twiztor

so i'm ready for this NWA "revival" to get up and going. I've got enough goodwill to check out a weekly or monthly show for a while, but watching just Nick Aldis once a week isn't gonna happen.

whoa, i never heard that but it explains quite a bit in hindsight.

started this series from the beginning. As it was coming out, i think i only read the first 3-4 issues. Liking it much better this time around. Probably mostly because i know what to expect going in, as far as tone and subject matter. I think for my initial read i had unrealistic expectations. I have read up until #14 now. The bit with death around #10 threw me for a loop, but it definitely adds a nice touch in a way to push Ben to what everybody seems to want. The storyline with the Slingers was quite good, with an interesting twist thrown in. I've never followed Spider-Man at all, so while i've heard/read about the costumes and identities, the actual characters hold no relevance for me. That being said, they did a good job of explaining JUST enough to follow but not so much that it was overwhelming. I look forward to following this title (which means that it will likely be cancelled in the not-so-distant future).

long story short, yes, the rising prices are a constant thorn in my side. luckily, i've been collecting NES games since i was a kid, so i have most of the rare (i.e. expensive) games that i want. got really lucky with some of them, because the prices are insane! I also only go after the cartridges, i couldn't care less about boxes or manuals (until we get to disc games- then i need the whole package). I end up scoping eBay for most of my games. so much on there is overpriced (even compared to the already inflated prices) but i try to not impulse buy and watch for deals. What systems are you interested in? the NES is my first love, but i'm currently trying to get all the games for the Sega 32x.

Action Comics #1000 out today. pretty crazy. i look forward to reading it tonight.

i hadn't jumped on yet. but, since i was looking for something to break up my X-Men run, this will do the trick. thanks for the reminder!

still on my massive X-Men read. just finished Legion Quest, and wow. i was describing the storyline to my wife and she said "that's some heavy stuff, let alone for a comic book". for sure. powerful stuff. this of course leads in to one of my top two storylines of all time, the Age of Apocalypse. I'm pretty pumped, but i think I'll check something else out for a short while and let this simmer.

just ordered my ticket for UFC 225. never been to a live UFC event before, so i'm pretty pumped!

IF true: hopefully with the addition to 165, MiddleWeight gets bumped to 175. I can't imagine they'd have a 165 and a 170. not sure how i feel about networks having exclusive fighter contracts. curious how the hierarchy of cards will work and how many we'll be looking at. will there still be Fight Pass exclusive cards? look forward to official announcement and more details.

@Go2Sleep basically nailed my thoughts on this card. lots of good stuff early, lots of weird stuff later. loved reigns losing, but it makes zero sense. only match i actively tuned out during was Nia/Bliss.

i have this same issue. actually, this entire response, but especially the bolded part.

this was my understanding as well. Like, he won't be able to get a license until a certain amount of time in the testing pool takes place.

Devil Without a Cause is one of my top 10 albums. right place, right time in my life i guess. basically everything since? no thanks. not into ripoff classic rock or wannabe country.

we are 1/3 of the way through Doomsday Clock and still haven't seen Superman. or Doc Manhattan. or, really, anything worthwhile. Don't get me wrong, i'm gonna keep reading, but i'm glad i'm not supporting this with money.

the mind is a powerful tool. contrary to all scientifically-provable results, placebos DO work in many cases.

not in the poll options themselves, you didn't. Please take advice from @NikoBaltimore and next time you make the polls end with "please choose this option" or something similar. do you have a larger tournament bracket drawn up or something? random one-on-one pairings can be a fun aside, but dropping a bunch of polls at once that don't lead to anything will just result in diminishing results. i agree with what @Niners Fan in CT said above, you will generate more debate and conversation in a main monthly thread.

btw don't tell me which option i "have to choose"

