JerryvonKramer

I knew that growing collection of film reference books would come in handy one day. Lelslie Halliwell, Barry Norman, Roger Ebert, and Leonard Maltin all seem to rate Ford quite highly. However, David Thompson seems not to like Ford much in his New Biographical Dictionary of Film and Clive James (by the by, whose Cultural Amnesia EVERYONE should read once) seems to agree with him. Mark Kermode hardly ever mentions Ford. The easiest way to see this would be to look at voter breakdown in Sight & Sound's top 100 lists. See if Ford gets more votes from directors than critics.

I'm pretty positive Chad has your entire body of work memorised off by heart Charles. And I'm only half kidding.

Dylan, my point is not so much that he's influenced fans in general, but specifically fans who do reviews on the internet. Chad and I cross-check reviews of these shows from many different sources: stuff the P2B guys have done, 411.com, Matt Pettycord, Adam Gutschmidt, Pegusus, all sorts of stuff that comes up on google searches. Some home truths: 1. The pool of people "out there" who have actually reviewed Halloween Havoc 90, for example, is quite small. You could count them on 2 hands. They are guys I could probably name. So I agree with you that the average fan out there is not name-checking Keith. But they might well watch this show and pull up a review of it and the REVIEW is what is Keith-influenced. 2. This small pool of people reviewing stuff aren't always terribly insightful or great at reviewing. Peter has identified a standard templated. I'm not suggesting for a second that WTBBP is the be all and end all of PPV reviews, but I do think we -- and PWO in general -- are a step "beyond" the typical wrestling show review / match analysis "out there". We break down matches. We look at structure. We do more than just say "Oh Earthquake is a fat guy. DUD" We account for 1% of 1%. 3. The small pool of people reviewing stuff all copy each other / copy Keith not just in their style but in their ratings. Take the opener here on Havoc 90. Chad brought up the the point that it was given ***1/2 pretty much across the board. He pulled out Hart Foundation matches that are routinely also given ***1/2 that are nowhere near that level. Something has gone wrong in the critical process by which that consensus comes to be. I'll tell you in a nutshell what it is: it's the guy doing the review checking Keith or another peer and ensuring he's always within 1/2 a star of that rating. I've seen this in review after review of show after show. You end up with what are essentially self-generated myths. Flair vs. Garvin is a ** match? How? Why? The Nasty Boys vs. Steiners match on this show. The Keith line is to think "oh hey it's the Nasty Boys, they are shitty workers, this match will be shitty, there's a cap on how good it can be. Let's make jokes about how shitty Knobbs and Saggs are. Let me pull out Keith's review of that match. This is a fucking disgrace of a review. The wild brawl at the start automatically becomes a "spotfest". Keith is complaining that there's too many high spots. In the next breath when the Nasties take it to the mat he's complaining about perfectly legitimate, focused work on Scott Steiner's injured back as "restholds". So he doesn't want high spots, and he doesn't want matwork. What does he want? Why is the camel clutch a "shitty resthold"? In what way are the Nasty Boys aping the way Sid works? Or was he just trying to "get his shit in" as a reviewer? Why is the Steinerline in the hot finish criticised for contrivance? What does he want? So a clear ****+ match, in Keith's hands, becomes a **3/4 disaster. Now Matt Peddycord ... **3/4 Now Dark Pegasus ... ***1/4 Now mcc91 from the P2B board ... *** Now some chap called "Scrooge McSuck" who doesn't give star ratings but not too subtely picks up on exactly the same criticisms as Keith: "Good brawl, but too slow at times, particularly the overly long bearhug spots." And really, there aren't that many more HH90 reviews out there. That's pretty much "the field". You see how things snow ball? You understand why I get frustrated?

These animated gifs are fantastic rz!

