Showing posts with label The Wyatt Family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Wyatt Family. Show all posts
Thursday, June 25, 2026
Friday, May 21, 2021
The Fiend
Consumers of storytelling should never have to compromise when it comes to good character work. Apparently, the readers of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter agree with me given how often they slaughter Bray Wyatt in the yearly awards. No, this isn’t just a minor disagreement. They annihilate him! They murder him! They brutalize him! They do all the things he could never do to his opponents when it counts the most. Oh sure, they’ll give him the Stockholm Syndrome treatment with the Best Gimmick awards in 2013 and 2019. And trust me, there’s a lot to be said about playing a demented cult leader and an indestructible monster on TV. But unfortunately for Mr. Wyatt, that’s where the praise ends and the raging against terrible booking begins.
Most Overrated Wrestler in 2020 (that’s a little harsh, all things considered, but okay). Worst Feud of the Year in 2017 against Randy Orton. Worst Feud of the Year in 2019 against Seth Rollins. Worst Feud of the Year in 2020 against Braun Strowman. Worst Gimmick in 2017 for being the bodily host for the spirit of Sister Abigail. Worst Gimmick in 2020 for doing the same indestructible monster character in 2019, but with more losses and more ridiculousness. Worst Match of the Year in 2014 against John Cena in a Steel Cage match (deep voiced child, anybody?). Worst Match of the Year in 2017 against Randy Orton (the worms…all those fucking worms!). Worst Match of the Year in 2019 against Seth Rollins in a Hell in a Cell match (a.k.a. the match without rules and limitations that ended in a disqualification anyways). Last and surely least, Worst Match of the Year in 2020 against Braun Strowman in a Wyatt Swamp Fight (there was no clear winner in this cheesy horror movie with more plot holes than I can count).
So…how did this happen? How did the WWE fuck up this badly when they had handfuls of gold with Bray Wyatt’s various characters? How do you fuck up a charismatic cult leader who could and would kill you with a screwdriver if he wanted to? How do you fuck up a creepy children’s show host who looks crazy enough to be on the sex offender registry and therefore shouldn’t be around children? How do you fuck up an indestructible monster with a hideous, ugly, nightmarish face that would put Pink Floyd and Slipknot to shame? How do you fuck up a character with so many layers, so much creativity, and so much potential to be a top star for the rest of eternity? I’ve got your answer right here: he loses too much.
Yep, that’s right. He’s a three hundred pound killing machine who can hit like a cannonball and move like a cruiserweight. His dialogue is so cryptic, so seductive, yet so terrifying that it’ll echo in your mind like a schizophrenic voice for days on end. If he tells you he’s going to murder you in a cold blood and leave your corpse for the buzzards to feast on, you don’t question him for a second…until he loses all of his biggest matches. He talks a big game and never backs it up when it matters. The audience is so used to seeing him fail that when he finally does add a championship or two to his resume, nobody cares. All the Hawaiian shirts, bowler hats, demonic masks, and pedophilic tendencies don’t mean shit if no one believes in the villain who embodies those traits.
Even if you don’t watch wrestling and have no idea what the fuck I’m talking about, you as authors should still take Bray Wyatt’s story and career as a cautionary tale when creating your own villains. If you want to create a convincing villain, you can splatter them with all the creative tropes in the world as long as they’re powerful enough to make their eventual defeat believable and meaningful. I’m not saying the villain has to win EVERY time, but his losses should be in small ways that don’t derail whatever momentum he has.
You think Darth Vader would be an iconic villain from the Star Wars franchise if he kept getting his ass kicked by the rebels? Fuck no, he wouldn’t have! So what does he do to solidify his power? He cuts off Luke Skywalker’s hand, he imprisons Han Solo and hands him over to Boba Fett to be frozen in carbonite, he destroys entire planets with his Death Star battle station, and he murders the fuck out of Obi-Wan Kenobi. If you’re coming for Darth Vader’s head, you’d better paralyze his ass, because he’ll kill you the first chance he gets.
Your main villain doesn’t have to have political power over an entire galaxy. Maybe he can have power over another person. Maybe he can kidnap somebody and bend them to his will through mind-fucking torture and endless agony. Can his captive defeat him over and over again for the story to be believable? Hell no! But can his captive run away for a little while and get recaptured and brutalized over and over again? Sure! Even if the kidnapper gets an infected bite on his arm, that’s still a small enough defeat that he’s not completely gone just yet. Maybe he has no medical supplies for that wound. Maybe over the course of the story, he has to travel a long way to the nearest hospital for care. The longer he travels, the sicker he becomes. Even if he does make it to the hospital, he still risks getting captured himself, but by the police. So many layers to this story, yet the kidnapper in question is still a villain you love to hate and would love to see systematically destroyed.
Now…take those two scenarios I laid out and replace the head villains in charge with “The Fiend” Bray Wyatt. He’s the last motherfucker who deserves to wield a light saber. He shouldn’t be allowed near anybody whom he can easily stuff into his windowless van on its way to a room with no view. Long dreadlocks that look like Cthulu’s tentacles. A face with an enormous grin, rotten teeth, and ripped skin. A lantern with Bray Wyatt’s original head covering the light. Dialogue peppered with death threats and seductive promises of the darkest kind. Immunity to pain that his torture victims could only dream of having during their times of torment. If he’s written like a killer, he will succeed in these roles and become even more iconic than his predecessors. If he’s written like a chump like he’s been for most of his career, Siskel and Ebert will come back from the dead just so they can shit all over whatever story he’s a part of. And then they’ll be put back in their graves by The Fiend’s necromantic powers.
Even the most brain-dead authors understand the idea of the villains having a shit-load of power. Power can come from anywhere, but if a villain has a lot of it, then his defeat will be even more incredible, especially if the hero comes from modest means. But that of course is giving the WWE too much credit. They used to know how to build stars. Hulk Hogan, The Ultimate Warrior, Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, and John Cena are all shining examples of their success in that department. But as Vince McMahon got older and slower, so did his storytelling.
