OK, well, I finally binged on both episodes tonight. (I'll NEVER go back to watch the casting special, sorry.) I have a vague idea of who all the competitors are, but the focal length of the "reality TV" lens is definitely a narrow one. The challenges have been marginally interesting but haven't shown much. The house stuff is what it is ("reality"). It's not as bad as I feared, but not GREAT. Daniel Bryan, Paige and Hulk Hogan are mostly useless. Chris Jericho is largely useless and I'm not sure why they wouldn't just use Renee solo (but I suspect there's probably a "behind the scenes" reason for Jericho's involvement). I should probably watch it live...Tuesdays are normally slow anyway, right? Not slow enough for me to watch Miz' post-show on the WWE Network, but...
Mostly I kept wondering how all these guys are tweeting in a Faraday cage with no Wifi...and if they're NOT, why even give them Twitter accounts in the first place?
Saw the first two episodes, which was a mistake because I'm a completionist and now I have to grind my way to the end. This show is bad.
Bryan looks/acts high as hell and is the only bright spot on judge's panel.
Hogan is Hogan.
Paige is surprisingly bossy and bitchy for someone who has been with the WWE for a relatively short time. I know she's been wrestling since before she was born, and THIS IS HER HAUS, but dial it back a bit sunshine.
Jericho has become the 80s rocker he always wanted to be, but not in the way he intended, and it's not flattering. Renee could've been a better Ryan Seacrest than Jericho, and that would've eliminated the stress I feel having to look at Jericho's botox-facelift-hairpuff holy trinity.
I'm not the target audience (I think?) but I want more wrasslin in my wrasslin reality television. The challenges aren't bad, but meh. The fake gator in the distance made the swimming challenge for me. Book, Billy, and Lita are ok, but meh.
Contestants? I like ZZ and Gigi. I like their names and the way those names sound together. Everyone else is either a variation or a direct representation of a stereotype, which fits really well in this world. Unfortunately, they went with the least compelling stereotypes available.
Very disappointed that none of the hosts asked Alex for his favorite match.
What happens at Full Sail when they do the live show? Is that the first time the contestants actually see how their week got edited down to 20 minutes? If so, I would love to see a second-screen stream of the contestants' reaction. If you look closely you can probably pinpoint the exact moment their hearts break in two.
BOLD prediction: the judges' save thing is going to come into play a few weeks down the road when WWE's desperate to get rid of someone, and the other two "finalists" both get saved.
I feel like Paige is the only worthwhile judge. She actually called out most of them on being boring and she wouldn't let Hank slide in week one for his sexist crap. Bryan tries but I can almost see him censoring himself and trying to be as 'sports entertainment' as he can. Hogan is Hogan, but I do like him calling Paige 'brother'.
"Never piss off a hawk with a blowgun" - Conan O'Brien
The new ECW Title belt reminded me a lot of Hulk Hogan's 1985 WWF Title belt: http://www.midwestwrestling.com/championshipbelts2/oldwwf.htm It was a curious thing: