twiztor

A little bit different format here. I listed them in chronological order, but ranked them instead. NR = No Rating, as i haven't seen enough of the show to form an opinion: Live Action: The Batman / Batman & Robin (the 1940s serials) - 2/5. fine for what they are, but not my bag. i only watched the first half o the first serial and didn't feel the need to continue. Batman (1966) - 5/5. i LOVE this show. the tongue-in-cheek zaniness is the exact point, and i'm saddened that so many people miss the fun inherent in the concept of a grown man dressing as a bat to sock! pow! thwack! themed bad guys in the face. Gotham (2014) - NR Animated: Adventures of Batman (1968) - 3/5. This is Batman and the Casey Kasem Robin seen on Scooby-Doo and SuperFriends as well. It's goofy but fun. The New Adventures of Batman (1977) - 3/5. this brings back Adam West & Burt Ward to the role. It's fine. It's probably worse than the prior series, but the novelty of having West & Ward back works for me. Notable for introducing Bat-Mite. Batman: TAS (1992) - 5/5. along with X-Men TAS, THE staple of my childhood TV viewing habits. The Batman (2004) - 1/5. hated the art style. Batman: The Brave and the Bold (2008) - 5/5. this series is so much FUN. Batman is usually the straight man surrounded by so much hijinks and absurdity, and it works wonders. Special shoutout to Aquaman, who is Outrageous!-ly good Beware the Batman (2013) - NR. i really can't get down with computer animated series, so i never watched this. Batman: Caped Crusader (2024) - NR. i didn't even know this existed, but am interested in checking it out.

Here's how i would rank them. Not on discord enough to even know this poll was happening. And obviously i'm a month late here on the board, so i'm not paying close enough attention. Will try to make a Batman series ranking list later this afternoon, but i haven't seen everything, so will probably forget some stuff. not ranked: The Batman (2022) as i haven't seen it and don't plan to. 11. Batman vs. Superman (2016). completely awful. Zach Snyder is a hack. 10. Batman and Robin (1997). also completely awful, in the totally opposite way. 9. Dark Knight Rises (2012). this was just one huge plot hole and i hate watched my way all the way through 8. Lego Batman Movie (2017). just felt underwhelming. I loved the Lego Movie, FWIW 7. Batman Begins (2005). promising, but it loses points because i hate the Tumbler/Bat Tank. 6. Batman (1989). enjoyed this but it is surpassed by its sequels 5. Batman (1966). campy in all the best ways. a slight step down from the series itself, however 4. The Dark Knight (2008). Heath Ledger's Joker completely changed the character for all media. That alone is enormous praise for a character/franchise that was almost 70 years old at that point. 3. Batman Returns (1992). Michelle Pfeiffer's Catwoman. 'nuff said! 2. Batman: Mask of the Phantasm (1993). this is peak Batman: TAS. 1. Batman Forever (1995). i fucking love this movie, and i am not ashamed in the slightest. Combines the zaniness of the '60s film with the moodiness of the '89 series. I totally get why people don't enjoy it, but it is the top of the heap as far as i'm concerned.

i played BOTW once, back in 2017 when it came out. Bold of you to assume that i have any remaining memories of locations or specifics about that game. [Spoiler: I Don't] But i think that is a pretty cool idea. Apropos of nothing, i do still have my homemade maps from the NES Zeldas from when i was a kid. Not sure if i still have the SNES/GB Zelda maps i made, but probably not.

where does everyone think he's headed? AEW?

legit surprised that Paddy beat Chandler. Paddy has looked like he's *just* out of his depth for the last couple fights of his i've seen, and i thought that Chandler, even on the downswing, would be too much for him. also good on Chase Hooper getting the W over Jim Miller. I like Miller, but it's gotta be time for him to bow out. I think it would have been a fitting ending to go out with the UFC300 bout, even with a Loss. I don't see him getting that kind of fan support again, and his skills will only deteriorate from here. i wonder how much he has left on his contract. As it stands now, a 17 year octagon career is damned impressive.

