More random stuff!
Yeah, you'll notice that I tend to save up CHIKARA shows and then watch them marathon-style. So I sometimes go weeks without watching anything other DVDs. So be prepared, as this is probably mostly going to be about everyone's favorite little indy...
-Also watched the first disc of CHIKARA's International Invaders, Night 2. Much better than the first night so far, but most of the highlights have actually been on commentary. I loved the bit where Chikarason talks about Sleepy Hollow and somehow mentions that Hallowicked lives in a tree. Chris Hero just flips out for the remainder of the match, including wondering aloud how 'Wicked can review tapes of his opponents if he lives in a tree. Great stuff. You also get a 'Mantis riff on the state of healthcare in the US as opposed to Canada, so yeah...this can't be beat.
(Is there any doubt that CHIKARA has the best commentary in wrestling right now? A lot of stuff is played for laughs, but you have guys like Quack who do commentary when you need a more serious tone. Ultramantis Black should have replaced Tazz on ECW. Seriously...)
-I finished off the first disc of Cibernetico & Robin this morning. Olsens versus Up in Smoke absolutely brings the goods. Didn't think it could possibly live up to the praise I've seen, but yeah...I was absolutely wrong. They keep the pace quick, there's some really fluid double team stuff (from the Olsens in particular) and the funny stuff is actually funny. What more can you ask for out of a midcard tag sprint? Also, that dive into the tornado DDT on the floor was tremendous. Cheech certainly died for his sins in this match and it was awesome to watch.
(It's a shame that Colin D. Olsen disappeared into the ether soon after this. I hope Jimmy Jam can track him down!)
Didn't really care for the BLK OUT match, because, quite honestly, no matter how much I like the Colony (and I do), with the way King is being booked at this point in time, I don't buy them as being competitive. Especially when Joker is standing next to King. They might pull their tricks on Sabian, but yeah...the end result of this should have been murder most foul.
-Got through Bruised and the first disc of New Star Navigation. Young Timothy Donst sure does like to get his ass stomped, doesn't he? The first match with Kingston is more brutal overall (and probably the better match as well), but this one has possibly the sickest headbutt I've ever seen. The NSN match versus Icarus is really good as well. He has a ton of naysayers, but Icarus has kicked up the awesome in the latter half of '07. He's pretty well shattered the "Icarus sucks" myth by this point.
(Fuck my hemming and hawing. Icarus RULES. How am I the only person to see this? Or am I just ahead of the curve, like usual? Heh.)
Actually, I'm wondering why people aren't talking NSN up a bit more. It's been pretty much fantastic so far. The Osirian Portal/Incoherence match is aces. Every bit as good as the Olsens/Up In Smoke match from the Cibernetico & Robin show.
-Finished the 2007 CHIKARA season and I'm halfway through "Two Eyebrows...". Lots of fun stuff worth talking about (like Brodie Lee kicking everyone's faces off!), but I'm just going to skip over it all and go straight to the sublime Kingston/Storm match. Sweet Christ, was that ever great. Who knew Shane Storm had it in him? Brutal, brutal match and one of the rare instances where SMV's instant replays didn't annoy me. I wanted to see that backfist from both camera angles and in slow mo. Seriously, Storm must have owed King money.
(This was a beautiful beatdown. You should really check it out. Shane Storm sucks, but he takes it like a man. I'm curious to see how he comes off as a rudo, since he can focus on his strengths and cut out the fat guy lucha stuff he tries and fails at doing well.)
Also dug the stuff with Colin Olsen hiding his sordid ECW experience from Jimmy. Maybe I'll comment on the other stuff when I have a bit more time on my hands...
-Blew through King of Trios '08, officially catching up with all of the CHIKARA shows I currently own. I'll wait until this past weekend's shows come out pick up the rest.
Anyway, fabulous tournament overall. There were a handful of really good matches, but really, everything had enough of a fun quotient to make it worth watching. Somewhat unrelated, but someone in the past week or so (sorry, can't remember who and I can't be assed to find the post) was wondering why CHIKARA fans don't attack the booking of outside talent over the CHIKARA mainstays. Really, these shows are a perfect demonstration of why that is. Not to play up the ROH/CHIKARA comparison, since it's ridiculous (the only thing they have in common is being indy wrestling based in the Northeast), but the general CHIKARMY member I would say takes pro wrestling much, much, much less seriously than the general ROHbot. It wouldn't occur to me to complain about how guys are booked. You know why? At the end of the day, if I get a fun match out of it, the winners and losers really don't matter. Especially in a tournament situation, which is probably the best place, as a booker, to indulge your OMG INDY DREAM MATCH!!!!! fantasies. Anyway, enough talk of CHIKARA booking. The wrestling itself and oddball comedy has always been what matters there. I feel slightly more smarmy even putting the words "booking" and CHIKARA in the same sentence.
