VIOLENT PANDA Weekly Review 07.10.06

VIOLENT PANDA Weekly Review

WWE Raw

The new champ, Edge, comes to ringside with Lita. They have their own commentary table. It has chains on it for some reason. What’d they do with the Spanish Team? Are they under the ring? Edge has much less to say than you’d expect. Cena’s music hits.

John Cena vs. Shelton Benjamin:

– The run-in is anything but evitable. Cena has full support from the fans to start. I guess they’ve numbed the anti-Cena people into submission.

– Ringside fans have a sign cut and painted up to look like a chain… pretty cool. Cena and Shelly start with lots of action, all of it decent in a indy-wrestling-from-2000 kind of way. Shelton cinches in a rest hold so Lawler can squeal about the possibility of another Edge/Lita sex celebration.

– Shelton then drops some elbows, and goes to ANOTHER chinlock. Cena escapes this by putting Shelton on his shoulders, standing up(!) and giving him an electric chair drop. Pretty sweet!

– Cena goes up top, Shelton with a SPRING ENZIGURI! It sends Cena all the way to the floor. That was awesome.

– Back from commercial, Shelton shockingly has a third chinlock cinched in. WWE STYLE~! John escapes and here comes the, uh, 2 moves and 3 punches of DOOM. About 7 fans try to do the “boo” “yay” thing with a punch exchange but it doesn’t catch on. Shelton escapes the FU set-up and hits a samoan drop, gets two.

– A few reversals lead to the STFU. Fans BEG for the tapout and Shelton obliges.

Parts of this felt like the X Division underwater, but from what we got to see here it definitely looks like a Shelton/Cena feud can pay off big time in the ring. Now the question is if Shelton can hold up his end of the promos.

Winner: John Cena

Cena drags Edge into the ring, but Lita grabs his leg so Edge can gain the advantage. Man, I could go for a scarycanrana right about now. Edge beats down Cena, John takes a perfect bump off a DDT and eats a spear to an audible roar. I guess the anti-Cena sentiment does still live in WWE arenas. Edge grabs a mic and says he’s leaving. Cena makes a “what’s that smell” face in the ring.

Edge vs. Cena.. it’s fresh, it feels like it’s time. I don’t know if this feud is going to be given the twists and effort a booking team should give it, but you know these guys will make the best of it.

This Saturday, Hogan and his goofy daughter Brooke will appear at Saturday Night’s main event. Randy Orton is assembling his date rape kit as we speak. Hogan vs. Orton… man that is going to be awful. Their only hope is that the crowd heat makes the match. I truly hope Hogan goes over, though. Randy Orton just plain sucks both in the ring and out of it.

Let’s punish the fans who watched the show from the start with a lengthy recap of stuff that happened five minutes ago. JR and King wonder what will be in store for DX tonight. Let’s see, people have already been peed and pooped on. I guess this week McMahon eats a cracker. We see a huge video recap of the feud..

Eugene is in the back with the McMahons. The WWE makes the effort to point out that retards find DX’s antics funny. The McMahons decide to book themselves in a handicap match with Eugene.

Melina with Nitro vs. Trish Stratus:

– So supposedly Trish is about to go on a hiatus, to get married or something. If she gets pregnant, then this might be the last we see of her. Trish has the unenthusiastic “I’m gonna job” face on. Melina has got herself some sweet ring gear.

– Melina does a super-high standing split kick, but it doesn’t get a reaction. Maybe from the crowd’s view it didn’t connect? Melina then uses a Dimension Door spell to slip under the ring and behind Trish instantaneously.

– Melina heels it up and hits a stiff-looking kick to the small of Trish’s back. Trish rallies with the handstand takeover and some breast-edge chops. She hits the satellite headscissors, Melina gives it a pretty weak bump. Crowd is into this though.

– Trishbuster gets two. The finish is telegraphed big time. They take way too long to set it up, making sure to get Nitro in line so Trish can give him a shot but allowing Melina to score a quick pin to steal it.

Decent women’s action. Melina looked off in spots. From what little we got to see of it, Melina’s heel offense looks dangerously dull.

Winner: Melina

After, the heels are about to beat on Trish but Carlito makes the save to a decent reaction.

Meanwhile, at a hotel, Edge’s room isn’t ready yet. He sends Lita to the hotel bar and yells at the attendant.. or as they call them in the hotel biz: The night auditor. Edge is pretty awesome here. And it feels like they’ve only scratched the surface.

The Highlanders vs. Matt Striker & Rob Conway:

– Geez, the gimmicks are really regressing, aren’t they? This is right out of the ’80’s. Highlanders are like the Bushwhackers plus the Head Bangers.. making them the Head Whackers…? Or the Bush Bangers?

