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PG-13 vs. The World


Dylan Waco

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So we're still talking about Demolition? Didn't we agree to disagree on this?

No. Demolition are obviously better than freaking Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard, The Rockers, The Hart Foundation, One Man Gang & Big Bubba, the Rock'n Roll Express, the MX and probably Kawada & Misawa too. And if you don't agree you're a moron.

Or something...;)

 

No,yes,yes,yes,no,no and yes. This is fun.
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Its when people use weasel words like "carryable" that my dander gets raised/ Exactly how were they "carried"? Since its clear Demolition always called the match.

They were carried in the sense that the other teams brought the wrestling, the offense and most of the good suff since the Demos were all about weak axhandles and weak punches, and goofy screaming. As far as Demolition calling the match each and every time, I'd have to rewatch them (which I won't) but I doubt the Demos called the match all the time since they were babyfaces in most matches you pimped. Calling the match with the Rockers, no doubt, but thank God the Rockers are the greatest southern tag team working up north, so we get some actual wrestling and excitement. Calling the match with Arn & Tully, well, maybe so, but that means dragging them down in that case. Oh anyway...

I'm wondering if the Nasty Boys, although worse workers mechanically than the Demos, weren't much more fun to watch than the Demos actually.

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No. Demolition are obviously better than freaking Arn Anderson & Tully Blanchard, The Rockers, The Hart Foundation, One Man Gang & Big Bubba, the Rock'n Roll Express, the MX and probably Kawada & Misawa too. And if you don't agree you're a moron.

Or something...;)

no,yes,yes,yes,no,no and yes.

 

That's your best post of the thread.:) (no sarcasm)

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They were carried in the sense that the other teams brought the wrestling, the offense and most of the good suff since the Demos were all about weak axhandles and weak punches, and goofy screaming.

Demolition brought structure and story to the matches. In fact Shawn Micheales hated the way Demolition called their matches. Really as much as I love the Towers the only significant tag matches of any length had were against Demolition. The Mega Powers match was hacked up to set up the Hogan/Savage angles and The Rockers match was a squash.

 

In any case their punches were certainly not weak. Ax's ax handles could be spotty but everything else he did looked painful. Smash's offense was consistently good.

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Demolition better than Misawa & Kawada? :huh:

 

That is REish to the third power, man. This is one of those rare times where my opinion will not waver under any circumstance. I wouldn't believe Jesus if he said Demolition were better than Misawa & Kawada.

 

I guess Dylan had a premonition that the title of this thread could eventually change from "PG-13 vs. The World" to "Doc tells us we're all wrong and why". A good thread decapitated...what was the over/under on that one?

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Regarding snowflake ratings: I understand why many people hate them, since far too many readers tend to just look at the star ratings and then basically skip the entire review. But they're still a helpful tool to summarize approximately how much you liked a match.

 

Although, I've never quite understood people who break it all the way down to quarter-stars. That seems like you're splitting hairs into nearly microscopic sections. I write movie reviews, and I just use a simple 1-10 numerical system for rating them. Of course sometimes there problems like "I like this movie more than this film I gave a 7 but less than this other film I gave an 8" and so on, but I still think a nice round whole number is less confusing than breaking things down into fractions.

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Demolition brought structure and story to the matches.

Because Arn & Tully, the Harts or the Rockers needs someone to bring structure to their matches. :rolleyes:

What Demos brought that bring the match down is poor and boring offense. Like I said, the Nasties are worse mechanics, but their recklessness and sloppiness at least produce some aura of actual violence and chaos, whereas the Demos are just blah to me on offense. Not a whole lot more dangerous looking than the Honky Tonk Man except for a few occasional good lariats.

The "structure and storytelling" aspect doesn't matter to me if the wrestling kinda suck or is boring and dull. I'd rather have an entertaining goofy spotfest or trainwreck than a well structured boring match with no interesting wrestling (and by wrestling I don't mean "technical wrestling", I also mean good brawling etc...). And the Demos on offense were rather sleep inducing to me.

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Actually those three teams do sometimes do schtick just to do it. Lots of teams do actually. They'll work some type of schtick to get a pop but does not necessarily add to the match or make sense within the story.

 

What Demos brought that bring the match down is poor and boring offense.

Wasn't poor or boring. It was usually well timed and calculated to get maximum effect. You've already admitted you have not watched the matches in a long time and have no intention to rewatch them.

 

 

Demolition better than Misawa & Kawada? :huh:

 

That is REish to the third power, man. This is one of those rare times where my opinion will not waver under any circumstance. I wouldn't believe Jesus if he said Demolition were better than Misawa & Kawada.

