Well, I needed a bit of a writing break to recharge my batteries and that pesky hurricane gave me little choice in the matter. Anyway, I’m back and I’m ready to finish what I’ve started. In other wrestling news, Rifftrax has released a new video on demand where they tackle the Jesse Ventura early 90’s movie Abraxas: Guardian of the Universe. It’s like a cross between Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Jack Kirby’s Fourth World, only completely and utterly boring. And with Jim Belushi as a principal only because the lead woman was his wife at the time!

Highly recommended.

Now back to the list.

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Sorry for the lateness. I was planning on finishing this baby up yesterday, but I was exhausted. Exhausted from MARKING! Why was I marking again? Oh yeah…

Right! Miz winning the title. Good times. But I’m sure I’ll be forgiven for finishing this list off a couple days late. Posting it on Thanksgiving sort of works, right? You’ll forgive me, won’t you, Miz Title Win Reaction Girl?

Oh. Never mind, then.

As for the PPV? I thought the first half was brilliant and the second half was below average. The Kane vs. Edge match especially. That’s a shame, since I like the angle.

Now for the top three Survivor Series!

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I am officially a day behind. The fatigue finally hit me, mainly due to real life scheduling and sleep sounded a lot better to me than writing about the Goodfather. I’m going to try to have the rest of this up before leaving to watch Sunday’s show, but I’m sure I’ll probably tap out and finish the last installment the day after despite my best efforts. Boy, I suck.

And speaking of people who suck, as well as Thanksgiving, I want to direct your attention to Luther Reigns. He’s a hoss from the mid-00’s who is featured in today’s update. For that, I bring you this clip, which features one of my favorite quotes in all wrestling.

He’s had peas before. That… That’s good to know, Luther. Thank you for sharing that.

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“Hello, everyone and Happy Thanksgiving. We are pleased to present to you one of the most prestigious events ever put together in the history of professional wrestling. Now, I know that you’re all full of it – Thanksgiving turkey, the dressing, the cranberry sauce, the apple pie – so just settle back in your favorite chair, because for the next three hours, you’ll be royally entertained by the superstars of the World Wrestling Federation.” – Gorilla Monsoon, November 26, 1987

Of the four big wrestling pay-per-views from the times before the WWE began putting on a show every third week, Survivor Series is always seen as being the runt of the litter. Wrestlemania is the grandest stage of them all. The Royal Rumble is the year’s most unpredictable and fun match, setting the course for the Road to Wrestlemania. Summerslam is considered to be the secondary Wrestlemania, taking place on the other side of the year. But Survivor Series? It’s just a gimmick show and only sometimes. It isn’t the place for the big closure-based showdowns. It isn’t where you’d usually choose to show off the climax to the biggest storyline of the year. There was even talk of ending the show completely for a while because the WWE brass consider it obsolete.

I decided to entertain the idea of doing a Survivor Series list the same way I covered the Royal Rumble matches and Wrestlemanias. It was an idea at first that I figured I would go with on a trial basis. If I wasn’t feeling it, I’d stop. The opposite happened. I really started to find that, yes, Survivor Series really does have its place in the WWE PPV pantheon. There are distinct advantages to the whole elimination match concept that really adds to the overall product that shouldn’t be discarded for the sake of another basic list of single matches that you can get at any generic PPV.

For the next eleven days, I’ll be counting down from the worst to the best. I’ll explain how I figured out the rankings in tomorrow’s update. I did find the research of this list more enjoyable than the Wrestlemania one. Wrestlemanias are so iconic and memorable that watching the shows gives you nothing new, as everything is written in stone by its importance. Survivor Series doesn’t have that to me. I’ve seen a good amount of these shows before, but there were some years where I flat-out skipped it and only read the results.

It really brings a level of fun surprise mixed with nostalgia when the shows start up. Whether it’s a show I’ve only heard about or haven’t seen in fifteen years, there’s a fun feeling when you go, “Oh, man! This is the Survivor Series with Chuck Norris doing absolutely nothing!” or, “This is the one where Orton’s team and Triple H’s team fight over who gets to control Raw for a month!”

Even with the lesser shows, I had a blast checking them out.

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Tonight we have what I guess would be considered the WWE’s third most important show of the year, Summerslam. I mean, on paper, it’s supposed to be the secondary Wrestlemania, but everyone and their imaginary friend loves Royal Rumble more. I look forward to the show despite the roadblocks it sets up. There are only six matches signed. One of these matches is a throwaway Divas match I couldn’t care less about. One of the championship matches is Rey Mysterio vs. Kane and while I love Kane and don’t mind Mysterio, I don’t need to be reminded of their abysmal, “Is he alive or is he dead?” feud.

