The Triple H regime kick off!

So I watched Raw last night, neglected all the matches by having them on X6 speed on my DVR (sorry, not expecting any 4* classics on TV anymore) and watching the skits in full, this of course was a landmark, it was the first under the kayfabe Triple H regime.

Firstly, if this angle is still going, how will they treat the retirement/death of Vince McMahon when that happens? When the company legitimately goes to the doofus son in law and idiot daughter? Well, I guess we’ll find out when we cross that bridge, Jesus, it wouldn’t surprise me if this Triple H angle lasts less than a year, then he disappears and Vince is Chairman again.

Anyway, to Raw, we start (with no Raw title scene (which I haven’t seen in ages now, maybe its just the Sky WWE broadcasts or something)), we’re told that the opening contest is Rey Vs Miz for the Vacant WWE Title. Miz is still in his tweener mode with the injured leg, looks like they’re turning this guy soon, which is fair enough. I always saw Miz as a Rock V2, starting as a heel and turning face when the crowd got behind him, which they are doing. Anyway, Rey gets the belt for an hour as he gets the win on Miz, Miz remains heel/tweener for this month when he hobbles in and attacks Rey after match. Then comes Alberto Del Rio! ADR goes to cash in MitB and for a 2nd time is cut off short as he runs off with briefcase in hand due to Rey’s early attack on him. I do hope WWE wont do a load of ADR cash-in teases only to have it not count, it will get old fast.

After that we hear Mr. Levesque (do you think that could catch on?) will give a state address tonight announcing changes as we cut to Evan Bourne Vs Dolph Ziggler in a ‘Who knows if this is for the belt or not? But it doesn’t matter’ match. Ziggler wins quick with a sleeper hold.

After that we have our 3rd match of the evening with Kelly ‘Ropes Scare Me’ Kelly & Eve Torres Vs Melina ‘Goodbye WWE Career, Thanks Twitter’ Perez and Mar ‘I have love affairs weekly on NXT but am really going out with Miz’ yse, again a nothing Diva match, later tonight WWE tell us we’ll get a Diva’s Battle next week for Kelly’s opponent at Summerslam, I can hardly wait.

Then we get to Trip’s state address, firstly, he thanks Vince for all he’s done for the WWE, he says Rey will face John Cena tonight for the title (giving Rey a reign of an hour), then he announces a HUGE superstar has resigned, its none other than Good Ol’ JR, the man I said should commentate Barclays Premier League Football is back on TV, and I marked out like a bitch! Michael Cole, the rat bastard protests, he is instructed by Hunter to get changed, he has a match, and is relieved of commentary duties for tonight. First off, great to see JR back even if they bury him every week, his voice soothes me.

R ‘I may call you R right?’ Truth comes out to complain about the conspiracy and for once in a while the two have a good back and fourth with comedy, where Hunter announces he’s resigned (a man who was never released/fired) John Morrison! Good to see Morrison back, I’m a big fan of the guy and wish he could be a WWE Champion one day soon after the fallout of Cena/Punk. Morrison takes out Truth and celebrates, all but definitely setting up a match for Summerslam.

We get our comedy match of the night, Cole facing the WWE INTERNET CHAMPION LONG ISLAND ICED Z! ZACK RYYYYYYYYDERRRRRRR! Wrong crowd to use Z, not much of a huge initial pop for him, due to the crowd being very PG-friendly and not an internet crowd, Zack wins with his finisher in the first half a minute and that’s all from Zack tonight (nice to know WWE Creative knows he exist, be good to see the outcome on his YouTube show).

Alberto Del Rio against Kofi in a rematch of last week is next, now had ADR won the cash-in would this match exist? Would ADR be champion and have to defend against Kofi then straight afterwards Cena? Well it doesn’t matter, ADR got the win with his cross arm-breaker causing Kofi to tap, at least he’s not facing Ziggler for the 753rd time in a row on TV anymore.

