Short Attention Span Review: The Road is Jericho (2015)

Hello, my name is Jimmy and I'm a Jerichoholic.  I enjoy wrasslin' and there are many superstars past and present who I have cheered for, but Jericho is the bee's knees.  Thus, I was pretty damn excited when I scored The Road is Jericho on Blu-ray.  First off, be sure to pick up the Blu-ray if that's an option for you.  7 hours of material on DVD is cool, but 8 and a half hours on Blu-ray is better.  Secondly, while it is true that most of Jericho's most celebrated matches were contained in the first set, dude has epic matches to spare.  This is a nifty collection that spans much of Jericho's career and features several of his finest rivals, to include the Rock, Shawn Michaels, Rey, and HHH.  His most recent rivalries with CM Punk and Bray Wyatt also made the cut by virtue of a Chicago Street Fight and a good old-fashioned cage match, and the best match in the set may be a no-frills but lengthy bout against RVD on RAW that is an absolute showstopper.  Understandably, there's no mention of Chris Benoit and none of Jericho's legendary matches with him are included, but Jericho's legacy is strong enough to survive despite the absence of what may have been his strongest rival.  My favorite Jericho match, a "Last Man Standing" showdown with HHH from Fully Loaded in 2000, is still missing in action, but lo and behold, the match with HHH that is included in this collection actually sees Chris emerge victorious.  Despite the presence of so many notable superstars and so many incredible matches, the real highlight of The Road is Jericho has to be the segments where Jericho discusses his career and the various matches included in the set.  Chris is very candid, funny as always, and dishes out lots of cool tidbits about himself, his opponents, and the wrestling business.  The Road is Jericho will definitely thrill any Jerichoholic, and any true wrasslin' fan should find something to love in this terrific set.

Final Grade: A

The "best there is at what he does" may be absent from the WWE at present,
but his second collection of matches is sure to break the walls down.

Short Attention Span Review: Hercules (2014)

Before I get started here, I should probably note that I have a soft sport for this particular sub-genre.  As a kid, I spent way too much time watching movies like Conan the Barbarian, The Beastmaster, and I even enjoyed those wacky Lou Ferrigno Hercules movies.  Okay, I confess: I also found time to watch Conan the Destroyer.  Forgive me.  I'm also a big fan of Dwayne Johnson, though I haven't enjoyed his movies as much as his work in the wrestling ring as the Rock.  Now, he was awesome in Pain & Gain and his first feature, The Rundown, showed a lot of promise.  Yet many of his choices have been a bit too generic for my taste, and as much as I dig these "swords and sandals" affairs, it's hard for me to get too fired up about anything directed by Brett Ratner.  So, my expectations were low going into this one and that may explain why I enjoyed it more than many of my peers.  Hey, it's no masterpiece, not by a long shot, and the end is a bit of a CGI clusterfuck, but I'm still going to recommend it.  First off, Ian McShane was a joy to watch as he gobbled up the scenery and stole pretty much every scene he was in.  Secondly, there's a wicked battle scene in the middle of the film that is certainly worth seeing, even if it does make that lackluster finish even more of a disappointment by comparison.  Finally, the notion of foregoing the mythical aspect of the title character's legacy and telling a somewhat grounded and action-driven story worked for me.  Alluding to the twelve labors many Hercules tales center on as little more than hyperbole and even casting doubt on his lineage, this Hercules is sort of a poor man's 300.  Thankfully it avoids the gimmicks that made that picture so unique--and that so many movies have done their best to ape ever since Zack Snyder hit the scene.  Ratner did an okay job, Johnson didn't have to flex his acting muscles all that much, but he also performed well, and the supporting cast was a joy to watch.  In conclusion, it's a shame the ending wasn't stronger, as the first two acts of this film were surprisingly fierce and highly entertaining.

Final Grade: C

"Come, let us layeth the smack down upon their asses!"

WrestleMania 31 Thoughts

I dig wrestling and I greatly enjoyed watching the big show last night.  Here are my thoughts on a few of the biggest moments from WrestleMania 31:

Daniel Bryan wins the IC Title
Chris Jericho is my favorite wrestler, so I have a lot of love for this belt.  Putting it on Bryan was an obvious call, but it was the right call.  He'll do a lot with and for that championship, and he earned it in a match where there were some massive bumps.

John Cena defeats Rusev
Call me a prude (can you be a wrestling fan and a prude?) but it's hard for me to get behind fat guys who wrestle barefoot.  That doesn't do anything for me.  It's worse if the guy is billed as a Russian patriot and he's actually Bulgarian.  Like, dude has a tattoo of Bulgaria on his shoulder.  Rusev aside, I'm a fan of Cena and I liked seeing him getting the win and scoring the U.S. Championship.  Score one for the people who wear shoes.

