El-P

It took some time, but I'm all in with Contra now, last week's episode worked really well with them going all nWo on the entire promotion. The Low-Ki angle reeked of old school (arguing with your manager, then a beatdown/faceturn happening after a squash match) and was really nicely done. The visual of Samael throwing that fireball in the eyes of Fenix was cool as hell (they showed it a million times too). Filthy Tom vs Avalanche was a good TV match, and the show ended up on a hot note (although the whole "cash-in" gimmick is one heritage from WWE I wish other promotion wouldn't use, especially since iMPACT does it too). The booking has been quite efficient these last few weeks in term of putting feuds together. I got a kick out of Fatu wearing those old SST/HeadShrinkers-like tights. I wonder if they are actual old Fatu tights... (yeah, I'm a geek). Bauer better sign the guy, he's too talented to not get grabbed by someone eventually.

Has Kayfabe Commentary stopped producing ? I don't think there has been any new release in eons now. The era of podcasts truly ended the Shoot Interview business (not to mention all these free interviews on Youtube now, some really good stuff on Hannibal TV).

Rusev and Lana probably are waiting for their contract to run out at this point.

You know what I enjoyed about Mox on this podcast ? His take on money. "What would I do with 10M $ ? My truck is paid, my house is paid, what am I gonna do with 10M $ ? Buy a Maserati ?" He's so right. No one needs this kind of money in their life.

The part of Mox's interview where he impersonates Vince throwing "That's really good shit ! It's really well written !" was both hilarious and really enlightening about how out of touch Vince really is. Honestly, I do think Vince has always been very overrated on the creative side. He's the guy who forced Shane Douglas in 1995 into the god awful Dean Douglas gimmick, while Shane in ECW was doing something truly fresh and hot for its time. He put Ted DiBiase with Steve Austin because "Steve could not talk" and settled him with the Ringmaster gimmick, until Austin by himself changed his character and took over the mic (they basically lucked into Austin, much like they lucked into Cena later) . Things like this are not new. They are way worse and all over the board now (now meaning = in the last 15 years at least), but Vince always had a thing for stupid ideas like Mox talks about.

Nah, that's his fault he moved slowly like Taker, it did NOT came from creative, it was ALL his doing and that's was why it didn't work, although, he was a great worker. Yeah, Brucie, sure... Wonder what he'd say about Mox opinion on WWE's creative process. Maybe Mox has no say because he never worked in creative either...

Yeah, that was really cool. The end of the NXT "indie raid" era ? It would be interesting to just make a list of all those people and what they actually accomplished in the company, compared to what they could have accomplished. It also would mean that NXT and the PC would have to serve as an actual development territory, which it really has not been in a long long time now. And who came from that system that ended up being successful ? NJ Young Lions with a few month of experience all look better than most of the guys and girls who have been there for years. Thus far, the NXT program has been way less effective than Corny's OVW in term of producing stars, despite an insane influx of already developed talent. Of course it mostly comes down to the fact they all got fucked once they moved to the main roster (apart from a few guys, like Nakamura who obviously didn't give a flying fuck anymore).

Damn, I suck at streams, I can never find what I'm looking for. Still do torrents though. I'm so from the early 2010's...

Just beginning and it's a great listen. The CM Punk analogy is spot on. CM punk is a guy who loved pro-wrestling and ended up hating it because of working in WWE. Mox was almost at the same point when he decided to quit. This company is run by idiots and is a totally toxic workplace. Yeah, apart from making big money (that is, if you can), no idea why anyone would want to go there at this point when there are some options at there.

Very surprising. He was always all over BTE, there's no way he will make it in WWE. Maybe he just wants to keep doing his thing.

"Mick Foley, who worked here as Cactus Jack, is gonna win their version of the world title. Now that's gonna put butts in seats."

Picture if Chainz was pushed as a main event guy in 1997. And Chainz had more charisma (ok, not in WWF, but Bulldozer Brian Lee in ECW was a cool brawling type character).

Yep. How many time do we need to hear about the JBL vs Eddie angle at Mother's Day ? I thought this episode was dreadful. Long, boring rants about ratings. Usual bitching about "people who have never worked in pro-wrestling". His way of defending Johnny Ace was not only redondant with the usual "It's a thankless job" bit, but exposed by Conrad as completely ludicrous when he asked his Vince just wanted athletes when JR was in position then changed his mind once Johnny Ace got there. Bruce sounds totally disinterested and acts more like a WWE drone than ever. We've been saying that for a long time, but this has jumped the shark pretty bad (and the really good, thus far, JR Podcast actually hurts it pretty bad too).

They spent how many years shoving Roman Reigns down the throat of an audience who didn't want him to be the top guy ? They just don't get it. They think they are above their audience, and it can't get better with the insane TV deals they got. Corbin has been proven death in ratings, on TV, in the ring. They have signed half the talent of the planet. But no. Let's push this useless oaf no one wants to see and who's actively killing ratings and whomever he's working with. I have to reiterate this though : Roman Reigns coming back from cancer ended up being *nothing* apart from a few really distasteful promos to get "heat" on heels. They had one shot to make him the top guy, finally, with a great true life story. They fucked that one up too. It's amazing.

