never really got to beat any old fucker did he. Every one of the 4 people at school still watching loved him, and he had some fucking brilliant gear when he turned face (not in this video sadly). Kevin Nash's parallel rise up the card well and truly fucked his chances.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bcZ8y5xm2JQ

 

There y'go.

OSW have put World War 3 '95 up on Vimeo. Great as usual, and the conversation on 'spooters' is so hilarious and true.

Thinking about it, I was a bit of a sucker for TNA big unncessary gimmick matches. Ultimate X, Six Sides of Steel, the stupid fucking red thing Homicide couldn't get out of, King of the Mountain. I'd always be buzzing if they announced one of them for the card. Elevation X was a slightly more colourful scaffold match too, that was tolerable the couple of times they trotted it out. 

I hate watching Hawk in singles matches playing the cunt like that. He does it in tag matches too sometimes but it looks less on display for some reason, maybe for the extra bodies. It's very apparent when he's just in there giving zero to some poor sod having to work around the proverbial broomstick (and getting their arse kicked by it)

I watch on that amazing Raw in 10 minutes Youtube page so I might have missed it, but has the thing with TJP's key round his neck come up yet? That's an absolute gift for a babyface isn't it, especially if it's even remotely true. You could call it his Key to Victory or some shite and knock them out for a fiver a go at shows. Like when Bret had a necklace with himself on at Survivor Series '94 as well as his shades.

TNA had a bad habit of smashing the credibiltiy of something into a billion pieces, and in the case of Lockdown, it was surely the Electrified Cage Match. A disasterous horrorshow as it happened, but something that could constantly be harked back to as a total joke, which in turn stained the name.

 

But broadly speaking, Lockdown was probably host to some of TNA's genuinely credible moments. Joe/Angle, AJ/Abyss & Gail Kim/Jacqueline were all little milestones, I have a recollection of a quality Angle/Anderson match (?), Bully Ray's Aces & Eights reveal locked in the cage was topper, and though it wasn't at a lockdown, XXX vs AMW certainly went some way to making cage matches in TNA must-see for a bit, in the way Foley's plunge gave enormous weight to HIAC as a scorched-earth feud-ending gimmick.

 

Mad to think TNA had 12 PPVs at one point, and strictly from that point of view, at least looked like a reputable wrestling company. If WCW hurtled itself off a cliff at 100mph, TNA's demise has been like Homer tumbling down Springfield Gorge.

Yeah, I reckon open challenges on TV keep her busy, and then they can ship somebody decent off the main shows for her to beat in something high profile for NXT and for a soft launch for her character on the main roster.

 

If she's not the Raw Women's Champion by that point and they commit a shred of story to it, Charlotte could put her over in a huge Takeover match. You could probably put that on last in fact.

Yeah I really loved this week's episode, echo other positive posts in here. I like enough of Ember Moon's act so far and there's still plenty of time to add some bits and bobs to the presentation and she'll be right in time for the big match agains Asuka (the Takeover at WM?) I think they could get them both there undefeated and have Asuka as a heel by then too.

 

Joe, Roode and The Revival were all just fucking great weren't they?! I'm so glad they're there on NXT but they could parachuted right on to the main roster and be major deals, no bother.

Jericho has repeatedly said he's gutted he didn't get a chance to buy WCW, I wonder if he's got his eye on this.

I just watched Bray Wyatt's NXT in-ring debut against Aiden English, and it's so so much better than the thing that finally made it to the main roster. He's verbose and entertaining with his patter, slicker in the ring without damaging the character, it's night and day from what he is now, or even when he debuted on the main roster.

 

It almost makes me blame the direction he's had from WWE rather than the man himself. It's like the opposite of what they're supposed to do - they've given him pointers that have made him the crap all round act he is now, instead of refining the jagged edges from NXT.

Cheers Rick. Had missed all that whilst pissing myself at 'Vincest'.

 

So it seems the wise collective UKFF view on Broken Matt to WWE is a 'no', but I still reckon it would port over to NXT exactly as is if Matt was willing to sacrifice the Saturday night money for a taste of one more big Takeover crowd and the slim chance of sneaking back onto a Wrestlemania.

I don't read newz sites but through Twitter I saw something about Hardy contracts coming due realtively soon. Is that true? Do TNA even have proper contracts?

 

In this modern era of gaffer HHH bringing all our stupid favourites in, is it completely ludicrous to think Broken Matt and Brother Nero won't make it into NXT en route to Jeff's last crack at stardom and fuck it, Matt's as well. They're well and truly back in the shop window, and are the undisputed "I wish WWE had these TNA wrestlers" champions over James Storm since the rest of the top folk are now all up there.

Bad Blood 2003 and 2004 are looping in my version of Wrestling Hell, with two HHH HIAC atrocities and that fucking Redneck Triathalon cunting up the 03 edition.

 

Has Jericho/Goldberg finished yet? I remember because I was Wan of Dem in 03 really wanting Jericho to shoot, brother, because they'd had aggro backstage for realises and Goldberg said no to the feud back in WCW. In the end the whole thing was just a pile a shit and everybody from the wrestlers to the fans were the ultimate losers. 2003 is absolute toilet.

A month or so's worth of WWF from late 92, a really busy spell too. Jimmy Hart stabs the Nasties in the back to sort Money Inc out, Jannetty returns with a Becky Lynch-esque Irish Jig and runs off Michaels, and Bret Hart is the most fightingist WWF Champion of all time having seen off Skinner, Shango and Virgil all on telly in a short span. Kamala is going to be resting in peace too, appropriate as those coffin-building segments are absolute fucking death.

 

I'm really fond of this period actually, because I was just so into Bret's first run as World Champion and Shawn's first run as IC Champ. Say what you want about WWE spinning certain times in their history, but I genuinely believe at the time Vince legitimately did want to take a chance with these guys before Hogan flickered his eyelashes at him around Mania. The *big* stories and heartbeat of the company centre around those two, and once they both had belts it was absolutely the Survivor Series main event on telly despite heavy big star involvement in the tag match and the late Perfect face turn. Very enjoyable product for me, laden of course with lashings of nostalgia.

FellatioLips mentioning tournaments in another thread got me thinking, what's people's favourite 1 night tournament ever? I'm immediately at a fight between King of the Ring 93 and Deadly Game, albeit for polar opposite reasons.

 

KOTR is a really brilliantly booked wrestling tournament in the traditional sense, but the myriad of superlative ring performances really push it over the top. Of course it's one of Bret Hart's best ever nights, but Razor's great, Bam Bam is tremendous and Perfect/Bret gave many of us cause to consider which version of the match was their favourite.

 

As oft-discussed on here, Deadly Game is surely Vince Russo's finest hour, a masterpiece of the era he helped shape regardless of your opinion on short matches or shitty finishes. It is as dramatic an evening of wrestling storytelling (and its that, a whole evening drama rather than some isolated moments) as I can ever remember, with threads running throughout the night bringing the entire roster and their motivations together in a way you rarely see outside of a Royal Rumble match. It's brilliant.

 

So I can't pick between those two, but WCW had a hundred stabs at tournaments and the WWF still used to do them before Vince seemed to just about totally outlaw them. What are other favourites?

Babyface HHH would have helped I think. They could have got some miles out of Austin ducking him because HHH proved he had the measure of him at No Way Out. But then if the Invasion happens with a fit and healthy HHH, it's impossible to predict the impact it might have had on that story anyway.