Henry's World

 It's fair to say that Fight for the Fallen was set-up quite a bit behind the 8 ball. For starters, it was taking place outdoors in Jacksonville, in the midst of summer, no less. Just to put that into perspective, it's currently 87 degrees Fahrenheit in Jacksonville currently, and the calendar hasn't even turned to April yet. I don't know what kind of heat they were dealing with for this show, but whatever it was, I certainly wouldn't volunteer to be out in it for over 4 hours, whether as a fan or as a performer. That runtime was another issue, as was the fact that Fight for the Fallen was taking place just 2 weeks after Fyter Fest. That meant there was only room for a single episode of Being the Elite for the build, plus a few Road to... videos, nowhere near enough time to add much in terms of stakes or hype. But if there's one thing I've learned in all my years watching the WWE, it's that wrestling companies tend to function best in the face of adversa

 We've got one more AEW show to cover before All Out in Fight for the Fallen. It only got two weeks of build, so the main card hasn't exactly gotten a lot of hype manufactured for it, but that's not a problem for the Buy In, which tends to consist of thrown together matches for it anyway. Certainly, "thrown together" is the correct term for this one, the two matches AEW decided to showcase here are about as awkward as any I've seen from this company.  - Woof, that logo is ugly. I know, I know, it's just a free preview show and the fact that logos are even designed for these Buy Ins is a level of added legitimacy that other companies don't have, but it still looks awful. This Buy In comes to you from Daily's Place in Jacksonville, Florida, with Alex Marvez and Excalibur on the call. I wasn't a fan of Marvez at Double or Nothing, but I thought he was fine here, though that might be because the action in the ring slowed down to match his muted sty

 AEW had a lot of time to fill between their inaugural effort on pay-per-view, Double or Nothing, and their grand return to the Sears Centre in Chicago for All Out in August. So they booked two more cards, both taking place in what has essentially become their home state, Florida. Both shows have been named as homages to pop culture, beginning with Fyter Fest, a parody of the infamous Fyre Festival that took place about two years prior. Kenny Omega took the role of scam artist Billy McFarland, though his character leaned a bit more in the direction of bumbling fool than malicious fraudster. It did make sense for Omega to try and refocus after his defeat to Chris Jericho at Double or Nothing, though his assault at the hands of the debuting Jon Moxley was largely left out of the build. Kenny did get to show a lot more personality in the four episodes of Being the Elite setting this show up, but his story completely overshadowed any other hype that could've been built for the rest of

 Well, fortunately I've been able to solve the issues I was having watching AEW content, so I'm moving forward to do the reviews I wanted to do initially, starting with the Buy In for Fyter Fest 2019. It is weird that they're doing a free pre-show to convince people to watch a show that was also available for free, but I get the idea that AEW is trying to establish this as a consistent business model. And hey, the Buy In for Double or Nothing was really fun, I think AEW really nails how to deliver an hour of content that can be both entertaining and feel like a complete show all on it's own.  - On commentary for this Buy In are Excalibur, Call of Duty caster "Goldenboy" and BBC Radio DJ Logan Sama. Boy that is an eclectic group, and I'm not really sure how to feel about their performance. I mean, there was a lot more genuine enthusiasm then you got out of Alex Marvez, so at least that's an improvement, but there really wasn't much chemistry here, a

 With many events from this time period missing matches, I've decided to jump forward two years, from the first Wrestle Kingdom to the third. By this time, New Japan's Tokyo Dome show had been completely invaded by members of other promotions, most notably TNA, who had basically become the American version of New Japan by this point. Say what you will about that decision, or the call to put the IWGP title on Keiji Mutoh, who was nearing 50 and only appearing sporadically in New Japan, but from the attendance numbers, it seemed like this trick was working. According to Dave Meltzer, the attendance for Wrestle Kingdom 3 was up 50% from two years prior. You could chalk that increase of interest up to the working agreements in place with TNA, All Japan, CMLL and others, but some credit should go to the main event, featuring Mutoh defending against his protegee, Hiroshi Tanahashi. Since our last trip to the Dome, Tana was defeated by Shinsuke Nakamura in the main event of Wrestle Ki

 Since it's founding in 1972, New Japan Pro Wrestling, or Shin Nihon Puroresu in Japanese, quickly became the standard bearer for wrestling in the country. Antonio Inoki, founder and top star, played a massive role in legitimizing the new company, thrilling audiences with his brand of "strong style", putting on wars with the likes of Bill Robinson, Karl Gotch, Seiji Sakaguchi and Andre the Giant. In the eighties, junior heavyweight wrestling began to rise in popularity thanks to the battles between the Dynamite Kid and the first Tiger Mask, and in the nineties, the company produced new stars for a new generation, as the "Three Musketeers" of Keiji Mutoh, Masahiro Chono and Shinya Hashimoto were set to lead New Japan forward towards the new millennium. It's during this era that they formed a partnership with World Championship Wrestling in the States, with a supershow between the two in 1993 being New Japan's first foray into hosting an annual event in th

