I had something else written here, but because part of me cares about YOU the reader I deleted all of it. It’s on my live journal if you’re inclined to read some hilarity about Paris Hilton but right now we got bigger fish to fry daddy.
So let us move along to this wrestling stuff shall we. Following the events of One Night Stand, Vince McMahon went off the deep end on television. On RAW he was taking his anger out on anyone who had a title belt just because he lost his. Crazy Vince oddly enough is probably the best character the WWE has had in years. Then again when you’re in charge it only makes sense the best material is used for yourself. Vince honestly was doing some Emmy worthy acting as he ran the full gambit of emotions as he went off on people. From his git…git…GIT…GIT…GIT bit on RAW to being comatose on ECW to finally bringing poor Ashley to tears (well she tried to cry anyway, it’s a little hard with a plastic face) it was all great stuff.
It makes you wonder where this crazy Vince character is going. Will the McMahon family come back on tv to have the old man committed into a home? Whose life will become a living hell because of Vince and his mental instability? Its questions like this that you know will be asked as this all moves along. At One Night Stand, there was something about a slow moving cancer. There’s a rumor floating around that this angle is leading down to a path where Vince reveals he has cancer. I made the comment on the DVDVR Board that Vince has this thing where he has to out do his old man to the bitter end. I’m sure you’re expecting me to say something about Vince’s morals, but this is Vince we are talking about and quite frankly I’m tired of having to use the wheel of morality to find out what lesson we shall learn from all of this.
I had gotten up to this point on Sunday night and I figured I might as well wait till the draft is over. I was gonna do a little write up on who got picked, but a hundred other people on the internet probably did that anyway and who cares about a silly little thing like a roster split when God has handed me an angle for the ages.
It wasn't like it was friggin' Cobain! It was just a little suicidal gesture, that's all
Well at the moment we don’t know if this was suicide or if someone wanted to kill him. What I do know is this. The WWE had the balls to give us the ending David Chase and The Soprano’s didn’t. When Vince showed up being all subdued I figured he was on some drug for the night. I was hoping we’d see a segment with his family where they said they did it for his own good, but that was not to be. It was interesting seeing Vince in a walking coma. I’m sure we’ve all have had days like that thanks to some pill we were taking. Last week with Vince off his rocker you didn’t know what to expect. Who would he snap at next? When the story is advanced further I’m sure we’ll get the sub plot that Linda got him on something and poor Vince was too drugged up to notice what was going on around him. Before he made it to the limo I figured he would snap at those two guys sitting by the door because it looked like they were toking up.
There are so many ways that one could go with this angle. The big one is obviously a new version of who ran over Stone Cold. Replace it with Who Blew up Vince. Vince obviously has a lot of enemies so the list will be a long one. You heard Dusty and others talking about all the people he put out of business. There are plenty of people who have wanted Vince dead for years so like I said this could be a fun summer.
You would think I would be all morally outraged at this. Honestly I’m not outraged at all from this. Sure I could be behind my bully pulpit right now railing against Vince for twisting the knife a little deeper into the corpse of pro wrestling, but I honestly I don’t care. I thought at the most we would see Vince go back into the office and then hear a pop and someone run in and scream and that would be the end of the show. When he got into the limo I was thinking to myself “it be funny if it blew up” and then BOOOM. I always knew I have psychic tendencies, but I have to admit that was pretty damn cool. It’s funny how people are taking sides on this angle. You’re either in the boat that “IT’S THE GREATEST THING EVER” or “JESUS CHRIST IS THIS WHAT WRESTLING IS COMING TO”.
Me personally I’m in a little bit of column A and column B. On the one hand I’m smart enough to realize that this might make some interesting summer television. But on the other…they faked a death. Of course I believed when Brian Pillman died it was all an angle for him to get the upper hand on Goldust since they were in the middle of this huge feud when he died. When Owen Hart died, I saw the pics from ringside and thought “Oh they could have easily dropped a dummy from the rafters and switch it around when no one was looking”. Finally when Eddie Guerrero died, with the way they were using his death I figured Eddie had to be alive. Eddie’s taking a long vacation right now and when he comes back he’s gonna have the biggest grin on his face” Hey holmes remember when they found me dead…well I LIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIED”
On a side note it’s scary how much Hector Guerrero looks like Eddie. And seeing him talk on Impact last night I was like “I knew it…Eddie did fake his death”. If you didn’t see Impact, watch it on Saturday and you’ll see what I mean.
