El-P

This. If anything it's one of the most overrated "moment" in wrestling history. It was a cute "WTF" moment for smart marks only, led to absolutely nothing in term of matches, angles or payoff, and didn't draw WCW any money. What it did though, was mesmerize Vince Russo who even mentionned it in one of his "Vic Venom" columns in the Raw Magazine sometime in 97. And from there comes his fascination for shoot-angles. So yeah, in some twisted way it was important as it "inspired" the worst booker ever to do a hundred shoot-angles in WCW which all accomplished nothing in the end just like the original one did.

1994 ECW had plenty of fun already, especially as the year was closing down. Being a Sabu and/or Sandman fan helps.

Ah… mass consumption… Such a great way of life.

I hate generic music and commentary/ring announcer overdubs. Just hate it. I can deal with generic music on old puro com tapes as it was part of the charm to get cheesy themes overdubbed for cheesy WAR fat guys, but for WWF/WCW/ECW and such, it's simply a no-no for me.

At 10$ a month, even *I* could be interested if I could have access to it.

Yep. Those two are these best. Just über classic popular movies in France for the last 50 years. i've watche dit countless times since I'm like 6 or 7 years old. A few other of his classics are La Folies des Grandeurs with Yves Montand this time (Bourvil was supposed to get the role but he died just before) and Les Aventures de Rabbi Jacob, both from Oury. The adaptation from the play Oscar is fun just to watch De Funes go batshit insane. He made a lot of mediocre/shitty movies though, so it hurts the perception of his talent. But recently guys like Denis Podalydes, who's a critic darling and who does a lot of auteur's movies, saying De Funes was great and an influence on him shed a new light on his work (from the critics I mean, he's an immensely popular actor including decades after his death). Yes. Which is very unfair, as comedy is the most difficult stuff to do. Real good comedy I mean. And comedian are more respected when they do "serious", dramatic stuff. We call it the "Tchao Pantin" effect in France. Coluche was a superstar comedian in the 80's but was only doing not so good funny movies. And then he does a super dramatic role in the very dark "Tchao Pantin", gets a Cesar (our Academy Award) and all of a sudden he's finally viewed as a great actor. To this day a comedian doing a dramatic role is called "making a Tchao Pantin" here, to the point of being a cliché for comedians trying to get respectability.

Depends where. Jerry Lewis always had good reviews in France, including from serious critics. At the same time, Louis de Funes was not highly regarded at all, and now 30 years after his death suddenly the serious critics are doing essays on the guy. Go figure.

The Gowinns said working wih Doug Furnas & Phil Lafon was like "pulling teeth". Yep.

Ditto. I guess this has something to do with him being Bob Jr.'s son.

It's impossible to know one way or another. Watch Yoshiaki Yatsu in 1989. You can never guess he was a great worker back in 1986. We'll never know about Stevens without footage, it's as simple as that.

Ah ah ! Awesome picture !

Indeed. And he's also pretty insightfull about how the nWo worked from the inside. And he's also pretty funny. His Death of WCW interview about his tenure as booker in 2000 was also quite fascinating.

I love that Flair & Luger, and Arn to a lesser extent, give their best babyface smile, while Tully just don't play well with others.

I'm not gonna argue anymore since you asked to drop the subject. In general I feel that Flair gets a pass for a lot of stuff because of who he is.

Flair agreed to put over Luger at the Bash as long as his contract was extended. Herd ended up getting mad at Flair during the back and forth over that and firing him. It was his decision to fire Flair without him dropping the title. Again, Flair is not blameless there, but the way you framed it isn't quite accurate either. Ok, but Fair refused to drop the title to Luger in 90 already, right ? And although Herd was an ignorant asshole, it doesn't change the fact Flair used "jobbing to Luger" as a leverage to negociate a new contract, which is not exactly what I'd call "respecting the business". And it doesn't change the fact he showed up on the competition's TV with the belt. Flair was as carny as anyone and gets a pass because he's "Ric Flair". He's not exactly Shawn Michaels of Hulk Hogan either, of course, but still.

