8 NXT Rookies; 1 Dream
June 9th, 2010 by Gavok | Tags: bryan danielson, darren young, david otunga, heath slater, john cena, justin gabriel, michael tarver, nwo, nxt, skip sheffield, wade barrett, wrestling, wweQuite a bit has happened since I last wrote about NXT. We had the season finale, which came across as rather strange and anticlimactic at first, only to be retroactively interesting based on recent events. Wade Barrett is the favorite to win the entire night with virtually everyone agreeing that he’s the most well-rounded of the finalists. When the NXT losers are interviewed in the crowd, even Darren Young – the one who had something resembling a feud with Barrett – sings his praises. As if hinting you with a swerve and swerving that swerve, there is no twist and Barrett is voted over both Justin Gabriel and David Otunga.
Then six days pass. On last Monday’s Raw, Barrett gives a seemingly generic, yet somewhat enigmatic interview about how the winds of changing and how something big is about to go down. The main event is John Cena vs. CM Punk as voted by the fans (which came off as the best choice, though you just know the company was hoping Cena would fight Mysterio or Swagger). Barrett arrives for what appears to be your usual spot where the heel messes with the champ as a way to informally challenge him and psyche him out. Then we see this…
…and all bets are off. What follows is the coolest 15 minutes of WWE action in years. Please don’t fuck it up, wrestling writer guys. Please don’t fuck it up.
With the fan discussion that’s followed, there’s been a lot of fun things to come out of the NXT/John Cena beatdown. There are a bevy of nWo parodies, like this one done by Renaissance Spam. Also came the Tubedubber mash-ups with this one by Gonz being my favorite. Give it a minute or so to get going, but the Otunga/ref punch syncs perfectly.
My favorite fan response has come from a guy by the name of Jerusalem. He’s a guy I know from Something Awful’s forum, in this case more specifically the Wrestlehut 2K sub-forum. The guy is witty, a class act all the way and always goes the extra distance by making animated gifs based on just about every wrestling show that doesn’t have the stink of Vince Russo’s never-ending failure.
With the NXT Invasion segment, Jerusalem made a bunch of gifs, but added a little extra. I very much dug his text-based mash-up and thought I’d share it with the rest of you. Enjoy.
What it is ain’t exactly clear
There’s a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to beware
I think it’s time we stop, children, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
There’s battle lines being drawn
Nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong
Young people speaking their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind
I think it’s time we stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
What a field-day for the heat
A thousand people in the street
Singing songs and carrying signs
Mostly say, hooray for our side
It’s time we stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you’re always afraid
You step out of line, the man come and take you away
We better stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
Stop, hey, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
Stop, now, what’s that sound
Everybody look what’s going down
Stop, children, what’s that sound
Striker totally deserved it, too. That patronizing, mic-stealing dickweed.
Similar Posts:
- WWE’s NXT: Outside of the Box and Refined
- Summerslam for Comic Fans
- This Week in Panels: Week 68
- This Week in Panels: Week 93
- The Genesis of the Countdown of the Top WWE NXT Eliminations
I’m completely unfamiliar with wrestling, but it looks like the competing rookies joined forces to launch some kind of dramatic coup?
@LaterComments: That’s the way it looks right now. Barrett, who appears to be the ringleader as he was the one who one the competition, is guaranteed a championship match at a Pay Per View anyway, but it seems like he and the other rookies took Cena out as a way to eliminate the man who was both the champion, and the man who was most likely to win at the PPV in two weeks.
@LaterComments: Basically, NXT was this fake reality show based on 8 Rookies being paired with 8 Pros (established WWE wrestlers) to be taught how to make it as a star on the WWE roster. It started off as having the guys show their stuff and evolve through wrestling matches, but then it devolved into stupid, demeaning contests like who can carry a keg and run around the ring in the shortest amount of time and other things that had nothing to do with their talents. Some felt that their Pros weren’t there for them and one was pissed because he legitimately has more experience as a wrestler than his assigned Pro. Seven are either voted off by the Pros or dismissed for stupid reasons.
The decisive winner is Wade Barrett and he’s awarded both a WWE contract and a title shot against whoever he wants. This whole segment is showing that all the rookies have indeed joined forces, but it isn’t just about taking out the champ. They take out the referee, the commentators and other employees. They tear up the ring and furniture. They beat up that masked guy CM Punk (one of the Pros), who even tries to save Cena despite being a bad guy.
