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DC's next big crossover is a tournament arc to determine who will be the cosmic counter to Darkseid. Titled DC KO. Genuinely so stupid and goofy that it rules.

I don't think so, no. Me, I'm still annoyed Mike Bailey didn't start wearing shoes after his win.

If she's going to have a larger TV presence, Mama Wayne needs to cut a certain kind of promo on Dynamite one of these days, where she explains how she grew up in the wrestling industry and is the daughter of a Moondog. It turns out none of the AEW diehards I talk to on other boards know about her background,so I have to imagine live crowds don't know either. It gives her instant credibility. It gives Nick a little extra cred too - there's no reason he couldn't work a year as Moondog Wayne when he's 30 and fat. and while we're spitballing, here's why Don Callis should call his new charge "Big Zooch"...

I think they want to save the cocaine and hookers for Scarface airings.

I have two thoughts about this, both which end at the same point. One, if you have to ask the answer is no. Two, the vast majority of the AEW audience doesn't watch the ppvs (this is true for pretty much every televised promotion), so the exchange of months or bad tv bits for an eventual PPV payoff is a bad one. Appreciate the moment, don't take away from it, but 10 times out of 10 I give it up to have done something else at the top of the card for much of the past year.

they ever have a vignette of the winner of one of these money matches "spending money" to buy stuff?

some old stuff which aired 30 years ago today... WWF Wrestling Challenge (7/16/1995): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INVQ_ouEbEM

See I feel like this is ignoring the obvious: the turnaround also coincides with Rampage going away and I think cutting one show per week resulting in the booking tightening up considerably is sort of a "well yeah, obviously" situation. I also understand why TK wouldn't want to say that aloud, if he even recognizes it.

I guess it's a good thing ESPN covered the ESPYs by talking about how Lee Corso gave a "heartfelt" speech. God knows he can't feel it in his face after all that plastic surgery.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkJiokAem8M&ab_channel=LIVE4W*ING W*ING - THE CURSE OF THE BARBED WIRE BAT This is for Tromatagon (he hasn't been around in awhile and I'm definitely misspelling the name, but he's the biggest W*ING fan. I've definitely seen his real name before but can't recall). I was reminded of it from an old DVDVR where Ray, I think, did a transcription of Jason the Terrible's broken English promo at the beginning of this, which is hilarious, along with the Japanese speech he gives later which is clearly a voiceover from somebody else. Then I started watching the rest and there is not only a Damiencito and a Cicloncito Ramirez but MR. NIEBLA in the flesh doing the best moonsault ever. I'm not done with the video but if it is as good as the start then holy shit.

For a brief shining moment tonight, I thought I was gonna get to explain Robbie Baldwin to a friend when I made a Speedball/Speedball joke during Dynamite, but it was not to be. To Natural's question about interactions online wirh Marvel pros, I had a few very good conversations with Christos Gage and Mike Allred on Twitter when I was still on Twitter. And Gail Simone made fun of me (the playing along kind, not the savage disassembly of a "fan" who corrects her about her own Deadpool story kind) on Bluesky but I think that's a universal Bluesky experience.

Yeah, love the look of the Aragon Ballroom.

THAT'S how you say the F word.

Goddamn outstanding professional wrestling television on a Wednesday night. 'Toni! Toni Storm!' She steals every show. But ugh, MITB rules 'contracts' are back for another season. Fuck off with that shit! All In video was fine if completely underwhelming. I wish they took more seriously the task of creating these post-'biggest show of the year' videos. The MJF promo was pretty good. The Briscoe promo was very on point. I'm digging the chip on Briscoe's shoulder. Bucks/Callis backstage bit was fun - as were all the digs. Cope/Stoke segment was fairly on point. I liked Stoke there. Fletcher-Dorada was tremendous. Grace and speed. Unfortunately, it also featured Excalibur pointing out how far Dorada's leap needed to be right as Fletcher rolled into position directly in our shot. Bucks/Alexander/Hechicero-Bailey/Knight/Brody/Bandido was another blowaway TV bout from all involved. The Bucks relish in making their opponents look incredible. Loved seeing the Hechicero win. The ladies 4 way was mostly fun. Dug Hanger's thanks to begin. The Death Riders-Hobbs/Hanger/Briscoe main was very solid. I liked the Darby Sting style close, but if I'm honest things felt a little busy in that moment. There was some really great camera work on this show. It feels like the photography in general has gotten significantly stronger in the last while. Nailed it.

As always, when Nick and Matt are eating shit, they're at their best. I can't believe Okada actually changed his theme; I understand why someone might pull the trigger, but that is an iconic theme, man. The way I'm describing how AEW is being booked right now is PRECISE. They are pushing all the right buttons and know when to be direct and when to sow chaos. Symphonic, really. An amazing turnaround for the company over the past few months.

I see one of my friends streamed DK while I was in the car. I guess that means it’s hopefully good.

