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Hagan

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Everything posted by Hagan

  1. Hagan
    Catching up on the parts of the show I missed. BTW - on the Los Matadores vignette, I loved them showing photos of Belmonte and Joselito. Pretty high-end references. Also, Christian referencing the McMahon/Helmsley regime was so unlike usual WWE protocol. They barely acknowledge things that happened six months ago, so for Christian to logically reference something that's 13 years old is pretty interesting.
  2. Hagan
    Who are you to doubt the #8th #militia? Zombie Randy Savage for face of WWE!
  3. Hagan
    Master's degree in English literature, buddy! About the posting of Ryder, Bryan, and Punk from TLC 2011: I presume that was in response to my question about them scuttling a main event babyface run for someone. They NEVER were going to run with Ryder in a significant role. Not that they didn't botch that, but let's not confuse the push of a comedy dude winning a secondary title over Dolph Ziggler,* and a guy who pinned the biggest star of an entire era clean in one of the biggest cards of the year. And Bryan and Punk, needless to say, have both ended up fine as they're currently 1A and 1B babyface in the biggest promotion in the world. *I do admit that my embrace of the Dolph Era was, in hindsight, a bit misplaced.
  4. Hagan
    What ruined Too Cool was Christopher's drug issus. And even then S2H had a pretty decent mid-card run. You can argue that they dropped the ball with big 'kish because there was a window where he was really fucking over. Wasn't it on SD that he had that great, great match with Hunter? Ultimately, what killed Rikishi was the botched heel turn, creative completely going to hell in that era, and he got injury prone. But, hey, fun run and the Usos are awesome so it all turned out okay. None of this has anything to do with Bryan. But, really, all this talk about how people get pushed or don't get pushed in WWE is meaningless. At the end of the day, there's about 50 diffferent rationales for why a guy gets shot into the main event, with the main one being "cause we fucking said so." All this talk about merch and ratings are good talking points, but when's the last time they completely scuttled a main event babyface over that?* Heels, sure, but they know that with the exception of Cena and guys like Brock and Rock, that it's the WWE brand that draws. As long as you get good crowd responses, you're a top-tier performer, and you don't drive away 3 out of every 4 viewer you'll probably be okay. Again, people treated Punk's whole title reign like one giant failure and he's the second biggest star in the company behind Cena, so the company clearly didn't have the issues with how things went that we did. They gave up on the ADR babyface run, but I think that had far, far more to due with the lack of crowd response, and the general problems with the character than any other thing.*
  5. Hagan
    This Daniel Bryan push may destroy the Internet. Re: Bryan's merch not selling. Very similar talk to last year's talking point of Punk being a ratings killer. That didn't effect his position on the card, so I don't see whether or not Bryan is selling more or less merch than Cena and Punk to be relevant.
  6. Hagan
    Partly due to Colt's podcast, I decided to give Miz another shot. Perfectly fine upper-mid card dude. Should be a heel, but by far not the most useless guy they have. Damning with faint praise, I know, but I'm somewhat back on board. He HAS been entertaining in the past. A bit shocked at all the hatred of the show. Does anyone seriously think that the master plan is to bury all the babyfaces FOR SIX MONTHS until John Cena comes back? This is the WWE, the fact that any heels at all get heat is a minor miracle. With the history of this company, I cannot believe that "they don't know how to book a babyface" is a talking point. It's literally all they actually know how to do. Anyway, long story short this all ends with Bryan being WWE champion. Honestly, I'd much rather have Bryan have a real match at 'Mania defending as champion than be in whatever convuluted WWE power struggle gets booked as the main angle. Regarding the other babyfaces...yeah, when they do finally say fuck it and run-in the pop should be huge. I assume there will be some Vince ex machina that allows them an out on the Hunter firing threats. It looks like Dolph, Christian, Henry, and Show are going to be the guys. I think a 5 on 5 at Battleground with those 4 and Bryan against Orton/The Shield/Hunter would be a perfectly acceptable 40 minute main event for a PPV. But no way this angle as is makes it past SurSer. I figure Bryan wins the belt there, transitions to the next step, and then they set whatever is set in motion for 'Mania then. But no fucking way the heels are running roughshod for any longer than that. Wyatt's promo was a beautiful thing of beauty. It was almost poetry. AJ babyfaced the fuck out of herself on that promo. Kind of odd that they'd bury a show that's more or less a hit, but it is what it is. Punk/Heyman was one of the best money angles they've done all year. It was violent, it was realistic, it was uncomfortable and it probably helped sell the PPV. Still think that they can't run with Axel much longer as the antagonist but he's doing well so far. Straight fantasy booking, but at the PPV if Punk is about to finally get revenge and Cabana ran in only to save Heyman...well...that would be a pretty good angle, I think.
