El-P

He sure is fixing some of the stuff he probably disagreed with Vince. Getting people back who had been fired just a while ago is quite interesting in term of what message it sends. Funny how timing is everything. If the Vince stuff happens one year ago, Adam Cole doesn't leave most probably. Samoa Joe doesn't get fired. Steven Regal doesn't get fired. Not sure people like Athena get fired either. Now Trip is getting back some of those people who are available, and really now, whatever people think of him, Kross never got a fair shake on the main roster, so good for him. And of course, he's paired up with Scarlett again (that was the most mind-blowing thing to me, alongside the gladiator outfit of course, why the hell would you not keep him and Scarlett together on the man roster, with the elaborate entrance and such ?). As far as being a geek, sure, that guy walking around with Scarlett Bordeaux as his IRL wife comes of like a geek, sure people, sure... The next 6 months are gonna be the most interesting WWE has been in more than two decades if only for what moves Levesque makes. Of course there's gonna be a honeymoon period, and people are gonna overstate every little positive thing like it's the greatest thing ever, but it's obvious that Vince was a HUGE problem for the company, in more ways than one. Is Kevin Dunn done yet ?

The thing is, Madison really shines as a heel character. She can work babyface, but that's not where you're gonna get the essence of Madison's work, which is all in details and maneurisms and reactions as a heel (not to mention promo work and angles, she went through years of making the best out of questionable TNA stuff and has been fun as heel in contemporary IMPACT, Locker Room Talk was always a terrific backstage segment, her team with Tenille Dashwood was tons of fun too). I don't think Leila Grey was a great fit for her, as really, after the entrance was done (cool theme song, great Red Velvet impersonation), she did not look very good, she was out of place many time, she showed no intensity to the point even the announcers talked about it. Mance vs Mox was a fun little match, but also by far the lesser Mox match in a long while. Ol' Mancer, well, he's basically the guy I remember from MLW, and by that I mean, whatever. Maybe his promo style and garbage bumping can get him over, but I don't look forward to more of him at all, sorry. Never did much for me and apparently still doesn't. Takeshita getting a quickie win reeked of "Fuck, we gave him a title match but he never won on TV" booking. That's the thing about this match, on paper it looks awesome and probably will be, but Takeshita has never won a big match and there's basically no way Claudio is losing, so that's another loss after a great match for Takeshita. This guy has gotten organically over in the shortest time more than anyone, but he's basically is the guy who loses great matches. He should actually *win* that title really, or the TNT title instead of that big powerbombing oaf, because the audience is already ready for him. Tony Neese & Mark Sterling have low-key became one of my favorite act in the company. Want more of Josh Woods, who apparently is still alive after *that* spot (so is Keith lee, but really he was cushioned by Woods). That being said, there's a reason Rampage gets killed in the ratings. For all the talk about not being a B-show, it has absolutely became a B-show. A fun B-show, I like the randomness of it sometimes, but a B-show nonetheless. One year ago the debut show had Kenny Omega losing the IMPACT title to Christan Cage, which was huge because it was Omega's first loss, of a title no less, since he won the AEW title from Mox after a long reign of terror. Now we get Josh Woods & Tony Neese in the main event, Mance Warner showing up, a squash thrown on TV for a guy who hasn't won a match but stil gets a title shot for the ROH title... It absolutely feels like Thunder in 1999. They probably would need to re-think their strategy for this second show, including make it look a bit different.

And Sabin, Shelley, the Bucks, the Briscoes.... Billy Gunn is not anywhere close to any of those guys. Let's be real, he's not Marty Jannetty nor Tom Prichard either.

There you go. That's what we need : Transformers death-matches ! I mean, Lego death-match were a thing a few years back. Why the fuck not.

AEW and current IMPACT weekly shows (apart from Dark) and big shows, yes. I do not watch everything on NJPW and Stardom big shows, it depends on the card, mood, time available... I definitely ff stuff during my still ongoing older TNA watch.

You have strange ideas about me. I was all about Transformers. And no, I did not realize the cartoon was basically a toy commercial.

That's one reason, among others, why I will never even follow that promotion again. 3hours Raw + 2 hours Smackdown is just NO from me. AEW adding Rampage was already not a good news to me for my viewing habits, but it' still pretty ok. But really now, one show a week was just fine. Just like IMPACT or LU. No way I get involved in watching 5 hours of weekly show to follow a promotion. If things really change, I may watch some big shows (through Very Legal Means, let's not kid ourselves), but the weekly TV is just nope.

Plus : "The One" Billy Gunn. Seriously.

