Jump to content
Pro Wrestling Only

Something to Wrestle with Bruce Prichard


Recommended Posts

 

Conrad is warning people away from the Edge show over at the BOARD. Nothing new to learn + way long.

 

I should have listened. Tepid doesn't even begin to describe it.

 

 

It wasn't all that great, no. I wasn't too upset, because I went into that particular episode with very low expectations. As I mentioned earlier, I didn't find Edge's career all that interesting, so I wasn't expecting a 5 hour podcast discussing him to be very intriguing either. The one thing I did find interesting is that Bruce didn't seem to have a problem disclosing the fact that Triple H and Shawn Micheals didn't see Edge as a Main Event guy and buried him behind the scenes to Vince. It's so rare that Bruce is willing to admit that Triple H buried anybody or held them back in any way. I also enjoyed Bruce's re-telling of Vince's response to Shawn Micheals claiming Edge wasn't over. ("Okay, so go get him over!")

 

This week's episode regarding Goldust was a bit more interesting. The main thing I found interesting was how much Dave Meltzer didn't like Goldust, or even the work of Dustin Rhodes. I had no idea Meltzer buried Rhodes that much in the Observer, it was funny to hear even Conrad asking what the hell Dave's problem was. Usually Meltzer bashing is the exclusive job of Bruce, but Conrad got in on it this week...with good reason.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 782
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

This week's episode regarding Goldust was a bit more interesting. The main thing I found interesting was how much Dave Meltzer didn't like Goldust, or even the work of Dustin Rhodes. I had no idea Meltzer buried Rhodes that much in the Observer, it was funny to hear even Conrad asking what the hell Dave's problem was. Usually Meltzer bashing is the exclusive job of Bruce, but Conrad got in on it this week...with good reason.

 

Yeah, Meltz was brutal with Dustin, to the point he really comes off having a terrible bias against him. Really ridiculous.

 

The Goldust episode was still too long and result-reading heavy, but there was some interesting stuff there. It's striking when you roll back his entire career how much crazy shit Dustin was a part of, including that godawful TAFKAG stint that I mostly erased from memory (apart from the Mania 14 match), and how much the real life issue played a role into his on/off pushes. I like that Bruce hated the "shoot" interview which killed the character dead and that he shit on most of Russo's nonsensical booking in 98/99.

 

Quite a fascinating and unique career when you think about it, although it also put a light on the fact that no matter how good Dustin's WCW work was, he had long periods of not really delivering anything that good (especially if you put the late WCW and TNA stint in the middle of it). And when he got back in the best working shape of his life he wasn't given much opportunities to shine.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thank Bruce and Conrad sooooo much for pointing out how fucking stupid it is to clean up the announcers table from the monitors and whatnot before dropping someone on it, because you're supposed to HURT the guy. I hated this shit for the very first time I saw it, it's one of the oldest, most infuriating, idiotic WWEism there is.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

I thought the Rockers episode was somewhat dry, but I did end up laughing when Conrad recapped the number of times Marty Janetty was fired and re-hired. Even Bruce said only The Iron Sheik nears Marty's record for comings and goings.

 

Also thought the 98 Royal Rumble episode from this past week was pretty good. I found it humorous that they spent 75% of the episode discussing the episodes of Raw before and after the actual PPV, and very little time re-capping the actual show.

 

Next week is a watch-along, which I will probably skip.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Interesting episodes about the creation of RAW, which made me think about how stale and dull the product really is today. It's kinda crazy to think RAW (and SD) basically haven't changed since 2001. With a few cosmetic differences, these are the same show, with the same dynamics and production (the same awful production of poorly written interviews and backstage skits, might I say). 17 years. Hell Smackdown is named after a guy who hasn't been a regular part of the show in more than 10 years. Can you picture a show named Watchagonnado in 2007 or so ?

 

It's not the "longest running TV show in history" like the bullshit they feed their audience, but it is actually a very old show now, and feels like it. It's a dinosaur. The monopoly really killed any kind of forward thinking, of trying stuff out of the box, especially since the only thing approaching an alternative as a mainstream show only tried to be like WWE. There's a reason why the 90's are revered as fun times, it's because things evolved all the time.

