Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling - 11/25/81

Tuned in for my second consecutive installment of Mid-Atlantic. It was pretty much the same as the first. Modern fans like to bitch about how current program can run for 30 minutes without showing an actual match....well, this episode went up to 20 minutes before showing a match. When they did show a match, it was another remote Tommy Rich jobber squash. Followed immediately by more remote footage of Angelo Mosca. In fact, it may have been the exact same Mosca match from the previous episode.

This reminded me of how repetitive pre-1990 shows used to be. You'd go for WEEKS, seeing the same replays, interviews and run-ins from previous shows.

But one match featured Blackjack Mulligan and Jake Roberts vs. Charlie Fulton and Nikolai Volkoff. The cameras completely missed Mulligan finishing off Fulton, as they zoomed in on Jake drop-kicking Nikolai out to the floor. Funny thing, but Nikolai was wearing his old USSR skullcap-- or swimmer's cap-- or flight helmet, for the entire match.

Most of the focus of the first half of the show was on the upcoming 1982 Cadillac Tournament, with Sgt. Slaughter and Roddy Piper chiming in, again. Mulligan even said he'd be interested... after all, Sally Mae and everyone back at the ranch in Texas were in hard times and they needed something to help pay the mortgage. Some of the old blue-collar themes that made old rasslers so popular.

The second half seemed to focus on the ongoing Roddy Piper/Ricky Steamboat issue. But overall, it was to drive fans to an upcoming houseshow in Charlotte, which would feature Steamboat and Roberts teaming up to face Piper and Ole Anderson.

There was also a "Pvt. Jim Nelson" squash worked in. Where Nelson was very much a protege of Slaughter. Nelson was much more mobile and active than the stompy/kicky lump he became as "Boris Zhukov". For instance, he started off with a quick waistlock into an underhook pinning combo.

Noticeably absent from the show were Jay Youngblood and Wahoo McDaniel. Slaughter seemed to tie-up his issue with Wahoo, saying how it was over because Wahoo never answered his challenge. Not sure of the details, but it made it seem like Wahoo had left the area, at least temporarily.

Ric Flair cut a promo for the Charlotte show, pumping his bout against Ray Stevens. Flair threw in a warning to Ole Anderson. Just seemed weird to hear Flair at odds with one of the original Horsemen.

I wasn't into this episode, too much, but I like how they're airing them in chronological order. The main crop of Slaughter, Piper, Ole, Steamboat, Roberts and Mulligan (both Jr and Sr) is excellent.

Farewell to Space Battleship Galactica

I wasn't a hardcore fan and didn't discover it until the third season, but "Battlestar Galactica" ended on a satisfactory note for me. Big ol' battle and no plot threads left dangling. Although, I kept thinking we would be given a final swerve and a "Planet of the Apes Ending".

For example, when they showed Bill Adama sitting on top of the field, then cut to little Hera... I thought she'd stumble over something buried in the ground. Something that had evidence of current 21st century techology (I dunno..maybe a cellphone, circuit board or a VW symbol). So instead of being in Earth's past, as we were led to believe, they were really in the future.. after mankind had destroyed itself once again.

But that would be SUCH a dark ending. I'm glad it ended how it did: on a hopeful and happy note. Also tied into the original series' intent, of how they were supposedly the Egyptian "gods" and/or started life as we know it on "Earth".

Nice touch how they played the theme music from the original series as Sam Anders flew the fleet into the sun. I think that was the first time they paid homage to the old music since the very first episode.

I can see how there could be disappointment over not explaining Starbuck's return. I was okay with it, but I'm curious why that Leoben Cylon guy wasn't seen. I was expecting some explanation of why he was so fascinated with her. Or why he freaked out and ran when they discovered Starbuck's corpse on the burned-out "Earth", earlier this season. After that scene, he essentially evaporated from the show. I didn't really care for the character, but after giving him such prominence in Season Three, I expected more from him in the end.

Oh..and "Chief" Galen Tyrol say he'd be on a island, somewhere far north, away from people? My guess is that Tyrol (who was known to be pretty handy and could command a work force) gave birth to the legend of Santa Claus!

There was a mix of spirituality in the ending, of course, as mentioned in the final scene with Virtual Baltar and Caprica. I'm pretty much an atheist and I didn't have any faults with it. I don't think there's a definitive answer to spirituality...and that's probably the point. What is the "higher power" that humanity likes to define as a creator? There is no definition of it, it's up to us to decide how to grasp it. We might try to define it, but we never really define it. Sure, that's ambiguous, but it makes sense to me.

Think about it in the content of Baltar's speech in the CIC. When he said something how "God is a force of nature. But good and evil are things that we define". So the message I got is that there's something out there...but it's open to our interpretation.

