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[DE.]

I still watch Raw and Smackdown but it's mostly out of habit. Raw is a genuinely awful show at the moment, for the most part, whilst Smackdown is better but is also helped by being shorter. Needing to fill three hours does Raw no favours.

I stopped watching NXT a while ago - something just isn't the same about it since they moved onto network TV. The Takeovers are still decent but not what they used to be either.

I really enjoy AEW, by far the most creative and varied product out there. Not having to do a PPV every month is a massive benefit to storyline pacing. Not everything they do is great - truthfully some of it is really bad - but by and large I find the show consistently interesting and well paced. Their main weakness is their women's division, which has been sadly neglected since day one. 

I don't watch any other promotion so can't really comment on Impact, NJPW, etc. I do miss NWA Powerrr on Tuesdays though. 

[Blue blood]

19 hours ago, DE. said:

I stopped watching NXT a while ago - something just isn't the same about it since they moved onto network TV. The Takeovers are still decent but not what they used to be either.

Yes. Maybe storylines are rushed more and as I said before about the character development and turns make little if any sense - that seems to have occurred more since the transition to TV. 

Strange really as the first few episodes after the move were still good and you wouldn't think the additional time would be that much of a problem. They had and have a roster deep enough to do a 2 hour show. And looking at the current roster it is incredibly deep. So the TV shouldn't have been that much of a negative change. 

 

[davulsukur]

I haven't watched wrestling for a long, long time but I was a fan as a kid.

I saw last night that The Undertaker has ended his 30 year career in WWE.

First wrestling I ever saw was Summerslam 92, and The Undertaker fought a bloke called Kamala (or something like).

Taker ended up laying in the in the middle of the ring and then of all of a sudden sat up straight and stared out his opponent, who started legging down the aisle, Taker got up and went after him with that weird bloke of a manager in tow.

He was my favourite wrestler after that and at some point between me stopping watching it and my parents getting sky, he'd dropped the gothic outfit and started riding a motorbike down to the ring and looked absolutely bad ass.

[Gav]

The Undertaker has at times sent shivers down my spine, my son has been a fan since 2000's.

Me being an old **** still pines for Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks!

American wrestling is a farce, but they're fit lads/lasses and deserve respect for the entertainment value and thats born out by the fact I've watched The undertaker and had goose bumps running down my spine.

End or an era, so I'm told   

[DE.]

We'll see. Retirement in wrestling is rarely a permanent thing, especially when it comes to the Undertaker in recent years. 

I found the 'retirement ceremony' a little flat and feel like they should have waited until next year when crowds are back. It's not like Taker is going anywhere. I'm not sure what the sudden rush was to get him officially retired now. 

[Mike E]

16 hours ago, DE. said:

We'll see. Retirement in wrestling is rarely a permanent thing, especially when it comes to the Undertaker in recent years. 

I found the 'retirement ceremony' a little flat and feel like they should have waited until next year when crowds are back. It's not like Taker is going anywhere. I'm not sure what the sudden rush was to get him officially retired now. 

Possible he wants to be in the HOF ASAP so he can stop having to worry about the character?

[DE.]

1 hour ago, Mike E said:

Possible he wants to be in the HOF ASAP so he can stop having to worry about the character?

Maybe, but realistically he could take a year off and just do this at the next Survivor Series & 2022 HOF. It just seems a bit strange to have such an iconic figure retire with no fans present, especially when there is no pressing need (as far as I know) to do so. 

Truthfully he should have retired after the Roman Reigns match. That would have been a great way for the character to bow out, and imo more fitting than the 'ceremony' we got at Survivor Series.

[Blue blood]

On 24/11/2020 at 17:05, DE. said:

Maybe, but realistically he could take a year off and just do this at the next Survivor Series & 2022 HOF. It just seems a bit strange to have such an iconic figure retire with no fans present, especially when there is no pressing need (as far as I know) to do so. 

Truthfully he should have retired after the Roman Reigns match. That would have been a great way for the character to bow out, and imo more fitting than the 'ceremony' we got at Survivor Series.

