“Teen tipplers drink a quarter of all alcohol consumed in the United States, encouraged by television ads and parents who see underage drinking as a rite of passage, researchers said on Tuesday.†–Yahoo News
ONLY A QUARTER?? Where are you guys? Of course, they make no mention of percentage of the rise that’s due to the complete ridiculousness of the drinking age being 18.
I didn’t check in last week because I’m crash preparation for Spring Break. I leave for Florida this Saturday, and I have a ton of assignments to get done by then basically so I don’t have to bring a laptop to Florida with me. Starting Saturday afternoon at 2:30, it’s going to be me, two buddies, and Daily Wet T-Shirt Contests from Club La Vela in Panama City Beach. I’ll be on the very sand the last Nitro was filmed from probably looking over the same balconies.
That being said most of the work I need to do isn’t quite done yet so real short and sweet this week. Don’t want you guys to forget about me in the wash of new columnists.
Raw
Big recap of the Austin/nWo stuff used Rey Mysterio’s music. I kinda forgot how cool Mysterio’s old music was before he went all gay and stuff. You know, the mini-eminem version.
The nWo gave a good nWo interview. Hogan’s was peppered with “What’s,” while Nash and Hall gave versions that made people boo and forget to say what… until Hall said Austin’s name, then they all said “oh yeah” and started doing it again. I think a Nash/Undertaker feud for ‘Mania would make perfect sense… considering Nash lost his last big feud to Undertaker. I believe ‘Taker kicked out of two Jacknifes.
Chuck of Billy and Chuck is sporting a new do. It’s less gay than the pigtails, but more gay than his WCW hair. It’s very Justin-ish, minus the curls. A spike-fro. That was officially two sentences too long to spend on Chuck Palumbo’s hair. The Hardyz have gone from top of the tag team ranks to Jobbing to Billy and Chuck.
Jericho and Steph get along great now. The continuity issue bothers me less because I find Jericho and Steph being together less creepy than HHH and Steph. Jericho reminded us that, while he has never “technically” beaten HHH, he did assist in putting him out of wrestling for 8 months. Surprisingly, he didn’t remind us of the fact he beat him for the title as well, even if it was later rescinded. Steph was at her best tonight for a while, because she looked super hot and didn’t talk. I really can’t wait until the Drowning Pool version of HHH’s music comes out… because Motorhead blows. H did score the line of the night with “Even a 747 looks small when flying it into the Grand Canyon,” which was in response to Steph calling him a “little man.”
Edge’s feud with Regal seems to be replaced with a feud with RVD. I don’t have a problem with it, I just find it odd. Edge, Regal, and RVD seem to be feuding interchangably. Hopefully, RVD goes over Regal at ‘Mania and holds the IC belt at least until Summerslam. It would be nice.
Mr. Perfect’s new schtick is pretending his record is perfect, even though it isn’t. It really isn’t quite as effective. His match last week was an “exhibition†and didn’t count toward his real record.
The Undertaker decided to influence Ric Flair’s decision on a Wrestlemania match by beating up on Arn Anderson. One punch busted Arn open. Arn proceeded to get the holy hell beat out of him by the ‘Taker.
There’s a new Hepner as a referee… someone’s kid. Regardless, they need to teach him how to be blind. Angle hit Jericho with a belt in plain view of him, when he was supposed to be “semi-bumped,” but JR insisted he didn’t see it. This entire segment was flat as hell, considering it was heel vs heel… so no one gave a damn who won.
The APA went back to the Friendly Tap for “Men’s Night.” They assumed it was sort of like “Ladies Night.” In a sense, it kind of was. Apparently, the bar which is less than 5 minutes from Hyatte’s house has a Gay Night. In the foregone conclusion of the night, Billy and Chuck attacked The APA, and they proceeded to trash poor Timmy White’s bar again. I’m assuming GLAAD would not be too fond of this segment… Excellent. Any gay guys who happen to read this article, please tell me gay night at bars are far cooler than that. I’m talking like pink spandex pants and shiny Jericho shirt cool.
The nWo wished Mr Perfect luck in his match against the nWo… of course, they didn’t make any reference to the fact that Mr Perfect used to be IN the nWo. Scott Hall, post match, took a cinder block and broke it over Austin’s knee. Scott, for future reference, at least make the cinder block LOOK heavy. This was important enough that JR and The King left the announce position entirely to check on Austin… so there was no commentary at all for the last few minutes of the show. JR was concerned, having completely forgotton the vicious beating Austin threw him a couple months ago… of course, those last few months never happened.
