2014 Pro Wrestling Thread

I honestly don't think Kidd's moving the needle much anyway in terms of a WWE return. I actually feel like this might help when the others debut, because for the casual fans, or the ones who don't know much of their NXT/indy work, it could be (with Neville, for example), "Hey, it's that dude with the awesome top-rope finisher. I liked him!" That could be (keyword, of course, being could) better than throwing in Paige cold, or Adam Rose with some repetitive vignettes that made him boring before he even showed up.

 

They also had The Ascencion beat Los Matadors as the main event of The Main Event last night. But that's a network show, so it won't have quite the impact. They could certainly make a big to-do about one of the guys in the match down the line, as they did when they handwaved Bo Dallas's first run in WWE to clear the runway for Bo-lieving. But it makes it a little less special. Or they just insult our intelligence by acting as though the guy who's debuting three months from now is a never-before seen character.

 

They'd never do that.

 

Some reports out there that O'Haire's death was a suicide. Sad.

 

I wonder how The Ascension is going to be handled when they move up because they will be moving up soon.

If they drop the straps tonight at Takeover then we'll be seeing them definitely on RAW/Smackdown soon. Maybe they don't drop them and say there's no challengers left here. We're taking our ball to RAW and throwing down the straps.

 

Anyone going back to Nitro from episode one? By the way, it's listed as episode 79 for some weird reason. But if you're watching the Mall of America episode, it's the first Nitro.

I'm about five or six in, and I'm enjoying the episodes. At 45 minutes, they're pretty fast-paced, a far cry from the bloated three hours they became and from the three hours of Raw. I kind of like the hour-format, as it gave feuds a little time to simmer from PPV to PPV and stay fresh. Sure, Hogan was on every week as champion and because of what Bischoff and Turner were paying for him, but the other feuds are moved along every other week, like Sting/Luger/Savage and Flair/Anderson/Pillman.

I probably saw some of the most absurd shit so far from the Hogan/Dungeon of Doom angle. It's a few weeks until Halloween Havoc, and the Giant and Taskmaster Kevin Sullivan are menacing America's hero. At one point, Sullivan, dressed as an elderly woman, attacks Hogan with a cane. Giant rips apart Hogan's neck brace (Giant had wrenched Hulk's neck at Fall Brawl War Games weeks prior), wrenches the neck again. Sullivan then SHAVES HOGAN'S MUSTACHE.

(Added for posterity)


Next week, while the Chicago smark crowd is booing the ever-lovin shit outta the Hulkster, Hogan decries the shaving of his mustache as on par with tagging the Washington Monument or burning an American flag. I SHIT YOU NOT. By the way, in a weird nWo Hollywood Hogan pre-cursor, he's dressed in all black, screaming at "Mean" Gene Okerlund and Jimmy Hart to shut the fuck up while he cuts a promo. All of this, mind you, is building up to a monster truck match at Halloween Havoc with the Giant, alleged son of Andre. (Spoiler: Giant wasn't really Andre's son.)

Check this shit out for yourself.

Don't forget, the whole angle started with my favorite segment of all time: Hogan scalding his hand in not hot water at the Dungeon of Doom's lair, where no Hulkamaniacs reside.

 

NXT Takeover was pretty damn good tonight. The Ascension did drop the tag belts to Kalisto and Sin Cara, then bumped around a bit for KENTA, who is now Hideo Itami for some reason. Charlotte vs. Bayley for the women's championship was solid. Neville, Kidd, Zayn and Breeze had the best fatal four-way I've ever seen in WWE. The "developmental" in-ring work is SO much hotter than the main roster right now.

Anyway, if you like long-winded reading material, here's a review:

http://realworldchamp.com/2014/09/12/nxt-takeover-2-review-sept-11/

 

Bradley, love the write-up on the early Nitro there. My guess with the numbering is maybe that they just carried over the same production run from some other WCW show? Like didn't it switch from World Class or something on Thursdays to going head to head with Raw? Either way, the pre-NWO Hogan stuff is Wrestlecrap of the finest vintage.

 

The commentary team on NXT is atrocious. Muted my computer to get through the 4-way, which was pretty good.

 

I don't think they're that bad.

What a solid show though. Love me some NXT

 

What a lot of people forget is that wrestling, with the exception of ECW, pretty much sucked in 1995. I remember the Hogan/Giant storyline and thinking who the hell would believe the Giant was Andre's son. It was so stupid.

The one cool part, I remember, was when Luger came back in the first episode, and then, in another early one, put Hogan in the torture rack and the WCW crowd popped huge, even though Luger was the heel.

 

10-year-old me did.