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The W - Pro Wrestling - The Little RAWscals...
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Boston Idol
Blutwurst








Since: 17.2.03
From: San Jose, CA

Since last post: 6303 days
Last activity: 6096 days
#1 Posted on | Instant Rating: 5.54
I'll skip the obligatory Groundhog Day
analogy. Let's just say that the tOA
powers that be told me that if I didn't
start discussing wrestling on a regular
basis they were going to trade me to
411Mania for that bedwetter Hyatte.
And with that flimsy pretext, here is
yet another irregular RAW review...

I missed Vince McMahon's opening swipe
at the NFL controversy and the NBA.
Back in the "Rock n' Wrestling" heydey
of the mid-eighties, the WWF took a
clever shot at MLB with a skit where
Randy Savage consoled a young baseball
fan and reminded viewers that the
WWF never goes on strike. That was
focused. Tonight's skit was modern
WWE: Tossing a bunch of shit on the
screen in a desperate attempt to make
a connection with an audience that
they no longer seem to understand.

I joined in progress as Chris Benoit
cut his babyface commissioner promo.
Benoit looked much more poised and
confident on the mic, even though
his material was weak. His approach
to being in charge was to put a paper
on his door and let wrestlers book
their own matches, except that he did
book himself into a cage match with
Triple H for the world title so that
this time there would be "no excuses."

I'm not sure I understand the concept
of the babyface wrestler commissioner.
They seem to be ganging up on Triple H
which makes him a quasi-babyface. Also
since they had the power, none of them
will have any excuses. If Triple H
survives them stacking the odds in
their own favor, he will have made
them all look like wimps or schmucks.
He'll have no serious opposition left.

Benoit's first match was Snitsky vs
Maven. Jim Ross claimed that Snitsky
"cost Maven the world title" last week.
In NWA parlance, Maven would be a less
polished, equally charismatic Tim Horner.
Can you imagine Ross saying that Nikita
Koloff cost Tim Horner the NWA title?

The crowd died early, then got surly
after a series of sloppy spots that
exposed the work and made them look
like rubes for buying it. Where was
shooter Puder when they needed him?
Snitsky hit his pumphandle slam for
an MCI "pin drop" pinfall. It's a
death knell when the crowd doesn't
even respond to the finishing move.

Lawler babbled some nonsense about
how if Maven had joined Evolution
last week he would have been in the
Evolution locker room with pretty
girls on his lap sipping champagne.

Huh? Did Evolution change their
gimmick in recent weeks? Last time
I saw them it was a creepy old man
fawning over two young studs. I
figured they didn't even like girls.

After a commercial RAW returned
with a shot of Evolution backstage.
Apparently Maven would have been
standing around where everyone could
overhear him with Flair fawning over
his body while Triple H brooded. At
least they finally had their own Raven,
though Trip looked closer to Flair's
age and Batista looked like chicken.

Back in the ring, Stacy pulled an ECW
DVD out of her miniskirt. Before
that unambitious segment ran out of
steam, Simon Dean came out to kill
it dead. Simon is the Brother Love
of the new millenium. One could hear
remotes across the country clicking.

Those that stayed saw Simon snap and
start menacing Stacy in a disturbing
way. Fortunately Hurricane sprang
into action to save her. Where was
he when Simon was abusing WWE fans?
Someone didn't think this through.

They showed a shot of two generic
divas backstage gossiping about
Evolution. Flair and Batista came
through a side door, but Flair led
Batista past the girls. I'm pretty
sure Evolution doesn't like girls.

WWE is pushing their new 24/7 with
the old "call your local cable company
to inquire about availabity" strategy.
Has that approach ever worked for them?

Benoit's next "sign up" match was
Batista vs Chris Jericho. Jericho
looked even more like Piper having
shaved off his beard. Jericho also
managed the same dead eyed, glazed
look that Piper would get when he
was booked into a dead end program.

The biggest response of the match came
after Ric Flair let out a "whoo" at
ringside. Remember when J.J. Dillon
upstaged the Horsemen? Me neither.
Remember when WWF announcers would
ignore the past accomplishments of
former NWA and AWA champions? Now
that phenomenon has come full circle
as neither Ross not Lawler bothered
to recall that Jericho was the first
"undisputed" WWE champion. In fact
Ross buried Jericho by referring to
him as "this young man" like he was
the modern answer to Sam Houston
challenging for the television title.

