Twenty years

I turn twenty tomorrow. It happens to be the 20th anniversary of the first ever Summerslam too. Here's my look back on my 20 years in and out of pro wrestling.

I loved wrestling from a very early age. I had all of the action figures - Hulk Hogan, Roddy Piper, Jake the Snake, The Undertaker, The Ultimate Warrior - the list goes on.

I loved everything about it. But the thing was that I never actually watched it. Wrestling was only really shown on Sky, and guess what we didn't have!

Yup, wrestling was my favourite thing in the world and I'd never actually watched it.

I'd learn about it from the older kids in the street who did have Sky. They taught me everything I needed to know. I've known the Ultimate Warrior's entrance theme for what seems like eternity. I even named my bike "The Ultimate Warrior". Though if I'd have done that now, I'd obviously be sued by the man-mental himself.

Having not seen any wrestling, I had no idea that it was about good guys and bad guys. Just look at the short list of action figures up there. They were all my favourites, but how many of them have always been face? I was a four year old who, in 1992, thought heels were the best. I pre-date the IWC by pretty much an entire decade!

There was then a period where I didn't really think about wrestling. It was probably about 5 or 6 years. But then we got Sky. The engineer was just doing a demo and happened to put wrestling on.

Lo and behold, I see the very same Undertaker that I had an action figure of when I was younger. He was in an inferno match against Kane. The only difference was that Taker was more gothic. But I was captured by the magic of wrestling again. The object of the match was to set your opponent on fire! As a 9 year old, this was unbelievable. Add to that the fact that Paul Bearer came down to the ring and set a teddy bear on fire to make Vince McMahon break down in tears, and you're talking entertainment.

If l337 had been invented back then, my mind would have been thinking "WTF?!".

I was hooked into it at a great time. The Corporation and the Ministry of Darkness were going at it. Edge and Christian had recently debut'd and were ripping up the undercard, as were the Hardyz. And did I mention D-X? The Attitude era is often looked back on fondly, and it's not just because it's looked at nostalgically, it was an excellent time to be a wrestling fan. X-Pac was credible enough to be my favourite wrestler at the time! Though having said that, I do miss the fact that I can't suspend my disbelief anything like I used to be able to.

But it was all a mystery to me. I knew it was "fake". But I didn't know how fake. I thought they might know a few moves in a match and maybe the ending, but the feuds were something beyond that, they actually felt real.

I eventually lost interest again due to becoming a teenager and doing other things and being teased for liking wrestling.

This was around the time Brock Lesnar was getting pushed and wrestlers' entrance music started to suck. All the music started to suck. Compare this to what you have now. Notice the absence of women in the montage too (with the exception of Trish Stratus getting put through a table from the top rope and Chyna who doesn't even count). Wrestling had balls at that time. That music meant "YEAH! MANLY WRESTLING TIME!". The music for Raw now just means "Oh it's that stupid band whose record company got them onto Raw, must be time for wrestling". It's no wonder I drifted away from wrestling.

I got back into wrestling about 2 or 3 years ago thanks to my meeting of now good friend Chris Brooker. He is the rainman of wrestling. Ask him anything, and he will give you the answer. Forget about using Wikipedia, this is your source from now on.

I got back into it because I saw how much he loved wrestling and thought that it was something that I used to love, so why couldn't I enjoy it as much as he did now? Well, quite simply, the quality of it was a reason to not enjoy it. Some people might say that John Cena was enough reason to not watch it. But I got back into it, maybe even in spite of myself. A few months later I was off to see my first ever live wrestling event. Goldust was even on the card. It turned out that not a lot had changed!

Wrestling will always be there in my life. I was born on the same day as Summerslam, it must be something to do with fate!

Interestingly I share my birthday with Michael Jackson, Lenny Henry and GG Allin. GG Allin is particularly interesting because of the severity of his mentalness. Known for being an outrageous performer and for crapping onstage and being naked and general violence at his shows, his final gig had him throwing himself through a sheet of glass while naked before marching the crowd at the show through the streets of Manhattan to get to the after party. Having taken a bit too much heroin, GG died. Except everybody at the party thought he was just doing an Andrew WK and was partying a bit too hard. Fans posed for pictures with the "passed out" GG while he was covered in excrement and dead.

What does this have to do with wrestling? A few years ago, VH1 made a list of the "most outrageous moments in music". The night of GG Allin's death only made number 4 on the list. Number one was a certain singer who, while past her heyday, was performing outdoors and a bird managed to hit the bullseye and crap directly into her mouth. This singer was of course everybody's favourite faux-gypsy Cyndi Lauper, an integral part of the MTV rock and wrestling connection that exposed WWF to a mainstream audience back in the day. Heck, Lou Albano is even in the video for 'Girls just wanna have fun'!

Anyway, who remembers hardcore matches?!

Demographics

I'm going out on a limb here and guessing that the main readership of this blog is the same as TNA's main demographic of viewers.

I wish it was because I was innovative (6 sided ring? OH MY!) or that I had catchphrases (it's not about weight limits... EURGHH). But it's not. I get hits to this blog the same way TNA gets viewers.