The Divas Tag Match
Paige is awesome.  A.J. Lee is pretty damn cool.  The Bella Twins are okay.  Why wasn't the Divas title on the line at the big show?  I wish the WWE liked their Divas as much as their fans do.  This tag match was okay, but these ladies deserve more--especially Paige.  I like Paige.
I like Paige a lot. 

Sting finally made it to WrestleMania

Sting vs. HHH
I liked Sting when I was a kid.  I cooled down on him once he started aping the Crow, but it was still cool to see him wrestle in the WWE.  I have several friends who are crazy about this dude, and I kept joking that it would be really cool if HHH kicked him in the gut, hit him with a pedigree, and scored a victory in the first thirty seconds of the match.  It seemed like a safe enough joke because I knew the match would go long and there was no way that Sting would be booked to lose this one.  Well, what do you know?  The WWE stuck it to WCW once again and Sting lost by pinfall in an overbooked (but entertaining) match that saw a lot of old dudes get involved.  There was a cheap finish followed by a baffling show of respect that was supposed to make fans feel better about Sting losing, but it made no sense.

HHH: Great match, Sting.  I respect the hell out of you.

Sting:  Hell yeah, bro.  The feeling is mutual.  The way you had all your cronies come out to interfere in the match was awesome.  The NWO came out to help me because we were always bitter enemies, but you had one more dude in your corner than I did.  Then you hit me in the face with a sledgehammer to win the match.  I respect the hell out of that.

HHH: Let's shake on it.

Sting: Word. 

If there's a silver lining, maybe the fact that he took the L means we'll see more of Sting in the WWE.

Bray Wyatt vs. The Undertaker
I'm glad the Undertaker won this one and he looked pretty good.  A lot of people were worried that he would be on his last legs, but he appears to have some gas left in the tank.  Wyatt did a great job, but that's no surprise.  He cuts too many promos and he talks way too much, but he's damn good and it showed

The future is here.

Roman Reigns vs. Brock Lesnar for the Heavyweight Championship
(Seth Rollins cashed in his Money in the Bank briefcase in the closing minutes and stole the victory)
I wasn't as hyped for this match as I should have been because Reigns is still a work-in-progress, but it was actually one hell of a match.  Rollins showing up at the end was a nice move, and the last few minutes of this contest were flat out awesome.  The fact that Lesnar and Reigns killed it was probably overshadowed by Rollins walking away with the belt, but this was a top-notch main event that many were expecting to be rather lackluster.

All in all, it was a solid WrestleMania with some surprise developments and several quality matches.  I'll be curious to see the fallout on tonight's RAW.

Scooby-Doo Wrestlemania Mystery

So, I watched the Scooby-Doo/WWE cartoon with my son and the rest of the family yesterday.  Asher turned 3 on Saturday and the DVD was one of his gifts.  Anyway, we had a silly good time with it.  There were some good jokes for the older generation along the way, and the whole thing was a lot of fun.  It was a typical Scooby-Doo feature and the WWE angle didn't feel at all out of place.  Some of the choices so far as the wrestlers featured in the cartoon are concerned were interesting; I'm sure it took some time to animate this one and I can only speculate that the WWE expected some of these cats to be more popular than they wound up being.  The production values were nice and the movie was entertaining from start to finish.  Seriously, Ash hasn't wanted to watch anything else since.

If you like the WWE or Scooby-Doo, you'll have fun with this one. 

The World's Smallest Jerichoholic

Yes, he's playing WWE '13

 My son Asher's love for wrestling is phenomenal.  The little guy isn't even 2 yet, and he's utterly fascinated by the WWE.  He'll settle for TNA, but RAW and Smackdown are definitely his favorite shows, and he's always up for a WWE Pay-Per-View.  The bizarre thing is that even though I'm pretty much a lifelong fan myself, I really didn't force it on him at all.  I figured we might get there one day, but Kris and I thought he would be into cartoons and such at this age, and while he does have a fondness for Spider-Man, nothing tickles his fancy like wrestling. 

The little guy is glued to the screen when it's on.  He claps.  He says "uh-oh" a lot, and he raises his arm triumphantly when someone he likes wins a match.  Incidentally, he picked up the raising his arm bit from a Steve Austin feature we watched on Netflix, so he celebrates a victory in Texas Rattlesnake fashion.  He doesn't understand why we can't fast-forward through the commercials (we like our DVR a lot) and he gets very frustrated, repeatedly grabbing the remote control and crying out for Jericho during each and every commercial break.  Ah, the cries for Jericho.  That might be the strangest part.

As a child, I started off with Hogan and Macho, and then in the late 80s and early 90s, I was all about Ric Flair.  Chris Jericho hit my radar in a big way when he went heel in WCW, and when he become a WWE superstar, he quickly became my favorite.  Has been ever since.  Yet I wasn't about to force Jericho on my kids (yes, even my girls, Alaina and Taryn, ages 7 and 5, are wrestling fans) and I thought it would be a little strange for my little fella to be rooting for a heel anyway--which Jericho was working as when my main man Ash started taking interest.  So, my wife and I got him a big stuffed Cena and basically pushed Cena and Sheamus on him.  I guess he could tell who the old man was pulling for, however, and he followed suit.