I don't hate Keith, in fact I've rather enjoyed his recent appearances on the Place to Be show. However, I think you are underselling his influence a little bit. No one really reads A.C. Bradley anymore, he arguably hasn't been relevent since the 1930s, and yet his spectre still haunts Shakespeare criticism to the extent where his take on Hamlet is still the default one. Anyone writing on Hamlet, even now, whether consciously or not, is in some way reacting to Bradley. On the show, we've always used Meltzer's ratings as our benchmark, but Chad and I often look to see what else people have said. It's become clear to me that very often the benchmark "out there" on the internet is not Meltzer's rating but Keith's. So often it's his rating that permeates all of the reviews of these shows out there. People often (rightly) criticise Keith for his historicial inaccuracies. My problem, however, is that his match reviews are often lazily automatic and predictable. This is bothersome to us because you get these weird common places right across the internet. We try to analyse things in-depth on this show, and very often the common places we're battling have their source in Keith.

http://placetobenation.com/where-the-big-b...een-havoc-1990/ Chad and Parv welcome back Solomon to watch Halloween Havoc 1990 - [02:59] Observer and Torch roundup, including: Family Feud, Jim Cornette's backstage heat, Jim Ross talks Mid-South on Torch Talk, Keller's "Booker for One Year" idea, the move to Central Stage and much more. - [56:36] Halloween Havoc 90 review, including Tony Schiavone as the Phantom of the Opera, a sad farewell to the Midnight Express, Black Scorpion magic tricks and should heels win clean? Question(s) for the listeners *Sting special*: has any wrestler been "faked" more than Sting? Has any wrestler been tricked more than Sting? Can you think of a single match where Sting has carried someone? - [2:39:18] End of the show awards and last show's responses to 'Question for the Listeners'. The PWO-PTBN Podcast Network features great shows you can find right here at Place to Be Nation. By subscribing on iTunes or SoundCloud, you’ll have access to new episodes, bonus content, as well as a complete archive of: Where the Big Boys Play, Titans of Wrestling, Pro-Wrestling Super-Show, Good Will Wrestling, and Wrestling With the Past.

I'd also say that there is no way in hell you could accuse us of group-think since we disagree about a hell of a lot of stuff and regularly. What I will say though is that I think the baseline standard of WWF in 1979 isn't exactly through the roof. Patterson is standing out on cards with guys like Bob Duncum, Swede Hanson, The Wild Samoans, Baron Scucluna and other guys of that ilk. Now while I'm probably in the top 1 percentile of guys in the world reasonably high on Dominic Denucci, there is a sense in which he and all of these other guys are making Patterson look super in comparison. I want to say that Patterson is light years ahead of most of those guys. He stands out because he's doing a lot of bumping and character work at a time when a lot of guys were lying around on the mat or doing very basic punch-y kick-y stuff. That sounds like I'm down on the period, I don't want to come across like that because it is under-appreciated, under-watched and subject to a lot of preconceptions that simply aren't true. But, viewed in context, Patterson seems like he's from another planet. Also, I think DiBiase's performance in the FIRST of the Patterson matches is very good (one thing we've found is the law of diminishing returns at MSG or Spectrum: often 1st match is great, 2nd one not as good, 3rd one disappointing -- often but not always). He is very fired up and works with real focus and intensity. The multiple kneedrops on the arm, for example, are brutal. Again, if you've come off watching peak All Japan or a bunch of cool Lucha or something, that sort of thing isn't going to seem like much, but DiBiase stood out to me as a guy who was really switching up the gears in terms of pace and intensity compared to everything else that was going on. That match is around the ***1/2 sort of level for me, I have the Patera-Patterson match from April 1980 around there too. But ***1/2 in this environment is not to be sniffed at. Hope that makes sense.

I think matches from this period and promotion suffer more than usual when watched out of context. I can't really explain why.

Like JYD, the PWO captcha has "Another One Bites the Dust" as its theme music.

Arn looks unusually chubby in that pic.

Yeah. soup23 let's drop this, I don't like where it's headed either.

Can you point to instances where he disrespected the business?

Not just people on PWO, his peers in the industry and so on. I'm not sure what you want Flair to be, some sort of humanitarian? How many people at the top of their profession never screwed anyone over? Or made personal sacrifices? I don't understand how it can be argued that Flair didn't respect the business. I'm baffled by that arugment Chad.

I don't really understand what is being said. Flair played the game. You have to look out for number 1 in wrestling, that much is obvious. You don't agree that he had a good attitude as regards his craft? He was a real student of wrestling and lived for it. It's all he cared about. And he lived his gimmick too. So what? That might have come at the expense of his family but so what? The net result is that he's the GOAT. That's what he wanted and achieved.

