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This how Meltzer recapped the episode in the WON (since it touches on some stuff folks are mentioning)

Spoilers for length and apologies as per usual for Dave speak

Spoiler

The final episode of Dark Side of the Ring on 6/10 was about Tom Billington, the Dynamite Kid. It was very hard to watch this one, but it was one of the best episodes they’ve done. The key speakers were first wife Michelle Billington, and his two daughters, the youngest of which he never met because he was thrown out when Michelle was seven months pregnant after he put a gun to his head. When Michelle described the beating he gave her before they split up, it sounded far too close to Chris Benoit with Nancy and Jimmy Snuka with Nancy Argentino, worse because she was seven months pregnant. She said the problems at home started mostly after his 1986 back injury and going to WWF in 1984 when he ramped up on the steroids. But the truth is I was around him on a late 1984 Japan tour after he had quit WWF and before he went back and he was so roided up it was ridiculous, and one of the most amazing performers ever in that every move he did had such explosiveness to it that he was like a different level of athlete from almost everyone. Besides the family, the key people on the piece they got were Mick Foley, who idolized him, Dan Spivey & Gary Portz (Scott McGhee), who were his best friends in WWF, and Jacques Rougeau Jr., who had the two famous altercations with him. There was one great story they uncovered. After Jacques Rougeau hit Dynamite with the roll of quarters (part of the story Jacques has told in the past as did Badnews Allen, was while he knocked Dynamite’s teeth out with the punches and he was bleeding everywhere until Badnews showed up to stop it, Dynamite was never knocked off his feet. Dynamite would have probably gotten revenge but he believed that the Montreal mob that Dino Bravo was connected to was going to kill his family if he made any reprisals. Dynamite took great precautions to protect his family including making sure his wife had a gun and they moved houses believing the mob in Montreal knew where he lived. Jacques’ version of the story is that he was not friends with Bravo, but knew Bravo would get word to Dynamite, so he made up the idea that his own mob friend would kill Dynamite and or his family knowing Bravo would warn Dynamite and thus believing Dynamite would not try and get back at him. Jacques laughed because he found out that was in fact the reason Dynamite didn’t. Dynamite quit WWF over it to sign with All Japan and book Stampede, but Stampede was too far gone. Dynamite, who Stu Hart called the biggest drawing card in the history of the territory, was also too far gone and even with him going heel and feuding with Owen Hart and Davey Boy Smith, they couldn’t bring business back. Dynamite wasn’t close to the same, but even with his body destroyed, he still had some very good matches in Japan but he was in so much pain he had to retire at the end of 1991 suddenly. There were two scenes that have been described to me from the 90s. Bret Hart and others, I think Brian Knobs, went to visit him on a U.K. tour when Hart was champion. Dynamite was out of it by this point. Hart or Knobs mentioned that Bret was the champion. Dynamite said, “Intercontinental champion, that’s good.” Bret said, “No, world champion.” Dynamite got silent, with this realization that Hart, the guy who copied him and who learned from him and who for years he was on a different level from (it seems everyone who was around Calgary wrestling during the Dynamite era believes it as a fact that nobody was better than Dynamite, not Bret or anyone, and that includes people very close to Bret) was world champion, the top guy, something Dynamite could have never dreamed of being and how he reacted. The other was when he was in a wheelchair, a few years before his death, and by this point he wouldn’t let anyone see him but Harry Smith came, and he liked Harry and Harry played on his phone one of the Tiger Mask vs. Dynamite matches from Japan and Dynamite watched with tears in his eyes. It was like the last time he saw Julie Hart, his sister-in-law, and as described on the show, he just sat there and watched his matches with Tiger Mask

 

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On 6/8/2021 at 4:28 PM, Boydy said:

It is nice to see Bret so happy with his life and his accomplishments. You can tell he has inner peace with everything.

I teared up at the end seeing him surrounded by his family and, like you said, really seeming to be HAPPY.