Batista got disqualified for something
so Jericho backed into a pyrrhic victory.
Forget Sam Houston, Jericho is being
booked closer to Mikey Whipwreck, but
the important thing is that Batista
lost his bet with Triple H from one
of their earlier segments. I'm sorry
for glossing over the details, but the
Evolution storyline was stinking up RAW
like a Taskmistress parody on rsp-w
and in the words of the Dark Cheetah,
"I don't follow that promotion."

Video aired of Edge punking out Christian.
I'm confused. Is Christian a face now
or is he just another punk, er, jobber?
Edge tried to intimidate some divas.
That's twice in one night that a male
character has menaced female characters.
Is Heyman back on RAW's creative team?
Speaking of which, where was Hurricane?!
They really didn't think this through.

Edge finally tried to menace some guy
which brought Chris Benoit out for the
save. I guess Benoit doesn't care as
much about women being intimidated.

Coach headed to the ring to wrestle
J.R. Lawler yelled "Get that coat
off! Get that tie off!" Could the
homosexual undercurrent on this show
be any stronger?! Benoit sent out
Rhyno instead. Nova? Rhyno? How
come Kevin Dunn gets saddled with
all the bums from Heymanville?!?!

Some divas came out for a three-way.
Lita got some of the biggest chants
of the night. They should feed her
Jericho, then put her in a shoot with
that Puder guy from Tough Enough.

Ross correctly identified "a rear
nekkid choke" and "punching from the
mount." He's tried to stay current
with this MMA thing, just in case.
Lita hit a DDT on Molly, but Trish
pulled Lita out, slid in, and stole
the pin because Lita somehow wasn't
able to do the exact same thing.
Did I mention that three-ways suck?!

Another shot aired of Flair and his
young, muscular friend backstage.
Still no sign of the champagne and
women Lawler referenced earlier.
Flair told Batista that he should
apologize to Triple H. I've thought
it over and I owe Liz an apology.
Her stuff was bad, but not this bad.

Shelton Benjamin got his own "Rikishi
Fatu - making a difference" video with
shots of the ghetto he traded in for
life as a WWE Superstar. He then got
stuck back in the WWE booking ghetto
with Eugene, Regal, La Resistance,
and Christian. The crowd was totally
dead for this match. Eugene is still
slightly over but there isn't much left.

Hassan cut a promo complaining about
airport security. Actually I agreed
with that. Extra security is a drag
and I doubt they'll stop terrorists
anyway. Oh, but I think Hassan was
trying to play heel. These skits are
too confusing. Even Ross ignores them.

Benoit came out for his "no excuses"
title match in the cage with Triple H,
but Trip was nowhere to be found.
Flair came out of the locker room
yelling for assistance. Flair said
that Batista "went nuts." Flair was
asked several times what happened,
but his response was always the same.
Someone needed to edit this script.

Benoit showed up in the Evolution
locker room (I wonder if he was
surprised that there weren't any
girls or champagne there) and
ordered Trip to come to the ring,
but Flair threatened to sue him.
Benoit backed down and settled for
stripping the title since Triple H
was unable to defend it. Sorry!
Just kidding. That would have made
sense, but that isn't what happened.
Instead Edge got in Benoit's face
so Benoit booked himself vs Edge as
the "bait-and-switch" main event.

If the switch wasn't bad enough, the
WWE had Benoit and Edge do a double
knockdown spot in the cage and cut
to commercial in the middle of their
match. Well, there was nothing at
stake in the match anyway. When they
came back, Edge was applying the rear
chinlock of doom with a bodyscissors.
Replay showed why Benoit was bloody.

The match continued. The crowd was
dead silent, even when Benoit was
near the door down the stretch. Of
course they had been baited, too.

Finally Edge speared Benoit through
the doorway to cost himself the match.
Poor weak Benoit didn't get his title
shot and got his butt kicked in the
main event by a guy who doesn't even
talk about wanting a title shot.

Thanks for coming...

Oh, wait. The show wasn't over yet.
Batista called out Triple H and Ross
sold it like their confrontation was
the real event of the evening. And
why not, since it seemed like there
were a dozen segments leading to it.

Batista came to the ring and called
out Triple H. I guess he became the
new commissioner at 11:00 PM EDT.
Triple H came out just as Alma came
into the bedroom.

