Archive for July, 2010

Wrestling Recap

It’s another week in WWE (and maybe TNA) as we move closer to Summerslam. Cena has his team. How will Nexus react? RAW begins with Cena making lame Super Friends jokes until Jericho comes out to make it clear he’s not a good guy despite joining Cena’s team. Cue the anonymous e-GM to force Jericho and Cena to tag together tonight. Nexus will face 7 WWE Superstars in an elimination match as well.

The Uso start being used as singles jobbers as Jay provides Randy Orton with little competition. Orton takes down Jimmy Uso, Sheamus and even The Miz when he tries to cash in Money in the Bank. The GM decides to make Miz and Cena the ones to face Cena and Jericho. Edge isn’t a fan of The Great Khali, which leads to a match where, if Edge wins, Khali is off Team Cena. But Nexus doesn’t let them finish the match so Edge bails on Khali. Weirdly, Nexus lets Khali leave without attacking him. The 7 WWE “stars” are Goldust, Mark Henry, The Hart Foundation, Yoshitatsu, Evan Bourne and… Jerry Lawler? Nexus is being so heavily protected they win this without losing a single member. And after looking so good lately Evan Bourne is left to be Nexus’s whipping boy.

The tag match is the main event. Neither side get along. They can’t even agree who will start, a classic way of demonstrating tension between partners. There have been “Y2J” chants on and off all night. People seem willing to get behind him as a face; but he makes such a great heel I’d rather he stay that way. In the end it’s Jericho who betrays Cena and allows The Miz to get the win. Yes, The Miz just pinned Cena. I’m sure some fans heads exploded upon seeing that. Then again, K-Fed owns a win over Cena, with the footnote that it was due to an attack by the late Umaga. Cena attacks Jericho and locks on the STF. That draws Khali to break it up, then get Speared by Edge. Morrison and R-Truth join the party and the message is hammer to the skull obvious. The Nexus are a untied force acting as a perfect unit. Cena’s team is falling apart. But, since I can’t see any way Bret Hart is actually going to take a bump big enough to remove him from the match, I’m still sure Cena’s team will win.

On NXT the focus is back on the rookies, not storylines going on elsewhere. There’s an elimination tonight, but not before some half-decent matches. They treat Eli Cottonwood like a bit of a joke this week so it’s no surprise he’s the one going home. Michael McGuilicuddy, who improved to 5-0 tonight, moves up to first place. Kaval, who is still doing a good job without having a winning streak handed to him, holds on to second.

Smackdown starts with Kane telling us his brother regained consciousness long enough to speak the words “Rey Mysterio” which Kane assumes means Rey was responsible for the attack on The Undertaker. There’s a good Christian/Drew McIntyre match with a weak finish that sees Christian win on a roll-up. “Dashing” Cody Rhodes’ grooming tip vignettes are actually pretty effective at making me dislike him. And I’m just sick of Alberto Del Rios.

CM Punk’s feud with Big Show continues as Show faces Luke Gallows. It’s a DQ when the SES jump Show and try to break his arm. The good news though is that Punk pulls off the sling so presumably he’s either ready to go again or close to it. So expect Punk/Show or a handicap match at Summerslam. Dolph Ziggler and Kofi Kingston have yet another non-title match. This time, if Dolph wins, he gets a title shot. Kingston goes a little nuts and pounds on Ziggler until he’s disqualified then continues until he is pulled off. It makes Kofi look more aggressive than he usually has but it’s pretty foolish to hand a guy a title shot with a DQ. The problem with Kofi/Dolph and Christian/McIntyre getting long matches is there isn’t enough talent in them to be really good. So a lot of this show is acceptable, but not great, wrestling.

Tiffany has a title shot, but Vickie Guerrero officially recognizes LayCool as co-Women’s Champions and allows McCool to defend the title. Tiffany’s ring gear is not conducive to taking her seriously as a competitor. Tiffany never had a chance here, but Teddy Long intervenes and says only one of them can be champion. They have to decide who that is or Long will make a ruling next week.

Our main event is Jack Swagger facing Rey Mysterio yet again, but this time it’s no disqualifications. Since they are in Corpus Christie Swager vows to throw Mysterio into the Gulf of Mexico. It’s the most exciting match of the night, but since when does no-DQ also mean falls count anywhere? Swagger does, indeed, take Mysterio out of the building before the match is through. They fight outside for quite a while, but it’s Swagger who goes in the ocean and apparently the All-American American can’t swim. Mysterio opts to leave him to drown. Kind of cold there Rey, but it’s Kane who has the last laugh as he shows up and puts Rey in the drink as well.

