Face Off 8 - Midnight Madness - Raven & Jim Mitchell
The Good
Another RF Video Face-Off starring Raven. This time he is joined by Jim Mitchell and the two of them have just returned from the late Chris Kanyon's wake. Obviously, they spend plenty of time recollecting their memories of Kanyon, his coming out, his battles with depression and his generosity. It is a nice little tribute in that way. Then, they get off onto promos, psychology and the current product. It is hit-or-miss in those parts. I think if you generally like listening to Raven, were an ECW fan or whatever, you can enjoy this for sure. These two have distinct personalities and in all their tales of debauchery and such, there is a friendship here that comes out. A fun little FaceOff, although maybe not the best.
The Bad
Raven, who I love listening to, seems to be off a bit and while he and "Vandy" have some chemistry, this does not work like previous Raven FaceOffs. Mitchell, while a great promo and an interesting fellow, is totally all over the page here. This seems like two guys chatting and it is such disorganized stream of consciousness discussion that it can hardly be considered a shoot interview. I guess Rob can just throw in a few questions, offer up some chocolate wine and pizza along with how much ever money and we'll get an interesting shoot. For what I expected, this was grossly disappointing.
The Rating: ***1/2
Showing posts with label TNA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TNA. Show all posts
Monday, September 13, 2010
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Kurt Angle Shoot Interview [RF Video]
The Good
I had been putting this one off until I knew I could listen to it in two or three sessions because I knew it would be interesting even if I disagreed with much of Kurt Angle's commentary. The beginning of this was excellent because Kurt Angle's amateur career was so unique, so remarkable and so successful. While RF seemed to only have random questions, Angle's narrative was pretty smooth and thorough. As it got into his professional career, the intrigue level remained. After it got into his first year in the WWF, things were always muddled and confusing. Luckily, Kurt Angle is a good interview and he carried this like many of his matches. While his responses to much of the Internet conjecture that exists about him, his drug problems and his injury issues were interesting, I always had this skepticism in the back of my mind. What ultimately shocked me in this was his comments on psychology. I personally have never found Kurt Angle to be the most logical worker, although his unparalleled athletic ability and willingness to do anything make him a great worker. Here though, he explains psychology in a manner akin to Ricky Steamboat, Jake Roberts or even Raven. It made me really rethink of how I've perceived Kurt Angle over the years. I took him as a great athlete who understands working, but because he didn't grow up a fan, he misses aspects and makes character mistakes (specifically being put over as a buffoon all the time). Is he instead a "moron" who gets in the ring and become a "killer" as he puts it? I'm still not sure.
The Bad
RF Video strikes again. A great talker saves much of this, but the painfully basic questions, inability to follow-up on anything, and constant "I wanna talk to you about that...later" just kills this from being a perfect shoot. The parts that seemed weakest were: not actually knowing about his amateur career, not really pressing the development prior to debuting issue and never even mentioning his noteworthy Japanese matches since leaving the WWE. Kurt Angle was great, but again RF prevented this from being a five-star interview.
The Rating: ****1/2
The Good
I had been putting this one off until I knew I could listen to it in two or three sessions because I knew it would be interesting even if I disagreed with much of Kurt Angle's commentary. The beginning of this was excellent because Kurt Angle's amateur career was so unique, so remarkable and so successful. While RF seemed to only have random questions, Angle's narrative was pretty smooth and thorough. As it got into his professional career, the intrigue level remained. After it got into his first year in the WWF, things were always muddled and confusing. Luckily, Kurt Angle is a good interview and he carried this like many of his matches. While his responses to much of the Internet conjecture that exists about him, his drug problems and his injury issues were interesting, I always had this skepticism in the back of my mind. What ultimately shocked me in this was his comments on psychology. I personally have never found Kurt Angle to be the most logical worker, although his unparalleled athletic ability and willingness to do anything make him a great worker. Here though, he explains psychology in a manner akin to Ricky Steamboat, Jake Roberts or even Raven. It made me really rethink of how I've perceived Kurt Angle over the years. I took him as a great athlete who understands working, but because he didn't grow up a fan, he misses aspects and makes character mistakes (specifically being put over as a buffoon all the time). Is he instead a "moron" who gets in the ring and become a "killer" as he puts it? I'm still not sure.
