Migs Posted April 23, 2014 Report Share Posted April 23, 2014 Just glad they're getting back on the train with the ECW timelines. It's a bit hard with those in terms of guests, though, because a lot of the ECW guys have done so many shoots. Raven would be the obvious 1996 guy, but how many stories does Raven have to tell that we haven't heard in prior shoots? Can TNA guys do shoots? The Dudleys would seem like a great choice for 1998 since they were so involved with the business end and haven't done too many shoots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sidebottom Posted April 24, 2014 Report Share Posted April 24, 2014 There are a few ECW timelines I'd like to buy that would seem feasible. Spike Dudley 1998, Impact Players 1999/2000, Tommy Dreamer 1995 would go down a treat with me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El-P Posted April 24, 2014 Report Share Posted April 24, 2014 ECW Timeline I would prefer for the remaining years, considering who's available : 1993 - Todd Gordon 1996 - Raven 1998 - Tommy Dreamer 1999 - Steve Corino Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Chief Posted April 24, 2014 Report Share Posted April 24, 2014 Has Todd Gordon ever made any media appearances after ECW? I don't think I've ever seen him on the convention scene, Indy scene, shoots, etc. He's definitely a guy I would be interested in hearing from. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeCampbell Posted April 24, 2014 Report Share Posted April 24, 2014 He briefly talked about the early days of ECW on Forever Hardcore. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sidebottom Posted April 24, 2014 Report Share Posted April 24, 2014 He was on Barbed Wire City as well and has done various other shoot DVD appearances. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Migs Posted April 25, 2014 Report Share Posted April 25, 2014 He did a shoot with Sandman, Scorpio and Fonzie that was quite entertaining. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeCampbell Posted April 25, 2014 Report Share Posted April 25, 2014 KC could probably lump 1992 and 93 together with Gordon, since I highly doubt there's much to talk about with 1992. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Petey Posted April 25, 2014 Report Share Posted April 25, 2014 The problem with Raven doing a Timeline is that his memory is admittedly terrible, especially for that time period. I started watching his Guest Booker where Hall and Nash went to ECW instead of WCW and Raven basically said he didn't remember much of 1996 at all. I love Raven shoot interviews but I'm not sure how good a Timeline would be with him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El-P Posted April 25, 2014 Report Share Posted April 25, 2014 Couldn't be worse than Sandman's from 1995, really. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyonthewall2983 Posted May 9, 2014 Report Share Posted May 9, 2014 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Petey Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 I watched the Vince Russo Guest Booker for re-booking the Invasion and found it both more realistic and more entertaining (on paper) than Cornette's version of the same topic. Granted, Russo's was more abstract and off the cuff (unsurprising when you factor in his booking style), but seemed like it would have made for quality TV. I was shocked. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SomethingSavage Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 I thought the same thing, regarding Russo's take on the whole Invasion. Sure. It would've cost A LOT more to bring those guys in, but it was laid out logically & totally made more sense than anything they tried doing - both with the Invasion and the nWo itself. Particularly liked the way he talked about re-introducing each individual, one at a time, piece by piece, just as they entered into WCW. Again, it's all circumstantial stuff that sounds GREAT on paper. But yeah. Made way more sense than just about ANYTHING you'd expect to hear from Russo. He's not a guy you'd expect to take the slow-burn approach to ANY angle, but here? He absolutely made it work that way.Rails kind of fall off a bit towards the end, where he starts talking up the potential swerves, twists, and turns to come down the road. But part of me believes he was just slapping that stuff on to play into his critics & detractors anyway. The actual angle itself contained a lot of genuine, neat moments & encounters that would've honestly had me glued to my TV. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Petey Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 Exactly. I was totally surprised at how much he kept emphasizing logic and the whole slow-burn and not wanting to give too much away too early. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SomethingSavage Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 Yeah. Looking at Russo through THOSE lenses, for at least a split second in time, one could make a valid case that he's completely capable of writing episodic television. It's harder to doubt that he had a hand now in keeping things fresh, interesting, and lingering on edge with those classic "cliffhanger" style endings that we saw a lot of in the early months of the Attitude Era. He seems to have a knack for THAT, despite the fact that I'm still not convinced he knows a lot about actual pro wrestling. More specifically, I think he's just a fan that was drawn in by interviews, talkers, and larger than life characters. Hell, he basically blatantly admits that himself. Nothing wrong with that necessarily. But I just don't buy him as a guy that ever really GRASPED the concepts and key elements of what - deep down at its core - really make pro wrestling work. It's a house that's very much built by & held together with emotion. Drama. Suspense. And, while Russo CAN capture and contain these things at times, he doesn't actively AIM for them. Too often - and this is where Russo fails for me - he seems to go for the shock, awe, and controversy. If any of that just so happens to strike a nerve or resonate on an emotional level with the fans, then it's a successful formula. In reality, it should work in reverse. You need to reach for that emotional connection. The fans need to feel invested FIRST. That way, the shock & awe of your swerves have meaning and pack actual FEELING within