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- [OFFICIAL] WWE NXT Discussion
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| [OFFICIAL] WWE NXT Discussion | |
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| Topic Started: Feb 24 2010, 03:27 PM (43 Views) | |
| Bad Medicine | Feb 24 2010, 03:27 PM Post #1 |
I don't want the world, I just want your half.
  ![]](http://i41.tinypic.com/2z4x0js.gif)
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So, the first chapter of WWE's newest pet project is in the books. What say the peanut gallery? Good concept? Bad concept? What did you like, and what didn't go over, in your opinion? Personally, I couldn't stop cringing every time the camera was on Bryan Daniel... er, Daniel Bryan during his promos with The Miz. No one has ever questioned Bryan's wrestling skill. Fact: the man is a machine. He could run a clinic all day long on most of the WWE superstars. However, last night he showed the entire world why he still needs a lot of polishing. How many people do you know that get bitch-slapped by another man, yet still try to hide a smile? Did it not bother anyone else that he couldn't hide his smile the entire time? Is he so excited he can't hide his exhuberance? Perhaps it's a nervous tick? Worse, maybe he's just not taking the whole concept seriously? Heath Slater needs polish too. That gimmick is not cutting it. He has no catch phrase and simply holds his arms out and shakes his hair. Meh. David Otunga has a strong gimmick. Coming in with a little bit of "street cred", so to speak, due to his relationship with Jennifer Hudson. He played up his background and I thought it went over well. My only pet peeve about Otunga? He could use a little voice training to lower the tone of his voice. Despite his massive physique, I took him a little less seriously when he spoke in a Mike Tyson-esque tone... a more educated Tyson, to be sure, but hardly intimidating. Darren Young's gimmick does nothing for me, and the WWE showed how little confidence they have in his ability by putting Otunga over him in a squash. I like Michael Traver's gimmick: the son of a sparring partner for Tyson. It gives him a strong foundation to use for his character. He may need to drop the "Mr. 1.9 seconds" nickname because it seems irrelevent. Who cares if it takes 1, 1.5, 1.9, or 2 seconds? A strong knockout punch is STILL a strong punch regardless of how long it takes to deliver. Overall, the ring work by the "rookies" was a bit sloppy... except Bryan. His match with Jericho was fairly crisp, if not a bit short for my tastes. I get it, that Jericho is a veteran and had to look dominant overall, so a clinic was out of the question, but at least they gave Bryan a few spots to shine and show what he's capable of doing. What about that sick dive Jericho turned into a slam against the announce table? Within seconds, Bryan's ribs were lit up like a christmas tree. Don't know how serious it could be, but I hope it won't prevent him from continuing the rest of the "season". Finally, not sure I care for the forced animosity amongst announcers. Just because Josh Matthews is an alum from Tough Enough, shouldn't put him in the "rookie" position of babyface announcer, defending the NXT rookies, while Michael Cole takes the Ventura role, vehemently defending The Miz and the other mentors, despite his actions. What about your thoughts? |
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| jaykhunter | Feb 24 2010, 03:36 PM Post #2 |
ScrewAttack G1
