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jesus WEP
Oct 17, 2004


Big Show‘s first reign was the drizzling shits as well.

1998-9 WWF really was a wild time of like 90% terrible poo poo but it had the promise of Austin and McMahon so millions of people sat through it

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IronCladBurrito
Aug 11, 2002

Excuse me, is this where the bitches are found?



Rusty Shackelford posted:

Dustin had like 2 matches in the WWF before going to WCW. I don't know if that counts.

Yeah, using that logic you could count Benoit.

CopywrightMMXI
Jun 1, 2011

One time a guy stole some downhill skis out of my jeep and I was so mad I punched a mailbox. I'm against crime, and I'm not ashamed to admit it.
The Diesel reign is notable for being a year long though. A lot of the other bad reigns were brief.

rare Magic card l00k
Jan 3, 2011


RVD resulted in a third brand that ended up getting nuked into oblivion when Van Dam loved himself drugs.

Hedgehog Pie
May 19, 2012

Total fuckin' silence.

disaster pastor posted:

Sheamus's first run was worse than Nash's. I think JBL's run was worse. If we're including the WHC, Khali is worst of all.

Not knowing much about the likes of Stasiak and Koloff, I think JBL would be my pick too, because his run turned me off wrestling for years. He had all the same problems as Nash but with the added problem of being thoroughly unlikeable, and not in the "good heel heat" sort of way. I was 14 when he became champion, and whilst I had already come to terms with WWE having or displaying toxic politics on their shows, there was a sort of pathetic campiness to things like Scott Steiner saying "All those liberals can go to Hell... or France, same difference!!!". JBL, on the other hand, dominated the show for a whole year as a bad George Bush parody that was hinted (later confirmed) to be not that far from who JBL actually is, and it was no fun at all.

CopywrightMMXI
Jun 1, 2011

One time a guy stole some downhill skis out of my jeep and I was so mad I punched a mailbox. I'm against crime, and I'm not ashamed to admit it.
I didn’t really care for Sgt Slaughter’s reign in 1990 but it was relatively short.

Davros1
Jul 19, 2007

You've got to admit, you are kind of implausible



Stasiak and Koloff were the literal definition of "transitional champions". Their reigns only existed to transfer the belt from one face champion to another face champion. The same can be said for The Iron Sheik's, or Bob Backlund's second reign.

Hell, even though he had a ten month reign as champ, and was quite a draw, Vince Sr had already decided to put the belt on Bob Backlund before Superstar Billy Graham won it. He was just a stop gap between Sammartino and Backlund.

Kosmo Gallion
Sep 13, 2013
What about that period in early 97 where the title was shifted between Shawn/Sid/Shawn/Sid/Bret/Sid/Undertaker or something along those lines? Those were some meaningless reigns.

Also Hogan's 93 run after beating Yokozuna.

Red
Apr 15, 2003

Yeah, great at getting us into Wawa.

anakha posted:

The Summerslam ladder match was hamstrung by a mandate to avoid using the ladder as an obvious weapon, IIRC. If you compare the ladder spots from WM10 to this one, you'll notice that the spots from the orignal ladder match that had the ladder being wielded are gone in the second one.

Shawn's tantrum at the end didn't help things either.

Really? Can you link to more on this? I don't recall anyone being injured from the first.

DeathChicken posted:

Pittman had exactly one feud I remember, where Cobra debuted as Pittman's former Army comrade who he left behind in Iraq, or something. They had a PPV match that Pittman won by rappelling in from the ceiling and jumping him (as apparently this very tasteful stunt was a thing even back in 1995)

I had to look this up. I can't believe Fake Sting guy did other stuff.

Also, I managed to find like one title match with Flair on YouTube or something, and it was god awful. I wonder why Pittman stuck around as long as he did?

disaster pastor posted:

About what you'd expect:
A) The Kliq were deep in Vince's ear and didn't care for Bam Bam;
B) if Bam Bam cared enough, he probably could have either won the Kliq over (I think he got along with Nash and maybe HBK individually?) or at least been one of the people that had enough leeway for Vince to keep them off his rear end;
C) he didn't care enough, because he could see the writing on the wall, and not only would it be very hard to get Diesel-like pops for himself even without the Kliq working against him, it wouldn't matter anyway because the rocket strapped to Michaels' rear end was going to leave Nash way behind, let alone Bam Bam.

I guess my question was more about whether Bigelow talked about it, and if he was bitter or anything. He seemed happy enough in ECW and later WCW.

MassRafTer posted:

It worked out really poorly for New Japan other than getting to do nWo Japan. They'd regularly get hosed out of the talent they wanted on their tours (or would have some unfortunate injuries like Goldberg missing the 2000 1/4 Dome show because of the limo injuries) and their talent was treated as a joke in WCW. Nagata was given a token push for 2 months and then mostly used as a JTTS, Chono was treated as a midcarder, Nakanishi was given the terrible Kurosawa gimmick and of course there was having Liger lose the IWGP Jr title to a tequila bottle shot. Muta was made out to be an absolute joke at the end. His 2000 run was supposed to set up something when he returned but he was treated as a complete clown, no pun intended.

There was also the issue that someone like Norton was a star in New Japan and then treated as a midcard guy in WCW.

