Wrestling consensuses you disagree with

[garynysmon]

1 hour ago, air_raid said:

Financially not worth it, probably. DSF clearly made an offer they couldn’t refuse.

PPVs were shown on a 2-3 week delay on Saturday nights.

Kids these days will never understand the skill required to blindly fast forward through all the german softcore chatline ads which filled the entire ad breaks, when watching the previous night’s shows the next day when your nain (grandmother) was over for Sunday lunch.

The German commentators never talked during entrances though, which was great if you were as sad as I was and wanted to record entrance themes on audio cassette.

[theringmaster]

Hot take-The wcw figures of the mid to late 90s were better than wwe's of the late 90s, that Toy Biz Hollywood Hogan is still a figure of pure beauty. I admit things got a bit weird towards the end (The liontamer Jericho is legendary for all the wrong reasons).

I think that was one of the great things about the wwe network-you could watch all the wcw ppvs the uk missed out on, we literally had video's to rent from blockbusters of shows from like 2 years earlier and that was it.

I know the ITV deal was pretty important in the early days of aew, you do have to wonder around 99/00, what would have been if WCW tried to sell something to international markets a bit better, it could have been a much needed inject of cash.

[air_raid]

2 hours ago, garynysmon said:

PPVs were shown on a 2-3 week delay on Saturday nights.

Kids these days will never understand the skill required to blindly fast forward through all the german softcore chatline ads which filled the entire ad breaks, when watching the previous night’s shows the next day when your nain (grandmother) was over for Sunday lunch.

It took about 5 hours to watch Bash at the Beach 98, the Rodman match felt like it lasted an hour.

[Lorne Malvo]

I was another who had loads of WCW merch even though the only WCW I'd seen was a really shit episode of Worldwide on Channel 5. I never understood why my family would always buy me stuff from 'the crap wrestling' but it being cheaper clears that up.

I had WCW annuals (I remember leafing through the roster pages wondering who all these shitearses were), that Nitro ring with the button in the middle that would play the Nitro theme / commentary when you pushed it (I loved this), a double pack of figures - Kevin Nash and Konnan I believe - with magnets on their fists which I believe were meant to suplex each other (this gimmick didn't work) and a shitload of the Nitro trading cards, which I thought looked ace but I never learned how to play with as nobody else had them.

[sivy]

That DSF channel, I remember that's where I saw halloween havoc 95 for the first time and because nitro wasn't on tnt wondering why lugar was attacking savage and hogan. 

[air_raid]

36 minutes ago, sivy said:

That DSF channel, I remember that's where I saw halloween havoc 95 for the first time and because nitro wasn't on tnt wondering why lugar was attacking savage and hogan. 

Never mind why, I’d be asking who.

[The Reverend]

Coming from a slightly vintage fan's perspective (eg. I'm f'cking old) WCW did do quite good business in the 91/92 era - Woolworths always had a big stock of the Galoobs, and they even managed to get in the Argos catalogue (you would've thought they would've just been in the Index one - see told
you I'm old!). Obviously they weren't as good as the Hasbros, but they bolstered your own Fed and it was good to have a Flair and Sid whilst they were actually in the WWF, and not have to wait until the Hasbros after they'd left (and, maybe controversial, but their Galoobs were better htan their Hasbros - a rare occurrence).

You could more for your money as I recall Galoobs at £2.50 in Woolies - rather than over £4 for Hasbros. Once I went to an independent toy store and the yellow card Hasbros had just been released. I really wanted the Nailz (?) but didn't have enough dosh. Tried switching the price sticker from a Galoob instead, the little villain I was, but couldn't do it. So instead had
to settle on a Flyin' Brian Galoob at a cheaper price. Fast forward and the Nailz figures after 6 months were being sold off for a £1 after the big wrestling crash in 1993, but that Pillman was the rare UK only blue trunks, now worth a pretty penny!

I remember other merch being around, a clock, a card game etc. but they always looked a bit cheap compared to the mighty WWF merchandise. The card game had an illustration on the front of Sting, which I'm guessing was a cheap way to do It rather than pay ol' Ted in Atlanta for photo rights.

One thing they also did well was their magazine - full colour like the WWF
one, but it came with a free double-sided poster, and had better covers which was probably down to the fact I think it had staff that had worked on PWI, The Wrestler etc. I thought their videos were quite good too, great
covers, cheaper prices (although I think they cut everything down to fit on 2 hour tapes) and more 15 rated vids which made them cooler seeming more 'edgy'.

Although not as big as the WWF, back in the early 90's WCW did have quite a lot of exposure over here.

