El-P

He had potential as a worker I think, but was axed way before he could developp into something. Listen to his shoot interview if you can, he's a really interesting guy to listen to.

Apparently it did. Kai also tells the story of Moolah trying to get her dirty hands of the whole Glamour Girl deal that Jimmy Hart had proposed to Leilani & Martin, wanting to be their manager instead of Jimmy to maintain the control over the girls.

Leilani Kai, who had worked with them in Japan before, suggested them as opponents for her and Judy Martin.

WEEK 74 (May 29 to June 3, 2000) Match of the week : Terry Funk vs Chris Candido (Thunder). Candido is dressed like Terry Funk. This is the most ridiculous and greatest hardcore match ever, as Candido ends up in teh back of a pick-up truck that Terry drives to some horses stable near the arena. So they fight in teh stables, paying hommage t that infamous Cactus Jack match back in the days, the only thing missing is Tammy getting dropped in the water. In the most absurd occurence ever, there's a WCW table set up near the stables. In the most dangerous setting ever, Funk piledrives Candido in the stable right next to a horse who freaks out and actually hits some mule kicks ! Tony Schiavone has this great line "The horse did the best highspot of the night so far !". Losing streak of the week : Shane Douglas (Nitro / Thunder). The story is that Shane screwed up when he was given power in Thunder the previous week, so he gets put in situations where he can win championship but ahs the odds against him. So we get Douglas doing teh job in less than three minutes in the Asylum to Scott Steiner, and in three minutes or so to Jarrett when The Cat hits him with a chair. This doesn't make much sense, but I guess everyone had to be driven away from the New Blood. Douglas does look weak in the process, especially in the Asylum. Last appearance of the week : Miss Elisabeth (Nitro). Involved in another angle with Kimberly, Mike Awsome and DDP & Luger to her rescue, I believe this his her very last TV appearance ever. Color me disapointed, I loved Liz, especially as a heel. Return of the week : Goldberg (Nitro). To the help of Kevin Nash. Well, the build with Tank Abbott and Ricj Steiner has been so stupid that I can't really care. Goldie gets a huge reaction. He should have been the champ again a long time ago. 2 stupid title changes of the week : Kevin Nash giving back the title to Ric Flair / Jeff Jarrett winning back the title (Nitro). Yes, another TWO WCW title changes, including one where the belt is handed to a guy. The Flair vs Jarrett match was decent enough thanks to Flair working stiff, as Jarrett is really showing me less and less these days. Maybe he tries to emulate Jerry Lawler by punching and punching and punching, but he's not exactly on the same level. Flair bleeds which adds to the drama. Of course this is all screwy since David was the heel referee (what did you expect), and Russo shows up with Beth and Reid who he had "kidnapped" (yes, it's an obsession at this point). This whole Russo vs Flair storyline is complete garbage. The WCW title is a complete joke at this point, having changed hand like 8 times in five weeks or so. And Jarrett is a terrible champion too, just terrible. Solid at best but unimpressive (less and less so as the weeks go by) in the ring, annoying and boring on promos. Promo of the week : DDP (Thunder). A good sit down interview with a very subdued and serious DDP adressing his issues with Bischoff and Kimberly, whom he "still loves". Good old school stuff. Tenay looks creepy though. They are planting the seeds of the David Flair in love with Miss Hancock storyline already, which will only make things worse. The product is pretty unbearable. Terry Funk still is the saving grace of the terrible promotion. Scott Steiner and Goldberg should be on top, mega-heel vs mega babyface. Shane Douglas should be above Jarrett on the upper mid-card. Russo should be fired and never be showed on camera again. I went quickly through this week, as it's mostly not fun at all. I am going on vacations now. Hey, I have done two third of this project ! Only one left to go !