 

I guess Dylan had a premonition that the title of this thread could eventually change from "PG-13 vs. The World" to "Doc tells us we're all wrong and why". A good thread decapitated...what was the over/under on that one?

You are so feeble and weak minded you quake and quiver in fear of anyone who says how they feel with any sort of conviction.
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What Demos brought that bring the match down is poor and boring offense.

Wasn't poor or boring. It was usually well timed and calculated to get maximum effect. You've already admitted you have not watched the matches in a long time and have no intention to rewatch them.

Come on, don't talk to me like the Demos had some special offense that escaped from my mind for fuck's sake. I've seen countless Demos matches over the last 20 years, enough to consider that their offense was boring, dull and weak looking to me. I don't need to refresh my memory on everything you know. I haven't watched a Mariko Yoshida match in 8 years probably, I don't need to refresh my memory to know how awesome she was at submission and matwork.

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You are so feeble and weak minded you quake and quiver in fear of anyone who says how they feel with any sort of conviction.

I must be a brave coward then because I will gladly point out something not entirely popular even with the forethought of, "Imma gonna have some peeps mad at me." But I guess you know me better than I do because all my letters, nouns, adjectives, and own personal know-how is weirdly somehow always wrong to you. Must be some pedestal that you sit upon.

 

The problem here is that you seemingly believe your opinions to be objective, not subjective. There is an obvious difference between the two adjectives.

 

Here's an example of you:

"I wish reviewers would use more star-ratings instead of paragraphs of text. It is easier for me to find what to watch and what not to much quicker."

"Star ratings suck. The only worthwhile system is pass/fail or good/bad. If you want more detail have a conversation."

 

The first line of dialogue is exhibiting a subjective nature, while the second line exhibits an objective tone.

 

I use words that express my subjectivity - words such as "like" or "favorite". Whereas you on the other hand is primarily objective - best, worst, sucks, greatest, horrible. And you play off those terms as sermon. There is no other alternative. Everyone else is wrong and you are right. Gets fucking old always reading your responses to other members of "Your wrong." Sure I don't have to read your posts, but then again, some people could try a little harder not to be such a cunt all the time.

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Well, that was apparently a long, painful night of three pages of posts that I'm tremendously glad I slept through.

 

Anyway, my talking points are slightly different. I don't think that Demos are the best ever. I also don't think that their highs are necessarily higher than other people's. To me, that was never the point of going through the matches, though I can see how it would be easy to get too close to the source material certainly especially after putting the work in.

 

The entire point of how great Demolition is is summed up in two words really, Consistency and Variation. I think I summed it all up 9 or 10 pages ago and I'm not sure why we're even still on the subject, since the people who disagree with me on this disagree about what makes wrestling good, which is fine but there's not going to be any convincing anyone of anything, as is pretty damn obvious at this point.

 

But what I found is that they weren't necessarily great over one or two matches, but when you watch the lot and see that they almost never do the wrong thing or never do anything for the sake of doing it or never ever fail to make the opponents work for what they're doing. When you see those trends over time, they really stand out. There are nights were Bret is lazy or where Arn falls to doing a few spots that don't make any sense because he likes to stooge too much or where Dynamite takes WAY too much offense because he thinks he deserves it or something. I'm not going to say that they're the best ever, but I've never seen a team better at staying focused and on task and on the story of the match and that I've never seen a team that changed things up, not necessarily when it came to moves, but when it came to the specific story of the match, even on a night to night basis. Does that make Demolition the best ever? No. Does it make them unique to me and am I impressed by it? Absolutely. And it's not something that you'll spot in watching four or five matches (though you can see how well they could adapt in different situations, sure). The whole is so much greater than the sum of its parts. It's like the reverse of watching too many Ric Flair matches. Am I going to ask you guys to watch all of the matches? No. I did it for you a couple of years ago, because only through examining a large body of work do the most important things come to the surface with this particular team. If you do, I think you'll come to be impressed in the same way I was. But it's okay if you don't. There's only so much time in the world. But that's what I feel and why I feel like I do.

 

I obviously can't talk for Vic. I was trying to raise their profile as workers because that stuff stood out so much to me and no one ever, ever talked about it.

 

Now, can we please move on to something else. Like comparing the two MX squads and the Heavenly Bodies or something.

