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WRESTLEMANIA
XIX
BY JACOB ZHIVOV
April 4, 2003
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As many of you know, I love my wrestling -- and yes,
I know it's fake. But hey, as soap operas go wrestling is far better
than Days of our Lives and Passions -- even at its worst.
Unfortunately, wrestling pay-per-views are not available
this year to Australian viewers and this pisses me off. However, Village
cinemas, in their infinite wisdom, decided to get a satellite feed
of the pay-per-views this year and are showing them in their cinemas.
This also means that they can then charge $25 per patron for a ticket
and hence make a nice profit ta boot.
Anyway, Wrestlemania is the biggest wrestling pay-per-view
of the year. It’s a massive four hours long and usually has the
most exciting matches, interesting plot twists, a whole bunch of celebrities,
semi-famous commercial stars and often old retired wrestlers turn
up. This year's nineteenth Wrestlemania was no different. Here’s
my quick rundown.
Live from Seattle, Washington, Wrestlemania started
with its “We support our country" shit by having Ashanti
sing “America the Beautiful”. Now I wouldn’t necessarily
mind this, as usually they have someone sing this song every now and
then on the show, but when the pictures of the troops started flashing
on the screen I almost went mental. I don’t care if you're pro-
or anti-war: I don’t want it in my wrestling.
First up was the Cruiserweight title match: Matt Hardy
Version 1(Champion) vs Rey Mysterio. The Cruiserweight division of
wrestling is by far the most exciting division as all the wrestlers
are below 220 pounds and are usually very acrobatic in their style.
Rey Mysterio being the best of this lot as he is a Mexican wrestler
and the Mexican wrestlers are considered to be the most acrobatic
in the world. Rey had his outfit designed as a cross between his usual
outfit with mask and the suit Affleck wears in the "Daredevil"
film. Matt Hardy’s entrance was like a media player style with
interesting facts about Matt like “this was his fourth Wrestlemania”
and “he wonders how they did Wrestlemania without him” This
got a huge laugh from the crowd. Unfortunately, as wrestling is a
soap opera Rey was “screwed” out of his victory and Matt
Hardy Version 1.
For some reason lately the WWE has been going through
this lesbian angle or insinuating lesbian behaviour. This was probably
why the Miller Light Cat Fight Girls were shown arriving between this
match and the next.
The next match involved The Undertaker vs A-Train (the
hairiest man in wrestling) and the Big Show (the slowest man in wrestling).
Australia’s own Nathan Jones was meant to be involved in this
match but what I’ve seen of him sucks so no wonder they had him
“knocked out” before the show. This match was boring as
hell as those who know wrestling know that The Undertaker is never
defeated at Wrestlemania and I doubt he will before he retires. What
I did like was that they had Limp Bizkit on hand to play their song
“Rollin” which is also one of The Undertaker’s entrance
themes while he came in. Nathan Jones did eventually turn up and spin
kick Big Show but hey, there was no real surprise there.
Now back to the Miller Light Cat Fight girls, who run
into two of the WWE’s Divas -- Torrie Wilson who is in this month’s
playboy and Stacy Keibler. Quick banter that promotes the playboy
and the wrestler’s then onto the next match
Known to many as the piss break match, the Women’s
Title match started. Tradition held at the Village Cinema, as many
people went to the toilet or went to get food while the match was
on, but I stayed to see what would happen: after all, I had paid $25
to watch. In a triple threat match, we get three competitor going
for the title and by pinning either of your opponents you can win
the belt. The match was as expected and Trish Stratus, the very lovely
blonde, won. Quick sidebar: that Tatu song “All the things she
said” is the entrance music for the ex-Women’s Champion,
Victoria. (Lesbians again!)
Now a quick promo from The Rock (who happens to be a
heel currently). He is one of the best people at doing these promos,
and sometimes you can see the throw back to the Hulk Hogan/Mean Gene
days of pre-match interviews in them. Anyway, usual "I’m
gonna beat Stone Cold Steve Austin tonight" stuff.