  7. Hagan
    This fan-fucking-tastic ://www.wwe.com/videos/bray-wyatt-tells-the-tale-of-sister-abigail-26143801
  8. Hagan
    WCW was worthless without the time slots. That's why it got sold for so cheap. I mean, shit...Fusient's initial offer was 70 million. They dropped that in half when they discovered how worthless the company was. Now, obviously the WWE has probably made back their money 10 fold on the tape library but that wouldn't have helped anyone else. To fantasy book...if Jericho (or anyone else buy its) it staggers around with a reduced payroll and touring schedule, and finds a money mark in the next few years who funds it. While producing great wrestling, due to providing a different style and allowing for undersized guys to prosper, the new WCW undergoes a series of creative changes that make it impossible to gain momentrum while at times producing legendarily non-sensical programming. Guys like Eddy Guerrero do jump over before finding out that wrestling for the new WCW is not as financially or creatively rewarding as their time in WWE. Eventually they get sick of wrestling in the new WCW because fans in airports assume they've retired. Yadda yadda yadda... Tito Ortiz eventually debuts in WCW.
  9. Hagan
    It's almost Friday, guys.
  10. Hagan
    I watched a 17 minute version just now that I assume is full. It had a commercial break spot but otherwise seemed intact. I was linked to one that cut out a bit of the second fall. That finish was fucking wild, but yeah...I mean...this was filmed, what, five weeks ago? There's been so much fucking good wrestling since then between G1 and like every Daniel Bryan match that it didn't measure up to the upper-tier stuff. But yeah, great match but not WWE MOTY by any stretch.
  11. Hagan
    That story from the plane crash about telling the paramedic to get a chick's number from his bag is great. Flair thought he was going to die and didn't want his wife to find it. "Shelia, I love you, but not tonight."
  12. Hagan
    Joe's story about Kobashi wanting to play "Mr. Fuji style foreign heel" because he figures the American fans will boo him is great. God, I can just imagine Hammerstein's reaction if Kobashi had opened the match with a salt throw, judo chop, and choke in the corner."
  13. Hagan
    According to Wiki there has only been one Puerto Rican bullfighter in history, Ernesto Pastor. So, The Colons are really making history there. But, really, when you factor in Spain's colonialism of Puerto Rico it's not quite as outrageous as a lot of their "all brown people are the same" gimmicks. I love bullfighting by the way. Read two rather exhaustive books on the subject that were assigned in college. Quality stuff. I hope PETA gets mad at the gimmick too.
  14. Hagan
    Indeed, and KENTA will give him Shinsuke Nakamura's phone number.
  15. Hagan
    Would you mind elaborating some? Again, I'm not quite sure I get the Bryan/Austin comparisons at all. Other than the fact that Austin's character motivation was feeling held down, there's way more differences in their characters, backstory, and portrayal in the company. I mean, a much more apt comparison is this a redux of SurSer '99 with Bryan as Mick and Orton as Rock. Actually, there's a shit ton more overlap in the way Mick and Bryan were presented than the Austin/Bryan deal. Indy darlings, respected for their work, ability to effectively portray heels and babyfaces, could do serious and comedy angles equally well, and had their title runs presented as underdogs achieving the impossible. And, if that comparison works, well...Mick took his fair share of heel beatdowns. It seems like no one wants to accept any narrative that doesn't seen Bryan somehow replacing Cena as the face of the company. And, it's probably not going to happen. Even if Cena retires tomorrow they'll find some other clean-cut all-American babyface and try to use him to sell kid's merch. Even fucking Bret Hart got shoved aside for Big Sexy for a year. Not that Bryan isn't going to be a massively huge star when it's all said and done, but like Punk, like guys like Jericho and Edge, like Foley it's naive to expect that he's going to on a multi-year run where he's pushed at the level of Hogan, Austin or Cena.
  16. Hagan
    Just watched Ibushi vs Okada. Fun match with a hot crowd. Kind of a weird botch on a top-rope 'rana spot that deflated the crowd for a bit. Ibushi had has nose jacked up as well. Seemed a bit on the short side but your typical great Okada performance
  17. Hagan
    The recent trend toward Attitude Era navel-gazing is the worst. On the note about babyfaces not helping Bryan. A) It's heels and babyfaces all lined out so you know some uneasy detente has been reached. One motherfucker makes a wrong move and a prison riot breaks out. How often has every single person switched between babyface and heel? There's no love lost between anyone on the roster. I mean, it was treated as a big deal when Show and Henry said they'd team up because of their history. Bryan, Vince and Hunter have all switched multiple times. I mean, fuck...Daniel Bryan's running buddy for a year was beaten and destroyed by a bunch of psychotic hillbillies and D-Bry didn't seem overly concerned. Do we really expect like fucking Miz to storm the Bastille? Now, would John Cena have saved Bryan? Of course, he would. And then everyone would have made fun of him for being a goody-two shoes. Remember, these are wrestlers who either worked in, or grew up watching the Russoian dystopia that has poisoned the modern wrestling well. They saw when Hacksaw threw down the American flag and donned the Canadian garb. Very little trust these days among babyfaces.