I was curious about this whole Wyatt's deal, so I watched the vignettes. I can see why people would enjoy them, but for me it is way overedited with a thousand frames and effects which doesn't fit the mood they were trying to instill. Then I watched the infamous debut. Well, I enjoy the music, the whole lantern and rocking-chair deal, but really, those two guys look like the Godwinns and the beatdown on Kane complete with the awkward steel step spot where it's obvious they don't even touch Kane's head was rather tepid to me. Finally, Wyatt's long ass pose looked as inorganic as any other WWE robot pose. Frankly, in the end I thought this guy was as uncreepy as Vampiro in 2000 (gasp). Much ado about nothing as far as I'm concerned. Nice intro though.

Well, Guest Booker with Robert Fuller booking Shawn Michaels in the nWo was a random (and stupid) idea enough, but goddamn if the first 30 minutes or so are watchable because Fuller tells a few stories, I quit after the first 10 minutes of complete meandering nonsense of "fantasy booking" (which is something I don't care about to begin with to be honest, but at least hearing guys like Cornette or Gary Hart explain their ideas was interesting on some level). Really useless stuff.

Like Dylan, I'll always have a soft spot for DVDVR, although I haven't posted there in a very long time. But I have memories on this board dating back to their very beginnings, including that infamous giant thread in 2000 or so... I think I had been banned from there at some point also before coming back. This and the old TOA board are just part of my wrestling fandom history. And yeah, Smarckschoice was awesome at one point before the first crash. (damn, is this the the cauliflower alley club of pro-wrestling boards old members all of a sudden ?)

Scrapped because of/thanks to Bret Hart, who was in negociation to re-sign with WWF at this time. I also remember Mankind acting like Marlena was his mommy or something. Never went anywhere, sadly, could have been awesome, I guess.

WEEK 73 (May 22 to 27, 2000) 2 stupid title changes of the week : Jeff Jarrett gets the WCW title back after Ric Flair's aneurysm/Kevin Nash beats Jeff Jarrett in a total culsterfuck (Nitro / Thunder). Yep. Two more WCW title changes in one week, including one that involves a guy being stripped because he did an aneurysm. Anyone wants to still defend Vince Russo ? Jarrett and Nash have a complete clusterfuck of a match on Nitro, with Russo as a heel referee, guitar shots and red goo drop, but like it wasn't enough, they have another one on Thunder, a three way with Scott Steiner. Nash wins the title. Makes about six title changes in six weeks. Brillant. Stupid new gimmick match of the week : The Asylum (Nitro). A small UFC like closed cage in which Scott Steiner challenges people in I quit matches. And in the very first match, against his brother no less, we get the way to actually interfere in the match : simply beat up the timekeeper and push the button to lift up the cage from the ring. Brillant. Channel-changing feud of the week : David Flair vs Reid Flair (Nitro). Kinda odd to watch young Reid, knowing that he had only 13 more years to live. So yeah, now this gets more and more silly, and even sillier on Thunder with Reid's "sixth grade teacher", an old woman, being involved. Oh, there was also a stupid "burial of Ric Flair's career" segment on Nitro, with Kevin Nash hiding in the casket. Brillant. New woman cruiserweight champion : Daffney (Nitro) So yeah, we get Daffney vs Crowbar to decide the cw champ. Candido gets involved, Crowbar ends up being KOed, so Daffney wins the title. On Thunder we get Candido vs Artist vs Daffney, with the involvement of Miss Hancock, selling her clipboard to Tammy Fytch who then fucks up by hitting Candido with it. Highlight is Candido's bump and the way he ends up pinning himself. Funny angle of the week :Terry Funk's "retirement" (Nitro). Terry Funk in a suit with his bandana is always a cool look. So he teases that his big announcement is that he's retiring, but infact it's just that he's a granddad now. Then he announces his retirement for June 1.... 2001, to the anger of Shane Douglas and the New Blood. That whole promo was pretty funny. The New Blood jumps on him and beats him down in front of his daughter, taking his hardcore belt in the process (apparently you don't need a referre to count three anymore, as Kronik also just took off with the tag belts a few weeks ago and they are considered the champions now). Good stuff. Idiotic rebranding of the week : GI Bro (Thunder). I don't care much about Booker, but sadling him with a JTTS group and a godawful name surely was another brillant move to screw around with one of the most over young babyface in the company. I already feel the hilarity coming with Russo's shoot at Bash at the Beach when he'll pretend that Hogan is the guy who kept the "Booker's back in the locker room" down. Yeah, you sure did wonders for this guy... Comical "swerve" of the week : Terry Funk as Ralphus (Thunder). Shane Douglas gave Norman & Raphus a shot at "his" hardcore title, and Ralphus shows up in a complete mascot dress-up. Of course for trained eyes it's pretty easy to see it's Terry Funk under the hood, making the reaction of the announcers a bit ridiculous, but Terry did a good job looking incompetent for most of the match though. So again, Funk delivers the goodness, and we could get a cool Douglas vs Funk feud. But we won't, as Douglas is feuding with the Wall (don't even ask). Building toward the PPV with Sting vs Vamp in a human torch match (yeah, it *is* a Kane feud...), Hulk vs Kidman again for a shot at the weekly-changing WCW title, DDP vs Awesome in an ambulance match. The main event scene is a complete clusterfuck at this point. Terry Funk has been the sole saving grace of this company for the last few weeks.