Only Muta really drew and that was in the late 80s. Liger was important to the development of the cruiserweight concept but wasn't really a draw. He was a big deal in the sense the Pillman matches really got people talking and could have elevated Pillman if Watts didn't come in. His run in the Monday Night Wars matches had some good matches but nothing sustained.

There's a reason they ended the relationship and Bischoff was left trying to mend fences with Japanese groups during the Fusient negotiations.

Zounds, I honestly had no clue. I figured nWo Japan did such great business that it was a huge win for Japan.

Schlitzkrieg Bop posted:

Yeah the weird finish drags it down for me. The superkick at the top of the ladder looks like crap, and then Shawn botches getting the belt twice as I recall. The first time they manage to play it off because the ladder is out of position, but the second time is just awkward.

Still a pretty good match though with some really sick bumps from Shawn. He takes a nasty suplex to the outside that I'm surprised didn't ruin his back, and another spot where he gets his leg tangled in the ladder really makes me cringe.

The finish never bothered me. At the end of the match, when guys are tired, and you're using and failing to get the ladder just right (which you've almost never used in this scenario), I can totally buy that it's frustrating for the wrestler. I bought Shawn's legitimate frustration as part of the match, and for me, it actually adds to it. The superkick pretty much has to be awkward so Shawn doesn't fly off. That may just be me, though.

MassRafTer posted:

You cannot make an argument for Curt Hennig at all. His WCW run was horrible. The Flair feud was hot but never got blown off due to injury and he was just bad in the ring.

Kevin Nash and Scott Hall are the best examples.

Wrath/Bryan Clarke was definitely used better than Adam Bomb but, it's not like it was a great run.

Hennig hadn't wrestled in ... 3 years? And even when he had, it was upper midcard. I figured a brief run at the top with Flair was a move up.

Nash and Hall seemed to me to make a lateral move; Nash had been champ for a year, and Hall had been the top midcard guy for 4 years.

Breitbart Is Rightbart posted:

What about that period in early 97 where the title was shifted between Shawn/Sid/Shawn/Sid/Bret/Sid/Undertaker or something along those lines? Those were some meaningless reigns.

Also Hogan's 93 run after beating Yokozuna.

I know he was transitional, but Backlund's win on a storyline gag, which then saw him lose the belt like a week later to Diesel in a non-televised deal must've felt like such a kick to the nuts for him. After all he did to get the crazy old man gimmick over, too. Just completely took the wind out of the sails of a great character, and made the WM blow-off mean so much less.

Davros1
Jul 19, 2007

You've got to admit, you are kind of implausible



Red posted:


I know he was transitional, but Backlund's win on a storyline gag, which then saw him lose the belt like a week later to Diesel in a non-televised deal must've felt like such a kick to the nuts for him. After all he did to get the crazy old man gimmick over, too. Just completely took the wind out of the sails of a great character, and made the WM blow-off mean so much less.

Not even a week; won it on a Weds, then lost it that Satuday. In 8 seconds.

Davros1 fucked around with this message at 02:20 on Jun 4, 2020

oldpainless
Oct 30, 2009

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MassRafTer
May 26, 2001

BAEST MODE!!!

Red posted:



Zounds, I honestly had no clue. I figured nWo Japan did such great business that it was a huge win for Japan.


Hennig hadn't wrestled in ... 3 years? And even when he had, it was upper midcard. I figured a brief run at the top with Flair was a move up.

Nash and Hall seemed to me to make a lateral move; Nash had been champ for a year, and Hall had been the top midcard guy for 4 years.


I know he was transitional, but Backlund's win on a storyline gag, which then saw him lose the belt like a week later to Diesel in a non-televised deal must've felt like such a kick to the nuts for him. After all he did to get the crazy old man gimmick over, too. Just completely took the wind out of the sails of a great character, and made the WM blow-off mean so much less.

nWo Japan was a big success but WCW was so hard to work with that well before they split and then were absorbed into Team 2000 they were working on ways to get out of the use of the nWo trademark since WCW was such a wreck to work with. When Bischoff first negotiated with New Japan he didn't start things off on the right foot by involving Sonny Onoo who got on the nerves of the people he dealt with. It wasn't as bad as their relationship with TNA but when Bischoff was taking over WCW in 2001 it was thought he'd probably be working with Ultimo Dragon to bring in Japanese talent unless he could rebuild the NJPW relationship.

The Flair feud was in the midcard for the US title. After that he was barely a factor in the nWo, then a comedy tag team and whatever the hell his role in Russo's run where he was portrayed as a washed up loser, then a flunky type. He did get a title match with Goldberg by accident when they did the last minute title switch though

MassRafTer fucked around with this message at 02:44 on Jun 4, 2020

Kosmo Gallion
Sep 13, 2013
First time I ever watched WCW was the Nitro when Hennig joined the NWO. He won the US title that night from Mongo.

Later on he did this - https://youtu.be/nVGww_75olE

disaster pastor
May 1, 2007


Red posted:

I guess my question was more about whether Bigelow talked about it, and if he was bitter or anything. He seemed happy enough in ECW and later WCW.

He did talk about it, that's where the info comes from. He was a little bitter, but more in an "it could have worked out if not for..." way. He seemed to get more annoyed at other people getting sidelined by the Kliq than at how they interfered with him.