  18. Hagan
    I think Bryan is at that stage where because of his work, his character, and, importantly, his catchphrase he's basically bulletproof. I mean, losing in 18 seconds launched him into the hottest run of his career. I really doubt that after pinning John Cena clean that all of a sudden getting beatdown by a gang of heels ruins his heat. I mean, it's the same deal with Punk. The guy has won once on PPV all year and he's hotter now as a babyface than he's ever been. Now, we can argue the issue of why the WWE books their babyfaces to be idiots or generally selfish people, or why the McMahons and Hunter can't resist subtly demeaning characters in segments whether they're heel or babyfaces.
  19. Hagan
    Wait, are people really complaining about WWE not booking a babyface strong enough? And the Austin comparison is such an apples and oranges thing. I think we kind of need to lay off those kind of comparisons. Honestly, Bryan's push/character reminds me far more of Eddy's. And think about how Eddy's main event push went. The huge underdog against Lesnar, the mid-card guy who survived struggles into the crowd pulled him from the tag ranks into the main events, and a guy who had to prove himself night after night to show the heels he was truly the top guy.
  20. Hagan
    Best thing not on Raw Yeah, I wasn't feeling Hunter's promo. For a guy who is one of the better money promo guys to sell his own matches, he does a really shitty impression of Vince's evil businessman's promos. Honestly, they should just let Vince do all the exposition needed. Punk was on fire on his promo, though. As I'm sure a lot of us felt, him going off on that fan was a bit uncalled for, but the fact that Lawler and Heyman both brought the fan up made me suspect that maybe there was just a really fucking annoying guy at ringside. I also assume that Fat Guy is the illegitimate son of Fat Boy, the man that stalked Naitch for all those years. Yeah, good show overall though. Nice little showcase night for The Shield after not having much to do the last few months. I also like Dolph and Show being set up as anti-HHH guys because them, and Henry, can logically be woven into the main storyline now. The Usos manage to do more with less TV time than so many guys. I think them and the repackaged Colons could tear it up. You almost have to think that there rebuilding the tag division for when The Shield split off into singles. Also, with the matador gimmick I demand that JBL quote Death in the Afternoon at least twice a match. Also, I was just shocked to shit to learn that Orton is only 33. Shit, technically he may only be entering his prime.
  21. Hagan
    Minor quibbling, but for all the talk about "Bryan wasn't supposed to succeed" in WWE if you really look back at his run he's continually been put in pretty good spots. Sure the original NXT run was terrible but very few people get out of that clusterfuck in a good spot. After the firing, which was mainly damage control, he came back to main event SummerSlam in the Nexus angle, beats Miz for the US title, bounces around the mid-card, wins MITB, has a pretty well booked first World title reign. Yeah, he lost in 18 seconds but it was all angle set-up and lead to the whole AJ angle and the team with Kane. I mean, I get the idea that no one saw him pinning Cena clean, but I think the idea that he's overcome bad booking is a bit misleading.
  22. Hagan
    That Cena loss list is something. I literally have no recollection/have never seen the majority of those. I mean, I think Cena is great but I dropped off of most WWE for a year or two while finishing school or not having internet/cable at various times. How many of those are worth seeking out? I've seen the Michaels match and all WM and SummerSlam matches, of course.
  23. Hagan
    American Dragon is just a really cool fucking name. The slap battle between Bryan and Cena was great too. Actually with the Boma ye , Bryan hanging onto the top rope after the superplex (kind of reminiscent of Makabe's German spot), and the slap battle, I'm now amused by the thought that Cena and Bryan were just crushing the G1 Climax like the rest of us the last few weeks.
  24. Hagan
    Oh...we have to note that Cena almost killed Bryan by accidentally piledriving him on his head from the top rope. Awkward stuff.
  25. Hagan
    Bryan winning clean with a fucking running knee shocked me to shit. Loved Del Rio/Christian. The first few minutes of Brock and Punk were just fucking incredible as it looked like Brock had little interest in whether Punk survived. It got a little bear huggy in the middle before a good enough finish. Even though Punk/Heyman is the angle, it felt a little flat that Punk would continually turn his back on BROCK LESNAR to go after a manager. Main was great, though honestly I think they have a better match in them. Cena wrestled like a man in a lot of pain. I think the finish caught the crowd off guard because how often do main event matches end with non-finishers. The angle after was the angle after. Everyone knew it was coming, there's money in Bryan chasing Orton and winning it back and I think Bryan getting a clean win over Cena is a much bigger deal than whether or not he actually left as champion. Plus, heel Hunter is less pandering than babyface Hunter.
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