"Ewww! He almost kissed him" she
said as Triple H and Batista went
nose to nose. "Can I write that?"
"No! Is that Triple H? Didn't he
used to be handsome once upon a time?"
"Can I write that?" "No!" Sadly
Alma left before sharing any more
unsolicited gems of insight.

Finally Triple H and Batista revealed
that Trip's injury was a hoax simply
to avoid facing Stingoit in the cage.
Trip then called for the ladies, but
Orton appeared instead. Coincidence?

Orton announced that he would be the
impotent, humiliated babyface commish
next week. Trip buried his comment.
Orton got his heat back by booking
the champ into a battle royal for
the world title. Trip stooged for
that. Batista and Flair stooged for
being involved too, though one would
think they would have wanted to be
involved to help Trip, so the stooging
seemed forced and stupid. They really
aren't thinking this through anymore.

Frank
Promote this thread!
Excalibur05
Knackwurst








Since: 19.1.02
From: Minnesota

Since last post: 2906 days
Last activity: 2774 days
#2 Posted on | Instant Rating: 7.73
    Originally posted by Boston Idol
    I missed Vince McMahon's opening swipe
    at the NFL controversy and the NBA.
    Back in the "Rock n' Wrestling" heydey
    of the mid-eighties, the WWF took a
    clever shot at MLB with a skit where
    Randy Savage consoled a young baseball
    fan and reminded viewers that the
    WWF never goes on strike. That was
    focused. Tonight's skit was modern
    WWE: Tossing a bunch of shit on the
    screen in a desperate attempt to make
    a connection with an audience that
    they no longer seem to understand.


Er...maybe you should stick to commenting on what you DID see, because this was actually a fairly clever and unsually funny moment for the WWE. Rather than just taking shit and seeing what works, they actually made a skit that showed that they still have a sense of humor. Contrary to your statement, I think they were spot on in line with the audience on this one, as everybody was in on the joke from the start, it played to a majority of the audience's feelings on a popular situation, and set up a midly entertaining night that played up the WWE psyche better than any show in recent memory (Batista's swerve was well set up and given purpose, Edge's ramblings seem directionless but it gives him something to do, and Orton getting his show a "week early," as the case may be, sets up a seed of doubt as to the outcome of next week's battle royal which encourages more fans to tune in.



Tonight I wanna ruin my life,
I wanna throw it all away,
In a spectacular way
Spaceman Spiff
Knackwurst








Since: 2.1.02
From: Philly Suburbs

Since last post: 1327 days
Last activity: 4 hours
#3 Posted on | Instant Rating: 4.05
The MNF swipe was clever when it was just Trish & Shelton. Once Vince appeared, however, it just went way over the top and ceased to be clever/funny. Subtelty would have been perfect, but that's not exactly the WWE's strong point. The audience doesn't need to be beaten over the head in order to get the point/joke.

(edited by Spaceman Spiff on 23.11.04 0909)


Boston Idol
Blutwurst








Since: 17.2.03
From: San Jose, CA

Since last post: 6303 days
Last activity: 6096 days
#4 Posted on | Instant Rating: 5.54
Thanks, Spiff. That seemed to be the
concensus based on the comments I saw
from other reviewers and average fans.
The reference to the NBA seemed to be
confusing as well, but maybe Excalibur05
thought that just made a good skit better.

Frank
Excalibur05
Knackwurst








Since: 19.1.02
From: Minnesota

Since last post: 2906 days
Last activity: 2774 days
#5 Posted on | Instant Rating: 7.73
It wasn't meant to be a straight parody. Vince's presence took it out of the realm of semi-reality, and made it self referential. Being directly subtle wasn't the point. The point was to just make a funny skit and have Vince take a swipe at how stupid the FCC was. In that it succeeded. Without Vince, it would just be Trish and Shelton doing another direct, stupid parody of a real life situation.



Tonight I wanna ruin my life,
I wanna throw it all away,
In a spectacular way
CRZ
Big Brother
Administrator








Since: 9.12.01
From: ミネアポリス

Since last post: 17 days
Last activity: 8 days
ICQ:  
#6 Posted on | Instant Rating: 9.02
Hi, Frank! Just so your hard work won't go to waste, here are a bunch of pointless one liners I wouldn't tolerate from anyone not running this board!
    Originally posted by Boston Idol
    I'll skip the obligatory Groundhog Day analogy. Let's just say that the tOA powers that be told me that if I didn't start discussing wrestling on a regular basis they were going to trade me to 411Mania for that bedwetter Hyatte.
Part of the problem with namedropping people you don't know is you end up making careless errors. Hyatte was part of the mass exodus to Inside Pulse back in July. ;-)

    And with that flimsy pretext, here is yet another irregular RAW review...
Hell, you're still reviewing it more than *I* am!


