cabbageboy

Given Jarrett's lack of drawing power in WCW and throughout TNA's history (not really his fault in WCW) wasn't Austin essentially right about Jarrett? Of course Jarrett had little potential to be a huge star in the WWF at that point, mainly because his act wasn't at all over. For the life of me though I have never figured out why Jarrett spent about 90% of his mainstream career as a heel, since those comments about his work being light are correct and hence he didn't really have much force as a heel in the ring. Jarrett was always best off as a whitebread babyface, since it allows his natural good old boy personality to show. The thing is, could such an overt white meat babyface character have worked in the Attitude Era? I tend to doubt it.

Yeah I hope they just quickly refer to the limo angle since it was never explained and then move on with it. In theory this is supposed to be giving Kennedy some kind of rub, but I fail to see exactly how it is. Beating Lashley clean does more for him.

Ah yes, but Superbad might appeal to the same crowd that made stuff like American Pie a hit. I'm very interested in seeing it. The other major release that week is The Invasion, but the buzz on that movie isn't really so hot.

I have yet to see Ultimatum but probably will in the next week or two. No rush since I'm not as high on this series as some on here. They are....okay. Nothing more. I'll put it this way: The Bourne series seems like the sort of 80s spy novels that would be made for TV fare if this was 20 years ago. Actually the original Bourne Identity WAS made for TV.

I think Mantle won 7 World Series as well (1951, 52, 53, 56, 58, 61, 62), so wake me up when A-Rod does all that. The most interesting aspect of A-Rod being the youngest to hit 500 home runs is that it's getting Jimmie Foxx some modern notoriety. Wasn't Tom Hanks playing a thinly veiled Jimmie Foxx in A League of Their Own?

Eh, I'd give a slight nod to Hogan/Warrior since it at least had Hogan's first clean pinfall loss....the goofy Piper run in at SS 89 knocks it down a tad.

Yeah I have to admit if I'm a top level Raw guy then I wouldn't care to work all the various SD shows in addition to the current shows. What I fear about a newly combined roster is who exactly is going to book this thing? It better fucking not be Brian Gewirtz, or this thing will be dead in the water before it starts. I think that is the problem with the brand extension since its inception. There has never been a time when both shows were good at the same time. In 2002-03 SD was better and Raw sucked. In 2004 both shows had a brief time when both were pretty solid, but then SD put the belt on JBL and that show went to hell (and Raw soon followed with the Orton push from hell). And so on. But really has there ever been a time when both shows were both of high quality?

Peter Jackson is the new Von Stroheim in terms of needing a stopwatch. I thought what was most draggy about it was the finale if anything. I was like "Jesus, we all know the planes are just going to kill him, so shoot him down and let's get on with our lives." I also didn't like the tinkering around with the main characters. Ann was the only one who seemed faithful at all. Driscoll was now an ugly wuss writer instead of a macho sailor type, and they basically did a character assassination on Denham, making him a completely uncaring sleazebag on all levels. Considering those two roles were originally thinly veiled versions of Cooper and Schoedsack themselves I have to wonder what they would have thought of Jackson's take on those characters.

SS 89 is a very good show. But that said, Warrior/Rude isn't remotely Warrior's best match ever. I'd put the Hogan match at WM 6 as well as both major Macho matches ahead of it. WM 7 is by far Warrior's best match ever.

Yeah, the Angle stuff is so absurd and tongue in cheek (especially Dr. Nash) that I don't really take offense to it. It's going to end up making Joe look like Sting circa 1990 in terms of being a fool though. As far as OVW goes, I tune in and out of it at certain points. I enjoyed Conway and Dinsmore as a tag team, though I always thought Dinsmore was the worker of the two. See, the reason OVW booked around guys like Conway and the Bashams is that they were the guys WWE took forever to call up and only did it because they HAD to at some point. Guys like Orton and Cena were destined to be called up promptly, so OVW wouldn't book shows around them as much. It's hard to put it totally into words, but it was the same thing with USWA. I would see guys that I enjoyed a lot like Lawler, Dundee, Jarrett, Billy Travis, etc. But their acts were all very regional and couldn't get over as well in a national promotion (and no, Lawler hasn't been over as much beyond a chickenshit heel on a national level). Let's face it, how are guys like the Bashams going to get over in TNA? Fans view them as jobbers and they aren't going to get 20 mins. to work a crowd and get them interested. I'm not even sure they could get anyone interested if they HAD 20 mins. Hell, I remember an OVW episode from 2003 or so where Benoit came down to face Doug Basham and they hyped the hell out of this match, saying Basham was this mega talent who would take Benoit to the limit. Then what does he do? A bunch of Memphis heel stalling and bullshit and eventually got DQed. The dude had a crap match with Benoit, a hyped one at that.

The brands being unified is a bad idea. I think it would work to have travelling champions, which is what the unified champ was supposed to be in the first place. But let's face it, do we really need any of the guys on the WWE roster on TV 3 different times a week? I can halfway tolerate this Cena/Orton crap on Raw, but if they brought it to SD and maybe ECW as well then it will get incredibly horrible. Cause let's face it, the big problem in WWE right now is that some guys are all over TV and PPVs and aren't drawing money enough to justify it. So let's just push them on even MORE TV shall we.

Who knows. I dunno if they will ever know the real rating for the show now, but if it goes back to a 3.5 or so this week we'll know that it was roughly a full point off.