(Well...this was a random post. I guess the point stands, but I don't remember typing this at all and can't imagine why I cared enough to do so. Especially since I largely ignore the actual shows. Seriously, if you want to know where to start your slow descent into CHIKARA madness, King of Trios '08 is the spot. Watch it, love it.)
-All I can say about the Jacobs/Whitmer I Quit match from the IWA 500th show is WOW. What an amazing match. Jimmy Jacobs is every single thing I love about pro wrestling wrapped up in one tiny, ass kicking package. Tons of emotion, top shelf brawling, great throwbacks to the ROH matches and the single most convincing finish to an I Quit match pretty well ever.
(This ended with Jacobs using his railroad spike to stab Whitmer in the groin area repeatedly.)
Having King on commentary made it that much better, since it's exactly the sort of heated brawl that he'd work in the same situation and he manages to add that little extra touch with his commentary here, playing up that he's friends with both and concerned that they will literally murder one another in the ring. He knows exactly when to shut up as well, so yeah...a million billion stars for all of this.
(This is still possibly my indy match of the year so far.)
ROH: Take No Prisoners
I was bored and saw that the replay was on. I vaguely remember this being the show that Kingston debuted on, so I decided to order it. Sadly, King is edited out, but yeah...this is the first ROH I've watched in close to a year and I have to admit that I was kinda surprised as to how much I enjoyed the show. First half was so so, but the two matches that needed to carry the show did so in a big way.
-Claudio vs. Tyler Black vs Delirious vs. Shiozaki was decent, but I'll probably never get over my bias against the multi-man match. Lots of situations here that didn't make a ton of sense and had me rolling my eyes. Realistically, though, there's no way around it if you're going to book 4 guys in the same match. Some fun stuff with Claudio and Delirious, but not a match I'd go out of my way to watch again.
-Steen vs. Roddy is next. Pretty much what you'd expect from these two. Steen is such a great meatball dickhead. Roddy is generic as ever. But, uhh...he hits hard or something, so a lot of people dig him. Gotta love Steen..."WHO WANTS TO SEE HIM DIE!"
-Necro/Matthews vs. Briscoes earns a great big meh. Mark certainly does have a death wish, doesn't he. He bleeds quite the gusher here. Necro is probably the best brawler in the world right now, but this wasn't a good brawl. At all. I guess it was fun for the stunt show, watching dudes land on their head, unprotected chairshot crowd, but there was little flow and absolutely zero drama at all. So, the standard Briscoes match, I guess.
-Hangmen 3 get brought into the SnS fold. *yawn* Leads to Erick Stevens showing how big a moron he is, getting in Sweeney's face while totally ignoring the 5 other guys in the ring. Unfortunately, it also leads to Stevens vs. Albright. This wasn't actively bad or anything, but I almost fell asleep watching it. It was short, though, so props to ROH for at least making the crap easier to swallow.
-Pretty much loved the Davey/Romero vs Jig/Ruckus match. Really fun little tag sprint with a FANTASTIC crowd. It's saying something that I liked this, since Jig is the only one of the four that I can usually even stand. There were definitely some awkward moments, but the pace never slowed down and by the time you could dwell on something negative, they'd run through five other big spots. Not the style for everyone, but I personally find this sort of match fun from time to time. Jig looks pretty ridiculous sans mask and hell...even the name is meaningless at this point.
-I've always wondered what people saw in Austin Aries. Said time and time again that I just didn't "get" him. This might be the match that puts me on the path to being a fan. He and Danielson are absolutely fantastic here. Lots of really nifty matwork (with consequence) and even the lame headscissors sequence was palatable here.
-Main event is pretty great as well. Nigel had gotten pretty annoying when I was last watching ROH, but the heel turn definitely freshened him up and even the Lariat showcase we get here worked in context of the match. Crowd was going insane for Tyler's hope spots and Nigel was great in knowing exactly when to stuff his offense and take back control of the match. This is the first I've seen of the London Dungeon and the one at the end of the match looked absolutely sick. The arm really shouldn't bend in that particular direction. Was Tyler the first guy to kick out of the Jawbreaker? Half the crowd creamed themselves at that point.