Edge & Christian
May 20, 2001

Earth-1145 is truly the best!
A world of singing, magic frogs,
high adventure, no shitposters
So I had a similar but unrelated memory of WWF really teeing up the Too Much Are Gay storyline and dropping it all, but zero memory of DOA being involved in the angle at all.

I remembered there being rumors of WWF wanting them to do a "gay wedding" storyline in late 1998 and they obviously didn't do that. My memory was of the "smoking gun" for this was a promo that led you to you think Scott Taylor was going to propose (marriage) to Brian Christopher, but the "swerve" was that no, he was just proposing they reaffirm their tag team partnership after a rough patch. I cannot find any evidence of this promo online. Spending way too much time, I came up with the following timeline of "WWE playing Gay Panic with Too Much":

Summer of 1998
Too Much had what could easily be interpreted as effeminate dancing/taunts/etc. for the first several months of their existence, but it wasn't something the announcers ever discussed or played up, they were generally just treated as "cocky heels" and Cornette or Ross would toss in a reference to the Midnight Express or whatever once in awhile.

Some time in November 1998 they start pushing the 'gay' angle a little more with Taylor declaring "I love you, man!" on the house mic before every match and Too Much hugging pre-match or on the rare occasion where they win a televised match, after the match.

December 6, 1998 (Heat): Too Much are now doing a lot of 'flamboyant' dancing on the way to the ring, start to hug in the ring and then the LOD2000 beat the living gently caress out of them for 90 seconds as the announcers mostly discuss Stone Cold Steve Austin's health and Hawk's absence and replacement by Droz. Droz refuses to let go of a leglock on Taylor and so a crying Christopher has to carry him to the back.

December 13, 1998 (Heat): Scott Taylor comes out on crutches to support Christopher in his singles match against Kevin Quinn, who "dedicates the match" to his tag partner. Shane McMahon on commentary asks probing questions to Taylor about his and Christopher's "extracurricular friendship", Quinn gets a surprise roll-up and Too Much are very upset, which in Shane McMahon's mind is another suspiciously gay response.

December 20, 1999 (Heat): The following week Brian Christopher is tagging with Kevin Quinn against the Hardys. Shane McMahon spends the entire match gay-baiting "Scotty Too Hotty", pointing out how "clooooooose" and "flamboyant" and "a little funny" their partnership is, and how the two like "to tango". Christopher/Quinn pick up the victory, and the announcers question if Christopher really needs Taylor at all.

December 26, 1998 (Shotgun): Christopher and Quinn team again against DOA. Quinn seems to actually be getting into being a dancing fool like Christopher this week after not really showing any character the week before. The match turns into a double DQ somehow because DOA spend three minutes double-teaming Quinn and posting his knee over and over and Christopher keeps trying to break up the double team so both teams are DQed. Christopher carries the injured Quinn backstage and announcers sell how mad Scott Taylor looks about this.

January 2, 1999 (Shotgun): Brian Christopher is scheduled for a singles match against the Blue Meanie and is accompanied to the ring by both Taylor and Quinn. Meanie challenges him to a dance contest instead. Blue Meanie grabs him to tango and Christopher dances along, but Meanie turns it into a lariat and a match begins. Taylor distracts the ref so that Christopher can headbutt Meanie in the groin, which leads to Gillberg getting involved, which leads to a schmozz no contest.

January 9, 1999 (Shotgun): Following the controversy of next week, the full JOB Squad* unite against Brian Christopher, Kevin Quinn, and the Hardys. * (Al Snow is absent selling his injuries from the 12/29 Raw match against Road Dogg for the hardcore title, a match Bruce Pritchard calls "one of the greatest matches I have ever witnessed") and the JOB Squad picks up the win after Quinn is thrown into the ropes while Christopher is on the turnbuckle and gets crotched, allowing Scorpio to Top Rope.... something Christopher into a pin. Post-match Christopher and Quinn argue until Christopher turns to leave and Quinn dropkicks him. Taylor comes down and the two of them beat down Quinn with a crutch and embrace.

January 23, 1999 (Shotgun): A three way elimination match takes place between the Oddities, Too Much, and DOA. Too Much spend a lot of time hugging and patting each other's asses before the bell rings. George Steele hits Taylor with a chair so Too Much get eliminated. DOA use Twin Magic to give them an advantage after "whatever DOA member that was that snuck in" punches Golga in the groin. DOA eventually win, but the Oddities (the clear babyface team in this match) then do a four on two attack against DOA, and dance to the Insane Clown Posse in the ring as Too Much offers condolences to to DOA.

January 24, 1999 (Heat): Too Much now have rainbow tights and vests and are really prancing in their entrance, though Shane manages to talk pretty much exclusively about the Royal Rumble rather than any gay-baiting as Too Much loses to the JOB Squad. Then the Acolytes and Mideon kill all four men.

January 30, 1999 (Shotgun): DOA have a match against the JOB Squad. Scorpio appears to have the match won, but Too Much run in and Taylor distracts the ref while Christopher legdrops Scorpio, giving DOA the win.

February 7, 1999 (Heat): The Oddities are kicking Too Much's asses, but Giant Silva is lured away from the ring by a bat-wielding Droz, and then DOA comes in to beat up the remaining Oddities and throw Christopher's carcass on top of Golga, allowing Too Much to pick up a win. The DOA high five Too Much and allow some hugs, as Shane McMahon makes "Blue Oyster Bar"/Police Academy jokes.

