El-P

Jacob Fatu vs Tom Lawlor was a completely "meh" match. Fatu looks great doing his signature spots, but really, as a match it was "ok", at best. MLW keeps on being the anti-epic. Highlight of the show was Konnan coming back to confront Salina in a segment that was called the Jim Cornette Experience in the most transparent plug-for-a-podcast ever.

Not a large crowd, but a great crowd. I'm pumped as all fuck for Ishii vs Cobb. All the G1 matches delivered in a big way. Ospreay is so great at using the space of the ring in unusual yet interesting ways, like this crazy counter to the first pounce. The one issue with that match is that Archer's G1 has peaked. Watching Ospreay take on this different guys is gonna be so much fun. I'm not as down on Bad Luck Fale as others, he's a decent big man worker (his finisher is the pits though) but he's really taking space in G1 at this point, especially since he wins so much. Does he has a sextape of Gedo of something ? EVIL looked pretty damn good though, and I'm usually pretty mixed on him. SANADA vs SZJ was great. Total technical clinic, Sabre is the greatest dickhead, SANADA is displaying more charisma and he seemingly can do anything. KENTA vs Ibushi delivered in a big way. KENTA works exactly like he should. People expecting him to fly around are gonna be disappointed because he won't do that anymore. Ibushi looks like a freak, really, he's almost scary. The right guy won. I thought Okada vs Tanahashi still was the best match of the night, they can have a MOTYC in their sleep it seems. Tana also looked to move way better than at Dominion, which is a good thing, although I have no idea for how long it will remain that way. I wasn't too keen on the idea of beginning the G1 in the US, especially on a show that would not sold out (they should really promote better by announcing matches in advance), but it was a complete success. Great, great show with a terrific atmosphere.

Well, cool. And good for them. She can be the ace of the show (in a way she already is). If so, I hope they go all batshit insane and have Eddie legit kill him. We had the Bunny die already (and Luchasaurus also, as an extra). Keep the bodycount alive !

Losing LAX would be a huge blow to iMPACT indeed and a big gain to whoever gets them (unless they get wasted, if you know what I mean...). It makes the match against the Rascals less important too. Maybe the idea is to get some buzz for their joint shows on Twitch, like the old "a title can switch on a house show" deal. They really have done an excellent job building the card up and down again, with several matches I really look forward to (Swann vs Johnny, RVD vs Moose, Tessa vs Callihan, the four way Monsters Ball, Kross vs Edwards). With no angle or promo about the main event this week, I wonder if Cage really is cleared at all. Hopefully they don't put the title on Elgin, that would be a big mistake to have the guy with the charisma of a dead fish and the self-conscious work to build around the main feuds. TJP, I'm pretty indifferent. Both the name and the look scream indy geek, despite his long career. I dunno why they jobbed Ace Austin, who's got potential and character, twice to this guy already, although their booking usually makes sense and leads somewhere. The Tessa little doc on Youtube was quite cool (she told most of these stories on the Jericho podcast). Her interest in doing intergender match pretty much closes the door on her going to AEW for now (that is, assuming she isn't locked with iMPACT anyway), hopefully the AXS deal makes iMPACT stronger because I need my little promotion who isn't afraid to go all freaky Lucha Underground style from time to time (as showed by the final angle on the show).

Fuck me, that match... It's like the two greatest young wrestlers ever against each other. The whole 5-5 match is great, but they stole the show that day. Yatsu was awesome up until 86.

You mean the booking that had him interrupt Bret Hart at Double or Nothing to showcase his great promo ability ? As far as the matches go, they are still in the process of introducing their roster, they can't book a bunch of 1-1 matches up and down the cards yet.

Is there a show in Parts Unknown tomorrow or something. Anyway, they sure know how to capture the imagination of the current audience by going back 20 years straight...

Yep. Cody vs Dustin feud : one promo each on Youtube a few weeks before Double or Nothing. It kinda worked out allright. Until they have TV, that's how AEW will operate. Some big angles on the shows and then promos on "Road to" format and maybe some on BTE too.

