Tuesday, November 29, 2016

Oh, The Metahumanity! (Oct 21-27)

A whole new color of Speed Lightning! Yay!
I know this week is the big Invasion crossover, and we already know the "four-night" part is total bullshit, since the only crossover scene on Supergirl was two minutes long, at the end, and repeated on The Flash. But I forgot to write up the stuff I watched last week, so might as well get it in now.

Sunday, November 27, 2016

HateWatch: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice


Ah, HBO. The only proper way to properly experience the DC Cinematic Universe, aka Zack Snyder's Slo-Mo Adventures. I'd heard a lot about how bad this movie was since it came out, and it still surprised me. It's fucking dire.

Motherfuckin' Lucha Underground! (Every Woman Is Sexy, Every Woman Is A Star)

Well....
After what seems like a season's worth of promos promising their arrival, the Rabbit Tribe debuts.

Weekly Wrasslin' Wroundup (Week of 11/21)

OK, another format change for the Weekly Wrasslin' Wroundup. It's back to covering all the shows once a week because, well, I'm sick of recaps and instead I'm just gonna rate all the things that happened into three groups. Good things, generally ordered best down. Bad things, generally ordered worst up. And the rest.

Monday, November 21, 2016

Survivor Series 2016

Ladies and gentlemen, the hero of Survivor Series.
In the end, Survivor Series was... OK. A surprising, above average number of cool moments throughout, hampered nearly constantly by the fact that I don't care about the brand rivalry. At all. I would, however, like to extend a special thanks to the Toronto crowd for continuing to make EVERY number chant a "10" in honor of Tye Dillinger. That was probably my favorite part of the entire show.

NXT Takeover: Toronto

Bobby Roode's career is just a series of increasingly insane robes.
Once again, NXT puts on a show before a big WWE PPV, and once again, an incredible amount of effort by the performers and a super-hot crowd lets NXT steal the show from the big boys.

@midnight Power Rankings (Nov 14-17)

Learning fun new things about Uncrustables.
Obviously, we need to talk about Doub Benson's unprecedentedly low place on the Power Rankings this week. Doug and the level of copetition this week had one thing in common - they were both a bit too high for him to do well. It happens to all guys at some point, Doug, and of course, these rankings are arbitrary, pointless, and not intended as a slight on any of the performers.

Friday, November 18, 2016

Weekly Wrasslin' Wroundup (NXT)


No. Just stop.
As is traditional with the rare NXT pre-Takeover show, the Takeover stuff is all in video packages and the show itself features side content. So my Takeover Toronto predictions will have to be separate from the main show stuff.

Oh, The Metahumanity! (Nov 13-17)

It's Bobo Master Chief! I mean The Punisher! I mean Vigilante!
Not the best week for the CW. And with the Invasion crossover coming soon, let's hope things pick up, 'cause I'm gonna have to watch a Supergirl and a legends.

Motherfuckin' Lucha Underground! (Aztec Warfare III)

NEW CHAMP NEW CHAMP NEW CHAMP
AZTEC WARFARE! The first of Lucha Underground's two big events each season. Twenty luchadors enter, one leaves with the Lucha Underground belt. This year, in a move of sheer hubris, The Monster Matanza Cueto defends his title from the #1 spot.

Weekly Wrasslin' Wroundup (Raw/SD)

WHY CAN'T WE HAVE NICE THINGS?
Raw and Smackdown have difficult challenges this week,and so do I. How do two shows do go-home stuff for a PPV where all the matches are Raw vs. Smackdown? And how do I recap and predict? Gonna have to go by the card and then talk about what happened leading up to it. And, of course, the predictions themselves are very who gives a shit as a result.

Monday, November 14, 2016

@midnight Power Rankings (11/7-10)

Not the easiest @midnight to watch, even days later.
Ah, election week comedy. It was an easy decision to make to delete the entire week's Daily Shows, it was easy to wait several days before diving into the Full Frontal, but the live @midnight was tricky because it happened literally at the point where we all knew in our hearts that things had gone horribly wrong. Thank you Ron Funches and Dolph Lundgren.

Oh, The Metahumanity! (11/7-10)

EVIL! POLITE AND EVIL!
A light week thanks to the election, so I was able to knock off a couple of Luke Cages around stomach flu and political armageddon. Plus, Arrow!

Thursday, November 10, 2016

Motherfuckin' Lucha Underground! (Two-Ep Spectacular)

Two episodes, two GIFs.
I mean, hot damn.

Gotta double up on the Lucha Underground stuff this week because of, well, everything. Luckily, these two episodes, "Loser Leaves Lucha" and "Ready For War" are kind of a package deal setting things up before Aztec Warfare.

Weekly Wrasslin; Wroundup (NXT)

He is Pentagon Nakamura and he has CERO FUCKS.
This week NXT comes to you from Full Sail and California, because for some reason they taped the Dusty Rhodes semifinals at a live event and the filler stuff at FUll Sail.

Weekly Wrasslin' Wroundup (SD Live)

Paying their dues, I guess.

Hope you enjoy long promos where the members of a Survivor Series team spend a long time bickering awkwardsly in the ring, because after the three we had on Raw, we open Smackdown with one as well.

