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Scott's Blog of Doom - LiveJournal.com
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Why are you still here?
If you're still coming to this blog, don't. Go to www.rspwfaq.com and sign up for an account there, because that's where I'm blogging from now on.
http://www.rspwfaq.com
Alternatively, you can add "rspwfaqrss" to your friends list and get an RSS feed of the new blog that way.
Vinceosity
(Also posted to the new blog for your convenience)
"Hey Scott,
This is Matt Foster, fos4545 from the blog. Sorry I
haven't been at the blog for a while, I just got
married and started a new school year at a new school
and the kids are kicking my ass right now.
Anyway, I have a question/statement/musing:
With all of this McMahoning going around on RAW and
the DVD, it seems like the pinnacle of Vince being all
over TV. Raw just doesn't seem motivated, the
characters are bland, and the writing is at best
boring, and at worst offensive.
My question is, what if this isn't Vince's fault? I
think the Attitude Era worked because Vince was
tempered by creative, extroverted personalities like
Austin, Rocky, Foley, HBK, the Undertaker, and the
rest. Even HHH was a thousand times more entertaining
when he was getting over as the best wrestler in the
world. It was entertaining because each guy was in to
their gimmick and running with it full force. Now the
only people that seem to do that on Raw are Edge,
Umaga, and Vince himself. Cena was a phenom until he
became bored and watered down. What the hell ever
happened to having a personality on this show?
I guess in all this rambling, what I'm trying to say
is that the crapability of the WWE may not be all
Vince's fault. I'm sure if someone came up with a
good idea, he'd run with it. But in the meantime,
he'll keep fucking Katie Vick's dead body and trying
to be Stephanie's baby daddy.
Your thoughts?"
The problem is that pretty much everything is going to be Vince's fault, because Vince takes the blame for what goes wrong and takes the credit for what goes right. It's been clearly established that he's in total control at this point, for better or worse. So no matter what, you have to lay the blame on him.
Testing time...
www.rspwfaq.com
I'm still getting the hang of Wordpress and I'm not sure how it'll work in all areas, but I like this layout and having a registration system and such. Comments?
McMahon: The DVD
Thank god someone did this so I don't have to.
"Yo Scott... it's the guy that sent you Oz tapes all those years ago. I wrote a review of McMahon's DVD for my website at Stablewars (where you're still revered as a former champion). I figure you might want to post a review of the feature on your blog, so here you go! Cheers!
-Charlie (Stablewars.com)
=======================================
McMahon: The DVD
Review by Charlie (Stablewars.com)
Disc One (The Feature)
The feature clocks in at 2:09.
-We start with a look at Vince's annoucing. His father fired the annoucer and replaced him with Vince Jr. out of nowhere.
-We skip over Vince's hostile takeover of his dad's company and go straight to the territory stuff. Vince tried to buy the AWA, but then got Hulk Hogan. Greg Gange is interviewed saying that Vince put his dad into bankrupcy and that he's a bad man. Really. Now to Vince's credit, the Ganges actually tried to put a hit on Hulk Hogan, offering money to various guys to break his leg in a match, which is against the law. Also worth noting is the Ganges, like everyone else in wrestling, lowballed talent. If they had opened up their purse strings, they might still be around.
-Sgt Slaughter says Vince screwed everyone. Vince says he doesn't have sympathy for the people that owned the territories. The DVD actually shows a map of the territorial borders and the owners of each promotion, the ones Vince doesn't have sympathy for. Johnny Rougeau of the IWA in Eastern Canada. Frank Tunney in Toronto. Oh come now, they were in cahoots with the McMahons. Pedro Martinez and the NWF. Ed Farhat, the original Sheik, in Detroit. Jim Crockett's Mid-Atlantic. Again, oh come on. If Crockett hadn't been such a bad business man that territory could have held it's ground for years. Jim Barnett's Georgia. Eddie Graham in Florida. Ron Fuller's Continental, Jerry Jarrett's Memphis, Angelo Poffo's ICW. Dick Afflis' WWA, Sam Muchnick's St. Louis. OH COME ON, McMahon didn't knock him out. He was on the verge of retiring anyway. Nick Gulas' Mid-America, Bill Watts Mid-South. Fritz Von Erich's World Class, Bob Geigel, Dory Funk Sr, Stu Hart, Al Tomko, The Lebells, Roy Shire, and Don Owen in Oregon. Funny enough, most of these guys have worked for McMahon at some point. I guess Vince is a softy.
