Re: Extreme Championship Wrestling 2001- To Survive and Prosper
Before I kick off, just wanted to say that I’m honoured to be your first proper review. Especially since you’ve shot me a few in my own thread already.
TLS ECW Review: Hardcore TV 9/1/01
Opening Promo: Joey in the ring was always a lock to start, following a video package. Not sure I was totally down with him announcing the whole card though. A lot of the ECW charm was in matches just happening at random.
C.W. Anderson vs. Tony Mamaluke: Loved your descriptions of them as you brought them to the ring. Really brought it to life. This was a really great match, the psychology was extremely sound throughout and again, you brought it to life with a combination of some good adjectives and syntax. My one minor gripe is that the delayed vertical came a little too early in the match. But that’s cool.
New Impact Players Promo: Now, Corino and Credible were never going to be as great as the original Impact Players line-up, but you did a really great job with them in this segment. Every piece of dialogue was realistic and you achieved the rare feat of getting both Francine and Jack Victory right. Props for your Corino, too. His ECW promos are rarely written well, even if people get the general gist across. Kudos to you, son.
Loving the Looney Toons ending, too.
Kid Kash & Super Crazy vs. Danny Doring & Roadkill: Again, your set-up is brilliant here. You set the scene so well that even an ECW virgin would’ve been able to get into it. The psychology here was lacking a bit, which normally would irritate me, but then I’m not sure this match would’ve been all that psychologically sound in real life anyway. It was just lacking something that I can‘t put my finger on. Will let you know if I do. A good effort, but I know you can do better.
Chris Chetti vs. Nova: Impromptu match. Fuck yeah! This is what I was talking about. Nova promo was solid, you got the history across far better than anyone cared about at the time anyway when you dropped the Chetti promo. It was nice to see you explain the angle and further it. The fact that you’ve picked up where Paul E. left off is a huge credit to you. Loved the Hot Commodity cameo. EXACTLY the kind of spineless bullshit that Chris Chetti would’ve pulled. And the cover was an unnecessary act to rub salt in the wound.
Paul London vs. Rob Van Dam: Not sure how I feel about London debuting in ECW at this stage in his career. Might be a bit soon, especially when you could’ve used an indy flyer already in the company in this role, like Michael Shane. But I liked the Joey Styles build-up and intro to him. The match itself was spotty, crazy and fucking brilliant. You, my son, just won yourself a nomination in the awards.
Pulp Fiction: Well, you know I love some Pulp Fiction goodness, and I know you love some Pulp Fiction goodness. We both love Pulp Fiction goodness and everybody loves Pulp Fiction goodness. Fuck it’s like a 2002 DDP promo up in here. Anyway…
Your formatting here is awesome. It’s made me seriously think about how I’m going to write mine from now on. I was wary of writing too much action/location stuff but you’ve shown it can work. Good work! Now I just have to figure out how to review this bitch.
The NIP/Rhino segment was pretty awesome. Again, totally believable, buying everything. York and Matthews with a rare promo was a nice surprise. Joey always was a better talker than Christian, IMO, so it would’ve been better to reverse the roles here. But no biggy. CW in the centre of an empty arena intrigues me. Are we gonna get an empty arena match at Cyberslam? Because that would be insane, especially between CW and Dreamer.
Not buying the Sinister Minister promo. I’m not sure he’d have gone so far as to pick on Roadkill. Not his style at all. The minister preys on the weak. He’d have torn into Doring, but not Roadkill, I don’t think. It was also a little more preachy than I remember. I’m fairly sure Mitchell was more ‘sinister’ than ‘minister’ at this point.
HYPE CENTRAL~! Is all I’m saying. Lance Wright mark out moment. Nice continuation of the Rhino/NIP spot too.
Simon has a problem… and Swinger is the solution. You have no idea how happy that makes me. Just… shit eating grin. This is gonna be awesome.
The Minister continues and Tajiri & Whipwreck are the highlight as usual. So is the hooker. Just pure, raw comedy. Unbelievably good, and I genuinely LOL’d.
Again, I love hw you make characters sound just right. Cyrus is pissed about losing the network job, and I buy that. And Jerry Lynn… I’d almost forgotten that he could promo once upon a time.
Corino and Credible still at it, although now getting killed by Rhino, but Balls for the save?!?! I’m guessing he’s got gold on his mind but concrete to the spine. I pictured the Gore and wished I hadn’t. Absolutely epic way to end the show. This feud has me excited already.
Overall: Just immense. I can’t believe it’s taken you four years to unleash this. You’re one hell of a talented writer, this is one of the best shows I’ve ever read. Probably THE best ECW I’ve ever read. Consider that nomination number two, for the record.
Everything about this was right (Well, apart from the shit I already pointed out) but it was the subtle touches that really set it off. The descriptions of entrances and crowd reactions, the disclaimer at the beginning, LANCE WRIGHT~!
Yeah. Loving this. McLovin this, in fact. I’ll be back for the next show. And the next one. And the next one. Keep it up dude! I’m with you 100%
|