FMKK

How long before we see some of those guys showing up again? We've already got Lashley, Benjamin and MVP from that weird lost generation of people who never became stars. What a bleak time it was when people thought Mr. Kennedy would be the next big star.

It's bad when the nostalgia signings nowadays don't even come from hot business periods anymore.

I dunno, if I was running a wrestling company and someone on my payroll was refusing to cooperate in a match with someone from another promotion I'm trying to cultivate a relationship with, I'd probably can them. I wouldn't say that this looked like more of a struggle.

Definitely no in between from thigh slapping and shooting on someone.

Yeah, she looked like she was walking from spot to spot at times too. I would can her tbh.

The Bryan match in 2018 smokes the AJ match imo

The guy should've been a star on national television years ago.

The only times he's ever been on screen is sitting at a table in the backstage looking like a dork. I'm fine with that.

I think it's going to be Jay as well. I can see him beating Tanahashi in the final because he's a star who's able to take a loss and they'd want to hold off on a Jay vs EVIL match until they pull the trigger on a Bullet Club split. That's how I've gone in the competition I entered anyway. I think Sanada is an outside bet to at least reach the final. He was feuding with White earlier in the year and has a long history with Okada so he could easily face either of them.

In spite of everything, New Japan have somehow managed to put together a G1 line-up that's as stacked as ever. I'm trying not to have too lofty expectations because Covid era wrestling has struggled to live up to normal times but the Jingu show was fun enough to make me excited about the company again after the Summer of EVIL. Here are the blocks: A Block Kazuchika Okada Kota Ibushi Jay White Tomohiro Ishii Shingo Takagi Minoru Suzuki Taichi Jeff Cobb Will Ospreay Yujiro Takahashi B Block Tetsuya Naito EVIL Hiroshi Tanahashi SANADA Zack Sabre Jr. KENTA Hirooki Goto Juice Robinson Toru Yano YOSHI-HASHI I'll not give away the match orders because a lot of times that can spoil the direction of the booking but really, the block finals cards make things seem more unpredictable than they've ever been. You could make the case for like six different winners, which is about four more than usual really. Voices of Wrestling and Post Wrestling are both running pickem competitions that seem like good fun if you want to make more interesting or just give yourself a headache from trying to be Gedo for 15 minutes. The tournament kicks of on Saturday 19th September and runs until Sunday 18th.

Those two dorks were actively saying in interviews that they wanted to swerve people instead of making it make sense. Right out of the Russo school of booking.

Well yeah, it could be BS (though I think there was some official statement about focusing on new characters which led to her speculation I guess). But I just thought it was funny to bring up in the context of talking about carny businesses. Hollywood is as carny as it gets, but with more money and better production values.

Really rumoured. To the extent that half of the episodes in the next season don't even really feature or centre around him. That's the story anyway.

Although rumours suggest the main actor is pulling a HBK and refused to do business because they wouldn't let him do scenes without the helmet.

Colt having a guilty conscience leading him to help Cody win the title back would be a nice way to conclude this and allow you to spin Cody off into his next feud while leaving Brodie with something to do.

Kinda. Brass ring and glass ceiling etc.

Miro could be a really great signing for them but for some reason I also fear he could be like one of those ex-WWE guys who would show up in TNA and put in low effort

Yeah, he got carried along by lots of experienced workers into decent NXT style matches but he was always a clunky worker. After he got injured he came back even worse. The guy had charisma and the character for over with NXT fans but as with all WWE characters, they shove it down your throat too much and it's a turn off. Plus, even before the alleged pedo stuff there have been allusions to him being off the rails behind the scenes.

He's a useful placeholder guy who can be used to beat whoever he needs to to make the points work out without ever really being a threat himself. Kinda like Goto, but obviously a much lesser worker.

Is he part of whatever that weird WrestleJoy shit is?

I'd say Yujiro is the worst guy in the whole thing. I think I'd rather have Fale than him. I just watched the Tanahashi vs Naito block final from 2017 so I'm pumped for those two to hook it up again, even though I doubt they'll be able to push their bodies in the same way 3 years on.

Looking at their track record over the last four or five years, I would hesitate to agree with the idea that cream rises to the top there. But then people are so pigeonholed by the overproduction that its hard to even really tell where the cream is.

I'm a little disappointed we aren't getting SHO and Hiromu in there but their time will come. I'm stoked as hell about the A Block like everyone else but there'll be some nice matches in B Block as well. They've been setting up an Tanahashi vs Ibushi feud for a while so that's a potential final I think. Or maybe Jay White vs EVIL with a Bullet Club explodes storyline, but I think they'll save that for the Dome.

Just take a break from it for a couple of weeks and try to watch again. It's an interesting experiment on how bizarre it truly is and how it must be impossible for them to ever make new fans.

How can anyone see the camera work on the Cedric turn and the Mysterio kendo stick attack and hear the cringe verbiage of the Retribution promo and think this is anything but one of the worst produced television shows in history? This is the first that I'd seen any WWE TV in a while and it is genuinely unwatchable.