WrestleMania 23 is the first one of these things I actually watched live. I mean I wasn’t there but you know what I mean.

I really, really like the all grown up theme and video packages for this show. Also really like the return to the stadium setting. Ford Field looks fucking gigantic. It is, but that’s what you want to convey. Looks way better than a fancy set for a RAW. Not sure why they insist on really blue lights for the big stadium shows though, both this one and XXV were extremely blue.

This show has such a weird card, like, fucking MITB is fourth biggest for fuck’s sakes. And your main event is Lashley/Umaga, which, celebrity involvement aside, always gets ‘…’ responses when I tell people. Still I remember really liking this show. LET’S SEE ABOUT THAT.

I will always love King Booker because when he’d come out, my sister (who absolutely hates wrestling) would start screaming “I hate that man!” and not like I want to spite her or anything but that’s a job well done, you know?

Always happy to see CM Punk doing, well, anything, but his first ‘Mania is cool.

Edge’s hair looks fucking horrendous.

Jeff Hardy v King Booker v Finlay v CM Punk v Mr. Kennedy v Matt Hardy v Randy Orton v Edge

This was okay… you had some really spectacular spots but there was nothing tying them together, it was just spot spot spot and between the spots it was everyone laying around. You have eight guys, why there ever downtime? Worst of all this was just way too ‘cute’ for me to really like it. Still Hardy going through Edge on the ladder, the whole Kennedy/Hornswoggle bit, and Punk taking an RKO off the ladder were fucking awesome. But then you have shit like the dumb Finlay dive (coming from a Finlay fan) and Matt threatening Booker’s wife with a FINISHING MOVE which causes Booker to give up on the title. So I don’t know. Wasn’t bad or anything but this isn’t my thing.

MR. KENNEDY WINS

Condemned promo which got skipped, then a pretty good Mr. Kennedy interview. Kind of a shame he never really went anywhere. But he would have needed to get a lot better at the same time. But oh well.

Kane not coming to the ring with his big ol’ hook and chain was pretty disappointing.

Kane v The Great Khali

Hey it’s a big man spectacle and those are always fun and the chain came out and yeah okay this wasn’t very good. Better than it should have been probably, and I quite like Khali’s cocky one foot pin, but uh, yeah. Not really any noticeably worse than some of the ‘big’ matches on the past few shows but that doesn’t make it good, either.

KHALI WINS

Fucking beyond wacky segment this whole backstage dance party was. Not that I’m complaining about the ECW Dancing Troupe in shirts that show tit and stomach.

MVP’s entrance makes MVP seem like a big, important deal. LOL

A sign in the audience says “Chris Benoit, WWE’S TRUE MVP”. LOL

Chris Benoit v MVP

*crickets*

*a week passes*

Annnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd this is where I finished, turns out. Cool!

WrestleMania 22 is cheating lol

Yeah I’m leaving tomorrow and have a fuck ton of shows to go through so you’ll forgive me if I cheat a little (a lot) here and just repost what I wrote about the best matches of WM 22 last year, yeah?

Don’t you worry though, my precious lists will remain intact (tard)

1. Cena/HHH
2. James/Stratus
3. Michaels/Vince
4. Benoit/JBL
5. Undertaker/Henry
6. MITB
7. Edge/Foley
8. Angle/Orton/Mysterio
9. Show & Kane/Masters & Carlito
10. Torrie/Candice
11. Boogeyman/Booker T & Sharmell

TOP 15

1. Austin/Rock, X-Seven
2. Austin/Rock, XIX
3. Hogan/Rock, X8
4. McMahon/McMahon, X-Seven
5. Cena/HHH, 22
6. Mysterio/Guerrero, 21
7. TLC, X-Seven
8. MITB, 21
9. Hogan/Vince, XIX
10. Flair/Undertaker, X8
11. Mysterio/Hardy, XIX
12. James/Stratus, 22
13. Evolution/Rock N Sock, XX
14. Undertaker/Orton, 21
15. Michaels/Vince, 22

WRESTLEMANIA RANKINGS

1. X-Seven
2. X8
3. 22
4. 21
5. XIX
6. XX

WrestleMania 21 is talkin’ to me?

Lillian looks so happy to be singing America the Beautiful. That makes me very happy for her. A feel good moment, if you will. And also a moment in which I press R1 and skip ahead. Sorry gorgeous.

The vignettes throughout the show of WWE does Hollywood or however you want to describe them are pretty fucking fun. This is a catch all, I don’t want to have to talk about it a thousand times.

Eddie Guerrero v Rey Mysterio

Man I thought this was really fucking great. If I wasn’t so tired, I’d probably watch it multiple times in a row. That said… am I far too tired to really articulate what I liked about it and how great it was (as much as one can articulate anything when writing a wrestling blog, I suppose)? Absolutely. :(

REY MYSTERIO WINS

I liked the backstage bit where HHH and JBL run into each other and talk shit. Kind of got over RAW and Smackdown! as different worlds in a sense. I don’t know.

Chris Jericho v Chris Benoit v Christian v Shelton Benjamin v Edge v Kane

Man this match is actually really good, it’s structured like a match that happens to have a lot of nutty spots and bumps as opposed to a bunch of nutty spots and bumps where someone wins at the end. Going into this I was kind of dreading watching all of these MITB matches, I mean, what passes for match structure in your ‘modern’ MITB is call back spots to the finish of the prior year’s. Which I mark for. But anyway, I was really surprised with this, you had your requisite silly bumps and spots that looked good, you had Benoit getting his arm destroyed and actually selling it all match and having it play into the finish, everyone feels like a legitimate option to win. Again my brain is a bit mushy at the moment and given how much better the opener was I’m kind of embarrassed that I can’t think of anything to say about that when I can ramble on about (nothing) this one but hey. This was good. And Jericho’s beard was great.

EDGE WINS

Eugene, I love Eugene, I really do. It’s such an offensive gimmick but man he plays it really cute. I choose to think of him as a loveable child. Pretty sure Anne would have never gotten into wrestling if he’d been around the last few years though. Eugene also always brings huge heat onto whoever is attacking him. I fucking HATED Triple H when he was murdering Eugene (now I just hate watching him murder my eyes with shit matches). So I am sitting here all ‘fuck that God damn Arab Hassan even though yeah he isn’t really Arab wait when did I become racist’ and then HULK HOGAN comes out. Awesome. And yes, your big WrestleMania moment probably shouldn’t be a U-S-A!!!! type face beating up a heel working a evil foreigner gimmick but man this is your stupid fun segment so I am gonna shut up and cheer.

When the fuck does ‘Taker ever come out first?

Undertaker v Randy Orton

They had a lot of neat ideas that kind of looked really shitty but it was fairly good anyway. In particular the punch exchange stand off, which seems like a precursor to the boo/yay punch exchange stand off, looked awful, the ref bump was awful, and as great as the RKO out of a chokeslam SEEMS, it was pulled off pretty shittily here. I still liked it though so whatever I guess.

UNDERTAKER WINS

I should really consider getting a red can of spray paint and spraying SLUT on bitches’ backs, that looks so fun. Oh how I love you Trish.

Trish Stratus v Christy Hemme

This match is fucking fantastic for my penis. However it’s really not as good as *I* wanted it to be, Trish is a fucking great heel with her taunting and bullying and shit talk but Christy’s offense actually somehow looks better than Trish’s. Don’t know if Trish was taking it easy cause she didn’t want to hurt her or what. I on the other hand thinking hurting her could be quite fun. You know what, let’s just move on. Match of the year.

TRISH WINS

Why does Shawn still have the 1996 pop gun pyro?

This is also the WrestleMania debut of Shawn’s plastic chaps. His spray tan also makes him glow a bright, Space Jam-like orange.

Shawn Michaels v Kurt Angle

Holy shit, this was an absolute MESS. Shawn is an absolute poor man’s Eddie Guerrero and this was essentially a longer version of the Eddie/Angle match from last year. Throw in a shitty table bump and more emphasis on the ankle lock and boom, you have this match. Brian told me that this tore down the house, I wasn’t aware that the Staple Center was made of cards.

KURT ANGLE WINS

Piper’s Pit was super fun, Roddy getting annoyed with the WHAT! chants and adjusting on the fly was great. Piper and Austin are always fun. Carlito not so much.

Big Show v Akebono

Could have been pretty cool but I kinda started laughing and then it was over so I don’t really know what happened.

AKEBONO WINS

Another weird video package theme song, this one has the song from the “please don’t try this” video. Don’t try taking the title from Bradshaw? Well okay.

JBL v John Cena

Wow, this was really not good. I’ve really liked some of their matches together but this is pretty much the worst match I’ve ever seen them have. Really boring and pretty much just there. A lot like the Cena/Big Show match from last year, actually. Actually I already forgot this match. Maybe it wasn’t bad?

JOHN CENA WINS

Nothing in the HOF recap is as emotional as Heenan from XX.

Holy shit, Michelle McCool with a body on her. No fucking way.

Eppppppic video build for the main event.

Motorhead gets another shot at playing HHH to the ring. They were better in 2001.

Triple H v Batista

Ew.

