Welcome, dearest and oddly fuzzy Rageans. This is The Rager, where I, Chris, serve as your indubitable gondolier to guide you through this murky, pseudo-shoot colored stream of Rage. Now if you will please step out of the boat and into the water, its time to get dirty…
Overlooked
Something that went unmentioned in The Rager last week was the reemergence of Sexual Chocolate himself, Mark Henry.
WWE has put me in a tough spot because I’m spent the past few years despising Henry and R-Truth and now I find myself actually enjoying them on-screen. This is mainly due to just being curious as to what they’re going to do next.
What I like about Henry is the ad-libbing he does, just the random trash talk he yells. Where was all this when he was a face? Is it really that hard for a character to have any depth as a face? I suppose so because the only we got out of face-Henry was the dumb crowd bit where he raised his hands and that section of the crowd got up and cheered. Instead we get what he’s built to be, a monster, and we got exactly that sending Big Show through the cage. Its hard for big guys like Henry, Show and Khali to be faces, especially in a PG world because you can only do the gentle giant bit for so long and nobody really could do it like Andre and that guy was barely understandable half the time. Also, if WWE values their giants as much as I think they do, they’re going to have to find a new one soon (Khali will NOT cut it) because Henry and Show aren’t getting any younger and honestly, I’m surprised they’ve lasted this long.
Repetition
Time for my old and grumpy side to come out for air…
Why have all these talented mid and lower-card guys and only use the same two for EVERY single US title match. We’ve seen Kofi and Mr. Ziggles square off nonstop for what seems like forever on Raw after we just had an even longer stint of these two not too long ago on Smackdown. There are guys that the fans are literally begging for but instead of giving them what they want, WEE gives us the same Miz and Alex Riley match we just saw.
The Elephant
Last week, as plenty others did, I dedicated my entire column on CM Punk’s glorious promo at the end of Raw as well as played devil’s advocate and debating within myself the various possibilities that it was scripted or real. Like I commented on that column later, it was discovered just after i finished writing that it was part of a scripted story and I felt completely dumb for just submitting the column.
However, I still think it was an amazing promo and that has boosted CM Punk to incredible heights BUT I really think WWE screwed this up by taping the next episode directly after. The debate following the end of that Raw was heated and it was all everyone talked about but what killed it was when news of the next Raw leaked and that kinda took some of the wind out of the sails. It was just the wrong week to pull that kind of move and I’m not saying the story is complete crap now but I think it definitely hurt and ruined the suspended beliefs of the fans.
Speaking of the pre-taped episode…
First off, I’m probably just over-analyzing but did Michael Cole really expect us to believe that McMahon’s flight from Stamford, CT to Vegas really only took a half hour? Just wanted to get that off my chest…again (aha Twitter reference, you’d understand that if you followed me)
But even though I had heard basically what was going to be said, there were a lot of things that I did like about the McMahon/Cena square off at the end. The main being that for the first time in forever, it looked and felt like that was Vince McMahon the man out in the ring instead of the Mr. McMahon character. Now, of course he reverted back to the character here and there but it seemed, even if it wasn’t real, as if he was truly giving us some honesty and Cena was no slouch either. Like Randy Orton said in his now-infamous radio interview, there’s no one that can touch Cena on the mic and I believe he was right-on this past Raw. I will admit that it seemed like Cena has phoned-in the past few promos but he really put everything into his character things time around.
HUGE RAGER ANNOUNCEMENT!
So since I briefly mentioned it a little while back, I’ve gotten many messages from various people wanting me to explain the true story behind the name “The Rager” and I haven’t answered because, well, its a tad lengthy and I don’t like repeating myself so I swear to everyone that I’m only half-ignoring them. But your wait is over, I’ve decided to tweet the full story tonight (Tuesday the 5th) probably around 9ish. I’ve decided to do it this way so that if you want to know and you’re not around the read it when I post, you can always come back and read at your own leisure. Be warned that it will take up quite a few messages sooo your feed might look kinda ridiculous for a bit. I figured this would be the easiest way to tell everyone and a great way to continue to cheaply plug my twitter page.
On a personal side note, everything with the new job is going very smoothly and I’m really glad things are starting to work out on that front. Now just to find a decent, cheap apartment and I’ll be all set. For all those interested, my song of the week is this.
I thought about doing a movie of the week but all the movies I watched in the past week were complete crap, especially From Dusk Till Dawn. I don’t know if any of you watched it when it came out years and years ago but the entire thing is about an hour and forty-five minutes and it stars the best one-trick-pony since Cary Grant (yeah, I said it) and that’s George Clooney. The majority of the movie is set up like a decent fugitive movie and then at the 1:15 mark, it turns into a terrible vampire horror film outta nowhere. So I guess, if anything, that’s my Anti-Movie of the Week.
My funny thing on the interweb-series-of-tubes-thingy of the week came from Pulse Wrestling’s own, Joel Leonard. Something doesn’t quite fit with the other, can you guess what’s wrong?
Well that’s about it for this week, feel free to comment below on anything discussed above or just talk about something you’re raging about, doesn’t even have to be wrestling related. I’m still doing the live tweet during Raw because I find it to be a lot of fun to interact with you guys as we all enjoy the show so be sure to follow me and join in on the fun. Don’t worry, I won’t cheaply link to my twitter page again (OR WILL I?!?!. Be sure to check out the great columns that will be coming your way later in the week that I’m very sure you will enjoy at least some of one of them or your money back.
Have a great week and keep your preacher dad away from vamps!
Chris