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But what I found is that they weren't necessarily great over one or two matches, but when you watch the lot and see that they almost never do the wrong thing or never do anything for the sake of doing it or never ever fail to make the opponents work for what they're doing. When you see those trends over time, they really stand out. There are nights were Bret is lazy or where Arn falls to doing a few spots that don't make any sense because he likes to stooge too much or where Dynamite takes WAY too much offense because he thinks he deserves it or something. I'm not going to say that they're the best ever, but I've never seen a team better at staying focused and on task and on the story of the match and that I've never seen a team that changed things up, not necessarily when it came to moves, but when it came to the specific story of the match, even on a night to night basis. Does that make Demolition the best ever? No. Does it make them unique to me and am I impressed by it? Absolutely. And it's not something that you'll spot in watching four or five matches (though you can see how well they could adapt in different situations, sure). The whole is so much greater than the sum of its parts. It's like the reverse of watching too many Ric Flair matches. Am I going to ask you guys to watch all of the matches? No. I did it for you a couple of years ago, because only through examining a large body of work do the most important things come to the surface with this particular team. If you do, I think you'll come to be impressed in the same way I was. But it's okay if you don't. There's only so much time in the world. But that's what I feel and why I feel like I do.

And I think you made a fine point of explaining why you felt the way you did about the Demos, and if I ever got back to watch old WWF it'll certainly be something I'll have in mind.

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Wow, I go away for awhile and the board turns into complete chaos. There are quotes on here that just blow my mind.

 

 

"Now this is the great Demolition/Hart Foundation match. This a Evelventy Gajillion times better than the 90 match"

 

I agree with Vic on somethings and I know Matt D who posts here is a contarian on this as well when compared to the general wrestling fan but the Summerslam 88 match while being strong is not 1/5th of the match from Slam 90. Slam 88 is great but it does not do one thing in it better than Slam 90. I watched them back to back (on very little sleep) for Matt D on DVDVR and just like how I had remembered Slam 90 was way better at creating emotion, the drama was better, the timing was better, the highs and lows and build were better, the brilliant thinking was way better, the innovation was on a different level, the excitement was off the charts and the ending was absolutely epic. There is absolutely no comparison between the two matches. Slam 90 destroys Slam 88 and that's saying something because I like the Slam 88 match a very good deal.

 

 

Now for some other quick points that have been addressed in this thread

 

Demolition is indeed generally underrated. I always thought there offense was good to pretty good and more than got the job done. I always thought they were smart wrestlers and personally enjoyed a lot of their matches. Their gimmick itself was great, the interviews were full of energy, their ring entrance is among the best ever and their attire worked. I never really thought they were Road Warrior imitations when I grew up watching wrestling though.

 

Which brings me to the Road Warriors. Demoliton was cool but their aura just like everybody else's aura was not on the level of the Road Warriors. The Road Warriors were this mythical team that the magazines pumped up to no end. They were the team that was shown initially to me by VHS by an older friend telling me how incredible they were. I remember watching them on 2 0'clock in the morning destroying a couple of prelimary wrestlers I had never seen wrestlers get destroyed before. The spikes, the interviews, the presence and the offense. Man alive, the offense. I couldn't believe I was seeing these humongous guys do dropkicks, jumping fist drops, flying shoulder tackles and Doomsday devices off the top ropes. They didn't live bad assery. They were bad assery. I just watched these guys the other week over in Japan. Still incredible!!

One of my problems with the WWF/WWE is the atmosphere. It was never as gritty as the NWA/WCW or other leagues. It had more lights, less intimidating atmosphere, a bigger ring with softer looking ropes which I always say is bad for wrestling and other things which makes it feel less hardcore. Intense wrestlers are often at a disadvantage because of this. It can be overcome (Benoit the murderer did it especially after he adapted to the bigger ring) but it does hurt people. It hurt Vader's presence presence and it did hurt the Road Warriors as well. Their spikes turned way less intimidating at the time, they lost Ironman, they got a doll, the ring did hurt them some, etc but they were still bad assery enough to make themselves work in the WWF. That says something about them. Even the WWF thought they were so bad ass that they squashed Demolition when they came in. That is incredible when you think about it.

I highly reccomend one of the Road Warriors vs Orient Express matches which may be the best "competitive" squash I have ever seen. I voted it for on smarkschoice in the WWF poll but I can't remember the date of it. This was one of the best examples of the Road Warriors being the Road Warriors in the WWF. The Road Warriors also had some incredible matches with Orient Express at Maple Leaf Gardens but I don't know if anyone can see those anymore. I still remember the Orient Express taking spin bumps off of clotheslines on the outside of the ring. The Express were awesome.

