Wrestlemania 35 - Voluntary Colonization

[KawadaSmile]

I just realized I won't be able to watch the show live and I am fucking livid right now.

So, here's what we've got:

• Drew McIntyre vs Roman Reigns
• Samoa Joe vs Rey Mysterio
• Boss 'n Hug/Samoan Slaughterhouse/Divas of Doom/IIconics
• Seth Rollins vs Brock Lesnar
• Becky Lynch vs Charlotte Flair vs Ronda Rousey
• Big Dick Batista vs Triple H
• AJ Styles vs Randy Orton
• Kurt Angle vs Baron Corbin
• Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal
• Buddy Murphy vs Cedric Alexander/Tony Nese
• The Miz vs Shane McMahon

To Be Announced:

• Intercontinental Title Match
• RAW Tag Team Title Match
• SD Tag Team Title Match 
• SD Women's Title Match
• WWE Title Match

 

Stacked as fuck. Gonna hide from social media until I can watch it all

[Jmare007]

Card looks fun but there's no way I'm watching 5 hours, let alone 7 or more. If Kofi vs Bryan is early I'll check it out from there but if not, I'll probably join in when there's 3 hours left or something.

[SirEdger]

Technically, about the Women's tag title matches, aren't the IIconics pretty much the only challengers of the bunch that have a legit argument about being worthy of a title match given they've just beaten the champs tonight?

[El-P]

Samoa Joe vs Rey Mysterio and the Triple threat main event should be really good.

But yeah, staying awake all night long and suffer through shit like Miz vs Shane, Angle vs Corbin and 50 years old Trip Epic of the Year just doesn't sound very appealing to me.

[Stiva]

You have to assume HHH is putting himself bang in the middle of the card, right before the crowd tire out to ensure the biggest crowd response. There's no way the main event gets a ton of heat since these shows are so long. And with 16 matches, marching the HOFers out and all the miscellaneous nonsense around the sides, this one is going to be the supershow to end all supershows.

[DMJ]

For sure. It makes me think back to a show like WrestleMania XIV where you had this incredibly popular star on top (Austin), a big attraction with Tyson, and a co-main with Taker/Kane, but not really that much else on the card. Imagine that show going an extra 3 hours with an extra hour-long pre-show. Would that crowd have cared at all about Austin's coronation? Obviously, Austin in 98' was a much hotter act than Becky, Ronda, or Kofi or whoever...but that's what makes it even more ridiculous and, in a way, detrimental to the star power of the show's headliners.

If there is some question as to whether, in 98', with Steve friggin' Austin winning his first World Title in a main event featuring "Iron" Mike Tyson, the audience might've been burnt out then there is NO WAY POSSIBLE that the audience is going to give a shit about Becky Lynch. 

I'd love to see WrestleMania crowds start treating these shows like big fights in Vegas, where the place is relatively empty until the last hour or so. Maybe it would inspire them to cut the shows back to 4 hours (which is probably still at least 30 minutes too long, but whatever). 

[C.S.]

14 hours ago, KawadaSmile said:

I just realized I won't be able to watch the show live and I am fucking livid right now.

I understand your anger, but you are going to enjoy the show a hell of a lot more being able to pick and choose what to watch and what to skip.

[Robert S]

4 hours ago, El-P said:

But yeah, staying awake all night long and suffer through shit like Miz vs Shane, Angle vs Corbin and 50 years old Trip Epic of the Year just doesn't sound very appealing to me.

I will also take a pass on watching it live this year after powering through and staying up till 6:30 AM last year. A 7+ hour wrestling card (or rather this 7+ hour wrestling) card is just not worth taking a vacation day.

[sek69]

At some point WWE has to decide if it's worth being able to brag that eleventy million hours were viewed on the Network if it comes at the expense of turning your marquee event into a crowd destroying death slog every year.

[KawadaSmile]

I think we are being pessimistic here, guys.

