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describing a common practice in wrestling forever like blading as “The self-mutilation that bloodied several women in the December 31 event on TNT.” This is the kind of bullshit lawyer speak where Ted Cruz would describe student loan forgiveness as “the sinister plan by leftists to dis-empower several American businesses that promote educational funding.” As small a thing as it is, this kind of abuse of language to foster concern trolling just to score a few points somehow really pisses me off. The arrogance of thinking we are so much stupider than them that they can just just push our outrage button with the most childish nonsense, coupled with the craven willingness to pretend they themselves believe this when we all know they know better signals crossing a line from “kind of corrupt corporate type” to “utterly soulless ghoul without a glimmer of humanity left in their eyes.” goddamn I hate this company and genuinely hope it dies.

It's ok to ask women to move cross country, employ them, and then fire them three months later after enrolling their children in school, but bleeding on tv is where they draw the line?

Uncle Tony absolutely shouldn't sign everyone WWE releases. It's terrible business practice and leads to a bloated roster. Uncle Tony absolutely should move heaven and earth to bring Mustafa Ali to his show. Dude could be an absolute star. If that means less tv time for guys like Tony Nese and Bobby Fish... so much the better.

I watched the Rampage episode with Pac vs Andrade 2 on it last night. This got me thinking two things: One, I've missed the intensity of PAC so much! And two, does anyone know if his parents are still alive? What are the odds of them tying the knot this late in the game and legitimize PAC's status, so he wouldn't have to be a bastard anymore?

Vince was squeamish about UFC having women fighting. That’s what this is about. Pure misogyny. Fuck him and his pearl clutching concern trolling.

Blading bad. Brock Lesnar elbowing Randy Orton into oblivion, leaving him concussed and lying in a pool of blood: good

I honestly feel like having fairly predictable storylines is a good thing in wrestling, so when you do pull a swerve it hits harder. One of the things that WWE did to lose me is trying to always swerve the audience. Tell good stories even if they are predictable, and I'll be satisfied. When you do swerve the audience, make sure that it matters and turns into something bigger.

Ali is a much better sympathetic babyface than all the guys you mentioned, save maybe Darby. Thank you for your question.

Right reply.

WWE doesn't like self-mutilation but has dealings with a murderous regime that does in Saudi Arabia. Fuck off, WWE.

Didn’t they (WWE) literally have a wrestler burn to death in the ring last year?

WWE had a match where someone removed another wrestler's eyeball. But sure, they're totally innocent.

WWE, we don’t support gory self-mutilation of women performers, but we do support regimes who mutilate reporters and jail women.

Inject that right into my veins. That's the good stuff.

Give him the opportunity and he's probably the best pure babyface in the world. He's that good.

Man, I don't know what the hell that move is called, but if I ever buy another game with a CAW mode I want it as my finisher.

Unagi

LOL. . . .Fuck the Pats.

Demolition did it first. Fucking posers.

Their patrons in Saudi Arabia are famous for a blade job known as decapitation.

Yeah but he didn’t BLEED. Plus they singled out the women’s match, and not Danielson/Hangman 2, so you could probably draw conclusions that it’s more about how they perceive violence with men is acceptable but violence with women isn’t.

Through two episodes. Gunn's the perfect match for Cena's ideal "2003 DVD where a third of the cover is a giant all-caps UNRATED stamp" brand of goofy humour undercut with some pathos. Seeing how well Gunn's material and direction have meshed with John and Dave makes me really want to see him get his hands on Dwayne. And considering how fatigued I am by standard superhero fare, a bunch of actors doing to silly dance on a soundstage is really the cure for what ails me. Unskippable opening. This show's the most enjoyable superhero TV stuff I've seen in a while outside of The Boys.