'promotion' gives off the wrong impression. It is closer to the "WCW International Sanctioning Body" or "WCW International Championship Committee" but yeah, it definitely was just referred to as the "Big Gold Belt" for a good chunk of time.

In your opinion, did TNA's licensing and use of the NWA Title from 2002-2007 give it World Title status again, or is it lost forever?

Yeah, the whole NWA Title history is wonky around that time. I just watched '93 WCW a year or so ago. Rick Rude carried and presented himself as the World Champ. But WCW clearly showed him and his title as second to their WCW Champ. I say this not to disparage him, and i fully believe they should have presented those titles as being on the same level, but they did not. WCW made it feel like it was more on par with the US Title, which is a huge disservice. That's why i mentioned that he was A champ instead of THE champ. There was still a higher tier, as presented on WCW TV. (i can't comment on the WCCW as i've not seen it) When WWE first enacted the brand split, each championship (WWE/SmackDown, World/Raw) were presented on vaguely equal platforms. [Personally, i continued to view them as the WWE and WCW belts, despite what WWE officially recognized, so i was amenable to that presentation.] I know they later got unified, and re-split, and then the Universal was created, and also there's the ECW and NXT championships to consider, but originally they were co-equal. I would recognize both as legitimate. I think Cena's reign, when the spinner belt was introduced, is when that became the semi-official #1 belt with the other brand's belt being bumped to #2. This is when i really began to lose interest, so if somebody has other views or thoughts i wouldn't argue them too much. And how the Universal and 2023 World belt factor in are best left for somebody else to elaborate. i read the question a little bit differently, but i fully agree with this take on Scott Hall. excellent worker, and his talent absolutely would have been perfect for a World Champion/top main eventer. His feuds, while not centered around the World Title generally, definitely gave credence to his opponents who would instead be at that level. Well said.

FYI tomorrow is Record Store Day. Hit up your local spot! I'm not really one for new/current releases, but it gives me a reason to dig through the bays and flesh out some of my collection. Good deals on LPs, CDs, and whatever else your favorite shops offer!

yes. a long, long, world tour.

Rick Rude was the "WCW International Champion", which was (to oversimply the situation) a placeholder belt for the NWA belt after WCW had established their own belt. So he was A champ, but not THE champ. I still think he's the best answer to the question. Scott Hall put out some great matches, but he didn't have much in the way of World Title feuds.

Kaz Hayashi is good every time he is on TV. But he's always in very forgettable segments, so he doesn't really get any benefit from being good in them. It's incredibly disappointing in that way. I know this can and has been said of my wrestlers, but i would have liked to see Kaz get a higher profile with the company. Maybe that's just a side effect of us never getting a post-Jung Dragons WCW. As an aside, everytime you type "Kaz", i think of Frankie Kazarian, who is featured fairly prominently in my 2007 TNA watch. A cursory search tells me they've never faced off, so now i am doubly disappointed. In fact, it looks like post-WCW, Hayashi does a short stint in WWE developmental (2002), then he returns to Japan and has only made one short return stateside (2005). this was indeed Crowbar's last match for WCW. I'm surprised he never got a run with WWE after this (looks like he did get a couple tryouts, notably one with "Prototype" John Cena). But i'm not too disappointed, as he was a highlight of the WWA run of shows. Surprisingly, he's largely irrelevant in TNA, as he only made a few appearances. I would have thought that would have been his bread and butter. there's every chance i mentioned this back when you covered it, but Shane Douglas did get a PPV win over Ric Flair at Slamboree 2000. I know they didn't have the headlining feud that Douglas probably envisioned, but he can always hang his hat on that win at least. I have no evidence of this, but i've always believed that he had that put into his contract. He based his entire ECW career around "Dick Flair" holding him back, so i can see him needing that as justification (either IRL or purely kayfabe, i don't know his personal thoughts). The match, like his entire WCW existence except tonight's promo apparently, sucked.

