A Look on the Bright Side

Columns, Reviews, Shows, TV Shows

Greetings everyone. Welcome back to your weekly installment of the Internet Wrestling Community’s only happy place, A Look on the Bright Side.

Eh, I got nothin’ this week.

YouTube Video of the Week

So, you’ve seen “Dick In A Box” by now, I hope. (And I certainly expect you to have found the uncensored version.) But have you seen the response video, “My Box in a Box”?

Around the Pulse

Blatt talks some ECW stuff.

Wheeler writes about the Divas. I established my opinion on this subject long ago, when I was just an emailer who appeared in Eric’s column: give me something to whack off to, or get off my screen.

Phil Clark makes a compelling case for TNA to get rid of Vince Russo. My personal opinion on Russo is unchanged from the WWE Attitude Era: he is an invaluable compliment to a strong show, but cannot be trusted to rein himself in, and absolutely cannot be given carte blanche with storylines.

Kennedy writes about movies and Mother’s Day.

The Week That Was

And now, we get to the meat of the column. The idea is fairly simple: I point out (at least) 5 things from each major show that should be getting more attention, but aren’t. (And occasionally, I just point out some absurdity just to tweak the rest of the IWC.) There’s way too much negativity infused into columnists who write about pro wrestling: this is just my little attempt to balance it out a bit.

Love the concept? Hate it? Think I missed something important from last week? See something this week that you think should be here? Email me by Tuesday evening.

And be sure to take part in the Insidepulse Forum for A Look on the Bright Side thread too.

Smackdown

There was only one part of the show that actually mattered, so that’s what I’m talking about tonight.

1. If you’re Batista – seriously, how pissed are you right now? You’ve had several draws with The Undertaker, the recognized phenom of the WWE, and yet when he becomes injured: they go to someone from “the other show” to find a new champ? How frustrated must he be now?

2. And somebody should point out: having this match in a steel cage made no sense whatsoever. Steel cage matches should be left for feuds where the heel champ keeps counting on interference DQ wins to keep this title (see: Four Horsemen, The), or when two competitors have been shown to just HATE each other over an extended period of time (see: Backlund vs. Sgt. Slaughter). But, putting them in a cage just cuz they’d had a few other matches? Bleh.

3. You should have been able to pick this up on your own, of course – but, UT absolutely hit the ground before Batista did (about half a second earlier, but still noticeable in slo-mo). No, you can’t compare view from two different cameras at two different angles. And as my follow-up: DUH.

4. Now, if they’d just keep Mark Henry as an enforcer for guys that could wrestle (say, turn him into the new Diesel for Shawn Michaels), than I don’t think anyone on the IWC would really complain. I mean, he’s big – he could obviously cause damage. No one questions that.

5. Why is JBL, the most cowardly world champ of all time, giving Edge a hard time about when he decides to cash in his MitB shot? JBL should be lauding that as the most brilliant move ever.

6. I’ve been watching The Undertaker in matches since Wrestlemania VII, and I’ve never wavered in my support of him. He’s been the ultimate team player. He’s grabbed the title when he needs to, but has never played backstage politics in order to ensure himself of it. And he’ll just as easily lose the title, or loose a major PPV match, if he thinks it’s good for the company. Honestly, everyone should aspire to Mark Calloway’s example.

*cue “Battle Hymn of the Republic” in the background*

Monday Night Raw

1. Hmm – unique promo for Cena, with this low-key, humble approach. Truthfully, without the bravado, he really loses most of his charisma. Hope Creative is paying attention. (I hope they are also noticing that they guy is going against The Great f’in Khali, the bane of the Internet smarks, and he STILL gets booed.)

2. The psychology coming from Cade & Murdoch the past couple of weeks has been impressive. Let’s see if someone backstage is patient enough to let a storyline develop for more then 2 whole weeks…. wait, they are? Someone is? Holy crap – color me shocked.

3. And Vince walks out in his lavender suit, with his lavender doo-rag. Heh. Heheh… BWAHAHAH…. *ahem*… *snort*… HAHAHAH…. *rolls off his couch*

4. Santino Morella has some excellent technique for a (relative) new guy. His first counter to the Masterlock was smooth, and the hiplock right afterwards had some good legwork thrown in to make it look even more impressive. Plus, his second set of counter-moves went off without a hitch, and had almost an MMA feel to them (makes sense, since that was one of his earlier gimmicks down in OVW).

5. Okay, somebody back me up here – has Melina… uhh.. “grown” just in the past 2 weeks? I just don’t remember her being that blessed in the breastal area before today.

6. Wait, did someone start convincing Candice Michelle that she gets paid by the move in her matches? Holy CRAP, I haven’t seen someone improve this quickly since… yes, I’ll go there… Trish Stratus. (Some of you don’t remember how bad she was when she first showed up, eh? Lucky you.)

