The Andrew "Test" Martin Memorial Thread

Status
Not open for further replies.
[quote name='mykevermin']I'd like to be so wealthy that I ca simply make shit up and, even when called on it, continue to go with the flow. The excitement of being surrounded by people who willfully lie to my face just to kiss my ass is fucking palpable.



TNA sucks, we're kid friendly. Because we use sledgehammers and not baseball bats.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr..._profiles/e3i4f087b1aeac6f008ce7e043061b71c40[/QUOTE]

Vince is such a fucking douche.
 
[quote name='JJSP']Uhhh, supposedly there's going to be Fire Pro Wrestling HD released for the PSN and XBLA this fall along with Fire Pro Collection for the Wii.

If it's true, I'm fucking stoked.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=356531[/QUOTE]

:whee::whee::whee::whee:

The bad news is that my import console buying has frequently been driven by either Firepro or King of Colosseum games. I may be saving my pennies for Fire Pro Collection and a Japanese Wii.
 
[quote name='onetrackmind']Vince is such a fucking douche.[/QUOTE]

No kidding; there's definitely something greater than...chuztpah...coming from his mouth when he says TNA is "reprehensible" because it's TV-14. He either (1) doesn't know the meaning of the word "reprehensible," and instead uses it to mean "too much bullshit, not enough wrestling" (which would explain why he used it so much on WWF TV as an announcer) or (2) simply believes his shit doesn't stink and/or that anything he wills into existence is the truth, like some sort of roman god of existentialism and self-fulfilling prophecies.

There's "spin" involved as a promoter, and he handled the "your ratings are declining going into WM, are you worried?" question well. But this was just kinda desperate sounding (even if their flagship show only approaches ECW like ratings).

Actually, come to think of it, his ratings answer was pretty funny, too:

"McMahon: Quite frankly our TV ratings have been very good. We averaged over a 4, I think, three weeks ago. Last week and the week before it was a bit less so because of a number of factors: how many people watched TV and one-off events. What you have to look at is our overall reach in the course of a week. On TV, we reach over 15 million people each and every week, 52 weeks a year."

Yes, Vince. "How many people watched TV" affected the ratings just during the weeks when Raw was declining in the ratings by 12.5% in 4 weeks. When it's high, though, it certain can't be due to how many people watched tv. Then it's the power of Hunter Hearst Helmsley over the reprehensible Randy Orton.
 
[quote name='JJSP']Uhhh, supposedly there's going to be Fire Pro Wrestling HD released for the PSN and XBLA this fall along with Fire Pro Collection for the Wii.

If it's true, I'm fucking stoked.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=356531[/QUOTE]


Like I said on fireproclub, my guess is this is an April Fools prank.

"FULL ENGLISH TRANSLATION AVAILABLE FROM THE OPTIONS MENU" That was the first thing to make me think something is up. And then the end where he says Spike wants 10 ideas from everyone to put into the game. I know in 5 months its not that unreasonable to do, but if they havent even started working on it really I am not sure. Also if you read the original thread it seems like most the ideas that were guessed at turned out to be true.

If true though, I just hope it comes to USA as well. If not, pretty good prank and thats always a good thing.
 
[quote name='hankmecrankme']Uh, I've got a sledgehammer and a folding metal chair in my house. . .
[/quote]

Your reprehensibleness astounds me.
 
15M viewers a week, huh, Vince? Not so impressive when you realize that probably at least 80% of those are just the same people watching all of his programming. I don't know where he's getting that number from. The ratings for Raw, SD and ECW don't total up to 15M, not even close.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']No kidding; there's definitely something greater than...chuztpah...coming from his mouth when he says TNA is "reprehensible" because it's TV-14. He either (1) doesn't know the meaning of the word "reprehensible," and instead uses it to mean "too much bullshit, not enough wrestling" (which would explain why he used it so much on WWF TV as an announcer) or (2) simply believes his shit doesn't stink and/or that anything he wills into existence is the truth, like some sort of roman god of existentialism and self-fulfilling prophecies.

