Jericho returns to the WWE

2007 as felt a bad year to be a wrestling fan, with the Chris Benoit incident and a number of other deaths aswell as the constant negative media scrutiny...but on last night's Raw there was something to smile about, the return to the WWE ring of one of my favourite wrestlers...CHRIS JERICHO, over two years since he last appeared in a WWE ring (or any ring for that matter), sporting a new do and a glittery top, Jericho verbally bitchslapped WWE Champion Randy Orton and is return was not one bit disappointing, I hope he sticks around for a long time because he is truly among the most charismatic and talented wrestlers to step foot in the ring. Y2J is here to Save_Us.

Did You Crack the Code? (cryptic clues had been running for a few months with many wrestling fans hoping it would be the return of Jericho- with rather obvious clues last week and the new WWE magazine been sent out last week, the reveal of Jericho wasn't so much of a surprise)

Where the hell am I supposed to find silver bullets? K-Mart?

I seriously have a goldfish memory. I'll just get to what I've watched the last few days and do an life update when I get back in.

Recently purchased two great WWE DVDs- The Ultimate Hulk Hogan Anthology and Rowdy Roddy Piper: Born to Controversy. Both are excellent, Piper's probably in the top five greatest performers on the microphone and the three disc set as an excellent documentary on the first disc covering his career (including an interview with They Live director John Carpenter), a couple of matches also appear on the first disc, the second disc is Piper matches including his awful boxing match from Wrestlemania II against Mr. T, who Piper hated in reality and the third disc is chock full of awesome Piper's Pit segments. Highly recommended. Hogan's 4 disc DVD doesn't have a documentary per say, he and others comment in between matches. One of my favourites of the set is actually the first match, from 1980 with Hogan playing the heel against Andre the Giant, 7 years before their famous encounter, interesting because in 87 they built up would Hogan be able to slam Andre, and he does it here. I should also mention the Wrestlemania VI encounter against The Ultimate Warrior, the match is excellent and that is suprising considering the participants, Warrior couldn't wrestle a lick and Hogan was never a master of technical wrestling, 4 discs of goodies including AWA and WCW matches, comes highly recommended.

With all the talk of a Goonies sequel (animated it sounds) that a lot of people are cramming for and are likely going to hate it when it comes out. But to me (and others) in a lot of way's their is still a spirtiual sequel, almost as wonderful - The Monster Squad - (1987)

Now obviously the Monster Squad is not a sequel to Goonies at all, but it's got that wonderful charm about it that the Goonies also has. Both have likeable young leads, token fat kids, here in Monster Squad actually nicknamed Fat Kid, and the Monster Squad as it's very own Sloth in Frankenstein's Monster (The criminally underrated Tom Noonan), what's wonderful about this movie is things like the dialogue -seriously, the dialogue seems so natural, like real kids would talk- This was also Shane Black's first writing gig- he went out to write Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (which he also directed), so this man is completely cool in my book! On a note, this hasn't come out in the U.K as of yet (or been announced) and I was lucky enough to pick it up the 20th Anniversary set at a used DVD shop very cheap. Good find. D.O.A.: Dead or Alive (2006) is a great movie, seriously. I'm judging the term great movie but how much fun I had watching it. Based on a computer game I've never played it's like the Charlie's Angels movies dumber cousin with a quartet of lovely ladies: Jaime Pressly, Neighbour's Holly Valance, Sarah Carter and Devon Aoki invited to a fighting tournament called the D.O.A.: Dead or Alive by the hammy Eric Roberts where there is a $10m prize well not Sarah Carter as she plays the daughter of the deceased creator of the tournament. The film seems to spend a lot of time on the girls wearing almost nothing. Wrestler Kevin Nash is great as Pressly's wrestling dad. Recommended.

I can't quite bring myself to call Black Snake Moan (2006), a romantic comedy, them words appear on the same line in the IMDB genre line, It's a bit hard to categorise, Christina Ricci is the town bicycle, who gets herself drugged up when her boy Justin Timberlake (who's a good actor) joins the service, getting drugged up she ends up beaten up, scantily clad on the side of the road, in the morning she's found by Samuel L. Jackson -here acting for a change- finds her on the side of the road, takes care of her, hears of her reputation, then ties her to a radiator with a big chain, A BIG CHAIN. If it is a romantic comedy it's certainly an unconventional one, both the leads are excellent, Christina Ricci spends the film mostly in little clothes and sometimes no clothes. Don't want to give too much away, but it's good film.

Back later...

WWE Raw in Sheffield

I'd be meaning to get online and do a post all week since coming from the WWE Raw house show in Sheffield last Thursday. It was a fantastic day went with Andy and Paul and his son George, all of us massive, massive wrestling geeks...cough...erm I'm mean fans.

We got to Sheffield about half 12 in the afternoon and went to get hand bands to go the signing of superstars Jeff Hardy and Candice Michelle, we decided to join the back of the line (which was small at this point) and do it in shifts so none of us got to bored from waiting in the line. The signing was arranged for 3 but didn't begin until half 3ish, both where very friendly especially Candice who was a delight. I got a Great American Bash 2007 and Summerslam 2000 (signed only by Jeff- thanks to Andy for taking this up because we was only allowed one item per person) DVDs to add to my signed DVDs collection.