The Sullivan Timeline is good.

The vignettes had Windham cut promos on the heels : Rewatching these, and stumbling onto Waylon Mercy's and Goldust's vignettes, it reminds me how much I loved to watch these and how excited I was to see new creepy or funny characters being introduced. Of course the T.L. Hopper, Duke Droese or Henry Godwinn vignettes weren't nearly as fun... But to me it was all a part of what I loved about wrestling, because vignettes were unique and simply an introduction to, well, pro-wrestlers who were gonna work pro-wrestling matches.

She wants babies and a family and that's why she dumped Clooney seemingly. Doubt she would go back to the circus. I can't believe she's only 33. Means she was 20 when she was doing Miss Hancock.

From memory Owen vs Vader is pretty much one of Owen's best match in the WWF. Ken vs Vader was cool as a spectacle to get Ken over as something special. Would last a whole one match, but hey, it was rather cool, not to mention brutal. Shawn vs Austin from KOTR never struck me as a very good match. Plus it really didn't mean shit in the grand scheme of things when you think about it. Maybe that's why no one talks about it. (and I feel old talking about WWF 1997, the high point of my pro-wrestling fandom... 16 years ago ? Damn, where all that time has gone ? I was 21 and in a blink of an eye I'm almost middle-aged and crazy...)

You weren't the only one. I remember the hype on Byte This (yeah, I listened to Byte This in 1999... I know I know...) before he debuted. Andrew Martin was supposed to have the charisma and size of Sid with the work ethic of Shawn Micheals. Ah ah, those were the days...

