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https://www.f4wonline.com/news/aew/bryan-danielsons-aew-contract-expires-before-all-in-wants-to-wrestle-at-wembley/

Looking forward to Kazuchika Omega vs. Dax Harwood and Bryan Danielson/Jon Moxley vs. Jeff Cobb/Kyle Fletcher on AEW Dynamite.

They all look devastating to me watching them because they all are being sold like death and you know no one is kicking out lol. I wish Murdoch and Adonis got to be a team atleast a year longer so we could've gotten some matches with them and the Bulldogs on TV

Just sped through the show to see what I missed. Chase Hooper absolutely dominated his fight, and I actually think him vs. Paddy would be a really fun matchup. I feel like it won't be on the horizon any time soon, as Paddy is probably looking exclusively at Top 15 guys now until someone shuts him down. Regardless Hooper has leveled up his game, and is still only 24 and could get much better. Joaquin Buckley had a fun night at the office in front of his home town. Good for him. I actually love the crowd deflating when he said Connor's name. It's so hard to even get Connor to the cage, you might as well call out Richard Nixon or the Dalai Lama. Derrick Lewis did Derrick Lewis things. National treasure.

WWF Survivor Series Showdown 1990 Earthquake vs The Big Boss Man https://youtu.be/hwknYeFfXzA?si=Xr_-yAJ7hIonfM5Q

That's more like it. Fucking *great* games out of Holiday and Brown. Kinda crazy to listen to the Cleveland crowd be even that raucous when they were down 10+ for the entire quarter. Hopefully Monday deflates them a bit more.

I like how they are switching things up for Jade every time. We seen her in Traditional tags with Belair, and 6 Women's with Belair and Naomi and still work singles. The thing that slowed her progression in AEW was she was working once or twice a month. With her level of experience she needed to be working more. They are doing an amazing job handing her weaknesses but I think she will finally start to actually get better by working more. I don't know about her being in the QotR unless she's going to win. I'd avoid her having to lose as much as I can but atleast it gives them a chance to get her out there against different people every week plus she's working house shows. I know she's over 30 now but she had barely used her bumb card, so in my opinion she has alot of time to actually get good at this. Solo is being booked to well. I'm sure alot of that is Roman Reigns the way they are being very subtle it the Storytelling with Paul Heyman. Solo had the least personality of the Bloodline and he wasn't going to get to show this rage with the others on TV at the same time.

Roger Corman has died at 98.

Super Dragon Ball Heroes is ending. The replacement is Dragon Ball Super Divers.

Derrick Lewis winning means we ALL win.

"Oh no. OH NO!"

