John E. Dynamite

Damn near every Pokemon game on, let's say the DS, runs for $80-$150 complete despite selling tens of millions of copies. I think Smash Bros Melee was the best selling Gamecube game ever and it still runs $80ish bucks. You take that away from me and I stop buying your games, period. I buy something, I own it. I can sell it. It becomes part of my personal worth. I understand that there's a different strategy of discounting the shit out of older games in Western franchises or selling games as a service, and these companies have the right to do things this way if the market is buying... look, I understand if you want to download Madden or Call of Duty or something that will cost 5 dollar in 5 years. But gamers willingly buying into a system that literally takes money out of their hands has never made sense to me.

Dude, go take a shower. Board's still gonna be here.

Talking dog puppet, actually. ESPN didn't touch then-UFC champion Sean Strickland's wild homophobic rant the other week. And since ESPN has the UFC TV contract, and WWE is the same company as the UFC, I'm not surprised that they haven't touched this. I'm getting really tired of not being surprised. I forget how much they covered Dana slapping his wife but I'm gonna guess it was somewhere in the realm of "barely".

The on-screen Vince McMahon character was a less-exaggerated version of the monster he actually is. He showed it to us, mask off, in the stark light of television, and convinced the world it was entertainment. This is what they do.

I'd argue that the way pro-wrestling folds reality into itself is somewhat specific. I deeply believe that the response to the initial news regarding Vince's misconduct was muted by his presenting himself as a heel for decades prior. We'd seen him act like a power-mad, lecherous bastard on TV for years. People were used to it.

And all of the heinous transgressions against human decency get folded into the broader pro-wrestling narrative experience. We love the scandals. They make for the shows we enjoy consuming. This is content.

Every top star, every person in a suit, anybody who claims to be buddy-buddy with Vince knew all about this. If Brock was in the loop then I'm assuming *everyone* else was. This is just one whistle being blown. The Ashley Massaro case needs to be re-examined. The company is built on filth. I have spent decades trying to explain why WWE has always seemed wrong to me. Here you go.

I own 1,000 games so I really like beating games. Two of the most recent games I've beat have been Judgement and Trails of Cold Steel 1, which are very very long. I'm approaching the end of Elden Ring and it hasn't been that challenging for awhile (except for the Mountaintop Catacombs, yeehaw!). I'm so done with modern long games. Nothing is worth 100 hours. I look at those modern classics like Persona 5 Royale and Tears of the Kingdom and Yakuza 7 sitting on my shelf and I am simply not there for them at the moment. I'm making nothing but 10-to-20 commitments until time comes to pass. I'm playing the first Alan Wake on 360. I got half of Pikmin 3 and half of Sly Cooper 2 and half of Dragon Quest 3 on GBC left. Thinking about Paper Mario on N64. Definitely gonna actually beat Mischief Makers. Trine. Henry Hatsworth. Crimson Skies. Exactly one of the storylines in Uncharted Waters New Horizons. Kentucky Route Zero maybe. Every single PS2/Xbox/Gamecube game I own that got a 7/10 instead of an 8 from EGM because it was "too short"? People, blow the whistle. Point is fuck modern AAA and fuck asset-theft xoomer brainrot and fuck 100 hour Japanese more-is-more franchise defining 90+ Metacritic whatever. It's VIDEO GAMES, damnit. I just want to beat one and move on to the next one. I gotta shrink these shelves.

Woodley defended the belt four times and had a great first fight against Wonderboy and absolutely drubbed Till. Yeah the other two fights were rough to watch but I think we can pin the Maia fight on Maia. All while Dana outright loathed Woodley in that special, Bostonian way. Don't see why he requires a "fucking" prefix.

Lawler vs. Dundee is THEE ONE but Dutch Mantell really should be mentioned after them.

Shoney's is every single highway exit in the eastern half of Tennessee. I would go so far as to call it oppressive.

I just want to know Collision's DVR numbers. I watch it live *maybe* once a month.

Well then, see you there.

He wasn't ready for Primetime.

Mike Bailey's shoot name is Emile Charles Baillargeon-Laberge. For some reason I find it adds depth to his character when I am cognizant of his overwhelming French Canadian-ness

Here's a very good episode WWE C TV - it's the Velocity before Wrestlemania XX. Outside of my shitty high school's drama program falling apart, it was 2004 Velocity that called me to the backyard oh so long ago... so I had to check if it was still great television and sometimes it really was. The first match on the broadcast is the match in question. and it is Jamie Noble vs. Paul London - Savannah, GA 3/2/04 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wroCYa9p57U Golden Age ROH INVADES~ WWE programming. They're given twice the amount of time you'd figure they'd have and the crowd is full of pre-Mania hype. The whole episode is quite a bit of fun.

