El-P

1 time is an accident. 2 times is a coincidence. 3 times...

How many times has Nia thrown someone to land badly on their shoulder already ? The reviews of this show are so damn awful that I almost want to get back on my post GRR decision, as a pro-wrestling masochist. I said almost.

This is a rib. This whole promotion has apparently turned into a huge rib. WCW 2000 have nothing on them anymore.

Damn, reading this thread, I guess the GRR was right on time to drive me away from watching more of this. The idea that people are now actually leaving the building to not have to see Roman Reigns is amazing. So much for the old "People complain all the time but don't act on it, Roman will get over eventually." And so apparently, Nia is as bad a babyface as she was a heel ? Damn. Nothing works anymore. Time to send Vince to the glue factory...

This match is ugly, folks. But really fun too. But ugly, really. The one issue that appears really quick is that Makabe, a few weeks removed of being renamed Togi, is not very good. Not good even. So the beginning of the match with a long sequence against Honda just drags forever. Each time Takayama tags in, the match comes alive. Each time Makabe gets back in, it's a yawnfest with his boring, plodding brawling style. So, from there, Kobashi beats the shit out of him and now it gets fun, as soon enough after another heat sequences that works a bit better (Takayama gets things moving), the match loses it's structure and it's just a bunch of brawling outside, Honda suplexing Takayama from the ramp to the inside, Makabe getting blood and Kobashi beating the fuck out of him even more. And finally, a short but nice teaser sequence between Kobashi & Takayama, foreshadowing a title match in the future maybe. Kobashi was just the Man at this point, he could adapt to any situation. So he brawls, tries to make Makabe's stuff look good (but fails, as Makabe can't even do a powerslam right) and then, fuck it, beats him even more. Meanwhile, some Honda ugly goodness too with him trying to smothers the outsiders one after another. Well, it's an ugly match, that moves from boring to a fun mess, to the point I'd call it quite good in the end, but man, Makabe was not good and really took that one down a bunch of notches. Watching the other three make up for it and Kobashi beating on Makabe (who 's only good for that use at this point) unmercifully finally made the match fun, basically.

Liger invading NOAH was the best thing that happened in the junior scene in the early 00's. The guy was on fire again against a crop of guys who were super motivated to work against him. Now we're getting serious with KENTA & Maru, the young stars of NOAH's junior division. Damn, they were good. Maru's stuff really looked unique for the time too. it didn't always hit right, but it was looking very different and unlike the indierrific US guys, it wasn't just cosmetic stuff to make a move überawkward, it was a new way to move inside a ring. KENTA is ridiculously good as the kick-ass (litteraly) babyface in peril then making fiery comebacks. Murahama, the small Osaka shoot-style guy wasn't exactly lost in this sea of major players, he's just right there with them, although overshadowed a bit by Liger, who's just the best at conveying disdain and whose offense is made even bigger by KENTA & especially Maru's bumping. This is just classic stuff to me. MOTYC.

Just as a cultural footnote, I think an anti-semitic remark would have come off even worse (not saying what he said would not come off awful already) in France for instance (for obvious reasons). In the US I have no idea. Maybe not as much. But it's interesting.

Sophie knows… (yeah, I know she was named Penny in English) (let's make May 6 the official "Offensive Jokes Day at PWO")

He got a 100 million dollars out of it. I would have told the world and WWE to smell my ass. Cool. But don't complain when people treat "you" (as in Hogan) as a fucking racist. Again, it's not a matter of balance between the two issues. These are separate issues. The fact is, we have seen and heard Hulk Hogan say he wouldn't like his daughter to marry a nigger (and I repeat the sentence on purpose because it's not just a simple word, it's being used in a quite disturbing, extremely racist, way that doesn't need to be explained I think). So, from there what ? Let's make some excuses because he was "the childhood hero of a generation" (and really, what a childhood hero… grow the fuck up people, my childhood hero was Inspector Gadget, I got over him some time ago) ?

Well, no. Spewing racist shit betrays a particular vision of the world which Hulk Hogan, heroes of many, seems to have. What you don't seem to get, or refuse to admit, is that the leeking of a sextape and the expression of a racist view of the world are two separate issues here. We're not in a court of law. There's no such things as "oh that piece if evidence can't be considered because of the way it was aquired". Leeking Hogan's sextape : wrong. Hogan using nigger : very wrong. Too fucking bad for him it came out that way. Karma's a bitch apparently.

Don't tempt me. There have been enough debate about tasteless and offensive jokes on this board today already. But yeah. What the fuck. Brain implodes indeed.

Wait. Hogan saying he doesn't want his daughter to marry a nigger doesn't count because it happened on a leeked sextape ? Really ? Well, people have made excuses before, but that one is hilarious.

Well, yes, that's the conventional wisdom. Actually, you really don't hear much about any of his 80's stuff, which is not much anyway in term of body of work (some of the NJ stuff is excellent, some isn't), while the Bret feud and the Bulldog match in Germany are part of the canon WWF greatest matches. So, no I don't think Owen's 90's is that underrated tbh.

How can he be so ignorant about the political context of this particular show is beyond me though. It's bad enough that WWE seems to think that makes it ok to just pay the women anyway (hey, it's good that they do, but it doesn't make it ok).

Well, in beautiful, progressive Jeddah, it's actually your birthright not to be booked and therefore, not to be paid.

Indeed. Pretty sad.

Oh yeah, the 2006 drop is downright brutal (although D'Amore booking had already began to show clear signs of burn out). It takes a while for the product to recover to the point the first 7 months of 2008 are actually the best since 2005, despite Russo's bullshit.

Just picture 2007 & 2008, with the talent they had and D'Amore & Mantell booking... I wonder how bad the quality drop is when Dutch gets fired in 2009.

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.