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 Here's my review of the show and general thoughts  Finished watched the inaugural episode of NXT. It is not ECW, and it's not a reality show, it's an odd but enjoyable mix of the two. This week was really just to introduce most of the mentors and rookies. Click here for the mentor/rookie pairings (pics) : Here's the general concept : There are 8 mentors and 8 rookies. The rookies have matches in either singles or tags (with their mentors). They'll get time for wrestling and promos, and interacting with each other/the mentors/the crowd. Michael Cole and Josh Matthew commentate, and Matt Striker is the backstage reporter/does some commentary. The ropes are white! The rookies come out to their mentor's music. The "winner" of the season gets a spot on RAW or SmackDown. Here's what happened on this episode : Bryan was singled out immediately backstage, as the Miz made him cut a promo in the ring. Danielson looks so green with his short haircut and clean shave. He's also the smallest out of the NXT rookies. Bryan cuts a weak-ish babyface promo, but also disrespects Miz by saying he's been wrestling for twice as long as he has, and wished Regal was his mentor. (Regal did train Bryan, and gave him his boots and tights - which is why Danielson wears purple). Miz interrupted him and admonished his lack of charisma. He made Bryan come up with a catchphrase - which Bryan stole from Kurt Angle - saying he can either "tap or snap". Miz slapped Bryan and left the ring. Backstage, Bryan again disrespected Miz (while staying face) as Striker condemned his words. Whenever a new NXT rookie came out, there'd be a promotional video explaining the background and the character. Carlito and Michael Tarver (the boxer) vs Christian & Heath Slater (red-haired 'rocker') The two rookies wrestled fine, just a little sloppy, but nothing bad. They had no big moves. There was usually at least one veteran in the ring. In the end Christian hit Tarver with the Killswitch and the win. Heath celebrated by waving his arms about which was pretty funny. David Otunga (w/ R-Truth) vs Darren Young (w/ CM Punk) Otunga's the "MVP" of Hollywood, and Young is a "partier" in contrast to CM Punk. Punk's taken an immediate dislike to Young. This was a squash. Otunga hit an awkward spinebuster on Young for the win. Otunga's jakked; he's huge, like a shorter version of Big Zeke. Chris Jericho (w/Wade Barrett - the bare knuckle boxer) comes out to face Daniel Bryan! Wow! Main Event : Chris Jericho vs Daniel Bryan Jericho makes Barrett introduce him; but he takes his time, and Jericho gives out to him (which seemed pretty real). Miz comes out but Bryan lightly shoves him, running past. Miz is not amused! During the match, Striker asks Wade what he's learning from Jericho. He kind of dodges the question and so Striker asks him again. Wade shakes his head afterwards like he's messed up. (Looked real!) Danielson tries a suicide dive through the ropes but Jericho turns it and Danielson's back hits the commentators' desk. Looked pretty bad! Jericho and Bryan have an ok match, with Jericho in control of most of it. At one point Bryan counters the walls with a kneebar and Jericho really sells it. Jericho gets to the ropes, hits a codebreaker and applies an awesome looking Walls-of-Jericho for the instant tap. Afterwards Miz beats up on Danielson. Overall : Good Points + Bryan is showcased + The idea is pretty fresh + The rookie/mentor relationships should prove interesting + Otunga was put over strong; in his vignette he cut a very good promo + Cole played heelish/real by saying Danielson hasn't done anything where it counts, Striker/Matthews talks Bryan up + It's not another Tough Enough/Ultimate Fighter with guys in a house up to BS shennanigans/girlfriend/family problems + An hour-long show is the right length. We get a few matches and some time for talking. Bad Points - The mentors are mostly non-big names (HBK? Tripper? Cena? Orton? etc) It's not really a bad thing, as they have other storylines to do Other Points - Some of these guys don't look like they have charisma (Skip Sheffield looks like WWE's version of Rob Terry :pac::pac: ) - It looks to keep kayfabe All in all, this was the Bryan Danielson show. It was really promising, and is exciting to see new wrestlers before they're ready, in this climate. Well done, enjoyable show, I'll definitely watch next week. How they progress (will it end up being like the Diva Search with men?) is up in the air, but for now it's pretty interesting. Edited by jaykhunter, Feb 24 2010, 03:37 PM.
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| Thrash | Feb 25 2010, 01:42 PM Post #3 |
D'Oh! Thrash!