WEEK 72 (May 15 to 20, 2000) Title change of the week : Ric Flair wins the World Title for the 15th time (Nitro). Fourth WCW title change in five weeks. Match lasts about five minutes, but at least is pretty good while it does, as Flair seems to have some fire under his ass again. Russo is at the booth so we have to suffer through his commentary, as if Madden wasn't enough. After the match, Jarrett breaks a guitar (the second on the show, it's to the point of being comical) on the ref and David breaks a mini Statue of Liberty on Flair's head (because Vince is from NYC, get it ?......). Vince, wearing a Flair robe he stole at Flair's home (in a long and painfull video with David and Russo visiting the home and spewing bullshit) tries to leave with the belt but Nash prevents him and powerbomb Jarrett through the ring. Yes, they gimmicked the ring so they get a cool visual effect. Of course it makes no sense to have a guy like Jarrett go through the ring, but who gives a fuck about making sense at this point ? Clusterfuck of the week : Chris Candido & Tammy Fytch vs Crowbar & Daffney (Nitro). It's a cruiserweight title match. Yep. Here we go again with the bullshit. What's with Vince's obsession with putting the cruiserweight title around women in mixed matches ? Just a clusterfuck of a match with girls-on-guys spots and Daffney winning the title by pinning Tammy. I like everyone involved here but... *sight* And I forgot the "best" part of it, during the match, Miss Hancock showed up on the ramp and danced. Because a mixed-match is *not* enough TNA I guess. Debut of the week : Major Gunns (Nitro). So yeah, we got the whole Misfits in Action going, with stupid names like Private Stash (get it ? Ah ah ah, it's hilarious) or Lieutenant Loco (Chavo has to be loco, because he's Spanish, ya know). The killer of course is ex nWo girl Tylene Buck being repackaged as Major Gunns, so she rip her shirt after every match to show her huge fake boobs and do a first aid reviving gimmick on a prone wrestler after the match. She really looks like a porn actress too, no wonder she ended up doing it. Also, Booker T is jumping in everytime to help the MIA, so you know what's coming eventually. And finally they also wear a FUBAR shirt, like in "Fuck You Bischoff and Russo". Smells like money. Mark Madden really is a really crass announcer and sounds like a fat pig whenever a hot girl is on screen. At least he doesn't say "puppies". Stupid new gimmick match : Ambulance match (Nitro / Thunder). So, every Mike Awesome match is an ambulance match now, a stupid concept which makes the old stretcher match look like a good idea. That way we can be assured every Awesome match will be worst than it should. New tweeners of the week : Filthy Animals (Thunder) So, after just two weeks of coming back as heels, the Animals, who now consists of Konnan, Kidman, Rey, Juvy and .... Disco Inferno (wait, what ? And they don't bother explaining this either, at one point Disco just shows up in Bischoff's office, clamining he wants to be with his friends, and that's it. Since when Disco was friend with the Animals ?) already have some issue with the New Blood, so they are just splitting from the team. As for now they still are rather heelish (since they feud with the faces MIA it seems like), but it's just a big structural blur again. Promo of the week : Ric Flair (Thunder). He already had cut a solid, emotionnal promo on David on Nitro, but this promo making fun of Russo is really pretty funny, basically saying Russo was a little Italian boy and his parents wanted him to grow up like Bruno Sammartino, but one day he flipped the channel on TBS and saw the Nature Boy, and all of a sudden he wanted to become like him, to the great despair of his very catholic parents. But Russo couldn't be like the Nature Boy because he had no muscle, no girl, no long limousine etc... Of course Jarrett had to run in and cut a tepid promo to ruin the moment, then it got all mixed up with Arn Anderson (and really, I like Arn a lot, but I don't care about a promo from a guy who I know won't actually wrestle, it's just false advertisement) and later another Flair beatdown, with Flair showing odd signs of weakness. But hey, the promo on Russo was fun at least. Swerve of the week : Sid Vicous coming back to help DDP, then turning on him (Nitro). Come on, you know you gotta have one. I saw that one coming from a thousand miles ago (and I wasn't aware of it beforehand). Feud that won't die of the week : Vampiro vs Sting (Nitro / Thunder). Gawwwwwwd. This will last forever ! On Nitro Sting beats Vamp in a House of Fun (or whatever name it gets, the big cage with handcuffs on the side) in like 5 minutes. We fucking get it, Vamp is a total jobber, why this has to go on again and again ? So yeah, it refuses to end, with Vamp playing the worst Mankind/Raven "I enjoy pain" routine ever before pulling off a Houdini, and then another terrible promo on Thunder "Yes, I'm psycho.", and more stupid gimmick, this time the ropes getting set on fire. Seriously, I can't take anymore of this shit, this is like a Kane feud. Hoe of the week : Torrie Wilson (Nitro). Yeah, because she's the reason Horace finally turns on his uncle. Yes, they are doing the same thing they did with David Flair one year before. I think it should be noted that not only the booking is eyegoungingly godawful, but these guys aren't especially creative either, everything is incredibly repetitive, predictable and deja-vu for the most part. I think that hasn't been said enough about Russo, his ideas suck dick, but they aren't very original either. So yeah, we get Horace leaving with Torrie, who undoubtedly will perform sexual favors on the big bald guy, at least that's what we are supposed to believe. Ah, women... Of course Kidman is not happy with this and will jump on Horace on Thunder. More Goldberg giant truck nonsense too. Terry Funk kept his hardcore title by defeating the Cat on Thunder, which was decently funny and absurd. Norman & Ralphus have no jobs now, so they are selling popcorn and T-shirts. Aww, whatever. Kanyon did an interview from his hospital bed, and it looked fake and unsincere as shit, you can already smell the next ultimate swerve from here.

