BomberPat

That's gorgeous, and reminds me that I bloody love a Shift Lock key.

5 minutes ago, Accident Prone said:

I still think that excuse is just a front. WWE can peddle out that reasoning until the cows come home, but the Big Trump Fundraiser letting their independent contractors work in Saudi whilst pulling them from the dangerous Quildan territory just feels bogus. 

I think it's dubious - as I said, RevPro have been on the blacklist since day one anyway - but the incident was absolutely on WWE's radar, and there is a difference between their talent working Saudi Arabia where they're lauded, wined and dined, and probably micro-managed from the moment they arrive to the moment they leave, so not actually in any danger at all, to working indie shows where WWE have no control over them. 

The main reason WWE get involved on indie bookings for NXT UK talent is out of concern that their talent might get hurt, and be unable to work WWE dates. If they feel that what happened with Aaren - and how RevPro managed it - doesn't satisfy them, that feels like a justified decision. Because chances are it wasn't just Ligero and Conners pulled from this show, but NXT UK referees too, and if WWE feel that they can't guarantee their safety, they'll make that call.

Of course, it could all be four dimensional chess designed to make AEW look like pricks for offering their support to the company that battered a ref, who knows?

In which case, fair fucks to them. 

I don't know if it's true or not - RevPro have pretty much always been on the "don't work" list for NXT UK talent, after all - but it's good for WWE to be able to set a precedent. 

Makes AEW look a little more foolish for rushing in to help out, though.

The key difference here is that it sounds like he would be signing with FOX to host a WWE recap show, not working for WWE directly. It wouldn't necessarily translate to him wrestling. Though you know once that foot's through the door they'll likely be trying to talk him into it.

On the same topic, just seen this on Twitter;

From the pilot of a Jerry Jarrett/Jim Cornette pitched project that's basically "American Idol for wrestling", with Cornette as one of the judges.

So Jim Cornette, complaining about wrestlers exposing the business, is actively exposing the business and presumably wants a broader audience to see it. Jim Cornette, who every day seems to be insulting some wrestler or other as not belonging in a ring, is working on a format which positively ensures that inferior wrestlers will receive a platform and a paycheque. It's almost as if it's got nothing to do with him protecting the imagined integrity of the wrestling business, and everything to do with him working a gimmick that allows him to be an arsehole with impunity.

3 minutes ago, Otto Dem Wanz said:

You know what they've never done before that could disrupt WWE's creative malaise or even just provide a bit of a short term publicity boost - SEND IT TO THE FANS.

Select a random sample that includes all demographics - men, women, kids, "casuals" (however many are left now), old-timers/saddos like most of us, lapsed fans, etc etc, and have them write storylines. 

Kayfabe's dead anyway so its not like it would be "exposing" the biz.

This is a half-baked post because my lunch break is nearly over but wondered what everyone thought the troubles or potential benefits of this could be. 

It would be the Itchy & Scratchy focus group. "You want a realistic down-to-earth show that's completely off the wall and swarming with magic robots?"

And one thing that becomes abundantly clear in conversation with a lot of wrestling fans is that being a fan of wrestling doesn't remotely equate to having the know-how to write wrestling.

That one's been around forever. Obviously it's the schoolkids that are booking holidays in foreign countries, driving 4x4s, and making the purchasing decisions for the family.

There is something extremely "Galaxy Brain" about making a career out of shoot interviews, while spending every waking moment complaining about other people "killing the business".

I agree with @Accident Prone though that the snitch-taggers are far worse than him, because there's little if any actual thought process behind what they're doing. You can tell when someone starts using Cornette buzzwords in their criticism of wrestling - "outlaw mud show", or using his shitty nicknames for wrestlers - that they haven't an original thought in their head, they're just blindly parroting his opinions.

In a broader sense - I have friends who have written academic papers on the history of wrestling and the nature of kayfabe, I have been involved in long, detailed discussions of the changing nature of kayfabe and pro-wrestling, how wrestling relates to MMA and to broader pop culture, and how wrestling navigates those relationships. The question of "how wrestling works" is one that's always changing, so for anyone - Jim Cornette, Joey Ryan, Vince Russo or Vince McMahon - to say, definitively, "Wrestling has to be X" is extremely irritating, because it's ignorant of decades of history that have seen what wrestling "is" change time and time again. And of course it's just a happy coincidence that wrestling just happened to be in its perfect, correct form at around the time Jim Cornette started watching it and then first got involved in the business.

5 minutes ago, Accident Prone said:

As you said, Jim's grasp on the basics and fundamentals are solid, but his ideas as to what pro wrestling is and what it can be are incredibly outdated, and he shifts his focus and moves the goal posts in order to keep his fans entertained and outraged.