February 21, 1999 (Heat): This is the show you remember where Too Much wear pink motorcycle helmets and rainbow tights and act SUPER gay prior to an eight man tag match against the Oddities. Most of the commentary for the match focused on guest commentary Droz menacing Kevin Kelly. Taylor steals Golga's Cartman doll and 3/4 of the Oddities chase after him to retrieve it, allowing DOA to double team Kurrgan and get the win for the heels.

March 20, 1999 (Shotgun): DOA have a match against HHH and X-Pac, and Too Much (now sans rainbow tights) once again ride down on the back of the bikes with their pink helmets. HHH refers to them as "Two Big Biker Guys With Two Big Nancy Boys" during his intro spiel. Too Much repeatedly try to interfere, but shockingly HHH is too smart for them and wins with the Pedigree.

March 27, 1999 (Shotgun)Wow, the DOA/Too Much partnership lasted a lot longer than I thought. DOA/Too Much face off against Mideon, Viscera, and the Acolytes. DOA/Too Much basically got squashed while the announcers hyped Wrestlemania.

April 3, 1999 (Shotgun): DOA and Too Much once again do their tandem entrance despite the match being a four way between them, the Public Enemy, and the Hardy Boyz. Eventually DOA and Too Much are the two legal teams,and DOA menace Too Much into "lying down" for them the partnership seemingly explodes, though eventually the Hardyz tag in and DOA crushes them and tags in Too Much who go back and forth with the Hardyz until Public Enemy tags in and all three teams dogpile them and pin them.... in tandem? They sell this as a "locker room grudge" against Public Enemy in dumb worked shoot terms and I guess DOA/Too Much patch things up in the background?

April 25, 1999 (Heat): Too Much have dropped the rainbow tights, Scotty does the worm before the match begins. Droz and Prince Albert destroy them in about a minute. Prince Albert prepares to pierce Christopher's nipple but the Ministry of Darkness interupt the piercing to come in to beat up Too Much some more.

May 15, 1999 (Shotgun): Labeled "Russo's favorites" by Michael Cole on commentary, the rainbow are back and Too Much face off against D'Lo Brown and Mark Henry. Actual commentary from the cursed pair of Vince Russo and Michael Cole:

quote:

RUSSO: You know Michael what man, and I'm sayin MAN now, in their right mind would wear sissy Mary colors like these two clowns?
COLE: They're obviously comfortable with their, uh, masculinity!
RUSSO: Oh yeah, they're masculine all right.
[...]
Taylor debuts the worm as an offensive maneuver in this match, which Russo groans at.

Russo is an exceptionally bad announcer, more or less just calling what is about to happen in a pre-scripted match and then praising himself for predicting what would happen. D'lo and Mark Henry win.

May 16, 1999 (Heat): Too Much team up one last time with DOA, though they make separate entrances no motorcycles or anything. They took on THE UNION and Big Show chokeslams a Harris brother in twenty seconds to end the match. This was the final appearance of DOA.

May 23, 1999 (Heat): Rainbow tights are gone again, as Brian Christopher takes on Meat (accompanied to the ring by PMS) in a match that exists mainly for Terri Runnels to try to get the PMS gimmick over on commentary: "Remember: We Hate Men!" Scott Taylor is successfully distracted by getting the moves put on him by Ryan Shamrock, but Brian Christopher is disgusted by Jacqueline trying to hit on him. Meat wins, and then the Hardy Boyz run in with Michael Hayes and beat down Too Much.

May 29, 1999 (Shotgun): Too Much get squashed (literally and figuratively) by Mideon and Viscera.

June 5, 1999 (Shotgun): Too Much are assaulted by Teri and Jackie with supersoakers in a product placement pre-tape. This is, I believe, the final appearance of Too Much before Too Cool debuts in October.

The "Too Cool Gay Wedding" thing is corroborated by Meltzer reporting that it was planned for the Valentine's Day Massacre on 2/14/99:

Dave Meltzer recapping the January 24 match described above posted:

B. Bob Holly (Robert Howard) & Scorpio (Charles Scaggs) beat Scott Taylor & Brian Christopher (Brian Lawler) in 3:52 when Holly pinned Christopher. It appears from their lack of push or focus and their gimmick being toned down, that the Too Much wedding scheduled for the 2/14 show in Memphis has been canceled (one, if not both of the participants wasn't exactly thrilled with the idea of doing it), and with it, whatever push they may have gotten from it. The work was good but the crowd didn't care, which may turn out to be the subtext for most of wrestling in 1999.

Christopher and Taylor would (much) later confirm as much, though with fairly dubious memories of the timeline:

"Christopher in 2015"[/quote posted:

Vince Russo and Vince McMahon came up with the idea that Scott and I would be gay and get married on TV at a Valentine’s Day Pay-per-View in Memphis, Tennessee. I told Vince with my southern heritage that was not going to fly, to give me a week and ill come up with something better and that’s how the spoof on the hip hop culture came into existence. We switched baby face and became “Too Cool” and the sky was the limit for us.

Scott Taylor basically revealed the root of the original question (why did they briefly team up with DOA) in an interview though:

Taylor in 2008 posted:

Jack asks about Too Much leading to a gay wedding. Scotty says that is true, the first time he met Stephanie was when she pitched it to Vince. He thought maybe down the road they could say it was all a rouse, but Brian wouldn't do it. When they didn't do it they ended up riding behind DOA with pink helmets on
So like all classic WWE angles, it was done as punishment with no real long term thought!