As the CEO of WWE, Vince gets the final say in whatever creative decisions make it to television. When his brain is rotting that badly and he has that much influence over the shows, people start to notice and people turn off their televisions. I turned off mine in 2018 and haven’t turned it back on for WWE since then. Thanks, guys, for completely murdering my love for pro-wrestling. And an extra special thanks goes to the geniuses who set Bray Wyatt up to fail. He had all the creative potential in the world. He could have been a badass villain everyone can be scared of. But not anymore. That makes me sad. I’m sure it makes him sad as well.
Authors, if you’re going to make your readers sad, do it the old-fashioned way by killing off their favorite characters or at least badly torturing them. Don’t do it by creating awful villains. And don’t do it by creating awful heroes and neutral characters either. If you’re going to create a character cast, do it right! Make them three-dimensional. Make them overflow with personality. Saddle them with crazy gimmicks. But most importantly, make their victories and losses believable, for fuck’s sake!
(sigh)
…In case it wasn’t abundantly clear already, my heart hurts for Bray Wyatt and all of his incarnations (except for Husky Harris, but he was just learning how to do decent character work at the time, so I shouldn’t be too hard on him). Wrestling fans were angry as hell in 2020 when the Wrestling Observer Newsletter put out their yearly awards and Bray Wyatt was absolutely wrecked. If those same fans still believe in the magic of Bray Wyatt, then they’re certainly welcome to. I’m not going to shit all over their happiness in that regard. So maybe the negative attention has less to do with the wrestler himself and more to do with the way he’s portrayed on TV. Even Dave Meltzer, the head journalist in charge of the WON, called him a genius when it came to his character work. I bet it hurts him and the rest of his voters to do Bray dirty like that. But silencing criticism is the same thing as acknowledging the problem doesn’t exist. WWE fucked up Bray Wyatt like a bunch of idiots and now they’re surprised when he doesn’t connect with everyone who watches him. How sad. How relentlessly sad.
Tuesday, January 12, 2016
Scary Masks
***SCARY MASKS***
If you go to my Face Book page (which is under my real name Garrison Haines-Temons), you will see that my profile picture is me wearing Corey Taylor’s Slipknot mask. I wore a different Slipknot mask on Halloween, but the scariness was the same as evidenced by little children crying, screaming, and parting from my walking path like the Red Sea. Scaring the shit out of everyone around me is fun because I already get enough grief for being socially awkward, so why not go the full nine when it comes to traumatizing people? Why does Halloween terror only get to happen once a year? This journal will document some of my favorite creepy masks throughout history and maybe give you all ideas for scaring the shit out of people on October 31st. Starting with…
***SLIPKNOT HORROR MOVIE MASKS***
If you wear one of these masks, you’re a part of something special. You open your ears to the grinding vocals of Corey Taylor and the thrashing heavy metal music the rest of Slipknot brings. Although the music comes off as angry, energetic, and devilish, the people of this band would never inflict harm on another human being. The violent fantasies are just that: fantasies. Each mask comes from classic horror cinema and was designed to carry out the legacy of psychological torture. Corey Taylor’s most recent mask comes from Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Mick Thomson’s mask is a modification of Hannibal Lecter’s hockey mask. Shawn Crahan’s clown mask is based off of Stephen King’s horrifying monster Pennywise. Though his name escapes me, the guy who wears the gimp mask with the long leather nose drew inspiration from Alex’s mask from A Clockwork Orange during the rape scene. If you’re not chilled to your core, you were dead from pants-pissing fright a long time ago, my friend. Then again, that’s how most close-minded folks meet their fate.
***PINK FLOYD THE WALL PUTTY FACES***
If you wear this kind of mask, you’ve lost so much of your individuality that you blend in with the rest of the crowd. A flesh-colored mask with two large holes for the eyes and one large hole for the mouth, that might as well be your driver’s license photo. But you didn’t give up on your individuality without a fight. It had to be taken from you via negative reinforcement, which came in the form of coercion, violence, or most common, insults. When someone insults a part of your life, the insulting words leech onto that part of your mind like parasites. Try as you might to derive pleasure from that part of your life, all you’ll get is a playback of those negative words, so you avoid it as much as possible. And when you avoid it, you avoid other things that give you pleasure and hope until you no longer have a face of your own. Fighting for your individuality has become more important now than it ever has been with the emergence of the millennial generation, a group of youngsters who follow their own paths to success and prefer creative expression over dull corporate politics.
***PHANTO FROM SUPER MARIO BROTHERS 2***
You don’t have to worry about having this creepy visage on your face, because Phanto is a sentient being. Two downward curved eyeholes followed by a wide grin, Phanto has one job in Super Mario Brothers 2: to guard the golden key and punish those who take it with intimidation and incessant ramming. Not all Phanto masks have this assignment. Some of them are hanging on the walls of whatever dungeon Mario is in just for a frightening ambience. The hallway leading to King Wart and his vegetable machine is lined with a row of dormant Phanto masks. They won’t hurt you physically, but mentally, you’re on high alert even after King Wart is nauseous from being force-fed vegetables. Looking into those pitch black eyes and knowing you’re being smiled at is enough to give most Nintendo-playing millennials lifelong nightmares. If Phanto’s mouth was capable of forming words, what would he say to you? “Run!”