Then came our MAAAIN EVENT! John Cena against Rey Mysterio, Cena really was a heel in this match, challenging Rey who’s faced off for the title already and Cena didn’t celebrate his first win earlier in the back, like I said, not much I can say on matches, heard this was a very decent match, anyway, Cena wins and celebrates, does the face thing and shakes the fellow face Mysterio’s hand and then GUITAR RIFF! “Look in my eyes, what do you see!?” Living Colour’s 'Cult of Personality’ hits, automatically I clocked who it was, not watching ROH I didn’t realise it was his ROH theme (nice touch there WWE). Punk comes out to new Titantron, new music, and new shirt (already seen at MitB 2011), he walks to the ring, Cena says something, he lifts his 'Championship’ to a moderate pop, then Punk lifts his REAL championship to a mega pop. Several notes, first, Punk’s belt had his name on it, Cena’s had nothing, Punk’s was raised higher too. Cena leaves as Punk raises his title to close the show.

Overall, decent Raw be good to see how they carry this big angle on without ruining it.

EDIT: Couple of weeks with no ‘Anonymous’ Raw GM, either that angle has been killed with no pay-off OR they’re waiting for someone (presumably Foley) to be cleared to come in.

Why criticizing TV-PG is a poor argument.

The great thing about today’s technology is YouTube, you can quite literally search for any significant or not-so significant moment in wrestling and some crafty bugger has infringed several international copyright laws to bring you the moment in wrestling for your viewing pleasure.

Its a guilty pleasure of mine to spend several hours of a boring day off re-watching old WWF clips from the 1990s onwards, researching the angle on Google and then watching it in awe. However, whenever on YouTube, you always get two groups of people there just to spoil your entertaining minutes of joy when you look back and watch Stone Cold deliver the Stunner to everyone on Sunday Night Heat when you scroll down to that comments section, these two kinds of people are the utter arseholes who just search up wrestling clips to try and get an ignorant reaction from some 12 year old by writing “That shit’s fake” (a bit like that person’s social life by the looks of it) but I’ve dealt with that person on video:

So what about the other sort? Well, these are the people who say that WWE is terrible just because of the age rating. To me, this is a flawed argument, just because it says “TV-PG” at the start of the program, it automatically is bad? Lets not get carried away, most WWE stuff from this era is poor when you compare it to the good of 10 years ago, but that’s down to poor writing not its age rating. I mean, be honest, WWE had poor years as a TV-14 product in past and recent history too. The Invasion angle of 2001, 2006 (with the exception being Unforgiven which was awesome) as a whole, 2007 as a whole again, they had a terrible last couple of years as a TV-14 product. I mean the Attitude Era is no way flawless, it had terrible angles, shows, years. Are you telling me that Mae Young giving birth to a hand is better than some of the Hornswoggle skits? Totally killing a huge story with the Higher Power revealing it as the man Undertaker and Shane set out to get at, is that better than some of the stories they do nowadays?

Maybe I can’t talk, I stopped watching wrestling for two years, although that was due to poor writing and because I got bored of wrestling. Also, it may sound shallow but wrestling isn’t a popular past-time anymore, lets be honest, how many girls can you attract saying you’re a wrestling fan? I think its almost a social put-off, unfortunately. I think being a naive teenager I tried to distance my obsession with wrestling, because unfortunately, its not 1999, its not cool to be a fan of WWE or wrestling. However, that stereotype is for another blog.

So in closing, just because Cena is the Champion or its not as ‘cool’ as 1999, doesn’t mean its no good, you can write a great PG show, just like you can write a shit TV-14 show.