started playing the Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom last weekend. open world games are not what i typically enjoy playing. I'm more an old school platformer. But there's something about BOTW and TOTK that just feel so inviting. i start playing and hours just melt away. and all with very little frustration. Sure, there's some, but mostly i just get to relax and live in this world. Pure bliss. Definitely taking my time to enjoy this as much as possible. There's a reason this is the last game on my list to beat for the year. i don't want to feel rushed, or that something else is waiting for me. This gives me a chance to complete any and all side quests that compel me. So yeah, this will be my only game for the next 4-5-6 months. And i couldn't be happier.

this right here. if there is a hard line where a renumbering makes complete sense for both publishing and storyline sense, i have no issue (no pun intended) with it. more often, it is done as a sales tool. and that is where i have a problem with it. i'm sure it is mainly the collector in me, but having runs interrupted by renumberings are just a pain.

re: the cruiserweight tag team division, outside of Kidman/Rey, there are no established teams. But that may also show my unimpressedness of the whole 3 Count/Jung Dragons feud that spun its wheels for 6 months. i don't hate the IDEA of the division, but i feel like it should have had more of a build. And obviously it never goes anywhere, but it's hard to hold that against it in hindsight. I just think it started off with a shrug and never proved its reason to exist. i came in here to point out that the "E" spelling was correct, but decided to double check my own knowledge. Wikipedia shows no E. Cagematch shows the E. but his official facebook and twitter links do NOT include the E. edit: i just looked, and my records showed Clarke with an "E". just had to update them all. luckily, he only had a handful of non-tag team matches under that name.

this is only disappointing because, while i was fully expecting it to be cancelled/"postponed", i thought for sure we'd get a few weeks of fighters pulling out leading up to it.

NWA is celebrating their 200th episode of POWERRR! by airing on YouTube this week! I haven't watched an NWA event in over a year (since they were last on YouTube....this thread shows my last post about watching from February 2024). Haven't followed it at all, so i don't know any of the storylines and if there's any roster churn it will also be new to me. This is part of the Shockwave event. Not sure if it's the first part, the last part, or somewhere in between, but here we are! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19sQKTZLBlo 1 acceptable match, one pretty decent match, and one waste of time. All of the vignettes were very well done. next morning edit: further thoughts. 200 episodes is nothing to sneeze at, but outside of the YouTube graphic and description, there was really nothing past that. Reading the YT comments is all people praising that they made it to 200, and asking to bring the show back to YT. So it's kind of alarming that (1) people's reactions are glad to have the show available on said platform again, but (2) nobody is commenting on the show itself. And that's because it was just kind of a bog standard show. Nothing was fantastic, nothing stood out as "must see", nothing was special about this to celebrate the 200 episode milestone. And also (3) that there's no follow-up. Was this a one-off? Is NWA coming back to YT fulltime now? i don't even remember a teaser for any matches on next week's episode. I also don't know where to watch it. Is the Twitter deal over? continuing? back to the CW App?

yes, the days of rajahwwf are long gone. and then you look at how much hate was directed to ICW "smart marks" back in those days. compare that now with the absolute brain dead takes on twitter and reddit/sc. i'll take "benoit is the best wrestler of all time and he should be a multi time world champion. Hogan sux!" over "Tony Khan is killing the business because AEW SUX and WWE RULZ!" (and/or its inverse) any day.

Bowens' outfit gave me very strong He-Man vibes. that's a plus IMO.

^this. and like @supremebve said, there's no criteria and all entrants are created equal. There's no stats-based figures that can be argued: championship reigns, WrestleMania main events, ticket sales, sellouts at the Garden, tv ratings, ppv buys, employment longevity, merch sales, Make-A-Wish appearances, they're all effectively meaningless in this discussion. There is not a single accomplishment, or set of accomplishments, that anyone could point to and say "so-and-so did/didn't accomplish this, which cements their in/ex-clusion. ok, leaving aside your Freudian slip at the end there, and ALSO leaving out your dismissive take on Jim Powers, you're correct. But this is also a problem of WWE's own making. Their big push starting in 2004 of having 1-2 BIG names and 4-5 good sized names ate away at their top tiers. That, and their overreliance on stars of yesteryear rather than creating new stars over their history.