Smackdown
In a thoroughly pointless segment to start us off… we decided to have an intergender tag match. Before they even announced who it was between, Bubba announced Stacy was out and Jazz was in. Why? Would anyone have really cared if it was the Dudleyz and Jazz? I certainly wouldn’t have. It’s not the WWF goes out of their way to explain stupid tag matches… see also, the main event tonight… of HHH/Kane vs Jericho/Angle. Stacy did a roundhouse during the match that cleared the ring. I think if she does a split, she spans the ring.
Austin didn’t have much of a limp for having a cinderblock broken over his knee… those braces must really do their job. Austin came out to say something… probably “What?” but got interrupted by the nWo. Hogan left him to Hall and Nash, then went to the back. Austin approached them and pulled a gun. No, I’m serious… but it only fired a net at Nash. He tried to attack Hall, but it went badly when Hall went right for his knee. Nash worked his way free and they both took off.
Chris Jericho is now Stephanie’s bitch. She forced him to go out and get hand lotion. *Blink* Okaaaaaaay. So, now she can’t ride HHH’s coat-tails to be on television… so she writes herself making the undisputed champion her bitch. Boy… no ego problem in the McMahon family.
Maven had his first Hardcore title defense against Goldust. They showd Chris in the audience… one of the two guys who Maven beat on the last show. I immediately assumed he was running in to beat up Maven to cause a DQ. Maven actually beat Goldust though… then the Undertaker came out to beat up Maven some more. Then Al Snow came out to defend Maven… which led to the trademark “impromptu match.” This match ended when Ric Flair came out to beat the holy piss out of the Undertaker with Taker’s own lead pipe. Flair said the answer to Wrestlemania is still “NO” but if Taker ever messes with a friend of his again, he will learn why Ric is the Dirtiest Player In the GameTM. Chris didn’t get involved at all… I was thinking Chris was either going to hop the rail and win the Hardcore Title via the possibly defunct 24-7 rule, or just come in and start beating Maven. Neither happened, though. Eventually, Goldust caught up with Maven being worked on by the trainer backstage, and used said 24-7 rule to win himself the Hardcore Title.
Billy and Chuck had a title defense. I still stand by my question of “Why is Chuck Friggin Palumbo the only WCW guy on television?” It’s not like he’s all that much more talented then any of the other guys… IE: Jindrak, O’Haire, Lance Storm, etc.
They had a video package covering the career of hogan through the his WWF career. They make no mention of “Santa With Muscles.” They also go through is WCW debut… the make no mention of how no one cared. The video package was basically a retrospective of Hogan’s career… and it did kind of take me back. I didn’t see the Shiek/Hogan match… I would have been turning five on the day he won it.
Booker T had a match with Scotty, where he thankfully did NOT have to take the Worm. Unfortunately, Edge got the coveted “Japanese Shampoo Spokesman” spot. Booker was not pleased. Come on… look at Edge’s hair. Was there any doubt? Even the Japanese are out to get the black man.
DDP is trying to teach Christian the power of positive thinking. He starts by telling Christian he has to form a connection to the fans. Christian rolls his eyes at the thought.
Steph stops in to say hi to Hunter, who was discussing conditioning tips with Kane. Luckily, Kane no longer takes issue with the “Big Red Retard” comments. Steph comes in and informs Hunter that she’s not only trying to get 50% of everything Hunter has, even though she probably squandered a good portion of both their money buying ECW, but since she made HHH, she also is looking to get 50% of everything he makes forever. If he gives her 100%, will she leave entirely? If so, I’ll pay it for him.
The Week In Wrestling
Well, there isn’t too much I can say about the past two weeks which Blake hasn’t expressed already. The stuff with the Rock last week was really good, up until the point it went from a feud set-up to attempted murder. The whole thing should have stopped in the ring let the nWo leave, and let the Rock do the stretcher job. Period. No questions asked. When the nWo ran him down in a truck, you further lose the tenuous grip on reality that wrestling has. You lose it even MORE when you can’t work a transition to save your life.