An okay show but nothing outside the main event was special. Still, Summerslam is shaping up nicely and Nexus continues to seem new and fresh. So they’re doing something right.

As for TNA this week… look I realize ECW rarely announced many PPV matches in advance, but I have no clue what is going to take place at Hardcore Justice outside the leaks from the dirt sheets. Word is the main event will be RVD versus Jerry Lynn. Who is clamoring to see that?

Eric Young is back to being a goofy comedy wrestler but they are still keeping him a heel, for now. It’s not working well. Ric Flair invites Beer Money to fill out Fortune. So after dragging this out for this long and constantly teasing they would have somebody new to join it’s the same four people we expected from the beginning? AJ at least renames the Global Championship the Television Title. It’s not original, but it is an improvement. AJ is next in line for Kurt Angle (who is rumored to be trying to crawl back to WWE on a limited schedule) in his climb up the rankings.

Match three in the Beer Money / Motor City Machineguns best of five is a cage match. With Beer Money already up by two the Guns win, of course, since they plan to drag this all the way out to two Pay Per Views from now. At least it’s a really good match and Roode bleeds a bucket.

Word is nobody likes Eric Bischoff at TNA. He’s said to be totally out of touch, but he’s back on TV plugging something big for the August 12 Impact. Because TNA doesn’t actually want to succeed, Abyss interrupts before Eric can finish. Abyss wants to book the main event for the August 12th show. He wants a Janice on a Pole match with RVD, and yes, Janice is a board with nails in it. Useful for driving off Kang and Kodos. We finally see the champ on the show as he saves Bischoff from the wrath of Janice, but Abyss turns the tables and Al Snow has to show up to steal Janice and keep Abyss from using her on RVD. That draws Tommy Dreamer for his main event Hardcore Match against Abyss. Both these guys know how to put on a Hardcore Match, but neither are at their peak of performance. It’s a nice brawl, but the tag Cage Match was better.

I put more effort into TNA this week to give people a better sense of where it’s at right now. It is not in great shape. Sure there are some good matches, but they are throwing away time on an ECW (sorry make that EV 2.0) reunion that won’t build their brand at all. At least, outside the reunion storyline, the focus is shifting to current and rising talent rather than wasting airtime on The Nasty Boys and Scott Hall, but what matters is people being willing to spend money on your brand, and this brand is as weak as the global economy.

Until next week, when the PPV build should be in high gear on both shows, remember, wrestling is more real than most reality shows.

Stallone as The Punisher

AICN has been doing another round of fan Q&As with action movie legend Sylvester Stallone in anticipation for his upcoming flick The Expendables (which hits theaters of August 13th, 2010). These Q&As are awesome, with Stallone sharing stories about past films and dropping a lot of behind the scenes nuggets along the way. One of the questions Sly got was as follows…

“Have you ever been approached about playing the Punisher and do you have any thoughts about/interest in the character? None of the filmatizations have quite hit the spot and I always thought you were the obvious choice. Especially now you are the only actor I can imagine capable of pulling off an undiluted portrayal of Frank Castle with his Vietnam war origin intact. My imaginary dream project would be a run of HBO miniseries’ adapting Garth Ennis’ defining run on Punisher MAX mixing real-life horrors with bloody vigilante justice. You are probably not familiar with it, but with Rambo fresh in mind the material and sensibilities should be right up your alley.”

To which, he replied…

“I’m very interested in THE PUNISHER on several levels and think the story should be resuscitated with or without me. Its just always been mounted improperly.”

If I was Marvel Studios, I’d be on the phone with Stallone’s people right now.  Who could better step into the shoes of Marvel’s ultimate vigilante then one of the biggest action movie stars of all time? Not only does Sly look the part, but he could direct the thing better than anyone Marvel has gotten in the past.  Bring the gore of the latest Rambo, with the broken ex-boxer of Rocky Balboa and you have Frank Castle. A man with nothing, fighting for vengeance and to make sure no one loses what he has already lost. At Comic-con, Marvel Studios revealed that they have gotten the rights for The Punisher back and that they would like to make a movie that does his justice, well Marvel, now is your chance!

Check out day 5 of Stallone’s fan Q&A here, click on cool news for the rest.

Okay, so my mind has just been blown. Satellite Internet service? I just stumbled upon this and I’m semi shocked that it both exists and that I didn’t know about it until now. Using Satellites you can now get faster Internet pretty much anywhere, and not get stuck with dial up, or even worse, no Internet.