Thanks. Pretty interesting. I wonder how much % is actually happy of having bought that after the fact.

Wow. I would be interested to see the overlap with the last AEW PPV (not ROH not NJPW joint show) and IMPACT PPV (especially since IMPACT had a lot of talent involved plus the production crew, which is why they promoted their next special during the show).

Don't remember. I'm either too European or too young. Lance Armstrong was the best heel ever though. Everyone saw through him, he was detested.

And the reason is : he never was that great. The Smoking Gunns were probably the best team he was a part of in term of pure work, and they were an pretty good tag team at best, at a time WWF was about the Godwinns, Men on a Mission and the likes. Not exactly much to talk about. And I liked the Gunns. Their peak probably came in 1996 when they turned heel and were managed by Sunny too, as it was the first time Billy really showcased some personality. The NAO was an intro. Most of the matches *sucked*, that's something people tend to forget. The audience was hot as hell for sing-along the intro, then sat on their asses while a boring match with the Head Bangers happened, Billy Gunn did a bunch of routine spots while JR talked about how he was the best pure athlete in WWF and then Road Dogg did his two or three routine spots and a finish. That was 90% of the NAO stuff. And Billy & Chuck, well, I guess the less said the better. Their peak was a "lol gay wedding" angle, which I guess was less offensive than most gay stuff up until then in the company, but then again, no one will confound Billy & Chuck for anything more than a questionable comedy tag team with zero notable matches to their resume. So yeah, no one talks about him because, well, there's not much to talk about. He's been doing the same boring routine work since about 1999 too, although I guess his AEW work has been more entertaining than anything he did since the peak of the NAO.

Ok, sorry about that. Overall, like I said I think it's a good feud for Jungle Boy. He needs to win that one clean.

Scott Armstrong became a big star ?

See how it goes ? I just make a comment about Christian Cage's stint being underwhelming to me, and it goes to "Christian Cage bashing" to "complaining about Christian Cage taking the time away from younger talent". I said nothing like this either. I said there's probably 50 people I'd rather watch right now, I never said I only wanted to watch the younger talents. I know what the point of the feud is.

They were both basically useless in TNA, but Billy Gunn was funny for a minute or two when he was paired up with the Beautiful People. I don't think Road Dogg did anything worthwhile after the NAO. Which is kinda sad because he was actually quite good, but his issues really damaged him. I do remember at one point he was a producer on Smackdown and some people were all "He's an Armstrong that's why Smackdown is so great right now", which in itself makes no sense (because he's "an Armstrong" says nothing about his actual producing abilities) and was forgetting that Vince was the one making the decisions anyway. That being said, he worked at production during Flair's last match show alongside the IMPACT team, and if anything good can be said about the show, is that it was well produced. Apparently he's gonna be at the next IMPACT show in the same capacity, so maybe he can bring something positive to the table, who knows. His social media game and interviews have been extremely cringeworthy.

He's not been hired as a coach though (unlike Madison Rayne for instance, who apparently will also work from time to time, but she definitely is a coach first). He was presented as "a HOF pro-wrestler" and a big star. From that standpoint he has not delivered as much as I think he would have. I'm sure he's helping plenty backstage though, and he sure would be super useful in that role.

Absolutely. This goes hand in hand with one of the most off-base criticism that comes back from time to time : big guys shouldn't fly around, because then why should people care about smaller guys doing acrobatics. Which on paper sounds pretty fair, but the issue is that it isn't rooted in any kind of reality. By this time, after seeing Muto, Vader, Hugh Morrus, Bam Bam do moonsaults, seeing 2 Cold Scorpio, who wasn't a small guy by any stretch of the imagination, do stuff that would still look impressive today, see Lance Archer walk the rope into a moonsault and other big dudes do tope con hilos and such, guys like Rey, Juventud, Psychosis, the X-division guys and today the Lucha Brothers, Sammy, Darby and Vikingo really should get no reactions anymore. And of course, that's not what happened, ever. There's NO occurence of a promotion anywhere where a big guy doing a big flying spot has hurt the smaller guys doing flying spots. It doesn't exist. It's a fictitious idea based on "pro-wrestling should/shouldn't be", as opposed to what actually happens. And yeah, fucking Vikingo. I saw that Triplemania match the other day, and that guy showed up Fénix in term of "How in the hell he is doing this ?". Ponder that for a minute. And now, Komander is gonna be around more I guess too, he's another one.

