Minisode #176 Family Bar-B-Q No More

by iggy



May 28, 2010

Sheriff Dickwell calls.
Blade was bumped.
Peter Gazer has been nabbed.
Kindergarten Surprise
MovieTrolla: The Chaperone
Dave Batista

#freakin' b.s. #he was a dick

Random Thoughts from the Office: May 28, 2010

Seriously that Over the Limit pay per view sucked. I just had to get that out of my system before I began.

So this week I come to ponder another column and I'm not (usually) short of topics, but the one that's gotten my attention this week the most is actually something that started as a joke on the WrestleCrap forums. You may have seen that RD as a bit of joke posted a thread saying he was going to pitch a Death of TNA book to Bryan Alvarez and most people thought it was quite amusing.

And Like I said, I don't find it fucking funny! Why? Cause I hear a variation of this shit every fucking day of every fucking week of every fucking month of every fucking year, and now I'm suppose to relax cause "dear old Mr. Reynolds" made it?! No, I won't! Why the fuck should humor anyone when I find this fucking stupid?!? Are you seriously telling me that I have to take this shit even when it's stupid?!

Sinister1 from the same thread

Most people as I said.

Now if you think I quoted that just to bash Sinister you're wrong because actually, I do like his passion for TNA. I definitely disagree with almost all of his opinions but hey, if we all had the same opinion the WrestleCrap forums would be boring (Minus the 7 Billion Batista photoshop threads). I highlighted Sinister's post in particular as an example of the extremes of wrestling opinion, which you see a lot on the TNA forum in particular, but it's not limited to TNA as these passions run the gamut of wrestling fans in all of us.

The first is the Hardcore Promotional Fan, note I didn't say "Mark" because you don't have to be a mark to fall into this category at all. These are the people who have chosen a clear side in the conflict of the Big Two [or Three or Four? etc.] and they will back their choice to the hilt. Woe betide ANYONE who bashes their promotion when this guy's around because there's going to be a big battle coming. Again, note I say "Battle" and not "Flame War". There's a lot of times where the defender does raise good points, but he lets himself down however by hardly accepting anything that casts their guys in a bad light and that's when the problems start. The more people argue the case, the more defensive the hardcore fan becomes and the whole thing degenerates until you can't actually remember what the fuck you were arguing about in the first place. There's nothing wrong with the hardcore fan; if you love your chosen promotion you have every right to show it. But a lot of times the fan lets himself down by the inability to take criticism of their promotion's product.

Group two are the Bashers, almost a sub-group of the Hardcore Fan. These are the guys who like nothing better than to point out how inferior the competition is to their chosen promotion. You see this all the time in the TNA forum, so much so the mods had to crack down. These are the kind of people who would turn down having sex with a porn star like Sophie Dee because they were a Jessie Jane fan or if they did take up the offer they'd jump on the 'net the first chance they got and spread the word that Ms. Dee was a terrible lay. Their major problem is almost the polar opposite of the hardcore fan; they can't see the good of the competition because they'd rather laugh at them for even daring to compete in the first place. And they will resort to flaming when challenged and once again more degeneration occurs.

Next up are the Fence Sitters who, to paraphrase the late Richard Jeni, are a bunch of Flip-flopping, Half In, Half Out, Half Assed, won't pick a promotion so they can bitch no matter what each side puts out, hypocrites. Actually most fence sitters aren't that far gone; these are the people who want that competition because they believe it will make both companies better in the long run. The problem comes when in their eyes the people they want to see become the competition (in this case TNA) make a stupid mistake that might cost them the shot at becoming that competition (Say.....moving to Monday nights before they're ready for it).

SOUND THE ALARM!

When that happens they're WORSE than the first two groups because they want so badly to see success from TNA that they become hyper sensitive to screw ups and when they occur it's straight to the nuclear option (FIRE RUSSO! FIRE HOGAN! FIRE BISCHOFF! FIRE SO CAL VAL IF IT'LL HELP!). What's frustrating is the fence sitter actually raises the best points of all because having not picked a side he has the benefit of objectivity. However he comes off so hyper sensitive to the mistakes of TNA that his praise of the good stuff TNA is doing is forgotten and they get lumped in with the bashers by the TNA fans. This is where you'll find me by the way.

