Paid Members tiger_rick Posted May 7, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 7, 2018 5 hours ago, Shane O' Mac Version 2 said: Interested why you don't like the shades of gray approach? Graves having a personality and disliking/liking people based on that is actually one of my favourite things about him, but I really like characters that are beyond the simple good guy/bad guy dynamic. It's one of the reasons I think GoT works so well, there's clear heroes and villains, but they're not entirely good or bad, they've got their own set of character traits and some flaws, just like people in the real world. Why is that approach a bad thing in wrestling? Because wrestling isn't GoT or any other TV show. Good guys vs. Bad guys is Wrestling 101 and has been since the beginning of time. Unfortunately some people have spent the last 20 years believing bullshit from the likes of Vince Russo that it's anything other than black and white based on a couple of years at the end of the 90s. There is a massive misnomer that Russo booked "shades of gray" and was successful in the attitude era. He didn't. In 1997 the Harts were heels in the US and babyfaces in Canada. That wasn't gray, it was more like ying and yang. Autin and The Rock were cheered battering the shit out of absolutely anyone for a few years. Again, nothing to do with "shades of gray", just the two hottest acts they'll ever have who made any opposition to them the bad guy in the situation. The absolute worst aspects of the WWF in the boom period were the acts without clear definition who flipped and flopped performing Russo's fucking shit soap opera bollocks like The Undertaker, most obviously. Since then he's spent 20 years trying to reproduce it without success making WCW and TNA unwatchable time and again. I'm not saying it couldn't work but the people with the talent as writers and the knowledge of pro-wrestling do not exist. Graves, or the people who advise him, have no excuse. They have a decade of JBL's fucking idiocy on tape to use as a "what not to do". They have thousands of hours of ventura, Heenan and Lawler showing them exactly how a heel color commentator should behave. Is it one dimensional? Of course. But he's a commentator. not a star. He's there to enhance the people, matches and stories we're watching. That's his only job. Graves is too busy trying to come across as the smart one in the booth to enhance anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Jazzy G Posted May 7, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 7, 2018 Apparently Alexa Bliss has an injured shoulder after the match against Nia Jax. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members FLips Posted May 7, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 7, 2018 1 hour ago, jazzygeofferz said: Apparently Alexa Bliss has an injured shoulder after the match against Nia Jax. That's no surprise. Nia Jax is a fat clumsy idiot. I have absolutely no issue with her being fat either, but in this case she cannot control it at all and that's dangerous. She's not agile at all, did you see how she fell out the ring and just hammered off the ring apron? Shocking. Be as big as you want, but know how to be safe with it. Don't be taking top rope bumps to the outside and having 90% of your moves falling onto someone. Had such high hopes after Miz and Rollins but it got worse as the card went on. Big Cass, both Women's matches, Lashley and Roman Reigns seriously need to take a look at themselves. I didn't even watch the Orton match but can assume that sucked all the air out the room. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members Jazzy G Posted May 7, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 7, 2018 It's a case of her not being as strong as she should be. Likewise with Lashley. He has a great physique, but not the strength. He trained for shape rather than power, as evidenced by his inability to get people up for suplexes. Poor Joe, managing to get all his stuff in and being undone by a single spear.The ref's called matches after people have been in the clutch for less time than Reigns was. That they had to cut away from the "crowd reaction" shots because it was everybody leaving says a lot about "the project" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snitsky's back acne Posted May 7, 2018 Share Posted May 7, 2018 Apparently the backlash to Backlash caused problems over at the Observer site according to Meltzer. Â Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpykeDudlei1 Posted May 7, 2018 Share Posted May 7, 2018 7 hours ago, tiger_rick said: Because wrestling isn't GoT or any other TV show. Good guys vs. Bad guys is Wrestling 101 and has been since the beginning of time. Unfortunately some people have spent the last 20 years believing bullshit from the likes of Vince Russo that it's anything other than black and white based on a couple of years at the end of the 90s. There is a massive misnomer that Russo booked "shades of gray" and was successful in the attitude era. He didn't. In 1997 the Harts were heels in the US and babyfaces in Canada. That wasn't gray, it was more like ying and yang. Autin and The Rock were cheered battering the shit out of absolutely anyone for a few years. Again, nothing to do with "shades of gray", just the two hottest acts they'll ever have who made any opposition to them the bad guy in the situation. The absolute worst aspects of the WWF in the boom period were the acts without clear definition who flipped and flopped performing Russo's fucking shit soap opera bollocks like The Undertaker, most obviously. Since then he's spent 20 years trying to reproduce it without success making WCW and TNA unwatchable time and again. I'm not saying it couldn't work but the people with the talent as writers and the knowledge of pro-wrestling do not exist. Graves, or the people who advise him, have no excuse. They have a decade of JBL's fucking idiocy on tape to use as a "what not to do". They have thousands of hours of ventura, Heenan and Lawler showing them exactly how a heel color commentator should behave. Is it one dimensional? Of course. But he's a commentator. not a star. He's there to enhance the people, matches and stories we're watching. That's his only job. Graves is too busy trying to come across as the smart one in the booth to enhance anything. Hallelujah! Finally someone who thinks the same as I do about Graves. Just because wrestling has evolved, some of the basic principles could still keep things on a decent level. The examples you use - particularly Heenan & Lawler (albeit in a simpler time) - were quite prepared to sacrifice looking ‘smart’ & be humiliated to get something or someone else over. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members BomberPat Posted May 8, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 8, 2018 I think there is some space for "shades of grey". You can afford to throw in a little more nuance in characterisation when you're looking at a WWE main event level programme, because the guys involved get way more TV time than most to get their characters across, whereas a midcard act should be more broad strokes to get instant fan recognition with the limited time they have. The best example I can think of is the Kurt/Triple H/Stephanie love triangle, which was really an all-heel feud, but produced some good work. Ultimately, though, wrestling is goodies vs. baddies, that's the whole structure of the thing. I don't mind Corey Graves not liking all the heels, though, and still liking some babyfaces - it makes him feel like a real human being, not just a caricature cheerleading every villain mindlessly. Like how Bobby Heenan still hated Hogan even after he turned heel in WCW. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members WeeAl Posted May 8, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 8, 2018 One match into Backlash, I was really excited for the rest of the show. With the potential good matches to come following a blazing opener, I though 'we're onto a winner here'. What a shower of shite the rest of Backlash was following Miz and Seth going back through the curtain. Until this year, I haven't been a Rollins fan since the Shield ended. He'd been booked badly as a heel, had a botched return from injury and hadn't impressed me in general. Well, he's struggling to put a foot wrong at the moment. Between the Gauntlet match on Raw, his recent matches with Balor and The Mix, he's the most reliable at the moment for exciting matches, and I'd say his bout with Miz was the best WWE PPV match of 2018 so far. Fair play to them both, they produced, when the entire rest of the company involved in the show didn't hold up their end. Nia Jax and Alexa Bliss - rank. Including that promo afterwards. Orton Vs Hardy - professional, but it had absolutely nothing to remember about it. Bryan Vs Cass. Cass showed here why he isn't worth the investment. The fact that we have a re-match to look forward to saddens me. Bryan won clean, Cass isn't worth 2d, move on. Charlotte Vs Carmella. Carmella, like Nia, is also woeful. Either Carmella and Nia can't be carried to a good match, or Charlotte and Alexa weren't able to carry them. Whichever it is, like Big Cass, I don't see much potential for development between Carmella or Nia. AJ Vs Nakamura looked to be going somewhere until that piss weak finish. They were on course to have a pretty damn good match and they served up nonsense. Three times inside a month this pair have wrestled on PPV, and three times the matches have been a let down. The tag match with Strowman and Lashley Vs Zayn and Owens wasn't a patch on the six man from Raw. There was just nothing about this to get excited about and it had another terrible finish. Lashley is a disaster waiting to happen. How he hasn't seriously hurt anyone so far is a minor miracle. The main event is still going on, last time I checked. It seemed promising at first, with Joe beating the lining out of Roman in the first minute. Then it ground to a snails pace, after a bad show, and nobody gave a fuck. This may have been booked with the idea it would help Roman and sacrifice Joe if need be. Instead they have sacrificed Joe, without it aiding Roman, which was the outcome that any blind man and his goat could have told them would happen. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members ColinBollocks Posted May 8, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 8, 2018 I really like Graves' work. I don't know if it's mainly because standards were so low for so long, but I find he can be really quite funny with his air time too. You only need to be reminded of your alternatives when Byron chirps in with some inane comment that is quickly picked apart by the other two. It is a little odd that he somehow finds certain heels offensive, but as discussed, it adds a little more depth. He's maybe overthinking things, but I don't mind it at all. Better than JBL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members tiger_rick Posted May 8, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 8, 2018 34 minutes ago, BomberPat said: I don't mind Corey Graves not liking all the heels, though, and still liking some babyfaces - it makes him feel like a real human being, not just a caricature cheerleading every villain mindlessly. Like how Bobby Heenan still hated Hogan even after he turned heel in WCW. Heenan hated the nWo wholly. Because they weren't any other heel group, they were an invading force who were a threat to his entire way of life. That's not the same as Graves and Cole switching roles when it comes to Elias for no reason whatsoever. Then again, Elias is a heel who tells the crowd to shut the hell up and sings songs denigrating their home but has a sing along catchphrase that's over. Go figure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members BomberPat Posted May 8, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 8, 2018 I have far more of a problem with Michael Cole loving Elias than I have with Graves hating him. Graves' dislike of Elias is a character note going back to Elias' debut in NXT, and is consistent with Graves' character - it always felt like a bit of a hipster thing in NXT; he didn't feel Elias was everything he said he was, would question how he could be a "Drifter" yet make bookings on international shows, claimed that nobody he knew in Pittsburgh had ever seen Elias, and basically called out his legitimacy, the same way he used to rag on Becky Lynch for being a pretend punk. It's Graves being an elitist snob, and that's fine. Michael Cole has absolutely no reason to like Elias, other than to hold the opposite opinion to Corey Graves, and he overdoes it to the point that he's practically back to his Miz cheerleading days, and it's just odd. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members tiger_rick Posted May 8, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 8, 2018 I don't disagree with that. I just took it as a given that Michael Cole is overbearing and shit though. He's a lost cause. Graves with his confidence and delivery could actually be good if he watched tapes of Jesse and not fucking JBL. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
boytoy Posted May 8, 2018 Share Posted May 8, 2018 43 minutes ago, BomberPat said: It's Graves being an elitist snob, and that's fine. Isn't it the job of commentary to put over the wrestlers gimmicks though rather than developing more fully formed characters themselves? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members BomberPat Posted May 8, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 8, 2018 I think that a colour commentator having a character can lend credibility to their comments, though - Heenan had a character, Ventura had a character, Dusty had a character. You spend more time with the announcers than with any one wrestler - when you know what they're all about, what they stand for, they can use that to influence your opinion of other wrestlers on the show that you might not yet be familiar with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paid Members PunkStep Posted May 8, 2018 Paid Members Share Posted May 8, 2018 18 hours ago, FelatioLips said: That's no surprise. Nia Jax is a fat clumsy idiot. I have absolutely no issue with her being fat either I'd say you might, seeing as fat was the first adjective you used when ripping into her. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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