Without any TV to build it no less.

At one point they kinda bumped into him and he almost fell down, kinda scary. Yeah, Baby Earl should not be put into the ring too much at this point.

Yeah, that should be terrific. I just want Cobb, PCO & Brody King signing with AEW as soon as they're done with that waste of time of a promotion.

No one mentioned it I believe, but I loved the female ref actually showing authority and taking charge when the timekeeper fucked up and rang the bell. She pointed at him and showed him "TWO ! Only TWO !!" like a real referee would, not looking lost or confused for one second. Apparently, Aja cut an intimidating promo on the poor guy after the match. Wish that would have been on TV. Gotta love Aja.

Come on, the Battle Royal was a whole lot of fun. I hope Luchasaurus get signed. This guy came back from the dead twice already, he was litteraly murdered both in LU and iMPCAT ! Joey Janela dying for our pleasure was vintage garbage match heaven. Fat Ass Dreamer doing a cameo is always fun. MJF was a heat magnet and looked terrific. Pillman and the dye-job from hell ! Ace Romero pouncing Stunt out of the ring was awesome. The right guy won. It's not like Micheal Nakazawa oiling himself or Orange Cassidy doing his one comedy spot is gonna hurt anything for those who don't like that. Wonder where Joey Ryan was though.

At least Jericho and Omega (and Mox, apparently) have deals that allows them to work NJ. I wonder if the booking which really inherit from the NJ stuff (first Jericho vs Omega match) will keep on taking this element in account. I mean, I doubt Jericho wins the IWGP title at Dominion, so what's to follow for Omega and him down the road in AEW is pretty fascinating. I'd have Jericho win the first title, he's the biggest name, he's the heel, money's in the chase. Really, I know loyalty is a thing, but I don't see what's NJ has to win from a partnership with ROH at this point. Yeah, they have Bandido for the Super J Cup. But apart from this ?

Wow. Did not expect that. Pretty crazy how this guy looks like the hottest topic in the business now.

That is (and would be) crazy indeed. Gotta love Cody with "We're not gonna make a PR element out of it." BTW.

Best PPV ever. And I'm not even kidding. Ive been watching pro-wrestling for almost 30 years, and it's like they wrapped up everything I love now and have loved in the past (Aja, joshi puroresu in general, Bret, bloodletting) in a nice little package and swept it under my pillow. Yeah, there was a few mis-shots, but it's the very first show of a brand new company starting from scratch. Also, three MOTYC (Jericho vs Omega being the lesser one of the three, but still awesome) in a row. Marked the fuck out for Awesome Kong. Mox is their Lex Luger, and showing up at the end worked so much better than being in the Battle Royal, especially since by that point, no one was thinking about that eventuality. The Triple H trolling was glorious, Cody is fucking hostile. Brandi in high heels doing a better spear than most of the guys. Anyone checked Tony Schiavone on first row ? Aja still doesn't slap her tighs, she kicks you hard in the back. I missed you Aja. Yeah, this is everything I have missed from a major promotion, launched straight into the 2020's.

I was on the outs with WWF already, but still watching (I quit during the Summer, and Owen's death probably was the last straw). I remember usually I was taping the PPV's and watching them the next week-end. It's not like I was spending all my time on the Internet back then. For whatever reason, I choosed to watch it Monday morning, something I was never ever doing. It hit me like a ton of bricks. What's coming off of this show, is that Owen really did not want to do it and he wasn't well prepared at all. So yeah, it was an accident. But WWF was responsible (not the least of which, that idiot Russo who insisted on putting Owen in that position with basically no prep, while I remember Bischoff telling the story of Sting rehearsing for months before he would ever do it live). No wonder Martha got 18 millions on settlement.

That's not at all what I mean. I do think there's a generational gap in that a lot of people will have a bias toward what they grew up on, which is only human. And I think there's a perspective gap in that some of us are like obsessed with the canon and any discourse that will shake up the canon won't be accepted very well. Hell, we had that talk about lucha, very few lucha matches are part of the canon, and it's pretty much ignorance of that culture which is why we had the angry lucha fans during the GWE. It's all a matter on taste in the end. But people getting angry at other people because they love what is happening *now* kinda always goes back to these two elements, you can see it everywhere by the way, movies, music, TV show etc... In a way, it's always a matter of looking at a Golden Age, which is something of the past, and something that never really existed, because the Golden Age is *always* in the past, no matter from where you look (those salty old workers of the 80's shitting on Flair because he was not a shooter like World champion should and was doing too many nonsensical spots). I honestly don't think you can link popularity with "things done well". The hottest period for pro-wrestling as presented by the WWF was the late 90's. And it was mostly god-awful. But of course, some stuff were done better in a different context. Some things are done better now, but again, not the same context. You can only pretend it's 1985 for so long until you're into full cosplay mode. Hey, I have no idea how AEW will present their stuff. Maybe they'll bring back some of the stuff that was better 20/30 years ago and mix it with what is better now. Maybe they won't. As far as I go, I'm just saying I made a switch toward enjoying the most of what's better now (IMO) and stopped thinking about the past in a way that it becomes the absolute point of reference.