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as a forty year-old nerd explaining DC's pre-Crisis multiverse?

Man, you know what TNA should do? Something that hasn't been done a hundred times before, a hundred times better already. Quit going back to an already empty well. The six-sided ring combined with the X-Division, a strong tag division, and a strong women's division at least gave them the perception that they were markedly different than WWE at the time. Right now they just look like a bootleg SmackDown with their confused blue branding, traditional four-sided ring, and all the focus on yet another tepid invasion angle with another tired heel authority figure angle on the horizon. They wanted him as a trainer. He didn't want to relocate to Florida. They hired Nick Dinsmore instead. Sin Cara's problems in WWE are 90% his own doing. He didn't want to go to developmental, he won't learn English, and he's clearly a bitch. He quit a match because he jammed a finger. I jam my fingers all the time. I jammed a finger this morning and I'm here, I'm typing stuff right now.

Because he does things the Con-way.

Thoughts: 1) The Pete Rose comparison was amazing and epic. HHH is so good at being so completely full-of-turds and believing his lies. I also love that the WWE is showing and not telling with everything. They're trusting the audience to understand HHH is conning everyone with all of this stuff. That's how2) I am a big fan of Vicki's work but her delivery was terrible tonight. There was obviously a lot of memorization of stuff that she was struggling with. She did her great cackle at the end. I really liked that. But still, bad segment. 3) I liked that Diva's match. Good little match. Naomi's really athletic and has some cool spots. She doesn't have the ability yet to really incorporate all of those into a match without someone who knows how to do that. AJ doesn't have anywhere near Naomi's athletic ability but can carry another worker at this point. (See: Her match with Bailey on NXT.) "Hey! Here's how this will work. You do your spots. I'll bump around for most of the entire match. I'll talk trash and will pay the price for it. I'll get in a few sorta cheap shots here and there. But then at the very end,You just stand there and sorta spin me and I'll hook on my shocking awesome looking finisher. You struggle for a while and then tap." Solid stuff. 3A) I don't know if the commentary was terrible because Nattie's awful or if they just don't know what POV they want to do here. The angle would maybe work a lot better if they had AJ actually show jealousy about not being on that dumb show. But AJ and the divas division, overall, is a lot stronger by having someone who takes her stuff (kayfabe and otherwise) seriously rubbing in the faces of people who'd rather be on reality TV. None of Nattie's talking points were good. "We should stick together. We're role models." I don't have a daughter but if I did (and my wife allowed her to watch wrestling -- not happening), AJ's the one I'd have her look up to in this. Sure AJ's nutty with boys and struggles with romantic relationships. But with this, she's a super confident young woman not afraid to stick up for herself who is telling people that she's important and told the dumb dumb old boys club at ringside that they have no right to treat her as meat. Whereas Nattie and the rest are fine being creeps and willing to have themselves exploited on a Reality TV show and/or are totally fine with Lawler oggling them. Also, "She's a title holder. I was born a champion." Sure you were, unover daughter of Jim Neidhart. If so, take the title. We should all be so lucky to have someone who respects that belt so much and its meaning she'll get the date she won it tattooed on her neck.In other words, AJ rules it. Still. She's one of the most compelling people in the WWE of the past decade. The only role she's struggled with was as GM. Everything else (the love triangle, the Dolph/Big E. team, etc.) she's hit home runs with. And she's also a very competent worker in the ring. 4) Zeb talking about Santino not having a proper reptile owner's was soooooo awesome. That match was eh. Just couldn't really care and there was a lot of baseball on last night. 5) Ryback and Heyman already have tremendous chemistry. Perfect. They totally misread Ryback as a monster. The guy looks like one but he even had good delivery as goofball Skip Sheffield back in the day. I loved him saying "I! HATE! BULLIES!" along with the pin. Heyman and Curtis marking out was great, too.6) The Shield gauntlet showcase was great. I loved the build. Darren gets crushed right away. The stronger Titus gets a little bit of offense but eats it pretty quick. The fiesty Dolph who has figured out Ambrose, at least, goes at it. He knows what to expect since he's been repeatedly put in matches against them. Gets some offense and has a chance at the win but the damn numbers game finishes him before, at least, he takes the best spear bump ever. Jeez, Dolph. Kofi's got a little momentum going again with the rebellion stuff but succumbs. The veteran RVD -- crafty but with the (kayfabe) athetic ability and weirdo offense to give The Shield fits -- is about to win. The build for this has been so great. The release is RIGHT there for the crowd who wants to see these dudes fall and fall hard. But then HHH takes that away right as it's about to happen. PERFECT.7) HHH ripping into Vicki was awesome. He sure was fine with the gauntlet when The Shield was kicking ass. As soon as they might have lost, game over. He explains it well -- doing this can only make the rebellion stronger. He's "heard" the audience. His ideal revenge will wait. Not now. Vicki's too big of suck-up to ever stand up for herself to the boss.8) Ryder calling HHH bro and acting all chummy. HHH's textbook "Yep. You're buried." smirk. Sends out the brutal Wyatt's to beat up guys who aren't a regular tag team. Bray hits Sister Abigail and does more A++++ promo stuff. This is how to use these guys for now. Let them just beat dudes, have Bray cut his insane promos, and wait. Once the belts come off The Shield, the Wyatt's are up next.9) HHH's smarmy "Hey! Sorry about that!" to RVD. He's perfect at this. I loved that they hinted that, yes, this was a set-up when ADR jumped RVD. Also, ADR WORE HIS SCARF during the beat down. Great little touch.10) The Rays/O's game was getting really good. I skipped past ADR and dumb ass R-Truth. 11) That main event. Wow. Reigns and Rollins holding up the titles and being cocky pricks. Great stuff to start. The Shield doing all their "sacrifice yourself for the team" stuff. "YOU'RE ON THE BAD SIDE OF TOWN!" Reigns CRANKING in that chinlock. So many awesome cut-off spots. I loved the end sequence. Bryan's comebacks are THE BEST. It's a five moves of doom thing at this point but I will forever love this. Bryan reverses out of the corner with his flip. Corner dropkick series. A lariat maybe. YES! Lock attempt. And, maybe, the Knee of Death. The Uso dives were really great. So was Rolling that did the "You can take me out, bro, if it helps us win" Shield trademark. Usos get up, nasty double kick from the floor to the apron that lets Bryan get the win.The end of the show was great. No trash talk or anger from the faces. A joyous Bryan celebrating with the crowd. The happy-go-lucky Usos join in. Faces, they want to have fun.