BATISTA WINS

This show started strong as fuck and then really fell off a cliff. The ‘big three’ matches were all really boring and typical of a bad style that I just have no interest in watching. Taking the same matches I’ve seen in prior years and plugging new guys into it isn’t going to make me like it anymore unless you’re putting in someone who actively enhances the formula. But this was still an improvement as a show because the first match was legitimately great and the second was very, very good. So not a complete failure. But a let down after the first few matches, for sure.

1. Mysterio/Guerrero
2. MITB
3. Taker/Orton
4. Hemme/Stratus
5. Triple H/Batista
6. Cena/JBL
7. Angle/Michaels
8. Akebono/Big Show

TOP 15

1. Austin/Rock, X-Seven
2. Austin/Rock, XIX
3. Hogan/Rock, X8
4. McMahon/McMahon, X-Seven
5. Mysterio/Guerrero, 21
6. TLC, X-Seven
7. MITB, 21
8. Hogan/Vince, XIX
9. Flair/Undertaker, X8
10. Mysterio/Hardy, XIX
11. Evolution/Rock N Sock, XX
12. Undertaker/Orton, 21
13. Angle/Benoit, X-Seven
14. Austin/Hall, X8
15. Christian/DDP, X8

WRESTLEMANIA RANKING

1. X-Seven
2. X8
3. 21
4. XIX
5. XX

WrestleMania XX is so, so long…

Not fucking looking forward to this shit.

I’m not expected to sit and watch America the Beautiful am I? I mean. It’s a good tune and all. But I’m not watching this. Limp Bizkit more or less forced me to take a WWE MUSICAL GUEST break.

Why the fuck is the closing shot of the opening video the new McMahon grandchild? Is he main eventing tonight? Actually that’d probably be pretty cool.

Oh what the fuck, they’re not using the short ramp?

Cena’s rap… no.

Big Show v John Cena

Well this… was a match. A match I instantly forgot and have no idea of what happened in it. Am I going to go back and watch it again? Shit no!

JOHN CENA WINS

Coachman is the least interesting cool black guy ever.

Randy Orton cuts a pretty spectacularly shitty promo with RIC FLAIR and Batista at his side. In a back staircase. Randy’s seen people, you know, speak before, right? Did he do a lot of PCP as a child and it’s permanently left his eyes all googly, so when people speak he sees them bobbing their heads constantly? What the fucking fuck, Randy. What the fucking fuck.

Just realized that La Resistance’s theme song is the same music from the Undertaker/Flair video package a couple of years back. I thought it felt weird then.

Jindrak and Cade have the worst knock off of The Mob Rules ever. The best of course being from Maximum Carnage.

La Resistance v Booker T & RVD v The Dudleys v Garrison Cade & Mark Jindrak

So the last four team tag match at a WM was on X8 and that was pretty bad but somewhat redeemable because at least you had a fun table spot. This match has the Dudleys and it also has Booker T, who has been the only redeemable part of Mania matches with Edge and HHH. So I didn’t think this match would be the worst. Well. I was wrong.

BOOKER T & RVD WIN

Coachman is a cock blocker? Way to make him even fucking LESS cool.

Chris Jericho v Christian

Well this is a fun storyline match. I mean for a match built on a guy who wants revenge on his ex best friend for beating his woman, you’d think Jericho would show some more fire, but it’s Chris Jericho so you gotta adjust your expectations. And he was actually pretty good here! Definite step up from the last several matches of his at Mania and I was impressed. Trish was really fucking awesome by this point so her coming out, accidentally costing Jericho the match, and then turning on him and making out with Christian was all pretty spectacular. I liked it!

CHRISTIAN WINS

The Rock cuts a fantastic promo backstage. Of course.

The Rock & Mick Foley v Ric Flair & Randy Orton & Batista

This got clipped a lot because my DVD skipped. I have this on a burned disc somewhere. I remember it being pretty good. What I saw of it was good. So we’ll say it was good!

EVOLUTION WINS

Awwwwww Heenan saying he wished Monsoon was here is fucking heartbreaking. Legit would rather watch that again and again instead of…

Torrie Wilson & Sable v Miss Jackie & Stacy Keibler

Well. They build well to Stacy coming in to show her ass. And the rollling covers were… okay it’s not good but if for some reason you really need to rub one out and the only thing you have is Mania XX, it’ll probably do the job.

TORRIE AND SABLE WIN

LOL Paul London made WrestleMania!?

Oh fuck off, a Chris Benoit talking piece? No one wants that. Especially not with his hair slicked back to show off his brutally receding hairline. Even Eddie can’t say that. Also Cody’s mom is totally right, Benoit looks like he could kill someone.

My God. Why do all of the fucking Japanese guys have music that goes TIKA TIK TONG CHUNG CHING?

Cruiserweight Open

Man this is really a stupid format. You have ten guys you have to get in with only ten minutes. I figured “well, at least there will be lots of Rey”. Nope, there’s lots of Billy Kidman. Rey does get a couple minutes to rule in, and rule he does, but it’s still just a couple minutes and a Flash costume. There’s barely any Chavo, Noble is pretty disappointing, and I can’t stop laughing and screaming TIKA TIKA TIK TIK TONG at all the Japanese guys.

CHAVO GUERRERO WINS

Brock Lesnar v Goldberg

I think this match gets really unfairly shit on by a lot of people because of the terrible crowd. If you get a crowd who’s already decided that they’re not going to get into the match and instead are gonna chant whatever Shane McMahon starts chanting, well, there’s not much you can do. They probably figured that they’d have to work in all the stalling at the start of the match because of the crowd reaction. Well, that was a smart move, but everyone in the ring is pretty clearly baffled by it and they draw out the stalling to see if the crowd is gonna shut the fuck up. Well, they don’t. So they were more or less working handicapped to begin with. But the match itself really isn’t all that bad. I mean, it isn’t really that good. Don’t get me wrong. Brock gives up trying to get anyone into it about halfway through and starts pulling everything and really working in slow motion, and again, it’s hard to have heated nearfalls if the crowd doesn’t want to cheer you, and this match really needed those. But it’s not an end of the world catastrophe either. I actually thought the wild stalling at the beginning added to the match (even if long term the crowd would hurt it) and I really liked the opening ‘test of strength’ style lock up, thought they really worked it well and got the sense of a struggle across. The mid-match abdominal stretch I thought worked a lot better than whatever the fuck resthold Angle threw on Lesnar in the XIX match. Still not great, but there was enough good stuff here to keep it from being horrendous. Crowd and all.

GOLDBERG WINS

Vince wins the award for ‘most bitter face while making a ‘thank you’ speech’.

APA

ALWAYS

POUNDING

ASS

APA v World’s Greatest Tag Team v Basham Brothers v Rikishi & Scotty 2 Hotty

Bradshaw’s clothesline on whichever Basham made this acceptable.

RIKISHI & SCOTTY WIN

Edge is coming… holy fuck that seems like such a threat now. And from Goldberg one year to Edge the next is… yeah.

Jesse Ventura is here to kill time. I am going to get a drink. Because I do not care.

WHY WOULD YOU WASTE THE BEST STIP IN WRESTLING ON VICTORIA

VICTORIA!!!!!!!!!!

Victoria v Molly Holly

Molly selling fear post-match was dramatically better than anything in the match. And even then, all I could think of was how much more efficient CM Punk is at shaving a woman’s head than Victoria is. Again, WHY WOULD YOU WASTE THIS MATCH ON VICTORIA.

VICTORIA WINS

Kurt walking out and slowly taping his fist with dead eyes while Eddie has his hands tied behind his back is one of the more chilling things I’ve seen WWE do. They should recreate it with Punk coming out to murder Rey. I think that’d be fun!

Eddie Guerrero v Kurt Angle

Wow, this was a fucking let down. I liked the last three minutes and exactly nothing else. About ten minutes in I was drawing comparisons to Shawn/Jericho in my mind. And well it wasn’t that bad. Eddie Guerrero would never let it be that bad. But it was shockingly dull for something like twenty minutes before ANOTHER FINISHER KICK OUT. Holy fuck, what is with this show and finisher kick outs followed by roll up or other similar finishes? Was all of 2004 like this? Anyway, from the frog splash that somehow didn’t end the match on this was pretty good. But that’s not a good thing. Sorry, Eddie.

EDDIE GUERRERO WINS

Undertaker gets to be a cross in his picture? That’s a little presumptuous, no?

Undertaker v Kane

Wow this show is doing a tremendous job of putting me to sleep.

UNDERTAKER WINS lol obviously

Triple H v Shawn Michaels v Chris Benoit

This match is… hmm. Equal parts boring, Yakety Sax, creepy, and cool. Benoit is the only one with anything resembling offense I actually want to see, but he’s primarily taking everyone else’s stuff. Which is just as fine, because while he is the only one with good looking stuff, he also used that same stuff to destroy himself and kill his family. And yeah it’s cool seeing him win the title and he’s crying and it means a lot to him but fuck him, you know? The fuck should I be happy for a child killer for? I also really hate the WWE three way formula, where two guys hit one guy so he gets to lay on the outside, the other two guys trade holds or suplexes or punches or some shit until the third guy comes and knocks a different guy out and the two guys left trade holds or suplexes or punches or some shit, repeat ad nauseum. This match is certainly guilty of it as anything. Michaels bleeds an absolute fuck ton, his face is totally covered, but it kind of crosses the line between ‘wow that is a great visual’ and gets into ‘well shit his dick was everywhere in the 90s shouldn’t someone be a little worried about this?’ territory. But how much of all this is me just being really tired and in no desire to see anymore of this show? I mean, the table bump was pretty cool. And once HHH got stuck in the crossface the second time he sold it really well like a struggle (the first time he sat there waiting to roll over). So I don’t know.

