Wrestling Entertainment - we know, you don't have to tell us!

[Audax]

Recorded this TNA and watched a bit. This is more like it for me.

I always liked how HH would say "all the little Hulksters"!

[DE.]

I actually think Hulk has proven a very good authority figure. The aura he has is similar to that of HHH as kayfabe COO in WWE. Hulk is more entertaining in that role than in his final hulkamania run 10yrs ago imo.

Yeah, he's not old enough yet to be without any physical power, but you wouldn't want to see him wrestle any more. He's always been charismatic on the mic, and Sting bounces well off him in a similar kind of role, but with a bit more active participation. Sting still looks decent in the ring though so it's fine.

Recorded this TNA and watched a bit. This is more like it for me.

I always liked how HH would say "all the little Hulksters"!

I can't recommend TNA enough at the moment. It's light-years ahead of WWE in terms of entertainment for me. I genuinely think if more people knew about TNA it would be a proper competitor. Hopefully going on the road will give them the boost they need.

[Mike E]

It's little things like allowing swears occasionally. And having watched 2 episodes I'm already a fan of aj styles.

[Tom]

Never been able to get into TNA at all

[DE.]

When was the last time you watched it?

[DE.]

Looks like WM was pretty disappointing. Taker/Punk looked good, HHH/Lesnar decent. The rest...not so much. The ending of Cena/Rock looks cringeworthy, and Cena yelling "THE CHAMP IS HERE" to end the biggest PPV in 2013 the same way WWE ended most PPVs in 2007 is just sad.

About time people turned away from WWE and started watching the alternative - TNA. Then maybe Vince would get the kick up the arse required to shake the company out of its decline.

[Tom]

It was really bad the undercard was fine but unspectacular and the main events were shocking outside of taker punk

HHH Brock was abysmal and te crowd couldn't care less about it, you could see it was hurting HHH

[Mike E]

Enjoyed WM in terms of the atmosphere in the pub haha. Managed to get into all the matches to an extent (so it wasn't the car crash expected, more scraping a bollard). Bullshit ending though. I wouldn't have minded if they just hadn't shook hands. It's been a personal feud so the loser should've been @#/? off!

[Tom]

If you didn't enjoy this weeks raw then I would suggest pro wrestling isn't for you

Literally the best wrestling show in years the crowd made it even better

No no no its FAN...DAAAAN....GOOOO!

[bellamy11]

I can't remember the last time I watched a full wrestling event - two or three years ago I imagine. So I was very disappointed that no part of this year's WM was notably surprising or exciting to me. What has happened to the ability to deliver the unexpected?

The clusterf*ck of unsuccessful finishers in end-sequences of main events is beyond a joke. I get that they're trying to put across that people have more extraordinary desire (or something along those lines) at WM, but it's just farcical. Nobody even remotely believes in them any more.

The one guy who has impressed me whenever I've seen him is CM Punk. He gets put in an interesting (if distasteful) angle with the Undertaker and then they shove them on third to last. Bang goes ANY doubt as to how it will end. Not only that, but it killed the crowd for the rest of the event - where was the "pissbreak" match to allow them to switch off for 15 minutes?

There were 10 of us in the room watching this and I lost count of the times when we started talking about how good events like WM17 were in comparison. I know there's an element of nostalgia involved, but that involved workers in their primes, at the height of their popularities, working good matches.

From my perspective, there is a real need to dial things back. Finishers should finish matches. They've become devalued to the point of acting as transitions. I struggle to see how anyone can find that entertaining.

The point of professional wrestling isn't to make people think that it's "real" (which is the criticism that people who don't like it level at it) - it's to surprise and entertain. Without the former, they're onto a loser with the latter.

[DE.]

If you didn't enjoy this weeks raw then I would suggest pro wrestling isn't for you

Literally the best wrestling show in years the crowd made it even better

No no no its FAN...DAAAAN....GOOOO!

Nonsense. Replace that crowd with a normal Raw crowd and you have a very standard show. What about this Raw - crowd aside - was so amazing or different? The crowd made this show, the writing didn't, and next week it simply won't be the same. Dolph cashing in was the only notable high point but now that's done, he'll move into a standard fairly boring feud of some sort.

I can't remember the last time I watched a full wrestling event - two or three years ago I imagine. So I was very disappointed that no part of this year's WM was notably surprising or exciting to me. What has happened to the ability to deliver the unexpected?

The clusterf*ck of unsuccessful finishers in end-sequences of main events is beyond a joke. I get that they're trying to put across that people have more extraordinary desire (or something along those lines) at WM, but it's just farcical. Nobody even remotely believes in them any more.

The one guy who has impressed me whenever I've seen him is CM Punk. He gets put in an interesting (if distasteful) angle with the Undertaker and then they shove them on third to last. Bang goes ANY doubt as to how it will end. Not only that, but it killed the crowd for the rest of the event - where was the "pissbreak" match to allow them to switch off for 15 minutes?

There were 10 of us in the room watching this and I lost count of the times when we started talking about how good events like WM17 were in comparison. I know there's an element of nostalgia involved, but that involved workers in their primes, at the height of their popularities, working good matches.

From my perspective, there is a real need to dial things back. Finishers should finish matches. They've become devalued to the point of acting as transitions. I struggle to see how anyone can find that entertaining.

The point of professional wrestling isn't to make people think that it's "real" (which is the criticism that people who don't like it level at it) - it's to surprise and entertain. Without the former, they're onto a loser with the latter.

