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 bbb wrote:

BanjoJohn wrote:

What I hope will happen is that more of the archive becomes available on Netflix, like the golden age from the 80's, and everything from the 90's, and I hope they put out the NCW Archive? The alternative wrestling company that Macho Man and others who quit the WWF joined. That dominated over the WWF for many years, and it was eventually purchased by the WWE, so they could show the archive of those episodes and it would be excellent.

The whole back catalog is available on Peacock in the USA.

Peacock has it? I need to check that out, but is Peacock still free or do I have to pay? I kinda got interested in this whole thing because I was already paying for Netflix, so I could watch stuff again without having to pay more money, but I wasn't interested enough in paying for WWE streaming or other streaming services.

I have thought about what some of you have said and I'll try giving this new RAW a few more shots, I'll probably watch two more episodes before I decide if I want to keep watching, if they haven't been as boring as the first one that premiered on Netflix then it is worth trying to watch some more.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Watched feb 3rd RAW episode. Here's just some of my thoughts as I'm watching it, feel free to ignore/skip. I'll put it in a spoiler


I guess some of the stuff I saw, the in between match talking/story stuff I find hard to care about because its been 20 years since I've actually watched wrestling regularly. I don't know any of the new wrestlers, and the women (while athletic) seem very goofy and over-the-top that can sometimes work with men but seems odd with women wrestlers. 2 hours definitely was better than the 3 hour premier. But if I was editing/co-ordinating the show, without changing how many matches or segments that are actually in the show, I would have found a way to cut it down to 1 hour 30 minutes, do things like reduce down-time, cut the moments of silence/cheering shorter, make the matches a little shorter. I dunno how to describe it, it just feels like a lot of time is padded in between everything.

I think I'm going to see if there's a 2 hour episode from the raw archive that I can watch to see if the pacing feels different, something from like. 97 or 98 or 2000 ish.

Well, it's Cut Day in the WWE again. Wrestlers cut are:

Authors of Pain (Akam and Rezar)
Paul Ellering
Blair Davenport
Cedrtc Alexander
Sonya DeVille
Isla Dawn
Giovanni Vinci
The Good Brothers (Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows)

So Isla Dawn gets them a nice article on the BBC, and is cut within 6 weeks? Sounds about right,

time for G&A to show up in New Japan, and then AEW, and then end up back in WWE. as it goes

 StudentOfEtherium wrote:
time for G&A to show up in New Japan, and then AEW, and then end up back in WWE. as it goes

Anderson is currently out injured, so it may be a while for them to show up in New Japan.

However, expect Cedric Alexander to show up in AEW as word is that MVP, Bobby Lashley and Shelton Benjamin are already lobbying Tony Khan to have him join the Hurt Syndicate once his 90 day non-compete clause is up.

I chose August 9th, 1999 for an eppisode of the RAW Vault to watch, I guess it had a 2 hour timeslot on TV but ads and stuff that are cut out, left this episode as 98 minutes on netflix. I think the color commentators have more lively voices, and goodness I didn't know how much I missed jerry "the king" lawler as a commentator for wrestling. The rock comes out and starts speaking 4 minutes in, then thebig show and undertaker comes out and they start to fight at the 6 minute mark. 2 other guys come out and fight, then kane comes out and fights. oh wow yeah this was x-poc and kane era, I remember that. First match starts at 12 minutes in. Hardy boys interupt the match and attack christian (who is in a match against gangrel) Match ends at 15 minutes in, edge comes in to help christian. Lol a chef boyardee commercial with the rock. Jesse Ventura gives a little speech. HHH comes in with china. Lol sean michaels comes out. Second match starts at 34 minutes in. 47 minutes in the kane & x-poc match vs tag champs starts. x-pac and kane win, undertaker and the big show come out and start beating them up after the match. Third match starts around 58 minutes in, match over at 61 minutes in. Man some guy's getting his leg snapped in a folding chair after the match. Hmm Jericho interupts the rock's second speech. Fourth match starts around 78 minutes in, and the match ended in 2 minutes lol, someone got hit with a pet carrier through a table. fifth match starts 82 minutes in, big show vs the rock. Match ends in DQ because of outside interference heh. 91 minutes in the tripple threat match between HHH china and undertaker starts. Steve austin comes in, smashes HHH with a chain, puts china on HHH for the pin, and match ends right at the end of the show, undertaker is stunned because he had knocked HHH and china out of the ring. haha man that was a fun show.

Ok so i dunno, is it nostalgia glasses I have? is this show from 1999 better than modern RAW? 6 matches in 98 minutes, a few sneak attacks and whatnot, some story/drama but not a lot of down time. It feels like it was a better show back then.

It looks like AEW has released Malakai Black, Ricky Starks and Miro which is why they've been removed from their roster page. With the releases that WWE just made, they have room for any and all of them.

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Well, Ricky Starks showed up on NXT tonight, so that takes care of where he’s going.

