Greggulator

Adding to that is a piece from the NY Times about the religious implications of the movie.

I have no idea what any of this means!

Harold Ramis is a hero to anyone with just a passing interest in comedy. Such an amazing talent. Ghostbusters, Caddyshack and Vacation were (and are) huge influences on my taste. I think his crowning achievement is Groundhog Day. So does Jonah Goldberg of National Review, of all places. This was a cover story in 2005. It talks about how the movie touches on so many important themes of immortality and religion and the ultimate point that all of us are redeemable. It's one of the best movies of all-time.

For folks complaining about the ending of last night's match: 1) You seriously think Daniel Bryan winning the belt -- and concluding his epic struggle -- at Elimination Chamber is the way to go? 2) You seriously think Bryan losing cleanly to a RKO is the way to go, too? Because that essentially cuts his legs out and ends the story. They didn't do that and haven't done that. How many clean losses has he taken since SummerSlam? The only one I can think of is against Bray, which only made that dude's career and sets him up as a threat to Bryan once he does win the belt. Dude's gotta get shmozzed until he gets through all of the obstacles. That's how the story works. Bryan had a distraction from Bray, who saw a chance to manipulate Daniel to do his own bidding by convincing him "The Machine" wouldn't let him win/beating him into submission. That only made Bryan more popular.

Harper/Cesaro is going to change the world's magnetic fields.

I like how its supposed to be bullet proof yet can pop out with the simplest of ease. The structural integrity of the glass itself isn't the problem. It may be bulletproof. However, Seamus' Brogue Kick certainly packs the power of a Howitzer so it SHOULD crack the glass. But the issue is with the caulking/welding used to keep the glass in place. That's where there is potential litigation, as far as I'm concerned.

I loved the spot where Cesaro did the European Uppercut onto the plexiglass with Seamus behind the covering and it didn't work!

Bryan's too busy getting buried to sell the arm.

Eddie held the secondary title. The big deal was Benoit beating Shawn and taking the title from HHH. That's how it works.

I'd love to know what this "bad booking" of the main event actually was. 1) Was it John Cena getting taken out by The Wyatt Family? Because that rules. World beater Bray Wyatt took out Daniel Bryan and The Shield and now wants to ensure his dominance by destroying the one man everyone calls a hero. 2) Was it an injured Daniel Bryan coming into the match hurt, entering third, dominating several segments in it, getting a pinfall, kicking out of Randy Orton's finisher, getting a virtual visual fall and only losing because his former best friend-turned-corporate goon cost him the match? Because that was great, too. I guess you'd rather have Randy Orton beat Cena and Bryan cleanly? Or am I missing something. Having Daniel Bryan win on at a set-up PPV is the absolute dumbest thing in the world. That's not how it works.

You know that spot in tag matches where the face makes the hot tag at the same time the heel makes a tag to his corner? Would the sun rise from the west and set in the east if the heel got the upper-hand ever in that situation?

Well, can we just collectively wait for Bryan to not win the belt at WrestleMania before we complain about it? Also, did I miss the PDF of Batista's contract floating around guaranteeing him a title win at WM? Because everyone's acting like that's this official thing as opposed to something they read fourth hand that was originally reported by Dave "PS1" Meltzer.

The IWC's dream of "Daniel Bryan wins the title at the first PPV after SummerSlam and never loses it afterwards" is alive in Portland.

And, oh yes, the Wade Barret stuff was incredible. I loved him telling people they would end up homeless by ordering the WWE Network.