CHRIS BENOIT WINS

JR said that for his money this is the best WrestleMania. Well JR, this is why you can’t fucking walk away from WWE, you gamble all your money on retarded fucking shit like that. This show was baaaaaaad. I’m now running out of time to finish these by the time I leave for Phoenix and God dammit, after this show I kind of just want to watch the Punk/Hardy feud from last year to get me psyched about wrestling again. I mean my favorite match on the show was the match that I didn’t even get to see all of. Like. WHAT.

1. Evolution/Rock N Sock
2. Jericho/Christian
3. Goldberg/Lesnar
4. Benoit/HHH/Michaels
5. Guerrero/Angle
6. Cruiserweight Open
7. Cena/Show
8. Undertaker/Kane
9. Sable & Torrie/Jackie & Stacy
10. The four way tag with Bradshaw
11. The four way tag without Bradshaw
12. Victoria/Molly

TOP 15

1. Austin/Rock, X-Seven
2. Austin/Rock, XIX
2. Hogan/Rock, X8
4. McMahon/McMahon, X-Seven
5. TLC, X-Seven
6. Hogan/Vince, XIX
7. Flair/Undertaker, X8
8. Mysterio/Hardy, XIX
9. Evolution/Rock N Sock, XX
10. Angle/Benoit, X-Seven
11. Austin/Hall, X8
12. Christian/DDP, X8
13. Los Guerreros/Team Angle/Benoit & Rhyno, XIX
14. Edge/Booker, X8
15. Jericho/Christian, XX

WRESTLEMANIA RANKING

1. X-Seven
2. X8
3. XIX
4. XX

WrestleMania XIX is a crack addict

I like the opening video. Probably would have liked it better if it wasn’t the exact same video as last year.

Young Michael Cole is still hilarious looking.

When the fuck was Daredevil ever this purple? I love you Rey but… come on.

I may actually end up liking the Safeco set, with the long winding ramp, more than I like any of these matches. We’ll see.

Matt Hardy v Rey Mysterio

GET OUT THE CELLPHONES! What? It’s fucking 2003. This is the precursor to Michael Cole, in 2010, ranting about Twitter. Christ. Anyway this match ruled. Rey Mysterio is the fucking best and

OH GOOD THE MILLER CATFIGHT GIRLS ARE HERE

MATT HARDY WINS

I like the idea of Limp Bizkit playing Undertaker down to the ring. On paper. Fred Durst seems to have suffered from a bad case of the Vince Neils and again live WWE music is inexplicably quiet. This was so fucking lame until Taker showed up on his bike. Then it was just regular lame. Taker’s bike can save almost anything.

Undertaker v Big Show & A-Train

I like everyone in this match but this was not good. There wasn’t anything WRONG with it, Train was working nice and snug and it was your standard formulaic handicap match, maybe even a high end handicap match, but it was pretty boring and plodding. Biker Taker is just not really a sympathetic babyface. Especially when he spends most of the match getting up and punching the shit out of his equal sized opponents. Disappointing.

UNDERTAKER WINS lol obviously

I guess women aren’t important enough for proper pyro, they get confetti instead. Trish is God damn fantastic looking though.

Man what the fuck did 2003 do to Stevie Richards?

Victoria v Trish Stratus v Jazz

Fucking terrible. Maybe worse than last year’s. Victoria is seriously the fucking worst. The finish is a kick to the gut! What the fuck? Trish is mostly just here to show off a healthy amount of her vagina. She does a fucking spectacular job of this. However, so does Jazz. D:

TRISH STRATUS WINS

Wouldn’t NOW be an opportune time for the confetti treatment as opposed to the entrance?

The Rock cuts a fantastic promo. Of course.

Eddie Guerrero & Chavo Guerrero v Chris Benoit & Rhyno v Shelton Benjamin & Charlie Haas

I hate the format for this match. Multi-way tag team matches are generally the epitome of ‘ugh’. This was pretty cool though because you have three dudes who are fucking awesome (Eddie, Chavo, and the child killer) and one guy who has a great looking finish (Rhyno) and the match is smartly built around these strengths. And really I just can’t hate a match with this much Eddie. Even if I had an awkward moment with my cat when Benoit put him in the crossface and said ‘OH NO DON’T DO IT CHRIS YOU’LL KI’ and then got very quiet when I realized that they’re both dead. Minion was disappointed with me. Tremendously disappointed.

BENJAMIN AND HAAS WIN

Why does one of the catfight girls pronounce it “Holgan”?

Chris Jericho was sexy looking in 2003. That is all.

The hype video for this match has me fucking HYPED. Great piece of business, that.

The confetti guns being placed randomly is more American Gladiators than WrestleMania. But back when I was afraid Goldust was actually trying to fuck Razor Ramon in the butt, I was also an avid Gladiators fan, so this is fine by me.

Shawn Michaels v Chris Jericho

Shawn’s post-crisis hairline rears it’s ugly head and is the most brutal looking piece of offense in this match. What the fuck were they trying for here? For the most part this is your basic indy match in front of a giant crowd with a couple pieces of over offense. Do they build around that offense? No. Do they do anything unique or cool looking? No. Do they at least look like they aren’t moving underwater? No. No they do not even manage that. I know I said the handicap match was plodding but THIS was plodding. Apparently they were unwilling to make this look like a fight so they tried to make this… well I don’t know what. There is a somewhat neat subplot where Jericho wants to out-Michaels Michaels, but that’s pretty clearly given up on when they have Jericho superkick Shawn and then immediately move on to the next shitty looking wave of whatever the hell this is supposed to be. The best part of this match was after the match where Jericho kicks Shawn in the knee which is apparently where his dick is. That’s not vain or anything. Yikes.

SHAWN MICHAELS WINS

GOLDBERG IS COMING. OH FUCK YES.

Shit, I temporarily forgot that this is from 2003. Goldberg isn’t coming :(

More live Limp Bizkit? Do we have to?

We’re not talking about the pillow fight. I’m sorry, we’re not. It’s stupid. It’s not even good wank material. Unless you want to see Coach get rolled up and have his dick dangling in his tightie whities. Cancels out the Stacy roll up and yeah. Not talking about it.

Lots has been said on the whole race element of the Booker T/HHH feud but let’s be honest… why the fuck was Booker T in a world title match at WrestleMania? I did like the ending line in the video though, with Hunter telling Flair that no one told Booker T he didn’t have a chance as Hunter walks away all shook. Makes you think HHH took him seriously. Hahaha.

Once again Triple H is wearing far, far too much baby oil on his chest.

Triple H v Booker T

Holy fuck I hate wrestling

TRIPLE H WINS

Total 1995 movie trailer feel to this build video. Love it.

Mr. McMahon v Hulk Hogan

Well I’ll be honest, I really enjoyed this, but I as soon as the finishing bell rang I had to run and drop a shit (hello, female readers!), so I more or less forget what I wanted to say. Pretty fun old man match though, both guys bled a ton and drew everyone in like the old pros they are. The table bump was a kind of crazy thing for these two to be doing, and the Piper heel turn was fun. Not as fun as Psycho Vince coming up from the apron looking positively deranged with blood pouring down his face, but fun. This was going to end up longer but, well, duty calls.

HULK HOGAN WINS

Right into the next match? Fair enough.

Austin’s walk down the curving ramp looks huge and epic.

Stone Cold Steve Fucking Austin v The Rock

Now THIS was a great match. The two biggest and most important wrestlers of an era match up for one last time. This is really Rocky’s match. Start to finish he’s pretty much out of this world, mocking the fans for chanting Austin, throwing on Stone Cold’s ring vest to be a cunt, really just great heel stuff that makes you wish he stuck around longer. He’s also pretty smart, anyone who’s watched the previous matches knows that they always end up with both guys kicking out of every finisher, this time Austin tries to work the regular brawl and Rocky is all fuck that shit, I’m gonna break your knee. This in turn leads directly to Austin being slower on the cover after hitting a big move and slower to recover after taking one. The finish is great, you expect Austin to get up and start hitting some of his own bombs, but it never happens, Austin makes you believe with each kick out that he’ll pull it out but it’s a matter of time for Rock; this is Custer’s last stand, after all. Fantastic match and a great cap on the rivalry.

THE ROCK WINS

The video to build the main event… really stupid looking. Like. How did you people sit through that shit? Yuck.