Not sure the Roman match was a big enough storyline to finish on. That being, there was very little storyline. More a crap, we need to make Roman look as good as Brock idea. The feud was badly built up, if at all, with no emotional investment whatsoever. And the match itself was far from a classic. So not sure it was a great way to go out. 

That said not sure Survivor Series was right either...

[DE.]

Just now, Blue blood said:

Not sure the Roman match was a big enough storyline to finish on. That being, there was very little storyline. More a crap, we need to make Roman look as good as Brock idea. The feud was badly built up, if at all, with no emotional investment whatsoever. And the match itself was far from a classic. So not sure it was a great way to go out. 

That said not sure Survivor Series was right either...

I was thinking more the way the match ended with Taker laying down his hat/coat and descending down into the ramp. I thought that was a very cool image and would have been a good final image for Taker. I don't remember much about the storyline or the match itself to be honest with you. 

His last great match was probably WM28, the 'end of an era' match with Triple H & Shawn Michaels. If we're talking the best way to bow out with a solid storyline build, great match and great ending, then that was it. Taker obviously wasn't ready to retire at that point, though.

I'm not convinced this retirement will stick either. Wouldn't surprise me at all if Taker came back at some point in the future for another match, especially if crazy Saudi money is being waved in his direction. Even Shawn Michaels ended up coming out of retirement for some Saudi blood money. 

[DE.]

@Bigdoggsteel have you been watching AEW recently? Quite a few NWA Powerrr alumi on there as of late, which is nice to see. 

[Blue blood]

Just now, DE. said:

I was thinking more the way the match ended with Taker laying down his hat/coat and descending down into the ramp. I thought that was a very cool image and would have been a good final image for Taker. I don't remember much about the storyline or the match itself to be honest with you. 

His last great match was probably WM28, the 'end of an era' match with Triple H & Shawn Michaels. If we're talking the best way to bow out with a solid storyline build, great match and great ending, then that was it. Taker obviously wasn't ready to retire at that point, though.

 I'm not convinced this retirement will stick either. Wouldn't surprise me at all if Taker came back at some point in the future for another match, especially if crazy Saudi money is being waved in his direction. Even Shawn Michaels ended up coming out of retirement for some Saudi blood money. 

Yes that was a cool image and a good image to end on. But surely the match and story make a huge difference too. 

Thinking of Ric Falir and Shawn Michaels retirements at Wrestlemania - although neither actually lasted, as you also say when money is involved - they were both excellent ways to go out. Good matches, good stories, the works. They were, imo, what wrestiling is. A cool visual after a crap match and lame story is not enough for me. 

Also, and I get Taker is slowing down, a good story and a hyped crowd can elevate a match. Thinking of Hogan-Andre at WM3 as the prime example. The match seemed wow, due to the storyline and crowd, and both wrestlers playing their parts well, even if the match itself wasn't great from a technical standpoint. No reason with with right opponent that this couldn't have been done even with Taker slowing down. 

  

[DE.]

Just now, Blue blood said:

Also, and I get Taker is slowing down, a good story and a hyped crowd can elevate a match. Thinking of Hogan-Andre at WM3 as the prime example. The match seemed wow, due to the storyline and crowd, and both wrestlers playing their parts well, even if the match itself wasn't great from a technical standpoint. No reason with with right opponent that this couldn't have been done even with Taker slowing down. 

Honestly one of the things that bothers me about Taker's retirement is that he isn't going out looking up at the lights. It's a time-honoured tradition that you'd expect a veteran like Taker to insist on. Obviously they wasted the streak by ending it with Lesnar, who didn't even need it, but as you say the right storyline could have been built to have someone go over and be legitimised in a big way by beating Taker and retiring him for good. The most obvious choice would have been Bray Wyatt - whilst he doesn't technically need it either, it would have been a huge boost to his fiend character and in a lot of ways make sense as he is in many respects the Undertaker's successor as far as dark characters are concerned. 

Something about the way they've retired Taker just doesn't sit right with me. He's retiring long past when he should have anyway, but there were plenty of better ways to do it than this. It just seems really anticlimactic and boring. 

