Moments So Contrived

[... 0]

Bad/lazy writing, someone getting into someone's ear, a joke that fell flat, a sponser that had to be appeased... We've all seen it. I was thinking back to "The Rock, This Is Your Life" from 1999, a segment full of awkwardness and obvious joke set-ups. Between various actors pretending to be real live people from The Rock's past (and spending three or four minutes to get the pay-off of a middle-of-the-road one-liner insult), to Triple H struggling to free himself of the balloons, to the commentators remarking that the sticker Yerple had was a condom (Geddit? Sex is EDGY!), this is one cringe-inducing half-hour of television that barely had any payoff.

 

Other examples would include:

 

• X-Pac enjoying HANSEN ENERGY DRINK.
• The Master P invasion of Nitro in 1999, which was talked up as big angle which would revitalize WCW.
• 90% of Jerry Lawler's commentary.
• "Headlock on Hunger," when the WWF suddenly became direly concerned with the situation in Somalia.
• For that matter, ICO-PRO, which was the Big Dangling Wrestlemania Logo of the 90s.

[Maztinho 0]

Not to fuel the CenaHate, but there was a segment when he was sorta in limbo from the rapper heel after his face turn and before the Marine schtick that he did this Rock-esque rambling promo trying to ZING random people which just came off as bad, bad television.

 

It was like your awkward cousin trying to cut a wrestling promo off the cuff.

[BUTT 0]

I remember back in 2000/01, around the time The Producers was the hot Broadway show, they did a skit on Heat where they interviewed people coming out of the theatre and asked them "what did you think of the big show?" and we were supposed to laugh because hey, that's a wrestler's name. I suppose I should just be impressed that they took such a comparatively highbrow route considering they could have done the same skit outside a Dick's Sporting Goods store, but I still don't know why they did it.

[CanadianGuitarist 0]

DLo buying condoms for....someone (PMS, maybe?), and the two girls behind the counter who recognized him.

[Stunner810 0]

DLo buying condoms for....someone (PMS, maybe?), and the two girls behind the counter who recognized him.

 

I think he was buying tampax for PMS because he had to do favors for them. I think a week or two before that DLo knocked Terri off of the ring apron accidentally in a match and she had a miscarriage.

[Chazz 0]

The Mamalukes bringing Disco Inferno to meet the mob boss of the family, who turned out to be actor Chuck Zito.(Who played a similar role on HBO's prison drama "OZ")

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

Ranging from being just plain terrible ideas to outright intelligence insulting;

 

Buff Bagwell literally laying down for La Parka.

The finish to Bret/Goldberg at Starrcade.

Sting being 'set alight'.

Jeff Jarret laying down for Hogan at Bash at the Beach.

Goldberg being 'uncooperative' at New Blood Rising.

 

[King Kamala 0]

The Mamalukes bringing Disco Inferno to meet the mob boss of the family, who turned out to be actor Chuck Zito.(Who played a similar role on HBO's prison drama "OZ")

 

In a similar vein, Shelton Benjamin's "Mama" being the same woman that originally played Donovan McNabb's mama.

[Diamonddust 0]

-Eric Bischoff giving the Heavyweight Title to Triple H

-Fingerpoke

-X-Pac getting his own stable

-Shane McMahon running wild on Legacy

 

And speaking of sponsors, I always got a kick out of the faux-excitement J.R. would show when having to shill for something.

 

[Dobbs 3K 0]

Speaking of Good Ol' J.R., any time he had to play up the XFL. I remember even before the XFL had debuted on television, Ross would be saying stuff like "That was an XFL-like hit!" after a clothesline or whatever.

 

Some other moments:

 

- Lance Storm's multi-title run in WCW. Yeah, it was cool they were trying to push someone new who could actually work, but him winning all those belts in such a short time just killed a lot of the credibility any of those championships may still have had.

 

- Rey Misterio's mini-feud with Big Show after Eddie Guerrero died. Hell, Misterio's whole push after Eddie died.

 

- Most "Legends" wrestling matches in WWE in the past few years. Jim Duggan's whole current run, and Dusty Rhodes' one off match a year or two ago spring to mind. Also, any time a cocky heel mouths off about the legends, and then gets beaten up for it. Chris Jericho's current angle may or may not be applicable here.

 

- "The Alliance to Destroy Hulkamania."