We don't talk any more. They don't pay alimony. They don't write. They don't even take my son to Chuck E. Cheese's on every other weekend.

EXACTLY! The six-sided ring was a great way to distinguish themselves, and show that they are different than what people are used to. Saying that people would be turned off by it is stupid, because no one ever complained the action in UFC was too hard to follow because it was in an Octagon, and not a boxing ring like PRIDE/boxing. TNA never used the ring as a trademark like UFC did, so it just ended up being a cosmetic difference that they pretty much ignored. They never did things like having six-way tag matches or something to bring the ring into play. In a way the six-sided ring was a Chekov's Gun - they either had to ditch it, or showcase it. When this happened to me, I always would spend a few minutes running the ropes before the shows, and by then I was ok. The biggest thing to throw me off during a match isn't so much size or rope style but how much spring it has. I've been in some rings where I went to run across and damn near did a tope out of the ring. I always made sure to arrive at shows as early as possible, for the sole purpose of familiarizing myself with the ring. I always looked to see what the suspension system was (plywood/planks/spring/wood/metal), and what kind of ropes there were. I climbed in and ran a few simple drills, took bumps, and ran the ropes. There is actually a technique to running the ropes, and once you familiarize yourself with a ring, it is easy to adapt. I always found it harder to adapt to a bigger ring, than a smaller. There were a few times where I worked in a 20x20, and that was funkier than going from a 16x16 to a 14x14. I was never a guy that did a lot of stuff with the ropes (was heavyweight, not a flippy) so ropes didn't really bother me, unless they were just shitty. Loose cable ropes suck. I was always able to adapt to smaller rings by working more corner-to-corner, rather than side-to-side. You always want to take a bump as close to the center as possible, so sometimes it is hard to do that in a smaller ring without going corner to corner. I always had more trouble working in venues with low ceilings, despite not being a flyer. I worked a fair amount of shows at bars/nightclubs that had maybe 8ft of clearance from the mat to the ceiling. Some promoters that regularly ran venues like that built or rented shorter rings.