This is the point where, on wrestling grounds, I take umbrage with him. His criticisms always used to be broadly financial - "funny doesn't make money". His criticism of wrestlers he didn't like was always that they would never draw money. But then when Kenny Omega starts selling out the Tokyo Dome, that argument doesn't work any more, so he shifts the goalposts, and now it's, "it doesn't matter what he's achieved, he did comedy wrestling and he shouldn't be allowed in the business". It stops being grounded in results, and becomes entirely grounded in opinion.

I would say that Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks have done a much better job of articulating and presenting their take on what pro-wrestling should be than Jim Cornette has managed in decades. 

40 minutes ago, tiger_rick said:

You're banned from Yorkshire.

Fair cop.

watched Werner Herzog's latest, Nomad: In The Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin on iPlayer last night.

I've only read one Chatwin book, and more than 20 years ago, so probably wouldn't have bothered with this if it weren't Herzog. As it happens, it's excellent, but very Herzog, so depends how you feel about him as a director. Luckily, I think he's bloody great, and this feels like a culmination of a lot of his documentary work. It's self-referential in a way that his films rarely are - it frequently touches on his friendship with Chatwin, and similarities in their work, shows clips of previous Herzog films, and Herzog himself appears on camera more often than he ordinarily does in his documentaries. 

In places it reminds me of Orson Welles' F For Fake, in that there are open discussions about the difference between "truth" and reality that go unresolved, and that, as a director, Herzog seems intent on reminding you that the documentary format is wholly artificial - when interviewing people, the camera lingers just too long before they start speaking, and after they finish.

That is like moral panic bingo, tremendous.

I had a stab at it.

I don't see Muta getting cleared to work WWE, but Muta vs. Undertaker is probably a bigger "this never happened" match than Undertaker vs. Sting for me. But it's way gone the time when they could manage even a smoke and mirrors match, unless I've missed something and Keiji's got himself some Rey Mysterio Magic New Knees at his last operation.

If I saw nachos in a giant Yorkshire on a menu, I'd think it was a dreadful idea, but now that I've seen it, I'm blatantly going to make it at home when I get in pissed.

Yeah, I get not having him go out as Kishin Liger, and I hope this means they have something really big planned for Jushin at Kingdom for his final match instead.

Given that Kingdom is a two day event now, though, it would have been cool to have Kishin Liger on night one, and then Jushin Liger on night two. 

Either way, this makes it feel more like a "Retirement Tour", rather than just treading water until his last match, at least.

Yes, Elimination Chamber was called "No Way Out" in Germany, and then "No Escape" when WWE starting using the No Way Out name for PPVs again.

We're still no closer to knowing why, though! 

As I said on Twitter, I'm guessing it was a case of the names being given to Colisseum Video before the In Your House subtitles were decided, or something like that? 

A somewhat interesting query;

This is "WWF Rampage 1997" on VHS - but the show itself is just Bad Blood '97. I'm aware of Canadian Stampede being released on video as "Maximum Impact".

Is anyone aware of any other examples of shows renamed between PPV and home video release, and why that was done?

I've never watched it because I'm a contrary bastard who tends to not watch stuff on telly when everyone at work is talking about it.

"Casuals" probably weren't going so far as to buy wrestling magazines, though. 

Jad Fair and Kramer performing at the celebration of Daniel Johnston's life. When Jad Fair's guitar first comes in, it's so incongruous, but by the end I think it's absolutely perfect. Powerful stuff.

I've got a wardrobe full of lovely tweed jackets, waistcoats, and a couple of flat caps, and they're basically all in storage until Peaky Blinders stops being a thing, lest I be mistaken for one of them pricks. 

Untitled Goose Game is wonderful. Getting the goose "on TV" in the TV shop, just reeling around with wings out and honking maniacally was a genuinely joyous moment.

I've probably played less than an hour in total, but as a result spent a significant part of yesterday with the other half trying to sneak up behind me and honk at me to scare me.

Kishin Liger has long been one of my favourite things in wrestling, because I love a good powerful image, and some of the photos of that first reveal were incredible. It played into the MUTA "demonic alter-ego" persona better than anyone ever has, and that it's been used so sparingly since, rather than him busting it out for every big show, just makes it so powerful.

That he's completely bald with it now just makes it look even more sinister, and creates a stronger distinction between Kishin and the Liger we're more familiar with. I don't know if the facepaint being smeared and smudged was a result of him wearing the mask over it and working up a sweat, or a conscious design choice, but it also made it all seem so much creepier and more dangerous than if it had all been perfectly smooth, well applied and flawless.