I thought tonight was a pretty good show. I thought Hangman's opening speech was pretty good. It was nice that no one interrupted it. But this is all he should have done tonight. The Death Riders should be no where near television right now. The trolling of The Young Bucks was great. Making their new entrance video look like a mid 90's screen saver was funny as hell. The eight man was solid though and I liked the teaming of The Bucks and Don Callis even though they said they would never join the Callis Family. Why did the 4 way women's match need a stip? This random $100k stip Tony Khan likes to do is just dumb. It's good for once in a while on a big show, but this was just so random. Okada's new presentation was cool. Looking forward to him vs. Swerve. The main event was good, but it should not have happened with at least Moxley and Hangman in the match. Set up that next feud with Hangman and MJF all ready. But it was cool to see Moxley scared of Darby. He survived Mount Everest so whatever Mox can do won't be enough.

Women's 4 way indeed delivered as I knew it would. Looks like the Thekla/Aminata feud will continue with Julia and Skye plugged in as well. We got to see some Toni and Athena interaction so that was nice. Hangman's opening promo was good. I'm not sure who the next challenger is? I thought at first we could be headed to a 'Blood and Guts' situation but maybe tonight officially moves Mox into a feud with Darby one on one. I was laughing like hell all night at the Bucks. Most interesting they've been in a while. Swerve and Okada should be awesome.

Fun show all the way through. Great opening promo from Hangman. Venue looks great too, the home for the next few weeks of events. all the Bucks stuff was hilarious. can no longer perform the "EVP Trigger"! Toni vs Athena definitely should be another epic. Thekla/Aminata continue their great exchanges. I dig Okada getting some Japan mainstream theme music. Definitely down with Okada/Swerve. Badass promo from Mark Briscoe and a solid trios main event to end the first night of the new Hangman Era.

Movies today....not as many today due to work. Copycat (Criterion Channel, leaving on 7/31) - 4/5 stars Saving Face (Criterion Channel, leaving on 7/31) - 4/5 stars

Nothing worse than going on vacation and pulling into the hotel right when a massive thunderstorm opens up the heavens.

I liked Thekla joining up with Skye and Julia. Might as well get all the spooky chicks in one faction.

also, part of me thinks they should have given every team in the Bucks match pyro except the Bucks, although that might have been overkill and could they light much pyro in that building

I've spent some time playing RDR2 most days. I haven't left Chapter 2 of the game yet and am doing as much as I conceivably can as Arthur in this chapter before I speed along the rest of the game so I can slow down again and collect all the stuff in New Austin and the heavily-surveilled part of West Elizabeth as John. Mostly, now that I understand how to do a better job of getting perfect pelts, I've lately spent time gathering them and crafting outfits, saddles, satchels, etc. I had to go back to camp and get locked into a certain Strauss mission just to unlock the mission that opened up fishing, so now I'm doing that and only somewhat enjoying it because the fishing mechanics are sort of annoying. I guess the struggle of trying to catch legendary fish makes up for the easy legendary land animal hunts. I decided to use the internet more often for guidance, mostly so that I could figure out where to find a panther, but also to actually exterminate the rest of the Carolina Parakeets this time around (I don't feel as bad about this compared to killing bison in the first game because Carolina Parakeets were all dying of inbreeding anyway at this point in their existence). Today's happy little random thing: I was riding down to Annesburg after catching a legendary fish at the falls all the way up in the northeast part of the map when a cougar randomly popped out onto the path and tried to murder me. I popped off a shot as best as I could, but I only got the cougar in the leg before my horse bucked me to the ground. The cougar ran off a bit, and I was waiting for him to circle back and try to maul me when he collapsed to the ground. I got an artery. Not only was I able to study the cougar as it died to complete my compendium entry on cougars, but it yielded me a perfect pelt to boot. Happy accidents! I won't be done playing through this for months at the pace I'm going. It took me something like a half-year to do a third playthrough of Horizon Zero Dawn that I started last year and ended two or three months ago. I like these slow replays of big open-world games that I love and will probably do this in the background more often. I'm thinking I'll play the first RD Redemption game on Switch after this. I'm sort of annoyed that I started playing RDR2 on PS4 right before rumors of an RDR2 Switch 2 port hit the internet, but whatever. Beyond that, I finished up what are probably the last five bots that Astro Bot will ever have to collect. It was nice practice for playing DK Bonanza over the next handful of weeks as I make my way through that. I'm also excited to strum a lute along with Atsu in Ghost of Yotei later this year. There are two hundred Peach Medallions in Mario Kart World! I'm at around ninety, but I'm thinking I'll come back to the free roam when it gets updates and I can use coins and Peach Medallions for things other than mostly-pointless stickers. I did start trying to perfect trophy the 100cc races, though, so I'll probably come back to that game occasionally. The OST is insanely good. I bought RetroMania Wrestling on sale the other night, and it's a decent enough WWF Wrestlefest clone. It took a bit to figure out how to win grapples. I'll probably talk about that more over in the wrestling games thread when I get in a bit more time with it during my travels this summer.

I liked how it's set up as Mox and Darby as Mox's next chapter. I just hope it's not any kind of deathmatch stip given those two one of them might literally try to kill themselves. So Hounds of Hell... it's Julia, Brodie, and Murph. But Murph is injured, and Julia is with Skye, who as far as I know is not in the group, but it seems they're with Thekla now? Credit to a friend of mine for this one, Okada's new music is the ultimate heel turn. Swerve/Rainmaker is gonna rule! The 8 man tag was loads of fun, I really loved hte production team messing with the Bucks and that was a super fun finish.