Not only it takes a while for the whole crowd to get in, as we saw in previous Wrestlemanias, there are matches clearly designed to be breathers, with Angle/Corbin being the most obvious example. Plus, we've got Alexa segments and a guaranteed Elias show, that surely won't be in any way interrupted.

I get that long events can be really tiresome (and I'm missing the show because I'm going to a festival over the entire weekend, Lord have mercy), but it seems to me that they've wisened up. They got a stacked card and it looks like they are trying to make things work in "sessions", with breathing space in between the big matches. 

And, given how they've got 3 matches they can call Main Event, people can tune in for the matches they like the most and leave early, or get in late etc. They aren't forced to sit through the entire thing.

[C.S.]

Wouldn't it be hilarious if Brock Lesnar vs. Seth Rollins or even Triple H vs. Batista ended up closing the show? 

[El-P]

No chance in hell Trip vs Batista isn't closing the first half. No, what would be really hilarious would be Trip vs Batista as the opener. "Hey, good luck later on..."

[sek69]

I don't think it's being pessimistic considering the last two Wrestlemanias were way too long, and this year's show looks to be even bigger.  If you have to break your show into sessions to keep the crowd from passing out, your show is too goddamned long.  No one's "forced" to watch it all of course, 

It used to be a bucket list goal of mine to attend a Mania at some point, but I couldn't possibly imagine paying even StubHub prices to attend a 7+ hour stadium show. 

[KawadaSmile]

33 minutes ago, El-P said:

No chance in hell Trip vs Batista isn't closing the first half. No, what would be really hilarious would be Trip vs Batista as the opener. "Hey, good luck later on..."

Well he kinda did this dick move at the GRR. It payed off for him and Cena because the crowd reaction was grand.

30 minutes ago, sek69 said:

It used to be a bucket list goal of mine to attend a Mania at some point, but I couldn't possibly imagine paying even StubHub prices to attend a 7+ hour stadium show. 

Think about the other end of this issue: Wrestlemania XI sucked dirty ass and was around 2 hours. Which would you have between those two options?

[sek69]

Wrestlemanias can be 3 hours, hell even 4 can be okay if done right. Wrestle Kingdom was like 4-5 hours and it breezed by because it was properly paced. WWE rubs salt in the wound by having skits and commercial type breaks like it was a Very Special Episode of Raw and not a major PPV show.  There's no reason for any show to be over 6 hours, at that point you're just abusing the audience that paid to see you at that point.  

It's as if moving to the Network has made them lazy in terms of blocking out segments for PPVs and there's a general feeling of "fuck it, we can go as long as we want now" that they aren't locked in to the traditional 2 hour 45 minute PPV window.

[NintendoLogic]

The match I'm looking forward to the most is Lesnar vs. Rollins. I have no love for Seth, but it's pretty much impossible for Brock to have a bad match with a smaller guy who's willing to bump big. Joe vs. Rey would have been off the chain in 2005, but Joe hasn't been that level of worker in eons. And from what I've seen of Rey since returning to WWE, he's basically a PWG wrestler now. Plus, Rey always gets a raw deal when it comes to match time. He's only had two Mania singles matches go longer than 10 minutes.

[Afro Steel]

1 hour ago, sek69 said:

There's no reason for any show to be over 6 hours, at that point you're just abusing the audience that paid to see you at that point.  

But enough about some wrestling podcasts...

[Jmare007]

18 hours ago, KawadaSmile said:

 

Think about the other end of this issue: Wrestlemania XI sucked dirty ass and was around 2 hours. Which would you have between those two options?

Huh? Why are those two the options? I would rather have neither as none of them are good.

A very long show sucks and it tires the crowd almost no matter what (it happens to DDT all the time for their Peter Pan shows), it's gotta be very well paced to avoid it and nowadays it seems New Japan is the only company that can pull that off. There's no evidence whatsoever that WWE can book and pace an event as long as this Wrestlemania to be not be pessimistic about it. I you still wanna have faith, go for it man, I really hope you end up being right as matches like Becky/Ronda/Charlotte and Kofi/Bryan having a hot crowd would be awesome.