Sure, saying a gut is a solid worker is "bashing". To me the angle with Jungle Boy works overall (the turn angle was actually greatly executed), and I hope for an excellent match in the end, but I thought the promos were a bit much for nothing, it came out of nowhere. That's an issue with AEW booking though in general, things kinda happen because they do. Brian Alvarez made what I thought was a super interesting point the other day, TK knows how to end his stories, but has issues with the beginnings. Which kinda goes along that feeling of booking kinda going nowhere or being flawed after a super hot PPV or TV show. The destination always ends up being a really great show, but the starts are not always the smoothest. Doesn't apply to everything of course, but there's maybe something to that. All Christian Cage issues aside, on this, totally agree. That's a criticism that makes no sense whatsoever. Even back in the "old days", the MX had a bigger and cooler moveset (thanks to Eaton mostly) than any babyfaces anywhere. Which is one reason, among many, why they were considered so much better than anyone else.

Yes, exactly this. Kinda got the same feeling when I went through his TNA years. On a more positive note, I thought Austin Gunn really shined during the dumpster match. That bump on the ramp off that garbage can was a hoot.

It doesn't because I wasn't making reference to this match in particular (which was fine, and as Broken as he is I thought Hardy was fine too) rather a thought on Christian's AEW stint in general. I don't find his in-ring work to be either super impressive nor very interesting (sure, he had two excellent matches with Omega, who can have an excellent matches with anyone). He's been solid, that's pretty much it, no more, no less (which is good I guess, but you would expect more out of a so-called great worker). I don't see how he's been better than guys like Kazarian for instance, in term of veteran worker. And tbh I've not been a big fan of his edgelord-like promos about "Your daddy is dead !" either. But I wasn't about to pile on Christian Cage (whom for the longest time I considered underrated). He's just not a super interesting part of the product to me (despite me hoping the heel turn would benefit him). He clearly got a super deal, because he seems to work a match every now and then only, as showed by his W/L record.

Nothing to do with Matt Hardy, who worked super hard here.

I did found quite funny that on Dynamite they did not say a word about Lethal working Flair's last match but did refer to the card to promote Mance Warner. Like, yeah, better not mention the truly embarrassing part of the show.

Noticed it too. And yeah, how fucking dumb can you be. He's paying good money to look like a complete dumbfuck on TV. Corny's army certainly is something. NOt to mention it deprives someone who would have enjoyed the show of a good spot. Whatever. People are dumb shit.

Coach TK doesn't react to Trip or a RAW huge ratings because he doesn't have to. Would made no sense to hit the panic button. It's a long haul game, or like Trip would say, "a marathon, not a sprint". Going on about their business and looking to build toward a hot Fall seasons before TV contract negociations is the goal. And in the shorter term, next week is the big show. Orange vs Lethal was terrific. Lethal has been nothing but *great* in every situation he's been put thus far in AEW (much to my surprise). Orange losing is not gonna hurt him one bit. He's a guy who can lose and stay over, plus it's been made clear his leg had been fucked up. Not worried about Orange, who has picked quite a bit of steam back since his return. Thunderstorm vs Britt & Hayter was also terrific. All four were, really. Love me some more Hayter, and Britt has gotten more snugg lately it seems, fits her character well. Rosa vs Hayter with hopefully some really stiff work incoming, that should be really good. Adam Cole back but not really. So, does Omega comes back to team with the Bucks after all or will Hangman reunite with them before ? The Elite drama has always been the best thing in AEW as far as long term storyline. And matches too. People can say whatever about Jericho, but at 51 (I think that's undersold), the guy can still deliver some really good singles match including workers from a totally different generation. He's actually much better in this simple setting than in WWE-like gimmicked matches. On the other hand, I'm sorry to say that Christian Cage has been wildly underdelivering to me. He's been *solid* at best. I sure hope after the Jungle Boy loss he's not getting that much more featured spot (not that he even works that many matches anyway, fuck, Sting has worked a ton more), because I don't see anything special or interesting in this guy's work anymore (last stuff I enjoyed from him was his IMPACT stuff last year). For a supposed "great mind", there's nothing even in term of "details" that I can gather from his stuff, it's routine older Christian Cage, which is solid and all, but really now, there is about 50 people I'd rather watch. Even Iron-Sheiked Matt Hardy is more interesting because he's in such a rough shape that it's kinda compelling to see him still try as hard as he physically can. There you go. Mance Warner ? Well, that's a choice... Never was a fan in MLW nor GCW, he's Jimmy Havoc level guy to me with kinda annoying white trash promos, but hey, I guess if Mox wants to have a garbage bloodbath again he's the guy. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt, but really I only enjoyed him when Sami Callihan was beating his ass. Madison !!!!!!!!!!!