I need this show to open with Vince making Austin Theory do the Rumble entrant rundown. VKM: [hands Theory sheet] Read this. AT: [moves lips] VKM: Out loud. AT: Oh, right. The entrants for this year's men's Royal Rumble are AJ Styles, Madcap Moss... VKM: Do it with more gusto! AT: Omos! Montez Ford! Otis! Austin Theory! Hey, some guy stole my name. VKM: It's you, you moron. Keep going. AT: Johnny ca...ca...knock... VKM: Knoxville, jackass. AT: Kofi Kingston! VKM: LOUDER! AT: JEY USO! VKM: THAT'S IT! MORE! AT: JIMMY USO! VKM: MORE! AT: I don't know any more Usos. VKM: Gah, give me that. You want something done right, you gotta do it yourself. The entrants for this year's women's Royal Rumble are the SmackDown Women's Champion Charlotte Flair! Natayla! Carmella! Queen Zelina! So nice they named her twice, Kelly Kelly! Returning to take out the trash and make an impact, Mickie James! Taaa Meeen Aah Snuuuka! Brie Bella! Nikki Bella! AT: JIMMY USO! VKM: What are you doing? AT: I thought we were naming twins. VKM: What time is it? AT: Eight o... VKM: IT'S TIME TO RUMBLE! IT'S TIME FOR THE ROYAL RUMBLE!!!

If you're mad at the refs because you didn't have time left after running a quarterback draw with no timeouts...

That was pretty much the perfect way for the Cowboys to lose. 10/10 would recommend

What does Ali bring to the table that, say, Buddy Murphy or Swerve Scott don't? Or Bandido or Jonathan Gresham, for that matter. I'm neutral on Ali, but I can't think of a reason to sign him when there are so many free agents out there now with his skill set and then some. If AEW is looking for a cruiserweight for the Youtube shows, Murphy, Scott, Gresham and a couple others can fill that slot at least as well. If he wants a bigger name (and salary), well, Jeff Hardy and John Morrison are out there. If Jeff pulls his act together, I would expect he and Matt will at least try to get him into AEW. Honestly, if AEW is tempted to pick up Ali when he's free, they should sign Samoa Joe even if it's just to be a talker. Or go after Braun or Kross if they really want a big man. I don't really think AEW needs to sign another cruiserweight from WWE. I didn't think they needed Neese. They've already got more agile cruiserweights than then need. Push six of them. Push Dante Martin, Jungle Boy, Darby, Sammy, etc. Give Lio Rush a solid chance to prove he has something yet. If you really need more guys for your Youtube shows, see what the ROH castoffs have to offer before you chase WWE guys who didn't get over. I think Vince will keep Ali under contract and just let him sit home till the deal expires. Calling out your boss on social media never ends well.

The fact that Yano has not been inducted with 100% of the vote is an unforgivable crime against humanity.

You know, I can't help but think that WWE knew full well that putting that statement out there was going to get people talking... It's so hard to tell with them, because they can simultaneously seem completely manipulative and petty but at the same time totally self unaware.

The thing is...does a regular viewer know the difference between an unintentional elbow or hardway juice and "self mutilation" when they're both in the content of a fight?

Well, if you want to binge Yellowjackets from start to the most recent episode before the season finale tonight, there will be a marathon on from 9AM EDT to 5PM EDT on Showtime.

The last officially allowed WWE bladejob was Shawn Michaels vs Chris Jericho. All of the ones after that were against Vince's rules. But after Batista's big fine, that probably put a lot of people off from going into business for themselves.

Putting aside the WWE comments about bloody women. Blading IS fucking stupid and weird as fuck. I love it, I'm weird as fuck too. I don't care if people slice their fucking bodies with fucking razor blades cause it looks awesome and bloody wrestling is great. But it's just as fucked up as Lesner shoot splitting open Orton like Terry Funk did with eyebrow punches. Also fucked up.

Can't wait for the upcoming book: If I Did It by Josh Allen.