The Bad
RF Video strikes again. A great talker saves much of this, but the painfully basic questions, inability to follow-up on anything, and constant "I wanna talk to you about that...later" just kills this from being a perfect shoot. The parts that seemed weakest were: not actually knowing about his amateur career, not really pressing the development prior to debuting issue and never even mentioning his noteworthy Japanese matches since leaving the WWE. Kurt Angle was great, but again RF prevented this from being a five-star interview.
The Rating: ****1/2
Friday, January 8, 2010
The History of TNA: Year One
Producers: Bill Banks, Bryan Edwards
Distributor: TNA Home Video
Released: 11/07
Featured Talent
Jeremy Borash, Dixie Carter, Rudy Charles, Christopher Daniels, Chris Harris, B.G. James, Jeff Jarrett, Raven, Bob Ryder, Elix Skipper, James Storm, AJ Styles, Mike Tenay, Andrew Thomas, Don West
The Good
The story of the company now known as TNA is fascinating. There have been numerous attempts by groups of individuals with moneymarks behind them who tried to get a pro-wrestling company going. The failures of the XWF, WWA, MLW and other groups are the typical; TNA was the exception. This documentary tries to tell the story of TNA made it past that first hurdle that those companies could not. This is fascinating to see because it shows how much luck it took along with all the effort. When they lost their moneymark, HealthSouth (one of the largest healthcare services providers in the country), they were blessed by getting picked up by Panda Energy. After surviving that first year, NWA-TNA apparently was primed to greatness. That romanticism aside, this documentary had some funny anecdotes and a frankness from the interviewees that made it unique. The second disc features five matches and they are all in the good to great range.
The Bad
While this is an interesting story, it seemed lost or at least distorted in this format. There is a reason why Vince McMahon has never done a documentary about how his early time could have made him or broke him. However, the massive entity that the WWE is today is far from what TNA is current, yet they played it as if that was not the case. This had a fair amount of WWE bashing (without naming them), but played up the innovative cruiserweight division from WCW, the ravenous fans of ECW and the longstanding legacy of the NWA. In doing so, they undermined much of their uniqueness. That sort of poor production made this seem so low-rent compared to WWE’s documentaries. The negativity, the ramling, the excess kayfabe, the poor interview spaces (one room has an echo and people walking by and another has the TNA logo butchered for some reason) - those things which should have been left on the cutting room floor are in this. Another qualm was all the face time people received. Do I need to see Christopher Daniels in his makeup, yet out of character talking about things they are not showing clips or stills of? This is the first TNA Home Video production I have seen and I was so underwhelmed I fell asleep twice trying to sit through it.
The Rating: ***1/4
Released: 11/07
Featured Talent
Jeremy Borash, Dixie Carter, Rudy Charles, Christopher Daniels, Chris Harris, B.G. James, Jeff Jarrett, Raven, Bob Ryder, Elix Skipper, James Storm, AJ Styles, Mike Tenay, Andrew Thomas, Don West
The Good
The story of the company now known as TNA is fascinating. There have been numerous attempts by groups of individuals with moneymarks behind them who tried to get a pro-wrestling company going. The failures of the XWF, WWA, MLW and other groups are the typical; TNA was the exception. This documentary tries to tell the story of TNA made it past that first hurdle that those companies could not. This is fascinating to see because it shows how much luck it took along with all the effort. When they lost their moneymark, HealthSouth (one of the largest healthcare services providers in the country), they were blessed by getting picked up by Panda Energy. After surviving that first year, NWA-TNA apparently was primed to greatness. That romanticism aside, this documentary had some funny anecdotes and a frankness from the interviewees that made it unique. The second disc features five matches and they are all in the good to great range.
The Bad
While this is an interesting story, it seemed lost or at least distorted in this format. There is a reason why Vince McMahon has never done a documentary about how his early time could have made him or broke him. However, the massive entity that the WWE is today is far from what TNA is current, yet they played it as if that was not the case. This had a fair amount of WWE bashing (without naming them), but played up the innovative cruiserweight division from WCW, the ravenous fans of ECW and the longstanding legacy of the NWA. In doing so, they undermined much of their uniqueness. That sort of poor production made this seem so low-rent compared to WWE’s documentaries. The negativity, the ramling, the excess kayfabe, the poor interview spaces (one room has an echo and people walking by and another has the TNA logo butchered for some reason) - those things which should have been left on the cutting room floor are in this. Another qualm was all the face time people received. Do I need to see Christopher Daniels in his makeup, yet out of character talking about things they are not showing clips or stills of? This is the first TNA Home Video production I have seen and I was so underwhelmed I fell asleep twice trying to sit through it.
The Rating: ***1/4
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