Relatively comprehensible Spanish commentary para este gringo. So they clip everything from this match that doesn't involve Chico Flores being the active participant. It's basically a long heat segment on Chico, then the hot tag to Madril that gets clipped 30 seconds in, then the finish of Tolos winning with a knee drop. Issue is as far as I can tell Chicho's the least interesting guy in the match. He's fine enough at taking the heat, and I might be underrating him just because I can't see the actual payoff. This is a chunk of what's clearly a fun tag match, what we might call a WAR tag match which has always been the vibe I've got from the limited amount of NWA Hollywood I've digested. The crossover between Mexican/border town talent + deep cut US guys who didn't get poached nearly to the extent that Southern and Midwestern guys did when Vince Jr. rolled around creates matches that are anything but played-out to my eyes. The tiny bits of Madril's brawling babyface fire seems as good as I remember it, and MAN does Pritchard look young. I'd have loved to see him do anything here but it's all cut. The heels are pretty interesting and Ox is always a plus but it's Gran Goliath who gets the brunt of the time and he clearly knows what he's doing with Flores. I think I know Gran Goliath? I think he did some work in the Vince Sr./NJPW realm?? He's the most interesting rudo here. This is a baffling cut of an under-represented time + place in wrestling that leaves some major unscratched itches. I want to see Madril vs. Gran Goliath, I guess. I want to see the Dos Caras main event they half-announced at the start of the video. This Armstrong Alley YouTube channel is a trip and a half.

uuuhhh there are certain things that get selected a little too often. so, no classic japan. no joshi. no popular american wrestling tv. anything else is groovy.

I am starting this off with the former on account of it featuring ten guys I gotta write about and 36 minutes of action. THIRTY SIX, MY MAN. You're really putting me to WORK! As retribution here's 36 observations about this match, from minute to minute. --- 1. Osamu Kido’s deeply conservative haircut. It looks like he just got back from the war and his wife has asked him to grow out his crew cut and he’s simply *hated* himself once it got over ½ an inch. Osamu Kido never had a natural looking haircut in his life. It was like he was cursed to always look like he was wearing somebody else’s hair as a wig. 2.As though he read every word I just typed and deemed them entirely necessary to one-up Kido across time and space, Kantaro Hoshino still has some foil stuck in his hair from his perm. I’m not making this up. Inoki and Maeda are arguing about who should start the match but I can’t pay attention to it. Did nobody tell him? Is this a rib?? 3. We do get Inoki and Maeda to start, and I love how every bit of Inoki’s body and facial language is saying “alright, make me sell, bitch”. 4. Maybe the reason early-match limbwork became such a tired trend in NJPW is because people watched Yoshiaki Fujiwara dig for armbars like a dirty, dirty dawg and thought they could do it too. They can’t, nobody can. 5. Kids these days don’t know about Kantaro Hoshino. Him being the defacto Ricky Morton in these elimination matches is the best stuff he ever did., apologies to the Liger matches. 6. A young Kazuo Yamazaki is a strange lookin’ specimen. Some men are just B2BB (Born 2 Be Bald). Boy they’re tagging fast in this one. 7. Umannosuke Ueda is clearly part of some Squad Exchange program. It’s like like Tony Iommi doing a one-night only gig with the Rat Pack. He is literally tagged in for one second. 8. We’re beginning to ask the obvious question - does Yamazaki get eliminated first as the lowest guy on the totem pole? Or do we lose Hoshino or Kengo first to create a babyface disadvantage? 9. Kengo Kimura (who is sneaky tall, like Chrisitan or somebody like that) must have said something rude about Takada’s fauncy boots because he is now getting the shit kicked out of him. 10. A proud but stern Maeda decides to show the cubs what a real shit-kicking looks like. And when Yamazaki gets his turn to make aniki proud, he’s promptly backslided. Blackslid. Slidden. There are consequences to your actions, kiddo. 11. Hoshino vs. Kido is the first pairing that the crowd really doesn’t care about. 12. You know who notices? Inoki. 13. Inoki vs. Fujiwara is always a battle between the madness of civilization and the stability of barbarism. If I had any fukken clue what I was talking about I’d say their wrestling plays out like the correspondences between Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard. 14. In almost all of his matches, Fujiwara will make a face that I can only refer to as a Luchador’s Grin. I think he would have done a great job emoting while wearing a mask. His eyes do significantly less work than the rest of his face. 15. Kengo and Maeda enter together - they have a chance to do a sequence with Maeda looking for revenge after Yamazaki’s elimination, but Fuijnami just tags in and I’m acting like I’m disappointed by the new pairing. But they don’t commit to that either. 16. Has Japan ever produced a more purely white-meat babyface than Tatsumi Fujinami? It’s not a knock. 17. Hoshino and Fujiwara (who are establishing themselves as the workhorses) do this AWESOME spot where Fujiwara is stacked ass-to-the-heavens on a backslide but still manages to get a shoulder up despite not really “kicking out”. Camera catches it perfectly. 3/4s of the crowd maybe not so much. 18. A tale as old as time - if you’re in an elimination tag and you’re getting a lot of shit in, it’s probably because you’re about to leave the match. Fare thee well, Hoshino. Go find your hair dresser and see who put them up to it. 19. Did Osamu Kido’s backdrop always look that *violent*? It’s like he has a vendetta against terminal velocity, trying to drop his man down as fast as possible. 20. Umannosuke Ueda (who I appreciate more than most) tags in for TWO seconds this time and has still done nothing. He has been downgraded to Geezer Butler at best. 21. I thought eliminations were over-the-top-rope in these 5-on-5’s but Kimura gets eliminated going under the bottom one? Eh? Did I have it wrong? 22. This observation is bathed in the benefit of hindsight, but it’s quite funny how non-shooty Takada’s stuff actually looked. To the untrained eye you wouldn’t think about it for a second, but his offense looks “too good”. I wouldn’t change Takada’s crazy career arc of UWF-> UWFi-> PRIDE-> HUSTLE for the world but I want to watch the alternate history where he’s a straightforward NJPW guy. 23. Ueda is going to get some love if he is *ever* tagged in, but the longer this goes the longer I realize the UWF team is kinda getting chumped and NJPW might not even need him. 24. Fujinami applies a sasori-gatame and gets kicked in the face by Akira Maeda. FORESHADOWING. I really do think the Choshu thing was a semi-honest botch like Maeda claims. 25. Inoki vs. Maeda doesn’t get enough credit as one of the greatest feuds to never happen. For both the assumed match quality + the insane backstage drama that would have doubtlessly unfolded. 26. Fujiwara and Fujinami being the two to announce “ok, the teams are trying to win now” is the correct call. And you can tell because they’re sweaty. 27. Working a minute-long headlock for both guys to go tumbling out is fine by me, brother. But I’m concerned because… 28. The only two NJPW guys left are Inoki and Ueda and whatever story they’ve been telling with Ueda’s forced non-participation hasn’t made any sense yet. And I don’t think the remaining UWF team actually has a chance, which might be dumb of me but there’s a vibe. 29. Like now it’s Inoki vs. Kido and I know how this is gonna go. They aren’t gonna swerve me here. 30. Ueda gets tagged in for a POP. Like, a quick, high, loud POP. This crowd wants Ueda vs. Maeda. They want a BAR FIGHT. 31. Ueda drags Maeda out of the ring for the double elimination and Maeda is PISSED. He hasn’t been this PISSED since his dad took his motocycle keys in high school. FUCK YOU, DAD, I HAVE A MEETING WITH MY DELINQUENT GANG. HOMEWORK IS FOR NERDS. YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND. Maeda’s soul is punching holes in drywall. 32. Look, it’s Inoki standing alone vs. Kido and Takada and that’s FINE, I guess. If you hate where this is going then I question why you’re watching 80’s NJPW at all. But I would much rather watch Maeda lose his shit on Ueda ringside and get the whole match thrown out. 33. Inoki 34. Beats 35. Everybody. 36. At least Inoki took some time to make Takada look like a million yen, if not bucks. And I get another Kido backdrop. That gets kicked out of at one. The issue isn’t a formula Inoki comeback, it’s that it happens directly after the BEST part of the match. It’s nice that both Inoki vs. Takada and Inoki vs. Kido are extended sequences because this match is so frenetic, so driven by its pieces constantly being in motion that there is relief in watching just one guy left on his team having to do his thing for a five-or-so-minute stretch. And you’re just haunted by the specter of great singles matches that never happened during the UWF vs. NJPW stuff, but this is still a consistently engaging 35 minutes of top-shelf work, real stakes and a hot crowd.