Kurt Angle v Brock Lesnar

Match starts pretty cool with some nifty amateur stuff but then it absolutely falls apart. The typical ‘welp, mat stuff didn’t work so let’s punch and kick each other!’ routine doesn’t really work if you don’t lay in with your punches and kicks. Lesnar was visibly pulling his stuff, wonder if he didn’t want to accidentally punch a hole through Angle’s neck or not, which is a fair point. So that looked like shit and then we had Kurt’s control segment, which, God bless Brock, also looked shitty. Kurt just kinda sits there with a chinlock or something, but he doesn’t work it, he literally just sits there. Brock holds his breath and tries to make it look good, but yeah, not happening. And then you go right into the finisher exchange. I’ve totally given up on the match at that point, and evidently that’s Lesnar’s attitude towards selling Angle’s shitty looking holds. Like, man, I get that your neck is held together by string and bunched up coupons, but my God, this is your own finisher, show some pride. Somehow Brock’s finisher is only painful enough for Kurt to ‘play possum’ and immediately go into the ankle lock again…? Cool. But at least the crowd stays into it! Gotta give ‘em that. Of course, then Brock lands on his head with the attempted shooting star and yeeeeah the crowd is watching him borderline convulse and blood is trickling out of his nose. No one is really up for celebrating anymore. I mean for two guys who end the match ready for the morgue, this wasn’t as good as your old dudes bleeding bucket match. Or like half the rest of the show.

BROCK LESNAR WINS

This show was somewhat of a letdown. The card seems pretty even and stacked even. I’ve actually been hyping this year’s Mania as similar to XIX in terms of the card. You’ve got the cool Rey match (vs Hardy here, vs Punk in 2010), the Big Show tag match (ended up being a handicap in XIX, is for the tag belts in 2010), a shitty three way that no one gives a fuck about (women’s title and Legacy, respectively), the match with the most people on the card that is somehow fairly nondescript but decent enough (tag titles, MITB), last generation guy against new gen guy who idolized the older guy (Shawn/Jericho, HHH/Sheamus), a heavyweight title match that isn’t any good, a Vince street fight, the presumptive best match with two guys who are above the title by now, and your WWE title main event. I’ve been thinking this was a good thing but fuck me I hope this doesn’t fall as flat as XIX did. It wasn’t a BAD show, but it wasn’t as good as the last two and your sustained quality was coming from places like the six minute Rey match as opposed to, you know, your 20 minute main events. Also I kind of don’t really want Batista or Cena to try a shooting star. Bad times.

Best matches of WrestleMania XIX…

1. Austin/Rock
2. Hogan/Vince
3. Mysterio/Hardy
4. Los Guerreros/Team Angle/Benoit & Rhyno
5. Angle/Lesnar
6. Undertaker/Train & Big Show
7. HHH/Booker
8. Michaels/Jericho
9. Victoria/Trish/Jazz

TOP 15

1. Austin/Rock, X-Seven
2. Austin/Rock, XIX
2. Hogan/Rock, X8
4. McMahon/McMahon, X-Seven
5. TLC, X-Seven
6. Hogan/Vince, XIX
7. Flair/Undertaker, X8
8. Mysterio/Hardy, XIX
9. Angle/Benoit, X-Seven
10. Austin/Hall, X8
11. Christian/DDP, X8
12. Los Guerreros/Team Angle/Benoit & Rhyno, XIX
13. Edge/Booker, X8
14. Kane/Angle, X8
15. Jericho/Regal, X-Seven

WRESTLEMANIA RANKING

1. X-Seven
2. X8
3. XIX

Not a good trending pattern with that last list. And we have to go to fucking XX next. Five hours. Oh joy.

More WrestleMania! Now with RESULTS!

Yeah so Bryan liked the last post but didn’t like that I didn’t tell him who won the matches. So we’ll change that. Because he’s a bitch.

WRESTLEMANIA X8!!!! MY BEARD IS ITCHY!!!!

Ah here we go… a show open with various wrestlers talking about how cool WrestleMania is. More of what I’m used to. No one in a barn.

Rob Van Dam v William Regal

RVD’s offense looks atrocious in this match, and he gets way too much of it for my liking. The opening stretch in particular is just shit punch after shit forearm after shit kick. Then Regal takes over and it briefly gets very, very awesome. Regal is really just the best. Everything he does, from kneeing RVD square in the mouth to repeatedly forearming him, well, square in the mouth, to the brutal looking suplex to his utter distaste for an ignorant referee taking away his decoy brass knuckles, is utterly fantastic. The Tiger Driver was also a really nice touch that I thought looked nasty. However the match is too short and has too much of RVD in control to really be any good. Poor Regal can only do so much. He really needs to be on more WrestleManias.

ROB VAN DAM WINS

Why the fuck is Christian trying to make anime faces?

Why the fuck is Christian’s shirt made out of cheap soccer netting?

Christian’s theme song is fantastic though which makes up for the above two points.

Christian v Diamond Dallas Page

Man, this match surprised the shit out of me, because it was fucking good. Sure, maybe most of the drama was me wondering if Christian’s straw-looking hair would catch fire and if there’d be a real tragedy, but everything looked pretty good and Christian was a total dick. Mocking DDP and then turning around to a nice punch in the face is pretty fun. And DDP’s cutter is pretty awesome looking.

DIAMOND DALLAS PAGE WINS

The Rock cuts a fantastic promo. Of course.

GOL FUCKING DUST. OH FUCK YEAH.

Goldust v Maven

Maven takes a nice bump into the barricade but he looks pretty lost the rest of the time. Goldust, on the other hand, rules it and holds this together with nice snug punches and kicks. I really liked the use of the golden shovel, I wasn’t sure what the fuck he was going to do with it when he pulled it out, but I thought it was fairly creative. Then Goldust takes a bump to the outside, Spike Dudley runs in and wins the title. What?

SPIKE DUDLEY WINS

I hate having Drowning Pool play over the video package for the title match. I mean, for one thing, why is this on this early in the show? For another, WWF obviously feels obligated to focus the camera on Drowning Pool. Which makes sense, they shelled out for the band, so why not? However, I sure as shit wasn’t watching the build up for this match, and a combination of a) having no sound during the build up video because Drowning Pool is playing and b) not being able to actually watch the video because Drowning Pool is all over my screen means that I have NO idea what the fuck the storyline is. Usually WWF throws out a rocking video to get you stoked for the match. Yeah, not this. You get to see random clips of Stephanie flaring her nostrils and Jericho and Helmsley posing set to a mid-tempo song that is inexplicably played very quietly. The front man, at the very end, says “I CAN’T HEAR YOU”. Great man! We haven’t been able to hear you for the last four minutes either!

On the other hand, it gave me the opportunity to eat cheesecake, so that’s pretty positive.

Spike and Crash Holly brawling is terrible. Really terrible. Hurricane wins the hardcore title by flying in and making sound effects with his mouth, I think. Is that an official move?

Kurt Angle’s entrance rules.

Angle’s promo about Jamie Sale and David Pelletier winning gold medals makes me feel old. Somehow the show feels way, way older than the 2002 Olympics. Which of course isn’t true. But I remember those like it was yesterday and watching this show feels like peering into a time machine.

Kurt Angle v Kane

I liked this match too. What is going on? Two straight years of good Kurt Angle matches (kind of). Not looking forward to watching him fall apart over time. On the other hand, somehow I may end up…liking…Kurt…Angle? That may be worse. Has Kane ever had a match this good? I really liked the CM Punk matches, but there’s almost no way Kane had a better ‘Mania match than this. Kurt’s Germans look fucking brave, I’m almost positive he’s basically violently placing Kane on his own head. For whatever reason the middle stretch of the match is pretty boring and slow, despite functionally being not much different from the open. Then all of a sudden Kurt decides that Kane is a luchador and, being that Kurt is a hated heel, needs to have his mask ripped off. I absolutely agree with his decision. The finish is kind of awkward looking, I think everyone was expecting the roll up to keep rolling and end in an ankle lock, kinda looked like Kane thought that too. And the top rope suplex is stupid as always. But hey, this was fun.

KURT ANGLE WINS

Do we need to talk about Hurricane being a peeping tom? I didn’t think so. Who the fuck were those girls, anyway?

Undertaker’s entrance still gets me beyond jazzed. He should have stayed a biker heel forever and ever. Can we have him come back as Big Evil? Please? I’ll be a good boy all year, Santa.

Ric Flair v Undertaker

God damn, this is pretty much just the long, drawn out murder of Ric Flair. Everything ‘Taker brings to the table is pretty nasty and violent. I mean he’s no Bill Regal, but he looks like an effective Flair murdering machine. Flair is a pretty great sympathetic babyface, bleeding from every pore in his forehead and refusing to quit until he’s beat. And then he’s beat, but ‘Taker keeps it going, heeling it up with shit talking and general dickery. Arn Anderson’s run in is a big mark out moment. Really awesome brawl, more or less makes up for the shitty HHH match from the year before.

UNDERTAKER WINS

Hahahahahahahaha Skinny Michael Cole and his frosted tips

Booker T playing the idiot black. Well.

Edge v Booker T

What the fuck? Even this match was pretty good. Edge kind of sucks but Booker is laying in and leaning in on pretty much every move thrown either way. Booker’s break dancing ‘move’ is stupid though, nothing like an idiot black who also dances for the white people. Wish this was Regal v Booker instead, I get a feeling that may have been match of the night. Of course, that means you’re stuck with Edge v RVD. Yuck.

