Badlittlekitten

It really is a shame that most of the prominent posters on here have decided to migrate to twitter of all places. Hopefully things pick up a bit as GWE 2026 gets closer. Admittedly I'm part of the problem, as I'm watching the footage and still reading this site but never bother to post. I guess I'm just waiting for some debates to heat up.

I caught this on the Best Raw matches gimmick streaming on Youtube. I've not really watched any post-comeback Shawn since it happened. Growing up a fanboy I've always been scared to rewatch his later stuff and ruin the childhood memories. But that worry was instantly gone because I thought he looked fine here (hair aside) and had a good time watching this. It was a nice throwback match and the crowd were gripped all the way. There were fun Flair spots, great HHH bumps and some near-peak level WWE announcing. The thing that stood out though were Shawn's punches. I don't dislike them, but he's no Dundee, Lawler or Funk. It was always an offence thing with Shawn. I can see it being an issue as I watch and prepare for GWE 2026 and it's the sort of thing that results in really good matches rather than great ones.

I lost interest in this straight away. It was inevitable they would tack on some contrived coming of age story about Dump and AJW to fill the episodes and I wouldn’t have minded sitting through it if it wasn’t so naff and, ultimately, boring. Oh well. It’s a shame because I loved the intro. They did a great job of capturing the dangerous/cool vibe of the Dump character in all her glory. They even used the incredible ‘Black Devil’ theme!!

I'm no expert, but currently watching through 84 Mid South and his mini feud with Butch Reed features some good brawls. It's out there in the Houston footage. There's a fun "football helmet on a pole" match between them before Jim leaves the territory.

Poor Willow. What she do to get lumped in with all that? I've bored off it too. The shows are full of predictable, overlong matches that can only be appreciated purely on a workrate level, which is a chore after a while. I've also learnt to have zero faith in pushes or people keeping momentum. Willow though. She was one of the few brightspots for me.

Has Okada fell off? I've not seen him in NJ for years but his AEW work hasn't impressed me at all. His heel character work is great though. Second week in and I'm already finding myself skipping through Mercedes segments. Most overrated wrestler of this generation. I'm shocked by how much I'm enjoying Osprey. Real infectious energy about him. I'm never going to be a big fan of his ring work but he's a great mascot for them. Fun main event. Not sure about Copeland as TNT champ. Should be Garcia's.

Lol. Damage control on The Cody-Roman- Rock mess. A nothing segment just to gauge the crowd reactions. People are crazy about this more than even I thought they'd be. Good for Cody for maintaining that connection with the fans. What a mess though, and Seth and his title look like shit now.

I was hoping they were gonna switch it up with HOOK post-Joe and push him as an underneath babyface while developing his promo game. Instead they doubled down on the Goldberg thing which is kinda dead now. Hechicero vs Danielson was awesome. My current MOTY.

Never thought I'd be such a fan of Nick Aldis. Quickly becoming my favourite authority figure of all time. Him vs Heyman/Roman is magic.

Nia/Becky was fun. The Nia hate is corny now. Decent monster run since her comeback. Her cousin on the other hand, stinks. Inserting The Rock into the mania slot would be HHHs biggest fumble yet. Please don't.

I usually have no gripes with Meltzer, but he's been out to lunch on the Bloodline stuff. He's argument that Moxley is more important to AEWs business than Roman is to WWE is preposterous. As if Sami and Jey Uso would be moving the same numbers if Roman wasn't involved. Roman IS the Bloodline. Even when he isn't there, they spend the entire show talking about him.

Meltzer is being weird about this, claiming Sami is a bigger draw than Roman because the Smackdown rating held up without Reigns on the show. No doubt Zayn is massively over but the overall Bloodline saga (of which Roman is the core) is obviously the draw.

Bray is hurt?

Metal (post-Sabbath) is the only genre I'd call irredeemable. But even I'd admit it works well for wrestling. 'Beautiful People' is still the best theme Raw has had and totally fit the energy of the show. I think we can all agree that Def Rebel is the worst in house music WWE has ever had. Criminally generic for wrestling music and a major reason why the Rumble was so flat.

Wretched! Although Nirvana and REM did release a couple of good singles. It's like rock musicians forgot how to play and be interesting in the 70's. Grunge, shoegaze, Britpop... aged terribly! Each to their own and all that.