I liked the finish because it happened to Adam Copeland. Not just because it's a callback/tribute, but because there's an element of fair play to it. Edge was the one who codified the now-common trope of briefcase cash-ins happening after long matches and beatdowns. So having it happen to him like this is legitimate dramatic irony.

RIP Killer Khan

My primary shit-give will be if Tsuji and Uemura make a real attempt to steal the show.

I was gonna do a 85 AJPW deep-ish cut but it's been written up by segundacaida and Matt in the Treadmill thread and has been posted on this board a couple of times so INSTEAD, here's this freakin' classic that I stumbled across that doesn't even have a single cagematch rating. Javier "Monarca" Cruz vs. Ciclon Ramirez Hair vs. Hair 6/10/1994 Arena Mexico https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_M5iuZXLsI Cruz had been losing his hair about every year-and-a-half, in matches against El Dandy, Emilio Charles Jr., Jerry Estrada and especially Apollo Dantes. Ciclon Ramirez had long been saddled with a weird gimmick and had lost his mask less than a year earlier to El Felino. But this match doesn't require a ton of context outside of two dudes without much to lose and willing to beat the shit out of the other guy to keep their luscious locks intact. Blood. Topes. BLOOD. TOPES.

Yeah, alright, I'll buy. It's also a character-appropriate way to do it that puts over Edge's legacy while slyly admitting that the fanbase doesn't really want to see an Edge reign where he goes over a bunch of homegrowns in singles matches.

I don't mind a portion of the product being dedicated to storylines that are a bit more New Yorkish, but I wonder how much of AEW's perceived "off year" has to do with MJF's title reign. Even the good stuff like when Cole was in one piece. I don't pose the question as a hater, I'm just concerned that there's always gonna be a dissonance between it and the rest of the card, even when it's more "alright" than "awful" like tonight. It'll be interesting to see if there's a vibe shift after he drops the belt.