So it’s one big “Fuck you, WWE!” statement and it’s awesome.
@Gavok: Great NXT summary. The few episodes of NXT were highly regarded by the fans, but by the time the keg races started, it had slipped down a few notches in their eyes. Nonetheless, it still made for a dramatically different wrestling program, given its finite storylines that ended at the conclusion of the show’s season. The dramatic development on the three-hour Raw was shocking. However, with wrestler’s desperate to maintain their spots and the inevitable intrusion of backstage politics, my biggest fear is that this super-hot angle, which has started with as much flash and promise as the debut of the original nWo could quickly devolve into the next version of the Alliance, which also started hot, but quickly fizzled out.
Making the first 2-hours and 45-minutes of the program almost unwatchable, if that was indeed the plan, was a brilliant move as well. It made the main segment that much better, vindicating those that stuck around for the finale.
Because MAN…Santino and Koslov dancing really strained my watching ability, lemme tell ya. But the point is, I am intrigued about the NXT Stable (notice their matching armbands), more than I’ve been intrigued about anything in wrestling since Hogan & Bischoff took-over TNA, and I’m PRAYING this ends-up better than THAT particular abortion.
Yeah the earlier stuff in this Raw sucked. Well, except for Kozlov winning the dance-off. That was AWESOME.
Notice how Michael Cole gets away squeaky clean from the announce table. OMG mastermind!
***
The pic of Tarver before he jumps the barricade is so going to be a “YOU GONNA GET RAPED” image macro.
Notice that Tarver FINALLY got to use his 1.9 second punch.
And now Danielson’s been “fired”. This is the best story of all time and has turned every single person into a 12 year old kid again.
We are working the internet..
And we have just begun…
You don’t need those quotes when you say that. Dude’s really gone.
Fuck Mattel and fuck the WWE for being a bunch of pussies.
So what, this happened less than a week ago, but by the time I hear about and read this post, they’ve already fucked it up? Bravo. It takes real skill to ruin good ideas that quickly.
What happened with Mattel? They get pissed because that dude changed his name? All I know about NXT is what you wrote in your other post.
I call work: the biggest work in wrestling history.
Come on, Cena making a huge twitter diatribe about the guy and kayfabing it to boot?
@Schide: See that gif of Bryan choking the ring announcer with his tie? Word is that someone major with a lot of pull (either part of Linda McMahon’s Senate campaign or Mattel) thought it was overly violent and wanted something done. Though other takes on it are that there’s an unspoken rule in the company about strangling based on Chris Benoit’s murder/suicide. Either way, it’s bullshit.
As it is right now, there are camps on either side who believe that it’s either for real or a really complex storyline move.
@Psychoblue: The Cena thing is an interesting development. I still think the whole situation is a shoot, but that part gave the work argument a huge benefit of the doubt. I went from 95% sure to 70%. At the very least, the Twitter tirade is good for either side.
If he was saying it because it’s a work, then it means Bryan was never fired and I’d be so happy to be so wrong.
If he was saying it because it’s a shoot, then it means there is a LOT of locker room support for Bryan. Considering Bryan hasn’t spoken out about the situation, it means that he isn’t too bitter to ever return and he isn’t burning his bridges. All you need is enough angry fans in the crowd (like when Matt Hardy was fired) and his quick return is a total lock.
This is from Meltzer as of 4:30 PM
“Regarding the Bryan Danielson situation, it’s best to assume it’s a work. May not be, but work or shoot, the way it was handled at this point makes no sense. If they went to the extent they did to make it an elaborate work, why give it away two days later as opposed to waiting for the moment on TV? If he really was fired, by this point there would be an explanation as to who exactly complained. With the inability to pinpoint it, the story starts to make less sense. If there was a rule violation, it wasn’t something to be fired over and why was it shot because even if he didn’t know, the director should. It may just be WWE trying to get its characters over on Twitter, given the doctrine for the guys to all get accounts.”
Vince McMahon must be marking out because he’s finally pulled one over on Meltzer to a point where even he has no idea what is going on and he’ll just have to watch tonight like everyone else. The Dirt Sheet Gods have become mere mortals.