EDGE WINS

Mighty Molly winning the hardcore title makes up for Hurricane’s entire existence.

I badly, badly want to fuck a girl while the nWo song plays. I worry about you, Bevvy. I worry a LOT.

Stone Cold Steve Fucking Austin v Scott Hall

Hall is someone I really like because when I made the dubious decision to start watching wrestling post-childhood, all I really remembered was Razor Ramon. So I was pleasantly surprised to see Hall look pretty good here. I dug Nash a lot too, but that’s not out of the ordinary because I almost always dig Nash. It’s Kevin Nash! The man IS pro wrestling. Austin as your typical face working underneath is kind of weird to watch and I don’t think he was that into it because he didn’t look all that great until he was on offense and even then he was somewhat disappointing. Kind of think that if you let Austin be the ass kicker and let him beat up Maven for four minutes and gave Dustin and Hall twelve that you’d have two better matches. But that’s getting into way too much fantasy booking and this is yet another match I liked. Not sure if I’m in a generous mood or what the fuck is going on here.

STONE COLD WINS

WWF Axxess recap means I’m going to get a drink of something. Am I going to miss anything? Somehow doubt it.

I come back to a disc swap screen. Fuck!

Did not know that Saliva was grinding music. Doesn’t look like anyone got that memo but Stacy Keibler. And I guess she can make her own rules. Why not?

Billy & Chuck v the APA v the Dudley Boyz v The Hardy Boyz

Why the fuck was the APA eliminated first? All I wanted from this match was some Stacy ass and Bradshaw beating the dick off of the Hardys. Bradshaw clothesline the fuck out of Billy Gunn and I get super excited ‘yeah can’t wait til the Hardys get in that’s gonna be the best’. Bradshaw is immediately eliminated. What the fuck? And why is Jeff so fucking white? Like, SO white. Off-white, if you will. And he’s in a rapey mood for some reason, I guess if you smoke a lot of meth it’s not really any big deal to spank random women and force them to make out with you. Then again I suppose WWF will say she was asking it because misogyny is pretty awesome. But that spot is still fun if only because Stacy literally sells her ass being in pain longer than anyone else has ever sold a Jeff Hardy strike ever. And then something else happens and Bubba is all like TIME TO DIE JEFF HARDY. Well that was pretty cool. And D-Von’s bump through the table is pretty cool. But this match is pretty much worthless.

THE GUYS WITH THE FAGGOT GIMMICK WIN

I MEAN BILLY AND CHUCK WIN

I like Molly has a blonde. Immediately after deciding that some twat hits her with a door. CHRISTIAN. Oh, Christian. You twat.

Hulk Hogan v The Rock

This is probably the loosest match that I will ever like. Just a total atmosphere match. An experience, if you will. Hogan brings some fun heel tricks like BITING ROCKY’S HEAD. Rock takes his standard reckless looking bump to the floor. Everything looks pretty weak. But you’ve got two pros playing off of an incredibly hot crowd, adapting to what the fans wanted to see instead of doing what they had planned out in the back. The first couple big nearfalls are intense. Hogan’s hulk up is absolutely chill inducing. Rock kicking out of the leg drop made me break out into a huge grin. This would have been a fun fucking match to be at live. Your quintessential clash of the titans match. Sometimes you don’t need a guy punching another guy in the mouth really fucking hard to have a good match. Just most times.

THE ROCK WINS

The post-match face turn actually seems pretty anti-climatic because it’s blatantly obvious to everyone in the arena that Hogan is already a babyface. Plus we literally just watched Nash and Hall get beaten up. But you still get your big WrestleMania moment and everyone is happy so sure, why not?

Still pretty stunned how good Lita looks in 01/02 compared to 2006. Wrestling does not age women kindly.

Lita v Jazz v Trish Stratus

Lita let out a mouse-like squeak when Trish hit her. As for the rest of the match, well, no one cared and neither do I. Three ways suck, shitty three ways suck worse, and the only thing worse than a shitty three way is a shitty, boring women’s three way where one person falls over, one person covers, and the third breaks up that fall. A pretty big failure. Lita getting pissed and giving up mid-way through is pretty amusing though. If you like your wrestling to feature a healthy helping of not trying.

JAZZ WINS

Maven winning the hardcore title and leaving the show with it really makes all of these backstage ‘matches’ seem extremely fucking pointless.

Chris Jericho v Triple H

Holy shit HHH looks horrible. He is way, way too fucking big, absolutely covered in oil to the point where his chest looks A DIFFERENT COLOR than his arms, the obsession with having your hair wet leaves him with curly ringlets and plenty of visible scalp, and he looks like an ancient, ancient man. I mean, the oil alone. Holy shit. If you bump and leave a GREASE STAIN you are doing something wrong. Very wrong.

Who the fuck dressed Stephanie for WrestleManias? Another year of shitty hair and clothes. Can that blue rubber jumpsuit even be called clothes? She looks like a wrestling plumber with terrible implants. Why get new breasts if you’re just going to not wear a bra and let them sag anyway? Fuck’s sakes.

Things are very bad when Jericho’s random pink ponytail and typically silly ring vest by far wins the fashion prize for the main event.

These are all more interesting than the actual match. Why does Triple H insist on doing that shitty ‘fly over the top rope for no reason off of an Irish whip to a corner’ bump? Why does he land on his back from said bump and begin selling his quad? How did they fuck this match up so badly? Look at the finish, Hunter catches Jericho in the pedigree and the place goes NUTS. Why were they not able to capitalize on that for the entire match? What it is about Triple H main events that makes no one give a fuck until the finish? That’s two straight WrestleManias and two straight massive disappointments. Was Chris Jericho even in this fucking match? The biggest match of your wrestling year should not have more interest in what everyone is wearing.

TRIPLE H WINS

Overall I thought this was a really, really good show, even though the beginning and ending were let downs. The middle is solid as fuck. Is it better than X-Seven, no, no it isn’t, but it’s also not a gigantic gap. Like XXV this is a show where after it ends you focus on the main event and how shitty it was instead of how good the rest of the show was. Like X-Seven you have a bunch of matches with either good bodies and shit finishes or shit bodies but good finishes. But X-Seven also had four solid top to bottom matches that beat the top four on this show, so it wins. For now.

Best matches!

1. Hogan/Rock
2. Flair/Undertaker
3. Austin/Hall
4. Christian/DDP
5. Edge/Booker
6. Kane/Angle
7. Goldust/Maven
8. Regal/RVD
9. APA/Hardyz/Dudleyz/Billy & Chuck
10. HHH/Jericho
11. Jazz/Trish/Lita

YOUR OVERALL BEST 15 MATCHES OF THE LAST HOWEVER MANY YEARS OF WRESTLEMANIA

1. Austin/Rock
2. Hogan/Rock
3. McMahon/McMahon
4. TLC
5. Flair/Undertaker
6. Angle/Benoit
7. Austin/Hall
8. Christian/DDP
9. Edge/Booker
10. Kane/Angle
11. Jericho/Regal
12. Undertaker/HHH
13. Goldust/Maven
14. Chyna/Ivory
15. Eddie/Test

Sure, why not?

THE PAST NINE WRESTLEMANIAS IN ORDER OF AWESOMENESS

1. X-Seven
2. X8

ANYMORE LISTS, YOU LIST FAG?

Nope!

I am going to WrestleMania and for some reason I felt it was smart to write about old WrestleManias!

So I guess the back story here is that I went to Texas for WrestleMania last year and I’m going to Phoenix for WrestleMania this year. I got a bunch of days off work before the trip because work is shitty and I have trip stuff to do. THEN I realized, well, I don’t have much to do except for throw some clothes in a bag. That will take me five minutes. So I more or less have a week to do nothing, and for whatever reason I’ve decided that I’m going to take all of the (legitimate WWE release) WrestleMania DVDs that I have and write about them. This is pretty much the past nine years. Bryan has decided I should start with X-Seven because he is a 2001 WWF nerd. Fair enough.

WRESTLEMANIA X-SEVEN MOTHERFUCKERS

Apparently in the 90s you could watch WrestleMania with a bunny eared TV in the barn. Okay then.

Jim Ross tells me that we have eleven matches tonight. ELEVEN. Jesus Christ.

You can tell this is an older TV because sometimes the picture looks amazing and other times it starts looking blurry. Then again this could just be because I’ve insisted on stretching the screen. Watch with side bars? LOL

Chris Jericho v William Regal

In 2001 you were allowed to just take the turnbuckle padding off? This wasn’t an issue for the referees then? My oh my.

This match starts off fairly fancy but Regal isn’t having any of that shit and very quickly this turns into “William Regal beating a bitch” which is always super fun. Jericho is kind of inexplicably over, everything he does gets a pop, but I don’t think he really looks at the crowd even once or anything like that, he just kind of does his shit and goes home. The bulk of the match is Regal just kicking the shit out of Jericho. To his credit, Jericho hits Regal pretty hard back. The finish was pretty stupid, don’t think anyone in the crowd thought that the Lionsault was the finish. Pretty sure everyone was expecting a kickout and for Jericho to go back to the Walls. Oh well. Fun while it lasted even if the finish sucked.