-In a surreal moment, McMahon appears on World Championship Wrestling on TBS in 1984 to talk about how his superior product will appear in place of Ric Flair and the good ole' boys. Shane claims it was so sucsessful that Ted wanted to buy him out. Vince decided to get out because Ted kept harassing him to sell to him, so he sold WCW back to the Crocketts. Yep, that's exactly how it went down. And by exactly I mean not at all.
-So we skip a whole bunch of stuff and go all the way to Eric Bischoff launching WCW Nitro. JBL thought when they lost Diesel and Razor that the war was over. He didn't know better. Now we skip ahead to Bret Hart attacking Vince on Raw in March of 1997, after he lost a cage match to Sycho Sid. This was all a storyline, except Bret started to swear like a longshoremen and landed the WWE on a ten second tape delay.
-Up to this point, the TV show never acknowledged that McMahon was in fact the owner of the company. The Bret angle changed everything.
-So now we go to Montreal. Of all people, the Big Show says that Bret Hart was an idiot for thinking he could walk out of the company with the belt. Big Show says Vince did was a business man would do. Big Show says Bret got screwed. "Sorry, shit happens, get over it." Ouch. Jim Ross says it pulled the curtain back and revealed once and for all that Vince was in charge of the company. Shane says Vince wishes he didn't have to do it. I believe him. Bret was always... ALWAYS... Vince's favorite wrestler. Nobody wanted Bret to be the champion in 1992 but Vince. Patterson wanted Rick Martel, the cable companies wanted to stay with Randy Savage or Hulk Hogan. Vince stood up for Bret. And Bret returned the favor by spitting in Vince's face.
-We see the Raw "Bret Screwed Bret" interview where McMahon has a doctored up black eye.
-Bruce Prichard says the fans brought the character out. Vince says the fans wanted to dislike him, so he took advanage of it.
-We see Austin give Vince a stunner for the first time. Vince says that he's more Stone Cold Steve Austin then Mr. McMahon. We see various instances of McMahon being evil. Love him or hate him, it's a wonderful character and one of the most effective heels of all time. Angle says that Austin was only as good as McMahon was, because one couldn't have made it to stardom without the other. We see Austin spray McMahon with the beer truck, with McMahon trying to swim through it. Heh. We see Austin destroy McMahon's Corvette. We see him drive the Zamboni. We see Austin put a gun to McMahon's head. I loved that because the fans were screaming for Austin to kill McMahon right then and there. Hey, wrestling doesn't lead to violence and I'll kill anyone who disagrees with me.
-We see the McMahon/Austin 'match' from April of 1998, the match that changed the world because it was the day that Raw finally beat Nitro after so many defeats. Bruce Pritchard says McMahon always wanted to be a wrestler. Jerry Lawler agrees. Vince McMahon says he wanted to be like Jerry Graham when he was a kid, dying his hair blond, nearly killing his dad. Triple H says if Vince had been a wrestler, he would have been just like Ric Flair. The most outrageous outfits, and larger then life attitude. But his dad wouldn't let him be a wrestler, because they were the office and not the talent.
-We get a montage of his matches. Triple H, Eric Bischoff, Edge, and Kurt Angle all agree that Vince is the worst athlete they've ever seen. They agree he's a big stiff in the ring. Triple H says that Vince acts like he's Lou Thesz but half the time he doesn't know what he's doing out there.
-Falling off the cage at the Massacre, where the table didn't give right away, causing him to break his tailbone. Yep, it's sick. Austin says there was no reason for him to take that bump, but he wanted to entertain the fans.
-They talk about the company going public. JBL says that the WWE didn't do it for traditional reasons. It was to become mainstream. Also it made him a billionaire. They move into his so called 'charity work' like getting young people to register to vote. Most that did never voted. They talk about Make a Wish, which the WWE has been involved with for years. They work with Special Olympics, Americares, and various other things.
-Now to the XFL. Vince claims that it wasn't that expensive. Laughing my ass off. Joey Styles says that the first thing you saw on the first game was the Rock. At that point, it wasn't football. Then McMahon came out to say "THIS IS THE EXEFELL!" and that that point the WWE hating media had all they needed to destroy the XFL. Styles says if they had let it run without the WWE personalities, all on it's own, it might have worked. Styles says if it wasn't The Rock or Vince McMahon, it was the strippers that they hired as cheerleaders. Bischoff says it would have worked if the media had cut him some slack.