    I missed Vince McMahon's opening swipe at the NFL controversy and the NBA.
Maybe you would have liked it more if you'd seen it. This totally worked for me, probably because (1) Vince actually said "are you ready for some wrestling," which made me wonder who went to the mat for an hour or two to get Vince to actually utter THAT WORD, and (2) they correctly used the identifiable opening stanza of the NFL music where anything else would have REALLY annoyed me for the reason that they didn't bother correctly using the identifiable &c.

    Back in the "Rock n' Wrestling" heydey of the mid-eighties, the WWF took a clever shot at MLB with a skit where Randy Savage consoled a young baseball fan and reminded viewers that the WWF never goes on strike. That was focused. Tonight's skit was modern WWE: Tossing a bunch of shit on the screen in a desperate attempt to make a connection with an audience that they no longer seem to understand.
The alternative was spreading all that material out over multiple segments...isolating it from the show in a before-the-credits spot allowed them to get in their shot and get it forgotten by the time the pyro went off.

Also, did you really think that Savage spot was that clever? I don't think I did at the time. The one *I* liked was at one of the In Your House cards where Sunny tried to throw in the towel during a tag team title match and Hebner said "This isn't boxing, this is the WWF!" The sad part is while I remember the spot, I don't remember what the previous day's event was that it was a parody of. Pardon my grammar.


    I joined in progress as Chris Benoit cut his babyface commissioner promo. Benoit looked much more poised and confident on the mic, even though his material was weak.
"He said Buffalo!"

    His approach to being in charge was to put a paper on his door and let wrestlers book their own matches, except that he did book himself into a cage match with Triple H for the world title so that this time there would be "no excuses."
This at least demonstrates he learned SOMETHING from last week's main event...not that the cage stipulation has really kept out the interference either. Perhaps he should have added that the cage door would be locked, and escapes wouldn't win the title - in fact, how about a submissions only match? After all, Benoit has the Sharpshooter and the crossface, while Triple H has...that Indian deathlock? Oh, and the sleeper. How could I forget the sleeper?


    I'm not sure I understand the concept of the babyface wrestler commissioner. They seem to be ganging up on Triple H which makes him a quasi-babyface. Also since they had the power, none of them will have any excuses. If Triple H survives them stacking the odds in their own favor, he will have made them all look like wimps or schmucks. He'll have no serious opposition left.
Some would argue this has already happened. When's Shawn Michaels due back?

I think you miss a more important point, however - babyfaces just aren't all that smart...or creative.


    Benoit's first match was Snitsky vs Maven. Jim Ross claimed that Snitsky "cost Maven the world title" last week. In NWA parlance, Maven would be a less polished, equally charismatic Tim Horner. Can you imagine Ross saying that Nikita Koloff cost Tim Horner the NWA title?
21st Millienium Ross? Anything's possible! But I think attempting to make ANY linkage to the NWA with today's WWE is a fool's errand.


    The crowd died early, then got surly after a series of sloppy spots that exposed the work and made them look like rubes for buying it. Where was shooter Puder when they needed him? Snitsky hit his pumphandle slam for an MCI "pin drop" pinfall. It's a death knell when the crowd doesn't even respond to the finishing move.
I think live viewers still think of Snitsky's finisher as the "gets disqualified" without the benefit of JR's raised voice.


    Lawler babbled some nonsense about how if Maven had joined Evolution last week he would have been in the Evolution locker room with pretty girls on his lap sipping champagne.

    Huh? Did Evolution change their gimmick in recent weeks? Last time I saw them it was a creepy old man fawning over two young studs. I figured they didn't even like girls.
No, no, Flair likes to WATCH. ALL. NIGHT. LONG.


