El-P

It was way worse than it appeared. The guy is lucky to be alive. Probably gotta take care of his condition in term of not going through too much stress also. What would have been is last match then ?

It just occurred to me who Sammy Guevarra reminds me of in term of visual douchebagery : Alex Wright.

I did not notice ! Apart from that, yeah, like I said I agree he's not been very good at all for a while now (even before the Black angle really) and I also think Griff Garrison has potential (plus he got points with me during that Lexy Nair interview where he said he did not enjoy heat and he was always tired ! And where the fuck has Lexy Nair gone ?!?).

I dunno, a simple mention of Julia Hart triggering "BRIAN PILLMAN JR. SUX !" is awkward for me, yes. Like, I wasn't even talking about him... Whenever people act like this it always reminds me of that hilarious "HE'S FAT !" Scott Steiner promo though.

Rebellion : Jonah vs Tomohiro Ishii. Holy shit. Eddie Edwards vs Rocky Romero was excellent. Romero has to be one of the most underrated workers of the last 20 years, as he never seem to be in conversations but damn he is so good and has been for so long. Finally, the Chelsea Green turn that was expected and built on for a while now, and it was just expertly done, with Cardona jumping on Mickie James to boot. AEW badly need some big time angle of the sorts for their women division and badly need someone as good as Mickie (granted, she's been doing it for ever now and she's really good) as far as working angles.

Yep, I was thinking the same thing. Wasn't a fan of his MLW Loose Canon redux either, but the whole Hart Foundation stuff was fun.... well... I mean, of course there was the whole Teddy Hart stuff and DBS Jr. is that Canadian guy who supports Trump.... yeah, I said it back then I wasn't sure how I would look back on me enjoying those Hart Foundation bits when the Teddy Hart shit hit the fan and... maybe better forget about this whole deal... So Jungle Boy was somewhere in the vicinity. Him and Sammy are two of the pillars of the company apparently. (kappa Emote)

Won't get an argument from me, I was enjoying the Alexa stuff everybody hated back then when she was the dominant heel champ. She's definitely someone I would enjoy watching out of the system too. No idea what's the plan for Julia. And really, the Varsity shouldn't be a priority anyway. The Young Bucks have made them look ten times better (and more over) than they actually were and Pillman hasn't been very good for a while now (dating back from the MJF stuff, which still was kinda cool as they put him over in his hometown). There's so many very good to great tag teams in that company (i's ridiculous actually, they could run a tag-team G1), I don't see why they should be pushed above their current level now. If they want to actually work on developing Julia, she should indeed be given a new role.

That's a good thing actually. That's why it intrigues me. And ok, I'll do my coming out. Although the Alexa Bliss stuff I've watched (on Youtube) was often cringe because of the WWE kind of writing, the actual idea of the character, I actually kinda like it like I enjoyed the most out there Lucha Underground stuff (witches, murders and stuff.... damn, I still kinda miss LU). That being said, AEW has Allie aka The Bunny right there, and she has played creepy insane characters for a long time now and she was really fun at it too.

Sabu was infact the most realistic seller ever.

Your Pillman Jr. hatred is just getting awkward now... Yeah, he's not been very good. Probably should find himself another identity that suits himself better than just being "Jr." too, maybe that would help finding the right kinda working style for him (he's obviously not his father). I don't see what warrants to much constant venom though, including following up that post when he talked about his personal struggles...

Agree about everything here. And yeah, the Anjo part is spot on (although Anjo was still cooler because of the UWF style, he had quite a charm as a douchebag). And honestly, I already want PVZ to slap Tay around. If Vince Russo was there he'd book a OnlyFan on a pole match already. BTW, is Stu Grayson injured or something ? Seems like he hasn't been around for a while now. Hope he comes back, he's one of the most underrated talent in the company. Meanwhile, I would not mind a Silver/Reynolds underdog reign, they really can sustain that level now. Oh, and I'm actually intrigued by moody Julia Hart...