March 26, 2001 WCW Monday Nitro: "Night of Champions"; "Spring Break-Out"; Season Finale LIVE @ Panama City Beach, FL Vince McMahon announces that he bought his competition. What is the fate of WCW? It is in Vince's hands. Simulcast tonight. Tony Schiavone welcomes us. He is stunned. Sadly, he is not speechless. Scott Hudson says we'll go out with a bang (not a DDP BANG!) tonight. Ric Flair comes out and cuts a long, rambling face promo. Apparently he forgets he's been the heel CEO for a number of months now. Yay WCW Boo McMahon. Then he calls out his "greatest opponent", Sting, for a match tonight. Title vs Title: WCW World Champ Scott Steiner w/Midajah vs US Champ Booker T match only goes about 5 minutes. Steiner's power and aggression vs Booker's agility and determination. Booker goes for the Book End, Steiner reverses it into a Northern Lights Suplex. Booker kicks out and catches Steiner with the Book End for the 3 count! New WCW World Champion! Jung Dragons (Yun Yang & Kaz Hayashi) vs 3 Count (Evan Karagias & Shannon Moore) vs Filthy Animals (Rey Mysterio, Jr. & Billy Kidman) Triple Threat match, winner gets a CruiserWeight Tag Title shot later tonight. This is a complete car crash match. Lasts maybe 3 minutes. Not a single tag made, all we get is spots and finishers. Rey Jr. hangs Shannon Moore in the ropes and hits a guillotine leg drop for the win. CruiserWeight Title: Chavo Guerrero, Jr. vs "Sugar" Shane Helms (c) this was a good back-and-forth match-up. It clocks in at just under 5 minutes. Lots of counters and reversals, since they've wrestled each other a lot lately. Helms retains with the Vertebreaker. Booker T backstage. He's got so many mixed emotions. Says this might be the end of one story, but he has many more pages in this book (can't tell if that was a pun or not). He will prove that he is the best, to each and every sucka. Don't hate the player, hate the game. Tag Team Titles: Team Canada (Lance Storm & Mike Awesome) vs Chuck Palumbo & Sean O'Haire (c) this is a rematch from last week's non-title match, which Team Canada won after an Awesome Bomb to Palumbo. Storm calls for the Canadian Anthem to play. We go to commercial. Match goes about 3 minutes but is a bit of a mess. Palumbo escapes an Awesome Bomb (continuity?!?) and nails a Jungle Kick. O'Haire lands a Seanton Bomb for the finish. WWF Monday Night Raw (this is the last Raw before WrestleMania 17) LIVE @ Cleveland, OH Vince announces that he bought his competition. Says Jeff Jarrett should start spelling his name "G-O-Double N-Double E. GONE!" lol. Jim Ross & Paul Heyman welcome us. Paul: "The war is over. Vince McMahon has won." Kurt Angle comes to the ring and laments that he doesn't have a WrestleMania match. Chris Benoit comes out with some good news, and some bad news. The good news is that he doesn't have a WrestleMania match, either. The bad news is that he doesn't have a WrestleMania match, either. Benoit says that IF they had a match, he would make Angle tap. Angle says IF that was a challenge, he accepts. Says he'll make Benoit "squeal in seconds" They brawl, Benoit locks on the Crippler Crossface. Angle taps. Edge & Christian run in to save Angle. Shawn Stasiak w/Stacy Keibler vs Bam Bam Bigelow If Bigelow wins, he gets to tattoo Stasiak. Total crap match that ends in like 90 seconds. Stasiak wins. They usher us away. DDP on the beach. He thanks the fans. blah blah blah. Lumberjack Match: Tazz vs Val Venis Less than a minute. the lumberjacks (APA and RTC) brawl. Tazzmission - Steven Kick - Money Shot (miss) - Northern Lights Suplex for a Tazz win. CruiserWeight Tag Team Titles: "Primetime" Elix Skipper & Kid Romeo (c) vs Rey Mysterio, Jr. & Billy Kidman Tony makes disparaging remarks about Steven Regal. the heels beat on Kidman, hot tag to Rey. they trade moves for a bit, Kidman reverses a "Play of the Day" into the Kid Crusher for the 3 count and new CW Tag champs! This was an OK match that went about 5 minutes. Definitely could've used more time. P.S. Kidman and Skipper were both the illegal men in the ring. Sting promo. For some reason, there's a bunch of baseball bats hanging from the ceiling where he's at. As for Sting's future, "the only thing for sure is that nothing is for sure. It's Showtime!" ok then. Doink is in the Raw crowd to hype his Gimmick Battle Royal appearance. William Regal vs Light Heavyweight Champion Crash Holly w/Molly Holly Regal has something important to tell us. Something about W.C......Fields! ha! Crash says he never backs down from a challenge. Regal shoves him out of the ring and says he meant Molly Holly. Regal rubs her face in the mat and Regal Stretches her. Crash runs in and gets Regal Stretched too. Doink runs in and puts Regal in the Boston Crab (causing the DQ win for Regal). Doink unmasks and it's Chris Jericho! Paul Heyman calls the move the "Walls of Doink" Ric Flair vs Sting longest match of the night so far, at 7 minutes. This one actually could've been quicker. This was like a record company-mandated greatest hits performance from a band that is about to break up. They both do their signature spots at about half speed and face off a couple of times. Sting gets the win after a superplex and Scorpion Death Lock. Sting & Flair embrace. I wait for Flair to turn on Sting, but to no avail. SIMULCAST: Vince McMahon struts to the ring. says (again) that he bought his competition. Crowd cheers. Says Time Warner is practically begging him to buy WCW. Vince hasn't signed yet, but will at WrestleMania, when Ted Turner personally walks the contract down to him in the middle of the ring. he keeps talking. this segment is longer than any match yet tonight. after THIRTEEN MINUTES, "No Chance in Hell" plays. Vince and the announcers turn their attention to the entrance ramp, waiting for Shane. Shane comes out....in Panama City Beach! Shane says the contract does say McMahon, but it's not Vince McMahon, it says Shane McMahon! Shane McMahon has bought WCW! Hardy Boys & Chris Benoit vs Team ECK (Edge, Christian, Kurt Angle) 2 1/2 minute entrances, 2 1/2 minute match. Heyman plays up that Benoit and the Hardys don't get along. It doesn't factor into the match at all. Benoit's Crossface on Angle. Christian makes the save and gets Crossfaced for his troubles. he taps. Rhyno GORES Matt Hardy. then he GORES Lita for good measure. Non-Title Match: European Champ Test vs X-Pac w/Albert (no Justin Credible) Eddie Guerrero is our special guest referee. typical heel ref chicanery. fast/slow counts, light interference, etc. Test overcomes all of that, knocks Guerrero outside the ring, and slams X-Pac with the Pumphandle. Albert makes the save, hits the Baldo Bomb, and Eddie Guerrero counts three for X-Pac to get the win. Mick Foley returns! When he was the Commissioner, he signed a document that lets him referee any match at WrestleMania. That match will be the Vince vs Shane streetfight, much to Vince's displeasure. Non-Title Match: InterContinental Champ Chris Jericho vs Big Show this match started off good, with speed versus strength. Kane attacked Big Show. Raven attacked Kane. Regal attacks Jericho. Big Show with the Chokeslam for the win at about 3 minutes. Dudley Boys are at WWF New York. After WrestleMania, they're bringing their tag titles back to Dudleyville. Kane & Undertaker vs Rock & Austin Kane & Taker beat on Rock. Austin tags in, but Brothers of Destruction continue the assault. Triple H cracks Undertaker with a chair. Austin gets the pin at about 4 1/2 minutes. oh come on! Austin celebrates with beers in the ring. Rock slides in behind him, and gives Austin the Stone Cold Stunner! fade to black. Oh man, where to even begin? There were about a dozen backstage vignettes of Vince McMahon in his dressing room. Mostly he hated on WCW or made out with Trish, but there were just so many of them and they got old REAL quick. Also, i'm a bit confused. Shane is the face, and him buying WCW got a big pop. Does that make WCW the good guys here? Nitro felt completely disconnected from their own history. No mention of Flair's Magnificent 7 (with the exception of Steiner). Every match was insanely rushed. Every face went over (except Bigelow). Raw really wasn't much better. Every match featured outside interference. no titles defended. a main event that showed promise cut short. Not a good night for in-ring action. There's a reason the only thing remembered from these shows is Shane McMahon in a WCW ring.

