King Pitcos Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 Apparently some Scottish promotion has Dennis Stamp appearing at their shows this weekend. Unless the bloke happened to be on holiday in the area and offered to pop in it strikes me as an appalling waste of airfare, other than to have a giggle about him being booked, maybe even bring out a trampoline. Bloody surreal. A smarky in-joke that'll lose them a few hundred pounds so they can giggle with each other. Real smart business. Turns out when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer a couple of years back, they promised him a booking if he beat it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members gadge Posted September 4, 2014 Paid Members Share Posted September 4, 2014 Shelton Benjamin still had the "blue chipper, rookie future world champion" tag on him when idiots spoke even after he'd been there for years and years and years, because so little of note happened in his career that he never seemed to become a veteran.[/size] And that was after he won UKFF's Rookie of The Year in 2004, despite having been on WrestleMania in 2003. That's why the award was later renamed "breakout star."[/size] I think Michael Cole called Kofi Kingston "the veteran" the other day. I'm not buying that. That Lost Generation probably just needs to leave and come back later. Ziggler et al would benefit from a bit of "got better in Japan" type hype. I imagine that if MVP or John Morrison came back to WWE right now they'd feel a lot more significant. I suggested Jack Swagger for a spell in Japan a year or so ago and got ridiculed The whole Lost Generation seemed to coincide with the change in NXT format - suddenly the guys who were in the old style NXT dropped off the face of the earth, and the acts in the new NXT both felt fresh, and seemed to have the WWE machine behind them. Suddenly, developmental is the place to be to get noticed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ant Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 I feel a "hold pattern" has existed since the day WCW as a separate entity ended. There probably has never been a glass ceiling that can compare to the one that has existed for the last 13 and a half years. Timing as well. Eg had the big hosses of the naughties had been around 10/20 years earlier they'd be high profile players with inflated bank balances. Instead the Snitsky's, Matt Morgan's, Jon Heidenreichs etc are barely memorable compared to a Sid Justice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Liam O'Rourke Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 (edited) Rewatching Survivor Series 94 before the England game (bought the 93/94 Tagged Classic set from Ebay last week) and in particular the Submission match between Bret Hart and Bob Backlund. Even nearly 20 years on from that match, Owen Hart's antics as the tearful brother pleading with Stu and Helen to throw the towel in as Bret's locked in the Chickenwing is bloody convincing and I still love how at first he doesn't know what to do after the match is over then just runs off cheering like a total rat bastard, towel in hand Not to mention the fantastic job Gorilla and Vince did on commentary right after, disgusted at Owen...."How could you do that?" Edited September 4, 2014 by Liam O'Rourke Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members martyngnr Posted September 4, 2014 Paid Members Share Posted September 4, 2014 (edited) Apparently some Scottish promotion has Dennis Stamp appearing at their shows this weekend. Unless the bloke happened to be on holiday in the area and offered to pop in it strikes me as an appalling waste of airfare, other than to have a giggle about him being booked, maybe even bring out a trampoline. Bloody surreal. A smarky in-joke that'll lose them a few hundred pounds so they can giggle with each other. Real smart business. Turns out when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer a couple of years back, they promised him a booking if he beat it. Radio DJ Chris Duke (the man behind the NWO Takeover tour) promised to get him a booking. All he had to do was find some chumps to pay for it. Edited September 4, 2014 by martyngnr Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ant Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 Apparently some Scottish promotion has Dennis Stamp appearing at their shows this weekend. Unless the bloke happened to be on holiday in the area and offered to pop in it strikes me as an appalling waste of airfare, other than to have a giggle about him being booked, maybe even bring out a trampoline. Bloody surreal. A smarky in-joke that'll lose them a few hundred pounds so they can giggle with each other. Real smart business. Turns out when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer a couple of years back, they promised him a booking if he beat it. Radio DJ Chris Duke (the man behind the NWO Takeover tour) promised to get him a booking. All he had to do was find some chumps to pay for it. Christ I suppose if you put some thought to it someone like this would be involved somehow. Any idea what became of the NWO Takeover tour mob? Normal service resumed in the Scottish wrestling scene? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Van Dammer Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 The only thing I can think is to take from what's 'in' at the moment. In my mind, that's reality TV, social media, hip hop, the 'YOLO' mindset and party culture. How you weave that into wrestling, I've no idea. Trash TV and grunge seemed more apt for a wrestling product. Adam Rose is a shite party character. Tyler Breeze is a decent contemporary character, but he's pretty shit. Id say of all of those things only social media is 'in'. Reality TV as we know it has been around for decades now and hip hop wouldnt be the genre of music that I would say is in, infact id say completely the opposite about it and say theres only a few hip hop artists that are really relevant in the mainstream now. I would say you are right though, mainly because you are so wrong with what you consider in. Wrestling has rarely been good at identifying what is taking off and what is on the way down. They are still churning out generally horrible entrance themes that wouldn't have been out of place in the 90's. Even with social media they were late at jumping on the bangwagon and got on completely the wrong wagon with Tout and lost money there. I think its a problem that wrestling is in a bubble that nobody seems to look outside of, and all of their executives seem to be 50+. