El-P

The zeitgeist. Whether one like it or not is pretty irrelevant. To me it was certainly too long and excessive, but maybe if I had followed the whole saga, I would have enjoyed it more. Still, too much spots looking like death that served as transitions to me, but I'm from the 90's. Probably a great match, when all is said and done. Maybe not. Not sure. Kenny Omega is a star though, that's for sure.

The show was super easy to watch. Yano being over like rover was pretty cool. The main event was excessive, but it is the zeitgeist. (ok, I didn't watch Hangman vs Vampiro Jr. because what the hell, life's too short) Okada & Ishii vs Sabre & Suzuki was great. The Cody match I enjoyed a whole lot, bullshit and all.

Agreed. He's subtle to a fault.

Terrific match. Makes me think I should follow NJPW a lot more closely, because this reeked of old AJ in how everyone had his role down pat and built issues with his opponents. Sabre was a terrific asshole. It makes me want to check out the NJ Cup and definitely makes me want to watch Sabre vs Okada. Suzuki was his usual super fun self and Ishii reminded me why he still should be considered one of the best today, he's just so great at everything he does, including selling, nuances, timing.

The only time I enjoyed Ospreay because he had to slow things down to work against 51 years old Liger. Who of course outworked him. The knee selling was complete window dressing, but at least the match never went into ridiculousness territory and Ospreay showed that he could do less and look better doing it. Liger still rules. Ospreay was quite tolerable, although he still looks like a douche. I would have enjoyed Liger vs Rey Rey a whole lot more. Gotta love JR's call of the Ligerbomb though, as he said he wasn't overwhelmed by this spot because Liger never put any weigh on his opponent's shoulder. That had always bothered me. Older JR is so refreshing to hear in 2018.

But rusev already has a very important spot on the card, being eliminated by accident by aiden English in the Andre battle royal. You are making me a sad puppy. I want Bryan to look like he's got no partner at all and then Lana's voice resonate in the stadium and announce the Bulgarian Brute Rusev be the partner of Daniel Bryan. Book it. Let's have some real stars for a change.

Anything but Kane. Rusev would be awesome, but they are too tone deaf to do that.

The make-up department of WWE is absolutely god-awful, it has to be said again and again, they are doing a terrible job. I'm sure all those women look a hundred times better IRL.

You should watch every classic Onita. You may not enjoy some of the most gory stuff, but Onita was all about the thing you love the most, and not simply taking stupid garbage bumps (that became his tool but never his aim, unlike 99,99% of the garbage workers who followed without understanding why Onita drew so much money ).

He was also a really mediocre worker with no charisma and apparently a chip on his shoulder.

Apart from this Booker vs HHH nonsense (he really wasn't trying anymore when Conrad referred to the fact Hunter took forever to cover Booker, which *never* happens that way), I thought the rest of the episode was actually really good. WM 19 is a fascinating topic.

Anyone has listened to the "wedding edition" yet (because I probably won't) ? What's up with the podcast ?

That was more stiff than Big John Studd registering a punch, Matt. I guess the legacy of Goldy in WWE is all about Lesnar. And WCW doesn't matter. WCW never really beat the WWF and Goldy wasn't the only megastar WCW created. It's about WWEGoldy, so, Heyman because Lesnar.

It's actually pretty awful, but Onita vs fighters was always kinda fun because Onita was Onita and he understood pro-wrestling better than most pro-wrestler in that everything is about selling and making a comeback.

Yeah, comparing the Usos to the Crush Gals made so much more sense....

Ok, so whereas we can't really say anything as far as Bryan is concerned, because he never worked in NOAH as a main eventer, we can state the fact AJ Styles has actually mastered Kings Roadtm, and he is the one who should really be put on the same level as Misawa, Kobashi & Kawada.

I have the feeling this will end up being a PWO meme in no time.

AJ is versatile as fuck. He can work babyface, heel, do a long bomb throwing epic (Cena), current NJ main event style, classic X-div matches against Joe & Daniels, carry Abyss to a great match in bloody gimmick brawls, is a terrific tag team worker to boot. There's no one he can't have a decent match against. Hell, he made Shane-O-Mac fun. Dealing in "what if" doesn't mean shit. Neither AJ nor Bryan ever worked shoot-style (which was mostly dead anyway as anything relevant by that point). Let's compare what is comparable. And by that I mean, what actually exists.

Agreed.

That's actually pretty funny. I love me some Taue. I love most every former sumo guy (except Kitao). My problem with Ospreay is not that it looks rehearsed but that it looks ridiculous to the point of being stupid. He can do so much physically, but he just does way too fucking much. But actually, the worst thing about him is not his Petey Williams on crack kinda work, but his godawful facials and selling. I never had the same feeling about Puma (yeah, if people call Daniel Bryan "Dragon" in 2018, I can call Ricochet "Puma" as an LU fan) in term of doing too much crazy shit. He doesn't go above the "ridiculous" line to me. Ospreay also has a godawful emo-vaporwave look, while Ricochet looks sexy as fuck. (yeah, Daniel Bryan, we know, but this thread has gone astray anyway)

None of the old-school style stuff was "realistic". I just watched that video of that French wrestler in the 60's explaining how things work, despite the whole "kayfabe" stuff, pro-wrestling has always been seen for what it was, a carny trick. It never prevented the emotional involvment because real emotions don't need "realism" as a vehicule to be produced on and by a crowd. And yeah, AJ Styles is a great, great fucking pro-wrestler. As far as realism goes in pro-wrestling, I feel like it's an aesthetic above all. To me its almost synonymous with something being 'gritty' in that it favours a down to earth presentation, emphasises physicality, good working punches etc. So I don't see the problem with using it in that context s long as no one is under any illusions about the actual realism of pro-wrestling lol. I agree with the bolded parts. Then again, All Japan in the 90's was super gritty, but although I would use the term, or "stiff", you can always poke holes all over it in term of what I think shodate refers to as "realism" (but maybe I'm wrong, after all, he mentionned Yasha Kurenai in his HOF. YASHA FUCKING KURENAI !!!), which I understand as something looking the most "real" as in how a "real professionnal wrestling" match would look. Hey, I'm an old-school shoot-style fan, Tamura, Han & Khousaka were my heroes at one point, so I'm all for that aesthetic. But to disparage workers because they don't work that particular way (or toward that kind of execution of holds and strikes) seems kinda odd to me. Hell, if we're talking about the stiff and gritty, more "realistic" style of All Japan, no one was as awkward and unrealistic as Akira Taue. Maybe shodate doesn't like Taue though... Oh, yeah, Daniel Bryan. Well he's great too.

Unprovocated insults out of nowhere (with a little wee bit xenophobic tense I see) ? Nice. I have not interaced with you in a long time, but I see you're as personable as ever.

None of the old-school style stuff was "realistic". I just watched that video of that French wrestler in the 60's explaining how things work, despite the whole "kayfabe" stuff, pro-wrestling has always been seen for what it was, a carny trick. It never prevented the emotional involvment because real emotions don't need "realism" as a vehicule to be produced on and by a crowd. And yeah, AJ Styles is a great, great fucking pro-wrestler.

Actually, no. Pro-wrestling, in essence, has nothing to do with realism. Now, you can enjoy the things in pro-wrestling that verge toward a more "realistic aesthetic", to each his own indeed on those matters, but pro-wrestling has never been and will never be about "realism", whatever that means anyway (unless pro-wrestling is actually *professionnal wrestling*, if you catch my drift, and Kurt Angle is the best ever then). Pro-wrestling is symbolism.

Realism has nothing to do with pro-wrestling.