Just got back home from watching it at a Corporate Sports Bar: 1) Big E/Swagger was really good. Dudes laid into each other. Zeb blaming Big E for global climate change was a high water mark. The We The People faction are easy to turn face, since Zeb is everyone's lovable insane family member. 2) You will never find anyone who hates The NAO more than yours truly. I hated them in the 90s. I hate them now. But they did some good craft old heel stooging in this tonight. The best case scenario is for The Usos to get their big win in the opening match of WrestleMania or along those lines. Jimmy and Jey rule. Their pre-match promo sounded pretty good from what I could hear of it. There's a nice little chase for those belts coming up. 3) I really want to like Titus and Darren. But they just don't have it. This match wasn't terrible but it was just there. Titus would work great in an announcer type role. The dude has great charisma and a fantastic look but just the general art of storytelling is something that he doesn't have. He'd be a great color commentary heel, though. 4) SHIELD VS. WYATTS. Someone on Twitter said the following about this match: If I wanted to show someone why I like wrestling, I would show them this feud and match. That's it, right there. This was the best match since The Rhodes Boys beat The Shield. This was just a fantastic match in all aspects of professional wrestling. When does a match ever START with a "This Is Awesome?" chant? I loves them squaring off like they did for the past few weeks with Reigns and Rollins both trying to cool down hothead Ambrose so they can start things the way they want to. Loved Ambrose snapping and the insane brawl starting things off. And then there was just too much going on in that match to even keep track of. EVERYONE looked great and brought their best. Great job by Michael Cole spelling out the poetry of the end of the match -- Roman Reigns, the stud of The Shield, had to fend off the numbers game that launched his alliance to greatness and, by virtue, his shot at superstardom. And he fought valiantly like a soldier. I loved Harper taking The Spear -- of course he'd sacrifice himself for his master, but at the same time, that's another Shield trademark -- leading to the end. That's wrestling right there. I saw someone in here have a critique about Rollins table bump. What I loved about it is that it WAS simple. It was a double chokeslam through a table. It was nothing compared to Foley's Hell In A Cell spot, or like 50,000 ECW things. Heck, it didn't even look as nasty as Batista putting ADR through a table a few weeks ago. But all of the guys in this match are so incredibly skilled and the match was so epic that a fairly simple bump convincingly looked like death. They made us believe -- that's the magic of suspending disbelief and the con. This was an amazing match. If this is the last stand of The Shield, thank you for the 18-ish months. These guys are really responsible for reinventing the WWE in a lot of great ways. All three of those guys are absolute studs. And The Wyatt Family's Reign of Terror just kicked into the next gear. 5) AJ/Camron -- AJ's a miracle worker. She was in what's arguably the worst spot anyone has ever been in after a match. She was in a match against someone who is a total scrub immediately after one of the best matches of the decade that had the crowd absolutely electric. She still somehow managed to do something pretty compelling. I was at a bar so it was hard to hear if the crowd completely crapped on that match but good on her for trying to get something out of Cameron, who was awful. We really don't appreciate AJ enough. 6) Batista/ADR -- I loved ADR's dupe job. Great friggin' stuff. Batista's just awful. He was when he was in his prime. He had a good few weeks at the end of his run when he finally found a compelling character as the Hollywood Star guy. But man oh man he's just awful. I liked the idea of the match, though. ADR did all of the work and Batista just had to sell a bit before hitting a few things. 7) ELIMINATION CHAMBER -- This friggin' ruled. It dawned on me before this that I have never actually seen an Elimination Chamber match. This was so great and had so many awesome moments. Randy Orton was king sized in this. I loved him looking like a petulant brat in the holding pen. Him locking himself IN his chamber to avoid a beating is an amazing stall spot. Seamus kicking down the partition to get at him was such an awesome payoff. The end of the match was so well done, too. As far as the booking -- really? People are complaining about this? There is no way Daniel Bryan should win the title at the set-up PPV. He wins it at either WrestleMania or, at WM, he gets through one of the obstacles along his way of winning it in the spring/summer and culminates his chase. But being pissy-pants because he didn't win tonight is just really, really shortsighted. This came in looking like a two match PPV. It was actually a three match affair, since Big E/Swagger was really good. But the two must-see matches somehow passed that.

I'll be sad that we may no longer have The Shield as we know it in our lives after tonight. But the whole part of alliances and stables is for them to eventually break up. The Shield's arc has been terrific. They came in kayfabe as three rookies no one knew who were world beaters because they sacrificed for each other, had great teamwork and came in knowing a lot of heel trickery. It took a while for anyone to crack their code. The first one who did was Daniel Bryan, and that launched him to where he is now. Then came The Rhodes Boys in two of the best matches of the decade. But that's it. And now Roman's dominance has caused the already unstable Dean to become really jealous, with Rollins caught in the middle. It's so great. One of the biggest missed opportunities in wrestling history was how the Four Horsemen ended. They always had some great stuff when members left. Ole leaving with Lex as the new protege was great stuff. Barry's heel turn to join at the expense of Lex was even better. But the business as it was, we never got to see Tully try and lead a coup on Flair or something along those lines. That would have been the ultimate way to end everything. Instead, it sort of just died out once Tully/Arn left and JJ was written out for Hiro Matsuda. It morphed into Flair/Steamboat which obviously was great but Arn and JJ trying to play peacemaker between Tully trying to get what was rightfully with Tony Schiavonne in the middle would have been the best.

I really wouldn't mind if the next 10 years of the WWE was based around The Wyatt Family.

I think Armageddon tonight will determine how they run the next few weeks. I know Bray/Cena was originally in the works but the WWE can place Cena against anyone and it will be a huge deal. They can even run a quick Cena vs. Christian or Cena vs. Seamus program or even Cena/Titus or something like that. It would end up as a really good match and would have the same amount of build Bray/Cena would. They haven't done anything with it beyond The Wyatts attack Cena twice. I was hoping they would do something nuts like destroy Hogan on Raw leading to Cena seeking revenge, but they're not going that way so Hogan can host (and probably not have to take a bump.) But if this match is half as good as the build, they should just continue down this path for a another few weeks. They have enough matchups between those dudes in various singles and tag formations to carry the time. An anarchic brawl at WM would tear the house down. Then after WM, they can start the big Roman Reigns singles run. That might be the story of the year -- how well does Roman do in his run and how far can he go?

