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If I didn’t watch wrestling…
Much has been said about wrestling companies wanting to reach a bigger audience. The problem with that is they don’t seem to understand that to get a bigger audience, their product should be interesting to people who don’t normally watch it so they want to watch again. Bearing that in mind, I wonder what people who have never watched wrestling would think about this week’s shows. It might go something like this…
Monday Night Raw
Wow, the GM opened the show by introducing Brock Lesnar as a “legitimate athlete” and “the man who will bring legitimacy back to the WWE.” Nothing like telling your TV audience that what they normally watch is a bunch of fake, goofy bullcrap.
You can tell just by the way they’re talking and the way they set up the opening segment that they’re hoping the buzz from the Brock Lesnar return got them some extra views tonight and they’re trying to take advantage of those curious fans by giving them a really good “legitimate-looking” opening segment to get them hooked.
However, why oh why did they follow up such a hot opening segment with a solid half hour of complete crap featuring “The Funkasaurus” (complete with dinosaur fun facts from the announcers and discussion about what type of dinosaur they would be), a guy talking to himself as he walked to the ring, and a short, goofy Italian guy looking for The Three Stooges in a box? Is this their idea of the WWE being “legitimate” again? Or is this their way of trying to tell the curious fans tuning in to see Brock Lesnar that their fake, goofy bullcrap is just as good as that “legitimate” stuff?
Oh nevermind, I take that back. They just showed some fat white guy who’s pretending to be Japanese win a match by referee stoppage, which is what sometimes happens in UFC. So now it’s legitimate for reals.
Oh great, a second God-awful Three Stooges segment. And the crowd is completely crapping all over it. I’m guessing by now any new eyeballs they might’ve gotten with Brock Lesnar have already lost interest.
I like how in his backstage interview Brock commented on how he left the WWE and went to the UFC, conveniently leaving out his hilariously bad attempt to getting in to the NFL, where he was most well known for cheap-shotting Trent Green in the pre-season and being referred to by the Vikings as “a project with a capital P.”
This lawyer guy spending a ridiculous amount of time posing in the middle of his main event match also strikes me as not being very legitimate.
I’m amazed. The first fifteen minutes of this show were really good, and almost everything on the show was so bad it was just about unwatchable. If they were hoping to get some people to tune in to see Brock Lesnar, they missed a huge opportunity.
Friday Night Smackdown
Is it just me or do people who use the phrase “blast from the past” tend to fit their own definition of it?
So the Viper guy only sees his dad when the legends are invited to WWE TV shows? Damn, and to think my mom complains about me not seeing her enough.
And then the Viper guy’s dad needed to put on his eyeglasses to see his son’s match on an oversized screen that was about three inches from his face. See much?
I realize the breakup segment last week was probably sort of importantish, but did they really need to replay it three times this week?
Did the loud announcer really just make fun of the announcer with the dreadlocks for taking notes with a pencil and paper instead of an I-pad? I’m writing my notes with a pencil and paper, does that make me a “blast from the past” too?
Wow, the two Mexicans guy just got beat the hell up by two guys who have to be on the wrong side of 60. They’re going nowhere.
Nothing like your world champion telling his (albeit very old) tag team partner that they don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell in their main event match. That’s some inspiring confidence from a champion.
IMPACT Wrestling
So if the old guy’s team loses on Sunday, and as a result he isn’t allowed to use his last name anymore, how is he supposed to sign his paychecks or do his taxes?
So there’s a big PPV on Sunday and throughout most of the show the two big stories they’re spending most of their time on is the old guy feuding with his kid and the steel cage wedding between the manly woman and the little lumberjacking-looking guy?
Wow, entrance videos for weddings, why didn’t I think of that for my wedding?
Do the people writing this show realize that at real weddings they stopped asking for objections a long time ago?
Wow, I feel really special watching this steel cage wedding with everyone taking their clothes off for no apparent reason.
I don’t get it, they bleep the word “ass” on this show, but then they showed a video where the Cowboy guy says on Sunday “the bullsh*t is over” and they didn’t bleep it. Then later on in his faceoff with the champion they both said “bullsh*t” and it got bleeps both times. I’m very confused.
This main event faceoff might actually be better than the Brock Lesnar stuff from RAW.
Speaking of RAW, it and IMPACT were like each other’s evil twin this week. RAW had that really good opening segment surrounded by nothing but ridiculous bullcrap the rest of the show, and IMPACT had that ridiculous bullcrap steel cage wedding segment surrounded by pretty good stuff the rest of the show.
Ring of Honor Wrestling
I’m glad the announcers are taking the time to thank the fans watching on the Sinclair stations in the Dayton, Ohio market (which I am), but it would be nice if the Sinclair stations in the Dayton, Ohio market actually started the show at its’ scheduled time instead of started it 10 or so minutes early so those of us they’re thanking are actually able to watch the beginning of the show.
This match with the guy faking an injury was really good, but I have a hard time taking it seriously when one guy looks like Pauly Shore with a ripoff of the MTV logo on his tights, and the other has a ridiculous swirl in his hair and acts like an obnoxious caricature of a human being.
This fake press conference is REALLY cheesy, but the old guy cussing made me laugh so it’s ok.
The Final Verdict
Based on this week’s shows and this week’s shows only:
I would be MOST likely to tune in next week to watch IMPACT Wrestling.
I would be LEAST likely to tune in next week to watch Friday Night Smackdown.
Running Total Score:
Monday Night Raw: 4 Most 3 Least
Friday Night Smackdown: 1 Most 5 Least
IMPACT! Wrestling: 6 Most 1 Least
Ring of Honor Wrestling: 0 Most 2 Least