I know they're supposed to produce spin-offs and other crap, but I couldn't care less. Yet I'd be totally on-board for a spin-off show of Bill Adama and Saul Tigh sitting on a couch and shootin' the shit. Those two codgers MADE the entire series for me. Old Guys Rock and I'm now okay with getting old, gray, wrinkly, fat and even losing an eyeball. Every time I burn my Pillsbury Toaster Strudel, I always mutter in my best Saul Tigh voice: "mmm...frakkin' toaster!".

So thanks for 2.5 years of fun, SciFi Channel (I started watching in Fall 2006). You can now keep airing ECW, Ghost Hunters, House of Frankenstein and other Stuff That I'll Never Watch.

Oh--and if you missed the finale, I'm sure you can hit Hulu. Or, if you have Comcast's OnDemand, it's available there as well. It's hidden under "The Cutting Edge" category. Then select "SciFi" and you should see a listing of the last 4 or 5 episodes. Very handy thing and the way I got into the series in the first place.

Language Crutches

Just as the 90's had "Don't Go There" and "That's What She Said", we now have two new over-used supposedly witty and trendy cliches, both completely devoid of relevance and humor. I'm talking about:

"Yeah, especially in this economy"

-and-

"I'm That Guy"

Both have a few variant editions floating around. For example, there's "even in this economy" for #1. But the pertinent element is that it always has "in this economy".

#2 has quite a few versions, as well. Like: "I never wanted to be the guy who leaves at 9 and goes home to sleep. But, yeah, I'm now That Guy". Or, "The one who shoots her mouth off, I don't want to be That Girl".

Radio adverts use 'em. Newscasters use 'em. Shitty Bloggers on the Internets use 'em. You could create a running game on how many times you hear similar phrases during the day. First one to 100 wins a Kick to the Groin.

So clean up your vocab and, please, do NOT use these cliched crutches. Cuz' you don't want to be That Guy, especially in this economy.

Watchmen: Special Lights and Music Edition

After countless reprintings of the "Watchmen" Trade Paperback, it's nice that DC and Warner have teamed up for yet another version; one that's easily viewable on a giant movie screen, has music, and requires no reading!

If you liked the Watchmen comics...errrr, graphic novel, then you'll probably like the movie. If you didn't like it.. well you can probably figure out that version of the equation, Pythagoras.

The final ending was tweaked a bit, but it actually works well and feels more...symmetrical. The comic book's giant alien squid seemed out-of-left field to me. The new cinematic ending ties things together a bit more.

Also, I'm sure a lot of geeks will consciously or subconsciously cream themselves after seeing THE ultimate fanboy fantasy scene: banging a hot chick in your heromobile while she keeps her skin-tight black vinyl boots on. The whole thing only works if she keeps the boots on. It was an okay scene, until it included the stupid "joke" of switching on the flamethrower to simulate a climax. I heard a lot of audible groans in the theater at that point.

The "Watchmen" movie is similar to the Lord of the Rings movies in it's nature. Just as many scenes in those movies were meticulously translated from the Tolkien books, the same effect is in play, here. Even the bruises on Rorschach unmasked face seemed to be identical to their original printed inspirations. So if you ever want to read "Watchmen" again, just save yourself some time and see the movie. Pretty much the same thing, only you'll get some music.

World Baseball Big Bacon Classic

Maybe it's an embedded meme in my brain, but the term "World Baseball Classic" always makes me think of the dearly departed Wendy's Big Bacon Classic Value Meal #4. Man, I miss that thing. $4.59 of pure artery-hardening bliss! They should bring that combo back for the duration of the World Baseball Classic; just slap a WBC logo on the french fry box and I'd have a pants-creaming lunch break.

But I've been checking out a few World Baseball Classic games on the new MLB Network. Just like 3 years ago, it appears that MLB is once again airing their own version of the NFL's Pro Bowl-- a worthless exhibition with no relevance. No offense to the exuberant fans in Puerto Rico, but we don't seem to care about the thing. Especially when Sidney Ponson is leading the charge for a WBC team. Yet I do like the name of "Sharlon Schoop" on the Netherlands team. He plays shortstop, but with that surname he'd be better as a first baseman.


It's also a little peculiar to me how the USA team was seeded in a relatively weak bracket. Perhaps making up for the US's embarrassing belly-flop in the tourney, back in 2006? Without doing much research into the brackets and rosters, the avergae baseball fan could assume, in any tournament, that Puerto Rico, USA, Japan and Cuba would make the finals. So far, that seems to be the course.

While it might be a novelty to see rainbow-colored uniforms and weird exhibition games every 3 years, the WBC has a ways to go before it gains any relevance. If there was a way to take the previous season's four NLCS and ALCS teams into the tourney, that'd be interesting. Scheduling (late October) and/or off-season roster shuffling would make that impossible, though.