"extra high"? was that pun intentional? [edit: sorry, i just realized this was posted on pg 3 and we're on pg 5 now. i thought it was weird that nobody else had pointed that out.] my area has a town named "Lost Nation". it ended up as an answer in Trivial Pursuit. i assume it was some sort of carryover from the Native Americans that lived here, but i don't know for sure.

ahh, bummer. i legit thought you might get some enjoyment out of it. mea culpa. probably me overrating it because i'm trapped in the wrestling/music bubble and there's just so much trash. I certainly try to stay positive when writing these up. some make it easier than others (and then there's some, like Jillian Hall, that haunt me simply by existing!)

i must have not been in the right mindset while watching this, because while i didn't find any match BAD, i also didn't think any match was GREAT. Admittedly, i was distracted during Toni/Bayne, so won't comment on that, plus i skipped Jericho/Bandido and Garcia/Cole. Enjoyed the main event match, and seeing Swerve backed up by asskickers and finally taking the title off the unstoppable Moxley was fantastic. Excellent feel good moment to close the show............What's that? Moxley retained again due to outside interference? well that's just dumb. but i guess we need to have the big Blood & Guts match pretty soon, so Swerve+Hangman+Opps vs. Death Riders it is. i definitely bit on the FTR split/turn. very well executed and i look forward to them murdering some dudes. is this really going to culminate in FTR-E&C? Imagine being someone like Brody King or Takeshita. no match. no run-in. no interview. But they flew you in so that you could stand in front of a monitor. why?

posting this a few hours early. Dröch Fhöula – ALTER DEUS 1. Aquelarre (“Witches’ Sabbath”) (2:38) 2. Blood Fight (4:19) 3. Burning (3:36) 4. Peepshow (3:54) 5. Mainline (3:29) 6. Evil vs. Evil (4:57) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPpZhmzeOAE&list=OLAK5uy_noNJec9ZurXO216kefn-PKv21TV32FACM Ring Introductions: Vampiro is the lead singer for this gothic metal band. He previously played bass in some punk group, but I’m having a hard time finding any solid information about that. (This is separate from the belief that Vampiro joined the Misfits for a short stint during their WCW run). Anyway, this album was released in 2008, with a 2 track EP seeing the light of day the year prior. Now, I say “released”, but I can’t actually find that this was pressed onto a physical media at all, and neither of these albums are on discogs, so I dunno. The Match: “Aquelarre” is a mood-setting instrumental piece. Dark and heavy. It works well to set the tone. “Blood Fight” keeps the heavy vibes up, but now includes Vampiro shouting some pretty basic lyrics. It’s a bit repetitive on the vocals side, but shows promise. “Burning” infuses a guitar that adds almost a sci-fi feel to the whole ordeal. The vocals are a step up from the song before as well. There’s a 10 second guitar solo towards the end that, while it sounds good, feels very out of place. “Peepshow” was a weird one for me, as it showed promise early on, but as the song went on, I felt like it never really lived up to that potential. But by the end, my feelings had come back around and I enjoyed it quite a bit. “Mainline” feels like an adrenaline shot to your veins. Comes in hard, grabs you by the cochlea, and doesn’t let go. “Evil vs. Evil” starts out as a good instrumental behind Vampiro cutting a promo in his distinctive riff of a voice. After about 2 minutes, the song kicks in and it is another banger. Plays into the horror theme more than we’ve seen through most of the album. BONUS TRACK (from the EP of the same name): “Give Me Fire” sounds more like a demo, as it’s a bit muffled and unfocused. Still decent, but I can see why they didn’t include it on the main album. The Finish: This was a fun listen, and quite a departure from the last few albums I’ve listened to. Certainly different from the fare most wrestlers have put out. I had fairly low expectations but enjoyed it quite a bit. I’m going to rate this 3 ringbells out of 5. @Curt, i would be interested in your thoughts on this one, as it's the closest we're going to see to your actual tastes.