There's "spin" involved as a promoter, and he handled the "your ratings are declining going into WM, are you worried?" question well. But this was just kinda desperate sounding (even if their flagship show only approaches ECW like ratings).

Actually, come to think of it, his ratings answer was pretty funny, too:

"McMahon: Quite frankly our TV ratings have been very good. We averaged over a 4, I think, three weeks ago. Last week and the week before it was a bit less so because of a number of factors: how many people watched TV and one-off events. What you have to look at is our overall reach in the course of a week. On TV, we reach over 15 million people each and every week, 52 weeks a year."

Yes, Vince. "How many people watched TV" affected the ratings just during the weeks when Raw was declining in the ratings by 12.5% in 4 weeks. When it's high, though, it certain can't be due to how many people watched tv. Then it's the power of Hunter Hearst Helmsley over the reprehensible Randy Orton.[/QUOTE]

What i find funny is the WWE has done some of the raunchiest things for the sake of shocking people during the attitude era (Katie Vick anyone?). Now all of a sudden its reprehensible, completely ignoring the past 10 years of wrestling. If you think about it, the WWF turned super kid friendly in the mid-90's, and that was one of the most atrocious times in professional wrestling. It wasn't until more edgy characters (Stone Cold, HBK, Rock) evolved, turning the business around. I honestly feel like going back to a kid friendly wrestling program isn't evolution. Vince thinks he's too clever for his own good.

You know what really pisses me off... when i'm watching wwe 24/7 and someone is bleeding and the entire screen goes black and white and language being bleeped out during the ECW shows.
 
[quote name='neocisco']15M viewers a week, huh, Vince? Not so impressive when you realize that probably at least 80% of those are just the same people watching all of his programming. I don't know where he's getting that number from. The ratings for Raw, SD and ECW don't total up to 15M, not even close.[/QUOTE]

Rush Limbaugh says he has 20 million listeners.

;)
 
[quote name='mykevermin'](2) simply believes ... that anything he wills into existence is the truth, like some sort of roman god of existentialism and self-fulfilling prophecies.[/quote]
That's probably very close to how Vince's mind works, actually, based on a few interviews I've read/watched. Just take this for example...

[quote name='Paul Heyman'] Like most people who make grand achievements in life – Bill Gates, Ted Turner, Richard Branson, Bill Clinton – Vince McMahon is a most complex individual.

It would take Freud himself to accurate describe, and probably 900 pages to do so, how Vince’s mind works.

There’s a lot of self-justification that goes on.

Vince could never accept that another brand could be successful.
Look at the success of The Rise and Fall of ECW, the DVD, which has sold close to 400,000 copies worldwide and at any point is the No1 or No2 bestselling DVD in sports entertainment history. The World Class DVD is just breaking out of 10,000 units sold right now. The Rey Mysterio DVD, the John Cena My Life DVD, sold approximately 30,000 units each.

You look at the staggeringly successful numbers that ECW DVD did, Vince’s answer to you will be: ‘Well, of course it sold that many, we’ve educated the audience that ECW is something special by the fact that every time a table broke, every time a high spot happened, every time an extreme style was showcased, we’ve encouraged the audience to chant E-C-W and we’ve allowed it on our broadcast.”

Now if you think about that logic, it’s so ass-backwards, that you’re going to think this man is a f***ing idiot or he’s insane, but he’s neither.

He has convinced, or persuaded, himself the statement is true.

And he wholeheartedly believes that the success of the first ECW PPV was because the $400,000+ gate that was in the Hammerstein Ballroom were the last vestiges of the ECW audience and all those people that bought it on PPV were WWE fans who were educated that ECW would be something special.

Vince McMahon would swear on his grandchildren that is an accurate statement.

He won’t be lying, he’ll mean it when he says it, unfortunately it’s the furthest thing from the truth.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sport/wrestling/heyman/article762131.ece[/quote]
One can argue Paul isn't 100% objective here, but what he said made a lot of sense to me.
 
Oh, sure. In my line of work we call that "post hoc" evaluation. It's not considered scientifically useful, as it basically permits people to create explanations/justifications for (insert whatever it is you're looking at here) after the fact. That's what "post hoc" means, "after the fact."