Still couldn't find the promo I was thinking of.

Edge & Christian fucked around with this message at 05:30 on Jun 4, 2020

anakha
Sep 16, 2009


Red posted:

Really? Can you link to more on this? I don't recall anyone being injured from the first.

Linking several articles below saying the same thing about no weapons allowed. As per the Rajah article wasn't so much due to injury fear but more a mandate fom Vince to tone down the violent visuals.

https://rajah.com/node/34029
https://www.goliath.com/sports/the-...dies%20instead.
https://www.wrestling20yrs.com/blog/how-shawn-michaels-and-razor-ramon-made-the-ladder-match

Red
Apr 15, 2003

Yeah, great at getting us into Wawa.

Edge & Christian posted:

TOO MUCH (see what I did there?) to quote

You know, I found a crap quality video of them against Christopher Daniels and Suicide Kid on YouTube, and the 'human being' chants are really loud. I can understand them being afraid of going ahead with the gimmick, but it's on the WWF for equating being gay with evil (also see: Goldust).


anakha posted:

Linking several articles below saying the same thing about no weapons allowed. As per the Rajah article wasn't so much due to injury fear but more a mandate fom Vince to tone down the violent visuals.

https://rajah.com/node/34029
https://www.goliath.com/sports/the-...dies%20instead.
https://www.wrestling20yrs.com/blog/how-shawn-michaels-and-razor-ramon-made-the-ladder-match

So odd. Vince is either loving furious about Flair blading, or he's booking first blood matches a few years later, so who knows what the gently caress he's thinking.

Edge & Christian
May 20, 2001

Earth-1145 is truly the best!
A world of singing, magic frogs,
high adventure, no shitposters

Red posted:

You know, I found a crap quality video of them against Christopher Daniels and Suicide Kid on YouTube, and the 'human being' chants are really loud. I can understand them being afraid of going ahead with the gimmick, but it's on the WWF for equating being gay with evil (also see: Goldust).
I saw the same video (someone made a surprisingly thorough Too Much playlist) and didn't notice but I watched it again with headphones and you're right, that chant comes in hard around 4m40s:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHLcCuLdJCw&t=280s
Not an excuse for a single person involved, but wrestling crowds of the era were eager to chant that term at all sorts of heels, from heels clearly being coded as gay ('Adorable' Adrian Adonis, Goldust, the Beverly Brothers, Lenny & Lodi, Beverly Brothers) to just people who weren't with any consistency and closer to just run of the mill heels (Freebirds, Midnight Express, Rip Rogers, Shawn Michaels, New Age Outlaws/Mr. rear end, Triple H, Kurt Angle).

It's disgusting in every context but what makes Too Much extra bad/noteworthy is that someone (probably Russo, from the sounds of it) saw Too Much getting it (along with general booing and an even stronger "Jerry's Kid" chant at the start of the match) and went DIS, DIS RIGHT HERE IS HOW YOUSE GUYS ARE GONNA GET OVER, SWEAR TA GOD.

The big hugging spot at the end of the linked match makes it seem like they were already tweaking it in that direction, so I may be doing a lovely chicken/hateful egg thing here.

Red
Apr 15, 2003

Yeah, great at getting us into Wawa.

Edge & Christian posted:

I saw the same video (someone made a surprisingly thorough Too Much playlist) and didn't notice but I watched it again with headphones and you're right, that chant comes in hard around 4m40s:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHLcCuLdJCw&t=280s
Not an excuse for a single person involved, but wrestling crowds of the era were eager to chant that term at all sorts of heels, from heels clearly being coded as gay ('Adorable' Adrian Adonis, Goldust, the Beverly Brothers, Lenny & Lodi, Beverly Brothers) to just people who weren't with any consistency and closer to just run of the mill heels (Freebirds, Midnight Express, Rip Rogers, Shawn Michaels, New Age Outlaws/Mr. rear end, Triple H, Kurt Angle).

It's disgusting in every context but what makes Too Much extra bad/noteworthy is that someone (probably Russo, from the sounds of it) saw Too Much getting it (along with general booing and an even stronger "Jerry's Kid" chant at the start of the match) and went DIS, DIS RIGHT HERE IS HOW YOUSE GUYS ARE GONNA GET OVER, SWEAR TA GOD.

The big hugging spot at the end of the linked match makes it seem like they were already tweaking it in that direction, so I may be doing a lovely chicken/hateful egg thing here.

The shame is, they didn't need that to get heat - they were perfectly cromulent heels. Christopher's laugh alone made you hate the guy. Being undersized, having them cheat furiously would be more than enough to draw the crowd in. Hiring goons like DOA would just be the icing on the cake. I'm picturing Christopher insulting the LOD or someone from behind DOA, to where you can't even see him.

On that note, why even push the narrative of Christopher not being Lawler's kid? It's funny, but ... who cares? It got people to chant something at Christopher, but that could've been replaced by just about anything.

Smoking Crow
Feb 14, 2012

*laughs at u*

Red posted:

The shame is, they didn't need that to get heat - they were perfectly cromulent heels. Christopher's laugh alone made you hate the guy. Being undersized, having them cheat furiously would be more than enough to draw the crowd in. Hiring goons like DOA would just be the icing on the cake. I'm picturing Christopher insulting the LOD or someone from behind DOA, to where you can't even see him.