***HOLLYWOOD UNDEAD GANGSTER MASKS***
If you’re wearing one of these masks, you know the struggles of the originators of these visages. Hollywood Undead is a rap rock band who in their words have nearly died for the music they made. Hollywood isn’t exactly the safest place on earth with its history of gang violence, police corruption, and influx of dangerous drugs. To be a member of Hollywood Undead means you’ve survived these mean streets and you live to tell your tales through rapping lyrics and heavy metal instrumentation. You played a million empty shows to only family and friends, but the minute My Space discovered you, your popularity took off and your scary visages are recognizable from miles away. Keep on rhyming, boys. Keep on head banging. If anybody wants to deliver their negative hate to you, let them know just what it’s like to survive California’s toughest neighborhoods. Most trolls would crap their pants at such visuals, as if the masks aren’t scary enough.
***OCCUPY WALL STREET’S GUY FAWKES MASKS***
Every Guy Fawkes mask is identical with the curved moustache, soul patch beard, and debonair face. But make no mistake about it: you didn’t lose your individuality by joining this movement. You joined it because you’re sick of the top one-percent trying to strip you of everything you love. You ask for “free shit” because getting it with today’s wages would be impossible with bills and screw jobs serving as obstacles. Though vocal you may be, you still are capable of the same amount of peace and serenity as any other legitimate protester. But the corrupt police department doesn’t always know this. If they see you with a Guy Fawkes mask, they will not hesitate to beat and pummel you while pinning false charges and making false arrests. The one-percent think they’ve won after such a bloody battle with authority. But they haven’t. They’re merely proving a point we’ve known all along and the Guy Fawkes clan is here to spread that awareness worldwide. Those who listen to you will feel empowered. Those who don’t will feel unjustifiably safe.
***THE WYATT FAMILY’S SHEEP MASKS***
Unlike the members of Slipknot, the WWE’s backwoods cult known as The Wyatt Family enjoy the opportunity to bring violence and hatred to every battle with other WWE superstars. It’s not enough that Erick Rowan (the white sheep) and Braun Strowman (the black sheep) are nearly seven feet tall and weigh in excess of 300 lbs. of muscle and murder. They also have to wear creepy-looking animal masks that do little more than solidify their loyalty to not only their brother Luke Harper, but their leader Bray Wyatt. Very few people have waged war with the Wyatts and emerged survivors, let alone victorious. These men are huge, they have scraggly beards, they stink like a swamp, and two of their members feel the need to wear sheep masks. If they carried sickles, chainsaws, and knives to the ring with them, they would complete their serial killer images. When Bray Wyatt tells you to “Run!”, that’s the wisest advice anybody can give you. Stretch your legs, get your cardio in, because it’s going to be the longest and most exhausting marathon you’ll be a part of.
***CONCLUSION***
If somebody calls you a coward for “hiding behind” one of these masks, just allow them to get a better look at you and then we’ll see who’s shitting their pants at the end of the confrontation. We’ve got ears, say cheers!
***WEEKLY SHORT STORY CONTESTS AND COMPANY***
A new week is already here, which means a new prompt has been released. This time we’re dealing with the topic of “homecomings”, which is good news for me because I happen to have a synopsis ready for such an occasion. My story will be called “I Owe You Nothing” and it goes like this:
CHARACTERS:
John Link, Sexual Harasser
Tina Williamson, Victim
Kenny Williamson, Tina’s Father
Melissa Williamson, Tina’s Mother
PROMPT CONFORMITY: The story begins with Tina returning home from school.
SYNOPSIS: Prior to the events of this story, John had repeatedly asked Tina out on dates during school time and Tina’s answer was always a definitive no. Fast forward to the actual story and Tina comes home from school to see John in the living room chatting with her parents and buttering them up. Tina continues to resist John’s advances despite coercion from him, Kenny, and Melissa. The situation reaches its boiling point when John pulls a gun out of his coat pocket and demands a yes answer at the threat of Tina being shot.
***DARK FANTASY WARRIORS***
Danielle Courtney’s drawing yielded some…interesting results, particularly those of Marilyn Manson comparisons. I can’t say they’re wrong. Hehe! This next drawing will be different because the character is actually supposed to look manly. He’s a human necromancer named Angelo Rude and he’s the lead villain of a short story that used to be called “conform”, but is now called “Dead Man Walking”. Dance, skeletons! Dance!
***LYRICS OF THE DAY***
“If you’re 555, then I’m 666!”
-Slipknot singing “The Heretic Anthem”-
If you go to my Face Book page (which is under my real name Garrison Haines-Temons), you will see that my profile picture is me wearing Corey Taylor’s Slipknot mask. I wore a different Slipknot mask on Halloween, but the scariness was the same as evidenced by little children crying, screaming, and parting from my walking path like the Red Sea. Scaring the shit out of everyone around me is fun because I already get enough grief for being socially awkward, so why not go the full nine when it comes to traumatizing people? Why does Halloween terror only get to happen once a year? This journal will document some of my favorite creepy masks throughout history and maybe give you all ideas for scaring the shit out of people on October 31st. Starting with…
***SLIPKNOT HORROR MOVIE MASKS***
If you wear one of these masks, you’re a part of something special. You open your ears to the grinding vocals of Corey Taylor and the thrashing heavy metal music the rest of Slipknot brings. Although the music comes off as angry, energetic, and devilish, the people of this band would never inflict harm on another human being. The violent fantasies are just that: fantasies. Each mask comes from classic horror cinema and was designed to carry out the legacy of psychological torture. Corey Taylor’s most recent mask comes from Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Mick Thomson’s mask is a modification of Hannibal Lecter’s hockey mask. Shawn Crahan’s clown mask is based off of Stephen King’s horrifying monster Pennywise. Though his name escapes me, the guy who wears the gimp mask with the long leather nose drew inspiration from Alex’s mask from A Clockwork Orange during the rape scene. If you’re not chilled to your core, you were dead from pants-pissing fright a long time ago, my friend. Then again, that’s how most close-minded folks meet their fate.