There's also a fourth group, a smaller splinter group that has popped up recently. I call them the "Grumpy Old Schoolers". To use my earlier example, these are the people who would turn down sex from Sophie Dee AND Jesse Jane because Jenna Jameson did it a whole lot better before she met up with the Antichrist (AKA Tito Ortiz). Nothing in the current product excites them; guys like HHH and Jericho were better in the Attitude Era, the Band is a second rate nWo, wrestling would be a whole lot better if we had guys like Jake "The Snake" Roberts still involved...There's no point arguing with them because for the most part they're harmless and deep down they still like wrestling, it's just they liked the olden days better.

So how do we all co-exist? With each side presenting compelling arguments there has to be a point where we all agree to disagree. After all differing opinions is what makes the world fun; you get to think, you get to participate and ultimately a better time is had by all. And in the end that's what's important, not whether WWE, TNA, RoH or anyone else rules or sucks.






Except for Nathaniel and Nintendo John, they can rot in hell :P



Clarence "Showstealer" Mason

176 "The Mountain Of Youth": May 28, 2010

71 minutes

RD's beginning spiel is again interrupted by a phone call, as Sheriff "Dirty" Harry Dickwell (things have advanced with him to the point that he has a first name now. Progress!) continues his search for the elusive John Smith. Blade floats my theory that J.S. is in fact the Doctor, who was apparently played by Sir Alec at one point in time (and relative dimension(s) in space) in some random play or other. Of course, that's what he thinks he did...

SPEAKING OF drunken hallucinations, (:03) Blade unfortunately could not get on a flight to some launch party of Mickie James' album thanks to American airline superdickery and being "late"...or so he claims. He bemoans the fact that only 125 people showed up at the event and he missed his chance to interview the love of his life for the show. On the other hand, he may have not got the opportunity to do so (remember two weeks ago when they said they couldn't get anyone to be on a show called 'Wrestlecrap'?). And besides, 125 people? That's not a launch party, that's a World of Warcraft guild meeting. [124 guys trying to bang the one chick?....Actually you're right, it IS exactly like a WoW Guild Meeting - "Showstealer"] Even more Sad 'News': Peter Gazer has been "arrested" for the crime of actually attempting to be on a show for once and will thus no-show the Roast to be recorded this Saturday. I'd almost call him a myth if he didn't actually appear on the progrem those few times.

:18 There's something about RD going once more to Europe to get some beloved chocolate of my youth for his son. I couldn't really hear from Blade's random and frequent interruptions, a sign that he's drunk off his Stanley Cup yet again.

:23 Some actual Sad News here, Jim Ross had to close the last of his restaurants. The Co-Hosses call him and he is, of course, angry. But he has a right to be this time, so I guess it's different? They find out the real reason of the closures: he could never sleep because he would be up all night with a loaded shotgun waiting for Johnny Ace to show up, and this thus wrecked havoc with him being able to wake up and open the restaurant on time. Apparently he's never heard of the concept of assistant managers not nicknamed "Dr. Death".

Speaking of people with more free time on their hands, (blond) Trish Stratus is posing nude in a magazine. (Apart from working in a McDonald's Drive-Thru because...heavens knows.) RD spins her picture right round, like a record, baby. [Hey! I make the Mike Check-esque music references here - "Showstealer"] Meanwhile Randy Savage marries once more and Candice Michelle successfully delivers a baby girl. Blade mock sings for her.

The MovieTrolla works after a bygone age of collecting dust somewhere (:48). It seems WWE Films doesn't know when to quit. Their new upcoming "kid's action comedy", The Chaperone, has Triple H look after children somewhere in New Orleans. Well, I can see why it would be called a comedy if it involves Levesque trying to 'act'. There's no word yet on whether he'll do the chaperoning during Hurricane Katrina, which would make the film a must-see in my eyes.

In today's Question (:52) a 'Dave' (Meltzer?) lives in the same town as Blade's and doesn't get a good first impression of him. Perhaps he caught him at a bad time when he was drunk, which seems to be an around-the-clock thing. Blade doesn't help either to change the man's mind, somehow thinking he's secretly a jealous Dave Batista.

So Patrick Stewart has to show up to distract Blade from further going off in his drunken rage (:54). After saying a few random things he leaves now/teleports to his nearest GM/Pontiac dealership for a joyride. Unfortunately as a man of the 24th century, no one at Starfleet Academy seems to have told him not to talk on the phone while driving, so he wipes out almost immediately. But he manages to emergency teleport out in time just to taunt Blade. He's my kind of guy.