Another Triple Threat match, but this time for the WWE
Tag Titles. A very good match to watch, but pure time-filler, as no
real plot points happen. All three teams – Team Angle (Charlie
Hass and Shelton Benjamin), Chavo and Eddie Guerros and Rhyno and
Chris Benoit all doing their best to put on a good show.
Next – back in the locker room with the Cat Fight
Girls and the Divas who end up in a cat fight, which they decide to
settle in the ring/bed. (now, I was pissed at this as they removed
the World Tag Team Title match for this – hello, priorities people).
Now we go into the best matches of the night: Shawn
Michaels vs Chris Jericho. This feud has been going on since December
and finally came to a head. This was by far one of the best matches
of the event. Both men giving their all, especially Shawn who has
a very bad back problem but still willing to put it all on the line
for the fans, this was proven by his win and the mutual acknowledgment
between opponents.
We then have another piss break by having Limp Bizkit
come back and play the theme song for the event. It is after all a
four hour show. And to make sure everyone can go they have the Catfight
where all four ladies rip each others tops off until they decide to
gang up on the ref. What a load of shit this was.
Ahh Match #7 -- The Raw Brand Title Defence, between
Triple H (Champion) and Booker T. Now I’m a huge fan of Booker
T, he’s funny he’s quite athletic and would make a great
champion. However, I guess because Triple H is engaged to the boss's
daughter he can get whatever he wants. Since being given the belt
Triple H has lost it just once and that was to Shawn Michaels for
one month and most likely for sentimental reasons alone. Since he
won it back, he’s fought Scott Steiner -- who should rightfully
be the title holder -- twice, and Booker T at Wrestlemania. Booker
T so looked like he was gonna be given a shot at being the top dog
in the yard, but bullshit politics once again see Triple H walking
out of another pay-per-view with the title. Sometimes I really hate
watching wrestling.
On to the old timer match. This match was dubbed the
"twenty years in the making" match and for some reason I
knew it was gonna be bad. Hulk Hogan doesn’t realise he’s
old and still thinks he should wrestle. I think Vince McMahon does
as well. The Hulkster is fifty years old this year and when he wrestles
he looks it. Vince is almost sixty. I think these two need to see
the light and retire. However, that being said, this match was a streetfight
(no rules, basically) and was not too painful to watch. The highlight
was seeing Rowdy Roddy Piper turn up and clock Hogan, only for Hogan
to “Hulk” up and win the match.
The match we had been waiting for: Austin vs The Rock.
We’ve seen this match happen at two previous Wrestlemanias. These
two superstars perform brilliantly, and this year was no exception,
with the winner being The Rock, only to set up a new feud which began
the next night where The Rock claimed he had done it all in the WWE
and beaten everyone, only to have Bill Goldberg (ex-WCW superstar)
turn up and challenge him.
Our main event for this Wrestlemania was Brock Lesnar
vs Kurt Angle. Now I read a lot of the backstage gossip and reports
on wrestling so I knew that this match was gonna be good for two reasons.
1) Both of these guys are company men and really do step up when needed
and 2) Kurt Angle has majorly damaged his neck and if he’s gonna
go out for a while he’s gonna go out on a great match. This match
did not disappoint, except when Brock Lesnar who is 6 foot 3 inches
[the SmackDown! website says 6'4", Jake! -- a friend], tried
to do a high flying move and almost killed himself in the process.
He did win in the end but I presume someone had to tell him about
what happened after he recovered.
Wrestlemania is one of those pay per views where the
wrestlers always go hard and perform their best. There’s too
much history for them not to. So to you people who say wrestling is
fake, I ask you to watch this event and then make up your mind. Wrestling
is not fake: only scripted, like ballet and "Popstars".
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HEY, KIDS! Hit the WWE
website to find out what Sgt. Slaughter has to say to our troops
in the Gulf!