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NXT, starts off with Miz walking among the rookies, and getting Daniel Bryan out. The entire show seemed to have Miz and Bryan's relationship as the focus. Bryan went out and even cut a promo. There were I think 2 slipups, and I wonder if those were planned to play with the rookie thing. Points can be made that Bryan can dance circles around the Miz, absolutely. Also, technically, Bryan has been in pro wrestling longer, twice as long as The Miz, maybe more. What Miz can do? Well definitely make him look presentable, marketable, blah blah, but that's another topic. Anyways, Miz interrupts Bryan's little introductory promo, and asks Bryan to give a catchphrase. Tap or Snap, I like that. Miz doesn't, doesn't like him, slaps him. This is the relationship that will be the staple of this first season. I can already predict Bryan winning this season. I find it weird that Bryan still has his American Dragon apparel. He even gave a shoutout to Regal, since Regal was one of the teachers of Bryan. Bryan even talks with Striker, the host of this show, and he pretty much brought up some points Michael Cole would bring up. If there is one thing Miz can do, is help this man on the mic. It would be foolish to hope Bryan transitioning to WWE would lead to just his ROH and Indy work on WWE TV, that can't happen, it's a different ball game. As a sum, Cole sounded a lot different in this show, obviously conforming to this format. He's like "these rookies need to learn respect, yadda, rabble." While his partner, Josh Matthews is like "cut them some slack dawg." One thing I'm not going to enjoy is the camera shooting, it now includes a view of the ring that makes it look smaller. In fact, doesn't that ring look smaller than the regular ones? The size of HNA's ring? I don't know. Throughout, there are first person introductions by Tarver, Slater, and Otunga, showing footage of some of their FCW work, and basically their plans to be a star and crap. There is a tag match with Christian and his rookie, Heath Slater, against Carlito and his rookie, Michael Tarver. Decent match. The low point matchwise of this show was Goku vs. Otunga. It didn't last longer than 30 seconds, yeah. Punk didn't like mentoring Goku, and he would, if Goku pledged Straightedge, yeah! Jericho gets introduced by his rookie Wade Barrett. Jericho, the world champ, facing Daniel Bryan. Seriously, I think they are going for this guy to win. It's pretty obvious from this one episode. The match was impressive, but knowing Bryan, not as much as the next guy, but alright, he could do better. One submission from him was used, which got some fan attention, and another good highlight was him taking a rib shot from the announce table and just taking it in. It's not a no sell, and since it's "reality" based, it makes sense, but it's wicked nonetheless. He tapped too quickly, and Miz beat on him afterwards. Obviously this relationship, as I said, will be the staple of this season. Overall, the format of this show is clearer to me, as I didn't know they'd actually do this crap in front of a live audience, and there would be actual matches. I thought it was just drama crap on mentoring all these dudes. So, I'm impressed, but the camera angle showing a smaller than average ring by my view, Cole's commentating being out his element, and also the fact that we have yet to see all these men show up. We will soon, so a good final judgment can be made when that happens. So far, it's decent, and it's too soon for me to say it's better than ECW, or even compare which is better. |
Homer, Duck Dodgers, and Rey Mysterio thrash to Megadeth  Credit: Myself | |
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| Dangerous_Dave | Feb 27 2010, 10:21 AM Post #4 |
TWF Jobber
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Although NXT was basically just one massive push for Daniel Bryan, I actually really enjoyed it. Some of the relationships between pro and mentor are interesting to say the least and its really good to be able to get a look at potential newcomers before they just get thrown in at the deep end or future endeavoured. Main thoughts: Heath Slater; he looks and acts like a twat but he seemed decent in the ring, apart from Danielson nobody else on the show really caught my eye. Having said that, given Punks comments and Youngs' squashing I think they have something planned for him too. Not impressed with the camera angle either, or more specifically the camera cut aways which seemed to take a lot away from the in ring action... |
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| Seal | Feb 28 2010, 06:10 PM Post #5 |
TWF Upper Midcarder
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I was impressed and surprised by the show, considering the quasi-reality TV show opening and cringe-worthy theme music. I like the dichotomy with the commentary team, Michael Cole is awesome and I loved hearing him hit back at the IWC which loathes him so. The 1.9 second guy (boxing + wrestling doesn't usually work, sorry. Doesn't help also that his mentor is Carlito) and Heath Slater are embarrassing. I like Wade Barrett's look a lot, then he opened his mouth.  Of course he's going to be one to watch being with the world champ. Justin Gabriel looks good too, but I haven't got to see him yet.I guess David Otunga has some good qualities but working a short squash match as a debut isn't a good indication of what's to come. We could have an interesting storyline with Darren Young and CM Punk also, perhaps after weeks of failing he'll end up being converted to the SES, only to gradually work his way out over time, earning the favour of the fans. I like the realism of it (rookies getting given a hard time in a believable way, like Striker embarrassing Barrett) and the whole package is organised well, it feels progressive, you can tell something significant to the show is going to happen nearly every week. I could do with less focus on Daniel Bryan though, also, he's tiny! |
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| Thrash | Mar 3 2010, 05:51 AM Post #6 |
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D'Oh! Thrash!