Mea culpa, I really thought the French word "complotiste" was directly derived from an English word in a lazy "Frenglish" fashion, as we call it. I'll put it en Français dans le texte then. But well, you understood what I meant anyway I guess.

WEEK 71 (May 8 to 13) Mind blowing stupid line of the week : "I haven't burn any bridges. I call Vince McMahon. You'll be on Raw next Monday. You'll be a big star." Ric Flair to David. (Nitro) Yes, Ric Flair tries to get his son back to his side by saying he can get him to the big leagues, basically. I'm not a complotiste or anything, but lines like this just make me wonder if those who think Russo had been sent down WCW to kill them aren't right. I mean, seriously ? All that part of the really terrible angle with Flair and his son. Yeah, David turning on his dad would be a big deal if he hadn't turned the year before already, then if Flair hadn't punished him booking him with Meng, then if Flair showed some actual concern a few months before when David was getting killed by The Wall on a weekly basis. So yeah, this whole feud is stupid, and Russo being involved as the main heel character makes it even worse, but it's nothing these two haven't gone through already. David "wrestled" Arn on Thunder too. Match of the week : Mike Awesome vs DDP (Nitro). Stretcher match, so it can't get too good, but the FMW fan in me got a kick out of these two doing some really poor DDTs all over the place (although I doubt they really were paying hommage to Onita and Pogo, although my fantasist mind likes to think so). Nice little Nitro match, and Awesome is slowly building a real killer image, which is what they should have done since the beginning. This guy could be a player in a rebuilt WCW... Well, I know, I know... Sprint of the week : Jeff Jarrett vs Sting (Nitro). Despite being involved in a real stinker of a feud with jabronie Vamp, Sting is still over as all hell, and he's actualy fired up, as showed by this short match that really flows well thanks to Jeff's fluid work and Sting's intensity. Too bad it ends with Vamp coming from under the ring to drag Sting into the "darkness" (what, again ???). Sting is drenched in red goo, and gets pinned. That Vamp vs Sting feud maybe one of the worst ever in the company's history. Bad matches, horrible heel promos, awful gimmicks, and Vamp never even seems like that much of a challenge for Sting in the ring. On Thunder, Vamp threatens to bite off Sting's crow's head, a-la Ozzy. Terrible turn and comeback of the week : Rick Steiner turning and Scott Steiner (Nitro). Yep. Scott having issues with Russo only made him a rebel heel, but here we get Rick essentially turning him face by jumping on him while Scott is facing Russo scrub Tank Abbott. On Thunder Scott would get the help of babyfaces team Kronik, so it's as true as a turn as anything under Russo. So we have Scott Steiner turning babyface and Rey Mysterio Jr. acting as a heel now. Brillant. Of course nothing of that will last, but still. The whole deal with Rick Steiner and Tank is that they are challlenging Goldie... "Return" of the week : Goldberg in a monster truck squashing Tank's car (Nitro & Thunder). So, Goldie is back. Well, not really, we only see monster truck action. On Thunder Tank did the whole Gilberg entrance, complete with sparklers in his hands. Sid is nowgere to be seen BTW. Remember he was built for two months by SUllivan to be the ultimate monster to feed to Goldie. C-show cameo of the week : Future NWA World Champion Mike Rapada (World Wide). Never saw that guy before, and he looks actually pretty decent and un-indy like. Kinda like a babyface journeyman wrestler of old. Jobbed to Disco Inferno. In-ring debut of the week : Miss Elizabeth vs Daffney & Rhonda Sing (Nitro / Thunder). The rumour has it that Russo was effectively trying to get Liz to quit out of her big contract. Anyway, Liz doesn't wrestle of course, it all develops into angles with Chuck Palumbo attacking Luger. I really don't care much for these Powerplant meatheads. Time will tell. Cruiserweight match of the week : Chris Candido vs Crowbar (Thunder). Candido can only face a guy who has a valet it seems. Catfight incoming. Pretty fun spot match though, as expected with Crowbar involved. At some point Daffney does a top rope hurircanrana on Candido, which looked as good as anything this week. I like these two a lot, so there is some enjoyment to get at least. The only fun storyline right now is Terry Funk keeping his hardcore belt despite all the efforts of the New Blood, including in a 3 on 1 match against Harlem Heat on Thunder (helped by dissension in the ranks of the Heat). Had another funny match with Norman (with Ralphus around) on Nitro. Vampiro vs Sting / Ric Flair vs Russo are the depth of wrestling crap. Hogan is still feuding (along with Nash) with the Filthy Animals, who added Juvy in their ranks, resulting in a match between Kidman and Horace on Thunder which saw slimy heel Bischoff changing the rules on the fly to favour Kidman and the Animals. Watching Jeff Jarrett with the big gold belt still looks like a total miscast, and hearing him talk about being the chosen one and dropping slapnutz in every promo is painfull. He was so much more entertaining as a country singer, too bad he only kept that stupid guitar gimmick which is now totally irrelevent to his current character. I like Jarrett the worker, but he doesn't belong in that spot, period.

