As I figured, I got multiple e-mails either wholeheartedly agreeing with me or telling me I was an idiot or a moron based on last weeks views. It’s one of those issues where people are far on either side of the fence, and no amount of arguing will ever convince people otherwise. If they were more willing to use their sense, though, rather than blindly follow what the news media and the legislators tell them is “best for the children,” they might think a little different, but to each their own.
And to the one guy who thought alcohol and tobacco should be illegal. To each their own, man. The US Government tried that once and it didn’t work. I think most recreational drugs should be legal, though So I’m probably the wrong guy to argue with.
Regardless, I know I won’t change anyone’s mind… but this is a good a place as any to rant… especially when most of the people who read this are the folks stuff like this is going to affect for the next 50 or 60 years. Just remember, in the future, when it’s zero-tolerance for everyone driving… Remember where you read it first. And who warned you.
And NO, it wasn’t Eric S. He handles warning you about all the OTHER political stuff. He also gave me props for taking on the man. I’ve also reached the conclusion that Eric’s all right. So… apologies to him for anything I said before.
Ashish wants you all to know that 411 is selling T-shirts. I like them so I’m getting one. I think you guys should all buy one, so the writers can start getting comped into wrestling events. That would make us all very happy. Remember, when you order, tell ’em Daniels sent ya! Be one of the next five orders, and receive THE T-SHIRT YOU ORDER!
In other heart wrenching news, the Olsen Twins will NOT be renewing their show on ABC for next year. The lil yaklets want too much money. Can someone explain the phenomina that is the Olsen Twins to me? How did the two little trolls from Full House become full-fledged superstars. At least if it was a couple years from now, I’d understand it… because they’re going to be hot… but when they started out, they were STILL little trolls.
Congrats to Scott Keith, who I’m sure doesn’t read this column, on the book contract. I hope to get one someday. Even if they want to give me $5 for something I wrote. Hell, a contributor copy of something would even be nice.
Anway… Wrestling
Raw
McMahon and Flair pushed their Royal Rumble match. I don’t know about you all, but I’m not at all fired up about this. In fact, if I were to see Flair wrestle again, which is completely unnecessary, I wouldn’t want it to be with Vince McMahon… basically, because I don’t want to see Vince beat Ric Flair. Stay tuned to this report for more on this.
Billy and Chuck. They’re self-explanatory. This will also be discussed later, roughly in the same paragraph as the stuff in the previous paragraph.
A bunch of people were announced for the Royal Rumble. Austin, H, Angle, and the like all shocked the world and announced they were entering the Rumble. The Rock is facing Jericho, so I guess that means he’s not in it?
Lance Storm was Edge’s jobbin bitch this week. Did Storm go and get First Class seats or something? Last week he was involved in the beginning of a decent story. This week he’s squashed by Edge in under a minute.
The WWF finally managed to completely kill the “What?” thing, and it died on Raw, when Austin rattled off 29 “What?s” when talking about the Royal Rumble. Luckily, I still have “Who?” as a personal catchphrase. THANKS BOOKER!!!
Jericho beat Rikishi in a questionable finish. I don’t know why the questionable finish was needed, but it was there.
In the “What the Hell?” of the week. Tazz and Spike Dudley beat the Dudleyz for the Tag Titles. Team 5’4″ won with an Acid Drop through a table. I guess this is something to shake up the division. The tag division is in dire need of shaking up, considering there’s only one team anymore that anyone takes seriously… and that’s the Dudleys. Edge and Christian are gone, the Hardyz are a joke, the Gay Duo is even more of a joke, and that about covers it. Thank god I don’t do the Rankings anymore. I see they’ve even dropped the number of ranked tag teams from 10 to 5. I’d like to point out when I asked Widro to do this, he called me lazy. It wasn’t laziness, it was just plain impossible to come up with ten tag teams in the WWF every week that were worth mentioning.
There was a wet T-shirt contest on Raw, and I have to say I was quite disappointed. I think it’s about time to take Terri Runnells off television. If she has anymore plastic surgery, I think she may be put in the lobby of DuPont’s corporate offices as a “how-to” example. She’s starting to get that pathetic, “old soap opera” actress look about her, when they’re trying to keep her looking young well past her time to look young. They can find roughly 32,000 big-breasted blondes that look 32,000,000 times better than she does. Let’s do that, shall we?
H made his big return. It really would have ruined his tough-guy image if he started crying, which he almost did… but it was cool to see him again. Of course, it was a pretty lame payoff after a month of build-up. He came out, said a couple things, then Angle interrupted him. He Pedigreed Angle, and the show ended.
Smackdown!
Steph started the show and further reminded us that all of the last six months happened in some strange alternate reality… because Vince beat up Ric Flair on Monday for her… even though she recently told Vince that she and Shane wish he’d hurry up and die. All I ask for is a little continuity… just a little, and this is what we get. You know, occassionally I (and just about everyone who does this stuff) get e-mails telling you to “just sit back and enjoy it.” The thing is… in any other show you watch, ridiculous things like this don’t happen. Now that they’ve completely gotten away from pretending this is real, they need to make a logical story to keep people watching. They did that for a while. They seem to have forgotten how.
They also announced a bunch of guys for the Rumble who they should have saved as surprises, like Meng/Haku last year. I would have felt like I got my money’s worth if Golddust’s old music hit and they brought him out for the Rumble. Or the Godfather with a Ho Train. In fact, I think they should bring Golddust back for more than a one shot. He can form a “stable o fags” with Billy and Chuck. Actually, I wouldn’t mind seeing Golddust return again… maybe they can finally pay off GDTV.