***PINK FLOYD THE WALL PUTTY FACES***
If you wear this kind of mask, you’ve lost so much of your individuality that you blend in with the rest of the crowd. A flesh-colored mask with two large holes for the eyes and one large hole for the mouth, that might as well be your driver’s license photo. But you didn’t give up on your individuality without a fight. It had to be taken from you via negative reinforcement, which came in the form of coercion, violence, or most common, insults. When someone insults a part of your life, the insulting words leech onto that part of your mind like parasites. Try as you might to derive pleasure from that part of your life, all you’ll get is a playback of those negative words, so you avoid it as much as possible. And when you avoid it, you avoid other things that give you pleasure and hope until you no longer have a face of your own. Fighting for your individuality has become more important now than it ever has been with the emergence of the millennial generation, a group of youngsters who follow their own paths to success and prefer creative expression over dull corporate politics.
***PHANTO FROM SUPER MARIO BROTHERS 2***
You don’t have to worry about having this creepy visage on your face, because Phanto is a sentient being. Two downward curved eyeholes followed by a wide grin, Phanto has one job in Super Mario Brothers 2: to guard the golden key and punish those who take it with intimidation and incessant ramming. Not all Phanto masks have this assignment. Some of them are hanging on the walls of whatever dungeon Mario is in just for a frightening ambience. The hallway leading to King Wart and his vegetable machine is lined with a row of dormant Phanto masks. They won’t hurt you physically, but mentally, you’re on high alert even after King Wart is nauseous from being force-fed vegetables. Looking into those pitch black eyes and knowing you’re being smiled at is enough to give most Nintendo-playing millennials lifelong nightmares. If Phanto’s mouth was capable of forming words, what would he say to you? “Run!”
***HOLLYWOOD UNDEAD GANGSTER MASKS***
If you’re wearing one of these masks, you know the struggles of the originators of these visages. Hollywood Undead is a rap rock band who in their words have nearly died for the music they made. Hollywood isn’t exactly the safest place on earth with its history of gang violence, police corruption, and influx of dangerous drugs. To be a member of Hollywood Undead means you’ve survived these mean streets and you live to tell your tales through rapping lyrics and heavy metal instrumentation. You played a million empty shows to only family and friends, but the minute My Space discovered you, your popularity took off and your scary visages are recognizable from miles away. Keep on rhyming, boys. Keep on head banging. If anybody wants to deliver their negative hate to you, let them know just what it’s like to survive California’s toughest neighborhoods. Most trolls would crap their pants at such visuals, as if the masks aren’t scary enough.
***OCCUPY WALL STREET’S GUY FAWKES MASKS***
Every Guy Fawkes mask is identical with the curved moustache, soul patch beard, and debonair face. But make no mistake about it: you didn’t lose your individuality by joining this movement. You joined it because you’re sick of the top one-percent trying to strip you of everything you love. You ask for “free shit” because getting it with today’s wages would be impossible with bills and screw jobs serving as obstacles. Though vocal you may be, you still are capable of the same amount of peace and serenity as any other legitimate protester. But the corrupt police department doesn’t always know this. If they see you with a Guy Fawkes mask, they will not hesitate to beat and pummel you while pinning false charges and making false arrests. The one-percent think they’ve won after such a bloody battle with authority. But they haven’t. They’re merely proving a point we’ve known all along and the Guy Fawkes clan is here to spread that awareness worldwide. Those who listen to you will feel empowered. Those who don’t will feel unjustifiably safe.
***THE WYATT FAMILY’S SHEEP MASKS***
Unlike the members of Slipknot, the WWE’s backwoods cult known as The Wyatt Family enjoy the opportunity to bring violence and hatred to every battle with other WWE superstars. It’s not enough that Erick Rowan (the white sheep) and Braun Strowman (the black sheep) are nearly seven feet tall and weigh in excess of 300 lbs. of muscle and murder. They also have to wear creepy-looking animal masks that do little more than solidify their loyalty to not only their brother Luke Harper, but their leader Bray Wyatt. Very few people have waged war with the Wyatts and emerged survivors, let alone victorious. These men are huge, they have scraggly beards, they stink like a swamp, and two of their members feel the need to wear sheep masks. If they carried sickles, chainsaws, and knives to the ring with them, they would complete their serial killer images. When Bray Wyatt tells you to “Run!”, that’s the wisest advice anybody can give you. Stretch your legs, get your cardio in, because it’s going to be the longest and most exhausting marathon you’ll be a part of.
***CONCLUSION***
If somebody calls you a coward for “hiding behind” one of these masks, just allow them to get a better look at you and then we’ll see who’s shitting their pants at the end of the confrontation. We’ve got ears, say cheers!
***WEEKLY SHORT STORY CONTESTS AND COMPANY***
A new week is already here, which means a new prompt has been released. This time we’re dealing with the topic of “homecomings”, which is good news for me because I happen to have a synopsis ready for such an occasion. My story will be called “I Owe You Nothing” and it goes like this:
CHARACTERS:
John Link, Sexual Harasser
Tina Williamson, Victim
Kenny Williamson, Tina’s Father
Melissa Williamson, Tina’s Mother
PROMPT CONFORMITY: The story begins with Tina returning home from school.
SYNOPSIS: Prior to the events of this story, John had repeatedly asked Tina out on dates during school time and Tina’s answer was always a definitive no. Fast forward to the actual story and Tina comes home from school to see John in the living room chatting with her parents and buttering them up. Tina continues to resist John’s advances despite coercion from him, Kenny, and Melissa. The situation reaches its boiling point when John pulls a gun out of his coat pocket and demands a yes answer at the threat of Tina being shot.
***DARK FANTASY WARRIORS***
Danielle Courtney’s drawing yielded some…interesting results, particularly those of Marilyn Manson comparisons. I can’t say they’re wrong. Hehe! This next drawing will be different because the character is actually supposed to look manly. He’s a human necromancer named Angelo Rude and he’s the lead villain of a short story that used to be called “conform”, but is now called “Dead Man Walking”. Dance, skeletons! Dance!