– Rory tags in Robby with a slap to the beard and the crowd pops. He uses his brother’s head as a battering ram, heh heh.

– A couple double team moves precede the Scot Drop, and Conway eats the loss.

Well shoot.. looks like The Highlanders are gonna get over! I’d like to see them morph into Brody-type badasses, but JR’s probably already suggested it and gotten mocked for that idea as it is. I bet “I’m Robby!” gets over as a catchphrase in about a month or so.

Winners: The Highlanders

Ric Flair is WALKING. Maria sticks a mic in his face. He looks right into her fantastic cleavage and tells it that he’s going to tell the world all about Mick Foley.

Ric starts to cut a promo, but Mick interrupts on the big screen with a pre-taped promo. Scratch that.. an AWESOME pre-taped promo. Gone is the old “I’m gonna cry” ECW warble promo. Here is Foley going off on a “used-up hack” whose main move involves touching another man’s testicles. He recaps losing his ear.. is there footage of that? They should show it. He blames Ric, who was in charge in WCW at the time, for not preserving the ear. He goes over his accomplishments – 2 time WWE champ, 2 time New York Times bestseller, interviewed twice by Katie Couric and hahaha… personal friend of Melina. Hahaha.. he probably should have left that out. There’s a time for jokes, and this is not it. He says there will be no re-match “you used up piece of crap”. Holy…

The crowd’s not impressed as me, limply “woo”ing in response. And now Flair has an almost impossible task – follow THAT. He tries to get fired up, throwing his jacket to the ground and saying he wished he had thrown the ear to the ground and stomped on it. The ECW music hits… Here comes Paul Heyman (to NO reaction, unfortunately).

He introduces footage of Show winning the ECW title last week. And The Big Show comes to the ring. Show points out that he’s held the WCW, WWE and ECW World Titles. He challenges Flair to a title match on Sci Fi tomorrow. Flair accepts, and Show gives him the COBRA COMMANDER~! Flair.. ugh.. sells it terribly. Show handles him gingerly, and it looks awful. AWFUL.

Haha.. there’s a sign in the front row: “ECW Fans – I’ve got two words for you – SUCK IT”. All the ECW fans must be outraged. So… nobody’s outraged, then.

In the back, The McMahons pour green slime on Eugene and dunk his head in a toilet. Apparently in the WWE they just carry the slime around in a bucket backstage, mostly to torture hog-tied rookie referees with. I guess you just have to accept that this imbecilic stuff is what they do in the WWE… but you’d think they’d at least let a wrestler do this and not two non-wrestlers. Heels in this day and age need all the heat they can get, and for some reason the heinous, heel-heat-getting act of giving a handicapped guy a swirly is given to two guys who barely wrestle.

During the break, Paul invited Candace to come to ECW and dance against Kelly.

Viscera vs. Charlie Haas:

– Poor Charlie. Doesn’t even get a ring entrance.

– Lots of dull striking while Lillian EMOTES at ringside. Crowd pops big for a Haas leg slap kick to the back. Lillian hits the ring, mic in hand and tells them to stop fighting. She wants to be “just friends” with both of them. I don’t get it. Are they saying Charlie and Vis just booked their own match and came out and wrestled?

– Vis accidentally gives Lillian a samoan drop. At first both guys act concerned as EMTs ever-so-slowly make their way to the ring, but then they smile. OK then! Made no sense!

Winner: Raw Finish©

Lita and Edge are getting wasted at the bar.

Back in the arena, the Diva Search broads are WALKING! The WWE paid for that “Move Along” song (All American Rejects?). Now, the ECW theme situation is just getting pathetic. I guess women who can’t wrestle get hit themes, while guys who have been working in dumpy gyms getting paid jack shit for 15 years get WWE generic theme #307.

Back from commercial… the parking lot is silent. Where is DX? Here comes the Miz. He tries to get the crowd pumped up, but they boo him a bit instead. He does get them to say “hoo rah”. He’s like the WWE tour guide. Miz suddenly has a brain fart and doesn’t remember what the fans have to do to vote.. but he’s got it written on his hand. Some of the crowd pick up on it and boo, JR points out he’s nervous.

The diva search ladies come out. They’re all Maxim-y hot, but they kind of all look the same. They each get 20 seconds on the mic. Ohhh this could be awkward.

Jen: Wears black arm things. She speaks in a shrill monotone, saying she’s a “sex kitten” and wants to know if anyone in Sioux City wants to feel her bite. The crowd cheers. Cheap pop, smart! If one of these chicks gives Miz a stiff elbow, they’re gonna win this thing.

Layla: She’s as close to a black woman as the WWE will allow, apparently. She says she’ll make us proud of her being a “WWE DEEV-ER”. A bell sound effect plays, signifying that time is up? Miz says “tough crowd”.

