As you all know, Randy Savage passed away last Friday. I really have a hard time articulating how I feel about the whole thing. As I’m sure you all were, I was shocked and devastated by the news, but what makes the news even worse is that it seemed as if he was really mending some burned bridges. Savage and Hogan got back to being on speaking terms after a decade of not talking, Savage was featured on WWE All Stars, and if he’s on good enough terms to advertise All Stars, why would a possible onscreen return have been out of the question?
As a teenager, I didn’t grow up watching Randy Savage. In fact, most of my friends only know him as “the Slim Jim guy” or don’t know him at all. But as someone who’s really passionate about the whole industry, it hurts to lose any member of it, especially one as integral and legendary as Randy Savage. It’s odd to think of Savage as an inspirational guy, but he really is to me. While Savage’s physique was nothing to scoff at, it was his charisma and wit that really got him over. As someone who dreams of entering the business someday, Savage embodied charisma and entertainment in a way no other wrestler did. I’ve been watching old interviews and segments from his career all weekend, and he was just an admirable, entertaining guy. I’ll miss him, and so will the wrestling world.
Tough Enough: I’ve Been Bamboozled and Flabbergasted
Intro
We get a recap of the terrible, terrible events of last week. Martin got sent home due to injury, and Christina’s future was uncertain due to another injury. This week starts with Trish meeting Christina outside to hear what the doctors said about her ankle. Luckily, it was just a sprain. AJ feels bad, so he says sorry for about a minute straight. AJ hasn’t shown much character, but showing a little bit of compassion may be better than showing a lot of selfishness, a la Luke.
Daily Training
This week is focusing on charisma. Eerily fitting, given Macho Man’s death. Luke and AJ start out the drills in the ring, and they look so similarly bland that it looks like clones are fighting. Adding to the illusion, they both botch and go for a drop toe hold at the same time. We get an early line of the night out of Bill after the botch: “You think I’m gonna continue to come in here and let you piss in my Cheerios?” If anyone can decipher that, please let me know in the comments section, because I have no idea what that means. Jeremiah’s rushing, which would be terrifying for the other guy. The last thing he needs to be doing while he’s still green is being reckless. When Luke and Andy do the drills in the ring together, Luke looks good as usual, but Andy really stepped up his game as well. In a business where agile big guys are hard to find, Andy could really stand out.
Life Lesson: Charisma
Bill starts with a lecture about how every WWE Superstar has charisma. Heh. James Roday from Psych is here to help with the lesson. Each contestant will be conducting his or her own guided tour of the Hollywood Walk of Fame. If you think this is going to be soul-crushingly awkward, don’t worry; it was. Austin was right about not being able to teach charisma. There’s nothing worse than a forced comedian like Luke (except maybe a non-comedian like AJ). You have to cut these guys some slack since they had to be entertaining while not knowing anything about the subject matter, but someone with enough charisma should be able to make the best of it. Luckily, Jeremiah did just that. Ever since the Tough Enough contestants showed up on Raw before this season, nearly everyone got booed but Jeremiah, who, with not much more than a simple “What’s up Atlanta, Georgia?” got a pretty good pop. Jeremiah didn’t follow the script too closely and made a bunch of quick-witted remarks instead, which goes a long way.
The Rock Stops By
The Rock immediately gets into the ring to see what the contestants are made of. Andy keeps up, which I’m still impressed with. Everyone looks okay, if not a little awkward, but Christina doesn’t get the chance to square off against The Rock due to injury, and she’s obviously disappointed. This was a nice change from the usual superstar stopping by, saying nothing new, just “Don’t give up. Try your best.” and all that. Not that the other didn’t have good advice, but having The Rock actually do something physical with the contestants was a welcome change.
