El-P

So the winner won't get a direction.

They are so lucky to have so many other revenue streams at this point. Otherwise, this would have tanked the company a long time ago. You can safely add WWE Studios alongside Icopro, WBF, XFL and WWF New York. Note to Paul & Stephy Lesveque : you betta promote good ol' rastlin', my boys.

That was D-Lo. The Euro title never meant anything. It's been a one match (Owen vs Bulldog in Germany) title.

Finally got myself to watch the first episode. Yeah. Got tired of watching old stuff, I want to give chance to something fresh for a change. I really enjoy the presentation and the production. Dario Cueto buries everyone on any pro-wrestling promotion ever as far as acting goes. But maybe that's because he's an actor actor and not a pro-wrestler trying to act. The whole thing looks different, and that's exactly what wrestling needs. Now, I'm mostly not familiar with lucha, either old or current, neither am I with indy wrestling. Which means I'm the perfect viewer discovering this stuff from scratch, basically. Well, Blue Demon Jr. vs Chavo was a decent match, although Demon looked sloppy at times doing spots he probably shouldn't do at his age. Not setting the place on fire or anything, but good introduction with two known veterans I guess. The backtage vignettes get some awesome production. Go straight ahead into the TV series aesthetic. Why not ? Damn, Konnan looks old ! But he sure knows how to deliver his lines. I like this approach of introducing the characters. Unless it's Sexy Star, whose English promo was awkward and cheesy as hell. I guess it came off much better in Spanish and really, if you've got to use subtitles, just have her speak in Spanish anyway. Okay, a small bearded guy named Son of Havoc. Intergender match ? Not a big fan. Good enough action, but a guy beating down a girl just doesn't set very well with me. Why not two luchadoras against each others ? Hell, bring Shimoda, I believe she's still in Mexico. Johnny Mundo. Complete WWE character, he didn't even bother to change the robotic intro. Prince Puma looks quite amazing doing athletic feats. I admit having no reference at all as far as what a pure spotfest looks like these days, so I was amazed as some of the stuff he did. Mundo can't sell to save his life, so while he does some impressive looking stuff, I wasn't into him at all. Just a spot monkey just as I remembered him from his WWE days. So yeah, impressive in spots, but not the kind of match I care about, and the "this is awesome" chants and constant overpimping of the announcing (which was overall not good, so I guess we found something else that Vamp sucks at) only made me think it was nothing special sold as something special. Which is grating. Beatdown at the end by some guys I don't know of. Okay show. Interesting production. Nothing that really grabbed me, honestly. More interested in the overall presentation and vignettes thus far. Mostly enjoyed the two veterans, Cueto, Konnan and Puma.

TLC as a concept is an unwatchable and dumb show to begin with. A garbage match, whatever the stip, is supposed to be unique and special. When you reach gimmick use overkill in the very first match, it makes everything that follows quickly boring and extremely repetitive. And I really thought we were way passed the point of praising stuntfests. That electrocution gimmick… It was dumb as fuck in 99 with Rock and Foley at the Rumble. It's even stupider today. Really, this whole PPV seems like a relic from the late 90's. Rusev still rules though. I could watch him and Lana squash the entire roster for a year and not get bored. Ok, Lana is at least half the reason, but still. As dated as it is, it works because it's plain old pro-wrestling.

As annoying as he could be as Col Parker, Fuller is always really good as himself in stuff like these. I love the fact he could actually sing and play the guitar. Lawler and the crowd's reactions are great. Feels so organic. Dundee is a dick. Fun segment.

Jeff Jarrett, blowjob Memphis babyface. This guy's career is all over the place. 10 years to late for this kind of bullshit I think, but in the early 80's, it sure would have worked wonders (I mean, Jeffrey is much better looking than Tommy Rich or Ricky Morton). INXS. Ah, pro-wrestling, always at the top of cultural relevance.

Oh yeah. Savage not working WM 9 was a travesty considering the slump they were in at the time.

Odd, I thought people around here would enjoy this a lot more, considering I'm not sold on Lawler being that exceptionnal worker and yet this is precisely a case where I think Lawler was great. JYD is beyond useless, and Lawler makes a match out of it. I find him hilarious, really crafty with working the hide-the-chain gimmick, his selling (both for the shitty offense and the overall presence of another warm body in the ring) is terrific. This is totally smoke, mirrors and stalling, but to me that is a much better and smarter performance than Flair's, who just went on autopilot. JYD not even registering Lawler chainless punches is amazingly lazy. I never got the appeal anyway, he sucked even in his prime in Mid-South. So yeah, great stuff by Lawler, and good postmatch.