Erica: Her giant boobs are a jiggle away from escaping their constraints. The crowd pops for her before she speaks. She says she’s the “girl next door”. They’ve each got a gimmick already. She quotes John Cena saying “You can’t see me” and comes off lame. She is booed.

Maryse: A fembot with an accent. She is barely intelligible with that thick accent, and then she forgets what she was gonna say and it all goes down the shitter. There’s the bell. “Tough crowd”, Miz says again.

Milena: Black haired, “exotic-looking”. She gets the cheap pop, seems natural on the mic. She says her lifelong dream is to be a “Wrestler”. Yeah…

Rebecca: Fembot stuffs the mic in her top and says she wants to cool the other girls off. She has.. some kind of spray. It’s tiny. She sprays the other girls, but nobody could see what it was so it came off bad.

JT: Brunette, super-hot. She says she knows all the fans want to see her get down and dirty. The fans cheer. Then she doesn’t get down and dirty. She says you must vote for her first! She’s got the business down to a science, bah gawd. Boy, this thing sure isn’t doing the “models are dumb” stereotype any favors. This is as vapid as you’d expect.

Amy: Wants to “make us proud”. Argh…

I’m probably one of 5 people in the universe who likes the diva search things. It’s fun to watch a talent progress. It was fun to chart Christy’s rise. It’s fun to see people who didn’t win, like Candice, develop into a useable talent. But this segment was pretty dreadful. I’m sure lots of people tuned in to see boobies, but you sure didn’t get anything else to keep you interested.

Somewhere in the back, Hacksaw Jim Duggan is mad about the mis-treatment of Eugene and gets in Shane’s face. McMahon hits him with a chair to the back.

Randy Orton hits the ring and has a mic. He says he will introduce himself to Hogan at SNME. “Hogan” chant.

Randy Orton vs. Val Venis:

– Randy dumps Val while he’s posing, hits the RKO for the super-quick win.

Winner: Randy Orton

Randy grabs the mic again and says he’s also looking forward to meeting Brooke Hogan.

Edge and Lita are in the hotel room making fun of Hogan. Room service is here. Edge calls the hotel employee Pee Wee Herman, and Lita does a hilarious Pee Wee laugh. He’s gotta let her talk more.

WWE magazine’s first issue is out, and Batista’s on the cover. I dunno, if I was them I’d stick a diva on every cover and include a spread. That’d probably sell to casual fans better than a roided-up, oily, almost-naked man who is screaming.

In the hotel.. John Cena bursts in and throws Edge into every breakable object in the room. Edge is one of the only mainstream wrestlers that I know of who is willing to bump on broken glass with no shirt on. Pretty awesome. John stops to taste the room service mid-beating, heh heh. Good stuff, reminiscent of showlong segments from the boom period, in a good way.

Lilian is “hurt”, so GRISH does the ring intros.

Handicap Match (it never ends) – Shane & Vince McMahon vs. Eugene:

– Squad gets involved. They set Eugene up for Shane to elbow him through Edge’s table, but DX comes out to.. a decent pop, I guess. Hard to tell.

– They do a loonnnggg bit where Vince wants DX to stand in the middle of the ramp so a net can fall on them. The net ends up missing, and Eugene gets a quick roll-up for the win. HHH does a big fake laugh.

Winner: Eugene

OVERALL: They pulled wayyyy back on the DX stuff, which is good to me. And I liked a lot of the sportz entertainment on this show. Sure, the wrestling is putrid, but that’s the WWE. I give this a THREE out of FIVE.

TNA Impact

Recap of Cornette handing Jarrett the belt last week. I wonder if watching Jarrett book himself at the top is what got HHH to back off from doing the same thing? It had to hit a nerve. It’s pretty clear that the ONLY reaction TNA fans can give JJ that might get him to go away is silence. I’d suggest that live fans chat to each other casually when Jarrett is out there, or just give silence. Or best of all, everybody get up and go to the bathroom. It’s pretty much the only way to send the message in a way that TNA can’t explain away.

Hhaha.. 411’s OWN John Meehan is at this show, and you can see him and his buddies marking out all in yellow shirts.

Sonjay Dutt vs. Homicide:

– HELL… YEAH. LAX accompany Homicide, and they get a Rage Against the Machine-y entrance video. Sonjay immediately hits a hip toss, charging senton and standing moonsault right off the bat. Man, after watching WWE plodding slugfests, this is like heaven.

– Homicide misses the cannonball and Sonjay hits a big charging Senton. Homicide hits a speedy leaping back elbow, and cinches in a cool-looking submission. Some fans chant “Tap”. Homicide… wow… hits a superplex.. ROLLS into a Ki Krusher! Awesome!