Thunder Interlude – show number forty-four – 17 December 1998 "The WCW Gang gets some early practice in on stinking it up in 1999” It’s the last Thunder of 1998…I’ll go to bat for 1998 Thunder being a consistently solid show after this rewatch… Brady Boone, AKA, Battle Kat, passed away in a car accident and is given an in memoriam before the start of the show… The desk pushes the Flair/Bischoff feud stuff…The Flair family is going to show up on Thunder tonight according to Tony S., and let me tell you, I am not excited for more Flairs on my television… We recap Scott Steiner and Buff Bagwell recruiting Lex Luger into nWo Hollywood…Luger is facing Scott Hall tonight in a match that is storyline centered on nWo Hollywood membership…Yuck…The match should be decent [Editor's note: Not really], but will it even have a finish?... Konnan defends his Television title against Kenny Kaos…Kaos has defeated Chris Jericho and Dean Malenko in recent weeks to earn this title shot been off either of the two major shows lately…Wait, hold on, Kaos comes out here with one of the tag titles…Is he still a tag champ?...I thought Judy Bagwell was the latest co-champ…This company, ten years earlier, ran multiple dope tag feuds over TWO sets of tag titles…But here in 1998, Rick Steiner won both titles by himself and then hands out one of them to whomever the fuck he pleases, including Buff Bagwell’s mom… Scott Steiner and Buff Bagwell walk out here and crash the desk…Scotty’s out here mad about the Luger/Hall match…He promises to interfere on behalf of Luger…There’s a match going on in the ring, and we see snippets of it while they talk at the desk…I’ve pretty much checked out on this match, which is too bad because Kenny Kaos is trying hard…Tony S. Remembers a Random ‘90s Athlete: Scotty was wearing a Kerry Collins Panthers jersey. I forgot that guy existed and that he played for the Panthers, who drafted him. I remember him as a Giant. Meanwhile, Konnan hits a sitout facebuster and locks on a Tequila Sunrise for the win…Robbie Rage comes out wearing a brace on his arm…Do you love tag teams breaking up for no fucking reason?...I SAID, DO YOU LOVE TAG TEAMS BREAKING UP FOR NO FUCKING REASON?!?!...Rage and Kaos have an off-mic argument about Kaos not even calling Rage before agreeing to tag with Rick Steiner while the bored Charlotte crowd chants WE WANT FLAIR… Oh, Thunder…It’s so appropriate that you are being terrible to close out 1998 because you’re just getting in a groove of terribleness for 1999…The Flairs get out of a limo and wander around before we go to break…Oh, Thunder… Here’s some Nitro Flair/Bischoff recap stuff…Oh man, do I hate this feud… We missed out on Mike Enos, TV Champ, folks…We really did…His opponent, Fit Finlay, got the interstitial TV title reign earlier this year that should have gone to Enos, in my opinion…I love Finlay, but not really until he hits about forty and shows up in WWE…These guys just beat the hell out of one another…It rules…Finlay steamrolls the guy for a big chunk of this match…Enos finally gets some control after hitting a juji gatame (is that the right judo term?) out of a Finlay sleeper…Some dolts in the crowd chant BORING because they have shitty taste in pro wrestling, IMH-fucking-O…Enos lands a sweet fisherman’s shoulderbreaker…The desk agrees that Enos should have gone for a cover after hitting a second-rope powerslam instead of going back to work on Finlay…They’re right, as Finlay started out in total control, but has to sneak an inside cradle to get away with a victory…Enos chokes the fuck out of Finlay in a rage…They brawl in the aisle while I think to myself, yeah, Mike Enos should have been a consistent midcard fixture in WCW until the whole thing went belly up… There’s an outro with Bischoff feigning remorse w/r/t Flair…Can we get outros with Goldberg headbutting lockers and Nash issuing threats to Goldberg instead?... Scott Hall rolls out wearing street clothes…He takes a little mic time for himself to hype the Luger match later tonight…Scott Hall’s 1998 has been a clusterfuck of booking failures…Hall bemoans his messed-up kayfabe life and also his messed-up shoot life…Hall hits a Razor Ramon callback by saying that he wants “the world and everything in it”…Or is it Hall hitting a Razor Ramon callback that is actually a Tony Montana callback, technically speaking?... Tony S. announces that Billy Kidman will defend his Cruiserweight title at Starrcade in a triple threat match against Rey Misterio Jr. and Juventud Guerrera…Sure, why not, that should be a decent car crash…After Heenan gets done doing some annoying fake laughter, here comes a recap video for this whole-ass feud… Well, that was long…Rey Misterio Jr.’s up next on the show…I’m into seeing Rey wrestle Prince Iaukea, but here comes the entire lWo…Eddy Guerrero seems to misunderstand that Polynesians are not necessarily Latin or native Spanish speakers…Eventually, Eddy gets around to threatening Iaukea in English to keep Iaukea from going to the ring…Iaukea, who is annoyed by Juvi Guerrera grabbing his pecs, isn’t so annoyed that he’s not willing to take the night off…Eddy sends Juvi down to face Rey instead…Oh WCW Matchmaking Committee, whither art thou?...I’ll let it go…We’re headed into 1999, where logic has no place in developing angles… The match is fine, but the issue with this lWo angle is that all of this stuff means nothing because there’s going to be some kind of a screwy finish…WCW doesn’t have the ability to do satisfying screwy finishes like, say, same-era WWF or early-‘80s Mid-South…Mostly because their screwy finishes are a) pretty much all the same thing and b) usually result in the heels standing tall…On cue, here comes Eddy Guerrero as the match goes to break… We come back to a bunch of counters and two counts…Rey’s counter dropkick on a diving Juvi signals that we’re headed toward the end of this bout…Juvi blocks a Rey rana attempt by powerbombing him, then goes up for the 450…Rey manages to crotch Juvi, but Juvi engages the ref and Eddy lands a Frog Splash on Rey…That scores three for Juvi, but Iaukea runs out and pulls a Konnan, that punk-ass narc…Look, I appreciate Charles Robinson’s kayfabe ref work over the past few weeks, but