Asher frequently wakes us with his "Jericho" nonsense, and he will gladly club either of us in the face with a remote control while saying it just to make sure we get the hint.  He could watch Jericho 24/7, and I've lost count of how many times he has watched the Jericho set the WWE put out a few years ago.  Trust me, we're both eager for the next one.

Now, he's also saying Cena, Ryback, and Big Show these days, so he is branching out, but he remains the world's smallest Jerichoholic.  It's a little strange perhaps, and he's much better at picking up moves than adhering to the "don't do this for your own safety" warnings the WWE frequently dishes out, but it's also pretty adorable.  And the kids has taste.  Jericho's surprise return at the Royal Rumble took us all by surprise, and I don't know if I have ever seen the little guy so transfixed.  Not only that, but Jericho is doing some of his best work ever, and while most of his finest stretches came as a heel, he's killing it as a face these days. 

Who knows?  Maybe it's time to buy the little guy a stuffed Y2J . . .

Bonus:  In a strange coincidence, Chris Jericho has a son named Ash, which is what my wife and I call Asher.  Now, we didn't name our son after his son, but I think Chris and I are both fans of the Evil Dead franchise.  My wife isn't, and she didn't realize why I was so quick to agree when she suggested Asher as a name and noted we could call him "Ash" for short. 

WWE 13 Part II

So, let it be known: everything I said about WWE 13 last week when I was just getting started is completely true.  I'm tempted to say that I feel the same way about this title as Chris Jericho feels about the championship belt.
Truth: this game is even better than I initially thought it was.  I can't stop playing it, and my children are having a blast with it too.  It's not just that they want to play either.  When I'm doing the Attitude Era tasks and trying to unlock various characters, belts, venues, and matches, they might as well be watching a live show.
Taryn is 4, and she keeps coming up to me and saying "Daddy, why don't you play the wrestling game?"  Alaina is 6 and she can't wait to play another Royal Rumble.  She thinks it's the greatest thing ever.  I shouldn't be too surprised; the Royal Rumble has always been my favorite event to watch, and it has also always been my favorite event to play on a video game.  The Elimination Chamber earns a close second on both of those counts.  Ash isn't even 2 yet and he's getting in on the fun as well.  We are having a great time with WWE 13.
I don't mean to gush, but this game is utterly fantastic.  Reliving some of my favorite storylines from the last twenty years is incredible.  You get vintage video packages to build up the event, you're given a list of achievements (it is necessary to complete these to unlock content) which basically rewards you for playing out the match as it was scripted, and many of these segments come complete with highlight reels from the actual match.  Now, that's cool enough, but THQ has gone even further in their pursuit of a stellar wrestling game.  When you pick up your controller and jump into these matches, segments of the actual commentary play.  This includes spots from guest commentators like Stone Cold Steve Austin or The Rock.  It's super cool, and it makes you wonder when this same approach will be applied to some of the sports titles on the market. 
I wasn't a big fan of the last WWE game, and I know that many of you weren't either.  All I can say is this: believe the hype.  If you were waiting for the verdict on WWE 13 before you snagged a copy, don't wait any longer.  All of the good things you're hearing are true.  I could also go on and on about the gameplay and the graphics, which are superb, but the thought and the ingenuity that went into the presentation are what make WWE 13 a title worth raving about.  Get in the ring! 

Alaina Rachel trying to eliminate her opponent in the Royal Rumble

Tiny Gamer, Splendid Wife

So, my beloved wife hooked me up with WWE 13 tonight, and it's looking they've finally gotten it right again.  In my opinion, the last truly epic wrestling game was Wrestlemania 2000, but I'm a Jerichoholic, so take that for what it's worth.  That's not my point anyway.  My point is WWE 13 seems like a real winner.
I love the so-called "Attitude Era" of professional wrestling, and the way THQ has married archive footage and audio to gameplay scenarios is a great idea.  It's a nostalgic treat for old fans like myself, and it'll be like a history lesson for the younger fans.
I'm just getting started, but the graphics are sharp, the presentation is crisp, and the gameplay is stellar.  I think this is going to be a late night and I think it's safe to call WWE 13 a hit.
But you don't have to take my word for it.  Check out my main man, Ash. 

 

He thinks it's a terrific game.  He made some tiny little man sounds to that effect
.
Also, I should note that this spectacular wife of mine, who did indeed score WWE 13 for me tonight, also scored me Van Halen tickets for our anniversary.

And, I should also point out that this same woman also got me tickets to see the Seattle defense beat up the Panthers.

She's a marvel and a blessing, and I'm so very thrilled to call her mine.  She's going to have a hard time topping 2012, that's for sure.
I think she's going to need FNM to pitch in and do a legitimate U.S. tour to pull it off.