in the fall of 2012, i started a wrestling viewing project. i decided to relive the Monday Night Wars, in their entirety, in real time. September 1, 2012 i watched the WCW Saturday Night from 9/2/95. This led into the very first WCW Monday Nitro on 9/4/95. From that day, i watched every piece of WCW i could get my hands on. Every PPV, Nitro, Thunder, Saturday Night, Worldwide, Prime, and Pro that i could possibly find. In the summer of 2013 i included WWF in my weekly obsession. Starting with SummerSlam '96, i watched every PPV, Raw, SmackDown, Shotgun, Heat, and Metal that i could. I even caught some XFL, but that put me over my threshold. Anyway, the true goal of this project was to re-experience the WWF/WCW/ECW Invasion angle from the summer and fall of 2001. When it originally aired, i had just graduated high school. Many friends and I would be leaving for college in the fall. I didn't realize it at the time, but it was the last time I would spend regular quality time with all of my friends. What a time of change. Being the nay-sayer I am, i rooted strongly and loudly for WCW to triumph. Obviously this goes against everything WWF was showing at the time, which only made me more steadfast in my ways. I always maintain that the WWF Invasion wasn't really THAT bad, but more that it didn't live up to impossible expectations. I am interested in seeing how my views on this have changed in the last 17 years. I plan on keeping a tally of every time a member of the WWF faces a member of the Alliance, to see how the numbers play. I will update this thread after every Raw, SmackDown, and PPV with results and a quick recap of the goings on. Feel free to ask questions and make suggestions. Hope you enjoy! To get started, here's a primer on key moments from 2001 so far: 1/12: Haku (WCW Hardcore Champion Meng) debuts in WWF, joins forces with Rikishi 2/12: AJ "Air" Styles debuts in WCW (not related to this project, but a fun aside) 2/12: Justin Credible debuts in WWF, joins forces with X-Pac 2/27: WWF releases Stacy "the Kat" Carter. Jerry Lawler walks out in protest 3/5: Paul Heyman joins the WWF announce team 3/12 Jason Jett (ECW's EZ Money) debuts in WCW 3/19: Rhyno debuts in WWF, helps Edge & Christian win the Tag Team Titles 3/19: Cash (ECW's Kid Kash) debuts in WCW, loses to Jason Jett 3/19: Spike Dudley debuts in WWF, helps Dudley Boyz win the Tag Team Titles And here's a breakdown of current champions: WWF World Champion: The Rock (4 weeks, beat Kurt Angle) Tag Team Champions: Dudley Boyz (1 week, beat Edge & Christian) InterContinental Champion: Chris Jericho (8 weeks, beat Chris Benoit) European Champion: Test (8 weeks, beat William Regal) Hardcore Champion: Raven (1 week, beat Big Show) Light Heavyweight Champion: Crash Holly (2 weeks, beat Dean Malenko) Women's Champion: Ivory (20 weeks, beat Lita) WCW World Champion: Scott Steiner (16 weeks, beat Booker T) Tag Team Champions: Palumbo & O'Haire (10 weeks, beat Kevin Nash & DDP) United States Heavyweight Champion: Booker T (1 week, beat Rick Steiner) CruiserWeight Champion: Shane Helms (1 week, beat Chavo Guerrero, Jr) CruiserWeight Tag Team Champions: Elix Skipper & Kid Romeo (1 week, beat Rey Mysterio & Billy Kidman in Tournament Final) Hardcore Champion: Meng (well, not really, but they never officially stripped him)