A 619 throwing Flair off the tope rope would be the greatest bad spot ever.

Vampiro did powerbomb Kidman on many occasions. Rewatching those WCW years, I ended up not ebing annoyed that much by that Kidman spot. I was, however, very annoyed by Booker T's lazy setup for his ridiculously delayed axe kick. The W.O.R.M. may be the most annoying spot ever. It should never hit his mark.

Flair did hit the move regularly when he was working fiery babyface style. Of course the ratio is ridiculously low, but at least it's not a 0% success rate.

PPV 17 : Slamboree 2000 Surprisingly entertaining match of the night : Hulk Hogan vs Kidman. I didn't care one bit for the buildup, but I admit teh match is actually quite the surreal spectacle. First, Kidman really did much better than I thought he would developping as a sneaky (and bumpy) heel pretty quick. Second, Hulk worked harder at making this work than he did in ages, and it actually was fresher than any other Hulk match since his Hollywood peak. Watching Hulk bump for a hurricanrana is worth the price of admission in itself. Then, Bischoff, who looks fat, did a good job as a heel referee, which was needed to make this an efficient spectacle since it was obvious Kidman would not beat Hulk, and got a shitload of heat for preventing Hulk from doing the legdrop, which got him slapped around for his trouble. I can't hate Bischoff thanks to stuff like this match. He ends up being powerbombed through a table, not to ever regain consciousness again, while Kidman crashes into his own table to his fate. Plus, there was no Hulk up, so yeah, I enjoyed it, fun stuff. Outrageous gimmick match of the night : DDP vs David Arquette vs Jeff Jarrett. This triple cage is truly ridiculous, but in a good pro-wrestling way. It does have a spectacular look too. The idea of climbing to the top of three cages to get the belt is actually kinda cool, and they worked their way around it better than I thought they would, although they do run through a bunch of token ladder match spots in the first cage in a way that looks a bit contrived. Arquette takes a few good bumps here and there. The brawl begins to get dangerous when they get to the second cage. At one point they run trough one of the wall and it looks quite scary, although I wonder if that wasn't gimmicked (looks like it). Jarrett draws blood which is a nice touch. The whole thing gets ridiculous with Awesome showing up on the second cage (so, everyone can enter this structure ?) and Arquette climbing to the top to "help DDP". Then we get the "ultimate swerve". Yawn. The match was fun despite its ridiculousness, or because of it most probably. Then we get Kanyon being thrown from the top of the first cage to teh floor. Well, to the ramp, which made a welcome comeback in WCW's landscape. So, all in all, depsite still being a pretty scary bump, Kanyon didn't fall from that high and he took what looked to ba a flat back bump. Still, that move was questionable at best, or really bad taste at worst since this happened at Kemper Arena. It wasn't nearly as bad I as thought though. Dream match of the night : Ric Flair vs Shane Douglas. For the former ECW fan in me, this is a dream match, although it should have happened in 96 or so to be really extremely cool. Still, this was way better than it had the right to be. Flair is wrestling in street clothes now, which I don't care for, but here he's fired up, and Douglas obviously wanted to make the few minutes he would get with Flair as special as he could. They work a pretty intense match, with Flair working fiery babyface style and Douglas going from bumping a lot to delivering some super solid offense, inclucing a very impressive suplex. If this had a good finish, it would have been the best Flair matches in eons. Sadly, Douglas can't get a break, and the match ends up being a backdrop to Vince Russo stroking his ego and putting himslef in the position to feud with Flair, with another stupid swerve, this time David hitting Flair from behind under a Sting disguise. So yeah, this is going toward a shitty program with the shittiest of the shittiest, but for