Well, you know. It was the Slammies and all, and there’s nothing like an awards show to dampen my writerly spirits. Plus, I’m a little behind still — I need to listen to the Vince McMahon podcast, but I first need to dig up my password so I can renew my subscription to then network, which recently expired. I almost don’t want to, considering how much I hate looking up passwords, as well as the…
Tag: John Cena
RAW Notes are back! The way Cena approached Ryback for Team Cena recruitment totally came off as soap opera. But what he said to convince him was absolutely Best of Cena material: “It’s amazing that the guy who always wants to get fed more finally gets a chance to eat at the big table and suddenly he’s not hungry.” Cena is really working the populist hero angle while Triple H is nailing the corporate tyrant.…
Bray Wyatt was powerfully convincing about John Cena being a false hero. Will he hit on such an uncomfortable truth about Dean Ambrose? Will he talk about Dean Ambrose’s sometimes awkward delivery of humor? Or will he try to win Ambrose to his side? Like, behold the foolishness you’ve been reduced to, oh venerable hardcore legend. Could there be a Dean Ambrose-like storyline inside Luke Harper and Eric Rowan? Might we discover the soul of…
It is a curious state of affairs and a reflection on the liminal nature of kayfabe that WWE feels it must apologize to the people of Russia about Big Show’s satirical disrespect to their flag on RAW this week. Recall that WWE readily apologized about Lana’s mention of the Malaysian Airlines plane in Eastern Ukraine, while Lana herself dismissed the kerfuffle about what she said as “blah, blah, blah… propaganda.” These apologies are calculated —…
No Myth in Wrestling There’s always talk of legends in wrestling. Never of myth. Because all of wrestling is a myth, and yet what is legendary is a particular actor-athlete’s portrayal of the myth. Legendary are the men, not the wrestlers. Wrestling is ultimately a form of American mythology, and yet like with any cultural mythology a small part of us maintains that it is “real”. The Glory of #Bunnymania Don’t discount the fact that…
Night of Champions didn’t bore me once. Every match was solid, interesting, worthwhile to watch and played an important role in its narrative thread. (Except maybe Randy Orton vs. Chris Jericho— that conflict seemed like a last minute idea somebody had and figured we wouldn’t notice it came out of nowhere because they called RAW last week a “season premiere”. But it was still a good match to watch.) Most impressively for me, though, was…
JBL was in rare form tonight. Some highlights: “He comes out with a dancing cheese burger, and there’s nothing wrong with him?” “The bunny’s taken out The Gator! Titus used to be tough!” “How does a referee ignore a bunny hopping across the ring?” “A flying bunny!” And the rest of my Evening Notes: #Bunnymania was an satire on the legendary blind spots of wrestling’s referees. Adam Rose has reintroduced a Fellini-esque element into…
A couple days ago somebody looked at my post about John Cena and Paul Heyman after having performed the following Google search: “will pual hymen bring john cena thug in 2014” A drunk and possibly high wrestling fan was contemplating the John Cena problem and Google offered me as relevant source material. I’m not being silly when I say this: I couldn’t be more proud. This is exactly why I write the things I do.…