Metahead’s Riff: Lazy And Clueless (WWE’s MSG Special, TNA’s Bound For Glory) plus Nakamura vs Okada

Columns, Top Story

No, the title isn’t a description of me, but rather the two words that came to mind when thinking about past week-end’s two shows. Lazy for WWE’s MSG Network special who mostly presented rehashes of known stuff, and logic be damned in some case, clueless for TNA’s Bound For Glory, because, well, they are. Clueless I mean.

But first things first. Was the MSG show a spectacularly bad one? No. It felt like a slightly toned down version of RAW, a glorified house show if you will, which it was, despite the hype. Amazingly, Orton was very over with the MSG crowd, don’t ask me why, he just was, which added something to the Ziggler/Orton vs Sheamus/Rusev opener. So, it was fun. But, let’s face it, how many times have we seen these guys fighting with each-other now? Making tag teams out of them doesn’t really hide the fact those two “feuds” are as stale as last month’s bread.

Same observation as above for Stardust vs Neville, without the crowd heat.

So team PCB were teaming up again, even if that didn’t work out well on several occasions already and Paige basically told everyone else to piss off. Alrighty then. Not bad, but everyone is tired of those endless team vs team matches, and weren’t we done with them anyway? Apparently not. After Charlotte and Becky abandoned her, Paige ranted on the mic, saying she would NEVER do that to her teammates, conveniently forgetting she already did. Stupid doesn’t even begin to describe this particular angle. Bottom line, wanna see the real Divas Revolution at work? Watch Bayley vs Sasha Banks on Wednesday.

Chris Jericho reminded everyone this was his 25th anniversary as a pro wrestler. Well, congratulations Chris. And I really mean that, by the way, I’m not always sarcastic. Good chemistry between Jericho and Owens and they easily got the by now almost comatose crowd back into the spirit of things. Good back and forth match, but too short for my taste. And is the rake to the eyes-roll up combo gonna be Owens finish now? What is WWE trying to say here, a heel champion can’t have a convincing finish? Luckily, Owens reminded everyone why he’s such an effective heel by yelling “HAPPY ANNIVERSARY” at Jericho. Gold.

It is interesting to note that The New Day got a much bigger crowd reaction than the Dudley’s. As for the match itself, yes it was fun, but, how many more of the same matches WWE? Oh yeah one more at Hell in a Cell and several more in between and after the final match at the PPV we’ll just continue anyway. So silly of me to forget that.

The next match is one of those occasions that I really feel like I’m not in sync with everyone else. When I took my usual trip around the internet to get a feel about what the general sentiments were on the show, almost everybody was saying the Brock/Big Show thing was great, exactly what it should be and whatnot. I honestly don’t get it. What’s so great at seeing The Big Show dominate for about four minutes, looking like a threat before being destroyed by a couple of suplexes and an F5? What is it so great that the Big Show, of all people, got to look dominant against the Beast? Not even the Undertaker was allowed that when you think about it, so why the Big Show? It makes no sense and is counter-productive in the long run. Message is what exactly, nobody can handle Lesnar except The Big Show for four minutes? Come on guys. I really wish people would open their eyes on this whole part-timer thing and see it for what it really is: counter-productive. Sure, Lesnar is a good wrestler, but what has he really contributed to the general product since he’s back? And yet everybody will still cheer and yell “that’s great!!!” whenever he destroys someone in the ring. Take this whole show for example. This match was, in a way, the reason for this show to exist. WWE’s way of saying, fans aren’t happy? Let’s throw 5 minutes of Lesnar at them so they’ll be happy again for awhile. And, apparently, it works. I sometimes think Swayze is right, we really are all stupid.

Not much more I can add here, main event was what everybody expected, Cena won, Kane interfered and it wasn’t anything we didn’t see before.

 

Now, at least WWE had the excuse their show was a glorified house show. TNA’s Bound For Glory was announced as the most important event of the year, TNA’s second (and last) PPV. Knowing that, first question I got to ask is: WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT???

The opening X-Division match was at least good. Too bad the X-Division isn’t very high on TNA’s list of priorities. The appearance of Gregory was met with indifference from the crowd. Can’t say I blame them. Besides Helms looked out of shape, so I’m not sure where they’re going with this. Not sure I wanna know either now that I think about it.

The gauntlet was atrocious. I mean WCW WarGames Match 1998 kind of bad. Not one redeeming quality to be found in this one, even good wrestlers like Eli Drake looked bad. Booking was an absolute joke, the high point of which was everybody stopping to do a dance move that isn’t over in the slightest. If TNA doesn’t treat these Number One Contender matches seriously, why should anyone care about said Number One Contender? Oh and Tyrus won. Nobody cared.

For a moment, it looked like TNA was trying to do a Triple H/Batista angle, with ECIII in the role of Triple H and the former Brodus Clay in the role of Batista. For the record I had nightmares last night of an hybrid Batistosaurus pursuing me…

Tag team Championship match was fine, I guess, but it didn’t feel like anything special, despite one of the best teams in the world being in there. In his excellent review, BD said this wasn’t good enough to be on TNA’s penultimate show of the year. I disagree because I have the sinking feeling this is about the best TNA can offer us nowadays.

Bobby Roode vs Lashley was just a match that happened without much reason, for a worthless title nobody cares about. And people wonder why this felt boring.

Awesome Kong vs Gail Kim was the perfect example of promotions needing to just let a match be a match. The story between those two was there, the history was there, the heat was there, why the hell do you need all that extra bullshit then??? Totally bonkers I tell you.

I’m so numb by now  I can’t even put Kurt Angle vs Eric Young into words. Let’s just say that Kurt Angle ended up winning a match that was called off by a doctor around ten minutes before. Confused? Join the club. What’s really mind-blowing about this, is this might have been the last high-profile Kurt Angle match for this company. I’m speechless.

You know what? Despite their obvious shortcomings and limitations, at least Galloway and ECIII are working their asses off for the company. And then TNA went and put the title on lazy, unconcerned, just looking for his next pay-check Matt Hardy for some reason. This company really is doomed.

 

It’s a sad state of affair when TNA’s biggest show of the year felt more like an house show, and a bad one at that, than WWE’s MSG special did. Harsh, but there it is. For those of you who haven’t seen any of those shows, skip them both, you won’t regret it. Watch Takeover this Wednesday instead, or watch NJPW’s King of Pro Wrestling next Monday. It’s with English commentary this time so you have no excuses.

 

Match of the Week: I needed some good wrestling to wash all the above away, so why not go with the excellent Nakamura vs Okada from this year’s G1 Climax? Enjoy!

 

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x325vaw

 

That’s all from me this week, see you all later and have fun!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I've been following wrestling for almost 30 years now, and the metal scene for even longer. And let's just say that all that head-banging has left me with some weird ideas that i will share with you from time to time. Aren't you glad?