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| Guest Columns | Tom Dean |
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HOW *YOU* DOIN'? I'M FEELIN' FROGGY, BABY!! I mean... I guess. I dunno. Am I really? We all *say* that... but do we ever really think about what it means? I was definitely feeling pretty froggy about the RVD-Eddy G match at Backlash. Eddy was rusty in spots, preventing it from being as truly great as it could have been, but still. It's been a good feud, and Eddy is just such a joy to watch in every aspect of what he does. He GETS it, to such a frightening degree. Kidman also showed some rust, which also converted his match (with Tajiri) from "potentially great" to "really pretty good". Edge-Angle was the Backlash highlight for me. A lot of people have doubted Edge... I never have. His promos are gold, and he's got charisma (a word that still has meaning no matter how much WWF announcers abuse it.) I think his weakness as a solo wrestler has been getting the crowd involved in his actual matches, but Backlash definitely showed good signs in that direction. The women's matches continue to be really good, including the one at Backlash. Jazz still does nothing for me, but at least the crowd occasionally acknowledges her existence now. Molly and Trish is NEAT (even despite Molly's lame new gimmick). I wish they could get Ivory over there! Well, back to Backlash... the Lesnar saga is still being done just right... Heyman is adding so much to this. And Rico is by far the best thing about the tag team champions right now, so for the first time in a while, it's a good time for managers. Bradshaw-Hall was whatever. The loss of Kane, just when he seemed to be developing a compelling stand-alone character, truly and totally sucks. I have no beef with Bradshaw, but I dunno if he is up to being the #2 face on a show. What about Booker? I do think the oddball Goldust/Booker pairing is working surprisingly well, but, c'mon, you're pretty much wasting the guy. Actually, the way things are going on RAW, Bubba Ray Dudley could be the guy to step up. Imagine if a fat guy not only could dance, but on top of that, actually had a personality to speak of! History tells us that the possibilities would be unlimited!!! I wanna see Bubba Ray do the dance that that retarded woman in the front seat does in that car commercial. It's Robot-esque. Umm, back to Backlash again. Undertaker-Austin was an unmitigated disaster. I had been liking heel Undertaker so much too. I still do like his heel character, but his streak of interesting matches definitely ended on Sunday. Face Austin has really pretty much blown in the ring, as opposed to heel Austin who seemed to have a Match of the Year candidate once a week. I wonder why that is. HHH-Hogan was whatever. You can pretend that HHH gets the same emotional reaction as the Rock does all you want, but he just doesn't. So it wasn't the same. It really seems like a different universe where I went off about how damn great Hogan was. As I talked about last time, I was thinking that the Hogan revival could mean good things for the nWo and "split" angles. I certainly never, EVER would have thought it would have led to Hogan getting the freaking belt at the next pay per view. I guess it's just another one of many instances lately in which the WWF has 1) pounded something that was somewhat over way into the ground, and 2) didn't understand why it got over in the first place. Still, yeesh. They usually don't screw up with the world championship belt. I have to think that they may have done just that here, though. The crowd reaction to Hogan during the last two RAW's ranged from "barely caring" to "bordering on hostility". It's pretty clear that Smackdown is piping in some Hogan worship. I'm not sure that I would go so far as to say that *all* Hogan cheers are piped in. I think it's possible that the Smackdown crowd likes Hogan more than the RAW crowd does. If so, that would be good. I mean, these shows are trying to attract different crowds... we're supposed to feel that the two shows are competitors... right? It would also make me love RAW even more than I already do. Sometimes I even think about skipping Smackdown, but that just seems even more lame. It can't be this unbalanced forever, right? Plus Smackdown has Jericho. Anyway. I thought Hogan as a more mature, thoughtful "Hollywood" was something that created some great moments and could have created more. But putting him back in red & yellow... giving him the belt... and having him do mid-'80s promos? It really seems kind of nuts, to be honest. I don't mean to sound like Andy Rooney or whatever, but, it's just incredible how much trouble I have with my VCR. And I say that as a person who I've gotta figure is more technically savvy than 99% of the population. I taped over Tough Enough with RAW. And it seems like they only re-run it over the weekend, so by the time I went to watch it on Monday and found out about the mistake, it was too late. That means I missed Jackie, with her big fake boobies and super-toned body, getting her freak on! To coin a phrase: DAMN! (Most of the time, I don't tape over stuff... usually I forget to put it on the right channel, and either tape static or the wrong show. I keep finding new ways to fuck up tho.) The theme song for "Backlash" was called "Young Grow Old". Yeah, no shit... Tom Dean Wienerville: T.R. Mail the Author Visit My WOW Page Comment about this article in Wienerville |
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