Why CM Punk's hiatus could aid WWE in ending the failing 'Brand Extension'

So after 2 years of not posting on this blog, why don't I start with the hottest angle in wrestling right now? CM Punk's departure.
Remember when the Brand Split first happened? Raw and Smackdown divided, owned and written by two seperate people, some were on air week after week, others behind the scenes or in a different role on the show. However, still they were divided, when a Raw guy showed up on Smackdown from the years 2002-2006 you marked out or it didn't happen and you dreamt it. The only time I can remember seeing Smackdown guys on a different show was the 2004 draft. The split was so great you even had matches that belonged on one brand, it wasn't until 2006 that anyone other than Raw got an Elimination Chamber, heck, even the first Money in the Bank was only Raw superstars.

Many have argued that the 'Brand Extension' as WWE calls it helped create new stars like Eddie Guerrero, JBL, Chris Benoit etc, guys that would have probably been kept in the mid-card division behind people like Triple H had the roster been one big one. The fact the rosters was seperated helped the Smackdown writers and talent themselves create household names and WWE legends (with the exception of Benoit for the unfortunate circumstances).

Yet with all that the Brand Split has given us WWE seem like they want to destroy it, ever since 2007, heck maybe as far back as late 2005 when Raw returned to the USA network and the birth of 3 hour Raw's, Smackdown superstars have appeared so frequently on Raw its not even worth watching Smackdown. This month we had 2 Raw's in a row which were 3 hours long, which has meant that because Raw's short roster cannot fill 3 hours and because Zack Ryder can't go a whole hour with his material, Smackdown have had to show up and give us some inter-promotional matches or just their feuds on Raw. This has gone on for years, Smackdown arriving on Raw and giving us a match or two, just this week Smackdown's own Sin Cara had a match with Raw's Evan Bourne, arguably this match only happened because Sin Cara should have fought Bourne the previous week due to WWE's faulty voting system, but still another inter-promotional match on Television. I remember I was hyped in 2005 when Raw's Randy Orton was challenging Smackdown's Undertaker to a match at WrestleMania, much like Smackdown's Kurt Angle was challenging Raw's Shawn Michaels to a match at the same show and WWE played it so well to have Orton move to Smackdown and Angle to Raw to continue these feuds after the WrestleMania with the draft a few months later.

The draft, that lost all credibility years ago, the first instance of the draft looking pointless was early 2006, just 2/5 days (whether you go by Smackdown's taping or airing) after losing an Elimination Chamber on Raw only PPV New Year's Revolution, Kurt Angle moved to Smackdown and won the World Title in a Battle Royal when Batista forfeited the title through injury. Sorry, how is this allowed? I understood it was an open invitation Battle Royal, but surely just for Smackdown superstars? The draft has also flip flopped between rules every other year as well, in 2007 Bobby Lashley moved from ECW to Raw and was stripped of his ECW Championship and the following year Kane makes the same move and was allowed to keep his ECW Championship (despite leaving ECW with no Championships). How about Money in the Bank winners? Edge was a Raw superstar and yet wins the Smackdown title and moves to Smackdown, then CM Punk wins the World Title from Smackdown's Edge and moves the title to Raw.

Okay, that's enough talk of how pointless the Brand Split and Draft are, how about I tell you where CM Punk fits in. Now Punk's contract legitimately ends on the 17th June 2011, now unlike other former superstars, indications show Punk is not leaving for TNA, ROH or any other promotion, in fact he's taking a sabitical like Chris Jericho did in 2005 and 2010. He's actually burnt out and taking a break from wrestling to re-gain some energy. Now Smackdown's ratings at the moment are poor, the WWE have scrapped their Bragging Rights PPV and both the Tag Team and Diva's title are undisputed and can be defended on either show. Therefore, I propose we end this Brand Split and have one big roster (especially with this already thin one), and have one world champion (still keeping the US and IC championships to keep the WWE with at least 5 championships). CM Punk wins the WWE Championship and leaves for a while, the WWE is in commotion and eventually scraps the brand split and goes for one world champion with the 'new' WWE Championship, however, Punk returns and almost like the whole Michaels/Ramon scenario in 1994 faces off with the 'new' WWE Champion to crown the Undisputed WWE Champion.