-Now onto "Any Press is Good Press." We see the clips of the interview with Bob Costas on HBO where it looked like one guy was going to punch out the other. Stephanie says she was praying that Vince wouldn't hit Bob Costas. Triple H says it's a good thing he didn't because Costas would have kicked his ass. Bob Costas says that Bobby Knight was the next guest, and funny enough he was like Casper the Friendly Ghost next to Vince. Honestly, I think the whole thing was Vince trying to out-Bobby Knight-Bobby Knight. Angle says Vince is a caring person, who's good to the talent, but there's something bad about him.
-They talk about the Katie Vick angle where Trips, dressed like Kane, simulated fucking a dead body. Vince calls it high comedy. They showed an interview of the Rock on the set of the Rundown and he looked pretty disgusted by it. Joey Styles says it was so stupid that it couldn't have possibly be offensive. McMahon says he liked the Angle. The Rock says it was stupid and pointless and he hated it.
-They talk about the McMahon family. Trips says if anyone ever hurt his kids he would use every resource he had to destroy that person. Trips says he heard that threat personally.
-Now onto Triple H and Stephaine's real life relationship. Triple H says people are still surprised to know they are really married. Vince felt Triple H would be perfect for Steph, so he booked the angle. Linda claims that Vince says he loved Trips first. Vince liked the relationship first, then changed his mind because of business reasons. They tried different people. It didn't work, so they got married. Vince says that he respected Triple H because he had the balls to date his daughter, ignoring the way people in the lockerroom felt about it.
-Now onto the McMahons on TV. Shane didn't like having Linda on TV, along with every wrestling fan. That last part wasn't said on the DVD. We see clips of the McMahons feuding on TV. Steph says she didn't want to slap Linda. Linda thinks she warmed to the occasion. Shane refused to do it.
-Now onto Vince as a womanizer. We get a clip of Vince claiming to be a genetic jackhammer. We go into how Vince and Linda met, in church of all things. We move on to him putting the moves on Trish, while Linda is comatose, then a series of clips of him making out with all the hot divas and Sable. Regal says it's OK because Vince always gets the worst of it in the end.
-We move onto Vince buying out WCW. We get to see the big moment where Vince publicly buried WCW. Shane 'took it over' but really, that was the end. Steph says Vince was freaky all day, like part of him died when WCW folded, says Steph. Bischoff agrees. Lawler and Dusty Rhodes say that business was better when WCW was around. Vince says that competition is still there in the form of other TV shows and sports. Vince says the intent wasn't to be the only fed around, but it happened. They ignore TNA, which is OK, because everyone else does. Vince says his favorite match was against Shane McMahon at Wrestlemania 17. Shane says he was sick to his stomach because he doesn't like to fight with family. Vince gave him a black eye right off the bat during the match so Shane felt somewhat better.
-Now onto the Kiss My Ass Club. Regal loved the idea, and although Vince wanted to back out, Regal pushed for it. Everyone agrees that Vince doesn't like ass kissers in real life. Shawn Michaels says he's the best boss in the world because he's crazy.
-Now onto the brand extension. Lawler doesn't like it and doesn't think it worked right. Bruce Pritchard thinks it's confusing to casual fans. Shawn Michaels loves it. JBL is impressed that some people have brand loyalty. Shawn is surprised that some people watch one brand and not the other.
-Now onto Austin's infamous walkout of 2002. Clips here are recycled from WWE Confidental. Even the music is. Did they cut and paste the whole segment here? I guess not. They show Austin saying that he was pissed that they wanted him to have a match with Brock Lesnar on free TV and he didn't like that, plus his health was bad.
-Not onto his hiring of Eric Bischoff. To this day, I think it's the most shocking thing I've ever seen in wrestling. Linda thought he was joking at first. Lawler says that McMahon truly hated Bischoff and would have choked him to death if he had the chance. Lawler says it was surreal when they hugged. Angle was stunned. Big Show says it was kind of McMahon. Bischoff recalls a story of McMahon saying that if the table had been turned and McMahon had lost the war, he would have hoped Eric Bischoff would have hired him. They bring up how he brought in Paul Heyman. Uh yeah, like they hated each other or something. McMahon was the only thing keeping ECW out of bankrupcy for years. Bringing Hulk Hogan back was shocking too. Not really. Vince always loved Hogan.
-Now onto the feud with Hulk Hogan. They bring up the federal investigation, where Hogan testified against him. They show highlights of Wrestlemania 19.
-Now onto the Mr. McMahon character as a bully. They show him picking on Zach Gowen. We don't get the full match on the DVD, which is kinda stupid.
-We see Vince get inducted into the Madison Square Garden hall of fame.