But as for this whole Vince thing, I found it funny how many people IM’ed me last Monday night asking if it was for real. Add to that the fact the WWE doing some old school kayfabing and I would venture to guess there probably is a good percentage of the crowd who honestly believe Vince dun got blowed up. It’s also funny how people are coming out of the wood work to say how reprehensive this whole thing is. Odds are I would have been like that, but now it’s like who gives a shit.
The funniest thing at least to me is all the news reports about how the WWE is banking on this to get ratings up to get USA off their back. While watching RAW earlier, Phantom Classic turned to me and said “you know the problem is they talk to much”. I responded well what would expect them to have on a wrestling show? He said maybe wrestling.
Wrestling on a wrestling show? Oh that’s a good one. I mean if wrestling by itself was the draw then Vince’s limo wouldn’t have been blown up. I know a few of you are gonna be like “Umm Phantom aren’t you the one who always says there should be more wrestling”.
Yes there should be more wrestling. But when the best you have is Bobby Lashley who should be doing voice over work for Disney on Mickey Mouse cartoons and a poorly thrown together 5 man match then I can totally understand why Vince’s limo got blown up. But it doesn’t matter what the WWE does because they lack a thing called commitment. Instead of sticking with something if it doesn’t work they say fuck it and end it early.
The reports coming from The Observer and elsewhere are if the ratings do not improve then they will simply rush through the angle and end it quickly. See this is why the WWE will never get it. If anyone from the WWE is reading this, you have my contact information. I’ll gladly tell you in great detail what is wrong with the programs and how to fix it. It will cost you, but I can do it.
While watching ECW I saw a big problem right off the bat.
STOP SHOWING THE FUCKING FOOTAGE OF THE LIMO. WE GET THE POINT. IT WAS A BAD FIRE.
There should have been a body in the car, but there wasn’t. So now we the viewer have to suffer through a 3 hour fucking memorial service next week with Princess Stephanie in her shrill voice vowing revenge. I’ve seen enough soap opera’s to know how this is going to end. There’s so many ways they could have gone with this but in the end the WWE will go with something retarded like they always do because they lack the commitment to go all out in an angle.
On Days of Our Lives you think Stefano Dimira would come back after a couple of weeks after setting up a huge bomb or something to frame John Black or one of The Brady’s? No he would be long gone and milk it for all it’s worth. That’s what should be done here but like I said the WWE doesn’t have the commitment to angle like that. It’s said this is going to be a Who show JR type deal. Well to do a cliffhanger like that and then to end it a few weeks later would be stupid to say the least.
So far the suspects have been pretty laughable to say the least. Mick Foley, Bobby Lashley, Cryme Tyme, The Coach, Paul London, and John Cena.
The Limo Driver is in there to and well just look at the guy.
Now if this “federal investigator” was any kind of real cop, they would be grilling the limo driver. The story that he went to go make a call is has so many holes in it that’s practically Swiss cheese. I mean it’s obvious who ever did this paid him to leave the Limo. God knows he probably could have used the money because of that hideous rug on his head.
See at least I see all the humor in this. As I mentioned in the column earlier a lot of people have come out of the wood work to denounce this angle. Wade Keller from the PW Torch wrote a write up about how disgusted he was with this whole thing while watching RAW.
http://www.pwtorch.com/artman/publish/article_20567.shtml
It’s a pretty good write up and I know it echoes the feelings of many people including me. But as I said I see the humor in this. Yes it’s disgusting that they had Vickie Guerrero mourn the fake death of Vince, but Vickie’s been going along with a lot of stuff in the WWE BECAUSE SHE HAS THREE KIDS TO RAISE. It’s funny how personal morals and the need to survive cancel each other out. Oh sure one can be offended by all this, but if you happened to be employed by the WWE what are you gonna do? Raise your voice in decent and end up in the doghouse? We all know how petty people in the WWE are. It’s because of the pettiness and personal jealousy that Paul Heyman is at home collecting a check to do nothing because Stephanie and others would rather have him gone then have him working with them.
I’m sure everyone Wade mentions as going along with this have deep problems with this whole thing. But in the end they all have bills to pay and aren’t about to get black balled just because something that Vince thinks is great is stupid.
If you really want to blame someone, blame that chick from USA Bonnie Hammer. According to all the reports she’s the one on the WWE’s case to boost ratings. Even though the WWE’s ratings are no where near where they were back in the good old days of the Monday Night Wars, they still are one of the top rated shows on cable and I’m pretty sure Monday Night RAW dwarfs pretty much all the other stuff on USA (well except for Monk and the SVU reruns). But it’s not good enough for her and the people at NBC. Everything needs to be BIGGER so we’re getting that Jackass stuff during summer because of her.