7. Okay – you, me, and everyone with a freakin’ dot-com email address knows how it happened, but ask yourself this: in a straight one-on-one feud, with no injuries involved, could you see Edge eventually triumphing over The Undertaker? I have to answer “yes”, which speaks volumes towards how much Mr. Copeland’s character has grown over just the past 16 months.

8. Just when I’m thinking, “Man – Edge took way too long in his intro”, they cut his music — and the crowd is *rabidly* booing him. Never discount the power of a truly arrogant look.

9. Oh, they almost got me – I was just about ready to believe they were going to let Edge leave as the World Heavyweight Champ, without anyone else getting on the mic. (And yes, I would have been horribly disappointed.) So who do they bring out? Oh, only the top active promo guy in the business – Mister HBK. Suh-weet. …. Oh, and they let him say 2 generic lines in the “you suck” vein. Brilliant. *sigh*

10. Shane’s “I’m not touching you” promo was a really nice moment for anyone that ever had an older brother. Or was an older brother. Or thought about picking on an imaginary younger brother. Or… of course.. was just a dick. (And I’m not sure what prompted the “throwing a kiss” move – but that was genius. DAMMIT, but Shane is just so much wasted potential right now. I would pine for the day when he’s finally able to rebel against and conquer his father for good – but that will never happen.)

11. Well, dammit… just before the Lashley vs. Coach match, there was a sign, written on pink posterboard with black letters, that showed up in the middle of the screen. And I swore at the time that it said: “Umaga ate my hot pussy”. If so, this would have been the greatest sign in the history of the modern wrestling age. Unfortunately, on further review, it actually said “Umaga ate my Hot Pocket”. If someone, anyone, can get a female to hold up a sign with that former phrase on Raw on screen, I swear – I will pay you $100. (If I don’t, feel free to call me out on the forum for the next year or so.)

12. My respect for Shawn Michaels grows by the day. Seriously – watch his little promo with Randy Orton again. (What, you don’t have TiVo? After all the pimping I’ve done for it? Bah – I’m done with you now. You are NOT ALLOWED to read my column anymore). Anyway… is it possible for someone to so totally dismiss a challenger in a pre-match build-up, without actually coming out and saying “You suck, you can’t win, so go ahead and challenge me”, in so many words? Did anyone watching that actually think Randy had one shot in a million of winning? No? Point made.

13. Timbaland: “The reason I asked the Divas to be in my video..” *skreech* Insert reality: “…is because I knew I could bang at least 2 of them without even trying. Have you seen the bodies on these sluts? Would any of you actually turn down the chance to nail Layla, given the chance? I mean, have you actually looked at me recently? You think I could get chicks like this if I wasn’t famous and rich? Get real.”

ECW on Sci Fi

1. So did Vince speed up the pace of his opening promo in order to cut down the intro time, or to prevent the crowd from starting up the “What?” chant?

2. Hey, did anybody notice that RVD and Snitsky actually put on a good match? Let me repeat that last part: Snitsky, good match. Oh sure, it ended in a BS DQ due to a chair shot – but repeat after me kids: This Isn’t The Old ECW. My biggest problem was that Snitsky didn’t continue the beatdown.

3. A promo just to advertise the fact that CM Punk is coming up next? Well, I think we can retire the phrase “doghouse” now for Eric’s boy.

4. Now that is a rib tape job on the part of young Mr. Punk. DDP is totally jealous. (Though I am annoyed that the rib angle is surely going to play a part in the Punk/Burke match at Judgement Day, putting an unnecessary crimp in what should be an excellent match.)

5. Alright – Elijah Burke has all the tools necessary to be an upper card mainstay, there is no doubt. But let’s be honest here – he over-acted the *shit* out of the end of his promo backstage after the Punk/Richards match. That whole “grit your teeth and spit out your opponent’s name” thing? That was bad Renaissance Faire-level acting there.

6. It’s been several weeks – and Ariel’s new look is just NOT doing it for me. Can they find a way to fit this outfit onto the ECW show again? Please?

7. Layla frizzed her hair again. Words cannot describe how disappointed I am.

8. Lashley: “I’m not gonna fall for that banana in the tailpipe trick”. (Yes, I know, I used this before – but if Lashley can’t change his promo style, why should I bother changing my jokes?)

9. They had several storylines to push in the main event, and I have to admit: they pushed all of them appropriately. Lashley of course continued his monster push, Cor Von got over as a legit threat, and Striker kept on his “whipping dog of the New Breed” role. Considering the natural handicaps of a 3-on-1 match, the storylines really progressed here in an incredibly logical matter.

See ya next week, folks.