    After a commercial RAW returned with a shot of Evolution backstage. Apparently Maven would have been standing around where everyone could overhear him with Flair fawning over his body while Triple H brooded. At least they finally had their own Raven, though Trip looked closer to Flair's age and Batista looked like chicken.
The sad part is this segment - and all the subsequent ones - shows that at least EVOLUTION is aware they're being filmed and that other people are watching them as they're being filmed. Sadly, the internal logic concerning invisible cameramen has been twisted and pulled so many ways that it's really insulting to the people on the other side of the fourth wall who actually end up THINKING about these things.


    Back in the ring, Stacy pulled an ECW DVD out of her miniskirt. Before that unambitious segment ran out of steam, Simon Dean came out to kill it dead. Simon is the Brother Love of the new millenium. One could hear remotes across the country clicking.
But...he has a picture of his own face on the back of his sweat top! It's....FUNNY! Well, okay, it's not funny. It's MORE funny that Nova can't tell anybody he used to BE in ECW - also that he has to kayfabe his abilities as limited to some sort of "amateur background" when we *ALL* know he invented all the crazy moves you see today on...on...maybe on "Impact!" these days, I dunno.


    Those that stayed saw Simon snap and start menacing Stacy in a disturbing way. Fortunately Hurricane sprang into action to save her. Where was he when Simon was abusing WWE fans? Someone didn't think this through.
Hurricane doesn't want to fuck WWE fans! He knows Stacy's on the rebound!

By the way, you could tell the released talent was long forgotten with Stacy's "I don't date people who look in the mirror more than I do" line, as Test used to have the Narcissist gimmick down PAT.

Okay, this was actually to help advance the Simon/Rosey feud...somehow. People, I can't connect ALL the dots for you...


    They showed a shot of two generic divas backstage gossiping about Evolution. Flair and Batista came through a side door, but Flair led Batista past the girls. I'm pretty sure Evolution doesn't like girls.
But...it was all for the benefit of that cameraman that (sometimes) they know is there!


    WWE is pushing their new 24/7 with the old "call your local cable company to inquire about availabity" strategy. Has that approach ever worked for them?
I emailed my cable company. My brother bet me I wouldn't hear back. I naively pointed to the "we answer all emails with 24-36 hours" blurb on their website. I was wrong and he was right.


    Benoit's next "sign up" match was Batista vs Chris Jericho. Jericho looked even more like Piper having shaved off his beard. Jericho also managed the same dead eyed, glazed look that Piper would get when he was booked into a dead end program.

    The biggest response of the match came after Ric Flair let out a "whoo" at ringside. Remember when J.J. Dillon upstaged the Horsemen? Me neither. Remember when WWF announcers would ignore the past accomplishments of former NWA and AWA champions? Now that phenomenon has come full circle as neither Ross not Lawler bothered to recall that Jericho was the first "undisputed" WWE champion. In fact Ross buried Jericho by referring to him as "this young man" like he was the modern answer to Sam Houston challenging for the television title.
They mention the first Undisputed championship a LOT, even now. Regular watchers probably didn't mind it going unsaid ONCE. Of course, I didn't pay all that much attention to this match until the end, so...


    Batista got disqualified for something so Jericho backed into a pyrrhic victory. Forget Sam Houston, Jericho is being booked closer to Mikey Whipwreck, but the important thing is that Batista lost his bet with Triple H from one of their earlier segments. I'm sorry for glossing over the details, but the Evolution storyline was stinking up RAW like a Taskmistress parody on rsp-w and in the words of the Dark Cheetah, "I don't follow that promotion."
This was so we could see how SMART Triple H was. He predicted Batista would lose, and by golly, he did! Heels are SMART! Oh, wait, Batista's a heel and he foolishly got himself disqualified. Damn. So... was that part of the act? Either a "yes" or "no" answer will invite me to point out inconsistencies in the storyline, so let's evade that and move on...


    Video aired of Edge punking out Christian. I'm confused. Is Christian a face now or is he just another punk, er, jobber? Edge tried to intimidate some divas. That's twice in one night that a male character has menaced female characters. Is Heyman back on RAW's creative team? Speaking of which, where was Hurricane?! They really didn't think this through.
Hurricane was too injured by Simon Dean, dummy! As for Christian, he's still a heel until they figure out what's next for him after Shelton Benjamin beats him again.


    Edge finally tried to menace some guy which brought Chris Benoit out for the save. I guess Benoit doesn't care as much about women being intimidated.
Well, he IS already married...


