Jkeats

Well this is actually an acting staple (I'm an comedian/actor, it's how I make my living). It's not necessarily that the heel has to believe that he's doing the right thing...it's more a case of, when playing a character, you can't judge that character. You have to play it from a real place and believing in what you're doing (even if it's cheating because the babyface is just a little better than you) is vital to that. Someone who is evil doesn't believe he is evil. He has his own justifications. The best villains do. The rest, that play at being evil, just come off one note and cartoonish. It's called "indicating". Like kicking a chair to show you're mad. It's one of the reason names like "Brotherhood of Evil Mutants" always sounded off to me (from XMen comics). They don't believe they're evil...they believe that their way is the right way.

I did. I have that annual that it came out in and as bad as it comes off in print, it's even worse when you can hear the inflection in his voice. I'm not going to judge the man either way because I don't know him but that rant was uncomfortable to listen to.

He seemed to work heels a lot in World Class as well, IIRC

Some great stuff in this thread... For me, "money in the chase" just meant not to hurry a storyline along. There IS money in the chase if, as mentioned many times, it's a wrestler people care about chasing a heel they want to see beat. It's the same concept as not wanting a movie to resolve itself in the first 10 minutes. You want to go along that journey, even if you know what the outcome is (which is another problem that seems to jump up more frequently in recent years...not everything needs to be a "swerve". Just because an ending is "predictable" doesn't mean it can't be good. People still love the Orndorff turn on Hogan years later, even though you knew he was going to turn. That's called good story construction. But I digress...). If it's a story well told, you buy into it and enjoy the ride. In wrestling, that ride can result in money. Even the McMahon three match formula was a chase of sorts. The champ couldn't get a conclusive win over the heel challenger for two matches and triumphs in the third. It's certainly not the only way to tell the story or make the money, though.

A slight digression, but this site is amazing. Thanks for sharing, Bix. A lot of these tropes are things my friends and I have recognized. Ex: "Hollywood Homely" is something we always call the "glasses and ponytail effect", in which a hot chick is told to us to be ugly just because she has glasses and a ponytail. . . They have good comments about rasslin, too. I like the quote from JR about how it seems that they WANT people to use those weapons that always seem to be kept under the ring. Yeah they do a funny bit on that in that movie "Not Another Teen Movie". I always though the women were just as hot, if not hotter, WITH the glasses on.

I think the flash pin is awesome when it used as exactly that...a flash pin. It happens so fast that the wrestler on the receiving end is taken by surprise and the match ends quickly. The problem with the rollup is it became a cop out as there would be an entire match and then the finish would come and not have anything to do with the match itself. I don't want to see 15 minutes and then a roll up pin...at least if it's not connected at all to the match. Steamboat was really good at implementing these and not making them feel like a cheap win. The Wrestlemania III match where he reverses the bodyslam into the small package was a good example of this.

I'll give it a go. I don't have a problem with them when done in a way where the wrestler has a logical setup to a big move. Also, I feel the signature spots kind of give you a guidepost to where the match is. While a casual fan may not pick up on this conciously, it works on a subconcious level and can add to the drama when, as mentioned below, wrestler A kicks out of wrestler B's big finish or stops his sequence and adds something different to the mix. Our gut is telling us this should be the end but something happens to change that and it can add to the drama. I don't get this one, either. The Evil Commissioner has taken the place of the old school manager but it's not a good substitution. Even when there are babyface commissioners (other than Teddy Long) they are usually portrayed as incompetent and in over their heads. The Evil Commissioner flies in the face of almost all the story telling logic. If you can make the babyface jump through all these hoops to get the title off of him, and you do, why not just strip him of it in the first place? I would like to see a return to the wrestlers having specific managers that can cheat and connive with an overseeing Commissioner being the voice of reason and the voice of the fans. This goes along with the above "Five Moves of Doom". I think it's a good thing for pacing and, when well established, really can get someone over. If a finishing move is built up and well established, a wrestler kicking out or breaking it can really have a big impact on a match and for the wrestler himself. One of the problems with not having squash matches anymore is that, other than a top few guys, finishers aren't over. Setting an expectation and delivering on it 80-90% of the time makes those times when you go a different way much more special.

I couldn't get past the first paragraph.

Sadly, some fans won't. Hence all the fatass jokes about Samoa Joe. Never mind that he's a perfectly decent athlete who can work hour-long matches, he doesn't have shredded muscles, therefore he's a couch potato to some people. Years and years of the WWE and everyone who copied them constantly giving us roided-up monsters as "real athletes" and "looking great" have conditioned plenty of people into that exact mindset. I think that's all in the presentation. Again, like you mentioned, it takes conditioning of the audience. Pro Wrestling has that luxury though. Even Edge comes off well and he's got a lean, athletic body. I do think, had Joe been booked better, he would be taken seriously and accepted. When he was in ROH and first coming into TNA I don't remember nearly as much talk about his lack of muscles as there is now that he's a knife wielding whiner.

I'm not sure if this is a myth or just a really big pet peeve of mine. It's certainly something that people in wrestling have convinced themselves of: "Fans won't accept wrestlers who aren't jacked up"

It was SLL I was quoting then! I agree 100%.

Oh it certainly wasn't a knock (and I have no idea if it was Will so please don't quote me on that!). I took the comment as a positive meaning that Memphis has been maligned in shoots with various wrestlers as being cartoony and all but there's a lot of just regular "pro wrestling" in the promotion and some great stuff that any wrestling fan could enjoy. Even Meltzer, in the 1983 WON year ender, made an analogy with Memphis and "normal" pro wrestling to indoor soccer and soccer. He said that indoor soccer wasn't really soccer but he liked it better than regular soccer and that was how he looked at Memphis.

I always think of someone's comment about not buying the Memphis set because they weren't into that. I'm not sure who responded (Goodhelmet possibly?) that if you weren't a fan of the stuff in Memphis, you probably weren't a fan of pro wrestling.

Here's another myth that seems to have been busted by the DVDVR Memphis set: Memphis wrestling was just cartoony characters and gimmick matches

In watching a lot of the Freebirds vs. Von Erichs as well as the Von Erich-Duo feuds lately, this myth has definitely been debunked in my mind. I think David was good and, as mentioned, may have been on his way to being an excellent but I don't think he's the best of the three. What Kerry may have lacked in charismatic promos, his in ring charisma was off the charts. The way he entered the ring and moved around it...he really brought the crowd into the match. I'm really starting to come around on Kevin as of late too. I used to think of him as sloppy but in watching closer, I don't think he was. While I don't think it revitalized tag team wrestling I do think this feud is overlooked in WWF/E's popularity at the time. I only vaguely remember this match. I remember it being surprisingly good but I can't point to anything as to why Mike mentioned the buildup being Wrestling 101 and I agree with that. The only problem I had was that it was a buildup that really made it feel that Booker needed to go over. He needed to overcome the stuff that HHH was saying about him. The way it was booked, he kind of proved HHH right.

The Assassins in Memphis circa 1980... Was this the actual Assassin team with Jody Hamilton or was this the Smith/Bass version. Just curious.