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14 minutes ago, RIPPA said:

This how Meltzer recapped the episode in the WON (since it touches on some stuff folks are mentioning)

Spoilers for length and apologies as per usual for Dave speak

  Reveal hidden contents

The final episode of Dark Side of the Ring on 6/10 was about Tom Billington, the Dynamite Kid. It was very hard to watch this one, but it was one of the best episodes they’ve done. The key speakers were first wife Michelle Billington, and his two daughters, the youngest of which he never met because he was thrown out when Michelle was seven months pregnant after he put a gun to his head. When Michelle described the beating he gave her before they split up, it sounded far too close to Chris Benoit with Nancy and Jimmy Snuka with Nancy Argentino, worse because she was seven months pregnant. She said the problems at home started mostly after his 1986 back injury and going to WWF in 1984 when he ramped up on the steroids. But the truth is I was around him on a late 1984 Japan tour after he had quit WWF and before he went back and he was so roided up it was ridiculous, and one of the most amazing performers ever in that every move he did had such explosiveness to it that he was like a different level of athlete from almost everyone. Besides the family, the key people on the piece they got were Mick Foley, who idolized him, Dan Spivey & Gary Portz (Scott McGhee), who were his best friends in WWF, and Jacques Rougeau Jr., who had the two famous altercations with him. There was one great story they uncovered. After Jacques Rougeau hit Dynamite with the roll of quarters (part of the story Jacques has told in the past as did Badnews Allen, was while he knocked Dynamite’s teeth out with the punches and he was bleeding everywhere until Badnews showed up to stop it, Dynamite was never knocked off his feet. Dynamite would have probably gotten revenge but he believed that the Montreal mob that Dino Bravo was connected to was going to kill his family if he made any reprisals. Dynamite took great precautions to protect his family including making sure his wife had a gun and they moved houses believing the mob in Montreal knew where he lived. Jacques’ version of the story is that he was not friends with Bravo, but knew Bravo would get word to Dynamite, so he made up the idea that his own mob friend would kill Dynamite and or his family knowing Bravo would warn Dynamite and thus believing Dynamite would not try and get back at him. Jacques laughed because he found out that was in fact the reason Dynamite didn’t. Dynamite quit WWF over it to sign with All Japan and book Stampede, but Stampede was too far gone. Dynamite, who Stu Hart called the biggest drawing card in the history of the territory, was also too far gone and even with him going heel and feuding with Owen Hart and Davey Boy Smith, they couldn’t bring business back. Dynamite wasn’t close to the same, but even with his body destroyed, he still had some very good matches in Japan but he was in so much pain he had to retire at the end of 1991 suddenly. There were two scenes that have been described to me from the 90s. Bret Hart and others, I think Brian Knobs, went to visit him on a U.K. tour when Hart was champion. Dynamite was out of it by this point. Hart or Knobs mentioned that Bret was the champion. Dynamite said, “Intercontinental champion, that’s good.” Bret said, “No, world champion.” Dynamite got silent, with this realization that Hart, the guy who copied him and who learned from him and who for years he was on a different level from (it seems everyone who was around Calgary wrestling during the Dynamite era believes it as a fact that nobody was better than Dynamite, not Bret or anyone, and that includes people very close to Bret) was world champion, the top guy, something Dynamite could have never dreamed of being and how he reacted. The other was when he was in a wheelchair, a few years before his death, and by this point he wouldn’t let anyone see him but Harry Smith came, and he liked Harry and Harry played on his phone one of the Tiger Mask vs. Dynamite matches from Japan and Dynamite watched with tears in his eyes. It was like the last time he saw Julie Hart, his sister-in-law, and as described on the show, he just sat there and watched his matches with Tiger Mask

 

Isn't that clip of Harry showing him the Tiger Mask match originally from a BBC piece?  I swear I've seen that exact footage before.

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5 hours ago, Technico Support said:

If the story about Jacques Rougeau working Dino Bravo into helping him protect himself from Dyanmite is true, that's some next-level, Jedi Mind Trick shit.  Jacques just came off as the happiest, coolest dude in this show.

