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KB8

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Everything posted by KB8

  1. KB8
    Yeah, this looked alright, but I don't fancy seeking out the full 26 minutes. What we got was mostly Taue v Ace and I dug Taue's exhaustion selling.
  2. KB8
    Count me in with the crowd who flipped for Sid of all fucking people quoting Nietzsche. This feud is kind of all over the place as the big angle from last week seems to have been forgotten bar some paid lip service. At least Sid incorporates it into his promo - which I thought was really fun overall - so that's something. Shawn of course makes a subtle comment about having a big dick, and tells us more than once how he'll kick Sid's teeth down his throat. I thought his promo was actually alright, if mostly pretty garden variety, but his best stuff on interviews this year definitely comes when he's heel.
  3. KB8
    As a match this wasn't much and it's sort of hard to imagine Rock being the absolute megastar he'd become. But then that's the fun thing with the yearbooks, I guess (you know, getting to see it unfold). I wasn't sure why Bret was hobbling here but Sleeze's post clears that up. They may have lucked into the Hart Foundation/Austin stuff, but at least they had the sense to run all the way with it when the opportunity presented itself.
  4. KB8
    Hall and Nash absolutely feel like the coolest cats associated with the nWo. Hogan is hateable to absurd degrees, Bischoff as much if not even more so, the scrubs like Vincent and Bagwell are more goofy than anything, but the Outsiders feel like the reason fans show up to the arena in nWo colours. Everything about this was cool and the part about how Scott having all them muscles won't do anything for his rickety bones was great.
  5. KB8
    WCW continue their roll and this was a total blast. Hogan is on another level as a character right now, having Bagwell hold the belt while he poses, all of the B-level nWo guys worshiping at the alter of Hollywood. He's hammy as fuck in this once the match itself starts, wide-eyed and slack-jawed in disbelief as he low blows Giant to no effect. That back row could've been twelve miles away and it would've been fine because Hulk was playing to aaaall the way back there. Naturally we get the nWo run in and Syxx takes the bump of the match as he gets launched clean across the ring (as was his wont, tbf). I also had never heard that ratings grab story and man that's some amazing carny horse shit.
  6. KB8
    I had no memory of this. Awesome angle. The comparison with Austin is an interesting one because this got over huge and afterwards Page felt like a legit star that could oppose the nWo. Meanwhile on the other show Austin attacking whoever he wants every week never felt nearly as hot. Of course, WWF never felt nearly as hot as WCW. Shout out to Nash's table bump as well. I thought some kid front row was for getting his teeth removed.
  7. KB8
    Well I guess every day really is a school day because I had no clue Yagi was due for retirement here. I don't think I've actually seen her in a singles match before, but I know about the Yoshida match a couple years later and I'm really looking forward to that. But I figured this was one of her earliest matches. Also had the impression it might've been one of Kuzumi's and I'd never have made the Azumi Hyuga connection if not for this thread. Basically I didn't know shit about shit. Either way this totally worked for me. It's not an ideal one to one comparison, but it felt a little like early ARSION so that probably helped. It usually takes me a little while to get back into the rhythm and transitions in joshi if I haven't watched any in a while. ARSION tends to be an exception and if nothing else Yagi bringing the funky grappling and throws gave it that sort of aesthetic. I think because I was blind to the background of both women and saw this as a sort of young lions bout I was biting on a bunch of those nearfalls and thought it could end at any moment. Yagi looked really good here and straight away I'd like to see more of that ARSION run now. Enjoyed this a bunch.
  8. KB8
    WAR v New Japan delivering the goods again, is it? Never would've guessed. It wasn't that this had no business being awesome, it's that you look at those names and wonder why the fuck every single person in the building was going mental. This was absurd heat for guys so far down the pecking order. You could tell Orihara was feeding off it big time, though. He's pretty underrated anyway because he communicates hatred well and will get the shit kicked clean out of him on the regular, but I thought he was absolutely great in this. All Saito's really good for at this point in his career is crowbarring folk, but it was enough for Orihara to work with. And man did Saito crowbar him. He was trying to murder Orihara with kicks; huge punts to the chest, sloppy roundhouses, even a few punches to the ear just to spice it up some. Orihara trying to catch these shots and go for kneebars or chokes ruled, especially when he wasn't quick enough off the mark and wound up getting clobbered. A couple of his delayed crumples were awesome bits of selling and at least once I bought him going down with a collapsed lung. On a few other occasions he maybe popped up a little quick, but the crowd clearly lit a fire under him and you couldn't have asked for him to be any more aggressive. I about lost it when he just leapt on Saito and tried to punch his skull open. The way he sold those last couple knockout blows was incredible as well and I was totally behind him pulling off the upset.
  9. KB8
    Well, I guess this is the end of Sister Angelica and Mother Smucker. I knew there was a reason I had no recollection of them. Imagine being in that store and seeing a male nun arrested in right front of you.