***LYRICS OF THE DAY***
“If you’re 555, then I’m 666!”
-Slipknot singing “The Heretic Anthem”-
Monday, December 14, 2015
WWE TLC: The ECW Originals vs. The Wyatt Family
MATCH: The ECW Originals (Bubba-Ray Dudley, D-Von Dudley, Tommy Dreamer, and Rhyno) vs. The Wyatt Family (Bray Wyatt, Luke Harper, Erick Rowan, and Braun Strowman) in an eight-man tag team elimination tables match.
PROMOTION: World Wrestling Entertainment
EVENT: TLC: Tables, Ladders, and Chairs
YEAR: 2015
RATING: TV-PG for violence
GRADE: Mixed
All throughout the 1990’s, Extreme Championship Wrestling defined the spirit of hardcore wrestling. Power bombs through flaming wooden tables, Irish whips into skin-shredding razor wire, repeated kendo stick shots until the opponent bled buckets, high flying dives off of the tallest structures, broken bones, insane fan participation, and saying “Thank you, sir, may I have another?!” the next day. If you wrestled for ECW, you couldn’t just be a moderately good athlete. You had to be tough as nails, nasty as hell, and maybe even godlike at times. The pain you will suffer, the scars you will obtain, the blood you will spill will all be in the name of legitimizing professional wrestling. ECW has since closed its doors permanently in 2001, but Bubba-Ray Dudley, D-Von Dudley, Tommy Dreamer, and Rhyno are invoking the spirit for this confrontation at TLC.
Good luck, boys, because The Wyatt Family has dominated the WWE on a consistent basis for three whole years, temporary separation aside. All four of these stable members are giants among insects. In addition to towering over all of their opponents, their scraggly facial hair, ugly faces, sheep masks, and cultist mind games give them a psychological edge in their matches. Just imagine if Bray Wyatt, Luke Harper, Erick Rowan, and Braun Strowman came to your door to deliver a pizza. Could you in all good consciousness eat that pizza knowing four zombie rednecks with serial killer mindsets are the ones at your doorstep? You’d better give them a million dollar tip lest you be squashed and strangled to death by these behemoths of men.
It’s only right that four hardcore extremists and four monstrous hillbillies get together for a tables match, where the rules are simple: if a wrestler gets slammed through a wooden table, he must go back to the locker room and wait for the match to be over. The losing team is the one who has all of their members slammed through tables. There are no pin falls, no submissions, no count-outs, and no disqualifications. If you can dream it up in your sick and twisted imagination, you can do whatever the hell you want to your opponents in this kind of match. Hell, you might even get a way with bending the limits of a TV-PG environment.
As soon as both four-man teams made their entrances, they stared each other down and waited for that bell to ring. When it rang, nobody was safe. Punches, kicks, slams, head butts, elbows, these basic moves turned a wrestling match into a head-stomping, mosh-pitting riot. These wrestlers already do a good enough job with the wrestling aspect of their matches. But when the toys come out, you’d better watch the hell out. Kendo stick shots form the biggest welts on the Wyatt Family’s skin. Metal garbage cans flatten and twist as they bounce off the zombie rednecks’ skulls. Braun Strowman was the only one who could contain this extreme riot. He went around clubbing and clothes lining the ECW originals until his Wyatt Family had the edge once again.
It was only a few minutes into the match and it already looked like it had TV-MA potential. But it didn’t take long for this match to earn is mixed grade. There were a few spots in this match that looked a little botchy to me. Bubba-Ray Dudley was supposed to use a metal garbage can to block a haymaker from Braun Strowman. Bubba put up his guard too soon…and Braun punched the defensive shield anyways. Not long afterwards, you had Erick Rowan attempting a running kick on one of the ECW guys only to put his foot through a table (which for some odd reason didn’t count as an elimination). Erick Rowan had D-Von Dudley spread eagle across another table and was perched on the top turnbuckle only to be shoved off by Rhyno. Rowan broke the table, but only the edge of it and D-Von had supposedly rolled off in time, though it still looked sketchy to me who was at fault for this botch.
The WWE fans are rarely happy with the choreography of a non-Daniel Bryan match (I swear, that guy has spoiled the audience rotten). This time, I can empathize with their unhappiness. Just this time. But hey, the action picked up again when both Dudley brothers slammed Erick Rowan through a table. Once he was gone, there were more kendo stick shots, more beatings, more chair shots, and then the ECW guys were being slammed through tables until Bubba-Ray Dudley was the last one remaining on his team. Before that scenario took place, Bubba did a spot where he was supposed to do a cross body block on Braun Strowman. Those two took a while to get positioned and when it finally happened, Braun stumbled backwards and fell as if it wasn’t meant to happen.
Never fear, original ECW fans. Just when the crowd was about to die, Bubba-Ray Dudley set up another table in the ring, but also brought out some lighter fluid and a cigarette lighter. He squirted a very liberal amount of fluid on that wooden table and stunk up the entire arena with chemicals. All that was left was to light it on fire and power bomb Bray Wyatt’s fat ass through the hardcore toy. But that never happened. It probably couldn’t under a TV-PG setting. Luke Harper super kicked Bubba-Ray under the chin while Braun Strowman heaved the ECW warrior in the air before slamming him through the table, thus ensuring the match-ending elimination and a victory for the Wyatt Family.