    Coach headed to the ring to wrestle J.R. Lawler yelled "Get that coat off! Get that tie off!" Could the homosexual undercurrent on this show be any stronger?! Benoit sent out Rhyno instead. Nova? Rhyno? How come Kevin Dunn gets saddled with all the bums from Heymanville?!?!
You read it here first! Next week: Tajiri


    Some divas came out for a three-way. Lita got some of the biggest chants of the night. They should feed her Jericho, then put her in a shoot with that Puder guy from Tough Enough.

    Ross correctly identified "a rear nekkid choke" and "punching from the mount." He's tried to stay current with this MMA thing, just in case. Lita hit a DDT on Molly, but Trish pulled Lita out, slid in, and stole the pin because Lita somehow wasn't able to do the exact same thing. Did I mention that three-ways suck?!
There's an opening here, but I'm not man enough to take it. ;-)


    Another shot aired of Flair and his young, muscular friend backstage. Still no sign of the champagne and women Lawler referenced earlier. Flair told Batista that he should apologize to Triple H. I've thought it over and I owe Liz an apology. Her stuff was bad, but not this bad.
Wow, nostalgia CAN make anything seem better than it was!


    Shelton Benjamin got his own "Rikishi Fatu - making a difference" video with shots of the ghetto he traded in for life as a WWE Superstar.
Nitpick: just Fatu back then

    He then got stuck back in the WWE booking ghetto with Eugene, Regal, La Resistance, and Christian. The crowd was totally dead for this match. Eugene is still slightly over but there isn't much left.
Have I ever told you about the time the theory was posited that Eugene was the "Zach Gowen of 2004?" That one still kills me. I love how the story went that Christian and La Resistance both wanted rematches, so Benoit figured he'd put them all together in a six man...the LEAST they could was imply that Benoit knew they actually wanted TITLES on the line, but booked this instead just to peeve them or something. Ah, well. Either way nobody cares, right?


    Hassan cut a promo complaining about airport security. Actually I agreed with that. Extra security is a drag and I doubt they'll stop terrorists anyway. Oh, but I think Hassan was trying to play heel. These skits are too confusing. Even Ross ignores them.
It's funny to watch the Closed Caption guys decide on what to put on the screen when the manager starts talking. In recent weeks, it's gone from "[SPEAKING FARSI]" to "[SPEAKING ARABIC]" to the now storyline-friendly-yet-incredibly-confusing "[SPEAKING NATIVE LANGUAGE]" - hey, maybe he's an Injun now! Hey, doesn't the WWE still syndicate one of their shows nobody cares about to Arabic speaking languages? Maybe they're all Smackdown-derivatives now. I should hop on the international site and check, assuming the information there isn't two or three years old...


    Benoit came out for his "no excuses" title match in the cage with Triple H, but Trip was nowhere to be found. Flair came out of the locker room yelling for assistance. Flair said that Batista "went nuts." Flair was asked several times what happened, but his response was always the same. Someone needed to edit this script.
As an older, jaded, long-time viewer, the finish of the show was signalled from a mile away here. *When you don't see the guy getting beat up, he ain't beat up.* Duuuuh. Although, the paid-off doctor was at least a nice touch.


    Benoit showed up in the Evolution locker room (I wonder if he was surprised that there weren't any girls or champagne there)
Frank, if you want to see girls so badly, there are MANY fine avenues... ;-)

    and ordered Trip to come to the ring, but Flair threatened to sue him. Benoit backed down and settled for stripping the title since Triple H was unable to defend it. Sorry! Just kidding. That would have made sense, but that isn't what happened.
Yeah, this is really the worst bit. Can't the general manager strip people of titles at any time for any reason? The "board of directors" has never seemed to care who's holding the belts. I suppose one could argue that the proud babyface tradition demands that a title be won fair and square and in the ring, but...

    Instead Edge got in Benoit's face so Benoit booked himself vs Edge as the "bait-and-switch" main event.

    If the switch wasn't bad enough, the WWE had Benoit and Edge do a double knockdown spot in the cage and cut to commercial in the middle of their match. Well, there was nothing at stake in the match anyway. When they came back, Edge was applying the rear chinlock of doom with a bodyscissors. Replay showed why Benoit was bloody.