Actually I'm a pretty big Corny fan if you except some (most ?) of his views of modern pro-wrestling. I dunno, MLW always had that annoying kinda dated cosplaying stuff anyway (the Robert Parker guys from the early shows which thankfully are gone), but I think the show has been a lot worse lately, and some of the stuff really reeks of mid-90's mentality and presentation in a bad way, so I put two and two together. Maybe I overstate Corny's influence on the product, but the result is there, it's been pretty boring/bad lately to the point of me barely wanting to check it anymore. That Lawlor vs Samael match was awful, really.

Word. Carlito ? For fuck's sake, have a little dignity. No. But Rusev & Lana showing up sometime by surprise on AEW TV/PPV would be cool as hell.

Gotta love that, apart from the main event, they're nothing remotely closing or even involving feuds of storylines that were built in the last few months. Kinda fun to see that basically, AAA is working with both AEW and iMPACT at the same time. Come on, let's lend Kross to AEW like MLW does with MJF and Havoc, and recruit Scarlett already. The women's TLC match should be entertaining if only because of some really good workers on a car crash format. I don't know shit nor care one bit about MMA, so I have no idea who Cain Velasquez is. The AEW vs AAA six-men rematch should be terrific again and easily steal the show. How many interference in the main event ?

This week I learned the world cuckholding thanks to Maria Kanellis an Paul Heyman. Yep, you learn everyday. BTW, Maria Kanellis = Das Worker, better than Kevin Nash is term of knowing how to get money and when to do it. Mike is gonne get Meroed the fuck out on TV I guess, but as long as everything is fine at home, they probably won the game anyway.

It's hard not to see a correlation between how MLW has been evolving into a more and more dated and boring product and the fact Corny works here as a producer. Also, that "cosplay" reference feels awfully convenient and timely with Corny's current AEW vents. That being said, now that you mentioned the fact it may be Aries' feelings, I doubt Corny even knows what "cosplay" means, although it still feels exactly like what Corny thinks about what's going on (in his dated, biased mind). Anyway, it was completely ridiculous, as was the audience midly booing the reference to Aries' "former employer". Talking about cosplaying being hostile to an "opposition" that isn't even one (how long have they been sharing talent like Lucha Brothers, Callihan, Swann, AAA guys etc...) like they are an ECW crowd from 1998... As far as Aries goes, well, although I really like his work, his new look sucks, this match was ill-conceived and he way he left iMPACT was the epitome of unprofessional, so, there you go, have a blast working in the official SMW cosplay league...

Yeah, thought about that one too, honestly it might actually be the biggest one, but the matches have been so bad thus far... I wonder how much smokes and mirrors they'll thrown at Triplemania to make this fun.

Maria doesn't remember...

Both, probably.

I have no idea where that comes from. Kenny has always been positioned in the bigger match on both shows and is the key player in the N°1 angle/feud against Mox. His character may not appeal to you, but to say he comes off like a geek is simply not factual. Unless if by geek your mean "video game fanatic", in which case, yeah. And actually, Cody never came off like a geek in NJ either. Hell, it's watching him over there with Brandi that made him look like a star to me for he first time, much to my surprise, as I never saw shit in him before.