  10. KB8
    McMahon dropping the line about Sunny's home sex tape like it wasn't even a thing had me like "wait, what?" Sunny was absolutely outrageous around this time and I'm in full agreement with everyone else on how she should've been doing more. She was the bomb. This was also ridiculous as fuck and almost certainly one of the best things to come out of the Shotgun Saturday Night experiment.
  11. KB8
    A lot of this stuff is sort of surreal. I think I vaguely remember this from years back, probably in an old DVDVR thread about WWF daftness rather than from watching it/hearing about it at the time. But hey, if nothing else I'm intrigued as to where this nonsense goes next week!
  12. KB8
    This is a really fun pairing and they had an awesome match on Nitro the previous December. There were some awkward moments this time out and it led to a few stop-starts, but it was pretty fun nonetheless. Maybe Lesnar watched this before the Rumble match with Balor because Regal took that Psicosis dive right across his neck. Dusty was a hoot on commentary as well and Regal's short promo afterwards was great. "I might just retire this bloody belt." I believe him, too.
  13. KB8
    Desperado playing over a Terry Funk video is something I'll never not enjoy so naturally I liked this. I'll also never not get geeked for a final Funk rodeo (and he's had about two dozen of them so I say that with confidence).
  14. KB8
    Yeah, this got a bit long in the tooth, but I grew into it more than I figured considering how little I give a shit about Raven. Sandman was sure leaning into a few of those wall shots and at one point I thought for sure he was taking a head dive down a set of stairs (or a bigger head dive, I guess). Soup's Parks and Rec observation about the building is a tremendous shout, btw.
  15. KB8
    Still tremendous. I think watching it for the first time a decade ago, the freshness of it and the fact more people hadn't cottoned on to its greatness probably played a part in how thoroughly I was blown away by it. I guess lucha is still the most niche of niche in terms of what internet wrestling fans are talking about, but by 2019 we've had the 90s yearbooks and the DVDVR lucha set and the footage explosion of those godly youtubers putting up shit we never knew existed. Even if there's far less lucha-driven discussion online than New Japan or NXT or maybe even modern joshi, there's certainly more of a spotlight on it now than there was fifteen years ago. In 2009 I think I'd only ever seen this brought up by OJ on his blog. Nobody had comp'd it and Virus was still a couple years away from making everyone want to go back and watch everything he ever did. Watching it then was notable for me not just because it was an awesome wrestling match, but because it shaped a lot of what I would come to look for in lucha title matches afterwards. I still find myself judging matches against it to this day, and by now I'm pretty well settled on what my own idea of great wrestling is. Some of the matwork is still absolutely world class. Fluid, scrappy, graceful, a little of everything. It's one thing pulling out a bunch of gorgeous reversals but it's the struggle and fight over holds that really push it over the top. There are a few times were they'll do something I've never seen before - like Damiancito reversing a wishbone into a camel clutch - and then they'll punctuate the ground exchanges with bursts of rope running and armdrags or springboards. It felt like all through the match they were establishing Cicloncito as the superior flier and that it would be his route to victory. The best example of that came at the end of the primera when he hit a spectacular springboard rana where he leapt backwards over Damiancito's head. They kept that theme running into the segunda and there was one extended sequence that had about seven awesome moments strung together. Plus the finish to the fall was one of those preposterous submissions that reminds you you're watching a fucking lucha title match. If we're holding this to the same standard as the true all-time classics - and I am - then I guess the two big dives in the tercera never carried quite as much weight as they should've, maybe because they moved past them a bit quickly, but the dives themselves were humongous and Ramirez really lived up to the name with that bullet tope. I never expected to come out of this again thinking it's the best match ever, and that's the case, but it absolutely held up like I hoped it would and I'd still easily call it a MOTD-level bout. It's only fair given the post-match celebration.
  16. KB8
    Fucking hell I love this match-up. I wish they wrestled seven hundred times. Their G-1 match from earlier in the year is one of the best five minutes matches ever and this is worked in similar fashion, with Shibata showing all kinds of disrespect and trying to hospitalise his elder while Tenryu throttles him for his temerity. Tenryu as badass Clint Eastwood putting a young jock in his place is really the perfect dynamic. Right at the start Tenryu meets Shibata on the ramp and throws him off the stage into a row of chairs, then a little later Shibata drags him to the same spot and I thought for a second he was going to chuck the old man to his death. They do a back and forth in the ring where Shibata punts Tenryu in the chest, Tenryu responds with a punch and one of those low angle brainbusters, and they basically repeat that sequence three times until Tenryu comes out on top. It was kind of dumb but also awesome in that egregiously stupid sort of way. Tenryu hitting a draping DDT from the top rope to the floor was sheer fucking lunacy and I don't know how he never killed him. Shibata popping up and deciding it's his turn to throw potato shots a couple minutes later was a wee bit rubbish, but he doesn't get much offence in before Tenryu chokes him half to death. I can see someone thinking the finish was a touch flat, but for as annoying as Shibata dropping all selling can be, the way he staggered around like a man ready to be put out his misery was great. And of course Tenryu doesn't need to be told twice.
