Well, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from the Firefly Funhouse match, but “an Alan Moore-esque metafictional haracter deconstruction involving time travel, alternate history, references to Brodie Lee and CM Punk, Vince yelling “IT’S SUCH GOOD SHIT”, culminating in Cena being erased from history a la Donnie Darko” certainly wasn’t it.
Mind = blown.
Overall, I’d say 'Mania was pretty good this year. Not every match ended the way I wanted to, but there wasn’t any real BS to speak of and most of the matches were good to excellent.
I’d rate Charlotte/Rhea and Otis/Ziggler as my favorites. Edge/Orton was fun, but it went about ten minutes longer than it needed to. Brock/Drew was a bit anticlimactic after the Firefly Funhouse mindfuck - it really should’ve gone on second-to-last. Black/Lashley and the tag titles match were just OK, but they both set stuff up for future storylines.
It’ll be interesting to see what WWE does going forward - they have tomorrow night’s Raw taped, but nothing beyond that, and they’re still advertising MITB for May 10th, though they didn’t say where it would happen, so probably another empty arena show.
First night, one fave is John Morrison vs Uso vs Kofi. They know how to pace ladder matches pretty well, and the finish was very creative. It showed Morrison winning not by dominating, but by being a sly dog who grabs the grenade key when the opponents don’t notice.
I also liked Owens vs Seth. Brawn vs Goldberg amounted to each guy using 2 moves multiple times.
Becky vs Shayna was not as vicious as I expected it to be, and Becky’s win was out of the blue. I guess they’re continuing the feud.
Interestingly enough, RoH has been rerunning “classic” matches of their current top dogs. Last week they showed the Briscoes vs El Generico (Sami Zayn) and Kevin Stein (Owens). It was an awesome match, showing that former RoH stars now in WWE do a tenth of the work they used to. The Briscoes won. Then this week, they had Jay Lethal defeating AJ Styles from 2017. So, ahead of WM, they show how some of WWE’s top stars lost to the guys who didn’t leave for WWE.
Night two, the Last Man Standing match was so slow paced compared to the other matches. I took the opportunity to make up for my late start and advanced to the end. Really, Last Man Standing matches are soooo boring. Most of the action is the referee counting out loud.
The Firefly match may have been wrestling meta, but I prefer the swamp cult leader Bray Wyatt before WWE creative ruined him. OK, maybe I’m still bitter.
Drew vs Brock was also each guy doing 2 moves multiple times, but I’m cool with Drew winning.
I know Bray Wyatt is The Fiend. Can someone explain to me what the Firefly Funhouse is and why people are raving about it?
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Firefly Funhouse is the Peewee’s Playhouse-esque children’s show that Bray Wyatt is the host of, along with his puppet friends Mercy the Buzzard, Abby the Witch, Ramblin’ Rabbit, and Demon Vince McMahon. It’s the light-and-fuzzy side of Bray’s current persona, which the Fiend is the dark side of.
It’s also the name of the gimmick match he had with John Cena tonight, in which he teleported Cena back in time to various points in his career as the Prototype, as the Doctor of Thuganomics, and their previous match at WrestleMania 30, including several alternate timelines where he’s “Johnny Largeman” on Saturday Night’s Main Event in the '80s, and WCW Monday Nitro in the '90s where Hollywood John Cena is the leader of the nWo, in order to break him mentally a la the Killing Joke, before pinning him and causing him to be Donnie Darko’d out of existence.
Wrestling is weird.
Sometimes wonderfully so (and sometimes not so wonderfully so, but this was the former).
I hope this was a trial at doing 2-day Wrestlemanias in the future. If anything, I would propose an earlier Sunday start.
I’m cooler with Strowman winning than with McIntyre, because I like McIntyre and he deserved that victory in front of a crowd (and preferably as a heel, but that ship sailed). If I never see Goldberg or Lesnar half-ass a match again, it will be too soon. As much as I was looking forward to Edge/Orton, I think it dragged. It certainly didn’t play up to either’s skills. The 5-Way Elimination was better than expected, and I’m glad they didn’t give the title to Lacey Evans. Flair/Ripley was really good, maybe too much screaming by both but minor quibble. I wonder what the plan will be going forward with the NXT Woman’s Title. Is this an attempt to get a “name” on NXT to bump ratings (when such a thing matters again)? The Firefly Fun House was just surreally awesome, and like the Boneyard Match, benefited from NOT playing to a crowd.
