Author: dtm666

I ramble about things.

Ramblemania Rewind 32 – WWE Wrestlemania Star (32) (2016)

Date: April 3, 2016
Venue: AT&T Stadium – Arlington, Texas
Attendance: 80,709

So… here we are again… again.

This show.

This. Fucking Show.

I remember absolutely hating this show back in the day. So much so that I held off writing the Ramblemania post for a whole year. By that point, I mostly forgotten about the show save for the major bits and I had to rewatch it again… and all of a sudden, I remember why I held off watching the show… but I got my notes down at least… and then in rewatching this show, I sort of realized that I’m misremembering things slightly.

Wrestlemania 34 was the show that was on my permanent shitlist and don’t you folks worry, we’ll get to that shitshow soon enough. Wrestlemania 32, on the other hand, was the show that I recall being way too fucking long and being a total blank afterwards, saving for the fact that it was another attempt at the coronation of Roman Reigns and on top of that, it’s headlined by McSon-In-Law himself! Oh joy!

Yeah, so this is going to be fun…

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Ramblemania Rewind 31 – WWE Wrestlemania Play Button (2015)

Date: March 29th, 2015
Venue: Levi’s Stadium – Santa Clara, California
Attendance: 67,000

Wrestlemania 30 was supposed to be headlined by a one-on-one match featuring reigning WWE World Heavyweight Champion Randy Orton defending his title against the returning Dave Batista… and then the fans revolted and the show ended with fan favorite Daniel Bryan Danielson inserted into the match and winning the title to send the crowd home happy… which they needed to do because they just ended the Undertaker streak that people were invested in… and the guy who ended up breaking the streak was the guy who probably needed it the least.

Wrestlemania 31, on the other hand, was headlined by a one-on-one match featuring reigning and defending WWE World Heavyweight Champion Brock Lesnar defending his title against WWE’s next chosen one, Roman Reigns. And this match was supposed to be the coronation of Reigns as the top star in the company, much in the same vein as Hulk Hogan, Steve Austin, The Rock, and more recently, John Cena… except fans didn’t care for Reigns and actually resented WWE for pushing this guy down people’s throats. The show ended in a direction that wasn’t entirely expected… but was a pleasant surprise nonetheless.

So here we are… another outdoor setting and smack in the middle of daylight, which makes for an awesome visual in general, but not necessarily the best entrances.

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“Some Japanese Girl” Cleared To Wrestle

Source: https://www.ringsidenews.com/2024/03/24/asuka-makes-in-ring-return-at-wwe-live-event-after-injury-concern/

Some Japanese girl who broke some old guy’s undefeated streak from ages ago returned to action recently after suffering an injury of some kind. Also, did you know that people were using the old guy’s spear before he made his return some time in the last decade?

In all seriousness, good for Kana-chan. Glad to see she’s up and about. And as for ol’ Bill… how exactly would you like me to address this utter stupidity?

How about… don’t.

Review will pop up later.

Impact (March 21st, 2024) – What Mania Program?

Listen, if you want to blame the drop off in quality on DWAYNE, we can do that… but not everything can be blamed on DWAYNE.

Now Charlotte, on the other hand…

Anyway, I’ll keep this brief. Jake Something won a Number One contenders match to Mustafa Ali’s X-Division championship, Hammerstone had an interview with Tom Hannifan explaining his motivations and pretty much establishing himself as the monster heel for Josh Alexander to overcome one of these days, and Jordynne Grace retains the KO title over Tasha Steelz. There was other stuff happening, but not enough to warrant a deep dive or anything.

Don’t get me wrong; the show wasn’t bad, in spite of what the opening blurb of this post would imply. It was just there. And I had little to say. Sometimes, it happens. Is it professional? No, of course not. But then, I never said that I was a professional.

See you next week.

A Good Thing About Steam

So I’ve just got a refund on a pre-order for a ridiculously bloated and completely superfluous version of Star Wars Battlefront I & II with a borked online that I was never going to use and with not enough substantial updates to make me want to give up the old versions that I already have, which work just fine for my needs.

Anything on Steam that’s worth getting? That’s also cheap as shit?

Ramblemania Rewind 30 – WWE Wrestlemania XXX (2014)

Date: April 6th, 2014
Venue: Superdome (or is it Silverdome?) – New Orleans
Attendance: 60,000-65,000 (need further verification for actual figure)

First off, looking back in hindsight, bold choice in going with the roman numeral 30 on your Wrestlemania 30 logo. I don’t think we need to imagine all the NC-17 related jokes that you can come up with regarding that title alone. (NC-17 referring to the motion picture rating for adult content, not the handle of a now-defunct Youtube personality who fell off the face of the Earth.)

Anyway, Wrestlemania XXX is one of those interesting beasts that’s interesting to look at because it’s interesting in hindsight. It was under a much different regime of WWE compared to today’s WWE – well, for a variety of reasons, but we’ll focus on the creative side alone. Anyway, the company was dead set on bringing back former WWE superstar turned proper actor Dave Batista back to win the Royal Rumble and challenge reigning WWE champion Randy Orton in the main event of Wrestlemania. For a milestone Mania, we needed a milestone main event and that… well, in hindsight, not quite that big of a deal, if I’m being honest.

Had things gone according to plan, that’s how it would’ve gone down. Unfortunately, the WWE Universe had other ideas. ‘Cuz there was this fella named Daniel Bryan that people took a liking to and the result was a YES movement that not only took over WWE events, but other sports as well. It got to the point where the crowd was reaching almost riotous levels and WWE pretty much had no choice but to pivot as a result. Hmm, doesn’t that sound familiar…

Anyway, let’s revisit this show and see how well it’s held up.

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Ramblemania Rewind 29 – WWE Wrestlemania NY/NJ (2013)

Date: April 7th, 2013
Venue: MetLife Stadium – East Rutherford, New Jersey
Attendance: 74,300

When I wrote the original Ramblemania post for this show a couple days after its conclusion, the first word I wrote – and pretty much the word I used to describe Wrestlemania 29 as a whole – was “underwhelming.” And of all the shows that I would expect to label as underwhelming, this was not it.

Wrestlemania 29 has a number of marquee matches going for it. It featured The Rock defending his WWE Championship (that he won from CM Punk at the Royal Rumble – a decision that proved to be somewhat controversial) against John Cena in what is jokingly billed as “Twice In A Lifetime.” It also featured CM Punk attempting to snap the Undertaker’s long-running Wrestlemania win streak (spoiler: he fails), and short-haired HHH attempting to get his win back from Brock Lesnar after the pasting he got at Summerslam the year prior, promising to retire if he didn’t get the job done… even though he was kinda, sorta retired by this point by virtue of the fact that he cut his hair to be more presentable in the office… or something.

So I thought this show was underwhelming when I first watched it back in 2013… but that was eleven years ago. What’s the verdict on this show now? Is it a better show than I gave it credit? Does it even hold up?

Well… only one way to find out, I guess…

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Ramblemania Rewind 28 – WWE Wrestlemania XXVIII (2012)

Date: April 1st, 2012
Venue: Sun-Life Stadium, Miami, Florida
Attendance: 78,363

ROCK VS. CENA – ONCE IN A LIFE-BWAH! HA! HA! HA! HA! YEAH, GOOD ONE, P—…

Fuck me, I can’t even use that joke, either, can I?

Yeah, so long story short. Wrestlemania 28 is a better show than Wrestlemania 27, but not one that I would call an all-time classic or one of the better Manias, even. And hey, Rock beating Cena to kick off what would eventually be dubbed “John Cena’s Worst Year Ever” or something… yeah, let’s get into it.

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