  17. KB8
    Man, I know it's been a minute since I finished the '96 yearbook and everything, but where the fuck did all these ham 'n' eggers come from? Did they add like six guys to the nWo at the office Christmas party? Is that Rotunda? I don't even remember them pulling the trigger fully on Patrick. Whatever though, this was tremendous. Hogan and Bischoff blatantly lying about stuff rules and it's a cool new layer Hogan added to his gig after Starrcade. The facade was beginning to crack, he finally lost...so fuck it, just lie through your teeth and say you didn't. And YOU believe he's paranoid enough that HE believes it. The stuff with the Giant was great, Bischoff's futile axe handles, the crazy Nick Patrick bump, the inevitable swarming and beatdown, Bischoff's incredible smugness, and Vincent's greatest moment in WCW. I remember crowds were all the way on the Sting train towards the end of 1996 and this one was in full "we want Sting!" mode again. I haven't watched ANY of this stuff since it happened so I'm super hyped to see how everything with Sting plays out over the year. My ten year old self would be absolutely geeked.
  18. KB8
    I pretty much agree entirely with Pete on the match, especially the bodyslam which I had no recollection of but instantly hated. Other than Lawler making note of it the thing didn't seem to count for shit, either. I mean, that's pretty dumb. This being the tail end of a marathon taping session makes sense because nobody gave a rip about Austin being out there at all. Sid bringing the cameraman back with him was indeed a cool touch and I actually like the powerbomb on Pete Lothario in isolation, but it had no heat at all because he's some schmuck related to the old fella (who may have been a fucking awesome wrestler, but nobody had any reason to care about him at this point) who was tagging along with the guy crowds were already getting sick of. I thought WWF started getting a few things right towards the end of 1996, but it's still night and day compared to what's going on over on Nitro.
  19. KB8
    "You have to kick...or be kicken! You have to hit...or be hitten!" Sid talking about the ring being what he refers to as the dying field and how he was born the man and fuck it, how can you not get a kick out of Sid? Just all over the place and crazy as shit. His reaction to Michaels doing the striptease was tremendous and it was no wonder he was routinely being cheered over Shawn. We're entering that real obnoxious stage of babyface Michaels and I'm honestly quite hyped to see it play out again. I welcome it.
  20. KB8
    I didn't outright hate this, probably because I had no expectations of it actually being any good in the first place, but yeah, this wasn't much. Kojika is dressed like my 90 year old grandfather and moves at about the same clip. I can never be too critical of the old fogies trying to recapture that lightning in a bottle but he sure wasn't good and his opponents never really helped matters. I wasn't sure where they could go after the crazy scaffold senton into the wire at the start and the answer involved much walking around while lightly directing a designated partner to various walls so they could leave blood prints. I'll give them one thing, though -- that finish achieved what not a whole lot of deathmatches achieve and that was cap things off with the absolute craziest spot of the match. That was just absurdly brutal.
  21. KB8
    I've had similar issues to Rah with pacing in joshi before, but I actually found the rhythm in this far easier to get into. Maybe it's just because I found myself really liking a bunch of Kandori during the GWE and she became a bit of a favourite where most other joshi wrestlers leave me cold, but I thought this was pretty good. They definitely resort to the tired trope of dragging each other around the building, but I thought everything felt manic and they punctuated it with crazy enough shit that it didn't come off as being too ridiculous. For the most part the big spots carried weight and I didn't think it came close to the level of blowing shit off that a bunch of other joshi street fights have reached. The powerbomb across the upturned table looked brutal, the chain spot where Kandori tries to strangle her was almost disturbing, and even if the finish was a bit daft in theory I guess the threat of attempted murder will plausibly force you to tap out. I was fine with this.
  22. KB8
    Mr Backlund is losing his shit so naturally I'm on board. Vince as goofy chinos-wearing dad was also my first thought. I haven't seen any of these shows in forever, but based on this it feels like maybe he'd be able to let his hair down a little and probably enjoy himself (if he continues with announcing duty, anyway).
  23. KB8
    Agreed on Sunny with the subtle jealousy being fun. She was the best. Marlena was also stupid hot in '97 and I'll never not love old man Backlund going apeshit about whatever nonsense.
  24. KB8
    Yeah, this was daft as hell and feels like the perfect little canvas for Vince to chuck a bunch of stuff at to see what might work. Mother Smucker has to be one of the earliest attempts at a blatant bit of SMUT~ on the WWF's part, right? Attitude be comin'...
  25. KB8
    I was also sort of stunned that they were running around New York in winter wearing Daisy Dukes and crop tops. Stevie superkicking Santa was always a given because no way Santa Claus makes an ECW appearance and doesn't get hit in the mouth.
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