 

- Demolition's half assed heel turn toward the end of their run where they were paired up with Mr. Fuji again.

 

- Al Snow's feud with Jerry Lawler and Brian Christopher when he first showed up in the WWF.

 

- Rick Rude showing up on Nitro and siding with the nWo, just to stick it to Vince McMahon, and then doing absolutely nothing of note.

 

- The NWA "invasion" of WWF in '97. Sorry, but Jeff Jarrett, Barry Windham, and the Rock & Roll Express wasn't too impressive of a lineup.

 

- Speaking of, while I actually enjoyed their work as a tag team, the New Midnight Express went over like a lead balloon. Would have been better off if they had been given a unique gimmick, since no one was going to buy Bombastic Bob and Bodacious Bart as successors to Lane and Eaton.

 

- Kronik. Actually a decent power tag team, but a stupid gimmick that didn't really get played upon, and booking you could see coming a mile away.

 

- R&B Security. I think the worst was when Scott Steiner was clotheslining them in pairs on the entry ramp during one particularly comical Nitro.

 

- Speaking of security, I always found it funny in the very early days of the nWo when armed policed officers would storm the ring to keep the Outsiders at bay. Were we supposed to believe they were actually going to shoot them if they tried to get in the ring?

 

That's all I can think of right now.

[Chazz 0]

When Jeff Jarrett first came into The WWF and would go up against jobbers on Superstars, they would ALWAYS try some offensive move with the knee, end up missing it, then Jarrett would work over the injured knee to set up the figure four for the win.

[... 0]

"Those beautiful Titan Motorcycles."

 

Kane hasty heel turn to feud with the Undertaker in 2000 because The Big Show put on too much weight and was sent back to OVW. And within eight months they were frequent tag team partners. It did lead to CRZ referring to him as "Well It's Kane" for a few months, however.

[BUTT 0]

When JR used to open Raw by calling it an action-adventure show.

[Papacita 0]

I'm an HBK mark, but a few years back (I wanna say 05) they had a pretty funny moment where Raw came to MSG. For some reason, JR and King are discussing great ovations, and JR says something like "if you thought that was great, wait til you hear the response when HBK steps out here in a few moments, MAKING HIS RETURN TO THE GARDEN"! So Shawn's music hits shortly thereafter, and the pop wasn't all that bad, but nowhere near what JR hyped it to be. It's made even more funny by JR's going into complete oversell mode with his "BAH GAWD HAVE YOU EVER HEARD THIS TYPE OF OVATION?!" type stuff.

 

Similarly, at Bad Blood 2004 (I think), Orton is being interviewed backstage as he prepares for his match against Shelton. It was actually one of the better Orton promos from this period, as he showed pretty good intensity, etc...but it also clearly written for him. The who premise of the segment is that Orton's cutting a backstage promo and is so angered by the fans' booing him that he has to come out to the live crowd to address them. Of course Orton was over as hell by this point, and the fans started cheering him from the moment he appeared on screen. Orton didn't even try to adlib IIRC, so the whole thing--while cool to see how Orton was progressing--came off awkwardly.

 

John Cena's feuds against Jericho and Kurt Angle in 2005 where the writers tried everything they could to get fans to cheer Cena against these crowd favorites (e.g. 'Kurt Angle hates the troops') and not only failing miserably, but actually causing a good percentage of fans to turn on Cena in the process.

 

"CLB," with respect to Christian.

 

Kurt Angle's joining the Alliance in 01 after Austin threw his gold medals over a bridge, although this was kinda cool in the sense that Austin thought enough of Kurt to fish the medals out for him.

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

When JR used to open Raw by calling it an action-adventure show.

I only remember Michael Cole doing that, and it was the once.

 

"Welcome to the hottest action-adventure program/show on television."

 

For some reason that particular show opening stuck with me. Probably because it sounded so stupid.

[Mecha Mummy 0]

Kurt Angle's joining the Alliance in 01 after Austin threw his gold medals over a bridge, although this was kinda cool in the sense that Austin thought enough of Kurt to fish the medals out for him.

 

Yeah, but he joined it as a mole or something like that, so it's not like he actually forgave Austin for doing that.

 

Also, good god, "CLB." I don't know if that's contrived as much as just lame as hell, I can't believe they spent like a couple months trying to get that stupid nickname over.