When he refused to do jobs for Lex Luger twice when it was the right time ? When he left WCW as their champion and showed up on WWF TV with the Big Gold belt ?

This seems odd to say. I would disagree on everything here except the last part. Agreed. I'm a Ric Flair fan but I have no sympathy for Flair. He was painted as the babyface when Hogan and Bischoff fucked around with him, but the reality is that he himself fucked around with others before. Flair was about Flair. I have way more sympathy and understanding for a guy like Luger actually.

El Dandy was getting good reactions from WCW crowds when he was working random "lucha" matches on Thunder and JTTS matches. If pushed like say, Juventud or Ultimo, of course he would have gotten over just as well. WCW never even tried.

In 1995 in WCW he was already a fantastic worker to me. Just went through this period and his matches with Benoit were awesome. He also had a very nice match with Big Bubba. To me he was a fine babyface at this time. It's not like he was Tim Horner. Some of his heel stuff was awesome, some was a bit goofy. His most overrated stuff consists of the Dean Malenko matches, and I blame Malenko for being a jerk-off, work-in-a-vacuum worker.

Me too !! Yeah, he's got a peculiar look to him. Which helped make him unique I guess. That and the galons of blood.

The last classic Ric Flair title win, and by classic I don't mean great match but as far as booking goes. It's Flair the iron man going through WCW legends Luger & Sting in a very dirty way, then winning the title against WWF legend and classic foe Randy Savage thanks to the Horsemen, with the added bonus of the crimson mask. The crowd gives him a tremendous babyface reaction, like they had been waiting for this since Hogan came on board and ruined the company. A throwback Starrcade ending and a great moment. And yes, one of the most obvious bladejob ever by Savage. And Pillman really acted batshit insane here.

Agreed. Luger also makes a much better no-sell comeback, as it came after he already threw Flair off the top rope and he did register the shots as opposed to Sting who just no-sells from nowhere after some big spots a-la Hogan, which I can't stand. Disagree. Luger's role and the crap crowd played a lot in the lack of heat. Earlier on against Chono Luger was over like a rover, but here the crowd seemingly died at one point and they never got back into the groove. I think the Luger vs Sting part which was the worst of the three helped kill the crowd after an intriguing face off. The one thing I noticed with Luger is that no matter how many times they would turn him heel or face, he basically still was over with the WCW crowd, as showed by the insane reaction he got when he turned nWo Wolfpäck after months of doing nothing. Basically I really enjoyed this as a big Ric Flair showcase even though it was 1995 Flair and not 1989 Flair anymore.

He was a Horsemen and had no visible tie with New Japan, really. This show really looked apart in the Hogan era, but also predated the upcoming international cruiserweights-heavy era with matches like Benoit vs Liger, Kanemoto vs Wright & Eddie vs Ohtani. And at the same time, the whole World Cup thematic reminded older Starrcades, much like the Luger vs Flair vs Sting dynamic. Interesting show.

Great line. Really good match with a hot finish which used the craddle reversals galore in a good exciting way as opposed to the Dean Malenko exhibition way which would become the standart of jerk-offy "technical" matches. Ohtani was so much fun. It's kinda odd that Nakanishi wasn't used on the PPV as he was the only regular NJ guy in WCW at that point.

Good solid match. These two really had a nice chemistry. Flair going for the arm at first was a nice touch, but sadly he reverted back to the figure-four later on. Savage's selling is always a pleasure, he looks in so much pain. Every time he attemps a pinfall looks so urgent too, which is somewhat of a lost art. Yeah, they did a really strong job building to the Starrcade main event between those four, which was needed since the entire PPV was basically WCW vs NJ which had no build on TV basically except a few terrible Sonny Oono's vignettes. And it's so refreshing not to have Hogan around to fuck things up.