Shame about Gallows&Anderson. Unusual to fire a wrestler while they are recuperating. But I guess they were informed earlier onthat this would happen. I enjoy listening to their podcast (apart from the crypto currency stuff and investing into horrible crap companies like Palantir. And apart from the ghost stuff. Leaving not much to listen to really, but I really enjoy the two just talking. They're funny as hedge.)

Bea Priestley will be fine. Off to Japan (or home to the UK for a bit before that?) and things will be lovely.

Isla Dawn surprised me. Shame. I liked that tag team.




Good to finally have the Starks/Black/Miro situation resolved. Starks will be happier in NXT and fits that thing perfectly, Black can go back to the main roster and will be a big deal there this time around. Miro ...not sure. Somehow I feel like he's almost happier being a streamer? Who knows.


NJPW New Beginning in Osaka

So does Sheamus and Miro having a few pints on Twitter signal the return of Rusev Day?

 Ghaz wrote:
So does Sheamus and Miro having a few pints on Twitter signal the return of Rusev Day?

This is bigger than Rusev Day. Return of the League of Nations confirmed! Somebody call Wade Barrett!!!1

I just checked it NWA Powerr still existed (which I enjoyed for the first 2 seasons or so and when they stopped being on youtube, or even before that, I stopped watching because there was so much weekly wrestling on). It does, but it streams on Twitter now (after their short-lived tv deal. Shame that stopped.). Yikes.

Oops, Elimination Chamber is coming up again! Time goes by faster and faster. Here are my picks:

Elimination Chamber Match: John Cena vs. CM Punk vs. Drew McIntyre vs. Logan Paul vs. Damian Priest vs. Seth “Freakin” Rollins. My money is on CM Punk. This may be absurd, but somehow I have a feeling we'll see Punk vs. Cody at Mania. I'm demaing at least 20min of everyone involved beating up on Paul.

Elimination Chamber Match: Liv Morgan vs. Bianca Belair vs. Alexa Bliss vs. Bayley vs. Naomi vs. Roxanne Perez. Alexa Bliss. First PPV match after her return, plus I think Ripley vs Bliss is an interesting pairing (if Bliss can keep up in the ring). Sure, Liv Morgan would be the more obvious option, and I personally would probably prefer her because she's so good, but I think everyone is a little tired of the Morgan-Ripley storyline. The fact that Roxanne Perez is being pushed like this is really impressive. I don't quite get it yet, but ok. Good for her.

Tag Match: Tiffany Stratton and Trish Stratus vs. Nia Jax and Candice LeRae. House show match that I'm sure will be better than we're all assuming right now. Nothing against Mrs. Stratus, but good thing Candice LaRae is there to carry her through the match if need be (because I wouldn't trust Nia Jax - as good as she is in her role - with that job ). I can't get on board with Stratton any more than I can with Maria May; I don't know why we're falling back on the diva stuff now. But ok.



Unsanctioned Match: Sami Zayn vs. Kevin Owens.This will - if the WWE bookers do it right - be the main event (or happen after the main event, because Unsanctioned and all). And it's going to be great.Zayn/Owens have been among my top favorites for a long, long time.They can do anything, they do everything (especially Owens, physically). It's going to be a great match. And Owens will win. Unless someone interferes in favor of Zayn....



As always, an extremely lean card, with great matches (as always, totally solid with storylines, except for the tag match) with a total of 1h of commercials in between.

I'm more of a MMA fan, but wrestling is fun to watch too, Undertaker will always be my favorite.

I don't know why, but ever since AEW started and I began to watch wrestling again, Cody has been the wrestler that sucks me back in.

Each time I dropped out of AEW due to some nonsense booking or a superhuman spotfest, my friend would tell me about some new feud Cody had going and I'd be straight back in.

I don't think he'll go down as a great like the Undertaker, but to a casual fan like me he is definitely Mr Right Now!

He is great, no doubt about it. A man who seems to know exactly what he does at any given second. And his career is just fascinating. For that alone he'll go down in history. He's an entirely different breed than the Undertaker who is THE Vince McMahon-WWE-bred timeless character dude (who also is well hard, a great wrestler and so on); Cody is more interesting in to how smart he is about things and how he left on his own accord at a point at which nobody did, especially not anybody in his spot, got himself attached to the hottest acts in wrestling, built something incredible and then returned to WWE on his own accord, with his own character, his own theme, his own name and pretty much instantly became the top babyface of the company. At a time at which being a popular, straight-laced (pretty much) babyface is extremely hard. I think his babyface character works so well because in his face you can always see that there's always that underlying heel which could come out at any moment, but it won't.

Just put Smackdown on.

This is the first time I’ll have seen an episode before the PPV.

Also? R-TRUTH FOREVER!

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
...
Also? R-TRUTH FOREVER!