[Kahran Ramsus 0]

Robocop saving Sting from the Four Horsemen was the first thing that came to my mind. That used to be a running gag in the schoolyard in my younger days.

[Thanks for the Fish 0]

-Basically any backstage Kane segment,

-anybody being afraid of the Undertakers special powers.

-"Seeing from the perspective of the wrestler" camera work

-Hornswoggle running though the wall a la a cartoon

-The Raw Roster parting for Shane McMahon to confront Orton

-The XFL and the announcers having to sell it

-The over-selling of Cena's and Kennedy's movies

 

[DangerousDamon 0]

BATTLE BOWL. Am I really supposed to believe that Austin and Rude randomly got teamed up with each other?

[BUTT 0]

When JR used to open Raw by calling it an action-adventure show.

I only remember Michael Cole doing that, and it was the once.

 

"Welcome to the hottest action-adventure program/show on television."

 

For some reason that particular show opening stuck with me. Probably because it sounded so stupid.

You're right, it was Cole, and it was during the period when Ross was out with Bell's Palsy. I think they said it more than once.

[Chazz 0]

Anytime wrestlers held a super secret meeting where they were planning to attack another wrestler(s)/telling someone something they didn't want anyone to hear five feet away from the camera. Lita asking Stacy Keibler if she could keep a secret about Lita being prego during that whole Matt/Kane/Lita love triangle was the tops.

[PILLS! PILLS! PILLS! 0]

BATTLE BOWL. Am I really supposed to believe that Austin and Rude randomly got teamed up with each other?

 

As a fan of the concept, I must say, that the absolute WORST one was at Slamboree 96, when nearly every wrestler was magically selected, at random, to team with their sworn enemy. It was really lame. Actually, almost all pre-NWO Nitro era WCW booking was hogshit at that point.

[eiker_ir 0]

- When Mankind pinned The Rock in the empty arena match, that camera angle made me cringe since it was so stupid.

 

- Also in WM XX when Orton did a promo with Batista and Flair and they were standing in some stairs and they kept changing cameras and angles. I generally hate this type of stuff, when they try to get all movie-ish. It makes everything look so fake.

[JHawk 0]

On one WCW show, someone used one of those giant tubs for holding soft drinks with the Surge logo just because they were sponsoring that piece of shit company.

 

In the late 80s/early 90s when WCW had that agreement with Roos shoes, someone ran someone else into the "Roos post" (instead of ringpost. Get it?), and even Jim Cornette looked as JR and went "The Roos Post?"

 

And as far as contrived spots, and "tower of doom" spot in ROH/TNA multiman matches where 16 people all hit some sort of suplex/power bomb/whatthefuckever at the exact same time,

[PILLS! PILLS! PILLS! 0]

- Also in WM XX when Orton did a promo with Batista and Flair and they were standing in some stairs and they kept changing cameras an angles.

 

You're so wrong on this on.

[Richard 0]

Crash Holly seeking protection from Shaft.

 

Rick Steiner confronting Chucky.

 

The WCW mini-movies

 

Chuck Norris as a WWF enforcer.

[Jingus 0]

Another vote here for movie-style camera angles and editing. One of the most uniquely appealling things about wrestling is that it's all happening live in front of you. (Okay, maybe they taped it on Tuesday and you're seeing it on Friday, but you get what I mean.) Everything you see is what actually happened, with no special effects. The show is presented in that manner, like a real sports show, for about 98% of the time. But then you have all the kayfabe-breaking examples people have already named: people discussing "secrets" in front of millions of people watching live television, physically impossible things like a midget running through a solid wall, camera shots from places where there shouldn't be cameras. I hate it so much that it makes me do something I never do: give props to TNA. At least they try to keep things within the realm of plausibility, like usually having the interviewer people hanging around to explain why a camera just happens to be filming this moment.

[ChrisMWaters 0]

Kane's "Dream Sequences" from shortly before he lost his mask.

[Thanks for the Fish 0]

Kane's "Dream Sequences" from shortly before he lost his mask.

 

Or when everybody was hearing the voices in his head when promoting See No Evil...

[fazzle 0]

How about the night when Austin kidnapped Vince McMahon for an entire episode of Raw, and then eventually brought him out to the ring and shot him with the "Bang 3:16" gun?

 

I was already growing tired of Austin by that point, but I'm pretty sure that episode was the one that made me just completely hate him.