All in all, it was an enjoyable match to watch, especially since I have a lot of nostalgic feelings for the old ECW promotion. But let’s face it: the match at TLC earned its mixed rating. You could blame the hard-to-impress fans, you could blame the botchy spots, you could blame the false advertising when it came to the would-be flaming table, but there’s one other thing that stuck out in my mind. Elimination matches are tricky bitches as far as putting the winning team over is concerned. The Wyatt Family lost only one member of their team during that match: Erick Rowan. Losing three members would make the Wyatts survivors. Losing two members would also make them survivors. Losing zero members would make them dominant and scary like they’ve always been. But losing Erick Rowan exclusively made me believe that he’s being singled out as a weak link of that stable. I know it’s not true since he’s every bit as powerful and intimidating as the rest of his clan. All I’m saying is that one elimination looks suspiciously like a weak link plot. I’m interested to see where the WWE creative team goes with this. I hope they don’t go anywhere with it and just have Erick Rowan be treated as an equal.
PROMOTION: World Wrestling Entertainment
EVENT: TLC: Tables, Ladders, and Chairs
YEAR: 2015
RATING: TV-PG for violence
GRADE: Mixed
All throughout the 1990’s, Extreme Championship Wrestling defined the spirit of hardcore wrestling. Power bombs through flaming wooden tables, Irish whips into skin-shredding razor wire, repeated kendo stick shots until the opponent bled buckets, high flying dives off of the tallest structures, broken bones, insane fan participation, and saying “Thank you, sir, may I have another?!” the next day. If you wrestled for ECW, you couldn’t just be a moderately good athlete. You had to be tough as nails, nasty as hell, and maybe even godlike at times. The pain you will suffer, the scars you will obtain, the blood you will spill will all be in the name of legitimizing professional wrestling. ECW has since closed its doors permanently in 2001, but Bubba-Ray Dudley, D-Von Dudley, Tommy Dreamer, and Rhyno are invoking the spirit for this confrontation at TLC.
Good luck, boys, because The Wyatt Family has dominated the WWE on a consistent basis for three whole years, temporary separation aside. All four of these stable members are giants among insects. In addition to towering over all of their opponents, their scraggly facial hair, ugly faces, sheep masks, and cultist mind games give them a psychological edge in their matches. Just imagine if Bray Wyatt, Luke Harper, Erick Rowan, and Braun Strowman came to your door to deliver a pizza. Could you in all good consciousness eat that pizza knowing four zombie rednecks with serial killer mindsets are the ones at your doorstep? You’d better give them a million dollar tip lest you be squashed and strangled to death by these behemoths of men.
It’s only right that four hardcore extremists and four monstrous hillbillies get together for a tables match, where the rules are simple: if a wrestler gets slammed through a wooden table, he must go back to the locker room and wait for the match to be over. The losing team is the one who has all of their members slammed through tables. There are no pin falls, no submissions, no count-outs, and no disqualifications. If you can dream it up in your sick and twisted imagination, you can do whatever the hell you want to your opponents in this kind of match. Hell, you might even get a way with bending the limits of a TV-PG environment.
As soon as both four-man teams made their entrances, they stared each other down and waited for that bell to ring. When it rang, nobody was safe. Punches, kicks, slams, head butts, elbows, these basic moves turned a wrestling match into a head-stomping, mosh-pitting riot. These wrestlers already do a good enough job with the wrestling aspect of their matches. But when the toys come out, you’d better watch the hell out. Kendo stick shots form the biggest welts on the Wyatt Family’s skin. Metal garbage cans flatten and twist as they bounce off the zombie rednecks’ skulls. Braun Strowman was the only one who could contain this extreme riot. He went around clubbing and clothes lining the ECW originals until his Wyatt Family had the edge once again.
It was only a few minutes into the match and it already looked like it had TV-MA potential. But it didn’t take long for this match to earn is mixed grade. There were a few spots in this match that looked a little botchy to me. Bubba-Ray Dudley was supposed to use a metal garbage can to block a haymaker from Braun Strowman. Bubba put up his guard too soon…and Braun punched the defensive shield anyways. Not long afterwards, you had Erick Rowan attempting a running kick on one of the ECW guys only to put his foot through a table (which for some odd reason didn’t count as an elimination). Erick Rowan had D-Von Dudley spread eagle across another table and was perched on the top turnbuckle only to be shoved off by Rhyno. Rowan broke the table, but only the edge of it and D-Von had supposedly rolled off in time, though it still looked sketchy to me who was at fault for this botch.
The WWE fans are rarely happy with the choreography of a non-Daniel Bryan match (I swear, that guy has spoiled the audience rotten). This time, I can empathize with their unhappiness. Just this time. But hey, the action picked up again when both Dudley brothers slammed Erick Rowan through a table. Once he was gone, there were more kendo stick shots, more beatings, more chair shots, and then the ECW guys were being slammed through tables until Bubba-Ray Dudley was the last one remaining on his team. Before that scenario took place, Bubba did a spot where he was supposed to do a cross body block on Braun Strowman. Those two took a while to get positioned and when it finally happened, Braun stumbled backwards and fell as if it wasn’t meant to happen.
Never fear, original ECW fans. Just when the crowd was about to die, Bubba-Ray Dudley set up another table in the ring, but also brought out some lighter fluid and a cigarette lighter. He squirted a very liberal amount of fluid on that wooden table and stunk up the entire arena with chemicals. All that was left was to light it on fire and power bomb Bray Wyatt’s fat ass through the hardcore toy. But that never happened. It probably couldn’t under a TV-PG setting. Luke Harper super kicked Bubba-Ray under the chin while Braun Strowman heaved the ECW warrior in the air before slamming him through the table, thus ensuring the match-ending elimination and a victory for the Wyatt Family.
All in all, it was an enjoyable match to watch, especially since I have a lot of nostalgic feelings for the old ECW promotion. But let’s face it: the match at TLC earned its mixed rating. You could blame the hard-to-impress fans, you could blame the botchy spots, you could blame the false advertising when it came to the would-be flaming table, but there’s one other thing that stuck out in my mind. Elimination matches are tricky bitches as far as putting the winning team over is concerned. The Wyatt Family lost only one member of their team during that match: Erick Rowan. Losing three members would make the Wyatts survivors. Losing two members would also make them survivors. Losing zero members would make them dominant and scary like they’ve always been. But losing Erick Rowan exclusively made me believe that he’s being singled out as a weak link of that stable. I know it’s not true since he’s every bit as powerful and intimidating as the rest of his clan. All I’m saying is that one elimination looks suspiciously like a weak link plot. I’m interested to see where the WWE creative team goes with this. I hope they don’t go anywhere with it and just have Erick Rowan be treated as an equal.