People who aren't interested in genuine empirical validation can use this to live in a deluded world. One, which, McMahon lives in. He can point to a 1/8 decline in the ratings of his flagship program, Raw, in the weeks leading to the biggest PPV of the year, and he has his post hoc explanations. People watching TV (ha!) and "one-off programming" (like what? Oscars? Grammys? NCAA Basketball? My ass). So we look at his post-hocs in light of the people involved in the main event scene - Orton and HHH. We look at the quarter hour declines, and, most *damning*, a decline in the overrun (i.e., ratings were X from 10:45-11:00, and less than X from 11:00-11:07 or whenever they went off the air).

If you follow ratings at all, the trend for WWE shows, for well over a decade, is for the overrun period to actually increase, if only slightly. A decline is absolutely damning.

But then we go back to who is involved in that segment. Son-in-law and the golden child. If it was anyone other than Vince's "protective circle," they'd drop the belt this weekend at a house show. You know damn well that, if you take the same circumstances, and put CM Punk in Triple H's spot and, say, William Regal in Orton's spot, then they'd drop that angle faster than you know it.

That's why McMahon is out of touch. He is surrounded by ass-kissers who would rather tell him the sky is purple to satisfy his thoughts than dare tell him he's wrong; moreover, since he likes to explain things after the fact, he can remain satisfied in the nuances he creates for himself.

Here's how it's going to play out (save this one in your time capsules, since it will be relevant in a few months during the WWE's quarterly conference call). If Wrestlemania XXV does shit numbers (say, fewer than 700,000 buys), they will blame the struggling economy. If it does 1 million plus, they'll praise the strength of the "WWE brand" for resisting the economic woes. So it's pitiful, to paraphrase Rowdy Roddy Piper, because the answers are already there in Vince's mind. He's simply waiting for the questions to be asked; The WWE brand isn't responsible if it does 700K buys, but it is responsible if it does a million. Got it. Wish I could run a company that large as a blithering idiot.
 
Wrestlemania 17 is free on WWE 24/7 this month.. one of my favorite Wrestlemanias. I'm watching Vince vs. Shane right now.. great match. Debut of the Van Terminator by Shane.. I think.

Ha, I never realized that Bobby Heenan accidentally called Gene Okerlund "Tony" towards the beginning. Gene was like "Tony!? Are you puttin' me on!?" It's understandable, though, because the Monday prior to WMX7 was the Monday where Vince bought WCW.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
[quote name='Scorch']Wrestlemania 17 is free on WWE 24/7 this month.. one of my favorite Wrestlemanias. I'm watching Vince vs. Shane right now.. great match. Debut of the Van Terminator by Shane.. I think.[/QUOTE]

Funny... I actually just watched the first few opening matches from WM17 last night via the WWF era DVD release. Watching it makes me miss having someone decent aloneside Jim Ross on commentary (as in Heyman). Kane also was damn cool back when he wore a mask but we know that already.

From my memory that was indeed the debut of Shane's Van Terminator.
 
The most exciting feud in wrestling today: Carter/McMahon!

"I think it's wonderful that Vince watches TNA iMPACT. And I agree with him that things such as the brutal beating of a sixty-year-old man, a vicious home invasion and gratuitous man-on-woman violence can be seen as reprehensible – and that's just the last three Monday nights."
Click to expand...

EDIT: that's kind of an interesting point about tv ratings - TNA disallows ALL violence against women on their TV show (maybe the occasional "payoff," for lack of a less uncouth phrase, on PPV?). Yet the no-beating-on-women program is the TV-14 one, and the "DDT the wife" angle is running on the kiddy-tyme program.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']The most exciting feud in wrestling today: Carter/McMahon!



EDIT: that's kind of an interesting point about tv ratings - TNA disallows ALL violence against women on their TV show (maybe the occasional "payoff," for lack of a less uncouth phrase, on PPV?). Yet the no-beating-on-women program is the TV-14 one, and the "DDT the wife" angle is running on the kiddy-tyme program.[/quote]


That's very interesting. I didn't realize TNA outlawed man/woman violence on TV. I never really thought about that before. That's a good point about Orton DDT'ing Steph on Raw too.
 