On that note, why even push the narrative of Christopher not being Lawler's kid? It's funny, but ... who cares? It got people to chant something at Christopher, but that could've been replaced by just about anything.

lawler didnt want to look old especially in memphis

what's older than having an adult son

Davros1
Jul 19, 2007

You've got to admit, you are kind of implausible



Smoking Crow posted:

lawler didnt want to look old especially in memphis

what's older than having an adult son

When he broke into the business, Greg Valentine was booked as his father's Johnny brother

LadyPictureShow
Nov 18, 2005

Success!



Edge & Christian posted:

I saw the same video (someone made a surprisingly thorough Too Much playlist) and didn't notice but I watched it again with headphones and you're right, that chant comes in hard around 4m40s:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHLcCuLdJCw&t=280s
Not an excuse for a single person involved, but wrestling crowds of the era were eager to chant that term at all sorts of heels, from heels clearly being coded as gay ('Adorable' Adrian Adonis, Goldust, the Beverly Brothers, Lenny & Lodi, Beverly Brothers) to just people who weren't with any consistency and closer to just run of the mill heels (Freebirds, Midnight Express, Rip Rogers, Shawn Michaels, New Age Outlaws/Mr. rear end, Triple H, Kurt Angle).

It's disgusting in every context but what makes Too Much extra bad/noteworthy is that someone (probably Russo, from the sounds of it) saw Too Much getting it (along with general booing and an even stronger "Jerry's Kid" chant at the start of the match) and went DIS, DIS RIGHT HERE IS HOW YOUSE GUYS ARE GONNA GET OVER, SWEAR TA GOD.

The big hugging spot at the end of the linked match makes it seem like they were already tweaking it in that direction, so I may be doing a lovely chicken/hateful egg thing here.

:yikes:

So was this angle sort of like a test run before that Chuck and Billy thing they tried a few years later? That one got as far as a fake called off wedding, right?

Was Kanyon in the WWE when either of these angles were going on? Did he (or any other LGBT wrestlers; he's the only one I can think of) ever comment on those angles?

Alaois
Feb 7, 2012

LadyPictureShow posted:

:yikes:

So was this angle sort of like a test run before that Chuck and Billy thing they tried a few years later? That one got as far as a fake called off wedding, right?

Was Kanyon in the WWE when either of these angles were going on? Did he (or any other LGBT wrestlers; he's the only one I can think of) ever comment on those angles?

Too Much was 1998 so Kanyon was still in WCW, but Billy & Chuck was right in the middle of his WWF run.

Alaois fucked around with this message at 21:20 on Jun 4, 2020

El Gallinero Gros
Mar 17, 2010

LadyPictureShow posted:

:yikes:

So was this angle sort of like a test run before that Chuck and Billy thing they tried a few years later? That one got as far as a fake called off wedding, right?

Was Kanyon in the WWE when either of these angles were going on? Did he (or any other LGBT wrestlers; he's the only one I can think of) ever comment on those angles?

Kanyon would have been in WCW during Too Much

Unsure about Chuck & Billy, he might have been dead by then or at least no longer with WWE

DeathChicken
Jul 9, 2012

Nonsense. I have not yet begun to defile myself.

Kanyon would have been around for Billy and Chuck (which ran from about 2001 to 2002). His WWE run basically went "Debuted in July of 2001, got injured in October, reassigned to OVW/suffered through various medical problems until 2003, reappeared to get the poo poo beaten out of him by Undertaker, fired in 2004"

Eat My Fuc
May 29, 2007

Billy and Chuck's wedding is a truly bizarre segment, I'm pretty sure 3 minute warning was involved and they also were involved in a lesbian bashing angle that's nonsensical and gross.

Trying
Sep 26, 2019

Why does Impact still exist? I get Carter running it as a vanity project but a conglomerate straight out bought a TV station nobody watches to keep it going. Is it money laundering?

karmicknight
Aug 21, 2011
The people who bought TNA were trying to restart their Canadian multi-media empire from what I understand.

Kosmo Gallion
Sep 13, 2013
Did Billy and Chuck ever receive the F word chants?

Eat My Fuc
May 29, 2007

Breitbart Is Rightbart posted:

Did Billy and Chuck ever receive the F word chants?

Not that I remember but I do remember Test getting that chant a lot during his post corporation failure runs. No idea why. I think in the Elimination Chamber match he's in they are especially loud.

STAC Goat
Mar 12, 2008

Watching you sleep.

Butt first, let's
check the feeds.

karmicknight posted:

The people who bought TNA were trying to restart their Canadian multi-media empire from what I understand.

Yeah, I think its mostly a content thing. Like I don't have AXSTV or whatever channel Impact is currently on but I have FiteTV and like 25% of the programming on that channel seems to be TNA stuff.

They also seem to have dramatically reduced the costs and scope of the promotion from its Carter/Spike years so like I have no idea if its a profitable indy or not but it doesn't LOOK like it should be racking up huge costs.

ShootaBoy
Jan 6, 2010

Anime is Bad.
Except for Pokemon, Valkyria Chronicles and 100% OJ.