reversing a decision based on someone else’s word instead of what you actually saw is terrible reffing…That’s a Scott Dickinson-level decision…The lWo runs down, but fails to beat down either Iaukea or Rey, who both escape…The lWo is really bad at beatdowns…They should ask the B-Teamers for tips, maybe a seminar… A camera follows Scott Steiner and Buff Bagwell around backstage…They bust in on Lex Luger’s locker room and try to pitch him on the black-and-white again…Hey, Konnan busts in and runs them out of there, then checks to make sure Luger isn’t thinking of switching teams…He notes that they already talked about this issue off-screen, which I was sure as heck wondering about since no one from the Wolfpac has yet responded to Steiner and Bagwell on camera…Luger reassures Konnan and Konnan leaves…We hear Konnan go AUGH and a huge smack, and Luger runs out with the camera following him to see Konnan laid out and Scott Hall standing over him…Hall and Luger threaten one another instead of, like, communicating with words about who knocked Konnan out… DDP was able to recover from THA CHOAKSLAM enough to go read Christmas books to kids with Kimberly…Did Mick Foley, the self-proclaimed King of Christmas do this?...Uh, I’m trying to do a data-based comparison to see who really is the King of Christmas… Shiima Nobunaga has dope goggles on…He’s facing Disco Inferno…Disco wears a Wolfpac t-shirt…I know they eventually let him in because he’s in the Wolfpac in the WCW Mayhem game, as I mentioned in an earlier review…Does this lead to an internal Disco/Konnan feud and the OIL OF OLAY, ALL DAY, EVERY DAY song that absolutely fucking killed me?...I sure hope so!...They work a pacey match…Disco is an underrated base for smaller wrestlers…I stand by my belief that Disco Inferno is a better professional wrestler than Cody Rhodes…I bet I can make the case…Nobunaga gets control and tries to drop a Frog Splash, but he’s not a master of the move as is Eddy Guerrero or Rob Van Dam or even D’Lo Brown, so he misses…Disco quickly capitalizes with a Chartbuster for three… One thing going right in WCW: Norman Smiley is getting a mini-push…He’s a babyface tonight, I guess…He’s slapping hands and facing Jerry Flynn…OK, let me give Flynn credit…He feigns to lock up, but hits a throat thrust and then laughs evilly…That was a pretty good spot…Smiley takes over with a stalling slam and dances…Smiley blocks a sunset flip, but dances instead of countering and gets rolled up…I think this match drifts into potential Charming Uniquity status after Flynn catches a Smiley kick and transitions into an ankle lock…I can’t tell you that this match is, like, good, but it’s definitely entertaining…Flynn is having an oddly fun night in the ring…Smiley eventually goes up top, is caught by Flynn, but uses an eye rake to escape…Smiley leaps down and locks on the Norman Conquest for the win…What a weird little match that was, in a good way… More Eric Bischoff outro interview bullshit…Would you believe that Tony S. is kayfabe suckered in by Bischoff’s whole contriteness act?...Poor Tony S. was the dumbest bastard to ever sit at a commentary table in late ‘90s WCW… Chris Jericho and Ralphus come out onto the ramp, point at one another, and shake hands…I don’t know why it’s so funny to me, but man, it got a huge laugh…Jericho/Saturn seems like it could be good…They have a nice opening with a number of counters and a lovely short-arm clothesline from Jericho…Jericho celebrates, which pisses Saturn off…Saturn hits Jericho with a torrent of offense while Jericho screams HELP ME…Jericho struggles to keep control…He’s able to duck a Saturn diving lariat that nails Charles Robinson instead…Saturn locks on a Rings of Saturn, but is diverted by a Ernest Miller run in…Saturn handles both guys for awhile, but eventually eats a Feliner…Jericho locks on a Lion Tamer just in time for Charles Robinson to come to, check on an out-cold Saturn, and lift the arm three times…Jericho wins…Though with that bloody eye he’s got, he doesn’t exactly look like a winner… Finally, after one more Bischoff outro, we get Tony S. in the ring to introduce the Flair brood…Well, three-fifths of the Flair brood…Conrad’s spouse and the former WWE Women’s Champion in the family aren’t here…They walk down the ramp and, uh, the segment ends?... After a break, Thunder resumes with Tony back at the desk to introduce a video package of all the Hitman/Giant/Page stuff from the past few weeks…Maybe these long recaps would be more appropriate for WCWSN or Worldwide, perhaps?... They paid Michael Buffer to ring announce for this Scott Hall/Lex Luger match?...Bischoff always complains about getting his budget cut in 1998…Maybe he contracted Buffer for [x] amount of appearances before the budget cut, because otherwise, uh, maybe spend that money elsewhere…This isn’t even much of a match…Disco Inferno comes out to cheer Luger on before he locks up…Hall takes over with a headlock, but now here come Scott Steiner and Buff Bagwell…Hall locks on a surfboard…Luger makes a comeback shortly after this and hits the metal forearm…He signals for the Torture Rack, but Scotty and Buff jump in and stomp out Hall…Konnan runs down, apparently just now revived, and tells Luger that Scotty and Buff were the ones who hit him…Konnan and Luger clear the ring, even though some B-Teamers make a half-attempt at turning the tide…That was not a good match for either aesthetic or angle purposes to say the least… Tony S. brings David and Reid Flair into the ring to ask about their pops…Here comes Eric Bischoff…Bisch does a whole apology thing before finally fucking swerving and insulting Ric…Then, as is his function in life, David gets beaten up to act as motivation for Ric…Crush comes down and grabs Reid while Barry Windham stomps out David…This angle suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks…Keep Flair’s family at home, please…I know you won’t, WCW, but I ask you anyway…Bisch forcibly kisses Beth and WOOOOs to cap what was a pointless and shitty waste of a main event angle. I enjoyed some of the wrestling, but the angles are so bad, folks, so awful that I’m just going to give this Thunder a grade that it’ll almost surely see a lot of going forward…OWWW…