Found this today cleaning

I think the six-sided ring was a very good start on a road TNA stopped trying to travel. That being "something that looks different than any pro wrestling that has been on U.S. tv. before." Abandoning it, and going with their undefined, constantly shifting blend of WWE, ECW, and WCW doomed what little chance they had to take off, imo. And dropping the six-sided ring was a symptom of that.

Rotten is like a Dollar Tree Paul Heyman.

This was a pretty fun show overall. Good follow up to Raw. The only segment I thought was weak was the divas thanks to Nattie on commentary. AJ and Naomi were fine in the ring, but I couldn't tell what Nattie was going for out there. She had some very heelish talking points even though she's supposed to be the face, and it sounded like even she didn't know what her character's motivation was supposed to be. JBL and Cole tried their best to hold it together, but Nattie just kept talking and talking... "She's a title holder, I'm a champion." *shudder* The gauntlet match was well done. Mostly served as a jobber execution, but Kofi and Ziggler had some good babyface comebacks. Ziggler's demise was particularly fun. I don't know who decided to bring back the running single leg dropkick, but between Rollins, Cesaro, Bryan, and Naomi, there have been some pretty nasty ones flying around lately. That torpedo spear on the outside... Well, the .gif covers it nicely. HHH's follow up segment was pretty good too. He's putting his cerebral assassin skills to good use coming off as a guy who's biding his time for some real revenge and has no interest in letting an incompetent stooge like Vickie screw it up with a sloppy, unimaginative plan. Ryback's segment was hilarious. "Paul Heyman told me earlier you wouldn't sign a little kids' autograph" is some high-quality transparently phony pro wrestling heel character motivation. Yelling "I hate bullies" along with the 3 count was the icing on the cake. The main event 6-man was an excellent tv main, and probably one of The Shield's best, which actually covers a lot of ground towards the end of their first year. Strong teamwork by both sides, and much better structure with Bryan as the ace and the Usos as the young lions. There were some great individual spots like Bryan snatching Rollins on the leap frog attempt and Rollins' lightning enzuigiri to one of the Usos. The heat segments on each Uso went just the right amount of time, and the finish was appropriately heated. Classic Bryan hot-tag run on Ambrose, followed by a nice dive sequence to get Rollins and Reigns out of the way, Then there was the beautiful subtlety in the finish where the Usos hit the double superkick to give them a bit of a rub by being directly involved, but not taking away from Bryan who hit the long-setup variety running knee in true superstar fashion. Everyone came out looking great.

The raft scene alone elevates The Burning to classic levels. That, and Jason Alexander with hair as a smart-aleck camper.

I've been in both rings, and this is 100% true. I had been in hundreds of indy rings of various quality, but when I worked in an old WCW ring I was blown away by how short the ropes were, and it threw me off just running ropes and stuff. Also, WCW rings (and from what I see on television, most lucha rings) have cable ropes - where the rope is a steel cable run thru a garden-hose type of cover. WWE rings use a regular rope with a latex/acrylic type of coating. The difference in tension between the two is immense. Cables are much tighter, and have a spring-like quality, while ropes have a lot more elasticity and "wobble" more. Another difference is that WWE rings are 20x20... and most other rings are not. WCW rings were 18x18, I believe ECW were 16x16. Most indy rings are 16x16... although I have worked in 14x14 many times, as well as some rings that had ridiculously tall/short aprons.

That '60s book looks like something I'll be getting ahold of. Eyes Without A Face should be on everyone's list this year if you haven't seen it. It got a Criterion release so hopefully shouldn't be too hard to find. So wanted to be Eddie Furlong's character in Brainscan when I was a kid, with tons of metal and horror shit and that girl next door haha. I looked it up and John Flynn also directed The Outfit, Lock Up, and Rolling Thunder (!).

Yes, it's like he's a Funky Winkerbean character.

Hmm, what could he possibly have to offer that WWE would want their wrestlers to emulate? I'm stumped.