Babyfaces ? I dunno, I guess you had the infamous Shawn Micheals picture of him naked wearing only the belt, but assuming the belt is still covered in body fluid because you never even cleaned it up is not really classic babyface stuff. Sammy's just miscast at this point, he's not a babyface, and Tay becomes unlikeable by association. Of course there was plenty of good stuff on the show too, Dax vs Punk was very good (teases of Bret Hart coming in ? Would make sense especially as we're getting close to the Owen Cup), Cole vs Lethal was absolutely terrific (they had the crowd in the pam of their hand too, just listening to the crowd would tell you that, Lethal has been quite impressive thus far, I lust admit) and the Texas Tornado match had a very Nitro feel to it I thought, for some reasons. That new Jericho faction is quite a success thus far too.

I've been pretty happy about it, IMPACT is super enjoyable.

You know we're getting that legit Sammy/Tay sextape leak one of these days, right ? Might as well make it an angle before it even happens. The whole jizz on a belt is SUCH a heel move (and really, it kinda refers to the Paige leaks, which kinda sucks). Vickie Guerrero has been useless in AEW since day one. This angle is WWE level awful and a terrible mistake on how to jumpstart Thunder Rosa's title reign. MJF vs Wardlow still doesn't interest me. Yeah... hum.... Remember when AEW TV was all about the Young Bucks and Kenny Omega having awesome matches every week at Daily's place ? Ok ok, of course I'm focusing on the bad here (the Wardlow angle is not bad per say, just uninteresting to me), but I've endlessly praised all the great stuff before, and really, that wasn't a very good week for Coach Tony K. Maybe trying to book ROH at the same time is not gonna be a very good idea at all.

And I mean, honestly I have no idea about Kross, but on the same show you have Jay Lethal, who may have or may not have sexually harassed Taylor Haendrix, and the Briscoes, who magically gave a truly heart filled apology without ever specifically mentioning why they were apologizing a few weeks before the big ROH redux PPV in which they were supposed to be booked until the rumors got around that some people at WarnerMedia wasn't to happy about the perspective of maybe them getting signed by TK... So, yeah, whatever. And BTW, 30$ on Fite ? That's a 10 more than a AEW or IMPACT PPV.

Well.... he's booked on the NJPW Lone Star Shootout show, against Minoru Suzuki no less, on the same day. So was Bobby Fish, right ? And he said he did not know about Wuertz QAnon bullshit back then.

True. But by this time Heyman was probably already envisioning himself on RAW though...

Exactly this . Snow always came off like a bitter old guy to me. It's not like his work was notably great either. His SMW stuff really isn't that good. His ECW stuff is super hot because of the crazy gimmick but the big Douglas match sucked (ok, Douglas was banged up as hell). His WWE stint is at best okay in a goofy way, at worst pretty bad. The guy never drew a dime indeed. And he's acting like this all-knowing crusty veteran... meanwhile, Tracey Smothers, who actually was a great worker at the very least, was always giving and positive with younger guys if you believe the numerous stories about him. Hey, maybe Al Snow is a good trainer, I dunno...

Too bad they could not debut him April 1st, really..

So, I've finally reached the last Prichard era episode. What a ride. Overall, although the product was much more focused and definitely upgraded in term of production, the creative direction instilled by Prichard was extremely detrimental to the company (not even mentioning the financial aspects of going on the road with no backup plans while hype and ratings were dropping). Basically there has been two phases, the Bobby Roode reign of terror and Aces & Eights. The first was dull, repetitive, marred by tons of shit finishes on big shows. The second was dull, repetitive, never ending, dull, repetitive, stupid, never ending and really by far the worst major angle the company ever ran, if only because of its length. As much as Bully Ray was a nice reinvention in the first months, once he was the leader of Aces & Eights, he got just as unbearable as Bobby Roode the previous year. Also, the company never felt as much like WWE, which shouldn't be surprising. The long-ass promo segments setting up matches, the in-ring style of Roode as a single champion (Randy Orton-like crawl and dullness), the unnerving repetitive booking with people seemingly paired up for EVER, leading to a billion matches together, making even the best pairings boring after a while. Sure, there was some good things here and there (Aries short rise to the top, Jeff Hardy's best work in years, Gail Kim killing it and the Taryn Terell feud, the Joseph Park character which was fun for a while, before at the end all you get is still Abyss in the ring, Brooke Hogan in the stupid wedding angle which was quite surprising honestly) but much less peaks in in-ring work than before (which is kinda ironic since there was a bigger focus on actual wrestling following Russo's departure). And so this was really the beginning of the end for good ol' TNA, with budget cuts galore, AJ Styles soon departing at the end of the year which would be followed by an endless flow of departure, the demotion to smaller and smaller TV stations, the Carter wanting to sell it to Corgan then the GFW fiasco, then another Corgan fiasco, before Anthem would basically save the company with D'Amore & Callis at the helm. Really now, the Hogan era was a disaster for the company on every level, and Prichard seemingly only made it worse (2010 was at least watchable because of the car crash WTF aspect of the TV, while not good it was perversely entertaining sometime, there's no bigger sin in pro-wrestling than to be dull and boring). Last time the company still looked like a pretty cool alternative was 2008. Next time would be what ? The Broken Matt stuff ? And oh yeah, this episode had that Kim vs Terell ladder match. Gail was on fire at this point, she really had been a top worker in the company for a while now, and Terell showed tons of will and potential. Really a surprising bright spot during this time.