    The match continued. The crowd was dead silent, even when Benoit was near the door down the stretch. Of course they had been baited, too.
I wish WWE would book at least ONE cage match where I don't have to cry out "BUT THE DOOR IS **RIGHT THERE**!" on multiple occasions. At least it was funny when Benoit made the throat slash to the crowd and then...tried to climb over and out of the cage. What? Maybe he finally remembered how ultimately pointless his top of the cage headbutt during the WCW tag tourney on Thunder was.


    Finally Edge speared Benoit through the doorway to cost himself the match. Poor weak Benoit didn't get his title shot and got his butt kicked in the main event by a guy who doesn't even talk about wanting a title shot.
And here's the greatest irony. With his constant temper tantrums, Edge has now become Christian circa 2002. Yippee! One step forward, two steps back!


    Thanks for coming...

    Oh, wait. The show wasn't over yet. Batista called out Triple H and Ross sold it like their confrontation was the real event of the evening. And why not, since it seemed like there were a dozen segments leading to it.

    Batista came to the ring and called out Triple H. I guess he became the new commissioner at 11:00 PM EDT. Triple H came out just as Alma came into the bedroom.

    "Ewww! He almost kissed him" she said as Triple H and Batista went nose to nose. "Can I write that?" "No! Is that Triple H? Didn't he used to be handsome once upon a time?" "Can I write that?" "No!" Sadly Alma left before sharing any more unsolicited gems of insight.

    Finally Triple H and Batista revealed that Trip's injury was a hoax simply to avoid facing Stingoit in the cage. Trip then called for the ladies, but Orton appeared instead. Coincidence?

    Orton announced that he would be the impotent, humiliated babyface commish next week. Trip buried his comment. Orton got his heat back by booking the champ into a battle royal for the world title. Trip stooged for that. Batista and Flair stooged for being involved too, though one would think they would have wanted to be involved to help Trip, so the stooging seemed forced and stupid. They really aren't thinking this through anymore.

    Frank
(a) You know, if you're not going to reveal Plan B as a Batista title match...

(b) Why a battle royal? If the aim is to get the title off of Triple H so Orton can go for it, wouldn't, say, a gauntlet match be better? Hell, if Triple H drops the title, Orton can then immediately book himself in a title match with the new beltholder!

(c) Orton should just strip Triple H of the title and award it to himself, don't you think? Arrrgh.





CRZ
pieman
As young as
he feels








Since: 11.12.01
From: China, Maine

Since last post: 111 days
Last activity: 5 days
ICQ:  
#7 Posted on | Instant Rating: 8.67

Now see, this is the kind of recap we need. Frank and Chris, tag team recappers. Maybe this will ease CRZ back into the recapping business (or at least the wisecracking business). Nice work, gentlemen.








Gabba gabba hey!
fuelinjected
Banger








Since: 12.10.02
From: Canada

Since last post: 6696 days
Last activity: 6696 days
#8 Posted on | Instant Rating: 4.77
If Triple H put as much effort into thinking of ways to make his challengers look good as he does constructing elaborate shows to make them look like morons, he might actually be a damn good booker/writer/contributor. Kinda like Dusty back in the day.

Bischoff was the one who made the stipulation that Orton won't ever get another shot at Triple H. Why can't Orton just overturn it? He is GM for the week, right? And why is he giving Triple H options? Benoit and Maven didn't give him options.

As far as Triple H making the face GMs look like mental midgets, I think the worst is yet to come when we get to Chris Jericho. Watch, he'll have Jericho book Batista against Triple H and forfeit his shot just so Evolution can fight. Something ridiculous like that.

So when BostonIdol says:

    They really
    aren't thinking this through anymore.


I disagree. Triple H seems to be thinking this through quite a bit. I thought he would mellow with the marriage about protecting his spot but I guess Stephanie must have gotten the most airtight prenup ever.



"When did they pass a law that says the people who make my sandwich have to be wearing gloves? I'm not comfortable with this. I don't want glove residue all over my food; it's not sanitary. Who knows where these gloves have been?" - George Carlin
HMD
Andouille








Since: 8.6.02
From: Canada

Since last post: 2532 days
Last activity: 2532 days
#9 Posted on | Instant Rating: 6.71
    Originally posted by CRZ
    And here's the greatest irony. With his constant temper tantrums, Edge has now become Christian circa 2002. Yippee! One step forward, two steps back!


That's a stretch. Edge's tantrums aren't being thrown for comedy, they're being presented as evidence of his slipping sanity, and they happen to lead to beatdowns which are taken quite seriously.

