piranesi

Jack Clark is astoundingly stupid. And when he's not being stupid, he's incredibly boring. Either of those should be fireable offenses in broadcasting.

Wait, THE Space Baby? Because that's a huge get.

I may be PMing you soon about a fantastic entpreneurial venture I'm setting up that will fix a lot of what's wrong with the world and fulfill all your dreams with just a little up-front investment. Could you maybe just tell me now what some of your dreams are and I'll see if your vision matches up with what we're doing. If it does...then you can get in on this. Let's hope!

Tell it to Sting.

Say what you will about Cena-as-Hulk, but he does things Hulk would never do, like taking time in his promos to plug the other guy's merchandise or get people to chant the other guy's catch phrase. The thought to do that could not have materialized in Hogan's brain.

I'm such a mark. Brock absolutely worked my stupid mark self into caring about this as something other than a showcase for Heyman being awesome. And as much as I hate to point it out, I might as well because someone else will anyway: Note I wrote that Brock worked me into caring about this. Not "Punk and Brock" worked me into caring about this. I love Punk. But in this he's doing the same stuff he always does, which is fine...but he's been doing it for years now and the effect is wearing off. Kind of shockingly, Brock made this angle work

Better than that. If you're a Punk fan, it did the only thing a heel promo really needs to do...make you mark the fuck out to see your boy prove how tough he is in a fake fight $$$$$$$$$ON. PAY. PER. VIEW$$$$$$$$$! Like, make it matter if he goes over or not...not just how good the match is. My little inner Punk fan wanna see him wiiiiiiin now. Normally I could give a fuck a long as the match is good. But IWANNAHIMWIIIIIIIIIN!!!!!!!

Is the short guy the lead singer? Damn he's good. Good stuff

More of the laaaaadies (and one crossdressing dude):

More of my type:

I know Freddie King is a blues guy, but this song is Funk as anything:

/Thread Also this: I know these are white chicks from Queens. But this song is fucking awesome. All songs should end with a spoken monolog: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDHHm1mKZks I feel like somehow it should be playing in a David Lynch movie I haven't seen yet. Similar rough sounding mixes: Yeah. I have a type.

His influence on the stuffing has been really evident the past week. He must have gotten in touch with Vince through mutual friend Amanda Bynes

I was using one of those as late as 1991 to get a few basic cable channels in my dorm room. Thankfully it worked and I was able to find out that Gerardo likes his sushi raw(?)...over and over andover again. That same great poet also taught me that in a pinch, you can rhyme "parents" with "appearance." And that's what I learned in college. Thanks, early 90s!

In that gear he looks like mini-Nash.

[clueless American]Is he any good? Better than Suarez?[/clueless American] not me, I swear!

Protectiveness? He used Elizabeth as a human shield all the time. He protected her from Jimmy Hart and Honky. Christ knows what those two deviants were going to do with her. Also, the fact that she lived in a system, the WWF, where women could be tranferred as property through the winning/losing of a match, or where a freak like George Steele could apparently claim them rightfully (and baby-face-edly) based only on the level and purity of his physical desire meant she was in constant danger. The fact that she lived through the decade is a testement to Randy's vigilance.