Bradshaw is playing cards and drinking and smoking and ranting and I love Bradshaw so sure, why not?

Right To Censor comes out and I am prepared to shit on this and say ‘well fuck me Dave another terrible idea this was’ and then OH SHIT Bradshaw comes out. I love Bradshaw so sure, why not?

RTC v Tazz & the APA

What the fuck was this? God damn this sucked. Anything that didn’t look downright bad looked really awkward and weird or it was Bradshaw’s clothesline, which was awesome (as always). And I don’t mean like, ‘real fight’ awkward. Because that’s a good awkward. No this was more like ‘why in the fuck is this match even happening’ awkward. I was really hoping for this to be Bradshaw beating up Stevie Richards. Richards wasn’t even in the match. What a waste of time.

Who let Stephanie go on pay-per-view with her hair crimped like that? You are the daughter of the owner of the company, show some respect. Was she trying to be Raven?

Speaking of Raven! If you watch 1996 ECW and then you watch 2003 ROH, you can see how 1996 Raven became 2003 Raven. I have no idea where the fuck 2001 Raven came from. He looks like an only casually related human being. Did Raven blow off the show and send a third cousin?

Raven v Big Show v Kane

Someone as a MY COLON HURTS sign. Did they not have sign checks in 2001 either?

Don’t ever show this match to someone with epilepsy. For whatever reason the decision was made to make this a ‘big dudes chase Raven’s third cousin’ match, and so not only do you get the shaky cam as someone is running behind everyone, but you have everyone in the crowd taking a million pictures and the flash bulbs go off CONSTANTLY. The backstage destruction fest is fun at first because you’ve got a couple of spots that look pretty neat (Raven going through a window, for example), but the spots very quickly become more about breaking the surroundings than breaking the opponents and that’s kind of a boring match to watch. The actual brawling they do with each other looks really shitty, a match that’s only interesting when they’re breaking random stuff in the arena isn’t especially interesting at all. The best part of this match was either the window spot or me getting a plate of dinner that included corn. I’ve decided I’m a very big corn fan. In fact I decided that while watching this match. All in all I’d say this was a success.

Perry Saturn’s hat. Fantastic.

Perry Saturn’s LUGZ shirt. Takes me back to being threatened with beatings by thugged out Afghan kids when I was 14. Less fantastic than his hat.

Eddie Guerrero v Test

Somehow Perry Saturn is the only one here who isn’t dead. He must be in with the Afghans.

Why is the second move of this match a powerbomb? That gets kicked out of? I should have gotten a knife for this ham. I had no idea Eddie was the heel until about halfway through the match. Way to go Test. Man, Test is bad. Really bad. This match isn’t the shittiest I’ve ever seen but it’s entirely an Eddie show. Eddie more or less throws himself into Test’s offense and does it for him. Another kickout? How fucking weak is Test’s powerbomb? I kind of liked this match. Again, entirely because of Eddie. He wouldn’t forget his knife.

Kurt Angle v Chris Benoit

Is… is Kurt going to die? :(

Hahahahahaha mat wrestling with no one gaining an advantage and then a standoff, this is every bad indy match I have ever watched.

AND AGAIN! Fantastic.

I guess it says a lot about what kind of fucked up person I am when Benoit puts Angle in the crossface and I start going NO KURT GET OUT OF IT HE’LL DO YOU LIKE HE DID DANIEL and then Angle has Benoit in the crossface and I start yelling KURT WHAT ARE YOU DOING YOU’RE NOT A MURDERER STOP IT and then Benoit has Angle in the crossface (again!) but the ref is gone and Angle is tapping and Benoit doesn’t let go and I turn to my cat (MY CAT) and say “don’t you dare look, this is how he did Daniel, I don’t want you to see it” and just in general make a lot of jokes about a really horrible thing.

Also why the grab the tights finish? Two guys equally matched doing everything they can to win and one guy who wants it more resorts to cheating because he can’t win otherwise is a fine match story. But that’s your main event. So why do it here?

Pretty good match though.

Undertaker’s SARA tattoo. Ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. Sluts.

Trish Stratus’ breasts. Fuck yes. Lita actually looks super girly and attractive as well. Well. For Lita. Take what you can get I guess.

A Kurt Angle interview ends with Benoit coming out of nowhere and putting poor Kurt in the crossface again. GOD DAMMIT STOP TRYING TO KILL KURT

Ivory v Chyna

If this match lasts more than two minutes I’m going to be so pissed off. Chyna looks, facially, like the walking dead. Why is her ass hanging out? Where’s Chris Benoit with his crossface? We need it here, now more than ever. I think Ivory has just won the ‘award’ for worst wrestler I’ve ever seen. That said I kind of enjoyed this. I actually kind of dig Chyna’s offense. Her exposed ass is offensive, though.

Holy shit, that fucking crimp again. Like. Trish’s tits are right there. RIGHT THERE. Hanging out. And there’s a comatose, wheelchair bound Linda. And Michael Cole looking twenty pounds lighter and younger with a goatee and frosted tips. And all I can look at is that fucking crimp. Ugh.

“I will never, ever forgive your mother for giving birth to you”. What a great asshole line.

Mr. McMahon v Shane McMahon

I really love this match. It’s total storyline bullshit but I am not yet so jaded that I can’t still get sucked in by something like this. To his credit Shane doesn’t hold back on his whole ‘untrained stiffness’ bit and more or less punches his dad right in the face over and over again. Foley looked awesome in his run of offense at the end. Shane’s bump through the table looked huge and they managed to fill the match with enough stuff that you don’t notice Shane just laying around (but you also don’t have to have Shane blow off the table bump). Trish attacking Stephanie looked pretty bad, but it was a nice payoff, and Linda rising out of the chair is really a chill inducing moment of greatness. This is what you really need on your big show of the year, a match where several storylines come together and actually get blown off.

And got DAMN, Trish in that cowboy hat. Shitty slaps or not, 2001 Trish is always welcome in my home.

Edge & Christian v The Hardy Boyz v The Dudley Boyz

I’ve never really liked this match before but it was a pretty spectacular car wreck. The final few bumps were fucking ridiculous. Saying anything more would incriminate myself. Moving on.

Gimmick Battle Royal

Well.

Undertaker v Triple H

Man, you know, when ‘Taker comes out on his bike with Limp Bizkit blaring, I am expecting the best match of all time. I don’t even give a fuck. It’s a fantastic entrance. Sadly it isn’t milked nearly as long as Triple H’s, but then I guess you’re not gonna shell out for Motorhead and then not let them play. This is supposed to be this epic, wild, out of control brawl or whatever. The entire match is just them punching each other in the face, punching each other in the face as they walk through the crowd, punching each other in the face as they climb a tower, taking a break from punching each other in a face to throw each other off the tower. But like, and I know I’ve said this already (with the remark about the Angle/Benoit finish being duplicated in the main event), but this stuff is getting redundant on the show. You had the Raven’s third cousin match going through the crowd and throwing each other into stuff, except in that match you had Raven’s third cousin going through a window. In this match you get Triple H being chokeslammed onto three feet of foam padding. Not really the same. For a ‘slugfest’, these guys are getting outslugged by Regal and Jericho in the first match, and hell, even Shane and Foley are pounding on Vince more than these guys are pounding on each other. And THAT match had a big ‘guy goes through something’ bump with Shane going through the table. Not to mention the fucking ladder match. And then the main event, which is… no shit… another wild and crazy brawl! This kind of redundancy booking works if you’re continually topping yourself. The majority of this match is duplicating stuff that came earlier in the show without topping it. A bump onto a crash pad does not top a bump through a window or a table or through multiple tables. Loose brawling does not top a man punching his father square in the face or William Regal doing anything at all. So the vast majority of this match is pretty unspectacular. What these guys are good at is dramatic finisher kickouts, which you get when Hunter counters the Last Ride with a sledgehammer. Sadly that’s really the only thing worthwhile about this entire match.

Stone Cold Steve Fucking Austin v The Rock

I know I just went on a big rant against booking redundancy but that was in a semi-main underwhelming match. This is the main event and it kicks the shit out of everything. Wild, crazy, fast-paced brawl, brutal weapons shots, intense 2.9 wrestling, two huge blade jobs, and the story twist of Austin siding with Vince because it’s the only way he can beat Rock. Honestly I love everything about this match and it’s maybe my favorite match ever. As is usually the case with the matches I really really like, I can’t even be bothered to type anything out because it all just makes so much sense in my head that I don’t know where to begin. Fuck me.

This show was really really great, everything built from the opening match to the main event without too many low points. Since I’m obsessed with lists I’ll try to rank the matches I guess…

1. Austin/Rock
2. McMahon/McMahon
3. TLC
4. Angle/Benoit
5. Jericho/Regal
6. Undertaker/HHH
7. Chyna/Ivory
8. Eddie/Test
9. Raven/Big Show/Kane
10. RTC/Tazz & APA
11. Gimmick Battle Royal

That seems right. I could put the Chyna match as high as fifth, believe it or not. Anyway.

Smackdown for 1/29

Hopefully this will be better than the last show.