Fun Fact: Supposedly Style’s hand was a leftover prop found on site, and the idea for it to be sticking out was Undertaker’s. All the banter in the match was improvised, even when UT accidentally cut himself.
Forgot to mention I did like the way they did UT vs AJ. It reminded me of the Wyatt Family vs the New Day in the junkyard. AJ kept taunting UT and calling him old, then when UT had AJ propped and ready to throw into the grave, AJ wasn’t so tough after all and meekly told UT “Don’t bury me.” AJ’s gloved hand sticking out of the grave dirt was a nice touch.
So when AJ returns, will they have him stagger in covered in mud and limping? “Ah just dug mah way out of mah own grave! Ah got the coronavirus and ah’m psychologicly damaged! Ah now wanna eat brains! Gallows and Anderson didn’t have enough! Damn yew Undertaker!”
I must say, the lack of audience is forcing WWE to be more creative than usual, and I’m digging it. It’s light years beyond “beatdown of the week” promos. WWE does best when they don’t get complacent.
I thought it was a reference to what I think was the first Buried Alive match - WWE In Your House, 10/20/1996; Mankind buries UT, then a bolt of lightning hits the grave and UT sticks his hand out from the dirt as the PPV ends.
One thing I noticed; there were some noticeable cuts in the women’s tag team match. Since you could now hear everything that the wrestlers were saying in the ring, is it possible that they were cutting out instances of wrestlers calling spots?
And how long does Strowman keep his title, given that the match was supposed to be Goldberg vs. Roman Reigns (speaking of whom, Reigns is on the cover of the latest WWE Annual Report, so expect a push in the near future)?
I’m pretty sure I heard the referee call a spot during the five-way match. Just before Sasha was eliminated, it sounded like he told Lacey to flip her into a Women’s Right.
Braun described how it happened in an interview yesterday. Basically, after they finished the Raw/Smackdown tapings, he packed up his stuff and got on the road for a 21-hour drive to Wisconsin where he was going to hunker down on some land he owns in the country. Just as he was getting into Wisconsin, WWE called him and told him they were putting the belt on him, and they were sending a private jet to pick him up and bring him back to Florida. He wound up catching the plane at 9 PM, landing at 1:30 AM, and heading right to the Performance Center to tape the match.
In today’s “Vincent McMahon is really a dick” news, WWE has released The Revival. Nothing like waiting until a time when nobody new can be signed to make the release. Not that The Revival were getting paid; they had already made their downside guarantees. While AEW will most likely be interested, I can’t see anyone signing new talent until arenas open back up and they can gauge how the business will rebound.
I don’t know how much of a “dick move” it is when they’ve been asking for their release for nearly a year now.
So after the Bonehead match, what’s the argument when people say “Wrestling is fake.”.
I think it is a dick move because he could have:
(a) Used them when he had them
(b) Let them go somewhere else to be used when people were actively signing talent
VKM chose (b) at a time when they (likely) won’t be signed anywhere else, probably for the next few months at a minimum. Locking up “independent contractors” (which already is bullshit) simply so someone else can’t employ them was (and continues to be) a dick move. In essence, granting their wish isn’t a dick move, granting it during the pandemic is.
They were granted their immediate release so there is no waiting period like usual. AEW will surely pick them up. Personally, I’m not sad to see them go because I absolutely never understood their appeal, but people who do like them say they’re better for AEW so…sure
WWE will go back to live shows from its Performance Center in Florida starting next Monday, according to “sources.” Apparently, the next PPV, Money in the Bank, will take place live there as well on May 10. Still no audience, however.
AEW will probably pick them up when things get back to semi-normal. I doubt anyone will sign take on new talent until they start putting asses in seats again. Not a good time to be job shopping, especially when one’s profession is dependent upon crowds.
Revival was on their way out months before Coronavirus. WWE had no reason to keep paying them until the end of their contract. They’re having to do cost cutting across the board to stay afloat until the epidemic is over.
I’m sure several other wrestlers will lose their jobs before this is over.
One rumor is that Vince is forcing live shows to avoid having the TV contracts renegotiated. Supposedly they are allowed only a few taped shows per year. With ad revenue way down, it would weaken WWE in renegotiations.
Even if it is his fiancee, having Garza walk up to a photographer and plant one on the cheek was in typical WWE poor taste. That and Lawler’s ramen moonsault comment (even ignoring it was a senton).
Lawler needs to be replaced. While he was getting his butt kicked by one of the Viking Raiders, he accidentally said, “Great move by Cedric Alexander!”