A transition, for those on the WWF production team who don’t know, is how you change over from one segment to another seamlessly. Going from attempted murder, a gas leak, and “suspense†into “everybody come aboard the HOOOOOOOO train, doesn’t work. Not only do you immediately make the people in the audience forget about what was going on outside, but it makes it seem all the less worse. No, making the “escorts†pretend to be concered about what happened to the Rock doesn’t help either. Then it’s just even more ridiculous. The audience has already moved on and you assisted in helping them forget. See, after the attempted murder of the Rock, and interview of some sort was called for what the person could or would have said, I don’t know. Ric Flair could have suspended the nWo. Someone could have called the police. Don’t move from something completely heavy to something as light-hearted as you can come up with. It doesn’t make people think it was “unpredicted,†it makes people think it was stupid.
Of course, right after doing that, they move into making the nWo look like a bunch of fools by getting stalked by Austin all night and losing. When the nWo was interesting, they were badasses. THAT was what made them work. They didn’t duck and hide, and they sure the hell didn’t get tied up. Who wants to bet Hall loses to Austin completely clean at Mania? Anyone? Because I’ll take your money. The WWF is similarly doing with the nWo what they’ve been doing all year. Nothing. To preserve their precious “locker-room balance,†they are not making the nWo look like monsters. They’re letting the faces walk all over them. Austin is walking all over Hall and Nash just as Rock walked all over Hogan until the other two came out to help just as Taker walked all over DDP and just how everyone walks all over Booker T. Booker T and Page now, though, are becoming part of the WWF style. They’re becoming comical characters, to one extent, and patently WWF gimmicked.
I’m sitting and watching the nWo and asking myself what happened? Where are the guys who walked all over Turner-land for a year? They’re no where to be found. Apparently they feel Austin’s character has to get the better of them much like he got the better part of the McMahon character but the nWo is not Vince Vince was supposed to look inept the nWo is not.
And then there was Steph, who again must be involved in everything everywhere. While I do understand they need something to make Jericho a heel in Canada, it doesn’t escape my notice that it has to be her. There’s a reason everyone boos her it’s because she f*cking sucks. HHH ran circles around her in the ring and unlike Vince and Shane, she won’t even take a move to satisfy the crowd’s bloodlust. Shane and Vince allow themselves to look bad. She doesn’t. She has to be in the center of everything and SHE NEVER GOES AWAY. She tells her father to die, she can’t wait till he dies, she loses her federation and is kicked off WWF television. Two goddam weeks later, she’s back with HHH. She divorces HHH, the next goddam show she reunites with Vince. You know why the ratings are sagging? F**king Stephanie, that’s why.
That’s it, she’s my new scapegoat everythign that’s wrong is because of Stephanie. At some point, if I ever want to find my stopwatch, I’m going to a ratio of Steph-time on one of the shows. I bet it’s sickening. I bet it’ll be even more sickening when compared to the actual amount of wrestling on the show. People in the locker room are worried about the nWo and WCW guys getting too much TV time, but no one mentions the golden child, who can apparently do no wrong, even though she’s booking herself to the top, and booking the ratings into the toilet. They can bring in as many creative forces as they want to, but when it comes down to the end, the pen is still in her hand. Think she’ll let other folks on the creative team let her look bad? I don’t. Think she’ll finally get a Pedigree at Wrestlemania? Maybe but you won’t see another one.
Where Do They Go From Here?
Who knows. I don’t even think they do, and they have Wrestlemania coming up in three weeks. I think an Regal/RVD program is completely necessary, and it REALLY should end with RVD beating him at ‘Mania. On an interesting side note, I almost went to Wrestlemania this year, but decided on Florida instead.
All road lead to Wrestlemania so I think the WWF better start acting like it. Three weeks away, and the card isn’t even set-up yet? If they want to keep Wrestlemania feeling “special,†they can’t do stuff like this. It is becoming “just another PPV.†Except it’s four hours long and costs more.
How about giving Kevin Nash something to do? Hall is losing to Austin and Rock is losing to Hogan so how about Nash beating someone? Undertaker would have made sense, but the heel/heel match won’t work out besides, Taker’s busy with Flair. How about letting Kevin Nash lawn dart Scotty 2 Hotty into something over in over till Scotty’s head explodes? I’d be all for that.
I’d also be a big fan if they’d put a moratorium on the “HUGE†tag matches they have every goddam week. I’d like to repost an article I wrote for the site a while back, edited for current times. That will probably be my contribution for next week. The tag matches are getting sickening seriously.
I’ll take Flea’s resolution give it till Mania.
After that, it’s up in the air.
End Transmission