I remember it was pretty obvious after awhile. Something involving either Sharmelle or Miss Jackie.

After watching the past decade of "the sky's the limit" in terms of the depravity of content on wrestling shows, the lack of men kickin' the shit out of women in TNA really stood out to me.

There's a pretty awful documentary called "Wrestling With Manhood" about the attitude era of WWF (and some ECW/WCW thrown in, IIRC). It makes some very good arguments about the representation of women on pro wrestling programs, although it all comes packaged in that familiar sort of "if I'm researching anything about women from a radical feminist perspective, I just become a crabby cultural critic because the female ideal is never fully realized" bitchfest. You know the type - you want to acknowledge that they are making a valid point on the whole, but you can't get over that the sneaking suspicion that, in all cases to the author, "female" = "oppressed." If they're getting powerbombed through a table, it's embracing domestic violence and patriarchy. If they're beating up the men, then we'll focus on something else - the inherent sexuality of the female body as represented on wrestling tv?

Anyway, it's one of the few things on DVD that has unedited WWF attitude era footage, for what little that's worth.
 
[quote name='Scorch']So 12 Rounds is averaging a 50% rating over on RT.com.. that's a hell of a lot higher than I thought it would get.

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/12_rounds/

Of course, that's only after six reviews. I'm sure it'll fall lower.[/quote]

Action movies should always have decent fighting if nothing else. The only thing I didn't like about the preview was the villain. His voice sucks as a lead villain. He sounds like he should be on CNBC giving stock advice.
 
AWA Classics marathon on ESPN Classic.

Mike Enos is having a "football match" in the ring against a guy named "The Trooper."

Other people are wearing neon green nylon jackets with Jackson-Pollack style paint splashes on them.

The early 1990's were fuckin' TERRIBLE.
 
[quote name='TruthinessFC']One can argue Paul isn't 100% objective here, but what he said made a lot of sense to me.[/QUOTE]

Except that there is probably more validity to Vince's point of view in this instance. ECW as a brand, under either Paul or Vince, never did big ratings, never did big PPV buys and never was much more than a minor sub-TNA-level player in the industry.

The pack mentality of shouting "you fucked up", "holy shit", "E-C-Dub" or any other three-syllable chant, in my opinion, can only have been popularized by being featured on Vince's (and to a lesser extent, Turner's) programming. Vince has never been hesitant to turn the volume down on a crowd with opinions he doesn't like (see the rapidly fading "T-N-A" chants during the Donald/Rosie brawl).


[quote name='mykevermin']If you follow ratings at all, the trend for WWE shows, for well over a decade, is for the overrun period to actually increase, if only slightly. A decline is absolutely damning.[/QUOTE]

I remember Meltzer saying that the overrun numbers are usually more influenced by the influx of viewers for the programming AFTER Raw than by the show itself. As I'm in Canada, I have no idea what USA programs after Raw right now, but that must play some role in the decline of the numbers.

For what it's worth, I enjoy Orton in his role as lead psychopath. And I have no problem with HHH main eventing the big show. I just wish we hadn't seen this same damn match so many times.
 
[quote name='Fanboy']Except that there is probably more validity to Vince's point of view in this instance. ECW as a brand, under either Paul or Vince, never did big ratings, never did big PPV buys and never was much more than a minor sub-TNA-level player in the industry.

The pack mentality of shouting "you fucked up", "holy shit", "E-C-Dub" or any other three-syllable chant, in my opinion, can only have been popularized by being featured on Vince's (and to a lesser extent, Turner's) programming. Vince has never been hesitant to turn the volume down on a crowd with opinions he doesn't like (see the rapidly fading "T-N-A" chants during the Donald/Rosie brawl).[/quote]
...you can't be serious. Unless by "popularized" you mean among strictly WWF/E fans.
 
Yes, popularized meaning known and accepted as part of a wrestling show by a mass audience -- WWE fans -- although I wouldn't say "strictly" as I would imagine there is some bleedover between organizations.