Eat My Fuc posted:

Billy and Chuck's wedding is a truly bizarre segment, I'm pretty sure 3 minute warning was involved and they also were involved in a lesbian bashing angle that's nonsensical and gross.

3 Minute Warning was absolutely involved, and the twist that brought them out was genuinely really well executed, unlike everything else about that storyline.

Shine
Feb 26, 2007

No Muscles For The Majority

Eat My Fuc posted:

Billy and Chuck's wedding is a truly bizarre segment, I'm pretty sure 3 minute warning was involved and they also were involved in a lesbian bashing angle that's nonsensical and gross.

Yeah, that happened. It was part of this exceptionally lovely angle where Bischoff walked up to (IIRC) Trish Stratus and Lita and told them that nobody cares about women's wrestling, and that the real money was in "hot lesbian action." He later sent out some women to make out in front of the crowd, then got bored and sent out 3 Minute Warning to beat them up.

Also, at one point Bischoff tried to win Vince McMahon over by bringing out some "bisexual lesbians" to bang him.

"Bisexual lesbians" :psyduck:

Edge & Christian
May 20, 2001

Earth-1145 is truly the best!
A world of singing, magic frogs,
high adventure, no shitposters

Breitbart Is Rightbart posted:

Did Billy and Chuck ever receive the F word chants?
They definitely did, though from memory it varied a lot depending on what area they were taping the show at; I don't know if anyone was actually entertained by them, but crowds in a lot of areas just seemed sort of bored by them rather than going full slur chants. Wade Keller is quoted in a WaPo article from the time:

quote:

This is the most mature way wrestling has ever handled a gay storyline, which isn't saying much at all," Keller said yesterday. "But what I've noticed that's different this time is that the crowds have been surprisingly tolerant of the Billy and Chuck angle. It wasn't so long ago that you would go to a wrestling event and be sitting next to kids who were encouraged to chant, 'human being, human being, human being.' This time the audience responds to the gay, or effeminate, characters in a fun way, instead of as a way to express hate.
(This is also, to be fair, right around the same time where a recently returned Goldust was initially set up to be a creepy stalker 'in love' with Booker T and the audience effectively turned them into a babyface odd couple within weeks).

WWE definitely felt the need to keep amping the gimmick up when "two guys are acting gay!" wasn't enough to make them strong heels, so they started blatantly cheating to win their matches with loaded boxes of chocolate and poo poo, and when even that didn't work they added an even gayer heel manager in Rico who would interfere extremely homosexually with hair dryers and bottles of perfume and poo poo.

Even funnier, I guess they only did the PR disaster of a fake wedding because the New York Times got interested in Billy & Chuck months after Vince/WWE gave up on them.

This article was published on August 25, 2002. Billy & Chuck had dropped the tag team titles to Edge & Hulk Hogan almost two months earlier, and had been mostly going 50/50 with Shannon Moore, the Hurricane, Hardcore Holly and a pre-RNN rookie Randy Orton on Velocity for the subsequent seven weeks. A couple weeks later they're back on Smackdown and doing the gay wedding angle and being asked to do mainstream media appearances.

A big chunk of Vintage Dave:

quote:

For literally months, [the NYTimes] had been working on a story on Billy & Chuck. Please don't ask me why. WWE managed to get GLAAD to publicly come out in support of the characters, and they got a generally positive (well, with the exception of the fact it was pointed out that business was taking a hit) story since if GLAAD was in favor of the characters, how could they knock them? It was great strategy. The New York Times came within a hairs breath of killing UFC dead with no real facts, and to this day, it is still banned in New York state largely because of a series of Times articles that embarrassed state lawmakers. And more recently, the Times resuscitated a forgotten pro wrestling gimmick and got the guys on "The Today Show" and the entertainment page of USA Today, and made them, for one night anyway, actual ratings draws.

[...]

But it's pro wrestling. Since they were supposed to be faces and were getting so much pub, the decision, rightly or wrongly, is that the gay part had to go. Remember when it was time to turn Goldust? The first thing they did was establish he wasn't, as Jerry Lawler said in that face turning segment, "Well, you know, queer."

[...]

Billy & Chuck made it clear in all their media interviews that both are straight. But in what had to be the embarrassment for all those who proclaimed it as something more than what it was, a ratings ploy and a wrestling angle, the biggest pop the segment got was when they established that they Billy & Chuck were straight, and Billy's "Now we've got nothing against Gays" came off about as contemporary as the standard "Some of my best friends are colored." The key was that they had to establish they were straight before they got laid out for a sympathetic babyface turn, and that their gayness was nothing but a publicity stunt.

[...]

Vince McMahon on Confidential, who looked visibly like the stress of declining business had gotten to him badly since his last TV appearances, said that those who found the Raw segment reprehensible may have been right on the money. His feeling was that the two women stripping to their underwear and rubbing was fine, but the physicality, which virtually all the company's broadcast partners outside the U.S. edited off the show, was "a bit much." He said the company designed the segment to shock people, and that they would continue to try and shock people, but not on a weekly basis because then it would be overdone.

He said he didn't consider the segment gay bashing, and showed clips of Jamal & Rosie attacking Mae Young, asking if it was septuagenarian bashing, or Big Show, if it was giant bashing, or the mini-Goldust, if it was bashing vertically challenged people (actually that was kind of funny). I think he called the WWE equal opportunity bashers. He said that there are people working in WWE who are gay and there is no reason they can't have gay characters.