[Blue blood]

2 hours ago, DE. said:

Honestly one of the things that bothers me about Taker's retirement is that he isn't going out looking up at the lights. It's a time-honoured tradition that you'd expect a veteran like Taker to insist on. Obviously they wasted the streak by ending it with Lesnar, who didn't even need it, but as you say the right storyline could have been built to have someone go over and be legitimised in a big way by beating Taker and retiring him for good. The most obvious choice would have been Bray Wyatt - whilst he doesn't technically need it either, it would have been a huge boost to his fiend character and in a lot of ways make sense as he is in many respects the Undertaker's successor as far as dark characters are concerned. 

Something about the way they've retired Taker just doesn't sit right with me. He's retiring long past when he should have anyway, but there were plenty of better ways to do it than this. It just seems really anticlimactic and boring. 

Maybe it was a how do we boost survivor series thing? After all there is little build up and zero consequence to survivor series these days with brand Vs brand. The only thing going for it is you see some match ups you otherwise wouldn't like Lesnar Vs Bryan or Styles that people think are interesting. Last year they had NXT involved to add intrigue. This year had pretty much nothing going for it. Got to boost ratings somehow. 

[DE.]

14 minutes ago, Blue blood said:

Maybe it was a how do we boost survivor series thing? After all there is little build up and zero consequence to survivor series these days with brand Vs brand. The only thing going for it is you see some match ups you otherwise wouldn't like Lesnar Vs Bryan or Styles that people think are interesting. Last year they had NXT involved to add intrigue. This year had pretty much nothing going for it. Got to boost ratings somehow. 

Possibly, but I'd be surprised if it led to a huge uptick in WWE Network subscribers - and that's the only metric that really matters with their decision to effectively abandon traditional PPV. It for sure hasn't had any effect on the Raw/SD ratings, although that's probably because Undertaker has never been advertised as showing up on either of those shows. 

I always felt like it's a shame the ABA gimmick didn't get a final run out. I know it was mixed into the AJ WM36 match somewhat, but it would have been cool for Taker to do one more match as full on biker Taker. The match against Cena would have been ideal, as it was basically just a squash anyway.

[Blue blood]

1 hour ago, DE. said:

Possibly, but I'd be surprised if it led to a huge uptick in WWE Network subscribers - and that's the only metric that really matters with their decision to effectively abandon traditional PPV. It for sure hasn't had any effect on the Raw/SD ratings, although that's probably because Undertaker has never been advertised as showing up on either of those shows. 

I always felt like it's a shame the ABA gimmick didn't get a final run out. I know it was mixed into the AJ WM36 match somewhat, but it would have been cool for Taker to do one more match as full on biker Taker. The match against Cena would have been ideal, as it was basically just a squash anyway.

Forgot about the Taker Cena "match". Now that was another terrible, terrible waste of an opponent for the Taker. Good build up, terrible match. 

That would have been an epic way to turn Cena, retiring Taker, or with those two as story tellers they could have told an epic match. Neither happened though. 

As for raw and smackdown on the network both are a month behind which doesn't really help momentum. A poor product doesn't help either. 

[DE.]

The Taker/Cena match made no sense to me at the time and it still doesn't. I can't get my head around what the point of it was. On paper it's a great match, but the execution was absolutely baffling. I didn't even think the build up was good as it was completely one-sided with Cena repeatedly calling out Taker and increasingly falling out of "kayfabe", whilst Taker continued to ignore him. Then the match was treated like a bonus on the show, not even properly advertised. What the hell was going on? I can only assume they genuinely didn't know if Taker was going to be able to do the show up until the day itself. I can't make sense of the booking otherwise. It may have initially built some suspense but it only works if the match is eventually made, and it wasn't (until during the event itself) and I guess Cena was meant to be drunk or something? So he got squashed, and everything about the storyline and match was pointless. I mean it's vintage modern WWE (© Michael Cole) but still... what a shitload of fuck (© AVGN).

Taker will always be a legend, but in my view his relevency ended at WrestleMania 28. End of an era should have seen Taker, HHH and HBK all retire in a blaze of glory. 