a few minutes, this was a dream match of sorts, at least the best they could have in 2000. Sleeper of the night : Mike Awesome vs Kanyon. Same thing here, before going into a screwy finish ending up in a schmozz, these two worked a really nice, all offensive style match, with great bumping from Kanyon, impressive killer offense from Awesome, finally they have figured what kind of worker fits his style. Kanyon as a babyface is a bit odd though, he works better as heel but the combination of terrific bumping and cool offense allows him to get some good reaction still. Enjoyed this very much. Goofy match of the night : Terry Funk vs Norman Smiley & Ralphus. Ralphus wears a mask for most of the match, but is inpet as ever. And we get to see his butt crack, which is not something I wish I had seen. Anyway, they really tore it down backstage and destroy tons of stuff like it's a concession brawl in Tupelo, including a few comedy spots. They finally end up in the ring when things go really awful visually with an half-naked Ralphus trying to do the wiggle to Funk, but for a 2000 garbage match, when this kind of stuff had been overdone for years, this is pretty crazy and fun, and not too dangerous either. Ralphus as a one shot inept second to Norman worked for me, but he overstayed its welcome about the second time he showed up with Jericho, so I fear I may get tired from this pretty quick. "Hilarious" rebranding of the night : Hugh Morrus real name is actually Hugh G. Rection. Call him Captain Rection. Uh uh. That Russo guy is so damn funny. Huge erection. Get it ? Ah ah ah. So subtle too. Anyway, this is one of the worst name ever, but the match Demott works with Scott Steiner is really solid, and it's a testament to Steiner's efficiency as a heel that he makes people care somewhat for Rection here. Steiner is awesome, confronting people at ringside every two minutes, insulting the referee, delivering big spots then bumping hard for the babyface. And I like Shakira. The only thing that looks bad about this outfit is the Steiner Recliner, but hey, at least it's a safe hold, he sure won't hurt anyone with this. Copycat debut of the night : Chuck Palumbo as the new Total Package or something. The guy had been working a tarzan gimmick or sorts on Saturday Night until then, there he shows up at the end to help Buff Bagwell against Luger. The match was watchable, but Luger isn't as fun as a babyface as he was as a heel, he doesn't have much explosivity left. He still gets some good babyface heat now, WCW fans just never seem to get tired of Luger. Bagwell is good at stalling, but his execution is lazy as hell. Highlight is Liz (wearing a gorgeous dress) hitting Russo with the bat backstage then showing up at ringside to hit Bagwell too. Post match sees Bagwell carrying her away after the Luger beatdown. Hot cruiserweight opener of the night : Chris Candido vs The Artist. Just kidding, despite Candido's best effort and Terry Funk like bumping and maneurisms, the Artist just can't seem to have a good match with anyone. Get him off my TV already. Well, I'm amazed. This PPV was actually pretty damn enjoyable, as there was nothing really terrible or eye gouging except the Russo & Flair angle. Well, Vampiro vs Sting was pretty bad despite a good Sting flurry for the first few seconds, as was Candido vs Artist, but most of the rest of the card was either watchable, solid, to really fun. Stasiak vs Hennig was just there, but Stasiak didn't suck or anything, he just looked green. Bagwell vs Luger was plodding but the ending involving Liz was pretty good. Really, I'd say this was the best WCW PPV since probably Spring Stampede in 99, thanks to some solid stuff (Steiner/Rection, Awesome/Kanyon) the ridiculous garbage match, a surprisingly intense Douglas vs Flair match and the two fun spectacle main events. Sure, there were two stupid swerves and some rather flat stuff, but as a whole it had a decent flow. Maybe it's just that surrounded by this sea of unwatchable crap, it seemed like a breath of fresh air to get something that was actually fun, if mainly goofy and overbooked to be honest.

