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Official DVD/Match/Show Discussion Thread

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#1 ·
#362 · (Edited)
Royal Rumble 2012

Daniel Bryan vs Mark Henry vs Big Show Steel Cage Match

I didn't see this match when I first watched the PPV (just missed it on my stream), and to be honest, I felt like I didn't miss much. I saw **-** 1/2 ratings for this match, and that was about it. So I turned it on, not expecting much, but this actually exceeded my expectations. Sure, it only comes in at 9 minutes, but just like the WM 22 main event, that's all it needs to be a good match.

The story here is simple, how will Bryan (a tweener at this point), survive the two monsters. Show and Henry continue their great chemistry here, while Bryan flies around and does a majority of the selling and work, which is a fantastic thing. They keep the story solid throughout, with Bryan trying to take the easy way out. I LOVE the ending as it was so unexpected and made alot of people say "was that supposed to happen?". I wish it had to be 5-10 minutes longer, as this could have been a borderline **** match, but nonetheless....

***

Bella Twins/Natalya/Beth Phoenix vs Tamina/Eve/Kelly Kelly/Fox

Completely standard Divas filler tag match here, although it is quite decent by today's standards. Eve does her standard offense, the Bella Twins suck at normal moves such as chinlocks (as usual), Beth looks like a monster heel, but Kelly gets an awesome dive to the outside. Decent, only about five minutes long, just filler really.

**

John Cena vs Kane

I wasn't expecting much from this match either, but Cena ALWAYS seems to deliver a decent match on PPV (well, most of the time, depending on the circumstances), and this was no different. The trouble coming into this match was the booking: how could both Cena and Kane come out of the match looking strong (Or atleast not looking weak).

The answer is simple: make the ending a double countout. Yeah that's how the match ended, but before that, this match was your standard messy brawl, with some stiff shots from both men (remarkable, given Cena has to main event mania), but that's what makes this match work. Kane looks like an absolute monster here, while Cena dosen't look weak. This is more about the angle than the match itself, which led to a great blowoff match at Elimination Chamber. All in all though, this match was a good, messy brawl, with a good story and no real direction. Average.

** 1/2

Drew Mcintyre vs Brodus Clay

What can I say about this ? A squash match, complete with many jiggles and dancing from the Funkasaurus himself. One simple question though: Why does it have to be Drew ? I mean, this guy has a decent amount of talent, am I right ? And he gets fed to Brodus Clay ? REALLY ? I obviously can't rate it because it's a minute long, but it's really just pointless filler.

NO RATING

CM Punk vs Dolph Ziggler

Laurinitis is special referee(on the outside),Here we go. Punk getting huge pops here, while this match starts off more mat based then alot of other Punk matches that I've seen. Fast paced here, as both men exchange sleepers, false finish attempts, and dives. Both Punk and Dolph take some really stiff looking bumps on the ropes here. The psychology is solid, as Ziggler is being the annoying little "show-off", while Punk is just looking for his opening to unload.

These two have some really good chemistry, as this match is moving along quite nicely. Ziggler and Punk both sell like champs here, making each other's punches,kicks, and various other basic moves look lethal. At the climax of the match however, the pace slows down, as it becomes more of a ref bump/storyline based match, with Punk beating Ziggler THREE times with Laurinitis's back turned. Not sure if that was the route to go, as it makes Dolph look INCREDIBLY weak. However, Dolph gets the counter of the night, a GTS into a fame-asser. Great false finish. GTS ends this. If the whole "Laurinitis" story wasn't involved in this match, I'm willing to bet it would have been a classic. Nevertheless, it is still awesome, and shows what can happen if you put two world-class workers in the same ring.