He's really, really good. And he's been wrestling in WWE in 4 different decades (debuted in 1999)!
Also: the Lie Detector is a bad-ass move. Like the whirling candy. I like when people do twisty stuff.

Elimination Chamber

The constant "Oh my god the natural athleticism" really gets my goat when they talk about Paul.

He's 29 and a multi-millionaire who has lived an easy life of luxury for the last decade. I'm sure it was really hard for him to go to a gym and train with all that no work he does.

He is of course just there to get heat. And there’s no denying it works.

But c’mon. We genuinely loathe him. He’s not earned our ire in the old fashioned way.

Hence I say get rid, and bring back Enzo Amore for us to utterly despise on a cellular level.

The type of heat Logan Paul gets isn't heel heat, it isn't even X-Pac heat.

It's Tess Blanchard heat, and you should never want the stink of that near your promotion.

@Gert: That dude from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia in one season gained quite a bit of weight, was ripped in the next season, basically only to illustrate that this is totally possible as long as you're rich or have a company to pay for a celeb trainer and pre-prepared meals, 9 hours of sleep per day, have nothing else to do and no other real problems. Apparently. Logan Paul surely has a lot of discipline or at least drive to do all these things, but it's the very embodyment of the whole youtube-streamer-influencer stuff of the worst kind. He's constantly scamming people for money, he targets young people especially with crap products of which he must KNOW they're crap. And then tries to present himself to his audience as a nice, fun guy. He's bascially WWE's Saudi Arabia deal in human form and once more a reminder that companies will never act moral or immoral by they own definition. This is why law is required to keep companies from acting immoral and keep societies functioning.

Oh, as for Eliminiation Chamber - errr, I guess I'll watch it tomorrow night.

Come on guys!

I want to talk about...you know what!

It was a glorious Pod Shot.

In fact, Y’know wot?

Between “Dirty Dom” and that moment? We know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that WWE can produce absolutely superb heels. And in the case of “Dirty Dom”, deliberately not very good or competent heels.

Which only begs the question?

What. Purpose. Does. Logan. Paul. Serve.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
In fact, Y’know wot?

Between “Dirty Dom” and that moment? We know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that WWE can produce absolutely superb heels. And in the case of “Dirty Dom”, deliberately not very good or competent heels.

Which only begs the question?

What. Purpose. Does. Logan. Paul. Serve.

Celebrity involvement to try and expand your audience and get attention from outside media. Been a thing since the rock n wrestling connection and the very first wrestlemania, or Andy Kaufman and his feud versus Jerry Lawler. It's a carnie business, always has been, always will be.

Pretty much that, and...

...he has almost 25% of the Youtube subscribers that the WWE's account has.

Presumably *some* of those people like him/are interested in what he's doing?

I guess?

.) Andy Kaufman --> cool dude.
.) Cindy Lauper ---> cool lady.
.) Liberace --> great looking dude.
.) can't think of any other rock&wrestling people. Er..... Mr.T. ....well... he was special.

.) Logan Paul --> a pest.





Well, I watched it all now.

Apparently, AEW is coming to Prime.

Yus. Going by what I read is that people in the US, Canady and UK will be able to buy their PPVs via prime?


I've been critical of Timeless Toni Storm when it comes to in-ring things, but I think that with the return of that character they fixed that. And a talking segment - especially when pre-taped - is always a spectacle. That thing with Maria May on Dynamite was cheesy, but just horribly entertaining. Also good to see that they're doing something with Maria May characterwise, even though it's just "ladies be cray-zeee, amirite?".

I liked the Outrunners thing too, but I don't love the constant mentioning of them actually being from the 80s. I was more willing to go along with Kris Statlander being an alien than stuff like that. That should be entirely unmentioned. Don't change a thing about their presentation, just leave all the "this is from 1987!" stuff away. Everybody gets it. Nothing worse than an entertaining thing being pointed out by a superior authority, because then we're back to Michael Cole saying "he's so much fun to watch, guys!".

Anyway, as for that WWE PPV

Women's Elimination Chamber match was cool.


The Tag Match was very house show-y. Do WWE still have pre-shows? Normally this would have been a pre-show match. But okay. Can't get behind Tiffany Stratton. Nia Jax is unique and good in her role. I was impressed with Candice LeRae. First, I really liked how they wore matching outfits, and she's more 'poison pixie"-ish than ever before. I like that pairing too somehow.

Owens-Zayn Unsanctioned match was pretty crazy. Not quite as crazy as Cody-Owens, but that's perfectly okay with me, because that was horrible. I would have preferred for it to go on after the men's Elimination Chamber match, but okay. Promos for the build-up were great. I love Owens as a heel who technically is right, but goes too far. I wish he'd stuck with that thing of him going to heaven because he's a good person and the other guy isn't that he did for about 2 weeks a few years ago. That's one of my favourite lines now, because it's just so heelish and crazy.

Men's Elimination Chamber match was great.