Your next Raw guest host...
:60 The recent WWE PPV that took place in Detroit has been riddled with numerous injuries to the company's talent, but even worse than that, it is saddled with a title that seemed to have been drawn from the 80s (Over The Limit). RD is so bored he looks at titles for MacGuyver episodes (which now has less episodes than the longest running episodic radio podcast in the history of the internets).

Send ol' Dave Batista off with Seventeen Syllables:
Batista is gone.
Who will fuck the Divas now?
Their division will.

Minisode #175 Batista Did a Barrel Roll

by iggy



May 14, 2010

Buzz Aldrin
Sheriff Dickwell is looking for John Smith.
Ted Arcidi trailer
Brooklyn Decker
A fan is banned.
Miz and Jericho team up.
Batista flips.

#three man team #bumpy knuckles

Random Thoughts from the Office: May 14, 2010

I should probably warn you guys off the bat that this one may contain some....okay a LOT of bad language. Just covering my ass.

Boy the wrestling world changes a lot when you take a break, and yet a lot of it has had opinions stated on it already. Plus I'm in mourning that My Penguins ran into a fucking Human Wall (Blah can feel free to commence gloating here) in the playoffs. [Hah! Hah I must contractually say.] And yet I do have something I want to bring up.

You see up until last night, I was wholly intending this column to be on the reasons why Mickie James should think twice about joining TNA and how the entire Knockouts division has gone to shit, but I'm forced to put that on the back-burner this week. Oh don't worry, I'm sure I'll find another reason to bitch about the Knockouts sooner or later and I'll bring it back from the trash bin.

So why the sudden change? What could change my thought process so much in the past 24 hours that I would bin a pretty much completed column and actually start from scratch?

Well if I could break kayfabe again, it's because recently I celebrated my 29th year on this earth (Or as I call it: One more year till I have to start lying about my age again) and as part of my presents, my brother bought me a wrestling set, not just any wrestling set. The TNA Cross The Line 3 Pack, with Victory Road, Hard Justice and No Surrender of last year. That was about two weeks ago but I never got around to actually start watching those DVD's, last night here at the office as I finished my column, finished my cases and decided to reward myself with some wrestling so I popped in and watched Victory Road.

And that's when I realized I'd have to change my column.

And believe it or not it's not because of That Fucking Match

No it's actually because while watching this show, it made me realize just what I hate so much about TNA right now. NOTHING MAKES SENSE. Even since the move to Monday night it's been all hotshot bullshit; the decision to put the belt on RVD (Which I actually liked, that episode of Impact was the best wrestling television program the Big 2 have put out this year), The nonsensical Sting Heel turn, that FUCKING STUPID Knocklockbox thing. All of it has been done for one reason and one reason only - the failure to gain an audience higher than they got on Thursday night, all of it failed, all of it polarized an audience and in the end it meant nothing as less than three months later TNA are right back where they began, on Thursday nights.

Compare this to Victory Road - for those who don't remember this was at the peak of the Main Event Mafia storyline and the night ended with the heels having seemingly all the power in TNA, as they held all the major titles. Say what you want about Vince Russo, but after watching Victory Road again I just can't get how anyone can say he's a bad writer. The show was classic Booking 101. Build your heels to a position of power and make it look like the babyfaces don't have a hope in hell of even keeping their jobs, let alone take down the heels. Result? It makes people want to see the babyfaces overcome the odds and claim the glory, and because this is wrestling and good must always triumph over evil in the end, that's exactly the way it would eventually happen and it created a buzz. That buzz led to Turning Point and Final Resolution, in my opinion the two best wrestling shows of the year from the Big 2, the shows that for the first time since the death of Eddie Guerrero made me proud to be a wrestling fan again... A pride that was shattered when Hogan and Bischoff came into TNA.

Let's compare Victory Road with TNA's last offering, Lockdown and the shows of recent weeks, The main angle was Lethal Lockdown, Team Hogan and Team Flair, with the stipulation that if Flair's team won Hogan would leave TNA. It was a stipulation they didn't even think highly enough to add till the night of the pay per view and of course the heels got destroyed.

AJ Styles, the World Heavyweight Champion, is constantly made to look weak by Abyss and barely escaped with his life at Destination X. He couldn't get a clean pinfall and was constantly beaten down by Abyss and/or pinned every time they were in a tag match. Now maybe I'm crazy but I always thought that your world heavyweight champion was supposed to be....I don't know.....THE FACE OF YOUR FUCKING COMPANY! And by extension if he looks weak, your brand looks weak.