*** 3/4

Royal Rumble Match

Miz starts us off here, a pretty good choice, but does Alex Riley have to start this off too? Really ? Cody Rhodes enters at 4, so now we have our two ironmen of the match, Miz and Rhodes. One of my personal favorites, R-Truth, gets eliminated rather quickly by Miz, a bad move IMO. Here is the problem with this rumble: after Cody Rhodes enters at number 4, the next wrestler that could even be considered to win the rumble, is Dolph Ziggler, who enters at number EIGHTEEN. I'm sorry, but that is a HUGE number of jobbers, mid-carders, and comedy acts, but not enough talent to sustain a Royal Rumble match.

Mid-way we get a painfully unfunny comedy portion of the Rumble featuring Mick Foley and Santino, which goes on WAY too long. I mean, damn, this takes up a good 5-10 minutes of the total rumble. Okay, even I will admit, The Ricardo Rodriguez imitating Alberto Del Rio is PRICELESS, but Foley looks old, slow, and horrible out there. Spot of the rumble goes to Kofi's handstand, while not quite as good as Jo-Mo's spot last year, it is damn impressive.

All 3 announcers enter the Rumble, which is a unique gimmick. Never cared too much for Lawler or Cole's appearances, but seeing Booker T is always a treat, so is a rare Kharma appearance. The surprise entrants were REALLY lackluster this year. Hacksaw Jim Duggan and Road Dogg ? really ? I understand they got big pops, but is that honestly the best WWE can do ? Was D'lo Brown or Gangrel not available or something ? Sheamus's entry finally gets the rumble to heat up.

By the time Orton makes his entrance, the Rumble finally starts to feel like the Rumble... AT NUMBER 28, took them long enough didn't it ? Jericho then enters, leaving a completely anti-climatic Big Show appearance at number 30. Seriously, that was extremely lackluster. The way Show just throws Miz, Cody, And Ziggler out of the Rumble makes me kind of sick. You have three extremely bright young superstars, and you have them eliminated by BIG SHOW ? Couldn't have given them to Sheamus or someone ? Anyways this is moving along rather quickly now, as the final four are Show, Orton, Jericho, and Sheamus.

Orton and Show are gone faster then you can say "Cornish Hens" as the final two in the rumble are Jericho and Sheamus. What proceeds to happen is one of the most climatic finishes in Rumble history. Seriously, this ending is AWESOME, second only to the 07 ending IMO. Sheamus wins after a hard fought ending. So here's a summary: Too many jobbers and pointless cameos, Cody/Ziggler/Miz were the workhorses, the number 30 spot was lackluster, the comedy portion was terrible, but the last 15 minutes of this are AWESOME. This rumble was GOOD, but not one of the best, not even close. Entertaining enough.

***

Thoughts

The Royal Rumble PPV and the quality of it, boils down to the Rumble match itself. While the Rumble match was a step down from the last few years, it still managed to be a good encounter, mainly due to the ending. Still, with two GREAT championship matches, a messy Cena brawl, and some filler, you can't go WRONG by watching this show. There are a TON of better shows out there, but if you have some time watch this. It's worth a buy if you are a Punk, Ziggler, Bryan, Sheamus, or just a RUMBLE fan in general.

7/10
 
#363 ·
Need to give that a watch. (Y)

I ended watching XX last night and I think I'm gonna watch 21 tonight. The show itself certainly dragged except the Lesnar/Goldberg match is actually so dreadful it's entertaining.
21 is a pretty solid show overall. It's amazing how much it contrasts with 20. 20's flaw is a weak undercard and midcard with the HHH/Benoit/HBK match being the saving grace along with Eddie/Angle albeit to a lesser extent. The card is a bit overloaded too although some of it had to do with it being a 5 hour show. 21 has a great undercard and midcard but I don't think the main event championship matches were any good although obviously they were bound to happen with the direction they were heading in trying to establish Cena and Batista as the stars of RAW and SD, respectively. I wish Lita wasn't injured at the time period because we could've got a classic Divas match instead of a weaksauce in Trish/Christy with Trish carrying the match most of the way. Good thing it was a short bout. Orton/Taker, MITB, Eddie/Rey and Angle/HBK are all great matches though. There's a cool segment with Austin/Piper/Carlito in there as well.
 