A video package promising me DX vs the Straight Edge Society! Oh boy. What a main event! Wait why is this happening first? And now Rey? What the fuck? Triple H and Shawn both tell Rey, and vicariously the audience, that he is not to be taken seriously. Rey challenges them to a fight. What is going on? Punk and The Gang come out. Triple H makes fun of them. Teddy Long tells me that the main event is off. Why did they show us the video package then? Instead it’s going to be Triple H and Punk. The match is… a match. You’ve watched a Triple H match before, right? This is kind of like a good one of those. More or less just there. Then there is a fairly intense gang-beating on HHH after… and Shawn somehow manages to come in and break it up before they shave his head. Really? Shawn is going to out box a fucking GANG of skinhead hardline thugs? No. No he is not.

Chris Jericho and R-Truth have another match that is a match. Hooray!

Batista interview backstage. Says something about wanting to put the spotlight back on him. Well. You know, if Batista ran out and attacked everyone who had a spotlight put on him for whatever reason, that’d probably be the greatest thing in the world.

John Morrison cuts a really lackluster promo. John Morrison then has a really lackluster match with Drew McIntyre. I’d go as far as to say ‘bad’ or ‘boring’. Like ‘check my email instead of watching this’ boring. Or ‘unwrapping Heat on Blu-ray’ boring.

Holy fuck Michelle McCool’s act doesn’t work without Layla, at ALL. Yes, Layla comes out in a fat suit eventually. Still doesn’t make the rest of this shit worthwhile.

Batista tells Shawn to stay away from his spotlight or he’ll go Incredible Hulk. Well, not really. But this was fun!

Shawn vs Rey was… well, I thought this was actually pretty disappointing. I don’t think it’s really possible to not be a Rey Mysterio ‘guy’, especially after the past couple years when he’s been out of his FUCKING mind awesome. And I really like Shawn. Maybe not his matches so much, because I’m a strong believer that you can like someone and acknowledge that they pretty much suck (Edge, for example, is another of my favorites, and when the fuck will you see me praising Edge’s work?). But I like him, and so I had high hopes. Instead this match was just kind of… there. I honestly didn’t even think it was good as the earlier “RAW infects Smackdown awesomeness” match from this same show. Rey looked fine, not particularly great, but he didn’t have much to work with. I wonder how much of that was the general confusion here, Rey can work just about any style but these are two small faces who primarily work from underneath, neither are really used to working long lengths of time mid-match where they’re the ones getting the heat as opposed to selling. And Shawn is pretty clearly incapable of working the type of babyface sprint that you’d get from Rey and, say, Evan Bourne. I did think it was kind of interesting how they seemed to be working with Shawn, the bigger man, working as the de facto heel at the start, quickly realizing he can’t really work heat segments, and when we came back from commercial break it was Shawn selling and Rey working the heat. The problem there is that Shawn is either mailing in his selling or just can’t do it anymore, and Rey doesn’t really have the sort of vicious big man offense that’s going to not give Shawn a choice – and therefore the kind of big man offense that’d make this match work. As it is the match never really goes anywhere. The springboard into the superkick is cool for how contrived it was, but really that’s just about the only thing I liked in this match. Batista’s run in is well done, because he is laughing at Shawn and then sees Rey and gets all pissed off again. Then Triple H and Undertaker do their respective run ins and it’s kinda lame. But yeah this match isn’t coming close to making a ‘best of the year’ type of list.

Best matches: HHH/Punk, HBK/Rey, Truth/Jericho. Best angle: Batista being a dick

Smackdown for 1/22

Oh Lord.

Batista’s spotlight intro is amazing. Did Finlay dye his hair for this match? Match is incredibly short, but it’s fun and Finlay eats punishment like a champ. Post match is quite violent also. Actually once Batista grabs the microphone and goes on about how ‘this is what I’m gonna do to everyone in the Rumble’, it’s by far the least violent looking of his attacks. Which is a bit strange. These two need maybe seven minutes together, I think that’d work for me.

More of Punk’s Straight Edge Jesus act. It’s still a really great act. This week they save young Serena, bringing her into the fold as Punk’s own personal Anne. Plenty of creepy goodness here.

Tag match, John Morrison and R-Truth against Chris Jericho and Drew McIntyre. Terrible. Really terrible. Boring and just oh fuck this I can’t finish the match. Next.

Pretty good women’s segment with, well, basically the entire division. I re-watched it. Yeah. It was good. I have no idea what in the fuck Michelle yelled before shoving the pig in Mickie’s face though. Not sure if the whole “Facial Abuse” look is really PG friendly, either. But a quality angle.

Cryme Tyme against Charlie Haas and Mike Knox’s Beard, I thought, had potential, but it started by JTG immediately running through his spots and then Kane runs out and savagely kills four men. So.

Holy shit, watching Matt Hardy and the Hart kids play wrestle is SO UNINTERESTING.

Main event interview is cool. Rey does his ‘I will never say die’ part well. Undertaker does his ‘literally a gateway into the Christian definition of Hell’ part well. Batista does his ‘I will go wherever I want and kill whatever I want’ thing well. This was a success. Not the best Smackdown though, great angles but where were the matches?

Best match: Batista/Finlay. Best angles: Punk saves Serena, ‘Taker and Rey have a stand-off, Mickie sticks up for herself and winds up on a throat fucking video shoot.

Smackdown for 1/15

Chorrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrre.

Mr. Chris Jericho, complete with a makeup job on his jaw, cuts your standard “Chris Jericho is angry at DX promo”. Ok. John Morrison’s smile coming out of the slow motion entrance looks really unnatural, although when he gives the glasses he does look genuine. I guess these two are going to have a match now? Ok. There is immediately a shitty Morrison clothesline sending Jericho over the top and then Drew McIntyre comes out. What? I guess he’s going to sit outside and provide Morrison motivation to hulk up. No, really, that’s a spot they did. Morrison is in the Walls of Jericho, McIntyre taunts him with the Intercontinental title, and this leads Morrison to gritting his teeth and dragging him over to the ropes. What a match. Not in a good way, though.

“One nation under Punk, indivisible, with integrity and sobriety for all.” Fantastic. Punk as late-night informercial televangelist and Luke Gallows as his testimonial is the best act in WWE. “Luke, go get me that man.” That man is Trevor, Trevor is better at being the test subject than James was last week. “He doesn’t even know!” The best part of these segments is that Punk gets better and more maniacal each week. Him going borderline psychotic with excitement if he demands to know if Trevor is “true ‘till death” is wonderful. Totally wonderful. And then they have to go and ruin it by transitioning into a match. Fuck. Actually, technically we have Trevor’s pit stains first. Those aren’t very nice either. But yeah, they ruin it with a match. And the worst part is that they just play Khali’s music, and I’m like ‘holy shit are they going to have Khali, the party playboy guy, try to defend Trevor’s rights to pound beers and snort lines?’ and then Matt Hardy comes out too and it’s a four-way tag match with three teams that aren’t very good. The match, accordingly, is not very good. And then Trevor’s pit stains come back. They’re still not very good. But at least he’s a reminder of when this whole paragraph DID represent good things.

Josh Matthews, who @cockswoggle HATES, knocks on Batista’s door for an interview. Batista has this great look when he opens the door that basically says “look, I have Kelly Kelly back there and she sucks a mean dick, so do you HAVE to be bothering me right now?” This is confirmed when he just glares at Josh the entire time, blows off his questions, and says “knock on this door one more time and… you know what I’m saying?” Somebody’s gon’ get dey ass licked.

Undertaker has promo time. I support this in general but I also start yawning viciously during his entrance. Promo is what you’d expect, collecting souls and all that. He puts a hilarious emphasis on ‘two decades’ when informing us of exactly how long he’s been collecting souls for. Good promo, I guess.

Mickie James and Beth Phoenix have a match. It’s actually the best and most violent match on this show so far. It is followed by Michelle McCool and Layla attacking Mickie, which is accordingly the most violent angle on the show thus far. If it wasn’t for the incredible Trevor head shaving deal, it’d probably be the best single segment on the show (main event pending, I suppose). Interesting.

Oh GOOD it’s Kane, perfect. This match is kinda neat at first because Kane is beating the ever living piss out of Dolph Ziggler and I’m like hey, I like Ziggler, I don’t want him getting squashed really but at least it’s not going to be an even longer version of their last couple matches. Nope, I was wrong. Very wrong. This is the longest edition yet and really, once you realize it’s going a while, the only interesting part if how fucking ridiculous Ziggler’s hair gets. Like Sycho Sid ridiculous. It’s what you’d expect after the last two, not terrible or anything, probably the second best of their matches. maybe even the best. But it’s too long and you can’t run the same thing three weeks in a row unless it keeps getting better or it was really good to start with. And this wasn’t.

The Royal Rumble ad campaign this year sucked. What the fuck, is this The Matrix? A subtle attempt to promote Mr. Anderson in TNA?