Ok. MLW has officially jumped the shark with me. They're probably going the way of ROH in my weekly pro-wrestling regime. I watched this week's show live, and it was terrible. Again, very very few actual content in an entire hour. The shows drags like hell. The two only enjoyable moments were Fatu killing jobbers, he's terrific but needs to go the fuck out of this purgatory, and Salina calling Mance a "goat fucker". Aries big debut. Now he's got a beard and shaved hair on the sides, so he looks like every guy on the planet in 2019. With plain black trunks, to look even more generic. And they re-debut him in a long, drawn out, competitive guy against Adam Brooks, who''s as generic himself as his name indicates. 50/50 match with a guy no one knows, including some death spots like an almost botched death valley driver on the apron. I mean, Aries is a great worker, but that looked sloppy and useless in such an irrelevant match. And then, a promo in which he talks about the "wrestling war"... Against "sports-entertainment" but also "cosplay wrestling". Oh for fuck's sake Corny... Because of course, it can *only* come from Cornette and his ridiculous stance on modern wrestling. Anyway, talking about "cosplay pro-wrestling" is pretty rich in a promotion which itself has done more actual "cosplay booking" than any other current promotion and which includes Mance Warner aka a guy playing Bunkhouse Buck and Josef Samael aka a guy poorly doing some Sheik cosplay. Except cosplay is supposed to be fun and self-conscious, not being taken seriously and actually pretend it's 1994 or something. Speaking of which... The main event of Lawlor vs Samael was awful. Like, awful, boring, dreadfully boring mid-90's pre-ECW brawling style, on which the crowd totally shit on BTW. And ending with a DQ. Which the crowd shit on even more. This has Corny's footprint all over it. The guy didn't get ECW. He didn't get ROH apparently judging from the people who followed his stint as booker there at the time. He doesn't get Omega and the Bucks today. And MLW has turned into a sad parody of crappy mid 90's TV pro-wrestling, with lesser and lesser content, poorly defined character and poor matches. It's not like it's hard to have a really good TV show even with a somewhat limited talent pool, look at iMPACT (granted, they have much better talent overall). What was fun about MLW was Tony Schiavone calling crazy indy spotfest and marking out to LA Parka brawling all over the place and cool luchadors fighting the fight of Konnan vs Salina de la Renta. This time has gone. So am I, I'm afraid.

Come on, you loved the match with the magical girl. Which is great. You don't like chinese guy flying around ? Maybe you'll like Dustin & Cody working a story based bloodbath. You don't like that ? Maybe you'll like the japanese women taking on the american monster. Not your thing ? Maybe you'll like some good solid tag-team action with SCU or Best Friends. You prefer crazy spotfest ? Lucha Brothers vs Young Bucks is your thing. You want some rough grudge match ? Mox and Jericho are here. Classic heelish and great dickhead promo ? MJF says hello. Anyway, yeah, I like this approach. As far as the demographic, I dunno. I've been watching pro-wresling for almost 30 years, my tastes have evolved during that time, right now I probably enjoy current pro-wrestling more than I ever had and feel like I'm more open than ever to different kind of stuff, so... This. And this.

BTE this week has some fun stuff, including the usual little jabs at WWE ("I should have gone to NXT", and Brandi being told how to look at a monitor backstage), and some actual cool backstage footage like Kenny Omega trying to set up his intro or a camera guy falling straight on his ass into the pool while filming the post-main event angle.

Yep, great look into the deranged psyche of Vince McMahon. JR talking about his wife is heartbreaking though.

When too many podcasts is too many podcasts ? At the same time, how long can he sustain doing the Bischoff one now that Eric is a big shot (lol) in WWE ? As far as Arn goes, jury's out. If he opens up and is as funny and insightful as he's supposed to be IRL, this could be great. If he's the same guy he was 20 years ago on interview, this is not gonna be good. Since I was not down with JR's and it won me immediately, I'm willing to give this one a shot too, especially since I've basically quit Bruce & Bischoff's at this point (Bruce because it was becoming too samey and boring and Bischoff because the ranting was getting unbearable and it can't get better with his current position, considering how much Meltz buried his ass lately).

I had to google that one to understand what it meant. And it come from an Eminem song ? You learn something everyday.

Oh, ok. Since there doesn't seem to be such cases around here, I wasn't aware of those ones either. Oh, yeah for sure. Social media don't help at all, because people remain in their own little bubble where they validate each other all the time and can't handle any other different opinions without screaming for a safe space. BTW, I wonder what the "Metlz is AEW" crowd will say now that he stated how much he hated the pre-show and that he made quite a bit of reservations of other stuff like the chair shot and running Janela vs Mox cold instead of it being the culmination of a feud...

I guess, but thus far what is out there is mostly people in denial of the actual success of what's happening until now, and/or who display an irrational desire to see this fail. Which is really odd, really. You can't blame people (including me) to be really excited because something *new* is happening on the big stage...