[...]

He noted if the audience chanted "human being" at gay characters that wouldn't be good. Of course, that was a chant that Billy & Chuck received at most arenas when their characters were first developed that has been seemingly forgotten.

[...]

[Howard Stern] spent about 15 minutes on the subject, making fun of wrestling although he had clearly not seen the segment and said WWE didn't have the guts to go through with what they had promised. He thought Rico was the person performing the ceremony, and Eric Bischoff is such a mainstream personality that Stern thought his name was Gary Fischoff. Stern noted that Rico, playing the role of the old priest, was such a bad actor that he didn't even sound gay at all.

It's also kind of remarkable how much concentrated Wrestlecrap all spewed out almost immediately after the Brand Split began and they lost Rock/Austin almost simultaneously:

2002-08-26: "The Unamericans" attempt to burn an American flag in Madison Square Garden
2002-09-09: An entire Raw built on the promise of "Hot Lesbian Action" that ends with the women being legitimately injured by Three Minute Warning attacking them
2002-09-12: Billy & Chuck's Wedding, which also ends with Three Minute Warning attacking them
2002-10-07: "Katie Vick" is first invoked
2002-10-21: Triple H Fucks a Corpse

Also this, which I 100% have no memory of (I was pretty checked out and definitely not seeing B-shows at this point) which might manage to be high on the Offensive and Nonsense lists for PPV segments

Edge & Christian fucked around with this message at 00:47 on Jun 5, 2020

Defiance Industries
Jul 22, 2010

A five-star manufacturer


I remember during the blowoff segment, Billy said "If I was gay, I probably would marry Chuck" and everyone cheered. Which is probably why WWE stopped doing "gay heel" angles, the heat wasn't easy enough.

rujasu
Dec 19, 2013

Bischoff calling three minutes on the wedding got a massive pop at the time, probably because the homophobes and non homophobes were both relieved it was over, albeit for different reasons.

BrigadierSensible
Feb 16, 2012

I've got a pocket full of cheese🧀, and a garden full of trees🌴.

Apart from the homophobia, (and please do not discount how homophobic it was to have Billy and Chuck, at the end of an angle where they had been pretty well received by the crowd as I remember, go "hey hey hey, as fun as it is to act this way, we aren't really poofs. That'd be gross."), something that has always bothered me about this angle was the way they got GLAAD involved.

As I remember it, GLAAD sent a gravy boat or something as a wedding present. It was sweet, and positive attention that wrestling was getting from people outside the wrestling bubble/world. And we all know how Vince fetishizes "mainstream press attention".

But then WWE gently caress GLAAD, and their entire LGBTQ audience over by doing the "haha it was all a joke. Gays are still icky." bullshit at the wedding.

And although Old man make up Bischoff, and 3 minute warning is a cool "wrestling" moment, it is hugely overshadowed by the way WWE actively and intentionally hosed with a LGBTQ rights organization, and their LGBTQ fans.

To take this sideways, but I think this is a huge part of the reason Vince/WWE will never get the mainstream attention Vince creams over. Because every time they do get a little bit of it, they piss all over it by being Vince McMahon Dammnit! What are some other prominent examples of that sort of poo poo that people here can remember?

Red
Apr 15, 2003

Yeah, great at getting us into Wawa.

BrigadierSensible posted:

Apart from the homophobia, (and please do not discount how homophobic it was to have Billy and Chuck, at the end of an angle where they had been pretty well received by the crowd as I remember, go "hey hey hey, as fun as it is to act this way, we aren't really poofs. That'd be gross."), something that has always bothered me about this angle was the way they got GLAAD involved.

As I remember it, GLAAD sent a gravy boat or something as a wedding present. It was sweet, and positive attention that wrestling was getting from people outside the wrestling bubble/world. And we all know how Vince fetishizes "mainstream press attention".

But then WWE gently caress GLAAD, and their entire LGBTQ audience over by doing the "haha it was all a joke. Gays are still icky." bullshit at the wedding.

And although Old man make up Bischoff, and 3 minute warning is a cool "wrestling" moment, it is hugely overshadowed by the way WWE actively and intentionally hosed with a LGBTQ rights organization, and their LGBTQ fans.

To take this sideways, but I think this is a huge part of the reason Vince/WWE will never get the mainstream attention Vince creams over. Because every time they do get a little bit of it, they piss all over it by being Vince McMahon Dammnit! What are some other prominent examples of that sort of poo poo that people here can remember?

Does the Trump/Rosie O'Donnell "match" count? I remember the crowd poo poo all over it, and the news sites said WWE was confused as to why no 'real' press organization picked it up. Or maybe that was Hillary vs. Obama, I can't remember.

They tried to invite Michael Sam to 'tell his side of the story', which I think he ignored. Same for Glenn Beck.

I don't really want to think about their response to 9/11, either.

Super No Vacancy
Jul 26, 2012

wwe has worked glaad multiple times and they fall for it every time, or they just dont care. specifically them telling glaad that punk was no longer going to be there when he re-signed before his contract was up. and they used ultimate warriors wife for something lmao

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Eat My Fuc
May 29, 2007

Was there any reason Test had the F-Word chanted at him during the elimination chamber match or was that just early 00s casual homophobia where everything "lame" was called "gay" by mouth breathing teenagers.

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