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While it's still fresh in my mind, the second episode was pretty good. Personally, Cole's heel commentating reflecting his living in a WWE bubble is out of his element. If he were more experienced or something, I'd accept it. So, it was pleasing to note Cole tuned it down, although calling someone a Twitter geek doesn't show the person isn't a geek in his own right, Cole. I thought Otunga and Young (can't call him Black Goku anymore, because of the hairstyle change) was pretty good. I'm still not sure on either man, Otunga was decent, but really nothing stood out, and just hearing the fans, you would agree. Same thing with Young, his look and silliness makes me more attentive than his ring skills. Also, that finisher of Young's wasn't very hot. At least better than last week, but I don't understand why Otunga shoved R-Truth after the match, all he did was try to help. Daniel Bryan gets a video aired, introducing himself, describing his style. I assume the WWE Production Crew had another payday for replacing "Bryan Danielson" headlined articles with "Daniel Bryan." They even mentioned him being trained by HBK, so people might get turned on by that upon next week or maybe even after this segment, when he faced Wade Barrett. Before that, Bryan getting taped up, and Miz just slapping that bruise he got before getting taped up, that's nice. This was pretty short, but Jericho's commentating made it a lot more flavorful, though both men were impressive. I wish they had a different camera shot to show of Bryan's flying knee to Barrett. That looked like he just flew, getting hangtime for a brief moment, and landing the blow. Aside from that, and this is practically only me unless anyone listens to Helloween, but the highlight of commentating of the whole show was when Jericho said regarding Barrett, "The eagle flies free." Knowing his own name and submission finisher is named after Helloween's debut album, and since there is a Helloween song called "Eagle Fly Free," I took the reference as that of Helloween, and of personal excitement. Otunga and R-Truth having a little scuddle, still, it really shouldn't happen, I guess Otunga is so damn celebrity head filled, he just gets mad at one mistake and takes it on his "agent" or in this case, R-Truth. He should've really acted like this from his botch last week. A small annoyance of the show was the period of the RAW Rebound, it just felt so long, and you could've had a segment to span this time instead of this. Just that it's a one hour show, counting commercials, so could've stuffed it with more to the point programming. Anyways, what up with Skip Sheffield? I instantly reacted to his intro video with the thought of JBL. The cowboy schtick is too old, but JBL wasn't a total cowboy, just a thought. Cornfed Meathead? Ha, and Cornfed is even on his tights. That's so silly, it's funny. Also, Justin Gabriel, the ring attire he wore entering the ring, as Matthews put, looking like an astronaut. Looks like something a Japanese woman wrestler would wear. Christian and Heath Slater getting along in the gym. Christian giving Slater constructive criticism on his confidence level. See, the mentoring aspect should have this, the bad mouthing that we see mostly, and the nice, actual, showing someone what to say, think, swagger, image, and also add to the wrestler's talent bank. So far we've only seen the constructive criticism and bad mouthing. We've heard them all, Jericho seeming to show a heelish take on the third theme to an extent, as he said Barrett listens. The tag match between Hardy and Gabriel vs. Regal and Sheffield was nice: Regal got some good ring time and showed off to Sheffield how to actually wrestle, and not come off as a big meathead, who did a little strut, and a standing splash. The bad mouthing by Regal to Sheffield was there, and even Sheffield sharing some words, but in the end, Gabriel was the star of the show. It's really not often, rare, very rare, to see a 450 splash on WWE TV, so naturally fans jumped at this finish. To end the show, Carlito scopes the 6 other rookies, and all he had to say, was "that's cool" after spitting some apple towards Slater's face. Another impressive episode, generally. It seems they are starting to build towards this voting system where the pros vote on each rookie, but cannot vote for and or against their own respective rookies. This is good, but hopefully this isn't anytime soon, we still have to see the rookies get promo time. So who was the star of this episode? Justin Gabriel, he was pretty impressive, but the 450 splash was the big cookie for the fans, and probably what got the most pop. The format is becoming clearer to me, and the format is growing on me, but only 2 episodes, it is still too early for me to make a final judgment. A suggestion is in the future, not soon, have the rookies compete against outside names, oh yeah. Like, if Shawn Michaels beats Undertaker, and they still take the 1st season past Wrestlemania, have Daniel Bryan face HBK, or Edge facing Christian's rookie Heath Slater. |
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Homer, Duck Dodgers, and Rey Mysterio thrash to Megadeth Credit: Myself | |
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| Seal | Mar 3 2010, 07:10 AM Post #7 |
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TWF Upper Midcarder
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Michael Cole is the most experienced announcer in WWE, what are you talking about? He never slips, he's by far the sharpest commentator. Next time try and make your criticism of him a little less blind. |
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| Buckethead | Mar 3 2010, 08:55 AM Post #8 |
TWF Lower-Midcarder
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Please tell me you are being sarcastic. |
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