And, as Vince would no doubt say, who else matters?
 
[quote name='Fanboy']Vince has never been hesitant to turn the volume down on a crowd with opinions he doesn't like (see the rapidly fading "T-N-A" chants during the Donald/Rosie brawl).[/QUOTE]

Or turn up some piped in chants to mask up "Cena Sucks" chants. Or drown Austin's theme song after his match at WM17 against The Rock to drown out the people cheering for Austin after his heel turn.
 
I dunno about O'Haire. I like my Raven clones to come sans goatee.

EDIT - Not that Raven isn't a riff on Jake Roberts. I guess I've never seen O'Haire have great matches. If there are any out there, I'm free all night to watch wrestling.
 
That O'Haire gimmick was amazing, with his Brendan Fraser meets Lucifer look he had going. It sucked horribly that he got stuck teaming with Piper for no reason against, I want to say Hogan?
 
I loved that O'Haire gimmick. What happened to that guy? He couldn't put on good matches or something?
 
[quote name='moonknight25']Hbk is amazing.....nuff said[/QUOTE]

definitely, wish they did a variant of that entrance at WM25
 
[quote name='diddy310']Brendan Fraser meets Lucifer[/QUOTE]

bedazzled.jpg
 
I think O'haire got like 4-5 weeks of vignettes and then 1 match with the gimmick before he was made back into generic big man.


If i had to guess i'd say it was a disciplinary problem that led to him being released, seems like every time his name showed up on a site post-WWE it was about him fighting someone in a bar. Aside from that, he never really fit the WWE mold, in looks yes, but he wrestled a very strike/flying oriented style, and that doesn't fly in Vinces world when you're that size.
 
I thought this is the best place to mention this to the wrestling fans on here, even though it's kinda a deal, but FYE has 4 WWE tins with DVD sets in them for $20 with a mail in rebate to make them $10. The sets I saw were:

Legends 1: Bret, Pillman, Jake "The Snake" DVDs
Legends 2: Dusty Rhodes, AWA, Billy Graham
Icons: Vince, Piper, Hogan Anthology
ECW: One Night Stand 05, Bloodiest Matches, and December to Dismember (recent one)

I got everything except the ECW one.
 
Are they the full multi-disc sets? Like the 3-disc Rhodes set, 2/3 disc AWA set, and 2-disc Graham set for $20?

I'd totally buy that one.
 
Yep, it is those together in a tin case and like I mentioned it's only $10 after the mail in rebate. I know I sound like an FYE spokesperson, but I thought I'd let all you guys know cause it seems to be a good not well known deal.

[quote name='mykevermin']Are they the full multi-disc sets? Like the 3-disc Rhodes set, 2/3 disc AWA set, and 2-disc Graham set for $20?

I'd totally buy that one.[/QUOTE]
 
Gah, great deal but I already own at least part of each of those bundles. I might still check it out. I can survive with a duplicate Dusty set.
 
[quote name='GuilewasNK']It's been done...[/quote]
Yeah, I know. That's why I thought of it during that long-ass entrance HBK had Fri.:cool:

Might have to check out those Legends DVD sets.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
[quote name='TruthinessFC']I was half-expecting him to call out "God" to be his tag team partner.[/QUOTE]

Truthiness from TSM?

I just watched the first ROH show. Great stuff. Black vs. Jacobs was awesome.

I still need to catch up on Impact, Smackdown, and this week's ROH on the DVR.
 
Just looked at some photos from SD.

I'm tired of the "Wrestlemania banner as a character on the show" thing they've done for a few years now. Wrestlemania's important, you bet. But I'm far less convinced than the WWE is, apparently, that this is best conveyed by pointing and gesturing towards a big banner in the background.

Saturating the product with merchandise and whatnot is annoying, but makes sense. This is repetitive and doesn't get across that this PPV is a big deal.
 
Someone pooped in Juventud's bag, and he got in a fight with 150 lb Jack Evans and a crippled Konnan. I giggled a little.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
bread's done
Back
Top