Friday, September 25, 2015
Islands
***ISLANDS***
As much as I love talking about beautiful places like Hawaii, I’m not talking about those kinds of islands tonight. The term island can also be used to refer to anybody who feels alone in the world in at least one way. For this journal, the islands I’m talking about are people who are convinced they’re the only members of a certain fan base. I’m sure we’ve all felt like islands before. We feel like we’re the only ones who listen to Seether, the only ones who watch Inuyasha, or the only ones who play with Legos despite being 40 years old. While it is true that the island mentality is only an illusion, the other members of the obscure fandom can be so far out of reach for a lot of people. It’s especially hard when the person isn’t very good at social situations to begin with.
There are times when I personally feel like an island with the things I love. I’ve yet to find other people on Good Reads who are as zealous about pro-wrestling as I am. I tried to start a Dungeons & Dragons group, but no matter where or how many times I’ve advertised, nobody joined, so I had to close it down. I’ve found a few people at the WSS who enjoy Pantera’s music, but then again, when a layman thinks of heavy metal music, they either think of Pantera or Metallica. I don’t hear a lot of chatter about Soulfly, All That Remains, Slipknot, or Lamb of God.
As a man stranded on this island of weird interests and core values, the logical solution would be to get in a rowboat and sail to faraway lands. But there are several obstacles that lie in the way. The waters are too rough to navigate without being capsized. I have no idea where the hell I’m going when I’m out there. Bringing people to my island is just as hard for them since they lack navigation and aren’t interested in being capsized either. In case you’re wondering, yes, these are analogies and no, I don’t live in Hawaii. I want to live in Hawaii someday, but today’s not the day.
But as you gain more and more interests, the lower the water becomes to expose more land. When the water sinks far down enough, you cease to become an island and you might even become a whole continent. Continents are islands by definition, but they’re much larger because they’re housing different cities and nations. When you increase the size of your land, you include more people and your cities and nations will develop beyond the third world. And though it may be hard on right-wingers in particular, you have to occasionally let some immigrants pass through your borders and spread their ideas to make the population more open-minded. Yes, I’m using analogies again, but I’m putting a lot of faith in you guys to decipher them.
To use literal terms, increasing my interests would be as simple as turning on my TV and surfing my Roku for new shows to watch. It could also mean trying out new computer games since that’s the only gaming platform I have as of today. Well, that’s not entirely true. I do have a Nintendo DS, but I’m pretty sure it’s dated. I could also look for music to listen to outside my heavy metal and new age borders, as long as it’s not disposable pop music or ultra-conservative country songs.
Sailing the rough waters should be as easy as getting off my ass and finding things to do. I certainly have the open schedule to do it, but that’s where my conversations about mental energy come back to bite me in the ass. You know you’re exhausted all the time when you’re too sluggish to sit on your ass and watch TV. Trying new things will require a visit to a sleep clinic to eventually diagnose me with sleep apnea and get me a prescription for an oxygen mask.
But even after I gain all of this energy, I still have to get in the mood to actually try new things. This sounds easy, but for me in particular, it’s not. Trying new things would mean taking a chance against something I might not like or might fail at. I fear failure so much that I’d rather stick to what I’m good at than risk looking like a fool or getting frustrated with what I’m doing. I’ve practiced playing the guitar for a lot of my pre-teen and teenage years. Despite getting an A in my middle school guitar class, I never got better at playing and I eventually gave up on it. It’s weird, because I’m not the best drawer in the world, yet I keep pumping out pictures like hotcakes. But I still get frustrated when trying to play a stupid goddamn guitar. No wonder Pete Townsend likes to smash his instruments.
If I ever decide to stop being an island, it’s going to take some help and convincing from other people. It’s not as simple as saying, “Go to You Tube and check it out!”, because I will likely tell you to go to hell. To use more island analogies, if I’m going to sail rough waters to other foreign lands, I’m going to do it on a Norwegian Cruise Line and not in a rowboat. I’ll be the passenger who cruises the various restaurants, and you, the one who wants me to see these foreign lands, will be the captain of the ship. We’ve got ears, say cheers!
***POISON TONGUE TALES***
As of this moment, I have 35 short stories that fall under the sci-fi, fantasy, and horror genres. My goal is the same as with American Darkness and my drama stories: I want to hit the magical number of 50. Because I’m currently suffering from writer’s block when it comes to Blood Brawl, I’m instead going to choose Poison Tongue Tales stories to write without the WSS’s prompts. A man cannot live on movie, book, and wrestling match reviews alone. That, and I’ve pretty much given up on writing character profiles since they all sound the same to me. Here’s a sneak preview of “Harvest Moon”, the next PTT story I will write:
CHARACTERS:
Ambrose Volta, Witchdoctor
Kendra Callahan, Assassin
PROMPT CONFORMITY: I’m doing this without the WSS’s prompts (no offense to those guys; I love them like family).
SYNOPSIS: Kendra has been hired to protect a funeral home that has been broken into several times over the past few days. During her patrol, she catches the culprit, Ambrose, in the act of harvesting spirit energy from the corpses and stealing valuable objects off of them. Kendra and Ambrose battle it out together in a war of martial arts vs. magic. The fight gets interesting when Ambrose reveals what he plans on doing with the harvested energy.
In addition to writing new stories, I will also be editing old ones. The next one I edit is “Ascension”, a barbarian story which will eventually have a new title since the old one doesn’t fit.