them. And essentially he latches onto those things here. With his rebooking of the Invasion angle, he plays on the emotional attachment that fans have with built-in childhood heroes like Hogan. He plays on the nostalgia, but he also gives great callbacks to all the rich history that Nash, Hall, and Hulk had in the WWF/E. He brings things to light - like the former faults & sins of the Mr. McMahon character - keeping him both ruthless AND yet still showing him buckle a bit to his own vulnerability when faced with the game-changer of the immortal Hollywood Hulk Hogan himself. Like I said before, it's those key encounters that make for big, epic moments that gives strength and plausibility to Russo's experiment over most others I've read or heard. ALSO don't let it go without saying how he kept true to ALL the various personalities. He didn't have anyone behave strangely (again, up until all the swerve talk stirred up at the end). He never strayed away from the true nature of each character in the scenes he described. Kudos to him for creating such a fun scenario with it all. Didn't think he had it in him. And look there, ma. No filter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El-P Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 Russo's idea for rebooking the Invasion could seem "logic" up until that point : Sean asks "But are they heels or faces ?". Russo answers "It doesn't matter". There you go. Russo doesn't understand shit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JaymeFuture Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 I thought that Guest Booker was Russo in an absolute nutshell - came up with an interesting idea, but if you watch it, he doesn't actually book anything of substance at all. He doesn't get from point to point, he doesn't have an ending, and he keeps talking about the same buzzwords ("logic"..."reality"...), and then blatantly violates them with his following comments. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 I really don't think the face/heel alignment did matter as much during an invasion. People would likely cheer guys like Flair and Goldberg, and boo guys like Bischoff. But they would be on the same side. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El-P Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 I really don't think the face/heel alignment did matter as much during an invasion. People would likely cheer guys like Flair and Goldberg, and boo guys like Bischoff. But they would be on the same side. Of course it matters. You have to establish a clear cut line. Otherwise it becomes a clusterfuck. If Flair comes on a WWF shows and bashes the entire roster and talks shit about babyface Austin, babyface Rock and babyface Taker, he won't get cheered. Now, having the WCW guys get babyface reactions by running southern cities like they were running Canada during the Bret heel stint, that's another thing. Russo is a complete dumbass anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 So Goldberg should be a heel just because he's representing WCW? And Flair would be more effective as a heel than a babyface? I don't buy that. Not to mention undercard guys like Rey and Kidman, or Sting. There's no reason to do a one-sized-fits-all approach to something like this. Not everyone in WCW had to be a heel. It just needed to be clearly defined within each individual feud who was babyface and who was heel. I really think by this point, the bigger issue was that they needed big personalities with motivations that made sense. Fans could decide who they wanted to cheer or boo. That's not shades of gray as much as it treating the biggest angle in wrestling history with the special consideration it deserves. It would be the one time they could turn a lot of old hat wrestling conventions on their head and it would be the best path and make sense. Ideally, if you want WCW fans to be invested and stick around, you want to give both fanbases permission to cheer their home teams. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El-P Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 It just needed to be clearly defined within each individual feud who was babyface and who was heel. Hum : Sean asks "But are they heels or faces ?". Russo answers "It doesn't matter". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dooley Posted May 14, 2014 Report Share Posted May 14, 2014 It just needed to be clearly defined within each individual feud who was babyface and who was heel. Hum : Sean asks "But are they heels or faces ?". Russo answers "It doesn't matter". I think with something as large as WWF vs WCW, if it's done right you don't need to harp so much on face/heel dynamics. This is the Super Bowl of wrestling, and just like the Super Bowl people will go with the side they like best. The fans would be telling them in each instance who the face/heel were and the promotion could act accordingly or go with the dreaded (around here anyway) "shades of grey" approach. Goldberg vs Austin happens and the fans that like Goldberg better go with Goldberg and Austin's fans with Austin. You don't need to hammer people over the head with face/heel dynamics in every instance. Bischoff would never get a babyface reaction because he's a smarmy prick. That's ok too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeCampbell Posted May 15, 2014 Report Share Posted May 15, 2014 I felt like Russo's Guest Booker had a strong start, with the Hall, Nash, and Hogan angles, which leads to them reforming the nWo, but then, eventually leveled itself off. Much like Russo's real booking tenures. I'd put Russo's invasion ahead of Cornette's. But overall, I'd put Cornette's GB interview over Russo's. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JaymeFuture Posted May 15, 2014 Report Share Posted May 15, 2014 Thing is, the nWo was so played out, at that time people would have HATED if the big WCW Invasion they'd been waiting for for years started by being about the fucking nWo. Not that what they did was any better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kjh Posted May 15, 2014 Report Share Posted May 15, 2014 You say that, but No Way Out 2002 for the nWo's WWE debut drew a strong buy rate and a huge rating on Raw the next night, although the angle didn't have great legs admittedly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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