For satellite Internet all that you’ll need is a 26″ satellite mini-dish on your roof and a small modem by your computer. That’s it. The speed you’ll get is as much as 30 times faster than dial-up! Living or working in a rural area does not have to slow you down anymore.

Now, you can live in a cabin in the woods surrounded by forest and the woods and get away from civilization and still stay connected. I’ve been planning a couple month getaway for a while. It would be a dream to get away with my fiancé and my laptop and not have the everyday worries of working and paying bills. I’d be able to clear my head and just focus on my writing for a chance. Maybe that would help me get out of this writer’s block I’ve had for years.

If you had a chance to get away from the world and write, would you? And what would you write?

Posted on July 30th, 2010 by ThePit | Leave a Comment
Filed Under Filmmaking Resources

The folks at NBC were kind enough to put the Chuck panel up online. This is the whole panel minus any clips they showed (with a few annoying but understandable commercials mixed in). Enjoy it… (expect spoilers)

(Now, I’m going to talk about spoilers) I love the idea of the CIA taking over the Buy More and adding other agents into the mix. It should be funny to see how Jeffster, Big Mike, and the others react to this. Linda Hamilton as Chuck’s mom is completely basass, I just hope she is good and not evil. I hope we can see some of what happened to Chuck’s parents in the past.

Other casting news; Olivia Munn and the “Old Spice” guy Isaiah Mustafa will be guest starring as CIA agents, and villains Stone Cold Steve Austin and Nicole Richie will be returning. With Richie returning, hopefully that means we’ll learn more about Sarah’s mysterious past. I also love the addition of Mekenna Melvin as Casey’s daughter Alex. I really hope that we’ll see more of her in the upcoming season.

Are you excited about the new season of Chuck? Discuss it below! NBC’s Comic Con panels for The Event, The Cape, and Community are also online, you can check them out here.

This post is brought to you by your friends at ShopWiki UK.

TV

I love movies and even when I’m home I try to get the full movie going experience. To do that, you need an awesome Home Theatre System!  To get that you need to get all of the right pieces, which can sometimes be daunting and while a lot of places offer each of the pieces you’ll need individually, it is better to get them all from the same central place from people that know what they are doing.

Enter ShopWiki UK, an online shopping website that has put together a full Home Theatre guide to give you all of the options available to you in terms of televisions, players, and audio systems, along with just what you need to get going.

Finding the right Blu-Ray Player is very important, you want one that fits well with the television and can get updates via online. Blu-Rays are very different than DVDs and are very touchy. In terms of televisions, do you want a Plasma Television or an LCD? With audio systems, do you want surround sound (I hope so), but what are the different kinds of speakers? What works best for your space? You need to look into these different factors before buying your home theatre system, and thankfully ShopWiki UK offers a handy guide.

Posted on July 30th, 2010 by admin | Leave a Comment
Filed Under Sponsorships

Recently, DC Comics put together a test video for a proposed Blue Beetle live-action TV series. I gotta say, I dig it. Watch it below…

The proposed series would follow the latest incarnation of the Blue Beetle, Jaime Reyes, a teenager from Texas who the scarab chooses as its next host. In his short timespan as the hero, Reyes has been a member of the Teen Titans and has appeared in the animated series Batman: The Brave and the Bold. At Comic-Con, it was revealed that he would be appearing in an episode of Smallville‘s final season along with fan favorite hero Booster Gold. Could DC be hoping to use Smallville to spin the character into his own series? It seems like a smart plan to me.

Persons Unknown

Actually, the better question might be; have you seen where Persons Unknown has gone? The series got off to a very slow (and anti-climatic) start, but with a strong premise, a stylized visual presentation, and interesting characters it showed potential. Then, NBC struck. I sat down to watch the show one day to find that it was moved an hour earlier without any notice (TV Guide didn’t even have this update), and the following week it was just gone.

Canceled?

That is what I thought until this past Saturday when I caught the last 5 minutes of a new episode.  Is it really hard for NBC to promote the timeslot change, or better yet, let the series ride out in the slot that it began in. Sure, the series might not be killing in the ratings department, but with constant time changes and no notice to viewers, they are alienating the few viewers the show does have.  Thankfully, we can check out new episodes online.  I’m going to catch up on the series, hoping that it hits its potential and that NBC will air the rest of the episodes giving it a proper ending. The newest three episodes are linked on Persons Unknown‘s 141tv profile.

Posted on July 29th, 2010 by ThePit | Leave a Comment
Filed Under Entertainment