[KawadaSmile]

10 minutes ago, Jmare007 said:

Huh? Why are those two the options? I would rather have neither as none of them are good.

It wasn't that serious, more of a jest. Or just a lazy post. 

 

But now that you mentioned pace, from their more recent track record at booking RAW (which is 3 hours long) and PPVs that go nearly 4 hours, they've been doing a quite good job. Your mileage may vary, of course, but most of the shows this year felt like easy watches, specially compared to some slogs of 2018 and 2017. 

Based on this card, the only worry is what Batista/HHH are going to do. It's a No Holds Barred, but it still does have Trips in it, and most of his recent shit have been complete mood killers, no matter what pairing he's in - killed the crowd against Seth, killed the crowd against old dog Taker, killed the crowd against Roman for 75% of the match. The only moments where the crowd came alive to his previous big matches was when there was some sort of fuckery going on, which might save this bout.

[Blehschmidt]

1 hour ago, KawadaSmile said:

It wasn't that serious, more of a jest. Or just a lazy post. 

 

But now that you mentioned pace, from their more recent track record at booking RAW (which is 3 hours long) and PPVs that go nearly 4 hours, they've been doing a quite good job. Your mileage may vary, of course, but most of the shows this year felt like easy watches, specially compared to some slogs of 2018 and 2017. 

Based on this card, the only worry is what Batista/HHH are going to do. It's a No Holds Barred, but it still does have Trips in it, and most of his recent shit have been complete mood killers, no matter what pairing he's in - killed the crowd against Seth, killed the crowd against old dog Taker, killed the crowd against Roman for 75% of the match. The only moments where the crowd came alive to his previous big matches was when there was some sort of fuckery going on, which might save this bout.

While I greatly appreciate your positive attitude, which is hard to find on the internet these days, I'm not sure everyone is quite as enthusiastic about the current product as you are.

At least to me, they've managed to convolute what should have been simple angles like Becky/Rousey and Bryan/Kofi and the 3 hour Raws are exhausting slogs, let alone a potential 7 hour pay per view.

The whole company just seems directionless and deathly afraid of doing anything that might lead to someone or something getting over. The titles are meaningless, the feuds are stop and go and often times make little sense, and about half of the performers don't seem to care anymore.

My Father who is in his 60's and has been watching off and on since the Bruno era, said that WWE now reminds him of WCW when it was dying.

While they have too much money to die, I definitely see the comparisons.

[KawadaSmile]

Thank you, brother @Blehschmidt. The Power Of Positivity helps me get through things nowadays. Lot's of bad things going down and having a positive outlook on something can help deal with that.

 

Anyways, I used to see some WCW-esque moments in the latter half of 2018 myself. Faces never getting the upper hand on heels, specially on Raw, made for some awful, awful television, and that's something WCW had aplenty when they died a horrible death. That Corbin/Lashley/McIntyre partnership was a fraction of the sum of their parts. I like all three, but when they pretty much made everyone look like fools for months, it wasn't really engaging. 

Making them have their own separate programs was something they desperatedly needed, and I hope they stay separate after WM. Corbin can generate heat for himself (without needing to make references to a real life illness) and is a good bumper. Lashley is a freak of nature and a very dope heel, and at the IC level he's set. Drew is just a main eventer, to me. Let them go their own ways.

 

And I get being put off by Ronda/Becky antics. Having kayfabe-killing as your character, while not new, is hardly done right. They manage to avoid making it a total trainwreck by mixing some awful content with legit entertaining segments, but I totally get how bad it can come off. Like, I get using social media to promote your match is something that should be encouraged, and many people did that very well in years prior - Joey Janela and PCO are shining examples - but staying too online trying to have some "gotcha" tweets or using insider lingos can make you look so bad. It's just not worth the risk.