Batista vs Rey! Surely this won’t have another Undertaker finish. It’s in a CAGE! And holy shit it’s awesome. Batista is all “wellll I COULD win but you called me out of Kelly Kelly’s meat wallet for this so I might as well fuck with the little beaner who’s been fucking with my shit for the last three months”. Rey quickly realizes that he has two options, escape or die. He tries to wrestle the match, sets Batista up for the 619, is like ‘oh shit there’s a cage’ here and Batista just starts laughing at him. Batista is a glorious, glorious man. So the rest of the match is “Rey fights for his life and tries to escape while Batista is really just being an asshole and tossing the little boy around”. And then Rey wins! And it’s awesome. So fucking awesome. A fine way to end a show of wrestling.

Best matches are Batista/Rey, Mickie/Beth, Kane/Ziggler. Best angles are Punk saves Trevor, Michelle and Layla attack Mickie.

Smackdown Report for 1/8

Opening Batista/Rey confrontation is opening Batista/Rey confrontation.

Ziggler/Kane was better this week than last because they stuck to mainly the fun energetic mat stuff as opposed to shitty, shitty strikes. Usually I’m all about the striking but not from these two. You also didn’t have the annoying cutaway, and the finish was pretty clever. Still not great stuff but these two are an interesting pairing and I could probably keep watching their stuff. As long as it doesn’t get too long, because fuck that. And they need to work some tags with Mike Knox and Finlay so they’ll start hitting like men.

I probably don’t really need to talk about the backstage divas thing but Layla owned it. Jericho in the locker room with the Harts was pretty funny because when he was talking Natalya was looking at him as if he was proposing some scat fucking. Somehow this led to R-Truth which made me massively disappointed, this apparently was gonna be a Harts & Jericho against Cryme Tyme and Truth six-man tag. Jericho gets to continue his crusade against minorities in WWE which is getting pretty funny at this point. Seriously, since the start of 2009 he’s railed against the elderly (the Rourke/Flair/Steamboat feud that took like four months in hindsight), Mexicans (Rey), blacks (Cryme Tyme, MVP & Mark Henry, Batista is Filipino but he grew up in Washington so he’s gotta have some black in him, plus now Truth apparently), midgets (DX has Hornswoggle), and Legacy has pretty clearly been booked as the WWE’s gay troupe and he had a PPV match against them, too. Can’t wait for Jericho to start wrestling for the women’s title or something like that. The only thing that stood out about this match was realizing Shad shaved his head and doesn’t have his braids anymore. Well, and Jericho busting out the Lion Tamer for the finish. That was cool. But this had to be the least interesting six-man WWE has run in forever.

Not really sure what to put down about CM Punk shaving young James and initiating him into his straight edge cult. Except that every single moment of it was fucking awesome. Every single moment. If the show was just this segment repeated ten or twelve times it’d still be so great. And then it leads into Luke Gallows vs Matt Hardy, which on paper should be awesome, provided my January 2008 scouting report is still valid (and as I said, I’m keeping my eye on Matthew). Gallows really lucks out with gimmicks, the Festus thing was awesome, and his gear now is just absolutely perfect for the sXe punk rock soldier. He’s pretty much the perfect second for Punk and watching them as a unit makes me want to say ‘fuck watching this show’ and watch SLC Punk! instead. Anyway the match is quite good, Gallows still rocks even with the transition and Matthew has earned my approval for today. Wouldn’t mind seeing these two get a longer Superstars slot.

Vickie Guerrero rules but the shit with Maria selling the Celebrity Apprentice show was hideous and I skipped through it. Beth Phoenix and Layla have a surprisingly good match that is pretty much all Layla stooging, probably my favorite women’s squash I’ve seen. There’s a post match angle and Mickie is wearing the ugliest top. Like the entire storyline here is that Michelle and Layla are calling Mickie this slovenly beast and she comes out wearing that top? Wouldn’t have been my choice. At all.

I decided to skip through the Bret-Hart-on-RAW recap and ended up skipping through most of Drew McIntyre interview and after his match last week I decided I wasn’t going to bother rewinding. Then John Morrison showed up and somehow this all ended up better than that aforementioned shit match. Weird how that works.

Batista’s spotlight is awesome. It’s just a normal spotlight and it’s not nearly as high end or superstar as the ol’ cum pyro but it’s a pretty great way to get over that he’s a total asshole. I think this is like the fourth Rey/Batista match in about a month and a half at this point, pretty exciting matchup (again using the scouting report) but that’s a bit overkill, no? The match is good, don’t know if it’s as good as the Gallows match from earlier but it’s pretty close, Rey eats Batista’s spear like a champ and Batista is just such a glorious asshole now. However the Undertaker chicanery for the finish really kills this, you go from Batista being a pompous ass to the lights out, and it’s really terribly disjointed from there. I guess ‘Taker came out and gassed them or some shit. I guess that’s how you set up a three way, though I’m not sure why they… you know what, nevermind.

Smackdown Report for 1/1

Yeah we’ll see how long this shit lasts for.

Pretty neat video package of the past two weeks, Rey beating Batista to get a shot at Undertaker and then the subsequent shot at Undertaker, which Batista interrupts. This seems to be building a three way, the video in particular putting over that Rey can hang with these two and even win. I am fine with this.

This show features beat the clock which is fantastic for everyone who likes lots of short, not-very-good wrestling matches. Punk is out first, yet another great promo and Punk’s promos are pretty much the best thing in wrestling. Certainly in WWE. I mean not many other guys are cutting angry promos threatening to beat up everyone in the arena because they can’t raise their hand and follow directions like he has requested. I am excited to see him save people from the audience. Sadly I have to wait a week for it. But name dropping Minor Threat and Youth of Today always works for me so whatever.

MATT HARDY. I haven’t watched Matt Hardy in some time. Clearly he LOOKS worse than he did this time last year, but I’m actually excited to see if he is as good as he was this time last year or if the heel turn just totally murdered his career. Matt Striker is awfully cute trying to add some story background to the match but man, this could not have been more of a ‘nothing happens’ match if nothing had actually happened. It’s not shit or anything like that, they just kind of… do stuff for seven minutes. Evidently this will not be the match to determine if Hardy is any good still or not. I’ve my eye on you, sir.

Oh good, seven minutes of KANE. Dolph Ziggler really grew into something cool from working extensively with Finlay and Rey Mysterio last summer, then curiously they put the Intercontinental title on John Morrison instead and forgot Ziggler ever existed. Plus it`s probably a pretty fucking terrible idea to be working with Morrison a lot, lest one starts to strike like he has marshmallow hands. The first bit of this match is actually pretty cool, all this nice energetic stuff on the mat that I wouldn`t have expected out of a Kane match so I figure, you know what, I can watch this. Then Ziggler busts out the marshmallow strikes. Then there is a cutaway to the back as Punk and Luke Gallows watch this match with interest. I get why they do that, to get over Punk being interested in if someone will beat his time or not, but I HATE when they cut to someone watching a match. I WANT TO BE THE ONE WATCHING THE MATCH. Anyway then Ziggler puts on a sleeper hold that looks like he is trying to spoon with Kane. Yeah you dumped Maria, but I do not especially need to see you try to get nice and close with Kane, y’know? So I totally gave up on this match. Should have trusted my initial instinct to not bother with seven minutes of KANE.

Recap of Cena/Sheamus from the Monday show, if I wanted to be watching that show I would have. Skip.

The Great Khali squashes someone in a Carolina Panthers jersey. I do not care.

There is a Morrison vs Drew McIntyre Intercontinental title match because everyone must have a rematch. McIntyre is totally unable to take advantage of Morrison dangling from the middle rope by one foot in any sort of interesting way. It does lead to Morrison being hesitant to do his springboard nonsense, which was neat (as was the DQ finish), but fuck this match sucked. A parade of ginger strikes and similar bullshit. I actually seem to recall not hating what I saw of their TLC match so this was super disappointing.

I don’t think we should really be calling Mickie James and Beth Phoenix’s ‘match’ a match. It went what, two minutes? Then Layla and Michelle run in and somehow it ends with Beth killing everyone. Pretty much have to look at it as an angle. And it was a pretty cool angle actually, I’ve been pretty surprised with the Piggy James stuff. And Mickie was hitting Beth harder than anything from the last few matches. And I can always go for more Layla. But yeah this wasn’t a match.

Chris Jericho and Rey Mysterio had some really great matches against each other in 2009. So I get a bit excited for this match here but it’s only going seven minutes so that pretty much kills my excitement because you know damn well they’re gonna try to fit their entire 25 minute match into the smaller time frame. Plus after six months of Jericho teaming with Big Show, Jericho being anywhere without Big Show is massively disappointing. Although his promo is kind of surreal because I can’t remember seeing a singles promo by him for a long, long time. And it’s not like he’s a bad promo so whatever that was alright.

The match itself? Well I liked them putting over a count out win as a desirable result, but then they IMMEDIATELY do that God damn cutaway shit again. But that’s kind of a silly complaint (I am a Negative Nancy I guess) because this match is actually pretty fucking boss. Jericho cuts off Rey with a HIP CHECK. When I was younger I used to play in my grandparents’ living room and hip check my sister and have her hip check me. So that was a fucking fantastic cut off that I marked out for. It really is pretty much a miniature version of their matches from last summer, but those matches were great, this match had a springboard codebreaker and that awesome cut off, and this match was pretty great too.

Wait, R-Truth is in the main event? Oh fuck me. I’m going to go hunt for a Dreamcast instead of watching this shit.