 

Steiners ruled and while it's great to see accolades for them here they are being underrated. Their match construction is better than what is being said here but besides that their high end matches are incredible. They also have tremendous charisma with a presence and aura similar to the Road Warriors. Throuigh sheer will, electricity, the most devestating tag team moveset of all time, an excited Jim Ross and the manipulation of the fans' emotions they dominated everyone. You couldn't even buy anyone beating them in WCW. It was mentioned earlier I think by smkelly? correct me if I'm wrong, that the Steiners dominating everywhere was a sign that they were the best. Well, smkelly was right. The reason why the Steiners were able to obliberate WCW, manipulate the fans and win the WCW plus IWGP tiltes AT THE SAME TIME was simply because they really were the best tag team all factors considered. Who else could've done that in such convincing fashion? Nobody, Absolutely nobody and this was the symbol that they were the best. They did it because they got what wrestling was and were able to run with it. Someone might call some other X or Y team better but there is no way they could've done what the Steiners did. What the Steiners did to me was one of the more amazing accomplishments I have seen in wrestling.

 

PG 13 I haven't seen too much of because I wasn't watching the leagues they were wrestling in too much when they were in them unfortunately. I do like what I've seen of them.

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I watched 2 of the 5 recommended Demo matches from above...

 

Demolition vs. Twin Towers (6/3/89)

 

The Good:

- They stuck to the Face In Peril formula for most of the match but I don’t know if FIP is the type of match I want Demolition working. Dems are in a rough spot as they are built as these machines but going against two giants does not accentuate their strengths. Still, exhibit #1 in the WWF doing Southern tag formula.

- The Akeem butt smashes in the corner look devastating as did his big leg drop.

- The match didn’t last too long. I don’t want these guys in 20 minute matches so to have a decent ten minute match is fine with me.

 

The Bad:

- For a team that has been hyped as having state of the art offense, none of that was on display here. The early shine segment was entirely made up of clubbering and arm bars. Later on in the match, some of the Darsow offense was actively bad like the sloppy small package and the clothesline that took Bossman down for a double knockout spot. I look forward to other Demo matches where I can see these great offensive masterminds because it was not on display here.

- I love me some Ronnie Garvin but his interference early on was annoying and he just seemed out of place as a referee. Stopping Bossman from connecting with the punch only for Darsow to get one in seemed unnecessary. Demolition are machines. They don’t need referee help.

- When you get two big fat dudes, you want to see them squash bugs like they did in the super fun Rockers series. Akeem’s offense was fun (as mentioned above) but Bossman’s was very generic. I don’t blame Demos for this but when you have a man down do something besides wander around the ring for ten seconds.

 

Overall: Absolutely nothing special of a match. I am not angry I watched it and it was a nice way to kill ten minutes but nothing I see on the revamped 80s project and certainly nothing besides Akeem’s offense was as interesting as a number of PG-13 matches.

 

 

 

Demolition vs. Brainbusters (9/30/89)

The Good:

- Arn and Tully are awesome early on bumping big and putting themselves in situations where Demolition can counter. Tully and Arn bump big for mediocre Demo offense and I have seen them do this time and again in NWA matches. Those two are so great.

- The Axe clubbering works almost entirely due to how Arn and Tully sell the shots… Arn bouncing off the mat and Tully ramming his own head into the mat with each shot.

- The heat segment with Arn and Tully cheating and cutting off the ring works better here than in the Twin Towers match because those guys are masters of the style. The crowd really got into it once Arn & Tully took over as it should be. Like the Demo fans, I really liked the Tully chin lock spot as well.

- Hot ending with Tully and Arn bumping big for the Demo offense. Nothing state of the art but it worked well.

The Bad:

- Eadies clothesline sorta sucks and Darsow follows with his staple… the chinlock!!! Feel the power! Not feeling the high-end Demo offense at all although there was a super cool spot with the atomic drop-big boot combo. The rest of this match was entirely about what Arn & Tully were doing.

- Bad Arn kickout that gets the biggest pop of the match but it looked pretty fake.

- The screwy ending sucked but I understand why they did it.

- This match reinforces the idea that the WWF was a heel in peril company. Arn and Tully didn’t really take any kind of control until about 6 minutes left in the 15 minute match. I don’t have a problem with it because they are such great bumpers.

 

- Overall: Much better than the Twins Towers match and I could see this on a WWF 80s set. It would ultimately depend on how this match compares to other Brainbuster matches with other teams. Still, this was more of a showcase on what made the Brainbusters great and didn’t really feature the super high-end offensive power of the Demo’s that I was told existed.

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The heel in peril thing is fairly unique with the Brainbusters matches when it comes to the Demos and that has a lot to do with the structure of the story they were trying to tell. The first match was the Busters being unable to beat them and infuriating the Demos to force the DQ in order to save their lives.