Obviously, this involves long term booking and the guarentee Punk will return to conclude this story, it could probably be ironed out as well better than I can do it, still I think this is a good way to help WWE out especially with a thin roster as it is. Its safe to say the 'Brand Extension's' shelf life has very much expired.

January 4th Raw Vs TNA

I realise I’m a little late in commenting on this but what the hell I’m going to do it anyway.

When we all first heard that TNA Impact was going up against WWE Raw we all had mixed emotions. The Attitude Era marks saw it as a new Monday Night War and the pessimists saw it as TNA’s demise. Some of us (like me) saw it as both.

If anything I’m just a WWE fan, I barely watch anything but WWE programming, if I watch TNA on Bravo or Virgin 1 (The channels TNA is broadcast on in the United Kingdom) I see one match or the last five minutes and even that doesn’t bother me. So I’m probably not going to see the Impact anyway nor will I care to. TNA doesn’t interest me and the more I hear about it the more I don’t care for it either. However, that’s not to say WWE isn’t starting to annoy and lack appeal to me either.

Anyway, I feel this could be a rushed move for TNA, the company has been around 7 years and yes it needs to start building but this move is too quick. Now, they did play an ace card, they bought in Hulk Hogan which was an amazing move (go see my rant on Bret Hart) but WWE came up trumps (we presume) and bought back Bret Hart (go see my rant on Bret Hart) .

So why is this a bad move. Well, I looked at TNA ratings from the first show to the half way stage of 2009 and some odd ones from November/December. They all are around that 1.0/1.1/1/2 area. Whereas Raw is getting 3s and 4s each time. I mean TNA are only consistently and confidently beating WWE Superstars and that’s the D-show! Add the Hitman to the mix on Mondays and the fact WWE are just not losing the ratings war already and it’s a recipe for disaster.

Now who’s to say TNA could prevail. They’ve launched a load of ad campaigns but in my opinion, they’re fucked.

Bret Hart to WWE?

So according to numerous sources The “Hitman” has resigned with Vince McMahon and the WWE. Of course I am naturally shocked I mean this is the guy who got sold out by the devil’s incarnate and is returning. However, I am also anxious to see what they do with him. Of course if Shawn and Bret don’t cross some sort of path then we will be shocked but is the move to have DX win the Tag Titles the move that they’ve talked Shawn into just working Tuesdays to avoid clashes with Bret or Bret is coming to SmackDown to help his Hart Dynasty brethren.

If I was in the TNA camp right now I would be shitting myself with the debut of Hogan looking now even more doomed than just competition from The Rock (which if Bret is coming back looks doubtful) even though The Rock on Raw looked very dangerous if TNA want to win a war with the giant. As Vince said in “The Monday Night Wars DVD” that was released in 2004 that highlighted WWE’s own battle with the now defunct company WCW “You never want to go toe-to-toe with that giant” which is exactly the problem with TNA. A company struggling to get out of the 1.0 rating zone on a Thursday Night when they are unmatched by any other wrestling promotion. Of course, the master plan was to unveil the most over superstar in Wrestling Hulk Hogan. Which was the greatest idea ever. How could Raw possibly compete with Hogan? I mean non-wrestling fans of now who watched in the 80s would probably tune in just to see the Hulkster strut his stuff. Not to mention the smarks and casual fans. However, WWE have combated any threats and played their ace card Bret. I mean love him or despise him the episode he returns on is bound to be controversial. Hogan someone who most people will get sick of or Bret who is the most controversial topic in Pro-Wrestling. I’d say those 80s marks will have a hard time staying with Hogan when they know on the other channel Hart is ripping into the company.

TNA have perhaps tested Vince’s patience TOO far. They tried to intimidate a man who’s seen the NWA, AWA and WCW come and go. Is TNA just another “Rise and Fall” DVD?