El-P

Oh, two remarks about the Mysterio match. First, it says how much out of the loop as far as current pop culture I am when I just didn't make anything out of Rey's costume before one announcer mentionned Avatar. Yeah, I'm one of the few human beings in the western world that just didn't watch that movie... Second, I found that pretty ironic in a very twisted way that rey would "pay hommage" to Eddie in this match. CM Punk is an evil straight edge guy, right? And Rey is the face who pays hommage to his dead drug addict friend... Just made me chuckle ! Ok, so when does Shawn comes back now?

Ok, time for "Jérôme hates WWE" moment of the year. I pretty much fast forwarded through most of the show after having to get through the first hour or so. I guess WWE really passed me by. I find the homegrown talent dull and pretty much unwatchable. Rey vs CM Punk was a good ECW TV match, and you can feel the difference between them and WWE "talents". Really the only thing that interested me was the Bret and Shawn matches... Yeah, I'm from the 90's folks... Bret was just sad to watch. The double cross was painfully obvious. Diana still looks hot after all these years. The match itself was pretty shitty and really, coming back for *this* ? I hope he got paid shitloads of money and appeased his heart or whatever, because as a spectacle, it sucked. Taker vs Shawn was a good match, but not a great wrestling match by any stretch of the imagination. Problem is that it's a self-consious epic, like all big WWE match, with obligatory finisher counter and kick outs.... At least these guys know how to work, it shows the gap between workers from their generations and the new guys (when you compare with the robotic, obviously rehashed style of Cena, Batista, Orton etc...). The announcing is fucking atrocious though. I mean, god awful stuff. Ruined every nearfall and the actual fall but being so obvious about it. Ok, so post match is all emotionnal and shit, and at least the announcers shut the hell up during this, which was the right thing to do, and Lawler saying goodbye at the end was a nice touch. I can't say I give a shit about Shawn Michaels now, although I was a big fan of his when I was 17, but it was still kinda moving, not because the guy is retiring (frankly, I couldn't care less), but because it's clearly a big part of my teenage years and my youth that I see go away. Isn't that ironic that Bret and Shawn finally get the big sendoff of the same show ? With Bret looking sad and Shawn looking "great" ? Anyway, like I said, I do think WWE passed me by. The fact that I realized last Christmas that my niece and nephews watch the WWE now and are big fans just makes it all more odd, as I used to be a big fan. And now I can't really share that with them like I could have before. Odd to find yourself in the position of being the "old jerk" who only enjoys old stuff. Well, at least as far as US wrestling goes, since everytime I watched a modern puro show I enjoyed it a lot, so maybe it's not all wrestling that passed me by. But since I was brought up on US wrestling and particulary WWE, it feels kinda odd. Anyway, I'm rambling, but these thoughts to me were more interesting than the matches themselves. I guess in a way I wish I could enjoy the current product, but I just can't, and with each years passing it's getting more and more difficult to even try to watch it.

Jeeez. Sid seems to be one scary motherfucker... I mean, those stories are just insane.

Hum.... Exploiting wrestlers death for a political campaign. Now that's something new.

Well, I am nostalgic of Nitro and Thunder, and WCW in general, if only because you would get guys like Jerry Flynn work random matches on TV, get Gedo or Yuji Yasuraoka get PPV matches, get Mickey Whipreck or Marty Jannetty show up... Ah, WCW...

Is there such a thing as a Goldberg nostalgia match ? I mean, is there really a Goldberg nostalgia ? The guy's whole career was pretty much squashing JTTS on Nitro and blowing smoke out of his nose. I totally hated him back then. Waste of my time, squashed a red hot Raven, was useless in the ring until he crossed DDP. Really not a fond memory at all of that period.

Thanks for posting the original version. Here's the Benny Hill one : Priceless...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7ekE99Aifk No word needed really...

Anyone remembers the Great Hisa Title History pages ? I went crazy reading that stuff 13 years ago.

Concussions and getting a fat paycheck does those things to you I guess...

Yeah, what's the deal with this ? Get publicity ? Saw it last year or the year before, they don't look like porn stars that much, WWE "divas" always looked much sleazier than this. Cultural difference I guess.

Awesome.

I'm regularly listening to the little podcast thingy Cornette does, and he doesn't strike me as bitter at all. He just doesn't care about the current product put out by WWE and TNA. I can echo the sentiment, I find both unwatchable. Cornette does tell a lot of good things about individuals he worked with over the months, but of course him ranting about how current wrestling sucks is what people want to hear, and he's often hilarious doing it. Cornette puts over the Roh product (well, he's working there, but he wasn't exactly saying tons of good things about TNA when he was there). Really, Corny seems to be enjoying life right now. Not enjoying current wrestling, but I don't see this as being bitter. He's not Ole. Al Snow comes off like a douche who thinks way too much of himself though.

Already heard it, but Cornette telling some useless assholes to go fuck themselves never gets old with me.

Well, the disks covering Flair post 93 would quickly end up being a torture, especially after you get past 97.

Yeah, but does disk 87 include Paul Roma ?

37 disk ? That's insane ! Of course if one wrestler deserves a 37 disk anthology, Terry would be that wrestler.

Richter in the HoF and Bret at WM. It's the big year of people that got screwed by Vince coming back to the WWE...

What a bunch of insecure assholes. They've got a monopoly, but that's still not enough, people who bust their ass for your company aren't allowed to keep their most famous name to continue to make a livong once you've got them used up.

Agreed. That's when you know you're thinking way too much about wrestling. Our asshole president Nicolas Sarkozy could be a great heel manager now that I think of it. But yet, it never crossed my mind. It's like people who talk about "heeling up" or "not selling" about other thing than wrestling. Wrestling fans are one of a kind breed sometimes...

Blondie pimping Georgia over WWF, I need to see this !

No way. The T-shirt shop at the corner of my street would do a better job...

What I've seen of recent puroresu doesn't seem bad at all, but I agree about the trading forearm bit, it drives me nuts. Might as well work a headlock, at least you get more out of it. WWE has become unwatchable to me though, no matter how hard I try. I didn't even bother with the Rumble this year, and I didn't even watched Bret come back (which says a lot since I was a huge Bret fan). I guess I'll watch Mania, just like every year, and be bored, just like every year save for one of two things (last year was, unsurprisingly, Shawn vs Taker although I thought it was very overrated as usual). I've been a fan for 20 years. Seems like a long time, but at the same time I got to the point I don't think I'll ever lose total interest in it. I'm probably a lifer.

Interesting to read that I'm not the only one who actually got to the point of reading about the business and hearing interviews has become more interesting most of the time than watching matches. 10 years ago, I would have totally burned my time watching everything that is available these days.

I don't. I have tons of stuff on a hard drive to watch. I gave up on watching anything current (although it's not hard as far as US stuff goes, my attempt at watching WWE or TNA the last 3 years have failed miserably). Watching old FMW stuff these days.