Yep, another strong, serious promo from Lawler. On average, Lawler was pretty awesome anyway on the mic.

To fuck around with McMahon. I don't remember the reason, but Andre wasn't happy with Vince for some reason, so he choose to appear in WCW.

Very fun one-sided brawl, with Travis bumping all over the place. The DDT on the table was right out of NOAH circa mid-00's ! Jarrett was intense as a young fired up blowjob babyface. His punches haven't changed a bit since that time, he's been quite consistent with how he delivers them. That's Memphis for you I guess. Yeah, some offense overkill for sure, but this leads into a really fun post-match brawl. It really looked like Lawler was gonna turn on Travis at one point, or maybe that's me having seen too much swerves.

Well, Major Tom...

Is WWE really so worthy of being defended that you need to personally attack someone and pull out years old posts over it? Judging from his last few posts, this guy's an idiot. And really, digging stuff from more than three years ago must have taken him quite a bit of time, which makes the whole "get a life" gimmick (in 2014 ? Seriously ?) quite funny actually. (edit : well, since he's a goner, I might as well edit my reply)

Me too. He was hilarious. And right. These people are dumbfucks. This is right out of my WCW thread.

Charlotte, the NXT champion, the daughter of Ric Flair, jobbing in a nothing match for her first Raw appearance while trying to put on a figure-four. Clap-clap-clap. Roman Reigns is already annoying as fuck as far as I'm concerned. Most shocking thing to me : I'm currently watching 1990 USWA, and going from Lawler being awesome and hilarious to, well, what he is today, makes it even more striking how low he's fallen.

Agreed. Their matches took some patience, it was a different pace from what was done in the US at the time. That said, Doc didn't really get into his groove until the mid-90's. His peak was short, but absolutely terrific.

Can't *this* Jerry Lawler be back on TV ? Can't he ? Please ?

Lawler was carrying these TV shows on his own basically. It's amazing to compare how free-flowing these segments were compared to the overproduced, overscripted stuff of today. That's what pro-wrestling needs to go back to, enough of these awful backstage vignettes with awkward pauses and silences, we need people interracting with each other and playing off one another. And yeah, Dave Brown was excellent.

Yep, when you know how much Austin (and pretty much everyone not named Lawler or Dundee) was making in Memphis, this is pretty hilarious. God, Chris Champion's hair. And face. Yoshi Kwan can't happen too soon.

Terrific little worker. I loved the Bodies, the last true great southern tag-team, always wanted them to get the belt in WWF. Del Ray was at the same time hideously sleazy (that belly dance… ugh… couldn't be better for his character) and such a gracious and fluid worker. Had a few really good TV matches on Nitro against Dean and Rey, and that's the last I've seen of him. Sad news indeed, another one dying way too young.

Indeed. Totally cracked me up. Lawler was terrific here. Cobra, on the other hand, comes off as a third rate JYD knock-off with no charisma. Why was he given the belt in the first place ?

Yes, I'm watching USWA TV. God, it's so refreshing to have Lawler as a heel and actually being FUN at it ! Hey, King, remember when you were really fucking good at the booth ? Dustin emulating his father in promos was not good. That being said, he was already quite the decent worker in the ring, as green as he was then. Gary Young's hair are, well, red. Bright red. He looks sleazy as hell and delivers the promo that goes along with his look.

After watching his stuff in AWA and the Buddy Rose feud in Portland, it's pretty clear that Hennig peaked before he went to WWF. Kind of underwhelmed by the Buddy Rose feud to be honest. Not underwhelmed in the sense that it wasn't good, it was, but it's very much a very good small territory feud as opposed to a big time classic feud. Too much heavy pimping I guess. The early matches went from really solid to excellent (the last one). I thought Hennig was actually better than Rose on the mat, especially in the second match (I believe…), which I found interesting since he didn't do as much against Bock (although the matches were better). So yeah, no great classic match to me, but really good stuff nonetheless.

That's a great way to put it.