Last night's ep made me feel old.  I've liked what I've seen of Jacques elsewhere, but his segments last night just made me face-palm.   Especially when he said he didn't want to get revenge, he HAD to get revenge.  Because?  Some wacky eye-for-an-eye locker room code, I guess?

Look, Dynamite deserved payback.  Even if you don't quite believe Jacques' version of events, it's likely whatever he did to piss Dynamite off was fairly minor.  And Billington isn't the innocent victim in any story.  Even if he didn't deserve Jacques' payback for the locker room fight, he deserved it for something or other.

I'm sure I would have found Jacques' cooler when I was younger.  But, well, I'm not younger and I'm not all that interested in high-fiving a dude for impressing the locker room by waiting until the other guy dropped his guard, then smashing his face in with something heavy in his hand.  And then scaring the dude's family by gaslighting them into believing the mob might be coming for them.  Maybe Dynamite deserved it, the wife and kids certainly did not.  Dynamite quit the company over the incident and went into an even deeper tailspin after that, so maybe a small show of regret from Jacques would be appropriate?

Edited by Eoae
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2 hours ago, Eoae said:

Last night's ep made me feel old.  I've liked what I've seen of Jacques elsewhere, but his segments last night just made me face-palm.   Especially when he said he didn't want to get revenge, he HAD to get revenge.  Because?  Some wacky eye-for-an-eye locker room code, I guess?

Look, Dynamite deserved payback.  Even if you don't quite believe Jacques' version of events, it's likely whatever he did to piss Dynamite off was fairly minor.  And Billington isn't the innocent victim in any story.  Even if he didn't deserve Jacques' payback for the locker room fight, he deserved it for something or other.

I'm sure I would have found Jacques' cooler when I was younger.  But, well, I'm not younger and I'm not all that interested in high-fiving a dude for impressing the locker room by waiting until the other guy dropped his guard, then smashing his face in with something heavy in his hand.  And then scaring the dude's family by gaslighting them into believing the mob might be coming for them.  Maybe Dynamite deserved it, the wife and kids certainly did not.  Dynamite quit the company over the incident and went into an even deeper tailspin after that, so maybe a small show of regret from Jacques would be appropriate?

Jacques in other interviews goes into way more detail, the biggest being Dynamite was F’ing with him after the original incident, Dynamite even had a flight attendant announce to an entire plane that Jacques had a “boxing” match the night before. 

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14 hours ago, Mister TV said:

Jacques in other interviews goes into way more detail, the biggest being Dynamite was F’ing with him after the original incident, Dynamite even had a flight attendant announce to an entire plane that Jacques had a “boxing” match the night before. 

I get that Dynamite was a prick about it but I think that the way Jacques went about it was pretty f'n cowardly. I'm with @Eoae on this one. If you want to fight the dude, go fight him. Or if you want to sucker punch him, do it with your own hands. And then to use fictional (and likely not all that fictional) mob connections to avoid retaliation? To quote Moxley, "Bitch AF".

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1 hour ago, cav said:

Had anybody heard about Dynamite Kid’s bare knuckle boxing days before ?

I hadn't. Wasn't mentioned in his book as far as I remember and Bret didn't mention it either. Imagine doing some underground tough man thing and thinking you're going to fight some other random guy like yourself and the fucking Dynamite Kid shows up. Even non-roided and halfway crippled Dynamite would probably be like some kind of crazy buzzsaw of a badger to fight.

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3 hours ago, cwoy2j said:

I get that Dynamite was a prick about it but I think that the way Jacques went about it was pretty f'n cowardly. I'm with @Eoae on this one. If you want to fight the dude, go fight him. Or if you want to sucker punch him, do it with your own hands. And then to use fictional (and likely not all that fictional) mob connections to avoid retaliation? To quote Moxley, "Bitch AF".