There are fights that went horribly wrong for someone. Then, there is what happened to Alonzo Menifield tonight. The highest tier.

Holy Crap! "Space Babies" was terrible! Like "Spock's Brain" level terrible! James

8/20/87: Kobayashi vs Takada (c): The first minute of this was the best part of the match. Right at the bell Takada cracked Kobayashi with a kick and dropped him. It was jarring because matches usually didn't start like this and there was a momentary sense that it was going to end right there too. Plus you would have expected Kobayashi to get the relatively cheapshot in, not Takada. They more or less turned it into a normal match after that unfortunately, unfortunate because it was more along the lines of those Takada/Koshinaka matches that I don't love. I had hoped Kobayashi would bring something else to the table and that it was Koshinaka that was the problem but doesn't seem to be the case. The action was good but it was too back and forth without meaningful transitions. Kobayashi got a win out of nowhere at the end to win the belt. Takada stormed off dejectedly while Koshinaka rushed in to make the next challenge. 8/29/87: Anjo vs Nakano: I just struggle with these guys. This didn't have commentary so I didn't have the best sense who was who in the moment (even though one had kickpads). I would have done better with some variety. I'm sure I'll get it eventually, but for now, these are a bit of a chore even if the work is good. I just don't have a hook. 8/29/87: Fujiawara vs Maeda: Well, this was all hook. Super compelling stuff. Maeda would press him towards the corner again and again and that's the last place you want Fujiwara so it was compelling each and every time. You didn't know if Maeda was going to kick him down or if Fujiwara was going to snatch out the leg or come in from under with a bunch of slaps. At one point I swear that Fujiwawra had decided that he was going to wrestle the match with a hand behind his back by only using slap counters, but they kept driving Maeda back. In a lot of ways this was a battle between the ultimate offensive wrestler and the ultimate defensive one. It all built to one last exchange in the corner where Fujiwara finally struck, snatching the leg and kicking the other one out and locking in a leglock to end it. 9/1/87: Inoki vs Murdoch: We just get the last 4 out of 17 or so. It's a GREAT finishing stretch though. Murdoch gets out of a long sleeper by dropping into a chinbuster. He hits a perfectly timed back elbow off the ropes then hits a brainbuster and calf branding. Inoki kicks out. Murdoch goes for another brainbuster but Inoki floats over and hits the enziguiri. Murdoch goes flying into the ropes, choked in them. Inoki hits ANOTHER one, dropping him. Just the meanest thing to do to a guy choking to death. He goes up to the top, the ref delays him. Murdoch snatches him off the top and hits a running power slam but Inoki's in the rope. Murdoch thinks he's won but didn't. Inoki hits one last one right into the face and gets the win. Really good stuff. It's a shame we don't have the whole thing.

Bill Nelson's Chimera... this was an outstanding new romantic synthpop record. May be one of my favorite records of the year, EP or otherwise. Yukihiro Takahashi of Yellow Magic Orchestra collaborated with Nelson on several of the tracks and at times this feels like an extension of the Naughty Boys record I loved so much. Great record. The Human League's Fascination! -- speaking of New Romantics, it's The Human League. The Human League were under immense pressure from their record label to produce a follow up to their Dare album and released this EP as a stop gap measure. It's a credible effort. I prefer the tracks where Phil Oakey sings lead vocals and the girls do backup vocals, but I can see how the alternating vocalists may be appealing to others. Fall of Saigon's Fall of Saigon... I have mixed feelings about minimal synth. I can enjoy it as background music if I'm in a relaxed enough mood, but if I want to put on a record and get a hit of something, it doesn't really do the trick. This was another group with alternating male and female vocalists. The pair produced quite different sounding tracks. I preferred the female vocalist, whose tracks were built around haunting melodies. The male vocalist's tracks were closer to art pop. Children's Hour's Flesh... this was a Kiwi post-punk and whose members went on to form The Headless Chickens, a band I'm much more familiar with having watched a lot of Kiwi music TV in the 90s. Not a bad record this. Outside of the Dunedin sound, this was one of the most interesting records to come out in NZ in 1983. Mecht Mensch's Acceptance... low fi hardcore record. Some pretty intense thrashing. They slow things down at times before lashing out again. I quite liked the vocals on this.