I do agree that Prisoner of Azkaban is the best thus far. I'd rank them as follows: 1. Prisoner of Azkaban 2. Goblet of Fire 3. Order of the Phoenix 4. Sorcerer's Stone 5. Chamber of Secrets I put Chamber of Secrets last since it's the one in the series that most seemed to be treading water. The first introduces everyone, the third gives us Sirius and a lot of background details, Goblet has the Tri Wizard tourney and You Know Who's return, and so on. Chamber of Secrets also had Hermione incapacitated for most of the 2nd half, which hurts it.

I don't necessarily buy the HHH burying Jericho stuff in late 1999. HHH didn't really have quite the power at that point that he had even 6 months later in 2000. At that point maybe HHH was suggesting things like "Jericho sucks" but they didn't have to listen.

Oh no, please don't bring up the various Jarrett screwjobs involving Larry Z., Slick Johnson, and Earl Hebner. I still have nightmares about that Slammiversary show from last year.

Gotta love Victoria now being paired with Kenny considering she is about 36 and he is 21.

Teams like Boise face a dilemma. Namely they can't really play anyone since their conf. sucks, so they might get screwed out of the big BCS games (or were). It's a double edged sword, in that they shouldn't be screwed for being a smaller program, but also shouldn't be a serious national contender in the current system since their SOS is about 85. With that said, I didn't think Boise beating OU was an upset at all. Boise was unbeaten (albeit in the WAC) while the Big 12 was pretty crappy. If anything I expected Boise to win. What do you guys think of the proposed "and 1" game to have 4 teams in a pseudo playoff? I think it will likely suck, since how does anyone determine those other 2 teams that get in? Applying it to the past season you'd have FL and OSU, but who are the other 2? Notre Dame sure as hell ain't getting in, nor would LSU with 2 losses (finishing 3rd actually in the SEC West). Wake Forest was trash, no way they are in. USC I think had 2 losses, so they are out. OU wasn't much, they wouldn't be in that select 4. Michigan had 1 loss to a top ranked Ohio St., so I think they would be in. U of L had 1 loss by 3 points at Rutgers (an 11-2 team). Thus it would probably have gone like this, at least to me: (1) Ohio St. vs. (4) Louisville (2) Florida vs. (3) Michigan In other words Boise would still be screwed in some fashion even with the 4 team scenario.

Yeah but Hogan wasn't in the WWF then and hadn't been for 6 years. I never understood that Jarrett thing in 1999. Try and juxtapose it with the way Jericho was treated in the Chyna feud. Jarrett got to retain at one PPV and then had a Dusty Finish to cost him at the next PPV (the belt isn't a household item). They went out of their way to protect a guy whose contract was up and who sorta held them up. Then with Jericho....they just jobbed him to Chyna clean. Can anyone even begin to justify this booking?

Gotta love Booker's thoughts on ECW. He would have flat out quit if he'd had to go there. Jericho's comments on various shows about how Benoit wouldn't have looked at it as a demotion look dubious after this (as if they weren't already).

Jingus, here is the thing about that GAB PPV. There wasn't one particular finish that upset me in terms of a heel winning clean....it's that they did it about 5 different times. This is the way I've always felt about heels winning against a face on a similar level: --If the heel cheats to win, then the face can claim to still be the better man and ask for a rematch. --If the heel wins clean in the center of the ring, he's the better man.

It doesn't help my perception of Spears when Cody Rhodes went out on OVW and badmouthed his former partner (now enemy) saying he was "A balding, glorified indy worker." To be honest, he's pretty much accurate.

Well, to clarify about the original Dawn....yes, eventually they get frustrated with the mall isolation but for a time there is a feeling that "Hey, we got rid of the zombies and own this place!" They go on the shopping spree, eat whatever they want, do whatever they want. The remake (as noted) had far too many characters to the point where few were notable. And truth be told, it doesn't take you on a roller coster ride of emotions the way the original did. In the original I felt: --Terror and angst during the opening scenes, as in "Oh my god the world is coming to an end." --Amusement at the rednecks hunting zombies for fun. --A feeling of being swept away in escapist action as they rid the mall of the zombies. Throw in some suspense there too. --A sense of relief after they complete this and have some fun in the mall. --A sense of hollow, bittersweet victory as they are still isolated and the world is still fucked, and after the initial riotous time in the mall it all feels shallow and hopeless. --Sadness when Roger dies. --And finally, during the crazy biker finale I felt a combo of nearly all of these things. It was hilarious, terrifying, in some ways sad (Flyboy's fate), had escapist action, and finally a sense of bittersweet victory. The 2004 film is pretty solid and might be a quicker, tighter film but we're talking about the difference between a *** movie and a **** movie.

Thanks for the link, Al. Quality was a bit blech on the match unfortunately, probably just someone's old VHS recording. It'll be great to see it on 24/7 in pristine condition.

I think the Sting "heel" turn is much like these various guys attacking John Cena today. Yeah, it's the mechanics of a typical heel turn, but the guy being turned on is so tired that fans don't mind. That said, my choice for the single most heatless, baffling heel turn is The British Bulldog turning on Diesel after Summerslam 1995. Take an unover champion in Nash, a guy nobody really wanted to boo in Davey Boy, and an onscreen relationship that wasn't ever developed to begin with and you have a recipe for one heatless as hell heel turn. I remember distinctly that I had open house at school the night of that Raw and then found out about this heel turn on the weekend show. Todd Pettengill was like "The British Bulldog is a piece of scum!" and I wondered what he was talking about. Then they show him attacking Diesel in some nothing tag match and I thought "So? Have these guys ever been friends?"

As I said, I'm just waiting for Karen to reveal it was all a ruse and cost Joe the match with Angle at the PPV. This is Russo we're dealing with here. And to be honest, given how ultra mean Kurt was to her on this show that isn't a bad swerve. The sad thing is that I don't doubt Angle is somewhat similar to this in real life.