[Blehschmidt]

It's not even the Twitter garbage that bothers me. Your average fan doesn't even know that happened. I'll use my Dad as an example again, he doesn't even know what the fuck a Twitter is! What kills me is their constant need to convolute everything and twist everything, when a simple good old fashioned wrestling story is all you need.

Look at Becky and Ronda. The angle wrote itself. You had the Baddest Woman on the Planet in Ronda Rousey, and you had Becky Lynch who by sheer force of will got herself over and turned into some kind of female Stone Cold. All you needed to do was have Becky win the Royal Rumble, say she was going to Raw to fight Rousey, and then have some promo's and some pull aparts all leading up to potentially the single biggest moment in American Women's wrestling history when Becky beats Ronda in the Main Event of Wrestlemania!!

But we can't just have simple wrestling angles anymore, we have to let 40 soap opera writers get a hold of everything, so we've had McMahons, suspensions, Becky getting replaced by Charlotte, more McMahons, Ronda giving up the title, Hold Harmless Agreements, Becky vs Charlotte so that Becky can be in the match she was supposed to be in in the first place, now it's a triple threat match, a Rousey heel turn, and god knows what other nonsense in the two weeks left until the show.

It's all so unnecessary, it just dilutes everyone involved.

I mean, did we really need "Vince is a Racist" undertones to get Kofi a title shot? Did we really need to almost inadvertently turn Mustafa Ali heel to get Kofi a title shot? Couldn't we have just had Bryan vs Kofi at Fast Lane, have Bryan cheat to win, then have a No DQ match at Mania or something? Did it really require veiled racism, almost derailing Kevin Owens and Mustafa Ali, more veiled racism, and another gauntlet match where half the roster does the job to one guy (which doesn't help anyone in the match) only to pull a screwjob ending?

I get "making the fans wait for it" but this has become the WWE M.O. for years now, and eventually the fans are going to get tired of being Charlie Brown trying to kick the football, and they are going to stop giving a shit.

[peachchaos]

It’s not even just “make ‘em wait” that kills the entertainment value of this all. It’s the stuff they just flat out abandon with no explanation:

“Original Plans for the Rey Mysterio vs. Andrade Feud

The original plan for the feud was to have a mask vs. hair match but the idea ended up falling by the wayside.”

[Microstatistics]

22 hours ago, NintendoLogic said:

The match I'm looking forward to the most is Lesnar vs. Rollins. I have no love for Seth, but it's pretty much impossible for Brock to have a bad match with a smaller guy who's willing to bump big. Joe vs. Rey would have been off the chain in 2005, but Joe hasn't been that level of worker in eons. And from what I've seen of Rey since returning to WWE, he's basically a PWG wrestler now. Plus, Rey always gets a raw deal when it comes to match time. He's only had two Mania singles matches go longer than 10 minutes.

I still expect Joe vs. Rey to be MOTN even though both are not really at their best. Brock vs. Rollins should also be alright because, as mentioned, Lesnar almost always has, at worst, a decent match when it's David vs. Goliath. 

Even though I think Ronda is overrated, Becky is generally average and the triple threat stipulation is limiting, still expect the women's main event (assuming it is the main event) to be good-very good.

Three good looking matches and a potential solid one (Styles vs. Orton) is not bad but yeah, length is going to be an issue.

 

 

 

[SomethingSavage]

I definitely appreciate some of the enthusiasm for the modern product that can be found around here, but yeah. It's absolutely not for me anymore. I will likely select some matches from this show and eventually watch them (a month or so after the fact probably), but there's zero chance of me watching another Mania in full - at least in it's current condition.

These 7-hour slogs hold no appeal to me. Just not my thing.

One upside to Bruce Prichard being around again might be that he could push for the Rey/Andrade wager match to happen. Bruce is a fan of stakes matches, and he's helped put together programs for them in the past. So there's that. Just keep him away from any supernatural stuff & all's good.