WWE Fast Lane... Live as it happens

[shoe]

I even liked the Reigns/Bryan match more on second viewing. It was even more smartly worked than I realized on 1st viewing. They really got the crowd into it.

[funkdoc]

 

Actually, I think I am the only person hyping it as such. Pretty much everyone else seems to think it was very good to great, but I have yet to hear anyone else call it a MOTYC (Will & Johnny liked it a lot, Pete thought it was good and Dylan seemed to like it well enough, but I don't think he thinks it is a MOTYC). It is just I have been very persistent in talking about because I think it is a very interesting match and I like hearing other people's opinions on it. It is nice to know if I post something enough I become the personification of PWO. Being The First Ever Winner of The First Ever Pro Wrestling Trivia Internet Podcast, Brainbuster has brought me unforeseen power and respect! Now if it had only brought me unforeseen pussy...

 

LOL. Well, in addition to your post, I was talking about PWO threads in general when it comes to Rusev. After Rusev/Sheamus, people here were calling that a MOTY contender. I was like "really?!" Fun match, yeah, but come on now.

 

 

to get a bit more general than what dylan just said, i think it's perfectly reasonable to view rusev as a top worker in WWE. i don't care if someone doesn't have a lot of moves as long as their moves actually look like they hurt, and he's one of the best for that. his timing and long-term selling also stand out, and he's great if you're big on a wrestler's actions in the ring fitting their character. and his look & general presence/charisma are fantastic for what he does. he's just much more clearly defined and believable as a pro wrestler than dolph ziggler or any number of other guys on the roster.

 

that said, i could see his 80s throwback gimmick taking someone out of his matches, similar to why sheamus never got more credit than he did as a worker...

[The Man in Blak]

Cena/Rusev didn't do anything for me, but I should probably start dishing out some disclaimers. I don't like Rusev's gimmick at all and, by and large, I haven't been as impressed with his work as everybody else here, though he has improved since he was called up. I thought the Swagger matches, in particular, made him look like a cartoon with his goofy over-the-top selling of the ankle (but not so much selling that he still couldn't do that stomp before the Accolade!).

 

Rusev/Sheamus was a very good match, though. (Not MOTYC good for me, but very good nonetheless.) And Rusev/Ryback was solid for a TV match, though I think Ryback did a lot of the heavy lifting there.

 

A lot of my problems with Cena/Rusev are probably more attributable to Cena than Rusev, though. In the Greatest Wrestler Ever nomination thread for Steve Austin, someone pointed out that Austin's "clumsiness" (for lack of a better descriptor) actually enhanced both his selling and the grittiness of his matches by making them feel more haphazard and chaotic; John Cena is the total opposite for me. Everything feels anticipated and mechanical, from the spot calling to the way that he runs the ropes. It makes a lot of his ground-level work in a match feel "performed" in the worst possible way for me, even if the surrounding structure of the match is telling a good story.

 

Cena seems to work around this by giving away a fair amount of his matches and, in this case, Rusev did a decent enough job with the space he was given. But the narrative of John Cena's Will To Win Against An Overpowering Monster really isn't a new one and it's especially hollow when you still have his matches against Lesnar still in the rear-view mirror. Even with Rusev winning and Cena managing to deliver some nice offense -- the tornado DDT and the counter into the crossface were highlights -- the match still couldn't shake the tired narrative or Cena's awkwardness for me as a viewer.

 

In a way, I guess I could say that I thought Rusev/Cena was one of Rusev's better worked matches (though still not as good as the US Title win), but the ultimate end result of the match itself was underwhelming. And I blame the booking and (in a recurring theme) the agent/producer more than Rusev for that.

[funkdoc]

blowing off selling to do your video-game taunt is just part & parcel of the modern WWE style. i tend to just assume stuff like that & the finisher spam is forced on the wrestlers.

 

i do agree with the critics re: cena's facial expressions, and can't understand why people here like his selling. i swear whenever he's working from underneath he makes me think of

[Matt D]

My biggest problem with the Cena match was how he was anticipating bumps more than usual. I don't know if he's just not used to working with Rusev or what. I didn't notice that in the tag team fancam.

[GOTNW]

 

If you think pro wrestling isn't a great storytelling medium, then your world view of pro wrestling is going to be extremely far off what a lot of people here are looking for in a match. I know I don't view wrestling as a collection of moves and execution of those moves like you seem to.

Wrestling isn't "a collection of moves and their execution". Offence is just one of the components that affect match quality. When I engage in detailed reviewing of pro-wrestling I want to analytically break down what I liked/disliked about it, and I'm far more inclined to write about a match's layout, how much struggle there was, how were the transitions etc. than to concentrate on MOVES. Honestly analyzing pro-wrestling matches as stories just sounds ludicrous to me. They're not literally pieces, it strikes me as worthless meta-analysis.

If wrestling couldn't tell great stories, why would you watch it?

Because at age 11, when I stumbled upon an episode of Smackdown and saw two guys fighting each other I was immediately attracted to it because I liked action movies and MMA/kickboxing? I wasn't a self-conscious dick that needed to justify his viewing choices. I can't even imagine how my thinking process would look like if I were to think like that. "Well I guess if they can't produce something on the level of Macbeth I won't waste my time with this nonsense". Pro wrestling is fucking amazing for what it is. Its controlled nature allows the workers to artificially create amazing action that real life can't AND it allows them to make that action mean as much as it possibly can by using all of their other, equally (if not more) important tools. Just think of how many advantages say, selling gives the workers in creating a dramatic spectacle.

 

 

I believe Superstar Sleeze's post(s) deserve a proper, seperate reply which I shall type out later.

[goc]

With my current interest in WWE at kind of an all time low, I watched this (well just the last two matches although I will go back and watch Goldust vs. Stardust because it's actually the only storyline that I care about) without any real emotional attachment other than liking all 4 guys. I thought Rusev vs. Cena was really good, not great and the matches problems were really kind of on Cena's end as his timing was off on taking some of Rusev's stuff.

 

Roman Reigns vs. Daniel Bryan was one of the better WWE main events in recent memory. I think these guys have a lot of chemistry working together and I'm sure we'll see more of them together once Reigns wins the title. I don't really have a problem with WWE pushing Reigns over Bryan and so I have to give them a lot of credit in going all in and making Reigns look like a star at the end of the night.