Guest Andrews Posted April 3, 2013 Report Share Posted April 3, 2013 As the Marxists always say: follow the money. WWF has always been on Sky, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch owns The Sun. The Sun give WWF coverage. I also believe WWF programming was on the terrestrial television before being shown on Sky Movies... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnny Guitar Posted April 4, 2013 Report Share Posted April 4, 2013 As the Marxists always say: follow the money. WWF has always been on Sky, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch owns The Sun. The Sun give WWF coverage. I also believe WWF programming was on the terrestrial television before being shown on Sky Movies... It was. JN lister can give you the full breakdown, but WWF was on terrestrial tv by 1987. Regardless of who the actual GOAT is. It's more or less the same 5 names. Shawn, Bret, Savage, Austin & Taker. That get bandied about. Which is great and all, but as we approach 29 it seems sad that nobody who's made their bones in the last decade is really in contention. Rock, Jericho and Edge are probably the freshest names and they're not exactly spring chickens. How doe's Cena match up? He's probably the closest. Sorry, I forget who said it in the yearbooks, but that you could trace Savage's development over the years through WM. Shawn, Bret and Taker too, probably. As they rised up through the ranks. Apart from Cena is their anyone else to do that with. People seem to yo yo up and down the card. Not to rag on Hunter, but it feels like he should have a better WM résumé. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ButchReedMark Posted April 4, 2013 Report Share Posted April 4, 2013 (What I assume to be) WWF was on Sky as early as 1984. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomk Posted April 4, 2013 Report Share Posted April 4, 2013 [Regardless of who the actual GOAT is. It's more or less the same 5 names. Shawn, Bret, Savage, Austin & Taker. That get bandied about. Which is great and all, but as we approach 29 it seems sad that nobody who's made their bones in the last decade is really in contention. Who else has been given the opportunity? It's Mania, they can only squeeze so many wrestlers and so many matches on a show. Undertaker match plus Taker video package eats up time. HHH is a guy who will go long and have video packages eating up time, then you have Michaels showing back up and eating another large chunk of time. There's not a ton of time left. Big Show's been in the WWE since 99, I can't think of more than four Big Show mania matches that broke the 6/7 minute mark. I like those four matches, but the majority of his stuff is under 7 minutes and going to be forgettable. Oddly, I'd say the guy who never had a forgettable Mania is Batista (consistently got time and was never stuck in a multiperson clusterfuck). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yo-Yo's Roomie Posted April 4, 2013 Report Share Posted April 4, 2013 Batista Vs Umaga was pretty forgettable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryvonKramer Posted April 4, 2013 Report Share Posted April 4, 2013 What terrestrial channel was WWF ever on? This is total news to me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ButchReedMark Posted April 4, 2013 Report Share Posted April 4, 2013 ITV. On Saturday afternoons networked, and also early hours of the morning on several regions for quite a while until they started showing WCW tapes instead but still called it Superstars of Wrestling in TV listings for some reason. I don't think it was ever superstars they shown over here anyway though in the late night slots, but Wrestling Challenge. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-n83iG6F1Q Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryvonKramer Posted April 4, 2013 Report Share Posted April 4, 2013 When was that and what did they show? I remember WCW on ITV but thought WWF had only ever aired on Sky. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ButchReedMark Posted April 4, 2013 Report Share Posted April 4, 2013 The Saturday afternoon slot went from being just Joint Promotions to being shared between Joint/All Star and WWF in (I'm guessing here, I'm sure Lister can correct me) maybe 1987. The link above has an example of a card. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomk Posted April 4, 2013 Report Share Posted April 4, 2013 Batista Vs Umaga was pretty forgettable. eh... Mania 20 Batista/Flair/Orton v Rock/Foley Mania 21 HHH v Batista Mania 23 Undertaker v Batista Mania 24 Umaga v Batista Mania 25 Cena v Batista That's pretty much all wheat no chaff. None of these do a ton for me, but everyone other than 24 is something that I've seen people argue as candidate for the MOTN. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryvonKramer Posted April 5, 2013 Report Share Posted April 5, 2013 ITV. On Saturday afternoons networked, and also early hours of the morning on several regions for quite a while until they started showing WCW tapes instead but still called it Superstars of Wrestling in TV listings for some reason. I don't think it was ever superstars they shown over here anyway though in the late night slots, but Wrestling Challenge. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-n83iG6F1Q Holy shit, that's just absolutely surreal. I love the way it's presented as just "wrestling" regardless of the promotion. I'm guessing at some stage TBS must have bought that ITV slot. I don't want to derail this thread too much with this random talk of British TV schedules. Do you remember when they started showing Heat on Channel 4 though? Think Channel 4 even showed a couple of PPVs free-to-air. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ButchReedMark Posted April 5, 2013 Report Share Posted April 5, 2013 ITV. On Saturday afternoons networked, and also early hours of the morning on several regions for quite a while until they started showing WCW tapes instead but still called it Superstars of Wrestling in TV listings for some reason. I don't think it was ever superstars they shown over here anyway though in the late night slots, but Wrestling Challenge. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-n83iG6F1Q Holy shit, that's just absolutely surreal. I love the way it's presented as just "wrestling" regardless of the promotion. I'm guessing at some stage TBS must have bought that ITV slot. I don't want to derail this thread too much with this random talk of British TV schedules. Do you remember when they started showing Heat on Channel 4 though? Think Channel 4 even showed a couple of PPVs free-to-air. I really, really doubt TBS paid for ITV to show hacked to bits WCW Pro and Worldwide tapes after American Gladiators under the name of Superstars of Wrestling (although that is a very WCW style fuck up) at sparrows fart on a Tuesday morning in varying regions. Simon Garfield says in The Wrestling that TV paid for the tapes. I believe Sky was paying £500 or something a WWF tape according to the book. It was cheap tapes to fill time at about 3am on the fledgling 24 hour service, just like Prisoner: Cell Block H or America's Top Ten with Casey Casem. Almost Everyone in the UK was showing wrestling at that time, as it was just super cheap to buy tapes in. Even a satellite station aimed at women like Lifestyle was showing WCCW tapes from the David Von Erich days in 1990 or so. I could swear Reslo very very rarely showed some WCW, Germany and Japan on it when I was a babe in arms as well, although that's probably just be several Welsh child memories melding into one. Yeah, Channel 4 showed 8 PPVs, including InVasion as it happened. But Channel 4 already decided they were cancelling WWF 3 weeks into the contract when they showed Royal Rumble 2000 live and Mae Young got those prosthetic tits out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryvonKramer Posted April 5, 2013 Report Share Posted April 5, 2013 I used to watch Prisoner! It was on the same night as WCW. This would explain the random leaps in timeline though. They paid for one bunch of tapes, then got another lot from months later. I've said it before but going from Dangerous Alliance to Flair for the Gold in a couple of weeks was a bit jarring. Are you in Wales, Butch? I was watching on HTV and the scheduling jumped all over the place. 2am one week, 4am the next week, randomly not on the next, 1am after that. It was pretty obvious no one really gave a shit what they were showing in those time slots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ButchReedMark Posted April 5, 2013 Report Share Posted April 5, 2013 Yeah, I'm in Llangollen up by Wrexham, so I got HTV, Granada and Central making keeping up on the tapes my dad would record for me even harder to keep up with. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yo-Yo's Roomie Posted April 5, 2013 Report Share Posted April 5, 2013 Batista Vs Umaga was pretty forgettable. eh... Mania 20 Batista/Flair/Orton v Rock/Foley Mania 21 HHH v Batista Mania 23 Undertaker v Batista Mania 24 Umaga v Batista Mania 25 Cena v Batista That's pretty much all wheat no chaff. None of these do a ton for me, but everyone other than 24 is something that I've seen people argue as candidate for the MOTN. At 24 he was the odd man out, so they threw together a quick Raw Vs Smackdown angle to give the match a bit of purpose. I think it was basically filler. Did the feud even extend beyond that one match? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodhelmet Posted April 5, 2013 Report Share Posted April 5, 2013 FOr the record, I rewatched Batista vs. Umaga about a year ago and really enjoyed it. Much better than I was expecting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WingedEagle Posted April 5, 2013 Report Share Posted April 5, 2013 Nice, definitely one I should check out again. Strikes me as one of those matches that wasn't so incredible the first time around so you sort of trash it in your mind, then go back and see these two beasts throwing some bombs and it beyond exceeds your expectations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anarchistxx Posted April 5, 2013 Report Share Posted April 5, 2013 What terrestrial channel was WWF ever on? This is total news to me. WWF was partly terrestrial in the UK from 1999-2002. Channel 4 would show Heat every Sunday night, and also four PPVs a year. Royal Rumble, Backlash, Fully Loaded and Armageddon used to air completely free without the need of even cable, hard as it is to picture now. I recall a ton of parents complaining about the content suring the boom, especially Royal Rumble 2000 withy Mae Young's tits, Cactus v HHH and women getting chucked through tables. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chess Knight Posted April 5, 2013 Report Share Posted April 5, 2013 Who else has been given the opportunity? It's Mania, they can only squeeze so many wrestlers and so many matches on a show. Undertaker match plus Taker video package eats up time. HHH is a guy who will go long and have video packages eating up time, then you have Michaels showing back up and eating another large chunk of time. There's not a ton of time left. Big Show's been in the WWE since 99, I can't think of more than four Big Show mania matches that broke the 6/7 minute mark. I like those four matches, but the majority of his stuff is under 7 minutes and going to be forgettable. Rey's been really handicapped by that as well. His injuries don't help, but he's rarely had ten minutes each year at Mania. The Eddie match from 05 and Rhodes match from 11 are his only Mania matches where he got over ten minutes. Though even then he's pulled out awesome short matches with Hardy and Punk. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Boon Posted April 7, 2013 Report Share Posted April 7, 2013 Wrestlemania 3 aired on Channel 4 I believe.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryvonKramer Posted April 7, 2013 Report Share Posted April 7, 2013 Wrestlemania 3 aired on Channel 4 I believe.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ohtani's jacket Posted April 7, 2013 Report Share Posted April 7, 2013 Screensport showed NWA, AWA, Stampede, ICW, GWA, South West Championship Wrestling and WCCW. The Lifestyle channel showed a bunch of wrestling too -- Glow, PoWW, Global (Florida), and Pro Wrestling This Week. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
anarchistxx Posted April 7, 2013 Report Share Posted April 7, 2013 When Channel 5 first launched it showed the dying days of Nitro as well. I remember flicking over one night as a ten year old and being surprised to see wrestling on, as until that point I'd assumed only the WWF existed. Needless to say, it didn't impress me much and the next I heard about WCW was the Invasion angle. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ButchReedMark Posted April 7, 2013 Report Share Posted April 7, 2013 Wrestlemania 3 aired on Channel 4 I believe.... First I've heard. In fact I'm very sceptical of that. When Channel 5 first launched it showed the dying days of Nitro as well. I remember flicking over one night as a ten year old and being surprised to see wrestling on, as until that point I'd assumed only the WWF existed. Needless to say, it didn't impress me much and the next I heard about WCW was the Invasion angle. It was WCW Worldwide, not Nitro. And it was from August or so of 1999. And it was terrible. They'd pretend it was live, even though it was just highlights of Nitro and Thunder and so pretend this through the commentary. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryvonKramer Posted April 7, 2013 Report Share Posted April 7, 2013 Butch - the localised commentary for those shows was pretty funny though. Think it was Scott Hudson and Larry Z. I love it when guys are doing commentary for things completely off the radar. It's like those random Monsoon C-shows in the mid-90s or Mooney and Hayes on the Colesium Home Videos. I am also sceptical that Mania 3 showed on Channel 4. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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