-Now onto his feud with Stephanie. It was six days before her wedding, and it pissed off Linda, Shane, and Trips. They told him that if she had any marks on her for her wedding he was dead. Nothing is off limits for Vince though, and she didn't have a mark on her. Vince wanted to put Steph and Trips' wedding on Pay Per View. He was serious too. Trips said no chance, and Steph too. Trips says he Steph had let him have a webcast of the birth of their first child, he would do it. Then we get into a disturbing storyline proposal where Vince would be the father of Steph's baby. Wow. That's just wrong. Steph, to her credit, shot that down and said never. So Vince wanted Shane to be the father. Again, not happening. Well, at the end of the day he is still a redneck hillbilly rube from Nort Cackalackia.
-Onto Vince getting beat up. Angle admires it. JR says he would do anything for the business. Shawn says that Vince was the first person to ride the wire before Shawn did it at Wrestlemania 12. They even show a clip of him doing it. Also worth noting, even though they don't show it on here, is that Vince used the harness that Owen Hart was to be lowered to the ring with in Kansas City. More clips of McMahon getting his ass kicked. Blood pouring out of his head. They show him blow out his quads in both legs at the Royal Rumble getting in the ring. That's the second most hilarious injury ever, behind Hogan blowing out his knee getting off the couch. They show him rehab. JR says Vince's favorite saying is "Sleep is our enemy." Bruce Prichard says Vince hates to rest. Vince makes fun of Triple H because he came back faster from the same injury and he had it in both legs. Yeah. But realisticly, he wasn't expected to main event pay per views in the same time frame.
-Now it's onto a "YOU'RE FIRED!" montage. Bruce Prichard mentions getting fired. He was, but he was rehired. This moves onto real life firings. Sgt Slaughter asked for six weeks of paid vacation, a car, etc. Slaughter's attorney told him to no-show a couple dates in the early 80s to send McMahon a message. Vince got the message and fired him. JR says he's been fired three times by Vince McMahon and multiple times on TV by Mr. McMahon. They show JR's hate speech where he introduced Fake Razor and Fake Diesel. They show the Dr. McMahon skit that JR thought was funny at first but dragged on. They show Matt Hardy's situation where McMahon fired him. Matt Hardy says Vince is ruthless. Shawn Michaels tells the story of McMahon firing the Rockers in 1987. McMahon told him he had nice boots, and that they were made for walking. He said he was kidding, and then he fired them for real. McMahon says when he releases someone, they deserve it, and he doesn't feel bad for them.
-Now onto McMahon the Patriot. Oh dear. We see him go to Iraq a couple times. McMahon says nobody supports the troops or something. Yeah, all those yellow ribbons on the back of every car in the US are to support the freeing of Terance and Phillip. Yeah. Shawn Michaels says that he can be a nice guy, but he's still got some of that trailer trash in him. Really. He said that.
-Now onto McMahon's new religion. Shawn says he has fun with his feud with him. Les Thatcher of all people is shown saying how he didn't care for the religious thing and that it crossed the line.
-We end the main feature with Shane having a kid, making Vince a grandfather with balls the size of grapefruits. Vince loves being a grandpa. They show clips of his 60th birthday. Steph thinks he'll live to be 95 because he acts like a little kid. They show Vince toasting people, possibly drunk. He actually tears up a little. JBL calls himself a pigeon-toed fatass who wishes he looked like Vince. Heh. They show him working out. We wrap up by showing that we're still not sure if Vince McMahon and Mr. McMahon are the same person. Angle says that Vince is a nice guy, but if you don't give that in return, he'll end you. Shawn thinks Mr. McMahon is what Vince really is when he's not responsable. John Cena doesn't wish anyone to be on McMahon's bad side. But he conceeds that you don't see his good side on TV."
ECW
The Princess' ECW Report
Live from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.
As I continue working on my latest YouTube compilation, I figured I'd give ECW a whirl a few months after Scott gave up on it to see if things had improved. I'll stick around until you get sick of me.
Right away we get a little T & A from Torrie and Kelly Kelly. Kelly Kelly could definitely take some notes from Torrie on ring presence in a T & A segment, although Candace Michelle is probably a better example. Anyway Torrie bares plenty and Kelly threatens to do the same until Mike Knox and Test end the peepshow. Sandman and Dreamer join the fray and it looks like we've got a match.