 

Apart from Lucha Underground, which sadly stayed just that, there hasn't been anything new to what a pro-wrestling show is supposed to be like since things settled down in a format created around 97/98 and found its apex in 2000.

 

US pro-wrestling badly needs a serious competitor to WWE to push things in another direction. EIther that, or still 20 more years of GMs, backstage skits with awkward pauses, robotic entrances and bad comedy and silliness all around.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

One of the interesting things that I took away from the Royal Rumble 1988 episode was how much of an after thought the actual Rumble itself was. The primary motivations of this show were first, to harm the Bunkhouse Stampede PPV, and second, to hype Hogan/Andre II on The Main Event two weeks later. They thought so little of the actual Rumble match itself that they didn't even bother to cancel the other house show that night (a B-show in Nova Scotia, no less) so they could load the match with more names. Pat Patterson came up with the idea, and Dick Ebersol saw the potential in it, but it didn't seem like Vince really got it. Then the show did a huge rating even with the Crockett PPV at the same time and only then did Vince seem to understand that he had a pretty cool concept that could make them some money.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

They have a YouTube channel now, mainly with excerpts from the shows, which I find quite useful for not having listened to every single episode thus far. Conrad asked today on Twitter if they should do a video version (that I suspect would go up there), I think it'd be cool but just do excerpts of the best stuff visually instead of having the whole thing up.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

They have a YouTube channel now, mainly with excerpts from the shows, which I find quite useful for not having listened to every single episode thus far. Conrad asked today on Twitter if they should do a video version (that I suspect would go up there), I think it'd be cool but just do excerpts of the best stuff visually instead of having the whole thing up.

He’s been discussing it and other podcast-related stuff a bunch on the F4W Board. No-brainer for them to just throw on some webcams and put the same shows on YouTube and monetize it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

One of the interesting things that I took away from the Royal Rumble 1988 episode was how much of an after thought the actual Rumble itself was. The primary motivations of this show were first, to harm the Bunkhouse Stampede PPV, and second, to hype Hogan/Andre II on The Main Event two weeks later. They thought so little of the actual Rumble match itself that they didn't even bother to cancel the other house show that night (a B-show in Nova Scotia, no less) so they could load the match with more names. Pat Patterson came up with the idea, and Dick Ebersol saw the potential in it, but it didn't seem like Vince really got it. Then the show did a huge rating even with the Crockett PPV at the same time and only then did Vince seem to understand that he had a pretty cool concept that could make them some money.

 

I did the watch-along episode for Royal Rumble 1988 last night. I was reluctant at first because the Survivor Series 87 episode was pretty awful. I am not all that big on the watch-along shows in general, since I like to listen to shows when I am doing other things and don't like to be stuck sitting watching a monitor while I listen. I understand why Conrad pretty much has to go that route with Tony on What Happened When, but I wasn't thrilled when they did it on Something To Wrestle. Hell, even Conrad said during the watch-along for Survivor Series that it was the worst show they had done since "Austin Walks Out."

 

I found this episode a lot more entertaining. Firstly because the entire show wasn't a watch-along, just the Rumble itself was. Secondly, they seemed to be a lot more funny and relaxed the second time around.

 

There was a couple of things I found surprising about this episode. Firstly, the fact that Bruce openly and freely admitted that the main reason they even had the Royal Rumble 1988 was to counter-program JCP and the Bunkhouse Stampede. Everybody knows it is true, but that is the kind of thing that in the past Bruce has tried to deny or downplay. The way he made it sound, USA wanted them to do a show, they wanted to have a televised contract signing between Hogan and Andre, and this seemed to be a great way to do that, and screw with JCP at the same time. I agree with Cox when he says the actual Rumble almost seems like an afterthought.

 

The second thing I found amusing upon seeing the Rumble again, was how little was made of The Ultimate Warrior. He had just barely joined the company I guess? He appears in the match, exchanges some pretty lame looking chops with some guys, and gets eliminated. He's pretty much a non-factor. You could tell that they didn't know what they had at that point.