It's been no secret that the main draw of TNA in recent times has been its' women's division. And it's no secret that most people visiting this blog are looking for Candice Michelle's skanky feet. TNA's best rated demographic is men over 50. I would guess that my demographic's the same. So if you do by some miracle happen to be reading this blog and not scanning it for pictures, get your hands out of your pants and go outside.

In other news, Test coherently shared his thoughts on the return of The Ultimate Warrior in a recent MySpace blog post...

I'm not going to br sing this as a wrestling formum nyore but I will say this,,,thrE Ultimate Warirr is coming bacj, I;m 33 and barely remember who he as and thry expect the average san of to dat to remember wg..ho he is. I rememer Warior as the guy who ran to the ring he was so bown up he couln;t do anyhing in the ring,I remembr when Warrior opened up warrior university and at the ime I actually thought it was way to ake it nto pro westling yhat was until I met my idol zzzzzzzzzzzzzzbret hart and I'll never forget as long a I live brets exact words"warrior coulnn't even put youin a headlock, let alone teachyou how to put u in one. Brets gret guy who always hs a funny stry to tell. Now this story Bret told me about the Warrrior I have ahd no chuckle just disgust and wouldn't mind putting an old washedup ma i his place. as the story goes to Bret the hild who was brouht in the back because his dream was to see th Ultimate Warriop buy of course Warrior had no time for him not vrn a pvture ur an autraph and thr kids dream ws to met this piese uf shit and he went out in the crowd without a care in the worl, excuse my language but you are a 1st class piece of shit. and you think you are goinh to draw peole yu couldn't draw flys when Hogan graciouly hande you yh brlt. Younever loved wrestlinh like all of uds you wre there for thr payday and that's wy Hogan had to come baxk and yuwere wearing a singlet wit muscles painted om lke we couldnt tell u werent on the juice, there ar thoseho need juice and those that don't. You neded an iv hooked up to you. Im my mind you wanted toplay the sould00000000000000000000000000000000 you loved likemfootballand so on. You must have realized prtty quick you suckd but you could have gotten beter 000000000000000000000000000it bestwhen he tld me how was Igoimgto learn anything at wrrioys"

Erm... The only thing worth picking out of that is Test saying that there are those who need steroids, and those who don't. Considering he was fired from WWE, and then even TNA for taking steroids (seriously, how much did he have to take to get fired from TNA?!), I'm not quite sure what point he's trying to make other than he's drunk and unemployed.

The Hulkster apparently told his son Nick recently to "man up". Or as Macho Man may have put it, to "Be a Man". OOOHHHH YEAHHHHH.

Speaking of which, Jay Lethal proposed to SoCal Val recently. Not content with stealing gimmicks, TNA seem happy enough to steal entire angles. Not even low profile ones. MASSIVE angles that people won't ever forget. Vince Russo amazes me in the way that Piers Morgan does - both are completely unemployable, yet employed. Bizarre.

To finish, I'd like to tell you that I wore my Hotrod t-shirt to work one day this week. My boss was having a meeting with a bank manager. During which, as head of accounts, I was asked to bring some files and spreadsheets through. After I left, the bank manager apparently asked "Was THAT your accountant? Don't they usually wear suits?".

Ithangyew.

One Weirdo Nation

It's official. The Ultimate Warrior is scheduled to return to the ring for a match for the first time in a decade next month. Details can be found here.

Warrior, known to his friends as "WARRIAH!" will fight in Barcelona on the 25th June for NWE. But who will his opponent be for the big return, the money-making-match, the biggest thing to happen to wrestling since that thing Chris Benoit did?

None other than The Cabinet's own Orlando Jordan. Yup, the biggest match of the year is going to be The Ultimate Warrior versus The Ultimate supporting-role.

The make-up-wearing, bigoted, right-wing Warrior keeps a blog called 'Warrior's Machete'. In which he spouts his own brand of stupidity and moral wrongness. On a post of his made last year (this one here), I have to stop reading before the end of the first paragraph:

It has to be a difficult choice: Sluts or a Saint? Use print space and TV time to cover the sick behavior of psycho, suicidal, pop-culture sluts or revere this country’s Founding Saint’s birthday? Nah, scratch that — it wasn’t a difficult choice. No need to lie to ourselves, here. This country’s Media has for a long time easily whored itself out to irreverence, indecency...

I'm not sure about you, but when somebody who's a household name all over the world for being a professional wrestler criticizes the media for it's bias towards irreverence and indecency, the phrase "Biting the hand that feeds" comes to mind.

Seeing Hulk Hogan in the ring these days causes me to shudder. It's not the same as it used to be. However The Hulkster has made sporadic appearances in the ring forever, albeit less frequently as time goes by. The thought of Warrior stepping back into the ring after a 10 year hiatus, during which he's definitely not been training is scary. He wasn't the safest of performers back in his prime. The people who compile the Botchmania videos on Youtube must be in puddles of their own making in anticipation of Warrior's return.

For the sake of getting more hits to this blog through Google, I'll mention that Torrie Wilson was released from her WWE contract this week. I'll mention that she's also been nude on at least one occasion. That ought to do it.