Wednesday, November 9, 2016

Weekly Wrasslin' Wroundup (Raw)

They picked a good time to leave the country.
This wee's Raw is all about being in Scotland and naming Survivor Series teams.

Tuesday, November 8, 2016

Oh, The Metahumanity! (Nov 1-5)

OH NOES SPOOKY EYES
With all the shows taking Election Week off for some reason, I totally decided to wait and post this late and it had nothing to do with laziness and/or stomach flu. No, really. Gonna take the opportunity to get a couple more deep into Luke Cage this week.

Luke Cage: "Just To Get A Rep" (8% Stupid)

This one plays out fairly slowly, against the background of Pop's memorial service and Cage's daylight street justice. Cottonmouith squeezes the people of Harlem, so Cage squeezes back. This culinates in a weird, but mostly effective Dueling Eulogy sequence where Luke Cage wins over hearts and minds.

In other news. Claire Temple arrives in Harlem, after the events of Daredevil Season 2, possibly to start her path toward Night Nursing. And the Knight-Scarfe  subplot starts heating up, as some cops are suspicious that Scarfe is dirty. Which, of course, he is.

Agents Of SHIELD: "The Good Samaritan" (16% Stupid)

Normally, AoS strikes a solid plot and characterization balance. Characters change and move forward slowly, but the progression is consistent and plots are (usually) not rehashed. I mean, yeah, this week we have Origin Story, Secret Revelation, and Clashing With Authority, but it's all fine. But this one was all plot, no character.

Jeffrey Mace is becoming a problem. I mean, I know it's a bit early in the season for them to lay all his cards on the table, but his contant shifting from vague ally to vague nemesis is making me a bit seasick. Is there a method to this madness or is he shifting in the wind to make plots work?

I'm OK with the plot twist of Ghost Rider's uncle being the actual bad guy, but it's a situation where the only way to keep the viewers from seeing the twist coming is to leave it almost completely unsupported.

The Flash: "Monster" (5% Stupid)

I enjoyed this episode so much I looked up the writer, Zack Stentz. His only other episode, "The Runaway Dinosaur", was one of the biggest turds of Season 2, but that one had a bunch of other writers on it. It's possible other writers will be added to IMDB later, but the point is, whoever wrote this, MORE LIKE THIS.

This is that rarest of Flash episodes, one in which nobody has to be dumbasses for the plot to work. In fact, everyone in this episode acted almost uncharacteristically sane and competent. The interpersonal angst was, for Flash, antural and not overplayed. Some of the Julian stuff resolved awfully quickly, yes, but it was reasonably well supported and very well acted, so it worked. This is the most I've enjoyed a Flash episode in like a year and a half. Good job.

Arrow: "Human Target" (10% Stupid)

And there's the character pees that was missing last week. Man, it's great having Diggle back, and his character and Wild Dog's really play well off each other. All their scenes together were wuper appealing.

Plus we get the villain shift this episode, as Promootheus kills Church after Team Arrow catches him. And while I certainly could have lived without Felicity's New Boyfriend drama, they handled it very competently. And hey, Ollie gets to be a halfway decent character. Also, HUMAN TARGET! Played by Nuke, of all people.

Next week, though, it seems like Star City journalists are doing their first journalism.

Sunday, November 6, 2016

Monthly Free Games (November 2016)

This is the one to seek out.
Sony is the clear winner when it comes to current-gen free games this month. Last-gen is a bit of a draw.

Saturday, November 5, 2016

Some Fun TV Pops AND THE BEST POPS IN THE UNIVERSE



So we're going through one of those times again where a bunch of Pops I heard about the last time I was looking around at Pop news are actually out. So I got the full set of Preacher ones, not because they're the greatest Pops, but because I loved Preacher so much. And they're fine. Plus technically Jesse and Tulip also count as MCU pops via actor connections. Of course, with every incarnation, Arseface just keeps getting cuter, which doesn't seem right.

Friday, November 4, 2016

Doctor Strange

Sorceror Squad! IN COLOR.
Super-short relative to other Marvel movies grade: I give it an Ant-Man Plus.


Thursday, November 3, 2016

Weekly Wrasslin' Wroundup (NXT)

Hello, Shane Thorne's face. I'm Roderick Strong's knee.
This week, the Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic tries gamely to soldier on despite the NXT roster's best attempts to accidentally murder each other.

Weekly Wrasslin' Wroundup (SD Live)

Let's hope Curt Hawkins doesn't, as they say, get paid by the hour.
Smackdown this week takes the one good thing it had going for it, the scrawny, weird-looking, but plucky James Ellsworth, and ruins it. Now what's going to lighten my load from a jacked as fuck tag division and whatever the fuck keeps happening with Randy Orton?

Weekly Wrasslin' Wroundup (Raw)

RIP Francesca II
What rough beast is this, slouching toward Survivor Series? It's Monday Night Raw, and I don't know what the fuck they're doing most of the time.

Tuesday, November 1, 2016

Hell In A Cell

Setting the tone early in the match.
Gotta say, as PPV's go, WWE's done a lot worse than Sunday's Hell in a Cell, and as brand-specific PPV's go, they've ALL been worse than this. A few duds on the card, but the strong Raw roster brought it.