Totally off- topic but I’m about to see a metal concert at the House of Blues down here and it’s not Apocalyptica, but I don’t know if it’ll be the same watching it with Ms. Cups (NOT a rock fan) and not Knowed Out (rock fan)
I’ll be at Raw and Smackdown this coming week. For Raw, I’ve got a fifth row floor seat on the side of the ring facing the hard cam, so it’s distinctly possible I’ll be on TV during the show. Look for the overweight guy with short brown hair wearing a “Yes! Yes! Yes!” shirt. I may or may not also be wearing a Sheamus mask and holding a Glo-Worm as a shout-out to some guys on a wrestling board I post on.
For Smackdown I’ll be seated in the third row along the entry ramp and will probably be wearing the same getup, though it’s less likely that I’ll be on TV.
For RAW, I hope for your sake you don’t get trapped behind some kid standing on his seat and waving a sign. Made me swear off floor seats forever.
I got snapped at by the parent in the row ahead of me for asking him not to hold up his small child because I could not see through them.
That was the one show I’ve been to in the last 30 years. I always look at the sign wavers and ask why I would want to pay to be behind that.
Who did you see STC?
I’m watching Legends With JBL on the Network, and his interview with Eric Bischoff. JBL is totally different from his RAW announcer identity. He’s actually quite intelligent, articulate and congenial. He’s not antagonizing Bischoff, but he’s not softballing him either. Bischoff explains his side of the story and admits to some mistakes.
Bischoff considered Mick Foley a liability and a lawsuit waiting to happen because of his wrecklessness, which is why he let him go. He said Steve Austin and Jim Ross were already not happy at WCW and he didn’t force them out. The main thing that killed WCW was the Time Warner/AOL merger and executives who knew nothing about wrestling took over, but I think some poor decisions on his part contributed to their downfall, like making Kevin Nash head booker and announcing that Mick Foley won the WWE title during Nitro. But the guy definitely took risks and made TV history.
Not really hearing more from Bischoff. I’m tired of the entire damned backwards focus on the Attitude Era.
To paraphrase U2;
Don’t believe in the attitude
The golden age of wrestling
You glorify the past
When the future dries up.
I did, however, watch his interview with Ron Simmons. While I, in general, support Ron’s insistence that you have to get out and change your circumstances yourself, I think Ron seems to overlook that he was blessed with incredible athletic skills that most others don’t have.
Otherwise, watch it. It’s really good.
Opening act was Starkill, a young death metal band from Chicago who were quite good. Then it was Moonspell, some dinosaur goth metal band who has been playing for 30 years and were really quite uninteresting and boring. Headliner (who I came to see) was Epica, a symphonic metal band with a girl lead singer. Pretty girl too with Becky Lynch level red hair.
The show was a lot of fun and Epica was awesome. Ms. Cups was pretty weary when the first band came on, but learned to appreciate it as the concert went on. She ended up liking Epica quite a bit.
Lucha Underground, in case you needed me to tell you, was pretty darn good.
We get two new characters in this show. If the first, “Darewolf” PJ Black looks a little familiar, it’s because he’s the former Justin Gabriel. Not surprisingly for Justin Gabriel, he loses his debut match against Willie Mack, but it’s a great match where the crowd briefly turns into a Japanese crowd and watches silently, cheering after the big moves. It’ll be interesting to see where he goes in the Temple.
We also get a vignette introducing Kobra Moon, which makes us wonder what’s going on in this world’s version of L.A. where there are gangs of masked luchadors roaming the streets picking wuxia-style fights with people. Kobra is Thunder Rosa, a newly minted luchadora (she debuted in November 2014) who’s been wrestling around the southern CA indy scene.
This show had two entire segments that were just vignettes with no in-ring action, but it all felt necessary and good for the story. Quite the difference from WWE’s “stand in the middle of the ring, say a line, wait for the crowd to react, say another line” pace for character-building.
Vampiro is doing a good job playing up the major PTSD he’s apparently suffering as the result of his fight with Pentagon. Pentagon definitely hasn’t turned face, but he’s playing a lot more nuanced character than your typical heel, and the interaction between him and Prince Puma is compelling. I wonder why Konnan isn’t with Puma this season?
We close on Rey Mysterio talking El Dragon Azteca Jr. (who we met in the first issue of the Lucha Underground comic, and was revealed to be the hooded figure in the final scene of Ultima Lucha) into accepting his father’s mask. Perhaps we’ll be seeing him in the ring this season?
It’s Thursday and we remembered Smackdown exists!
Re: LU, I miss Dario Cueto and his evil machinations. He had designs on making his luchas into bloodthirsty warriors to please the gods, whereas Catrina doesn’t seem to have any connection with them. He was always pitting friends against each other and making them put their careers on the line. I miss that element from LU.
Kind of weird that they had the dog & pony show for PJ Black and then had him lose, but Mack is awesome and deserves to win anyway. Seems like new talent usually lose their first match then make up for it later.
I just saw KO Powerbomb Kallisto on Dolph Ziggler’s face on SD. That was hilarious.
What was Ryback wearing? Are they starting to change his character/turn him heel?
I like the no shirt/short shorts look on him. He’s so huge he shouldn’t be covering it up
I’m sure that he’s got some master plan above and beyond just “hang around the Bay Area and charge guys $20 each to get eaten by Matanza”.
Goooooold-berg! Goooooold-berg!
That is how Goldberg dressed. Maybe it’s a fallback plan for Vince in case he can’t get the real Goldberg to face Brrrrock at WM.
I’m guessing he’ll be part of the Rey Rey PI storyline. Didn’t you say they’re releasing a movie that ties in to this season?
In NXT news, Bull Dempsey, Sylvester Lafort, and Marcus Louis have all been released this morning.
All guys who had potential, IMO, but were never really used well.
Bull? Really? This surprises me A LOT. He was really over (especially at house shows) and replaced Breeze as the comedy segment of the night.
I guess I never saw him as having much of a future in terms of being called up, and NXT is pretty overloaded, but I never would have thought they’d release Bull when they have way less talent there
Heh, was just thinking earlier today about Marcus Louis and figuring that he’s on the short list, because they’re not using him as anything other than a very infrequent jobber.
Would not be completely shocked if Bull asked for it, but surprised they’re releasing him.
On second thought, no I’m not. Obviously the entire ‘Bull Fit’ and vignettes mocking him were intended to get him working on his weight. And when he was introduced in his last match at about 6 pounds heavier than a month or so ago, I immediately thought “oh, that isn’t good”. Corey Graves may have mocked him for being the exact same weight as before the holidays, but no, it was up slightly.
That sucks. Bull was hilarious. He would have been a comedy jobber like Santino in the main roster.
Maybe TNA will pick him up and have him win their title.
Injury bug bites again. Finn Balor was hurt yesterday at a house show in Nashville, his ankle is in a cast although it doesn’t seem to be too terribly serious. Coincidentally (or not) Samoa Joe was his opponent, another injured star with Joe in the ring