-Also watched the first disc of CHIKARA's International Invaders, Night 2. Much better than the first night so far, but most of the highlights have actually been on commentary. I loved the bit where Chikarason talks about Sleepy Hollow and somehow mentions that Hallowicked lives in a tree. Chris Hero just flips out for the remainder of the match, including wondering aloud how 'Wicked can review tapes of his opponents if he lives in a tree. Great stuff. You also get a 'Mantis riff on the state of healthcare in the US as opposed to Canada, so yeah...this can't be beat.
(Is there any doubt that CHIKARA has the best commentary in wrestling right now? A lot of stuff is played for laughs, but you have guys like Quack who do commentary when you need a more serious tone. Ultramantis Black should have replaced Tazz on ECW. Seriously...)
-I finished off the first disc of Cibernetico & Robin this morning. Olsens versus Up in Smoke absolutely brings the goods. Didn't think it could possibly live up to the praise I've seen, but yeah...I was absolutely wrong. They keep the pace quick, there's some really fluid double team stuff (from the Olsens in particular) and the funny stuff is actually funny. What more can you ask for out of a midcard tag sprint? Also, that dive into the tornado DDT on the floor was tremendous. Cheech certainly died for his sins in this match and it was awesome to watch.
(It's a shame that Colin D. Olsen disappeared into the ether soon after this. I hope Jimmy Jam can track him down!)
Didn't really care for the BLK OUT match, because, quite honestly, no matter how much I like the Colony (and I do), with the way King is being booked at this point in time, I don't buy them as being competitive. Especially when Joker is standing next to King. They might pull their tricks on Sabian, but yeah...the end result of this should have been murder most foul.
-Got through Bruised and the first disc of New Star Navigation. Young Timothy Donst sure does like to get his ass stomped, doesn't he? The first match with Kingston is more brutal overall (and probably the better match as well), but this one has possibly the sickest headbutt I've ever seen. The NSN match versus Icarus is really good as well. He has a ton of naysayers, but Icarus has kicked up the awesome in the latter half of '07. He's pretty well shattered the "Icarus sucks" myth by this point.
(Fuck my hemming and hawing. Icarus RULES. How am I the only person to see this? Or am I just ahead of the curve, like usual? Heh.)
Actually, I'm wondering why people aren't talking NSN up a bit more. It's been pretty much fantastic so far. The Osirian Portal/Incoherence match is aces. Every bit as good as the Olsens/Up In Smoke match from the Cibernetico & Robin show.
-Finished the 2007 CHIKARA season and I'm halfway through "Two Eyebrows...". Lots of fun stuff worth talking about (like Brodie Lee kicking everyone's faces off!), but I'm just going to skip over it all and go straight to the sublime Kingston/Storm match. Sweet Christ, was that ever great. Who knew Shane Storm had it in him? Brutal, brutal match and one of the rare instances where SMV's instant replays didn't annoy me. I wanted to see that backfist from both camera angles and in slow mo. Seriously, Storm must have owed King money.
(This was a beautiful beatdown. You should really check it out. Shane Storm sucks, but he takes it like a man. I'm curious to see how he comes off as a rudo, since he can focus on his strengths and cut out the fat guy lucha stuff he tries and fails at doing well.)
Also dug the stuff with Colin Olsen hiding his sordid ECW experience from Jimmy. Maybe I'll comment on the other stuff when I have a bit more time on my hands...
-Blew through King of Trios '08, officially catching up with all of the CHIKARA shows I currently own. I'll wait until this past weekend's shows come out pick up the rest.
Anyway, fabulous tournament overall. There were a handful of really good matches, but really, everything had enough of a fun quotient to make it worth watching. Somewhat unrelated, but someone in the past week or so (sorry, can't remember who and I can't be assed to find the post) was wondering why CHIKARA fans don't attack the booking of outside talent over the CHIKARA mainstays. Really, these shows are a perfect demonstration of why that is. Not to play up the ROH/CHIKARA comparison, since it's ridiculous (the only thing they have in common is being indy wrestling based in the Northeast), but the general CHIKARMY member I would say takes pro wrestling much, much, much less seriously than the general ROHbot. It wouldn't occur to me to complain about how guys are booked. You know why? At the end of the day, if I get a fun match out of it, the winners and losers really don't matter. Especially in a tournament situation, which is probably the best place, as a booker, to indulge your OMG INDY DREAM MATCH!!!!! fantasies. Anyway, enough talk of CHIKARA booking. The wrestling itself and oddball comedy has always been what matters there. I feel slightly more smarmy even putting the words "booking" and CHIKARA in the same sentence.