So why am I so jazzed about the show? Team WWE vs. the Nexus in an elimination tag match. The Nexus has been one of the better wrestling storylines in past years, despite its own set of roadblocks (Daniel Bryan/Bryan Danielson being fired, Wade Barrett’s visa problems, Ricky Steamboat’s injury). I can only hope the storyline doesn’t get killed as of the end of Summerslam, yet at the same time, I don’t want them to last long enough to get destroyed by a returning Triple H. God, I really don’t want to see Triple H involved with this in any way.

For those new to the big main event, here it is laid out DC Comics style.

(click for bigger version)

Let’s see who we got on here…

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In a few days, the WWE’s latest show NXT ends its first season. This new experiment is reaching the end and I thought it would be a good idea to look back at this idea. The short of it is that I think NXT started out strong, got borderline unwatchable for a while, then started getting good again towards the end.

But looking a little deeper into it, I notice what a brilliant show it’s been, at least in concept. The concept of a mistake is an interesting one in wrestling because most of the time, you can only see it in hindsight. A lot of the time, the wrong aspect gets blamed and allows for the same mistake to be made again and again. That’s a lot of what makes TNA so sad, in that it’s run by Vince Russo, Eric Bischoff and Hulk Hogan – three guys who couldn’t own up to a mistake if their lives depended on it. Those who don’t understand history are doomed to repeat it and TNA is proving that right.

The WWE machine has the occasional ability to see what went wrong and modify it in future attempts. For instance, Vince McMahon had the idea of having a handicapped wrestler. He thought it would make for the ultimate underdog hero and hired Zach Gowen, a trained wrestler with only one leg. The “handicap = underdog” idea was sound, but the execution failed. Gowen wasn’t exactly the most threatening individual and his one-legged offense stretched the suspension of disbelief to the utmost breaking point. A short while later, the WWE tried the same concept, but made the handicap something that’s fictional to the man portraying the wrestler. Hence, Eugene, a mentally-challenged wrestler whose drawbacks only existed within the story. Despite some flaws (hotshot booking, writing themselves into a corner and the wrestler letting himself go), he was a bigger success than Gowen.

NXT is a big amalgamation of different WWE ideas into something new and mostly fun. You see aspects of what they were trying to go with the first time around, but they’ve improved their process. Let’s take a look.

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Just got back from CHIKARA’s King of Trios and I’m completely exhausted. I’ll do a little trip report of sorts later. For now, it’s panel time.

Amazing Spider-Man #628
Roger Stern, Lee Weeks, Mark Waid, Tom Peyer and Todd Nauck

American Vampire #2
Scott Snyder, Rafael Albuquerque, Stephen King and Rafael Albuquerque

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For today’s Tales of Wrestlemania profile, let’s go with Andre the Giant.

Wrestlemania 1: Andre battles and defeats Big John Studd with Andre’s very career on the line. In Studd’s corner is Bobby “The Brain” Heenan.

Wrestlemania 2: Andre continues to show his dominance by winning the big battle royal. Later, in the main event, Heenan’s acquisition King Kong Bundy fails to defeat Hogan for the title.

Wrestlemania 3: Andre and Heenan have joined forces to get the title off Hogan. Andre loses the match. Once again, Heenan has failed.

Wrestlemania 4: Andre has a rematch with Hogan, though this time represented by Ted Dibiase. Andre succeeds in taking Hogan out of the tournament, but when he tries to take out Savage, Hogan appears to strike him down. Also at this show, Jake Roberts has a match with Rick Rude that starts a feud between Jake and the Heenan Family.

Wrestlemania 5: Andre is back with Heenan and is going after Jake Roberts. Big John Studd is the referee. Andre is disqualified and chased off by Jake, giving Studd some face closure in their rivalry.

Wrestlemania 6: Andre and Haku are the tag champs. They lose the belts to Demolition and Heenan has had enough. Ever since turning heel, Andre has yet to get a victory at Wrestlemania. Heenan slaps Andre and sets him off.

Wrestlemania 7: Andre is too broken down to wrestle, but he does show up to help Big Boss Man fight the Heenan Family. After helping clear the area of Mr. Perfect, Haku and the Barbarian, Andre gives some words of encouragement to Boss Man and effectively passes the torch before moving on.

Has kind of an Anakin Skywalker ring to it.

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