the real shame is that Madusa never held the WCW womens title.

nowhere else to put this, so here goes. i play and collect a bunch of NES games. not a fan of the Tengen black cartridges, but wanted a Ms. Pac-Man cart, so i frankensteined my own (swapped boards, made a custom label based on the Tengen one). Turned out pretty good as far as i'm concerned.

i didn't realize how many of my DVDVR brethren were at Mania 23. i attended largely because i had such an awesome time at 22. i know it goes against the grain, but i found 23 to be largely forgettable. had to add this here since i missed the poll.

Savage over Hogan at 5. Booker over HHH at 19.

got a chance to catch the main card last night. thoughts: Leon Edwards should not have won by TKO. he didn't throw anything in the few seconds before the ref stepped in. good on him, but that should've been a UD win. Duquesnoy got a gift on this one. i had him down 2-1, and how in the hell did he win rd3 on one judge's card? Manuwa looked pretty good, but Blachowicz looked as good as he's ever been. Do they start slotting him in the Gustafsson role now that Gus is MIA? Werdum looked great on his transitions on the ground. He seemed to effortless roll for the back, or slip into positions that Volkov couldn't handle. Unfortunately, he looked mediocre on the feet after catching a couple punches with his face. Volkov fought an excellent fight, especially after he stopped playing the grappling game and stuck to standing, where he had the sizable advantage. Late in the fight, Werdum gave in to desperation and exhibited some of his worst traits that we haven't seen lately (flopping down and inviting his opponent into his guard, to name one). Excellent win for Volkov. Who he gets next should be interesting.

didn't see it mentioned before: Andrei Arlovski is facing Tuivasa @ UFC 225. i think i'm gonna have to make the trek to Chicago for this.