This is a basic problem with wrestling heel/face logic. Every time someone turns face (apparently with the exception of Dolph Ziggler) they gain some superpowers or super-ability-to-kick-out. Especially the top babyfaces. They've been Supermen for a long time. You become a face, you get some kind fo Hulk-up powerup. Turning face is like taking a PED. Meanwhile the heels are fallible, and so have to work harder and be more cunning. But given this, wouldn't "turning face" be the ultimate heel move? You suddenly get this huge advantage you didn't have before (super-heart?). I think that's why a lot of smarks cheer heels. There's a way in which the Faces, if they are kayfabe-conscious, are pulling off a scam that makes them the ultimate heels...and a heel who doesn't exploit that becomes somehow enobled by not taking the easy way out. I know it's mixing kayfabe logic and non-kayfabe logic...but it's hard not to nowadays when guys like Cena and Punk want their character to be an extension of their backstage image. I was thinking something like this the other day when I was watching Chuck Klosterman talk about his new book, which is about evil in popular culture. Part of it is about why people feel drawn to villains. One thing he pointed out was that actors always say the villain roles are more "interesting" but he thinks what they really mean is that those characters are more real. They are flawed and human. I think this absolutely applies to wrestling. The traditional super hero character (Cena or Hogan being the obvious examples) aren't real human beings. We're not perfectly moral and we don't always do the right thing. We're complicated. Randy Savage was fascinating, a ball of energy and neuroses and excitement. CM Punk is thoughtful and principled and stubborn. They're great characters, in a way that Hogan and Cena are not. Savage especially. He was such a great combination of everything that is powerful and admirable but also dangerous about masculinity. Protectiveness (but also jealousy), energy (but also violence), loyalty (but also paranoia) the potential to direct rigtheous anger (or irrational selfishness) into action (but sometimes without thought or strategy). All this in the mid 80s, just at the time when masculinity was being generally derided as primitive and scary. Dude is a Zizek essay waiting to be written.

The great thing about the HBO one, other than the fact that it usually meant that MIDNIGHT MADNESS was about to come on, is how rooted it is in the real world compared to the others. Instead of phantasmagoric galactic nonsense just spewing random colors and lights, it tells a story (sort of) of something that actually happened. HBO or Echostar or whoever shot a satellite up into orbit, and that moment...happening way above all those little people and lights in the below, changed television. So We see an object that represents something that is essential to what HBO is...a satellite. That's what that giant HBO stands for. The moment that they put that first satellite in orbit and fired it up. It starts in the real world and never really leaves it...Yes, it's an exaggeration, a mythology. But it's rooted in a real moment that defined this company and changed the cultural landscape. It's quasi-historical and filled with pride. It says: "We put this thing up there in space and now we have a chance to do something amazing...show you boobs on DREAM ON while your parents are at work."

I find that site oddly comforting. Like, whatever happens, however badly I fail...just totally tank in life and career...there's always the option to just turn off completely and sink right in there...and apparently it's not so bad if you got nothing left. Like, if the worst it could get is being a gross Walmart dude shoveling cheez whiz down and watching judge Judy and walking aorund with some weird pet or creepy collectibles...it's kind of like saying the worst it could get as a mouse is being a mouse in a cage being fed crack and cake until explodes. Like, the other healthier mice...were they that much more fulfilled? Did they make the mouse world that much better? It's kind of liberating...like instead of seeing life as this tightrope you have to walk suspended over a rocky canyon where failure = death, it's like you have to walk a tightrope suspended over a canyon of cheap dvds and processed snack food. It's still tense and intense because all your success and dreams are at stake. But If you fall...you eat little white powder donuts and listen to Journey guilt free until you die. Like that's your punishment for failure. I mean, I intend to make a major difference in the cultural life of this planet...but, you know...there's a decent chance at this point that I won't...and that other thing could work too.

I've only included up to 2000, because things had already started to get crass by then. But the whole list can be found here: http://www.discovery.ca/article.aspx?aid=44961 The ones from like 1989 to 1993 or so were the best in my memory. Back then there was a lot of Stan Waterman, Rodney Fox, and Ron and Valery Taylor...and they were awesome. Casual and cool and as much about the ocean itself as about sharks...and no CGI...huh, imagine that?

The early Shark Weeks were so great. They were, like, grainy old documentaries featuring awesome shirtless Australian dudes whose lives consisted of floating around taking notes about awesome sharks. I didn't even really watch for the sharks, but for the amazing fantasy lifestyle of the "field marine biologist" who just soaks up sun and takes pictures of stuff and looks at sonar screens and labelling fish. But that was back when channels like Discovery and History were about, like, science stuff and history stuff.

Now you're a mark for electric light. Pathetic.

That's a baby sloth? I thought it was Kurt Angle. falling asleep during a field sobriety test.

mark.