 I realize I've already written a blog update just a few days ago, but I have more to say and I want to clue you in, so thus, this is basically a part two to that. In that update, I mentioned that I was considering between doing reviews for AEW, New Japan and Impact, to cover for the loss of the WWE Network library. At the end of yesterday's WrestleMania 19 review, I said I was moving forward covering AEW, starting back up at Fyter Fest, and so I've been watching the episodes of BTE and Road to... for that show, in addition to starting to watch the Buy In for it's own review.  I've gotta be honest, I'm not really feeling it. Something about AEW's style of comedy and wrestling just doesn't appeal to me, at least not right now, but my bigger issue is with their distributor, Bleacher Report Live. The platform is just a mess, it gave me a massive headache during my Double or Nothing review after I closed my browser mid-playback, which resulted in me struggli

 I don't think there can be much of an argument that this WrestleMania has the most stacked card in the history of "The Grandest Stage of Them All", possibly in WWE history as well. You've got your starpower in the final of the Rock/Austin trilogy, top tier nostalgia in Hulk Hogan, the biggest name in the history of the business in Vince McMahon, plus some of the most talented athletes to ever grace a squared circle in Brock Lesnar, Kurt Angle, Shawn Michaels, Chris Jericho, Rey Mysterio and more. So how does this ridiculous array of talent generate just 560,000 buys for 'Mania, 300k less than the previous year and half a million less than WrestleMania 20 the year after? I'm not really sure, but I could hazard a few guesses. My first thought would the predictability of the final two matches in particular, the build to this show left no doubt that the night would close with victories for Rock and Brock. You could also blame the wrestling-focused product, which

 A few updates to share today as we move into what should hopefully be a bit more of a relaxing month than the last. First of all, I'm going to be busy the next few days, dealing with an issue that means I won't be able to put up a post here until probably around the 15th. After that, the plan is still to review WrestleMania 19, at which point I would have a lot of options over what to do next. The WWE Network's transition onto Peacock will not include the pay-per-view back catalog, at least to start, so I couldn't continue reviewing 2003 shows even if I wanted to, nor could I try out my other idea of circling back to cover shows I've skipped along my journey through WWE history. That sucks, but it is what it is, nothing I can do about it.  With that in mind, I have a few different ideas for some new reviews. I think I'm likely going to try several things, with probably starts with AEW, I'd like to at least get to cover some episodes of Dynamite to see how I

 It's the final stop before WrestleMania 19, as the WWE makes it's way back to Montreal for the first time, at least on pay-per-view, since the infamous Survivor Series in 1997. To honor the occasion, Hulk Hogan and The Rock are back, both having not appeared on television since the previous summer, to once again do battle in the Great White North. These two joined Vince McMahon, The Undertaker and "Stone Cold" Steve Austin as high-profile returnees since the beginning of 2003, with the company obviously looking to ramp up hype with 'Mania set to be hosted in the 50,000+ capacity Safeco Field in Seattle. This card is stacked with name value, but devoid of the type of high octane in-ring action that you would come to expect from watching many of the WWE's productions around this time. As such, it feels like a massive outlier, an ode to sports-entertainment rather than pure wrestling, so the fact that it garnered a more mixed response critically wasn't much

 This is the first Royal Rumble since the beginning of the brand split, and it's the perfect even to showcase the gap in quality between the Raw and SmackDown brands at this point. On one hand, you have a showdown between Kurt Angle and Chris Benoit for the WWE title, two of the best in the world and two men who command respect from the fans and from the locker room, with quite a history of working together over the past few years that could lend plenty of intrigue towards a championship collision. On the other hand, Raw brings to you Triple H versus Scott Steiner, an infamous disaster of a match that completely ruined the career of one of wrestling's hottest free agents at the time and led to years of bad blood between both men, which is responsible for the omission of the Steiner Brothers from the WWE Hall of Fame. The two world title matches completely overshadow the titular Rumble itself, probably a good thing for the company as this year's edition was one of the most p

The Armageddon event name makes it's return after a one year hiatus, back to fill the spot as the final pay-per-view of the year for the WWE. The main event is another chapter in the never-ending war between Shawn Michaels and Triple H, a Three Stages of Hell match for the World Heavyweight title. Most of the time, you can tell that the creative team has mostly lost interest by the end of the year, just desperately trying to find anything to cover the gap between Survivor Series and the Royal Rumble, and this added stipulation is an obvious ploy to make up for the slow loss of heat in the feud between Shawn and Hunter. It's not the worst idea I've ever heard, since the Triple H-Steve Austin Three Stages of Hell match at No Way Out just under two years prior was hailed by most as a classic, but the flaws in that match style were laid bare on this night.  - Armageddon 2002 comes to you from the Office Depot (now BB&T) Center in Sunrise, Florida, although WWE insists it