Rowan was pretty good in NXT, started off fine in WWE, and is now very good at what he's there to do. He looks like a lunatic who makes his stuff look really credible. I love his nasty bearhug and when he takes his fists and rams it in people's faces. He's also very good as The Wyatts weak link and takes stuff very well. But, yeah, the dude is working next to Luke Harper who is one of the three best workers in the company and a dude who is the next Undertaker. It's hard to stand out in that pack. However, he has the benefit of wearing a sheep's mask that somehow looks more unsettling the longer he keeps it part of the persona.

Bock rules. I loved how at the end of his career he was essentially Jack Nicklaus as the veteran everyone could get behind.

And screw anyone hating on the Dance Off. That RULED. "My boopsy." Summer Rae's bump was really crazy, too. I will be a happy man if they run the same exact match they did in NXT at WrestleMania. That was one of the best matches last year. And D-Young was fine on commentary. He wasn't great but there have been so many guys worse than him over the years. He's a nice guy -- he wants to beat Titus to get revenge on him, but why does he want Titus to suffer afterwards? You do what you have to do and then move on with life. Makes sense to me.

I really liked Bryan/Swagger a lot. Jack targeting the shoulder using his strength and amateur acumen was great. And Bryan was awesome at selling his arm and stealing a decisive win with the knee. I also loved his look of "Awww, man" while Cesaro had the gloating smirk in the ring. I also loved Cesaro getting into. the ring while Vicki was still making her announcement -- he knew what was coming. Cesaro reminds me a ton of Regal in this match with all his arm work. It's obviously different work but the dickishness of Cesaro is pure Master Regal. I love the "momentum swing" of when Zeb and Swagger got kicked out -- just like when a coach/player gets a T in basketball. The cutaway to Big E and Swagger going at it was terrific. I know most people think the APP pushing is overbearing. But using in that fashion is such an awesome way to incorporate storytelling and their marketing. Big E and Swagger's issue gets advanced AND they add some flavor to an undercard match that hasn't had much of a build. I'm not one of mocking the App pushing. They're a business. What do you expect? Back to the match -- Cesaro did so many great things in this. I loved his little shove of Bryan so Daniel landed on his shoulder on the floor. Cesaro does SO many little things and does them so much better than anyone else. That's why he reminds me of Regal so much. Great, great, great stuff. Bryan and Cesaro have a PPV match in them that's going to be outstanding. "There isn't much left to say, is there?" Man, Wyatts vs. Shield has been historically good. The presentation of the final interview was brilliant. It's just so unique and unlike anything else, with Bray preaching in his chair, Rowan holding the lantern and Harper looming in the background. If I'm the WWE, I'd actually be worried about Bray leaving... to Hollywood. The guy has it and has it in spades. The commercial break transition with him doing his back-bend was great. Harper's sell after that sunset flip powerbomb deal from Goldie (!) was friggin' great. That match was just amazing. It's going to fall under-the-radar since it's part of the build. But between this and their match with Los Matadores on Main Event, The Wyatts have had two of my favorite matches of the year. Erik Rowan needs a ton more credit than he gets. The guy is fantastic. I also love how Bray is so opportunistic -- he comes in for limited doses, but when he does, he's going to just punish the hell out of everyone in the path. I can't even imagine what Wyatts vs. Shield is going to look like.

I haven't done that in a long time. Send me a DM and I'll give you some tips about it. Not sure who is running it but I can check it out for you.

I think Corey Graves just needs a little something more to get him there. He's got to get a little bigger with his moves to make them look special. He's got to bump just a little bit bigger. And he has to really focus on what his character is about and how to make it shine. It's a bit jumbled right now. Is he a tattoo loving punk? Is he a new age pretty boy? There's no reason for me to like him or hate him right now. It's just flat. He's well-spoken and knows how to talk. But he just has to really form his motivation a bit more right now as to who he is and why he does what he does. If they were to make him a new age pretty boy and give him someone like Sasha Banks (or someone else they have in development) as his Baby Doll, he could really end up in a decent spot. I hated The Ascension for a while but have come around to them recently. The reason is because they have a reason. They just want to be the best tag team in NXT, take on all challengers, and destroy all in their path. They don't need to do anything else but that to work right now. They're just a really good tag team.

This is some fan video someone made for The Shield/Wyatt feud. It's AWESOME. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9X3OXPQauU