 

[Bigdoggsteel]

On 27/11/2020 at 14:46, DE. said:

@Bigdoggsteel have you been watching AEW recently? Quite a few NWA Powerrr alumi on there as of late, which is nice to see. 

No,I haven't really. I ended my subscription. Have too much to be watching and playing. I think AEW in particular has struggled with no crowds. Good to see some of those guys and gals getting TV time though. I follow on social media. I see the NWA are starting back with a shown 

[DE.]

58 minutes ago, Bigdoggsteel said:

No,I haven't really. I ended my subscription. Have too much to be watching and playing. I think AEW in particular has struggled with no crowds. Good to see some of those guys and gals getting TV time though. I follow on social media. I see the NWA are starting back with a shown 

Yeah, I really miss Powerrr on a Tuesday and I hope they bring it back one day - even though it'd have to be a lot different considering how much the roster has changed. Pretty much all the storylines they had going would probably not be continued. I'm not sure exactly what Shockwave is meant to be, but I'll check it out anyway. 

[DE.]

Watched Shockwave and... eh. Hasn't got the unique charm of Powerrr and is basically just a bunch of canned indy matches. I think I'll pass until Powerrr returns. 

[DE.]

AEW certainly delivered on their promise of this week's show being the most important episode of Dynamite ever. 

Firstly - even at 61, Sting returning to wrestling and TNT was an incredible moment. Tony Schiavone genuinely marking out like it was the late 90s all over again was something to behold. Sting has apparently signed a multi-year deal with AEW, but I imagine he'll mostly be in a DDP/Jake Roberts/Arn Anderson type role where he's more of a mentor/on screen character than an active competitor. It would be nice for Sting to have a proper sendoff, as his WWE match with Seth Rollins definitely wasn't a good way to go out, but not sure how his neck is nowadays. Regardless, his character has enough presence and charisma that he can be a massive benefit to the show without ever wrestling a match.

Secondly, the ending to the show was really wild. I expected Omega to take the title off Moxley, but I did not expect his first appearance as AEW champion to be on Impact. It's interesting how AEW is so open to working with other promotions (NJPW, AAA, MLW, NWA and now Impact), especially compared to how WWE treat other companies like they simply don't exist. I'm sure it'll get a lot more eyeballs than usual on Impact next Tuesday, although I'm not sure how much of a bump it'll give AEW, as Impact's viewing figures aren't that high to begin with. Nonetheless, a potential partnership does open the door for talent exchange, which would be a great thing for both companies.

Exciting times. Whether you like them or not, AEW coming along is exactly what the industry needed to shake things up.

[Bigdoggsteel]

I cannot take Kenny Omega seriously, or is he meant to be a comedy heel? Albeit not a funny one imo? I just think he is a goofball nerd. 

In ringwise, boring. I've watched a good few of his matches, all the same. Repeating the same moves. His match with Jericho was decent, but that's Jericho. 

Maybe I'm missing something. 

Cool that he was on Impact all the same 

Edited December 9, 2020 by Bigdoggsteel

[DE.]

Omega's matches with Okada in NJPW were absolutely incredible, but I haven't watched much of him outside of that. He had a good match with Moxley on one of the early AEW PPV's, but other than that his run in AEW has been fairly lukewarm. Mostly tag team and exhibition stuff. 

As far as I can tell he is going for smarmy/overconfident heel rather than comedy, but before this he hasn't really had a character in AEW (other than just being Kenny Omega) so I guess he'll need some time to establish what he's going for. 

He's a fairly divisive figure, much like the Young Bucks. People seem to either really like these guys or are completely indifferent to them. The Elite have a mid-90s WCW mindset for the business, by my estimation - and Tony Khan does too - which works for me as that is my favourite era by far. I can understand other people seeing it as WCW-lite or being unimpressed by it - yet at the same time WCW was by far the second most successful promotion ever, so I don't think it's a bad thing to try and emulate some of the stuff they did during their heyday. You just don't want to remind people of the painful final years. 