***WRESTLING QUOTE OF THE DAY***
“I caught a snake one time. I skinned it and drank its blood. It’s in a better place now.”
-Braun Strowman, the Wyatt Family’s “Face of Destruction”-
As much as I love talking about beautiful places like Hawaii, I’m not talking about those kinds of islands tonight. The term island can also be used to refer to anybody who feels alone in the world in at least one way. For this journal, the islands I’m talking about are people who are convinced they’re the only members of a certain fan base. I’m sure we’ve all felt like islands before. We feel like we’re the only ones who listen to Seether, the only ones who watch Inuyasha, or the only ones who play with Legos despite being 40 years old. While it is true that the island mentality is only an illusion, the other members of the obscure fandom can be so far out of reach for a lot of people. It’s especially hard when the person isn’t very good at social situations to begin with.
There are times when I personally feel like an island with the things I love. I’ve yet to find other people on Good Reads who are as zealous about pro-wrestling as I am. I tried to start a Dungeons & Dragons group, but no matter where or how many times I’ve advertised, nobody joined, so I had to close it down. I’ve found a few people at the WSS who enjoy Pantera’s music, but then again, when a layman thinks of heavy metal music, they either think of Pantera or Metallica. I don’t hear a lot of chatter about Soulfly, All That Remains, Slipknot, or Lamb of God.
As a man stranded on this island of weird interests and core values, the logical solution would be to get in a rowboat and sail to faraway lands. But there are several obstacles that lie in the way. The waters are too rough to navigate without being capsized. I have no idea where the hell I’m going when I’m out there. Bringing people to my island is just as hard for them since they lack navigation and aren’t interested in being capsized either. In case you’re wondering, yes, these are analogies and no, I don’t live in Hawaii. I want to live in Hawaii someday, but today’s not the day.
But as you gain more and more interests, the lower the water becomes to expose more land. When the water sinks far down enough, you cease to become an island and you might even become a whole continent. Continents are islands by definition, but they’re much larger because they’re housing different cities and nations. When you increase the size of your land, you include more people and your cities and nations will develop beyond the third world. And though it may be hard on right-wingers in particular, you have to occasionally let some immigrants pass through your borders and spread their ideas to make the population more open-minded. Yes, I’m using analogies again, but I’m putting a lot of faith in you guys to decipher them.
To use literal terms, increasing my interests would be as simple as turning on my TV and surfing my Roku for new shows to watch. It could also mean trying out new computer games since that’s the only gaming platform I have as of today. Well, that’s not entirely true. I do have a Nintendo DS, but I’m pretty sure it’s dated. I could also look for music to listen to outside my heavy metal and new age borders, as long as it’s not disposable pop music or ultra-conservative country songs.
Sailing the rough waters should be as easy as getting off my ass and finding things to do. I certainly have the open schedule to do it, but that’s where my conversations about mental energy come back to bite me in the ass. You know you’re exhausted all the time when you’re too sluggish to sit on your ass and watch TV. Trying new things will require a visit to a sleep clinic to eventually diagnose me with sleep apnea and get me a prescription for an oxygen mask.
But even after I gain all of this energy, I still have to get in the mood to actually try new things. This sounds easy, but for me in particular, it’s not. Trying new things would mean taking a chance against something I might not like or might fail at. I fear failure so much that I’d rather stick to what I’m good at than risk looking like a fool or getting frustrated with what I’m doing. I’ve practiced playing the guitar for a lot of my pre-teen and teenage years. Despite getting an A in my middle school guitar class, I never got better at playing and I eventually gave up on it. It’s weird, because I’m not the best drawer in the world, yet I keep pumping out pictures like hotcakes. But I still get frustrated when trying to play a stupid goddamn guitar. No wonder Pete Townsend likes to smash his instruments.
If I ever decide to stop being an island, it’s going to take some help and convincing from other people. It’s not as simple as saying, “Go to You Tube and check it out!”, because I will likely tell you to go to hell. To use more island analogies, if I’m going to sail rough waters to other foreign lands, I’m going to do it on a Norwegian Cruise Line and not in a rowboat. I’ll be the passenger who cruises the various restaurants, and you, the one who wants me to see these foreign lands, will be the captain of the ship. We’ve got ears, say cheers!
***POISON TONGUE TALES***
As of this moment, I have 35 short stories that fall under the sci-fi, fantasy, and horror genres. My goal is the same as with American Darkness and my drama stories: I want to hit the magical number of 50. Because I’m currently suffering from writer’s block when it comes to Blood Brawl, I’m instead going to choose Poison Tongue Tales stories to write without the WSS’s prompts. A man cannot live on movie, book, and wrestling match reviews alone. That, and I’ve pretty much given up on writing character profiles since they all sound the same to me. Here’s a sneak preview of “Harvest Moon”, the next PTT story I will write:
CHARACTERS:
Ambrose Volta, Witchdoctor
Kendra Callahan, Assassin
PROMPT CONFORMITY: I’m doing this without the WSS’s prompts (no offense to those guys; I love them like family).
SYNOPSIS: Kendra has been hired to protect a funeral home that has been broken into several times over the past few days. During her patrol, she catches the culprit, Ambrose, in the act of harvesting spirit energy from the corpses and stealing valuable objects off of them. Kendra and Ambrose battle it out together in a war of martial arts vs. magic. The fight gets interesting when Ambrose reveals what he plans on doing with the harvested energy.
In addition to writing new stories, I will also be editing old ones. The next one I edit is “Ascension”, a barbarian story which will eventually have a new title since the old one doesn’t fit.
***WRESTLING QUOTE OF THE DAY***
“I caught a snake one time. I skinned it and drank its blood. It’s in a better place now.”
-Braun Strowman, the Wyatt Family’s “Face of Destruction”-
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