 

The second match (which is what you saw) is a revenge-driven house show match which is basically about Demos destroying them but not getting the belts. I think if Demos were going over more cleanly, they'd tell a story where they were careless from the anger and the Busters capitalizing on that. But it's pretty much the match they should have worked for the crowd they were in front of during the midst of the story. Which is tricky.

 

The third is the two-three falls match and more balanced anyway.

 

But Brainbusters should have a harder time GETTING on top in the beginning of the match against Demos than the Twin Towers or Powers of Pain, just due to the size difference, no?

 

As for the "state of the art offense" talking point, it's not really my talking point at all, so I'm not going to argue it much. My talking points are above. I'm sorry you didn't like the Twin Towers match more. I think it shows how adaptable the Demos were (in that they not only played FIP but did so in a way that made you check one off in the Southern Tag Category) even if you didn't think it was a great match in itself. I think what's most interesting to me is watching all three Demos/Towers matches and watching how the match changes night to night but again, I can see why you wouldn't do that.

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A Heavenly Bodies 1992-95 compilation is being made by a member on CMax. I think they are one of the better teams that doesn't get quite enough attention. Their SMW run was awesome. Is there still a SMW set being made, which reminds me, what about the ECW set? I think if those two sets get released that this discussion will pick up again because of newly acquired footage/viewing.

 

And...sorry for breaking the forum rules earlier this morning.

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But Brainbusters should have a harder time GETTING on top in the beginning of the match against Demos than the Twin Towers or Powers of Pain, just due to the size difference, no?

Absolutely. What kind of shocks me, and I never saw it this way before, is that Arn & Tully aren't that much smaller than Eadie & Darsow. The point is that even though it was logical, it was still a match that reinforces the heel in peril ideal.

 

 

My talking points are above. I'm sorry you didn't like the Twin Towers match more. I think it shows how adaptable the Demos were (in that they not only played FIP but did so in a way that made you check one off in the Southern Tag Category) even if you didn't think it was a great match in itself. I think what's most interesting to me is watching all three Demos/Towers matches and watching how the match changes night to night but again, I can see why you wouldn't do that.

I didn't hate the match. It just wasn't anything blow away. I think my problem with the Towers match is I don't want to see vulnerability in Demolition. In the Busters match, it was only cheating and nefarious deeds with the rope that allowed the Busters to take advantage. With the Towers, the Demos were clearly outmatched strength wise.

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A Heavenly Bodies 1992-95 compilation is being made by a member on CMax. I think they are one of the better teams that doesn't get quite enough attention. Their SMW run was awesome. Is there still a SMW set being made, which reminds me, what about the ECW set? I think if those two sets get released that this discussion will pick up again because of newly acquired footage/viewing.

 

And...sorry for breaking the forum rules earlier this morning.

Both the SMW and ECW sets are being released this summer.

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A Heavenly Bodies 1992-95 compilation is being made by a member on CMax. I think they are one of the better teams that doesn't get quite enough attention. Their SMW run was awesome. Is there still a SMW set being made, which reminds me, what about the ECW set? I think if those two sets get released that this discussion will pick up again because of newly acquired footage/viewing.

 

And...sorry for breaking the forum rules earlier this morning.

Both the SMW and ECW sets are being released this summer.

 

I expect people will have very fond feelings for the RnR's and Bodies coming out of that set, but I think the Thugz and the Gangstas will be the real surprises on the SMW set. The Thugz were a really great short lived team and the Gangstas were MUCH better in the ring at that point than anyone would guess

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I didn't hate the match. It just wasn't anything blow away. I think my problem with the Towers match is I don't want to see vulnerability in Demolition. In the Busters match, it was only cheating and nefarious deeds with the rope that allowed the Busters to take advantage. With the Towers, the Demos were clearly outmatched strength wise.

On the one hand it's a complete and utter personal preference thing, so I can't really mount a counter argument. All I can do is respect the explanation.

 

On the other, the sheer subjective nature there makes me feel like we're judging an iron chef contest or something in examining the match. That's what it made me think of, so that sort of amused me.

 

The only answer I'll give is that they were very adaptable and did what the match called for, including, amazingly enough, begging off against the Hart Foundation at Summerslam 88, and it was tremendously striking when they did and put over the Harts as huge superstars.

 

It was what the match called for. Now then, Blackjack Lanza or Jay Strongbow or whoever put the on the card is the one that we're going to have stern talking to for your negative impression of it, lack of mindblowing offense aside. Or I guess maybe Rene Goulet, but I'd just feel sad yelling at him. For starters i remember him as the "Hey! Who the hell is that guy who always shows up!" guy who I'd ask my clueless dad about as a kid. And he's also REALLY withered right now.

 

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