 

Funny sidenote, by the way. I live in the Toronto area. This show was filmed in Hamilton, which is pretty close to Toronto (within easy driving distance.) It was shown live in the United States on the USA Network, but even though it was shot in Canada...we couldn't watch it. The USA Network wasn't available in Canada at that time. The WWF was red hot in the Toronto area (remember, 74,000 fans had gone to see "The Big Event" when Hogan fought Orndorff just a couple of years prior) so it was a bit of a slap in the face that the WWF would film a major show like that in the area but not make it available for viewing until it came out in VHS.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

BTW Thread Killa, do you recommend actually doing the watch along with this episode, or do you think it would work just as well just listening to it (like you, I used to not be thrilled with the watch along formula for Tony's show, but I actually warmed up to it because I'm an old WCW mark and I don't mind rewatching this stuff *one more time*, again, after all) ?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sure El-P, if you have time I would do the watch-along for the Royal Rumble 1988. It's fun. It's not their best episode (I personally think Episode 46 on WWECW might get that nod) but it's entertaining enough.

 

I would NOT recommend the Survivor Series 1987 watch-along episode. There is nothing all that interesting revealed, Bruce and Conrad do a fair bit of bickering (and not in an entertaining way either, just annoying) and at times there are actually periods of silence where they obviously can't find anything to say. And having watched SS87 along with them, I can say honestly that sumbitch was BORING. When Bruce and Conrad are talking about how bad the show is, (not the PPV but their podcast) you know it's bad.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sure El-P, if you have time I would do the watch-along for the Royal Rumble 1988. It's fun. It's not their best episode (I personally think Episode 46 on WWECW might get that nod) but it's entertaining enough.

 

Thanks. I don't mind a watch along once in a while.

 

One of my favourite thus far, because it was one of the funniest to me, was actually the XFL.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Was Royal Rumble 88 common on VHS back in the day? I never saw a copy anywhere growing up in Calgary in the 90s

 

Pretty sure it wasn't released on home video until the DVD boxset from over a decade ago.

 

You know what, you may be right. I assumed that I ended up seeing it on Coliseum Video (as I did with a lot of big shows back then if I couldn't see it on Closed Circuit we had to wait for the video) but in retrospect, thinking back I'm pretty sure I remember what happened. Of course, this is 30 years ago now. Damn, I'm old.

 

I remember reading in the newspaper (no online news back in 88) about the Royal Rumble being in Hamilton, plus they talked about it on the syndicated weekly WWF TV shows, but we couldn't see it in Canada, and I specifically remember myself and my friends in the time bitching that we couldn't see it. I had a friend in High School who had a Satellite Dish, which was crazy rare back in 1988. This was back when having a dish took up half your backyard, seriously. He was a fellow wrestling fan (we met because he came up to talk to me when he saw me wearing a Jake The Snake t-shirt) and told me that because his family had a satellite dish, he could get wrestling from all over the United States. He used to lend me tapes of World Class and Mid-South (UWF) which was amazing at the time, because the only exposure I had to them was through the Apter mages. I remember how awesome it was to see the Von Erichs live for the first time, World Class was so different from the 80's WWF.

 

You're right, I'm pretty sure the way I ended up seeing the first Royal Rumble was through him lending me a tape of the USA broadcast, not from Coliseum Video. I do know for sure there was no way to see it on television here in the Toronto area.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Sure El-P, if you have time I would do the watch-along for the Royal Rumble 1988. It's fun. It's not their best episode (I personally think Episode 46 on WWECW might get that nod) but it's entertaining enough.

 

Thanks. I don't mind a watch along once in a while.

 

One of my favourite thus far, because it was one of the funniest to me, was actually the XFL.

 

 

If you say it is good El-P, I will go back and check that one out. I am still slowly working my way through the archives, and I tend to shy away from the earlier episodes. I have listened to a lot of the older episodes, but not all. The XFL is one I have not yet heard. If you say it was funny, I am going to check it out.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't have a massive amount of patience for the show, but I will admit to having really enjoyed and learned a lot from the Goldust, Jarrett, and Undertaker episodes. I'm curious what other single subject ones are as good as those two?

I enjoyed the Vader and Savage ones.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • GSR changed the title to Something to Wrestle with Bruce Prichard

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.


×
×
  • Create New...