I did jump out the window during week 70, but Vince Russo booked my fall so it was all a swerve and there I am, still alive and being forced to watch more 00 WCW, which is another sort of mental suicide.

A bunny rabbit or a teady bear could have booked a better wrestling product than the one I'm subjecting myself to right now.

WEEK 70 (May 1 to 5, 2000) Goofy match of the week : Crowbar vs Norman Smiley (Nitro). Mix of garbage spots and comedy, and since I enjoy both workers, it works for me. It would be the only match I would actually enjoy this week. The big "funny" part is Norman showing up with his new partner, under a huge mascot costume. He gets stuck between two ropes for most of the match, looks fat and stupid, and plays a role in the ending of a match when he accidentaly trips Norman who falls into Crowbar's craddle but reverses it and still wins the match. The partner would be revealed at Slamboree, and it won't be a good idea... Stupid vignette of the week : Vampiro and Sting in the cemetary (Nitro). In a grainy B&W. Supposed to be creepy I guess. It's only stupid. Vamp crashes a tombstone over Sting's head. This feud is truly awful, like the worst Taker stuff from the Attitude Era. I wonder why, really... Heel promos of the week : Scott Steiner (Nitro / Thunder). It's not much, but these are actual pro-wrestling heel promos that work because Steiner hit his points, doesn't try to look cool and doesn't use any stupid shooty-shooty comments. It shows surrounded by just terrible, boring and flat mic work by guys like Jarrett and Russo, Steiner is a breath of fresh air. He challenges Hogan and Thunder, and they work a short fight with Hugh Morrus showing up to double team Steiner, who gets no help from the New Blood faction, leading to him snapping on Bisch & Russo backstage. Comeback of the week : Konnan & Rey Mysterio Jr. (Nitro). As heels. Yep, Vince Russo insists on having Rey Mysterio Jr. as a heel. No comment. Okay, I'm sorry to not go into details this week, but at this point everything is turning into a giant blur with lots of awful Russo segments, more red goo falling from the ceiling, 2 minutes brawls with interferences, a lot of bullshit involving Liz being Russo's prisonner (the only good part would be a hard slap she gives to him), a lot of bullshit involving Russo and Flair (Douglas is officialy a Russo scrub now, it's sad), a lot of bullshit overall. Thunder was a bunch of short "New York rules" brawls (no referee, with the wrestlers doing their own count... no comment) in which the New Blood got their ass kicked, and ending with a giant, overlong and boring battle royale which featured probably the last appearance of Randy Savage in WCW, showing up to help the Millionaire's Club (if you guessed that Heenan said "He's in the best shape of his life !" you'd be right), and Bret Hart showing up to hit Hogan in the back with a chair. It's pretty odd, the more I watch this, the less I seem to remember what a good wrestling show or even match is all about. It's like it's so bad it's erasing the mere concept of a good wrestling show in my brain. I admit fast-forwarding quite a bit, and I try to hang onto the very few things that may end up being somewhat fun at some point, like Scott Steiner. But this is without a doubt the worst "wrestling" TV I've ever seen, by far.

So, this is 2001 all over again ?