#364 ·
WM21 was a great WrestleMania when looking back on it. There was some very high quality matches with HBK\Angle, Eddie\Rey, Orton\Undertaker and the MITB. There was also some entertaining segments with JBL\HHH backstage and Carlito\Austin\Pipper. The main event matches is what keeps a lot of people from calling it a GREAT ppv but I still look at both those main event matches in a positive light due to the impact it had on the business. HHH and JBL played there heel roles perfectly and it's amazing to look back on not only how entertaining those guys were but how dominate as well. I like the fact that they both had there own stables with Evolution and The Cabinet. Both heels were established as two guys who can kick your ass but at the same time will show there true cowardly side when met there match (Cena & Batista). WWE should look back on this PPV and realize that you must book heels very strongly and give them long title reigns such as JBL and HHH if you want to establish babyface stars.

HHH and JBL were two of the top four greatest heels in the last decade along with Jericho and Edge. That's why I look back on WrestleMania 21 and even with the lack of quality within the main event matches, it still surved its purpose. HHH and JBL had everything to do with John Cena and Batista breaking into the two biggest stars since Austin\Rock and that was because they were able to establish dominate heels. It's pathetic how one dimensional WWE books there heels currently and I really don't understand why they don't use the same logic they used with WrestleMania 21. Creating new babyface stars comes with establishing dominate heels. They would rather go the much lazier route in having Sheamus just squash everybody that falls in his way ultimately taking the title off the exact opposite of what JBL and HHH were. People are not going to be able to actually get behind Sheamus and cheer for him to take the belt off such an unconvincing heel in Daniel Bryan.
 
#367 ·
Triple H(C) vs Randy Orton: Wrestlemania 25

For the last 3 years, as a HHH mark, all I have heard is how shitty this match was, so I figured FUCK IT and decided to give it a watch. The results were mindblowing. This is NOT a bad wrestling match, as the slow pace works, there are some absolutely sick shots out there, some good counters, and some good false finishes. This match fails in people's eyes for a few reasons.

First of all, the psychology was a little fucked. This should have been a crazy/fast paced brawl ala Rock/Austin WM 17, with TONS of run ins and false finishes. I understand some people's points when they say that. Secondly, HHH going over really pissed alot of people off about this match, but honestly, how does that have anything to do with the match itself ? It DOES'NT. Thirdly, It's the main event of Wrestlemania, and the finish was about as anticlimatic as you can get. I get that idea as well.

But if you take this match out of the context in which it is placed, and view it as a random individual match, this was pretty good. The stiffness towards the end, with HHH taking the backdrop on the table and the DDT on the floor, plus the finishers at the beginning of the match really does it for me. I can understand why some people hate this match, but to say that HHH does'nt put people over is ridiculous. He lost at FOUR straight Wrestlemania's in a row. Swap this match on the card with HBK-Taker or even the Triple Threat match, and this DOUBLES in value. Good match with some awesome moves, with it's flaw being where it takes place, and it's FUCKED psychology.

*** 1/4
 
#368 ·
I mark for 98-end WCW too, mainly because I LOVED WCW as a kid when I first started watching wrestling back in 98 when I was 9 yrs old. My dad used to work really late, and would get home around 4 or 5am, and he would watch the re-run of Nitro that came on Tuesday morning with me and my brother before we would go to school. Just good memories that take me back. That is why I will buy anything WCW related that gets put out, Best of Nitro, Rise and Fall, ANYTHING idc.

With that said, I notice some of you on here have made top 100 lists of WCW matches, I don't get into any of that stuff in depth like that with ranking as I think it's impossible to have be all end all list as ratings with some matches will fluctuate on repeat watch.

Anyway, without me having to look through all the lists, did any of you guys rank the Benoit/DDP match from SuperBrawl 8? One of my favorite WCW matches with ease, but I am a DDP mark. Still a ****+ match imo, great back and forth, both guys looked great, and it had great pacing with the right amount of time. If anyone hasn't seen this, I highly recommend you do.