Christian's tantrums were just midcard jokes.



Hot Virgins-The World's Most Steadily Shrinking Commodity
tomk
Goetta








Since: 30.7.02

Since last post: 6116 days
Last activity: 4466 days
#10 Posted on | Instant Rating: 9.53
Frank said:
I missed Vince McMahon's opening swipe
at the NFL controversy and the NBA.
Back in the "Rock n' Wrestling" heydey
of the mid-eighties, the WWF took a
clever shot at MLB with a skit where
Randy Savage consoled a young baseball
fan and reminded viewers that the
WWF never goes on strike. That was
focused.

CRZ says:Also, did you really think that Savage spot was that clever? I don't think I did at the time.

Tom says:

The thing that struck me about the opening segment outside of Vince saying "wrestling" was that it was actually kind of clever. Not in the least bit funny. But kind of clever. More clever than the VH1 Best Week Ever parody.

I expect WWE comedy to be both unfunny and not clever. This was unfunny and clever. I was surprised by that.

CRZ again:
The sad part is this segment - and all the subsequent ones - shows that at least EVOLUTION is aware they're being filmed and that other people are watching them as they're being filmed. Sadly, the internal logic concerning invisible cameramen has been twisted and pulled so many ways that it's really insulting to the people on the other side of the fourth wall who actually end up THINKING about these things.


Tom again: I figured there was a swerve coming as soon as they did the two random divas backstage gossiping about overhearing Batista and Helmsley arguing. This felt like the writers explaining how the backstage was going to be swerved later. Doesn't explain the audience being swerved unless Evolution has broke through the fourth wall.

It should be added that the Batista turn has been hinted at slowly since at least a week before the last PPV with Batista eyeing Helmsley's belt. Was Batista setting this swerve up three weeks ago or was that not for the cameras?

Structurally Helmsley as Franchise with Evolution as Triple threat is a nice deal for Helmsley. It means Helmsley will never be overshadowed by RAW's secondary heel (as secondary heel will be a Helmsley flunkie).

At such point as secondary heel gets over enough that he might overshadow Helmsley, you turn the secondary heel face. Of course in the meantime Helmsley really doesn't need to put over any of the other faces.

It's a really nice structure for Helsmley. The swerve fucks it up.

Last week Colin Powell told reporters that he had information that suggested that Iran was adapting their missiles to deliver nuclear weapons. Didn't even make the above the fold section of the Washington Times.

The WWE is eventually going to want to turn Batista.

Next time, will anyone pay attention?


Frank again:

The match continued. The crowd was dead silent, even when Benoit was near the door down the stretch. Of course they had been baited, too.

Tom again:

The silence is decieving. I can no longer tell half the time what the crowd is or isn't responding to. Throughout the match the sound was being muffled brought up and down to the point where it was distracting.

The WWE lately has been making their sound cuts as abrupt as their quick video cuts.

Was the crowd silent?
Were they cheering the heel and booing the face?
Were they chanting "show us your tits"?
Where they chanting "fuck you Benoit"?
"Bullshit"?
"Boring"?
"Goldberg! Goldberg!"?
"UFC! UFC!"?
Chanting "Na na na na" at a guy getting kicked out of arena for starting fight?

I no longer can tell. Its like the early nineties where WWF didn't trust the fans and would sweeten noise when the crowd popped for wrong things but more distracting.

I'm not sure whether this started after the "bizzaro" Canadian PPV audience or when it started.

I started to notice it during the Diva search when it was really obvious when they were turning off the crowd noise and when surprised that something was getting a pop they would quickly turn it back up. Really get this abrupt sound when going from silence to middle of a pop.

But they weren't just doing it for the diva contest and started to notice it all the time these days.

The pre Survivor Series episode of Raw which I mentioned earlier had backstage segments where all of the heels other than Batista told Helmsley that they were interested in going after his title. The backstage segments had the crowd unmiked. They run the backstage segment where Batista stares at the belt...crowd responds, guys in sound booth go "wow crowd responding turn up the mic"... suddenly crowd mic goes on catching end of a pop (like middle of a clap) and then just as quickly crowd mic goes off.

The Edge vs. Benoit match was filled with these constant sound adjustments. Dead Silence...noise...dead silence... noise...volume of noise raised... dead silence... noise muffled.

I'd rather they just used a heat machine then constantly fucking with the sound as this is far more distracting.
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