I was a huge NWA fan ’86-’90, but watched a lot of the WWF ’85-’91 (NWA required complex tape trading here in Australia then). I read PWI, The Wrester and anything else that I could get my hands on. But I was so sick and tired of Hogan and Flair winning (either by stupidly ‘miraculous’ comebacks or cheap DQs ore interference, and the Warrior stuff just left me cold, aimed as it seemed at little kids. So I moved on to other things.
I remember thinking how odd it was when people would tell me that Hogan, Piper and Savage were in the WCW (the new NWA, I was told), and that tag team wrestlers Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels (of the Midnight Rockers!) were battling for the WWF belt, I thought that they were joking. The WWF like their champs muscled hulks I thought.
Eventually I started watching again in ’99, and there were few familiar faces. I knew who The Undertaker was (‘Mean’ Mark Callous), there was Owen Hart (the Blue Blazer), Ron Simmons (Doom), and the Big Bossman, but the rest were pretty much new to me. It was exciting, unpredictable, featured far more of the storyline that I remembered (‘sports entertainment’, it was called now). I particularly liked that the matches (Raw) were reasonably evenly matched, featured offense from BOTH wresters (different from the Steve Lombardi, Barry Horowitz etc squashes that I remembered). The characters seemed fresh, and it was all very entertaining.
But it didn’t take too long for it to get stale again. The Rock slowly morphed into Hulk (miraculous comebacks), the Undertaker just didn’t lose fair and square (memories of Flair) and it all went stale and repetitive all over again. Kurt Angle, Chris Benoit and Taijiri impressed me greatly, but I didn’t expect them to be given a run with The Rock and HHH at the top, refusing to demean themselves by mixing it up with others.
I haven’t watched much since 2001, but keep up with the goings on. It all seems very depressing right now, good to see The Undertaker keeping up the nonsense. It’s all a bit depressing really, especially given that my favourites of the past are dropping like flies. It's all very depressing
I remember thinking how odd it was when people would tell me that Hogan, Piper and Savage were in the WCW (the new NWA, I was told), and that tag team wrestlers Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels (of the Midnight Rockers!) were battling for the WWF belt, I thought that they were joking. The WWF like their champs muscled hulks I thought.
Eventually I started watching again in ’99, and there were few familiar faces. I knew who The Undertaker was (‘Mean’ Mark Callous), there was Owen Hart (the Blue Blazer), Ron Simmons (Doom), and the Big Bossman, but the rest were pretty much new to me. It was exciting, unpredictable, featured far more of the storyline that I remembered (‘sports entertainment’, it was called now). I particularly liked that the matches (Raw) were reasonably evenly matched, featured offense from BOTH wresters (different from the Steve Lombardi, Barry Horowitz etc squashes that I remembered). The characters seemed fresh, and it was all very entertaining.
But it didn’t take too long for it to get stale again. The Rock slowly morphed into Hulk (miraculous comebacks), the Undertaker just didn’t lose fair and square (memories of Flair) and it all went stale and repetitive all over again. Kurt Angle, Chris Benoit and Taijiri impressed me greatly, but I didn’t expect them to be given a run with The Rock and HHH at the top, refusing to demean themselves by mixing it up with others.
I haven’t watched much since 2001, but keep up with the goings on. It all seems very depressing right now, good to see The Undertaker keeping up the nonsense. It’s all a bit depressing really, especially given that my favourites of the past are dropping like flies. It's all very depressing
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