Well then, that's something else entirely. It does not seem so bad after all with those circumstances. Of course, I remember earlier today some random dude on ESPN complaining about the matchup and he did not say a word about it not being the original game. I am so not surprised someone on ESPN would make that sort of error, as that's what I expect from the alleged Worldwide Leader in Sports.

Fuck you J.T., I'm game.

This dude, world champ 3-5 years. Don't fuck this up Triple H. Just don't.

GTA Online cannot start soon enough. I think I am going to watch one violent crime movie a night while I am on shift. I think tonight's feature will be Heat since I have talked it up so much.

Opie was the worst though. Tig shoots his wife in the back of the head and they wrestle for a little bit and then he is like, eh, it is cool. That part has always pissed me off and I was glad when he got got.

http://comicsalliance.com/dc-comics-new-52-batwoman-harley-quinn-dan-didio-editorial/

Got my tickets today for KU vs Duke in the United Center. Wiggins vs Parker. Can't wait.

This ain't the place to advertise your shitty websites.

Cena thing? The stories have been flying around for years, but Kenny Doane famously talked about it after news of Cena's divorce hit. He blames it for ruining his career. Basically. he found out what was going on, complained to management, they said they'd handle it and then he vanished off of TV soon after. Well, to be fair, they did handle it. Maybe not the way he'd hoped they would.

Just switched back to Trevor and he had 2 stars and was shouting "It was self-defense!"

Bellator had two welterweight title shots up for grabs tonight (season 8 finals, season 9 opening round). In 2 hours and 15 minutes, they never mentioned Ben Askren -- you know, their current champ -- once. Pretty telling.

Ryder might be the most unlikable face of all time. Fuck no, actually that's The Miz. But Ryder is up there.

If memory serves me correctly, MistiCara has been backstage at Arena Mexico visiting at times when he was at home injured. I may be incorrect in that, because I know that Del Rio has been back, and I may have crossed up stories. As far as "Mistico" returning to Mexico, I would think that AAA would throw a ton of money at him for a lot less dates. However, Mistico has very influential family in the CMLL office, and a return there would seem like a bigger deal, I think. CMLL definitely owns the "Mistico" name & gimmick, as they have Mistico II running around now. However, at the time of the signing there were reports that CMLL also trademarked the "Sin Cara" name in Mexico, which would keep him from using either name south of the border unless in CMLL. One would think the money angle in a return to Mexico would be MistiCara returning to feud with MistiClone, perhaps alongside former rival (and legit BFF) Averno. It seems silly for the WWE to bend over backwards to adjust to his style when it's Sin Cara who should have adapted his style to the WWE. Bringing people who can work a lucha style will only get him so far. I kinda agree, at least in the sense that Sin Cara seems to have done very little to make the transition easier on himself. But..... if your product isn't really suited to the lucha style and you don't have anyone on the roster who knows how to take his offense and make it look good AND bringing in guys who can work the lucha style isn't a priority AND neither you nor he want him to go to developmental and be torn down and retrained from scratch..... .... then, maybe, you don't really need to sign said luchador in the first place? I think Mistico could have done more to help himself integrate into the company style, but it's really head-scratching the way he was handled. I think he could still have gotten over if he hadn't been so prone to injuries and botches, but it's not a huge surprise to me that he failed. Well, I have a firm belief that the folks in WWE are probably like most other Americans in the wrestling biz, and "lucha style" is a stereotype for "can't work". In my experience, folks that have no interest in lucha think it is just a bunch of flippy bullshit with no psychology, and a bunch of dumb Mexicans working the right. It is pretty much an accepted fact that WWE had offered Averno a deal to come in as an opponent for Mistico, but that something happened that killed the deal. But, it wouldn't surprise me if they looked at the roster in development and said "We have Del Rio, Primo Colon, Sicodelico Jr, Epico & Hunico in development... we don't need anyone else to work with Mistico."... not that any of those guys ever worked with Mistico. Also, supposedly Mistico had a tryout w/ WWE a year prior when WWE was in California where he worked w/ Super Crazy, and they offered him a development deal, and Mistico turned it down. The prevailing thought was that Mistico was making enough headlining for CMLL that he had no interest in a development deal. So, supposedly a condition when he actually signed was that he got a deal without a development clause... meaning they paid him his full pay even if he was booked in development. That seems like something that would piss off the vets, a a violation of an unwritten rule, no? I can see a guy like JBL or whomever just burying the guy in the lockerroom for this kinda "primadonna" stuff, and Mistico getting the "rep" as having an attitude before he even worked his first match. Well, if the rumor was true that Mistico wanted no part of taking the paycut to go to development, the office would probably balk at paying a guy like he was on the roster, if he wasn't actually on the roster. If HHH was the guy really high on Mistico, as has been said, I can totally see him signing Mistico to the full deal, and then Vince deciding to bury the kid to make an example for everyone else. This is a bad argument IMHO, because it wasn't like Rey Jr. was working strictly lucha shows his entire career, and then popped up in WWE one day and started having great matches with Renee Dupree. Rey Jr built his name by working Juvi & Psicosis all over Mexico & Japan, before working almost exclusively with those guys in ECW too. Then Rey branched out a bit and worked some tags, before jumping to WCW and working almost exclusively (at first) with the internationally experienced Dean Malenko... before working again with Juvi & Psicosis. In a way, the first "luchador" to make the transition from lucha to US style was Konnan, as he kinda came into ECW with a lot of fanfare, but mixed or poor results. Then Konnan made the jump to WCW and got the big push to the US title as the "Mexican Heavyweight Champion" before getting lost in the Dungeon of Doom. At that point, WCW started bringing in more and more luchadors to work with Rey/Juvi/Psic (booked thru Konnan's Promo Azteca, and familiar with those guys), and started mixing in some of the non-lucha cruiserweights, like Malenko, Chavo Jr, Jericho, Mr. JL, Kidman, Alex Wright, etc. WWE kinda had the right idea to bring in Mistico's top rival to make Sin Cara look as good as possible, but when they didn't pull the trigger on Averno, the whole Sin Cara experiment was doomed to fail.

