El-P

Of all the things he does poorly, bumping never struck me. That flying clothesline though, is legit atrocious.

This is where I'm at too. I really have enjoyed the podcast a lot in the past. A few more comedic episode was really fun from time to time. But that turned into a complete joke. I'm probably gonna check it out again for PPVs I care about in the hopes it's gonna get better again (one recent not-watch along before the wedding was really good again), or if they do another ECW episode or something, but I'm definitely gonna cherry pick a lot. As far as the joke itself, I agree with the bolded part. On paper, I don't find the joke offensive and may be even funny if delivered right. But the issue is that, is that the place ? I'm the kind of guy who would joke about literally anything, but I always take the "audience" in consideration before I say anything. If I'm not sure if something can be found offensive or too gross, I refrain myself until I get to know the people I'm around because the goal of to make someone laugh. Personally, I have no limit as long as it makes me laugh. That's why one can see me by myself laughing at my own bullshit in my head, and thinking to myself at the same time "Man, I'm so awful !". I dunno. Funny or not funny is probably not the right question. Unnecessary strikes me as the right word if you have to disagree with it.

I'm sorry to hear that. Then I can fully understand your reaction.

How do you know that Russo finally got his dirty hands on the women's division ? No more Awesome Kong vs Gail Kim. No more Awesome Kong challenge leading to a great underdog upset. Instead : Beauty Pageant with the Beautiful People, who are know saddled with Billy Gunn as a makeup-artist. Watching TNA, I think there's something about Russo that is absolutely destructive on purpose. Twice after a great in-ring focused product (Angle vs Joe in the cage and Angle vs Styles last man standing), the booking takes a nosedive with hotshotting and gimmicks galore. Now that Gail is out of the picture so we can't have more great Gail vs Kong matches, the women's division is turning into every Russo sexist cliché & bullshit.

Conrad makes the joke then bust Tony's balls for laughing. That's just phase two of the joke. It's pretty usual, really, when you do a borderline joke that you know is actually an awful thing to say, just adds another layer by playing outraged at the people laughing. EDIT : oh wait you're talking about Conrad's line after Tony's first sentence ? I must admit that first one totally flew over my head because it's not even a joke really. It's not funny, it's like, ok, whatever. But so it's Conrad setting up his own joke actually by telling Tony he's making fun of Nikita's wife dying. I guess if people should be mad, be mad at Conrad because he's the one making the actual joke. The context of the death. She died of cancer. The wordplay refers to cancer. (I actually had to google sickle cell because I did not know that term) BTW, I'm not saying I find it funny. I just like nuances.

I read some of the posts at 1.5X speed too.

I went through about 95% of available ECW shows some time ago. Candido was clearly one of my favourites there. The thing is with Candido is that he never got the super high end matches but he really wasn't positioned to do so (apart from SMW, which is also why this is considered his best work). He's also a guy who didn't take himself too seriously (and there the Owen comparison applies) I believe and would rather had fun than try to be a star (and back then, he would never had the same opportunities he would have gotten now because of his size). Then there was the life going astray (Tammy surely didn't help) which really fucked his trajectory too.

It's actually a way to relativize what he was just saying in a way that made the racist tone of his sentence "ok" because after all, it's not that big of a deal, right ? But no, we're not "all a little racist". But what he was just saying truly was. I guess it's ok to work with black guys when it's time to make money, but when his daughter is dating one, then surges something ugly. Anyway, I can't wait to see Hogan thank the Saudi princes for the way they hosted them in Ryad soon.

Having a racist discourse is not a "thought crime". It betrays a way to see and construct the world. How does it matter that Hogan never displayed any racism toward the black guys he worked with before ? That's just business. Bill Watts wasn't acting racist either. But the things Hogan said, or rather got caught saying in intimacy (in a context in which he was more himself, basically), are extremely racist. The fact he and his friends have only made excuses just makes it worse. Hum.. yeah, it's just sex. Who cares ?

Ok. That's not making fun of someone dying. That's making an absurd wordplay in the context of someone's death. Now, wether you find it funny, offensive, smart, idiotic, mean-spirited is all up to appreciation. But that's not making fun of someone dying. Delivery can also make it way worse or much lighter than it is on paper. (for reference, I have not listened to the episode either and have no intention to since I could not finish the previous one already)

This Liger vs NOAH stuff never ceased to be awesome. This is all about planting the seeds of the upcoming Jr. tag title match, as Liger is now teaming with the awesome Osaka Pro ass-kicker Takehiro Murahama. Marvin is an unmasked luchador was kinda was the talk of the day back then, while Suzuki is still a rookie, mostly, but shows very good potential. But really, as KENTA and Murahama trade great kicks, the crux of the match is Liger & Marufuji not respecting each other. And damn, this is awesome. Maru blocking Liger's shotei and holding his hand while badmouthing him, Liger deviating Maru's superkick and slapping him in the mouth. Meanwhile, Murahama and KENTA are kicking each other again, really hard. Excellent six-men match in front of the hot Korakuen crowd, with tons of purpose and heat, foreshadowing the big match to come.