I like Flair as a human being. Wrestling is his whole life and he had a tremendous attitude towards it, his heart was mostly always in the right place. What's sad about him is that he doesn't know how to retire. I have read in the WONs though that Flair wouldn't put Luger over for whatever reason.

The impression I get, Brain, is that Flair resents the fact that Luger didn't embrace his chance to learn when he was running with the Horsemen. Flair was a student of the game through and through. When Flair was a youngster he had total respect for the business and by all accounts was sponge-like doing anything he could for the older hands and learning from them all the time. Luger wasn't the same. Flair wanted the same sort of repsect he had shown others when he had broken through, and Luger didn't show it and acted with a sense of entitlement that (from Flair's point of view) he plainly didn't deserve. I CAN see it from his point of view. I understand why Flair and Arn and the others don't like him. He wasn't a fan of wrestling, he treated it like a job, he wasn't eager to please his seniors. All of these things feed into the burials on shoots and Flair's refusal to put him over from 88 to 90.

Not that I could find, but the Observers at the time talk about how Flair point blank was not willing to. He'd put Sting over, but not Luger. 1990 was an interesting year for Flair, his confidence and ego were hurt as he was turning 40. He was worried about his position, he was worried about Jim Herd. And on top of all of that, was coming off a run where he was facing almost total burnout from being head of the booking committee. I think the tendency is for fans to think of Hogan as the ruthless backstage politician and Flair as the guy who is willing to put anyone over. But make no mistake that Flair was not afraid to use his backstage pull and position in the company to call shots. You don't spend as long on top in the wrestling game as he did without being a canny political operator. This sort of thing is more visible in 1990-91 when his position is under threat. But even in the the 1980s, when Flair reigned supreme in Crockett, he had power struggles with Dusty. If you watch Flair in shoots, even now, he thinks the Horsemen were booked too weak and didn't win often enough. In shoots, Flair is unkind about Luger. You've got to believe that Luger's bad rep within the industry comes partly from the fact that he was never in with the boys -- Flair and Arn in particular. Flair often buries Luger whenever he talks about him in a way that I think is unfair. Then again, I wasn't there, maybe Luger was a massive asshole. All we can see is the work.

It's never crossed my mind, and probably never will. Blood pressure rising ...

I think the long-term plan must have been to build toward a long Sting vs. Luger programme and gradually to de-emphasise Flair as the main man. I've thought a good deal about this and if they'd played it smart you might have gone with: 1. Sting over Flair 2. Sting vs. Luger feud (3 PPVs at least) 3. Eventually have Luger win to become new champ. 4. Run interesting Luger vs. challenger stuff: Pillman, Scott Steiner, Face Flair, maybe a face Sid It's clear in early 1990 that Sting and Luger were being thought of as the future and Flair very much the past. In a strange way, the Sting injury was beneficial to Flair's career. He was about to slide down the card but instead had to work another programme with Luger.

Did Jumbo or Tenryu ever really get over with US crowds? Sid did.

Hopefully not at the same time.

Hold on, hold on. You had dream in which you suggested a best of best of 80s comp? Is this the least eventful and least exciting dream of all time? What format did the dream take? You literally dreamed of yourself being on PWO making a post about that? Or was it like in an imagined bar with imagined goodhelmet and Loss and Childs and so on sitting around with Johnny Sorrow getting drunk and loud and shoe falling off a stool in a stupor? You need to flesh out this dream.

I am not with you there Mark.

I just listened to the first half of Austin's interview with Meltzer. Great stuff so far, and Patterson got a mention as a "tremendous worker". But they've just said a lot of things about scripted promos that I think a lot of us agree with and it reminded me of that one Patterson promo that blew me away: Patterson is a great promo mainly because he comes across as absolutely meaning what he says. When you look into his eyes, no aspect of the performance is bullshit. It's totally authentic. Even when, as a heel, he's bullshitting, he does it in a way where you believe that he believes his own lies. Even back then, there weren't that many guys who could do promos with that level of believability and intensity. I couldn't love Patterson more.

khawk, do you think being memorable and standing out from the crowd is enough for a HoF case? Are we saying that for tag teams drawing records and so on matter less? Or are you suggesting that the mid-80s WWF teams would be work-only candidates? Not having a go, just seeking clarification.