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Chest Rockwell Posted September 4, 2014 Moderators Share Posted September 4, 2014 WWE has kind of got a whole lost generation of talent that just meander around, and it seemed like towards the end of 2012 someone noticed and realised they should start bringing new wrestlers in with more direction/fanfare. Wasn't it basically when HHH started doing the Talent relations role? That's when I remember noticing it - both Sin Cara and Kharma had a big hype around them turning up and neither of those worked out particularly well; I remember hoping they didn't just drop the idea because the general principle behind it was still a good one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sphinx Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 (edited) The only thing I can think is to take from what's 'in' at the moment. In my mind, that's reality TV, social media, hip hop, the 'YOLO' mindset and party culture. How you weave that into wrestling, I've no idea. Trash TV and grunge seemed more apt for a wrestling product. Adam Rose is a shite party character. Tyler Breeze is a decent contemporary character, but he's pretty shit. Id say of all of those things only social media is 'in'. Reality TV as we know it has been around for decades now and hip hop wouldnt be the genre of music that I would say is in, infact id say completely the opposite about it and say theres only a few hip hop artists that are really relevant in the mainstream now. I would say you are right though, mainly because you are so wrong with what you consider in. Wrestling has rarely been good at identifying what is taking off and what is on the way down. They are still churning out generally horrible entrance themes that wouldn't have been out of place in the 90's. Even with social media they were late at jumping on the bangwagon and got on completely the wrong wagon with Tout and lost money there. I think its a problem that wrestling is in a bubble that nobody seems to look outside of, and all of their executives seem to be 50+. Jay-Z and Beyonce, Kanye West and Kim Kardashian. I'd say they're some of the top, top celebrities at the moment and they're either hip hop or reality TV. Club music is prevalent in the charts I guess too, but pop acts are often affiliated with hip hop acts. Rihanna has hip hop elements. Nah, not having that. Hip hop is very relavent. Edited September 4, 2014 by Sphinx Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
King Pitcos Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 WWE has kind of got a whole lost generation of talent that just meander around, and it seemed like towards the end of 2012 someone noticed and realised they should start bringing new wrestlers in with more direction/fanfare. Wasn't it basically when HHH started doing the Talent relations role? That's when I remember noticing it - both Sin Cara and Kharma had a big hype around them turning up and neither of those worked out particularly well; I remember hoping they didn't just drop the idea because the general principle behind it was still a good one. I think it probably started slightly before them, with Del Rio, who got the big push right out of the gate. Before that, with ECW and the original NXT format, everyone seemed to be debuting as "look, here's a YOUNG GUY" and doing nothing of note. The Nexus attack and Barrett push was probably the first sign that they wanted to make instant/fast stars, but Del Rio was presented as a solo superstar from day one. Then the Sin Cara and Kharma failures probably put the brakes on it a bit, and I think that's what started the move towards not calling people up without having a solid idea for them. Although Xavier Woods. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members tiger_rick Posted September 4, 2014 Author Paid Members Share Posted September 4, 2014 Anyone who thinks "reality TV" in wrestling is a good idea only has to look at impact the last couple of years to see that it's a fucking stupid idea. Headache inducing bollocks that absolutely pales in comparison to have a smart, well lit backstage interview area with an interviewer and a microphone that actually picks up sound. What TNA don't seem to realise is that an "on location" skit can be really fun but that: a) if you can't hear it, it's pointless b) if you do them all the time they lose their impact c) if you mix segments where the camera is supposed to be present and segments where it's supposed to be invisible, you get a mess. The recent Impact where Sam Shaw tried on Gunner's coat is a good example. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sphinx Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 Just because TNA can't execute ideas well, doesn't mean the idea itself isn't a good one. Showing Dean Ambrose in his leather jacket and shades in the desert showed him in a different light to me, fleshed out his character some more, and made me appreciate him more as a consequence. I'm not saying completely mimic reality TV, just take certain elements that complement wrestling well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
King Pitcos Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 I'd like to see them do a mini-documentary each week on Raw, where over the course of the three hours you get three or four two-minute segments that shows you a bit more about a Roman Reigns, Dean Ambrose, Sheamus, Cesaro, even down the list to the likes of Justin Gabriel and Curtis Axel. Just getting into the characters more, establishing something relatable that the same matches every week can't do. The thing I'm thinking of specifically is the old JR interviews with Mankind and Goldust. Of course, the problems with it are cost (if it's anything more than sitdown interviews) and the diminishing returns factor if you do that every week. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members tiger_rick Posted September 4, 2014 Author Paid Members Share Posted September 4, 2014 Just because TNA can't execute ideas well, doesn't mean the idea itself isn't a good one. Showing Dean Ambrose in his leather jacket and shades in the desert showed him in a different light to me, fleshed out his character some more, and made me appreciate him more as a consequence. I'm not saying completely mimic reality TV, just take certain elements that complement wrestling well. I like the outside stuff. Brings back great memories of Boss Man vignettes, Dibiase skits, even the APA battering people in bars. And it works. But full on "reality TV" doesn't work. It's overly complicating a simple process. Plus wrestling is supposed to be "reality TV" anyway. Just in a sporting environment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Undefeated Steak Posted September 4, 2014 Share Posted September 4, 2014 Pitcos, I think you're on the right lines there. They need to do something, anything, to help us build up a more of a connection with the personalities on screen, even if it is just a daft 3 minute backstage sketch. Those skits with APA smoking cigars and playing cards were simple but effective enough. Van Dammer and Sphinx, in regards to what wrestling should do to try and catch on with the current mainstream trends, I'd latch onto the super hero/retro/comic book interest that would naturally tie in perfectly to WWE. Colour Raw up a bit (does it still have to be red and black?), give wrestlers more face paint and tassels and capes and have some whacky, over the top gimmicks and storylines. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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