The funny thing is if the WWE didn’t drive away all the old WCW fans back in 2001 by completely burying WCW after they bought it they wouldn’t be in this situation. There’s at least two full ratings points worth of people out there who do not watch anymore. You would think TNA could have cashed in on that void in the market but TNA shoots itself in the foot and takes five steps back every time it makes a good call.
I ordered TNA Slammeversery the other night and I thought there were a few good stand out matches. Robert Roode vs. Eric Young was by far the match of the night. Eric Young can make some serious money for TNA so they really need to start pushing this guy and not just as the goofy paranoid comic relief. Jersey All Pro fans rejoiced as their favorite son Jay Lethal won the X Division title. Black Machismo is a gimmick that they could print money with. He’s by far one of the most over guys on the show so it’s great that they finally gave him the title (of course if you read the spoilers for Impact you can feel my distain as I’m typing this).
Phantom Classic and I also watched for one reason and one reason only and that’s Mr. Bob Backlund. We were there the night he lost to Nash at the Garden (there really were 29,000 that night and The Garden doesn’t even hold that many people) so we’ve seen the evolution of Bob Backlund’s decent into madness. He took on Alex Shelley who is by far one of my favorite wrestlers in TNA. I was demanding a 15 minutes from them…we got 5 but it was five good minutes. Backlund was in great shape and if TNA were smart they better give him a good run. They had Nash turn on Lethal and attack Backlund along with Sabin and Shelley so it looks like Bobby is gonna get the rematch he was screwed out of in 1994-95.
This could be pretty big for TNA as there are a lot of old school fans who will tune in just for Bob Backlund. Bob deserves a good last run and a match building to him getting revenge against Nash for the eight second loss would be great.
Of course once again if you read the Impact spoilers you know TNA doesn’t have a damn clue about good matches. What the hell are they thinking with that main event at Victory Road? Just because Russo is there doesn’t mean you have to rehash every since match he ever put together.
See TNA came to their senses and finally put the gold on Kurt Angle. Angle hasn’t died yet so I guess that was seen as a sign that he was ready to be World champion again. But before this Sunday night at the PPV, those were a rough nine months. Kurt Angle can give Bob Backlund a run for his money when it comes to being insane. Kurt’s still trying to do a MMA match and he claimed in an recent interview that he knows a technique that can make Chuck Liddel and Tito Ortiz tap out that they have no idea about.
Well if there’s one good thing that happened at this PPV it’s that my fear of Jeff Jarrett becoming World Champion did not come to pass. They aired a real tear jerker before the King of the Mountain match with Jeff talking about his wife’s death. I had this fear that Jarrett was going to use this as a sympathy angle to come back and win the gold. Well the people of Nashville bought it hook line and sinker with everyone chanting JARRETT, JARRETT and people crying in the crowd. Right now it’s the whole “I’m not ready to come back deal”. But when he does come back rest assured he’ll be winning the gold. Jarrett is the Jerry Lawler of TNA and TNA is Memphis and in TNA Jarrett goes over EVERYBODY.
Ah well I think I’m done for this week. This column took over a week to finish so I can’t be accused of just writing something with out thinking about it. It’s like I said, I could be playing the moral card with Vince by why bother. I have high enough blood pressure as it is, I don’t need to blow a gasket over something this dumb.
On a side note, I have jumped into the online radio show world full time as I am now a new host on The Wrestling Burnout. I host the show under my shoot name of Joe Davis along with Jay “The Thriller” Miller. Jay can be a real prick, but he’s a cool guy and we have a pretty good thing going here. In the last two weeks I got to interview Dr. Death Steve Williams and Tank Tolland. On Wednesday June 20th the guest will be none other than Luscious Johnny Valliant. It’s gonna be a good show and it starts at 8PM Eastern on The Wrestling Burnout
Also I promised a guy I know that I’d post a link to this book a friend of his wrote. whacked Out wrestling: Memorial - A tale of Headlocks, Hurricanranas, and High School (Paperback) by Thomas Greene
My copy of the book had better be in the mail.
On that note I am done for this week. I’m sure this Vince McMahon angle we take more twists and turns. One rumor has it that it will all lead to The Great American Bash. It’s funny 20 years ago we had War Games. 10 years ago we had the N.W.O. Now we have who blew up the limo. It’s amazing how things change.
Well until next time, remember someone has to give you this information and it DAMN well has to be me.
You can click here to send me any and all feedback at phantomlordnyc@yahoo.com or leave me some feedback in my Live Journal
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