Mike Knox, Test & Kelly Kelly vs. Sandman, Tommy Dreamer & Torrie Wilson. I don't have huge expectations for this one. Torrie gets a stinkface on Kelly as the lights go out, but unfortunately it wasn't planned. The ladies tag out and Dreamer does the right thing and takes some solid bumps to help Knox and Test get over their very pedestrian offense. The heels work on Dreamer's back as the crowd gets involved with "You can't wrestle"...yes that was so cool back in 1995. You know I can't fault Test and Knox for their intensity, but they just don't have anything that forces me to pay attention to them. Kelly Kelly does nothing to enhance the package and with the right woman (Victoria??) they might be a little better off. I felt the same way about Harlem Heat until Sherri joined them and instantly improved the whole gimmick. Anyway back to the match, Dreamer finally escapes after a pretty lengthy face-in-peril segment and makes the hot tag. Sandman does his usual moveset but adds in a horrible looking suplex and a halfway decent Rolling Rock. Knox tosses him off the top but misses a legdrop of his own. Second hot tag to Dreamer and the DDT gets the pin. (Sandman/Dreamer/Wilson d. Knox/Test/Kelly, DDT -- pin, **1/4). This wasn't that bad to be honest. Dreamer carried the match and everyone put forth an effort.
-- Heyman begs Big Show not to take the rematch with Sabu, Big Show tells Heyman not to worry. I'm sleepy.
-- A promo by Matt Striker??!! Now his teacher gimmick could possibly work in ECW, since most of their fans hate being called stupid.
Extreme Rules: Kevin Thorn w/Ariel vs. Ballz Mahoney. Ariel's ring rope entrance completely dwarfs Melina's, I will say that. She also screams a lot. Not much in the way of wrestling here, it's a brawl...with weapons...and no sort of flow. Thorn uses the cane in a few creative ways and gets a two count. Thorn is focusing on the throat. Ballz rallies with a sit-down spinebuster for a two count. Ballz goes for the chair but Ariel distracts him and Thorn hits some variation of a diamond cutter or RKO with the ropes as leverage...Styles never informed me of the name of the finisher. (Thorn d. Mahoney, diamond cutter-esque move -- pin, 1/2*). Nothing to see here.
-- "The Reject" Shannon Moore? What the fuck.
C.M. Punk vs. C.W. Anderson. Crowd is feeling Punk as he and Anderson do a little wrestling sequence with a clean break. On the second try, Anderson floors Punk with a left and goes to work. Anderson goes for a charge but Punk slides out and uses an Octupus hold around the ropes. Punk hits a running knee and a bulldog but Anderson gets a two count with a spinebuster. Punk rallies with a roundhouse kick and a urinage into a submission. (Punk d. Anderson, submission, **). Typical Punk squash. His style isn't one that gets a lot of crowd pops, but it makes them pay attention and appreciate the ring work. Now they need to find him a strong enemy so the people will really get behind him.
-- Please pay Bill Alfonso to be Sabu's mouthpiece. I'm sure he'll work for $10/hour.
-- They show a trailer for "The Marine", I get a glass of Crystal Light.
-- Heyman whispers sweet nothings in Hardcore Holly's ear and instructs Holly to make an impact. Well I can't say I'm a fan, but they could do worse.
Rob Van Dam vs. Danny Doring. They start with Van Dam's hammerlock-bridge spot and he escapes with a scissors take down. Doring hits a cradle neckbreaker for two but Van Dam reverses things with a front kick and a clothesline. Van Dam hits all his spots including the rolling monkey flip, the top rope front kick, rolling thunder and a BEAUTIFUL five-star frog splash. (RVD d. Doring, Five-Star Frog Splash -- pin, *1/2) Good for what it was. Predictably Hardcore Holly waffles both men with a chair after the match and gives Van Dam an Alabama slam. Van Dam goes from multiple titleholder to a feud with Hardcore Holly. Well as the old saying goes, there's no hope with dope.
-- Rene Dupree says something. Just debut already..please..
-- ECW World Championship: The Big Show vs. Sabu. Show hammers Sabu with clubbing shots to start as they quickly go to commercial. Back from commercial and Show is choking Sabu, which I'm sure he's been doing for the last four minutes. Sabu tries a comeback but a clothesline stops that. Back to the choke. Geez remember when Big Show used to have a semblance of a moveset? Ref bump. Sabu tries to rally but it's stopped by a fallaway slam. Sabu goes for the chair and is successful at finally getting Show off his feet. Triple jump moonsault and an Arabian facebuster get a near fall. Sabu, clearly frustrated, gets the ring bell and goes apeshit on Show, busting him open and knocking him over the ropes and through a table. Looked good, but it's a disqualification.(Big Show d. Sabu, disqualification, 1/4*). And the feud that will never end has no end in sight.
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