I wish DDP didn't get stuck Kanyon and Bigelow, and involved with the whole Arquette BS. He was really over in 97-98 and had some solid matchups. I would've loved to seen him in longer feuds with other talent than some of the guys he did. He still had some great matches, the Havoc match with Goldberg I have at ****, the SuperBrawl 8 match with Benoit mentioned above at ****, had a good feud with Savage in 97, had a great 3 way dance with Benoit/Raven at Uncensored that I'd give *** 1/2 - ****, followed with a good cage match against Raven at another PPV (can't recall atm), but it's ***+, and a Heavyweight Championship against Sting on Nitro in 99 I believe it was that I'd go *** 3/4 - ****.

Very capable worker for his age, had a good gimmick and was charasmatic enough to get over and stay over, and worked well heel or face. Having the company ran by a bunch of idiots hurt him in the long run (as it did with mostly everyone not named Nash), but I sure would've loved to see him used better towards his end in WCW, and his whole run in WWF/E. I believe he could've had more ****+ matches had he worked with other capable workers. One of my favorite wrestlers ever.
Any of you who made WCW all time lists, did DDP/Benoit from Superbrawl make the cut? Sorry to quote myself, but I'd like to here others opinion on the match/DDP if they've seen it. If not, you should check it out! You can find it on youtube.
 
#369 ·
Triple H(C) vs Randy Orton: Wrestlemania 25

For the last 3 years, as a HHH mark, all I have heard is how shitty this match was, so I figured FUCK IT and decided to give it a watch. The results were mindblowing. This is NOT a bad wrestling match, as the slow pace works, there are some absolutely sick shots out there, some good counters, and some good false finishes. This match fails in people's eyes for a few reasons.

First of all, the psychology was a little fucked. This should have been a crazy/fast paced brawl ala Rock/Austin WM 17, with TONS of run ins and false finishes. I understand some people's points when they say that. Secondly, HHH going over really pissed alot of people off about this match, but honestly, how does that have anything to do with the match itself ? It DOES'NT. Thirdly, It's the main event of Wrestlemania, and the finish was about as anticlimatic as you can get. I get that idea as well.

But if you take this match out of the context in which it is placed, and view it as a random individual match, this was pretty good. The stiffness towards the end, with HHH taking the backdrop on the table and the DDT on the floor, plus the finishers at the beginning of the match really does it for me. I can understand why some people hate this match, but to say that HHH does'nt put people over is ridiculous. He lost at FOUR straight Wrestlemania's in a row. Swap this match on the card with HBK-Taker or even the Triple Threat match, and this DOUBLES in value. Good match with some awesome moves, with it's flaw being where it takes place, and it's FUCKED psychology.

*** 1/4
This exactly! I watched it today for the first time since it was live, and I actually really enjoyed the match. Kayfabe wise it makes a ton of sense for HHH to go over. The match isn't an all time classic or anything, but it's very enjoyable. I don't even think it had to be a no dq, brawl type match, the stipulation makes complete sense in hindsight. For months Orton made Triple Hs life a living hell, disgraced his family, had him backed up into a corner and there was nothing he could do to keep his championship. In essence he out smarted the "cerebral assassin" and he was going to win. I would call this a great match honestly if the finish wasn't so poorly booked and anti-climatic.
 
#370 ·
Any of you who made WCW all time lists, did DDP/Benoit from Superbrawl make the cut? Sorry to quote myself, but I'd like to here others opinion on the match/DDP if they've seen it. If not, you should check it out! You can find it on youtube.
Everyone really liked it including myself. I'm really not sure what a guy could say negatively about that match. First struggles were great, and the near-fall sections had pretty excellent climactic build. They should have a had a big World Title match in mid-99.

I really liked DDP in anything I watched from him. I slept on the guy for a couple of years but I wound going 360 to my original opinion on him being really fucking good on multiple nights instead of having a one-hit wonder match with Savage at GAB.
 