– Sonjay dodges a frogsplash, hits a series of lariats and then hits a beautiful spring moonsault. Reversals lead to that awesome backflipping X Factor thing Sonjay does.

– But shenanigans ensue. Ref is distracted by Konnan. Hernandez slides in and hits a really cool flipping neck throw. Homicide covers 1, 2, 3. Ref says Cide won.

– BUT! Here comes JJJ’s BEST FRIEND SLICK JOHNSON! The ref who gets more camera time than 70% of the TNA roster! He gets the ref to reverse the decision. Just based on Slick’s word. LAX proceed to beat on Sonjay, but Ron Killings makes the save.

A really good match. No bullshit. Compare this to one of WWE’s 5 minute matches.. it’s not even fair. Of course, TNA’s finishes are 30 times stupider than the WWE’s, but still… I love both guys and I’d like to see them in a long term feud.

Winner: Homicide

Eric Young comes out to the announce table. He’s worried he’ll be fired. And who’s back on camera? It’s SLICK JOHNSON! Ohh what a treat! He’s got photoshopped images of Zbysko bald. Well now, that’s just outrageous. There’s more to this but I can’t be arsed. That’s for the UK readers.

There’s a vignette of Shane Douglas trying to de-gay The Naturals. Harmless stuff. Christy Hemme’s still relegated to a little cube on our screen. No sign of BORSH yet, tonight.

We see a clip of the ECW Arena show… cool. Rhino cuts an old school ECW promo, where he says he’s staying in TNA, a place where he doesn’t have to be handed a script and won’t get fired if he knocks over a flower pot… hahaha. He is bleeped like crazy.. that was an awesome, intense promo. They gotta get him to do more of that. Wow.

Monty Brown vs. Kenny King:

– Poor Kenny.. he’s good, but there’s just no room for him. Kenny does a cool flip escape and hits some nice punches, but then takes a fallaway slam and the… PUUUOONNNCCCEEE. Crowd is still into Monty.

Winner: Monty Brown

Monty grabs a mic and says hunting season is open. He calls out Samoa Joe, Rhino, Jarrett, Christian, Steiner and Sting. You know, whoever’s not busy.

There’s BORSH. With JJJJJJJ and Steiner. Steiner calls Joe a “fat bastard”. Steiner is shocked when BORSH suggests that Steiner may end up facing Jarrett for the title at some point.

Kevin Nash is in the back with Alex Shelley and.. Cassidy Reilly, is it? Kevin is hilarious as he reveals his plan to put Sabin in a bodybag. Shelley and Reilly are so moved that they give him a slow clap which builds to an emotional ovation. These guys are a total riot.

They hit the ring and Sabin’s in the bodybag, Nash thought Osama was in there, haaha. “I didn’t know he was Al Qaeda”. Jay Lethal makes the save. Great stuff.

BORSH is in the back with SMO JOE. Joe looks a little high as he says he’s gonna make Steiner’s kids cry. Steiner deserves some serious accolades for putting Joe over so far. Hopefully it continues. Steiner could break down any day now, so if he’s going to help make a star it’s gotta be right now.

JJJJJJx1000 & Scott Steiner vs. Sting & Christian Cage:

– Wow.. you know, I would LOVE to see AJ/Daniels feud with Nash & Shelley in a long term feud. Christian hits a nice sunset flip and a sit-out powerbomb, gets two.

– Jarrett dumps Christian off the top and Cage falls to the floor and lands square on his back. Ouch! Steiner vs. Christian.. what an odd pairing. Steiner hits his two moves and tags out.

– Sting gets the hot tag, and he pummels both heels. Steiner’s knee almost gives out on him on an irish whip. JJ low blow, Stroke – Sting again sells the Stroke on his side, looks totally painless.

– Chris Chun frogsplash, Sting covers.. 1, 2, 3. Faces win.

OK match. By the numbers, pretty much.

Winners: Sting & CC

Steiner cinches in a camel clutch on Cage. Joe runs out and brawls with Scott to the back. Sting tells Jarrett that he’s a cancer and will be removed. I can’t believe Sting’s gimmick revolves around Jeff.

OVERALL: Lots to like on this show, too! Nash/Shelley, Rhino’s promo and Dutt vs. Homicide were all supremely entertaining. An easy THREE out of FIVE.

Match of the Week: Sonjay Dutt vs. Homicide – Show this to a random person and they will like it. Show that person Eugene vs. The McMahons and their eyes will roll into the back of their head.

Show of the Week: TNA Impact – Both WWE and TNA were entertaining, but TNA’s wrestling is worlds better. And this is PRO WRESTLING, right?