One of the most fascinating aspect of pro-wrestling is its ambivalent relationship to "reality". The idea that there is still a discourse about it being "fake" is amazing in itself, it's like no matter what the ambivalence will always be there despite the fact it should be recognized for what it is (some kind of performance craftmanship/art) for ever now. As far as toning it down, well, it all depends what constitues pro-wrestling in your (in a general way) eyes. There are aspects of it which absolutely constitute some sort of self-sacrificial behaviors (and I'm not just speaking of guys like Foley or Onita), which indeed can seem completely absurd, but what's the difference with workers (I don't mean pro-wrestlers) killing themselves and destroying their bodies and mental health during their entire lives (for much less money that is) through exploitation ? (and yeah, pro-wrestling is part of the entertainment world that makes violence acceptable as a spectacle so social violence doesn't occur and people accept their fate during the week instead of burning shit up until social justice actually occurs) The idea that pro-wrestling is "fake-fighting" is what drives that idea that it's stupid to kill yourself doing it, but pro-wrestling is not really "fake-fighting" (well, it is, but it's more than that). Still, the ambivalence lies somewhere, which is why it is so fascinating.

AL Snow also said that there was only *one pop* during a show, if I remember correctly. The guy who only ever got over in ECW thanks to a styrofoam head and a sexual pun giving advices like he's Yoda or something always cracked me up.

The guy is so fucking cringe now, it's no wonder the mystic was much better when he never talked out of character. Get your HOF ceremony wankfest and go away already. No one wants to hear your stories about travelling with weapons and shit, like it meant anything in term of how the product looked back then. Yeah, those casket matches with Kamala and those Ministry of Darkness skits were gritty as fuck, man. All those guys who have been privileged by booking since day 1 they showed up in the company because they are BIG or/and they look GOOD giving tips on how to get over is the pro-wrestling equivalent of mansplaining. Let's call it alwayspushedsplaining or something...

Nope. I actually wanted to catch up at least the woman's match (because I like all three) and Aldis vs Cardona (mostly because I'm really enjoying Cardona's heel stuff, Aldis' NWA champ fetish to me has jumped the shark a long while ago), but really, the thing is I'm way past the point of looking for an alternative. AEW and IMPACT more than fill my need in current US pro-wrestling now (and I don't even bother watching either Dark shows). Not even sure what I'm gonna cherry pick from Wrestlecon this year (apart from the IMPACT shows at least), probably some GCW stuff. NWA to me is like MLW at this point, I'm sure some if it is pretty good still (Richard Holliday & Alicia Atout as a heel duo sounds pretty fun actually), but I just don't have the will nor need (nor time, really) to look it up anymore. I'm still baffled they actually did a Dusty finish and thought this was a good idea for their big show...

A DQ Dusty finish in 2022, because old-school = good, of course. Corgan's NWA was a nice little cosplay novelty promotion for a few months. Them disappearing from Youtube really killed their groove, the over-saturation of pro-wrestling (and really now, I do think running ROH as a weekly show is not a good idea) makes them pretty irrelevant, as they got no hype whatsoever anymore (Cardona as NWA champ got much less talk than his stint in GCW does). Plus some of the talent they employ is questionnable at best (Tyrus, who brings exactly *nothing* to the table anyway, yet is apparently positioned pretty high in the food chain, for whatever reason). I wonder how long Aldis can carry this thing around.