Now before people start mentioning guys like Flair in the 80's there's a very significant difference. Flair didn't get pinned week after week like Styles did and the fact that they hotshotted the belt onto RVD the night after Lockdown just proves how bad they fucked up. One or two beatings is fine but if he's made to look weak week after week the heel champion loses his drawing power.

Which brings me to Abyss. Oh how I could started here (Blah what is the limit on swear words per column here?) [There is none. Swear away.] but he's in a position that basically no one wants him to be in, and the poll on who should be given a title shot is proof of that. Yet he's constantly pushed on TV and constantly forced down the fans throats whist a guy who the fans actually WANT to see, Desmond Wolfe, is treated like a second rate jobber and squashed in a three and a half minute title match as a huge Fuck You to anyone who DARED to vote for him on TNAWrestling.com.

Why? Because Abyss works well with Hogan, isn't that obvious?

So what must TNA do to try and repair its image? On Thursdays they have a chance to build something....IF Hogan and Bischoff just allow themselves to be shown as human, not the almighty saviors of TNA. If they show that they can be gotten to, whether it's by Styles or Wolfe or Anderson or even a Samoa Joe then TNA can start to regain some interest by building heels the fans will pay to see get beaten up. By putting aside ego and using their star power to give the "Rub" to the next generation of heels to match up with the top babyfaces they already have like RVD, Pope and to a lesser extent Jeff Hardy (potential incarceration not withstanding) Hogan and Bischoff have the opportunity to build the platform to do what they said they came into the company to do: Take TNA to the next level and provide real competition for the WWE.

But since that's never going to happen, I hope you're all going to enjoy another six months of Hogan-Flair-Abyss-Styles with the occasional RVD great match. It doesn't have to be this way and believe it or not the guy who can save them is the guy they're wanting to get rid of....Vince Russo.

Clarence "Showstealer" Mason

175 Flip-Flop: May 14, 2010

69 minutes

For some reason Blade uses his high quality headphones today while watching a wrestling DVD. He's drunk enough (as per his custom) to overlook SoCal Val's anime nose and get aroused by Buzz Aldrin appearing on RAW one of these days. Sadly that's the only good news we have. Due to work on the new Archive Disc and their 'Roast', the duo are going to be sporadic with work these next few weeks, and the Disc is affected enough to be delayed to June rather than late May. (The first of many?) I don't know though. Does a Roast really take two months to perform rather than two hours? [It does if they let Mike Check host - "Showstealer"] ESPECIALLY if they're just Roasting against themselves which is just sad (but also highly amusing).

:12 The only guest for the hour calls here, as a "Sheriff Dick Well" (who sounds like Frank in LA) calls with Blade's normal headphones looking for a John Smith. You mean THIS man? ("John Smith" is a common alias of his.) The man's call would set up an emergent plot arc...if we couldn't CLEARLY hear the sound alerts of his logging on and off RD's Skype account (which our friend fails to hide with haphazard editing).

:20 Pop Tart Popsters. Do they have Trivial Pursuit clues written on them too?

:24 Ted Arcidi is now mucking around in random low budget movies. I suppose there are worse ways to spend retirement...Unfortunately it seems the Celebrity Trip is now dead, as no one seems to want to appear on a show named "WrestleCrap". So let's waste time wondering what on Terra Stacy Carter and Kizarny were doing loitering around at a TNA taping, and having Stacy Keibler on a Maxim "Hottest Women" list. Also neither have heard of this thing called a 'mute button'. (If you're wondering, the #1 hottest woman (until the next time) is apparently Katy Perry.)

:46 Some random idiot was arrested for violent tendencies against WWE for Mickie James' future endeavoring, but was let go after his bail dropped by a factor of 100 when he was banned from any further WWE events, which according to the duo seems like a surefire boon to him. Bret Hart is now a proud grandfather, even if the child does have a strange name.

:53 Brian M (2) has his turn to make more bad puns, Patrick Stewart has his turn to shill Pontiac's "Deangelo DeNero Viero" some more, (:55) and the music drowns out Blade's nonsense. (:58) John Cena is all over Twitter about recording yet more music for September as apparently WWE has reversed its opinion on the site and is now actively encouraging its workers to use it. It could be worse, they could be like some random VP who was fired for sexual harassment...only to have his victim ALSO fired for fucking someone at work. Screw it, get to the haiku already.


An epileptic fish out of water of Seventeen Syllables of fury.
Flipping Batista.
Didn't get to see it live.
I flipped the channel.