Lazy me. This. The only criticism I would have is that Saito's kicks were sometimes not exactly reaching their target swiftly. But apart from that, what a great, great match. Honda as the underdog with shitloads of ability and will, Kobashi challenged to the task by frustrated grumpy Akiyama, Saito as the perfect second hand veteran who can actually go. Tons of layers, tons of cool shit, tons to Kobashi as the destroyer of wolrds. This was about as good as it could possibly be. MOTYC.

It's pretty easy to get caught in the Taue hype watching this match for two reasons : it was the Taue show, which mean he was the one who really got the shine the most as the story was all about Nagata taking everything one of NOAH's finest could throw to him and still come up victorious; it was also a great performance by Taue all around. It is not to say Nagata wasn't exactly up to the task, he was a terrific outsider, playing heelish toward the NOAH audience (something he learned in WCW) and being on point with everything (great kicks). They pretty much worked it as a sprint, with Taue getting the advantage early and delivering a barrage of bombs on NJPW's great savior of the cursed generation. Just relentless action with a terrific flow, this shows you can achieve greatness in a mere 15 mn.

Honestly, I would be Metlz, I would totally troll the idiotic Twitter crowd to no end and watch them get ulcers over nothing. Plus it's so damn easy anyway, almost too easy.

The Houston edition of Back to the Territories is interesting also when you get to the point Bruce is very bullshiting about WWF and Corny obviously knows is bullshiting. And then watch the interaction between the two. Bruce is a profesionnal bullshiter and a great promo (listen to him improv in his show, he's a better promo than anyone on the WWE roster today). And that's part of why his show can be so fun too actually. Conrad and him have a puppet show where Conrad plays the Meltzer side (not only that, but also the "smart fan" in general) and Bruce cuts promos on Meltz. It's like Shane Douglas cutting promos on Flair in 1994. It gets attention and his audience loves it (at this point it really feels rehashed to hell though). As far as the Twitter Stupid Army, it's a way broader issue, really.

So, one of the characters in this French role-play Youtube series is : John Cena (just watch the opening) He's probably gonna die a horrible death too. (if anything, it speaks about how Cena still is the most recognizable modern pro-wrestling figure today)

That and a great sense of timing are actually the reasons he's so good. People focusing on strike exchange (which is a modern puroresu trope, not an Ishii trope per say) just miss the bigger picture with Ishii. He's a detail and nuance guy. Terrific worker with quite an interesting career arc too.

The Kane gimmick should have had a shelf-life of about 10 months. It's been 20 years and as such, Glen Jacobs can be considered the worst major performer of the last 20 years. Almost nothing but shit matches and shit angles (not his fault but ne never made anything better) over a 20 years period. Painfull on every level.

At this point, only the most senile portion of the audience and the hardcore retromaniacs will pop. Ding ding ding. We have a winner.

Honestly, at this point, after the Saudi show, Hogan coming back is not even a footnote.

The issue with such a match is that it'll never gonna get a fair shake from all the people already prepared to hate it. When you look at things with a filter, there's no way around it, you're gonna see what you want to see anyway. I wasn't a fan of their first Tokyo Dome show match, watched in full post-hype mode. Then later in the year I went and watch the other two (that had been praised to the Moon by Meltz) and I suprisingly loved them (and believe me, I was not going in with any positive preconception, and tried to do away with any negative ones). If I'm going by the big Omega matches of last year (including this year's Dome show), I absolutely go into this one expecting something excellent at least. If I'm going by the latest big Omega matches, I fear some overlong fuckery. But haters gonna hate anyway.

Jericho never was a "cool dad". He does turn into "drunk uncle" though, which is awesome. I guess he must have binged after he got back from that awful show last weak.

*Agressors* ? Really ? Come on now... People are just being annoyed by the constant attention whoring (aka "me and my odd views") and pseudo victimization ("why am I being attacked ?"). The fucked up spelling alone would be enough to drive anyone crazy especially when he has showed before he was totally capable of actually using a perfectly readable format (huge mistake, that). Honestly at this point I don't care one way or another, but we all know how this is gonna end up, really... (I have crossed path with some guys acting pretty much the same before elsewhere, it always ends the same because they can't help it...)

Gotta factor the fact most of the shoot interviews and podcasts are also full of bullshit. I mean, Bischoff is notoriously full of shit too. So, I don't see how source sources do much damage to Meltz honestly. Was he wrong in the past (and probably today too) at times ? Sure. But I wouldn't take most of these insiders declaration as facts either, especially when they are know bullshitters to begin with. As far as Prichard goes, I pretty much agree with the whole "let's have a sneak peak into Vince's brain" being fascinating. To his credit, Bruce also takes no glove at time when he thinks some of the stuff was awful or didn't make any sense. But you have to know he's mostly throwing the WWE company line and won't ever critizice TriPaul on serious offense (his take on the Booker promo and program was ridiculous to the point he wasn't even trying not looking like he was full of shit). And he's an excellent storyteller. So there.

Lucha fan Freudian slip.