If I remember right Jacques wasn’t just concerned about retaliation from Dynamite but also from Dynamite’s crew of guys like Bad News Brown, Don Muraco, Dino Bravo and Davey Boy, so getting a little extra insurance was somewhat justified. The episode left out the biggest reason Dynamite didn’t retaliate and that was due to Vince threatening to fire anyone who was involved in another locker room fight, that’s why the Rougeau’s were eliminated early and the Bulldogs eliminated late at the Survivor Series, since the Bulldogs had given their notice and therefore had no concerns about getting fired. 
 

Also Dynamite was “Bitch AF” for waiting to sucker punch to Jacques when Raymond the fighter of the family was sidelined with a knee injury and on crutches. 

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16 hours ago, Firebreaker Chip said:

Goddamn I thought Spivey was scary looking in the 90s but he's nightmare fuel now

I just discovered Spivey's 68.  Holy S%&#@.  He looks like that at his age?  Jesus.  Imagine being five years old and going the grandparents for Chistmas and bald-headed geriatric giant Spivey comes out to rock you on his knee.  I'd need therapy after one holiday.

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8 hours ago, Mister TV said:

If I remember right Jacques wasn’t just concerned about retaliation from Dynamite but also from Dynamite’s crew of guys like Bad News Brown, Don Muraco, Dino Bravo and Davey Boy, so getting a little extra insurance was somewhat justified. The episode left out the biggest reason Dynamite didn’t retaliate and that was due to Vince threatening to fire anyone who was involved in another locker room fight, that’s why the Rougeau’s were eliminated early and the Bulldogs eliminated late at the Survivor Series, since the Bulldogs had given their notice and therefore had no concerns about getting fired. 
 

Also Dynamite was “Bitch AF” for waiting to sucker punch to Jacques when Raymond the fighter of the family was sidelined with a knee injury and on crutches. 

At least Dynamite hit the dude with his hands and not a weapon. And from other accounts, he slapped Jacques in the back of the head and then went straight up with Jacques right after and took him down. None of us were there so that's all second hand. I just think it's kind of a shit move to sucker punch a dude with a roll of quarters in your hand and then act like a tough guy about it after. DK was a shit human being but the way that fight went down rubs me the wrong way.

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And from what I've heard, the whole thing started because Hennig padlocked Jacques and Raymond's gear during Vince's strict "no rib" period. Vince got wind of it and everyone assumed it was The Bulldogs and that's why Dynamite was pissed at them. He thought that they stooged him off over nothing which would've gotten him fired. Really the whole thing could've been avoided if Hennig didn't act like a jerk and owned up to the prank.

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8 hours ago, Eoae said:

I just discovered Spivey's 68.  Holy S%&#@.  He looks like that at his age?  Jesus.  Imagine being five years old and going the grandparents for Chistmas and bald-headed geriatric giant Spivey comes out to rock you on his knee.  I'd need therapy after one holiday.

But look at it like this. If Spivey was your dad, you'd have no qualms letting him take your kid to the park. Who's gonna try to snatch a kid whose grandpa looks like that?!

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12 hours ago, Eoae said:

I just discovered Spivey's 68.  Holy S%&#@.  He looks like that at his age?  Jesus.  Imagine being five years old and going the grandparents for Chistmas and bald-headed geriatric giant Spivey comes out to rock you on his knee.  I'd need therapy after one holiday.

I don't know, man. If it was some long distance relative uncle you see once every few years, then probably. But overall, kids seem to adjust to some weird-ass looking people pretty easily, if everyone else behaves like it's nothing to be afraid of! Now, if the parents are talking the whole car ride there what a creepy looking monster your grandad is, then yeah, you'll be shitting yourself by the time he picks you up to greet you. Multiply this a few times if your parents ever tell you "if don't start behaving right now, we'll call grandpa Spivey and he'll come rock you on his knee again!"