(Well...this was a random post. I guess the point stands, but I don't remember typing this at all and can't imagine why I cared enough to do so. Especially since I largely ignore the actual shows. Seriously, if you want to know where to start your slow descent into CHIKARA madness, King of Trios '08 is the spot. Watch it, love it.)
-All I can say about the Jacobs/Whitmer I Quit match from the IWA 500th show is WOW. What an amazing match. Jimmy Jacobs is every single thing I love about pro wrestling wrapped up in one tiny, ass kicking package. Tons of emotion, top shelf brawling, great throwbacks to the ROH matches and the single most convincing finish to an I Quit match pretty well ever.
(This ended with Jacobs using his railroad spike to stab Whitmer in the groin area repeatedly.)
Having King on commentary made it that much better, since it's exactly the sort of heated brawl that he'd work in the same situation and he manages to add that little extra touch with his commentary here, playing up that he's friends with both and concerned that they will literally murder one another in the ring. He knows exactly when to shut up as well, so yeah...a million billion stars for all of this.
(This is still possibly my indy match of the year so far.)
ROH: Take No Prisoners
I was bored and saw that the replay was on. I vaguely remember this being the show that Kingston debuted on, so I decided to order it. Sadly, King is edited out, but yeah...this is the first ROH I've watched in close to a year and I have to admit that I was kinda surprised as to how much I enjoyed the show. First half was so so, but the two matches that needed to carry the show did so in a big way.
-Claudio vs. Tyler Black vs Delirious vs. Shiozaki was decent, but I'll probably never get over my bias against the multi-man match. Lots of situations here that didn't make a ton of sense and had me rolling my eyes. Realistically, though, there's no way around it if you're going to book 4 guys in the same match. Some fun stuff with Claudio and Delirious, but not a match I'd go out of my way to watch again.
-Steen vs. Roddy is next. Pretty much what you'd expect from these two. Steen is such a great meatball dickhead. Roddy is generic as ever. But, uhh...he hits hard or something, so a lot of people dig him. Gotta love Steen..."WHO WANTS TO SEE HIM DIE!"
-Necro/Matthews vs. Briscoes earns a great big meh. Mark certainly does have a death wish, doesn't he. He bleeds quite the gusher here. Necro is probably the best brawler in the world right now, but this wasn't a good brawl. At all. I guess it was fun for the stunt show, watching dudes land on their head, unprotected chairshot crowd, but there was little flow and absolutely zero drama at all. So, the standard Briscoes match, I guess.
-Hangmen 3 get brought into the SnS fold. *yawn* Leads to Erick Stevens showing how big a moron he is, getting in Sweeney's face while totally ignoring the 5 other guys in the ring. Unfortunately, it also leads to Stevens vs. Albright. This wasn't actively bad or anything, but I almost fell asleep watching it. It was short, though, so props to ROH for at least making the crap easier to swallow.
-Pretty much loved the Davey/Romero vs Jig/Ruckus match. Really fun little tag sprint with a FANTASTIC crowd. It's saying something that I liked this, since Jig is the only one of the four that I can usually even stand. There were definitely some awkward moments, but the pace never slowed down and by the time you could dwell on something negative, they'd run through five other big spots. Not the style for everyone, but I personally find this sort of match fun from time to time. Jig looks pretty ridiculous sans mask and hell...even the name is meaningless at this point.
-I've always wondered what people saw in Austin Aries. Said time and time again that I just didn't "get" him. This might be the match that puts me on the path to being a fan. He and Danielson are absolutely fantastic here. Lots of really nifty matwork (with consequence) and even the lame headscissors sequence was palatable here.
-Main event is pretty great as well. Nigel had gotten pretty annoying when I was last watching ROH, but the heel turn definitely freshened him up and even the Lariat showcase we get here worked in context of the match. Crowd was going insane for Tyler's hope spots and Nigel was great in knowing exactly when to stuff his offense and take back control of the match. This is the first I've seen of the London Dungeon and the one at the end of the match looked absolutely sick. The arm really shouldn't bend in that particular direction. Was Tyler the first guy to kick out of the Jawbreaker? Half the crowd creamed themselves at that point.
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