But at least the quality of play in the WBC is better than the "Carribean Series". MLB Network aired that thing, last month. After years of thinking it was something special, I tuned in to see dropped pop-flies, misplayed balls and weak at-bats.

A primer on Triumph and Tomorrow Woman

A budyd emailed me asking about DC's Triumph and Tomorrow Woman, both of whom have apparently been featured in the current "Trinity" series. So, not one to waste a decent email, I thought I'd share with the class:

1-- Triumph was created around 1994 and he's sorta' like Marvel "Sentry". He was rectonned to be an early member of the JLA...but he was wiped out of existence and completely forgotten. He was "lost in time" or some weird crap. He came back in the mid-90's and was a good guy for a bit. He even joined the JL:America or Justice League Extreme. He disappeared from DC around 1996 due to Lack of Interest. He came back again in 1999/2000 in "JLA" and had been brainwashed by an evil imp (Q'xl or whatever..an old Aquaman villain, sorta' like Mxyptylk) to be a bad guy of sorts. But he ended up becoming good, again, but soon fell victim to Lack of Interest. He was also used, recently, in "Brave and the Bold" and had apparently had a son.

2-- Tomorrow Woman was created for a JLA one-shot, circa 1998 as a new member of the JLA. She became a member, but it turned out she was just a robotic spy from Professor Ivo and T.O. Morrow. But she rebelled against her programming and "died" a hero (sorta' like Wonder Man in "Avengers", way back in 1965).

Nightwing finally gets "killed"!

I haven't been paying much attention to DC lately, yet I wasn't surprised when I picked up Nightwing #153 in my hold box, last week, and saw the tagline: "FINAL ISSUE" on it. The book's been a downhill train without direction for the last 100 issues or so. I was always amazed that "Azrael" got to 100 and I'm disappointed that in 153 issues, "Nightwing" actually out-sucked "Azrael".

What started out as a satellite Bat-title soon became a completely unnecessary title, period. The first 24 issues or so set up Nightwing's Bludhaven as a Triple A Gotham City, yet not without it's own unique appeal. Writer Chuck Dixon established a quirky little corner for Nightwing; a character who had mooched off of others for almost 60 years (namely, Batman and the Teen Titans), finally had his own mythology and realm.

Nightwing was originally sent to Bludhaven to pursue remnants of Black Mask's "False Face Society", but soon ran into Electrocutioner, Two-Face, Scarecrow, Brutale, Lady Vic, Stallion and others. All capped off by the obligatory "master villain": Roland Desmond the Blockbuster. After being enhanced by DC's 1995 crossover "Underworld: Unleashed", Blockbuster had become a super-powered Kingpin of sorts. And it worked. Mix in the corrupt Bludhaven PD, including Dudley Soames and things got really interesting.

Soames soon became one of the most gruesome villains in comics history: "Torque"...basically a guy who had had his head twisted around 180 degrees...and survived! With his head screwed around, Torque was in the vein of guys like Two-Face. Soames eventually ran into "Nite-Wing", a violent, overzealous dorkbag who wanted to become a superhero.

That got us to issue 25 or so. It was around that time that Dixon ran out of ideas. Soames and Nite-Wing seemed to almost take over the title, with their constant inclusion. A short interlude involving the retconned villain Shrike (hey, now THERE'S a character DC seriously needs to work with) was the only reprieve. For well over 100 issues, "Nightwing" lingered.

Around issue 120 or so, DC wanted to kill off the character of Nightwing. But fans revolted and the execution was passed over. DC re-launched Nightwing two or three times since with new directions for the book. All of which stunk and made Archie Superhero Comics seem like works of art.

The latest was a hack named Peter Tomasi who included lame dialogue that seemed to be copied from Wikipedia. Such as a master villain explaining how a woman's uterus produces a baby (really). He also worked in some of the shittest one-liners since a Lorenzo Lamas movie. Example: a water tower ruptured, sending water spewing below. Nightwing's "witty" remark was: "I guess the Beach Boys are in town". Ugh. In a later issue, when Nightwing was fighting some of Ra's Al Ghul's flunkies, he drove over them with a Batmobile and said: "welcome to Bowling for Ninjas".

Beach Boys and Bowling for Dollars references. Pretty sure those haven't been relevant since the early 70's. Not to mention that they weren't funny then, either.

So now Nightwing (the title) is being axed. Frustrating because the character of Master Dick/Nightwing has been extremely popular among fans for decades. Yet nothing of substance occurred in 153 issues of his long-awaited title. Now the character is being shuffled off DC's current "Battle for the Cowl of Batman" stuff.

He's right back to where he started: mooching off of others.