#371 ·
Speaking of DDP, boy he was a pain listening to on the latest Legends of Wrestling roundtable on celebrities. His love with Karl Malone was very irritating and you could tell the other guys were not interested. I hope he doesn't come on again. Also the quietest I've heard Michael Hayes speak.

I wished that they get some actual legends on the show like Harley Race or Ricky Steamboat.
 
#372 ·
Any of you who made WCW all time lists, did DDP/Benoit from Superbrawl make the cut? Sorry to quote myself, but I'd like to here others opinion on the match/DDP if they've seen it. If not, you should check it out! You can find it on youtube.
That match made it to #68 on the final list :). I had it at #49. Really great match, the third highest Benoit match on my list and 4th highest DDP match on my list.
 
#373 ·
Speaking of DDP, boy he was a pain listening to on the latest Legends of Wrestling roundtable on celebrities. His love with Karl Malone was very irritating and you could tell the other guys were not interested. I hope he doesn't come on again. Also the quietest I've heard Michael Hayes speak.

I wished that they get some actual legends on the show like Harley Race or Ricky Steamboat.
I was going to watch the families one today but decided against it. Last one I watch was "historic moments" or something. Flair was on it and he came off sort of, IDK, jerky, I guess. Foley was seated next to him and whenever they'd be talking to each other it'd feel uncomfortable.

I need a really interesting one to watch that I haven't. 'Heatseekers' is probably my personal favourite one. Or whichever one has Dusty Rhodes trying to pronounce "hurricanrana" as "hoomacarata." Dusty's the best.
 
#374 ·
I was going to watch the families one today but decided against it. Last one I watch was "historic moments" or something. Flair was on it and he came off sort of, IDK, jerky, I guess. Foley was seated next to him and whenever they'd be talking to each other it'd feel uncomfortable.

I need a really interesting one to watch that I haven't. 'Heatseekers' is probably my personal favourite one. Or whichever one has Dusty Rhodes trying to pronounce "hurricanrana" as "hoomacarata." Dusty's the best.
I watched the Significant Moments one with Flair and Foley on it recently. Flair acted like a complete egotistical cunt, and was worse any time Foley tried to actually say something.

I love the LOW Roundtable shows though. Got em all :D. The NWO one is really good, and its one of the newer ones. NASH~!
 
#376 ·
Just ordered myself WM 24 Bluray on Ebay for £5. Since its been recalled/removed from everywhere brand new (more info here http://www.wwedvdnews.com/wwe-wrestlemania-24-dvd-recalled-floyd-mayweather/21890/ ) I decided to get a copy while I still can/its still cheap just in case it becomes somewhat of a rarity :p. Plus its the first WM to be released on Bluray format (first WWE Bluray too? I dunno), and I love the event. Got the tin edition DVD too already, but HD is bettah! :p
 
#377 ·
Best roundtable I've seen was one in regards to "wrestling tough guys" might have been titled bad asses though. The panel was Hayes, Tazz, Foley and obviously JR - which doesn't really fit the bill for the title as such but they tell some great stories that I'd only vaguely heard of before.
 
#378 ·
That match made it to #68 on the final list :). I had it at #49. Really great match, the third highest Benoit match on my list and 4th highest DDP match on my list.
Cool to see others have seen it, why the jump to 68 from 49? What other DDP matches do you have on the list? I'm curious to see if there are some good DDP matches I haven't seen. What did you think of the Havoc match with Goldberg, and the Nitro match with Sting?
 
#379 ·
The jump is because MY list was #68, but when I counted up the votes from everyone it placed #49 overall :).

Sting/DDP from Nitro 99 just came up, #46 from me, overall #35, and someone voted for it in their top 10!!! Match with Goldberg at HH hasn't come up yet (their Nitro 99 match has though, forget which number it was, cba to look lol). I already know where it is, but the countdown hasn't finished yet so I don't wanna spoil it for anyone :p.
 
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