Yo-Yo's Roomie

Stewart Lee was on the new Harry Hill podcast talking about Zach Sabre Jr using Orienteering With Napalm Death, which if you didn't know came from one of his bits, as a move name. Quite surreal hearing Stew talking about wrestling (though he does call Zach a WWF wrestler, which is kinda cringe). Anyway, I like to think I have something to do with this. I emailed in to a comedy podcast I listen to responding to the hosts talking about going to a UK indie show (one of the co-hosts seems to be a pretty big fan) to tell them about the Stew/Zach connection, and I imagine they passed that tidbit on to Stew the next time they saw him (in reality, I'm sure the one co-host, who even said he'd seen ZSJ at comedy shows before, already knew this factoid, and probably someone would already have shared this with Stew anyway, though I'd never heard him reference it before.) But until proven otherwise, I'll just pretend this was my doing.

The fuck ICE chant was the perfect panacea to that ghoulish Kristi Noem commercial that aired right before the main event. It made my heart happy and capped what was a pretty awesome show all round.

Billy Gunn was a terrible wrestler. I mean, is that such a controversial thing to say? This is funny to me, because Fletcher to me is just Seth Rollins with Billy Gunn's face.

It's amazing how much better these shows are without the Don Callis family all over them. I know they had their one segment last night, but it was contained to the midcard where they belong at least. Plus, Andrade is cool so I'm glad he's back.

In this scenario, which I took as what was meant to happen, Harley moves out the way, Julia lands on her feet, and then hits the elbowdrop. So everything that followed would still make sense. Julia did exactly what she was supposed to do, but Harley not moving made her look stupid.

My favourite match ever.

Give Stewart Lee a big cut. I'm sure that's where ZSJ got the line from.

Loved the women's match. So many great highlights (Mercedes handing everyone a belt/weapon, Julia and Thekla Eugene Tooms-ing out the cage, Skye Blue bleeding for 40+ minutes etc) and the finish was spectacular. Marina was such a badass in this. Total chaotic and dangerous aura. She's the obvious choice to take over the Riders once they kick Mox to the curb. Imagine the heat when she slaps Renee around. And then who does Mox enlist to go after Marina, the monster he created for him? Renee's best friend in the business, of course, Mercedes Mone (this is based on the pure joy Renee seems to have every time she interviews Mercedes, even though Mercedes treats her like trash most of the time).

Sorry. I must not have been paying attention when you were telling people who it's okay to be attracted to.

Ultimo Hotty indeed.

Really awesome show. Pretty much uniformly great across the board. Quality wrestling and some really nice angles/story progression/stakes building. That Claudio/Orange match in particular was a banger. Also, Ultimo looking so fine my mum would keep her in the top cabinet and only bring her down when we had good company.

The image of Ultimo with the J-crown is awesome and all, but that thing is totally romanticised way beyond its actual worth. It was essentially one title represented by 8 different belts for one thing, and it only lasted about a year anyway. And another thing (and I know we're not talking about Ultimo or Mone specifically here) but, and I might catch some heat for this, I like Ultimo quite a bit, but Mercedes is a better wrestler than he was.

Yeah, hate them. It's something I'd expect WWE to do and reeks a bit of desperation. Plus, I got distracted reading one last week and missed something in the match that got a big pop from the crowd.

You're not really engaging with the points I was making, or trying to make (I mean, the bit you edited in is literally not engaging with the points I was making, since I never said any of that stuff). I'm not saying they don't bump, or sell, or show ass. I'm saying that they either have no interest in, or are incapable of, giving in to real, authentic emotion in their performances. If you want to talk about this storyline they're in now, I'd say that while, yes, the crux of the story is that they've had all their power stripped away and that has empowered everyone else in the company to treat them like shit, the way they are telling the story basically comes down to, "hey, wouldn't it be funny if we had no music or our pyro was really shitty, and then we can goof around a bit and act all annoyed and kinda peel back and poke fun at wrestling conventions?" And if you find that funny, that's awesome. You seem to be with the majority on that one (ratings are down, mind you, but that could be anything). But I don't see any stakes involved here. I don't see any actual progression in their characters. I see no desperation, no introspection, no catalyst for change. I see no-one getting over from this except them. It's all surface level, knockabout stuff. Which, again, is fine, if that's what you're into. Lots of people are. And not every story or angle has to have something deeper going on. Stuff is allowed to just be fun. But my thing is that with the Bucks, it's always one note, and that note is 'look at us'. I go back to Shawn because that's who I think originated this style of performance in wrestling. I remember Shawn cutting a promo, I think it was when he came back as part of D-X, where there was some goofy unfunny bullshit going on and Shawn stops, looks at the camera and goes "I love this stuff". He said it so earnestly and was clearly having the time of his life. For me, the Bucks' whole career is them stopping and looking at the camera and going "we love this stuff".

Not for this next show, but they need to run Toni against Marina. Toni in the orbit of the Death Riders would be amazing. They could do a triple threat with Stat too if they don't have faith in Marina being able to carry her side of things.