Skills Challenge
The Rock’s staying around to watch as the contestants have a promo battle against Bill DeMott. Jeremiah sounds just as good as some of the current superstars (and better than some, but that isn’t saying much). Luke sounded a lot like a superstar as well. Some of came off as silly, but that’s mostly because they’re in an empty arena, and the passionate parts were met with silence instead of cheers. Christina’s seemed a bit phoned in, as if she worked on those exact lines beforehand, but at the same time, how often does a diva really use a mic to build a match? Christina has a great smile, and that’s all a diva really needs these days, sadly. This has been a week full of surprises from Andy, as he cuts a solid promo as well. He uses the “silent rage” phrase that he’s used before in his WWE All Stars character, which is a lot less silly if you think about “controlled frenzy” and other phrases used in the WWE right now. AJ talks well, but he seemed to be cutting a promo on the wrong thing. He also says “crapping in my oatmeal” at one point, which is never a good thing to say. It ended up being pretty impressive, though. The contests find out who won via The Rock, who will be cutting a promo on the contestants. Oh boy. It turns out AJ won, and he did do very well, to his credit.
Judging/Elimination
AJ is not safe, according to the trainers. Although he performed well in the skills challenge, he was directly responsible for Christina’s injury (which I’m still iffy about, but then again, I’ve never been inside a ring), and he hasn’t been consistently performing well. They just tear apart Christina, from the skills challenge to the life lesson, both of which were pretty bad. There seem to be no problems with Luke, who has the most potential according to the trainers. I’ll agree with them there; it’s mostly the backstage aspect that I think he’d have the most problems in. Jeremiah gets praised for his verbal work but chastised for his in-ring work. Andy just didn’t bring any charisma this week.
The bottom three this week are Christina, AJ, and Andy. Luke and Jeremiah, bros since the beginning, celebrate while Andy’s madder than he’s ever been (which is exactly what he needs). Immediately Austin tears into Andy for slacking, but Andy defends himself. I believe that Andy’s been working his hardest, or close to it at least, but Austin does this hilarious impression of Andy. I can’t do it justice with text, but you need to go watch it. Christina had a break with this week’s focus being on charisma, and she didn’t do anything worth mentioning. Austin doesn’t think Christina wants this bad enough. He tears into them a bit more before dropping a bombshell: Two people are going home right now. He asks Christina if she has any passion in her heart and she nods softly. What? And just like that, her belt’s gone. Austin asks Andy if he’s shown his best, and Andy says no. This turns into a shouting match with Andy ending up looking really intimidating, yelling as loud as he can. Austin says that he’d better show something next week and takes AJ’s belt. Christina hugs Andy as she and AJ leave the ring, and Andy’s crying and seething at the same time. The show ends with Austin hanging up the two belts. Only three people remain.
Conclusion
This show has improved by leaps and bounds ever since the fat was cut, so to speak. We’ve gotten to know these last 5 people a lot more than most of the original 14. Normally when I write these, I’ll pull the show up on YouTube and watch it bit by bit, putting in a few sentences at a time between clips, but during the elimination, I accidentally let about 5 minutes go by without stopping the video. I don’t know if it’s just me, but this is turning into really gripping television. After today, I don’t know who I like more: Andy or Jeremiah. Before that elimination, it seemed as if Andy was clearly the underdog, but he finally showed some emotion, to an almost scary extent. If Andy stays intense and Jeremiah refines his in-ring work, it really is a complete toss-up. If I had to guess a winner, I would rank the likelihood of winning:
1. Luke
2. Andy
3. Jeremiah
I say that just because Luke has been impressive from the start, all attitude problems aside. Everyone knows the whole “WWE loves big guys” cliche that may work in Andy’s favor. That coupled with his newfound intensity and proficient in-ring work could definitely push him to victory. I’ve liked Jeremiah for most of this competition, but his sloppiness will probably come back to bite him. There are enough injuries in wrestling, we don’t need any other way for them to happen. In reality though, all three of these men will probably be in the WWE at some point down the road.
That’s it for this week. When I started writing these, I wanted to end every week with a video or something interesting, and I’ve been slacking for one reason or another the last few weeks, so I put together a little something this week. It’s not much, but I wanted to do something to honor Randy Savage, so I learned his theme, Pomp and Circumstance, on ukulele.
Be sure to leave any predictions, questions, or feedback in the comments section below. Thanks for reading.
0 comments:
Post a Comment