Impact was OK but I have two main issues - Josh Matthews on commentary, terrible, and the lack of any kind of crowd/reactions. WWE and AEW both found solutions to the silent arena aesthetic and it improved both shows a ton. Impact apparently opted to remain with the empty, silent arena and it's kinda tough for me to watch a show like that. It just feels so bland with no crowd noise or reactions. Not too dissimilar to football. I'd rather have fake, piped in crowd reaction than none at all.

Still not sure this Impact/AEW crossover does a whole lot for AEW, but either way I don't think I'll be watching Impact regularly. 

[Bigdoggsteel]

10 minutes ago, DE. said:

Omega's matches with Okada in NJPW were absolutely incredible, but I haven't watched much of him outside of that. He had a good match with Moxley on one of the early AEW PPV's, but other than that his run in AEW has been fairly lukewarm. Mostly tag team and exhibition stuff. 

As far as I can tell he is going for smarmy/overconfident heel rather than comedy, but before this he hasn't really had a character in AEW (other than just being Kenny Omega) so I guess he'll need some time to establish what he's going for. 

He's a fairly divisive figure, much like the Young Bucks. People seem to either really like these guys or are completely indifferent to them. The Elite have a mid-90s WCW mindset for the business, by my estimation - and Tony Khan does too - which works for me as that is my favourite era by far. I can understand other people seeing it as WCW-lite or being unimpressed by it - yet at the same time WCW was by far the second most successful promotion ever, so I don't think it's a bad thing to try and emulate some of the stuff they did during their heyday. You just don't want to remind people of the painful final years. 

Impact was OK but I have two main issues - Josh Matthews on commentary, terrible, and the lack of any kind of crowd/reactions. WWE and AEW both found solutions to the silent arena aesthetic and it improved both shows a ton. Impact apparently opted to remain with the empty, silent arena and it's kinda tough for me to watch a show like that. It just feels so bland with no crowd noise or reactions. Not too dissimilar to football. I'd rather have fake, piped in crowd reaction than none at all.

Still not sure this Impact/AEW crossover does a whole lot for AEW, but either way I don't think I'll be watching Impact regularly. 

I think there is some good in impact, but Matthews and his missus on commentarycertainly aren't. Brutal stuff. 

 

[DE.]

Just now, Bigdoggsteel said:

I think there is some good in impact, but Matthews and his missus on commentarycertainly aren't. Brutal stuff. 

I haven't really watched much if any Impact since... 2014? I basically stopped watching TNA when Samoa Joe, Sting & AJ Styles left. It was pretty much over at that point for me. I never thought Tenay and Taz were a great commentary team, but even they are streets ahead of the current team. 

It was cool hearing Dave Penzer as the ring announcer. Didn't realise he was on Impact. 

I watched Raw yesterday and it's still terrible. Smackdown has come into its own since Roman Reigns began his tribal chief shtick, but Raw is a horrible mess. NXT has also gone down the toilet since it moved to network TV. I didn't even bother watching the Takeover at the weekend - it's the first one I've missed in years, but even though they were doing the War Games gimmick I just wasn't interested. 

[Bigdoggsteel]

1 minute ago, DE. said:

I haven't really watched much if any Impact since... 2014? I basically stopped watching TNA when Samoa Joe, Sting & AJ Styles left. It was pretty much over at that point for me. I never thought Tenay and Taz were a great commentary team, but even they are streets ahead of the current team. 

It was cool hearing Dave Penzer as the ring announcer. Didn't realise he was on Impact. 

I watched Raw yesterday and it's still terrible. Smackdown has come into its own since Roman Reigns began his tribal chief shtick, but Raw is a horrible mess. NXT has also gone down the toilet since it moved to network TV. I didn't even bother watching the Takeover at the weekend - it's the first one I've missed in years, but even though they were doing the War Games gimmick I just wasn't interested. 

What has happened NXT? I don't watch any shows in their entirety. Just highlights really. 

In Impact, I think Moose has potential to be a star. Eric Young is good and that new bodyguard he had is a scary looking individual. Their team would actually fit in well in NXT. 

Do you watch Cultaholic on YouTube? Watched a good one last night. One of the lads applied to be a writer for WWE. Maybe I enjoyed it too much cos I'm a HR/Recruitment nerd 🤣 It was interesting to see the process