This also goes for Mr Perfect. Show Staziak how the Perfect gimmick is done. Besides, we already know he’s going to win the Rumble now… because he’s goddam Perfect.
Michael Cole got puked on. There was a match in there, too… but it was so stupid I refuse to comment on it. DDP was in the bathroom after this segment… even though he got fired. With all the folks walking around the WWF locker room that don’t have jobs there, can I wander around back there, too?
The Pedigree of the night goes to the Big Show. Why, I don’t really know. H has yet to align himself anywhere or say much of anything. His return is being handled quite slowly. I think they’re figuring out what they want to do with Hogan, Nash, and Hall.
The Week In Wrestling
The final sign that the WWF is struggling has now shown up. They are officially stealing WCW bad ideas and recycling them. They are forcing two guys to be an on-screen gay couple. Billy Gunn’s career already sucks… this won’t hurt it anymore. Palumbo’s is just beginning… and I don’t know if he can EVER shake this. Also, we have Flair and Vince vying for control over the company, which is going to lead to a second match at Wrestlemania for full ownership of the company. Which is soooooo stupid. Flair and Bischoff did this, too… and it sucked then. Why? Because Bischoff went over Flair, just like Vince will go over Flair. How do I know Vince will go over Flair? Simple, because putting himself over Flair is putting the WWF over WCW, once and for all.
Booker T continues to be my favorite part of WWF television, and he’s already given my group of friends new catch phrases with which to piss off various girlfriends. “Who?” works quite well as does “Sucka.” Try it. I also recommend calling your girlfriends “yaks.” They hate that, too.
I think the ultimate sign that the WWF knows they’re faltering is they have to pimp things that are going to happen before they happen. They had to build up HHH’s return for weeks before it actually happened. But, in another version of WCW’s playbook, they didn’t payoff the return nearly as much as they hyped it. He didn’t DO anything. He didn’t run into a match… he didn’t mention the whole Invasion thing that happened when he was gone, he didn’t even take a side. He didn’t mention Stephanie, who’s been on television constantly saying how much of an impact he (and she) will make when he gets back. Then, he gets back, and makes no impact at all. Also, the WWF of last year never would have let on that Goldust, Mr Perfect, Venis, and the Goddfather would be making surprise returns for the Royal Rumble, they just would have done it. This makes me think more and more that Diesel will make an appearance, just to do something cool. Of course, I often put together PPVs in my head that would excite me, and I get all hyped up for them, and then nothing cool happens.
Also, they can’t give Jericho a clean win over Rikishi? Why not? If they ever want people to start taking him seriously, they have to give him clean wins over guys who are not even main eventers. Rikishi’s a good guy and he’s way over but they don’t have to protect him against the goddam Unified, Undisputed World Champion. All he has to do is come out next week and dance, and no one will care he lost to Jericho the week before. Jericho, on the other hand, if he can’t even cleanly beat folks on the Upper Mid-Card how are we supposed to take him seriously when he faces the Rock next week at the Rumble? We can’t because he can’t even beat Rikishi.
The WWF is slowly getting to the point where I’m more and more willing to miss every show, and that’s bad… because they have to be REALLY bad to lose me. But, it’s OK, because they’re going to hire me… and here is why. It’s in
Where Do They Go From Here?
It’s very simple. They have the entire Kliq back in the fold… AND Hogan. A very simple, and rather compelling storyline, if you ask me… would be this: The entire New World Order storyline was a grand plot to bring down WCW and was completely orchestrated by Vince McMahon. He arranged the whole thing. He sent Hogan, he let Razor and Diesel out of Contracts Prematurely to get them there. All of it was part of a master plan to lower the value of WCW so he could buy it lock, stock, and barrel. It worked. He has all of WCW’s old footage to look at and spin whatever segments they want. They have Hall and Nash “destroying” Goldberg at Starrcade, to take the legs out from under WCW’s fastest rising star and meal ticket. They destroyed Flair at every opportunity, they ran off Sting, they ran off Lugar… and what was left? Nothing.
But, they aren’t happy with just being Vince’s lackeys anymore. They’ve decided if they bankrupted and brought down one company, they can bring down and destroy another. Why? I’m not sure. Maybe Hogan decided he wants to be the man to run wrestling… maybe because they’re bored… whatever. But, they have Hogan, which will immediately draw ratings from anywhere. They have HHH, which will lend them credibility with the “new” WWF audience. They have the damn Outsiders. They have EVERYTHING to make this work. Hell, they even have Michaels to flashback to the time when he was trying to “get fired” so he could get down there and go with them. The New World Order happens again, but in the WWF this time. The only ones who are going to be bothered by it are the people who’ve seen it once already… but for God’s sake, at least it might get interesting again. I, for one, wouldn’t mind seeing Hogan/Austin, or Hogan/Rock. Enough interest and money gets generated in it, and you might even see the guys who would “never work for Vince McMahon get lured out of their closets. Get enough time out of it, and Goldberg might even show up when his WCW contract expires and it sinks through that no one remembers him, or cares.
Regardless, that is my storyline to reintroduce all of them. Will it be a ripoff of how WCW ran the New World Order? Probably. Will I care… probably not… because it will be better than the god-awful crap they’re doing now.
We’ll see. The writer job is back on Hotjobs. I put my resume in… let’s see if I get it… with all the writing experience I have. They need to do something… and need to remember they’re writing this show to entertain the fans… not to entertain themselves.
Because right now, even I don’t care.
And I’ve been watching this shit for almost 20 years now.
Goddam, I’m old.
End Transmission.