IMO what they should've done is strike a better deal with ITV. The shows were all over the shop time wise, late night, afternoon, Had they been able to get a set, regular time-slot (maybe around 3/4pm on a Saturday) and
either show just one of their US shows, or better yet a recap show of Pro, Worldwide and Saturday Night, and combine that with some tours, they would've done mega business in the UK back then. The exposure they would've
had would've beaten the WWF which was seemingly enjoyed by the weirdly opposite side of the spectrum rich kids/council house kids who had a nifty satellite on the side of their house (didn't have Sky being middle class - not bitter at all!). With ITV having the TV Times too they could've advertised the hell out of it.

If WCW had started a proper relationship with ITV in early 1991, they may have been the ones to run the big, big show in the UK in '92 instead of the WWF.

Ah! Halcyon days indeed.

[wandshogun09]

49 minutes ago, The Reverend said:

it was good to have a Flair and Sid whilst they were actually in the WWF, and not have to wait until the Hasbros after they'd left (and, maybe controversial, but their Galoobs were better htan their Hasbros - a rare occurrence).

Galoob Flair was definitely better than the Hasbro Flair. Not even close. I always hated that headlock mold for Hasbros. Rude deserved better as well. And that’s even more annoying because Rude never got a Galoob either so that series one Hasbro version of him was all we had to work with. 

[Merzbow]

Sid was my one and only Galoob that I can remember having, for obvious reasons as the was the coolest wrestler in WWF at that time. There was never a Vader Galoob was there? I guess he was just that little too late, or they were before he really became big there.

[DCW]

I remember asking for WWF Attitude for the PS1 for my  birthday and ended up with WCW Mayhem because 'they're all the same' according to my auld fella. Definitely wasn't because it was in the bargain bin in Game. I had no access to WCW TV at the time so hadn't a clue who most of the wrestlers were. 

I made the best of it, trying to create WWF lads in the awful CAW mode until I bought Smackdown the next year out of my confirmation money.

[sivy]

26 minutes ago, DCW said:

I remember asking for WWF Attitude for the PS1 for my  birthday and ended up with WCW Mayhem because 'they're all the same' according to my auld fella. Definitely wasn't because it was in the bargain bin in Game. I had no access to WCW TV at the time so hadn't a clue who most of the wrestlers were. 

I made the best of it, trying to create WWF lads in the awful CAW mode until I bought Smackdown the next year out of my confirmation money.

Don't get me wrong mayham wasn't good least if wasn't thunder that was way worse. 

[DazzM]

Mine is that Samantha Irvine was a terrible ring announcer.

Not terrible in the sense she couldn’t do the job, she could. She was good at it.

But the ham acting; the social stuff, it became less about putting the talent over and more about her.

Loads of people loved her Mania performance where she got all emotional over Cody. I hated it. It killed the moment. The culmination of the journey should be backed up by a huge “Aaaannnnd newwwwww”, not some banshee wailing in tears.

Similarly the MITB cash in… put the moment over not yourself.

[TheScarlettChad]

13 minutes ago, DazzM said:

Mine is that Samantha Irvine was a terrible ring announcer.

Not terrible in the sense she couldn’t do the job, she could. She was good at it.

But the ham acting; the social stuff, it became less about putting the talent over and more about her.

Loads of people loved her Mania performance where she got all emotional over Cody. I hated it. It killed the moment. The culmination of the journey should be backed up by a huge “Aaaannnnd newwwwww”, not some banshee wailing in tears.

Similarly the MITB cash in… put the moment over not yourself.

Her over dramatic way she'd announce people was awful. Her crying while announcing Cody too. Makes it all about her. 

[simonworden]

22 hours ago, sivy said:

Don't get me wrong mayham wasn't good least if wasn't thunder that was way worse. 

I actually quite liked Mayhem but then I didn't play it until later post closure. I didn't have the cash for a PS2 and my parents decided no more consoles post PS1 so I went round buying all the PS1 games I could. 

Mayhem was one I enjoyed for it's entrances, range of arenas and variety of wrestlers from top dogs to luchadores and jobbers. Didn't matter it was slower or clunkier than Smackdown.

Speaking of games I thought Attitude was bollocks, too many combos and too slow. I also hate the good WCW and WWF games on the 64 for the same reason. Got to be pick up and play for me. 

 

[Cheeky Boy]

51 minutes ago, simonworden said:

I also hate the good WCW and WWF games on the 64 for the same reason. Got to be pick up and play for me. 

 

Surely they were about as pick up and play as it gets? Unless I'm misremembering, I thought they were the ultimate wrestling game that anyone can get a quick understanding of straight away. The perfect antidote to the combo headache of Attitude at the time.