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I can kind of understand being afraid of Dynamite's crew and feeling like he had to respond physically to show the locker room he couldn't be pushed around.  Although he waited a month to knock Dyamite's teeth out, so Bad News and the boys had plenty of time to rough him up again or decide he was a pussy or whatever.

I think I'm just too old for this "code of the locker room" nonsense.  Seriously, most of us grew out of fighting in our teens and taught our kids not to fight, so why am I supposed to romanticize this stuff, exactly?   It's not Jacques.  I have the same reaction to Taker waxing nostalgic about his era when men were men and guys reached in their bag for handguns instead of their Switch and dudes knew their place in the locker room because Taker and his crew would beat on them if they didn't.

Honestly, the one thing these documentaries prove over and over again is that a lot of wrestlers consistently make bad decisions.  Sometimes it's a combination of drugs, booze, and steroids.  Sometimes it's just sheer stupidity (NIck Gage, bank robbery, something something something). 

I forget the exact quote, but, in the Collision in Korea ep, Scorpio says something along the lines of "Well, what am I supposed to do?  Let Hawk get one over on me in front of the boys?"  This is in reference to his plan to shiv Hawk.  And I'm sitting their thinking "Well, your alternative is to murder a dude, cause an international incident, and maybe spend the rest of your life in a North Korean prison.  So, yeah, letting it go and allowing Hawk to get one over on you in the locker room seems like a sensible plan to me."  And of course, the whole beef started because Scorpio had some idiot beef with Flair that possibly only existed in Scorpio's head and Hawk was in withdrawal because he couldn't walk around pilled up and plastered.

I think I'm just tired of dudes who never grew up thinking the only way to live is to beat up dudes on the playground 'cause they looked at you funny and party like a rockstar in between.  I mean, I enjoy football, I enjoy wrestling, I enjoy combat sports.  Doesn't mean I go out and fight guys in real life after I turn the tv off.  I haven't been in a fight since my mid-teens and do not expect to get in one any time soon.  And I did my share of drinking (and some drugs) in my 20's.  My first job out of college was stressful and I'm in a white-collar profession kinda infamous for the "work hard, play hard" stuff.  Didn't take too long to figure out that I was wrecking my life and my wife was going to leave me if I didn't dry out.  So I did.  Not easy peasy, but not impossible either.

What has Flair said about Scorpio?  I can't remember, even though I've seen shoots with Flair, read his book, etc.  Scorpio thinks Flair got him fired from WCW?  Any truth to that? 

Edited by Eoae
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I have no clue about Flair and Scorp but Teddy Long has accused Flair of being racist before so maybe it was something to do with that. As far as I can tell, Flair makes poor choices but outside of Teddy, I haven't heard of anyone else calling him racist.

And I agree about Scorp/Hawk. I understand Scorp fighting him for calling him the "n" word but after that, just squash it. It's over. No need to get a fucking shiv or whatever.

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19 hours ago, Shartnado said:

I don't know, man. If it was some long distance relative uncle you see once every few years, then probably. But overall, kids seem to adjust to some weird-ass looking people pretty easily, if everyone else behaves like it's nothing to be afraid of! Now, if the parents are talking the whole car ride there what a creepy looking monster your grandad is, then yeah, you'll be shitting yourself by the time he picks you up to greet you. Multiply this a few times if your parents ever tell you "if don't start behaving right now, we'll call grandpa Spivey and he'll come rock you on his knee again!"

This is accurate. It took me years to realize my father's face was a little off from burns he received as a baby when he was saved from a fire.

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4 hours ago, Eivion said:

This is accurate. It took me years to realize my father's face was a little off from burns he received as a baby when he was saved from a fire.

Yeah, I can remember reacting very differently to encountering people who looked like something out of the ordinary, depending on how the adults around me were prepairing me for it, prior to actually meeting them. Of course, in the early to mid 80's, the adults didn't really worry about traumatizing children (especially if they are not your own children) by scaring them on purpose just to amuse themselves. Some therapy-worthy stuff I could probably still recall if I really tried.

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