7/3/89: Jumbo/Yatsu/Kabuki vs Tenryu/Hansen/Fuyuki: For the most part this was all action with little bits of time where Fuyuki or Kabuki would get beaten on for the sake of hierarchy. Key moment was Tenryu goading Jumbo so much that Jumbo kept on battering him in the corner even when he wasn't the legal man until Kabuki had to SHOVE him to get him off and Jumbo did not like that. I think this was not two far from the seminal Jumbo vs Yatsu match and this felt like more along those lines. Tenryu ended up nice and bloody after that. Fuyuki had a good run of spin kicks and what not at one point but he didn't get to show a ton. They were running this sort of thing multiple time a month and it was always worth watching and spirited. 4/19/90: Jumbo vs Tenryu one last time. The deal here is that Hansen comes out and crushes Tenryu before the match. Post match, Jumbo will ignore the trophy and hop on the mic and call out Hansen and they'll brawl. For the match itself, however, Tenryu started off hurt and Jumbo (who got Hansen to leave by coming out) tried to check on him but of course Tenryu would have none of it. More than that, he was able to sneak in a quick brain kick and power bomb, but it was too early to put Jumbo away. It was a big equalizer though, albeit not so big that Jumbo wasn't able to take over with a big boot. The interesting thing here is that they started with the bombs so they had nowhere to go. It meant that Jumbo kept going up to the top, with a knee drop (that looked more like a stomp to me) and the jumping knee to a standing Tenryu. He went up one too many times though and Tenryu nailed him with a jumping kick and was able to come back. Good finishing stretch with Tenryu turning a Thesz Press into a hot shot, really trying for the power bomb, and kicking out of the first back drop driver. The second one had the bridge though and that's a super move for Jumbo if there ever was one. Big energy match that started in an interesting way but I don't think it's what I would have wanted their last encounter to be. I'll have more to say about this and everything else over the next few days.

My favorite tweet today regarding WWE's stance on self mutilation lol

Saya has gotten so good its scary! James

I have that one on VHS. I snagged it off ebay for a really low price considering how rare it is. Still sealed. I havent had the heart to open the tapes yet.

I'm pretty sure Flash's main theme (I think he had a different one briefly for his debut) is basically a ripoff of Rick James "punk funk" and the Mary Jane Girls based on the female vocals and the style of the bass line. Although, I would argue the female vocals sound more...em....Teena Marie-ish than Joanne McDuffie to say the least. P-Funk stuff (especially the Bootsy era On the One stuff from the mid 70s glory days) was way more eccentric lyrically and complex musically. Flash Funk's whole style and look is basically 1981 Street Songs Rick James. Look at the boots.

I enjoyed this. Not my favorite or anything, but it wasn’t bad. Mostly, I just wish I’d got more of each character. This would’ve been a better series, IMO. First episode or two is the backstory with them ridding the world of Deviants, then each character gets and episode on what they’ve been up to. Then the last two or so are them coming together again for the emergence. Surprised to see so many of you all having trouble getting bored with it. It kept my 4-year-old’s attention all the way through. He was really into it.

THE LAST DUEL is on HBO MAX now. It is A) freaking great. B) a weird choice for a flashpoint in the Internet discourse regarding the death of cinema at the hands of superheroes and millennials. This is not GLADIATOR. There is very little action in the film, aside from the titular duel, and what little there is is explicitly depicted as being mostly pointless. The runtime of the film is largely devoted to pasty guys with bad hair squabbling over property rights and titles. Oh, and it’s about a rape. This film wouldn’t have packed audiences into theaters 10 or even 20 years ago. C) a real shame that we’re probably not many years away from losing 84-year old Ridley Scott as an active director, one of the few left with enough juice to get somebody to plunk down $100+ million on adult stories like this.

What system? I just finished Ghosts of Tsushima: Director's Cut and it is my favorite open world game ever. It is basically Red Dead Redemption in Feudal Japan with a better more concise story. It's also incredibly pretty to look at.

and after all the hoops the refs jumped through to even give Dallas the ball back in the first place, too. Anyway, Kyle Shanahan is very good at deciding to Stop Doing What's Working and outsmart himself. But Mike McCarthy just demonstrated once again he is The Master thereof by running up the middle with no timeouts left He traded two 40 yard endzone throws for that QB draw and either one of the two could've at least drawn a penalty, or something. next week will probably be Not Very Fun but 49ers Beating Dallas in a playoff game is way above and beyond what I thought this season was going to be. Successful Season assured.

I'm still confused about how Wardlow powerbombing Punk through the table was a DQ? That gives you a finish that protects both (Punk keeps his streak, Wardlow gets the loss because MJF told him to do it because he only cares about punishing Punk). Andrade promo was magic. He's finding his stride and I like him working a hard hitting style, there's plenty of flyers up and down the card, might as well try something different. Shida/Deeb was nothing, and if Shida is going back to Japan per her IG post, then we're not getting any progress for a few months. Maybe by Revolution? Or the next quarterly special? DoN would be too far away, right?