In America, you tie up hairdresser naked. #yakov

The way he came into the WWE is akin to a football player being traded and showing up for the first game without going through training camp. And not knowing English.

How much is 1000 roubles. Seriously, I can't make up my mind on this without knowing.

Sabin could be mildly entertaining if they had him get all egotistical and Al Bundy-esque. He has to take up a job as a shoe salesman to make ends meet and Velvet Sky ends up really Peggy Bundyish. "Yup, I was world champion once, they all chanted Hail Sabin back then."

Buy PS3s you cretins. The Legacy if Tenpenny will live on as I murder everyone between me and you.

Was Ultimo's run really any worse than Mistico's (so far)?

Are you kidding? With the hair he looks like a bulked up Predator. They should give him the helmet and a trophy room of alien species that got their wigs split.

What would happen if they used that camera to film a Great Khali match? Would time completely stop?

What does it look like without any Pogs on it?

As an amusing anecdote, Mr. Nick Bockwinkel will walk into the general lockerroom, even if he has his own dressing room, and not only shake everyone's hand, he introduces himself to each and every individual and asks their (often) gobsmacked names. The man is a super class act, and defines not only the honorific of "world champion" but he IS his gimmick. I have seen him treat the lowliest of indy scum workers (myself included) as you would think he would treat a seasoned veteran of ring and road. honored, RAF

Gismo's in a better place. A place where he won't get dressed up in terrible outfits against his will.

TWD is like watching WWE but every wrestler is The Miz

Just for BigFresh, it's Crazy Mary Dobson like you've never seen her before:

"We're taking you bitches hostage"

Id like to nominate a random match that came up in my Youtube likes, a match between my 2 favourites, Center stage 1991 - Pillman vs. Cactus. A sub 7 minute match that is one of the most watchable things I have seen in a long time, and going by the thread title, I have never seen pimped!

I hope evil owner Dixie uses her resources to fight AJ by hiring more washed up MMA fighters. Ken Shamrock and Tank Abbott trying to chase down AJ would be amazing.

Serge vs. Bob Carter for control of the company at BFG '14.

I don't have a list of favorites, but here's a site I have bookmarked with tons of good ones - http://www.critcononline.com/video_companies_cover_art.htm