I just saw on twitter that BOOM Pro Wrestling's Brady Malibu is on the ROH card tonight in Vancouver. Brady's awesome and is a great guy. I'm jazzed for him.

That's hilarious. "My dearest Abigail, I am returning from the front after months eating hard tack and cannot wait to sample your vittles. Alas, the War for the Georgian Territory was a lost cause, though history will record the depth of our struggle."

Steve Rubin gone after 26 years, he was the Senior Director, TV Event Relations at WWE. https://wrestletalk.com/news/long-term-wwe-name-gone-steve-rubin/

Later this month, Uncut Gems is getting released on IMAX. I'll be there again to experience the soundtrack and an incredible amount of anxiety. I found out about Good Time and The Curse later and will watch both of those soon. Yeah, St. Vincent just didn't grab me that much except for the last 20 minutes of the movie. I liked Bill Murray's scenes where he really did sound like he had a stroke. I guess I'll check out Tammy since that's another Melissa McCarthy movie. I'll have to check out Spermworld too. Most documentaries I don't like because it's an obvious format - scenes take place, person gets interviewed, and it's feels like an episode of 60 Minutes rather than a movie. Some Kind of Heaven felt like a movie first, documentary second.

Forest lose late to Chelsea 2-3 but are all but safe unless they lose at already-relegated Burnley and Luton beat Fulham with a 12-goal swing next Sunday.

Thinking same thing.

I actually suggested this idea a couple years ago and wondered why this never happened. IIRC I think I said the sons getting into the business at different times probably mucked it up. But yeah, Bryant in Smoky Mountain was nothing like Ole and the fact Ole for a few weeks was essentially his mouthpiece kinda overshadowed him and highlighted his lack of charisma. However, much older Bryant Anderson/Rogowski is Ole. Between Roop and Bryant, the spirit of Ole was still there. I think my issue with the more updated analysis tacked on to the episode is it's harder to put into context the missing 40 years between 84 and now. It was intriguing cause that part was pretty new for the series outside of just giving a "Where Are They Now" update on where folks are after various tragedies and traumatic events. However, as Dave put it in the episode, territory wrestling was going to be gone sooner rather than later. All the stuff leading up to Black Saturday and Black Saturday was just an accelerant. Hell, funny that Dave's statement is probably buttressed by what Cornette said earlier in the episode: You cannot treat or handle the business in 1983 or 1984 like you did in 1953 or 1954. So when Jimmy says that Endeavor buying the business probably removes the last vestiges of old time pro wrestling...eh...the business was never going to be what it was 40 years ago just like it wasn't in 1984 the same as the 40s and 50s. Some things are going to be same and a lot of things are going to be very much different. That's just the reality of any of these type of money making endeavors. That and you can hop on Peacock or any free streaming site or pop in a DVD and watch old time wrestling or wrestling from virtually any year where footage exists. Worrying about the lineage of wrestling is neat and all, but at the same time, Vince was never worried about that as much he would bring back all these old timers for the Hall of Fame or let them be agents/producers or whatever. If it got in the way of the bottom line, then it could go as well. Welcome to capitalism or at the very least the type of capitalism Vince McMahon subscribed to. And not to just throw Vince in there by himself, that goes for Turner and Tony Khan as well. That's why that part being tacked on would have needed an additional 10-15 minutes to bring everything full circle. BTW The Watts letter seemed like some shit you would get from a Ken Burns Civil War documentary where some guy is writing home after fighting at Antietam.

I watch literally every Mavs game, and dude gets the absolute shit kicked out of him every night. It's finally catching up to him at the worst time. There is no reason that OKC shouldn't be up 3-0 right now, given how pedestrian Luka and Kyrie have been. You can't feel great about getting beaten by PJ Washington, Josh Green and Derek Lively twice in a row, especially when you have the supposed MVP runner up and coach of the year.