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Kayfabe! – Vince Russo’s Attitude with Ken Shamrock

November 10, 2017 | Posted by Mike Campbell
8
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Kayfabe! – Vince Russo’s Attitude with Ken Shamrock  

Kayfabe!
Vince Russo’s Attitude with Ken Shamrock

It’s hard to not compare this to Back to the Territories, although that’s not really a fair comparison to make at this juncture. Back to the Territories has been going strong for more than two years, while this is the debut of Attitude. But, the similarities between the two concepts are more than a little obvious: An interview about a time in wrestling that many people have fond memories of, conducted by someone who is considered an authority on the matter, with someone who was heavily featured. Although, this concept seems to be a bit more constricting, since it’s basically limited to the WWF from 1997-1999 (Russo says he considers the Attitude era to have ended when he left), while B2TT, seems to have more staying power, with many possible guests and areas to discuss.

Shamrock is actually a pretty good interview. He’s comfortable in front of the camera, he doesn’t seem to take himself too seriously, and he doesn’t appear to have any axes to grind. One of the more interesting things that they discuss is the Brawl for All, and how Russo came up with it based on Bradshaw shooting off his mouth that nobody could beat him in a shoot. Shamrock’s favorite match was Blackman vs. Mero, because of how often Steve shot in and took him down, and shattered the myth about strikers being the dominant fighters. Shamrock thinks Blackman would have won the whole thing, if he’d opted to continue. Shamrock tells a hilarious story about Big Show needling him in the middle of catering, and Shamrock taking him down and making him scream and tap out, in front of Vince McMahon.

Ken discusses the transition from MMA to wrestling, and credits Bret Hart for helping him discover who Ken Shamrock really was as a wrestler. Vince asks if his first match being against Vader was a rib by Vince, which Shamrock doesn’t think is the case (Note from Mike: I always thought that Vader was picked because he’d worked for UWFI in Japan, which wasn’t legit, but actually wasn’t too far off). Ken also tells a story about tearing his lung, because he’d always told his opponents to lay things in, and after taking a particularly stiff bodyslam on the floor, he’d torn his lung and was coughing up blood. <BR

The only negative here, honestly, is Russo. Not even so much his interviewing (once you get past him saying “bro” every two seconds), but when he starts making outrageous claims, and also has to quickly backpedal. Like, his comment that Rocky Miavia truly became The Rock, because of his feud with Shamrock over the IC Title. Even Shamrock dismisses it, and says that it was after the NOD had run its course and Rock was able to show what he could really do. Russo also feels the need to claim that in 1996, Vince McMahon debuted Steve Austin as the Ringmaster and declared that he not talk, but that DiBiase talk for him, despite Russo’s pleas to let Austin talk. Russo finally got his way in 1996, when he was able to sneak Austin under the radar by having him do commentary on Raw. The whole notion itself is ridiculous, for too many reasons to list. The backpedaling is in full effect when Ken talks about why he decided to leave. Ken was being written to do things that he wasn’t comfortable with as a father, like being in love with his sister, and having a match with Chyna and having to hit her. Russo pleads ignorance. He claims to have no memory of either of them, and says that it must have been JR or Vince who came up with those angles. Typical Vince Russo: everything good was his idea, everything bad wasn’t his fault.

To his credit, Russo brings up some good points about why today’s product doesn’t seem to hold up too well. Russo’s method of writing was to take what he’d written to the talent, and if the talent didn’t like it, they would work on it together. Nowadays, the boys just get a script and are told this is what they’re saying, and this is what they’re doing. One week Roman Reigns acts like a babyface and the next week he’s acting like a heel.

8.0
The final score: review Very Good
The 411
An overall not bad start to this series. Ken is a pretty good interview, and the some of the backstories were very interesting.
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