Welcome to the modern WWE. They haven't created a star since John Cena and aren't trying to. The characters are mostly boring and the matches are usually pretty lacklustre too.

Edited April 10, 2013 by DE.

[Mike E]

The crowd was literally awesome Spent the last couple of days humming Faaaaaandaaaaaangoooooooo's theme

Good to see the Brits there with 'Wade Barrett's Barmy Army' haha

[DE.]

I think the Brits were behind a number of the chants on Raw! Cole even mentioned expecting to hear very similar in London in a couple of weeks, so I guess WWE knew that as well.

[Mike E]

[CapeTownRover]

Bring back Goldberg

[Nelsta]

really got back into wwe latley due to the shield, best thing to happen on wwe for a while.

Really hoping they get a decent run, the fact that they've had taker putting them over on raw/smackdown shows they have faith in them.

[Mike E]

Convinced one of the Shield members will beat Taker for the streak at WM30 now haha. Also have to say Cody/Randy was a very good match last night.

Wonder if there's any truth to the Punk vs Chael Sonnen rumours at wm30? Maybe back-up if Austin isn't able or something?

[old darwen blue]

It's all fixed

[Tom]

I went to a pcw show last week and it was really superb

They've just announced Kevin steen is coming back in November, can't recommended going strongly enough

[DE.]

Any chance of doing a short review Tom? I'd be interested to know how the event worked, what the matches were like, etc...

Btw guys, sorry to be the bearer of bad news... but turns out Matt Morgan hates us.

[Tom]

I wrote this on this night so ill just paste it here:

Holy @#/? balls PCW was amazing first of all we had just about the best seats in the house front and centre which made the whole thing an experience as we were close to being landed on a few times

When we entered there was Dibiase, Steen, Golddust, Gargano and Steen selling merch and photos and it almost made me a little sad, Virgil is mocked online but in reality the million dollar man didnt seem much better he seemed almost desperate really

The first match up was Noam Dar Vs Gargano, brilliant back and forth match, Gargano took out my seat with a suicide dive after a few minutes, Dar won with a submission

Then Dave Rayne came out and called out Golddust, he told him he has never been as over as his brothers moustache (cue codys moustache chants) nice promo from both of them which ended with Golddust hitting his finisher

Next up was Tommy Dreamer Vs T-bone, it started off mainly in ring and pretty basic but soon devolved into dreamer territory, beer shots, chair shots and fighting in the crowd, Tommy hit his usual spots but ended up being put through a table in the corner for the win for T-Bone

Then was a 'million dollar dream' match between Dave Mastiff with his manager Gillian something or other and Mad Man Manson with Ted Dibiase. Manson was hilarious throughout and the match had some great comedy spots, the end came when he locked on the million dollar dream and Mastiffs manager interfered, obviously then Ted locked on a MDD of his own. Great fun but again Ted was kind of a sad sight, he was wearing a WWE12 tracksuit and didn't look too comfy getting about

The first main event was Steen vs Kris Travis. This is by far the best match I have ever seen live, it was insane and the crowd was lapping it up, at one point Steen caught Travis flying to the outside then hit an absolutely brutal powerbomb onto the apron, Travis hit a perfect reverse hurricanrana at one point which the crowd popped huge for, the end came when steen clotheslined Travis off the apron who sold it like a champ turning inside out then steen rolled him into the ring and hit a package piledriver (my favourite move of all time)

After the match Steen got on the mic and put Travis over big and said he's going to make sure his name gets out there and then got emotional as he said its the first time he's travelled abroad since his kid was born and dedicated the match to his mate who helped him out a lot when getting started and who died last week.

After the interval was the 30 man rumble, it was good but didnt quite live up the the first half, Dave Rayne looked legitimately Shook after a nasty landing on a German early on, there was a comedy spot that started out awkward when some professor came and put helmets on people and then controlled them, queue Harlem shake music to groans from the crowd but it then cut out and Fandangos theme played, corny as hell but the crowd and all the wrestlers joined in. We got a ref fight in the middle of it and a returning Lionheart won after fending off a late return from Dave Rayne

Really really fun night overall with the crowd into it throughout, quite a few instances of Fandangoing as you would expect

http://imgur.com/3EsuBcq

http://imgur.com/YiHUydx

http://imgur.com/7sYkVLf

http://imgur.com/GQxFMsI

Edited May 5, 2013 by Tom M

[DE.]

Cheers Tom, it looks decent! I might have to give them a look at some point, though I'm not sure how close they come to these parts of the country. I'm debating going to see TNA when they come over in January, but I'm really irritated with how they're handling their product right now so I might not bother.

As an aside, how bad is Raw right now? 3 hours of some of the worst television you're likely to see anywhere. We're truly back in 1994 when the WWF was awful and WCW wasn't big enough to challenge for supremacy. Except this time there's no Ted Turner and no TNT to push the opposition to the next level

[Audax]

Mick McManus, popular wrestler, passed away at 93 years old

[Guest Norbert]

93? Good age. Not like many who seem to have heart attacks and cancer from all the 'roids (or fry ups if we're talking about the British wrestling) and other such nonsense.

[gumboots]

Huge part of my childhood was the wrestling at teatime after the football results on Saturdays. Used to hate McManus. My Nanna was a huge fan and would always talk about it when we went to her house after tea every Saturday night.