We all made our way to the arena, stopping at the kiosk where George spents loads on wrestling memorabilia, I'm a cheapo who didn't buy anything, we went to KFC for tea before arriving at the venue earlish where there was only something of a small line, we got among the first people and practically walked in one they started letting people in.

The matches where as follows:

Tony Chimmel was ring announcer, last time I was there it was Lillian Garcia, don't mind Chimmel. Would love if it was the Fink.

CODY RHODES vs CARLITO was two second generation or is it third generation I forget, got a good reception because it was the first match, Carlito bad mouthed English apples which made us all mad for some reason (Boooooooooooooooo, how dare you bad mouth our apples). A solid match if a little slow for an opener.

SUPER CRAZY vs SNITZKY, Crazy came out to a good reception considering he's jobbed out for ages, Snitzky got almost zero reponse, love Crazy wanted him to win, knew he wouldn't. Snitzky won in an almost squash, continued to beat him down, which brought out Hacksaw Jim Duggan for some reason for a farily big reception, Snitzky ended up beating him down after a while as well.

TOMMY DREAMER vs ELIJAH BURKE, I'm a big Dreamer fan and Burke's got the potential. Pretty good match ended with a nice DDT from Dreamer. Crowd where not massively into this. Too many kids I think.

THE MIZ vs BALLS MAHONEY. The Extreme Expose came down with Miz and sat at ringside. Not massive on either of these guys. I think The Miz won. Kelly Kelly cheered for Balls during the match I remember.

WILLIAM REGAL AND HARRY SMITH vs CADE AND MURDOCH: Strong match good reception for Regal and a top reception for Smith when Regal said he was the British Bulldog's son. Crowd including me where very behind Regal, they got the win by disqualifcation. Best match so far.

There was a short interval.

CANDICE MICHELLE vs BETH PHOENIX. Candice Michelle is the new Trish Stratus, there I said it, she like Stratus started as a diva with little to no wrestling talent and kept about because of there looks but both worked hard to learn the ropes and Michelle as come a long way since her debut. Beth Phoenix, whose an impressive wrestler won. On a note, last monday, Candice Michelle was injured quite badly on a live Raw back in the U.S. she'll be out for two months, get well soon Candice.

SANTINO MARELLA vs HARDCORE HOLLY. Santino is truly gold on the microphone, he was very funny and issued an open challenge to the back, out came Hardcore Holly to a good reception, went to get some beers cause I'm not a fan of either of these wrestling. Holly won in the end with an impressively brutal Alabama Slam.

MR. KENNEDY vs VAL VENIS. Kennedy got a good reception coming out, he is gold on the microphone and the crowd where eating out of his hands during his intro, Venis got a fairly good reception. Crowd seemed more behind Kennedy (who won).

JEFF HARDY AND TRIPLE H vs UMAGA AND RANDY ORTON. Orton and Umaga got sutiable heel heat, Jeff Hardy got a really strong ovation but Triple H's enterance blew the roof off of the building. Crowd where really into the match and there was some decent manoevers. Triple H ended the match with the Pedigree to send the fans home happy.

Overall, an enjoyable show to be at, had good company, lacking in star power compared to the last WWE show I attended alongside Triple H and Orton last time where Chris Jericho, Ric Flair, Edge, Batista, Shawn Michaels and he who shouldn't be named (aka Chris Benoit) where there. Overall a fantastic day out.

Benoit

I've been a wrestling fan for 18+ years (for some reason I'm using Wrestlemania V as a reference point), I was a kid obviously as I'm 24 now and most people specially here in Hull, England they expect you to grow out of it by now...

I have many happy memories of watching wrestling, in the early 90s enjoying Bret Hart and The Hart Foundation, The Rockers, Ric Flair, Ted Diebse (booed like hell for him) and others.

I was a teenager during the Monday Night Wars period or the WWF Attitude period. It was a great time to be a wrestling fan we had WWF, WCW and ECW (Bravo would show ECW over here in the U.K.) which introduced me to a variety of different wrestlers, many I'd never heard of before and just completely blown away by, among them.

• Chris Jericho
• Eddie Guerrero
• Dean Malenko
• Chris Benoit

Loved um all and others (like Rey, Booker T and RVD), If anything they strengthed my love for wrestling those years (and it actually became cool again during this time period) and where all in WCW (minus RVD) when I was the beginning of my peak of being a wrestling fanatic- 1998. Jericho jumped ship to the WWF in the Summer of 99 with one of the greatest debuts in wrestling history and Guerrero, Malenko and Benoit (along with Perry Saturn) jumped ship in 2000, making me an incredibly happy bunny.

I was going to talk about my memories of some of these guys in the WWF (later WWE): Jericho becoming the first ever Undisputed World Champion, Benoit winning the Royal Rumble, Eddie winning the WWE Championship from Brock Lesnar and Benoit and Eddie at celebrating at Wrestlemania XX after Benoit had just won the Heavyweight Title.

The moment of Benoit and Eddie celebrating became more touching when Eddie Guerrero died in November 2005, I will not go into details here, but the death as a wrestling fan touched me and the image I'd keep in my mind forever...

Or so I thought. Last Monday. After Benoit cancelled his appearence at the Weekends House Shows and Vengeance PPV because of a family emergency, Benoit was found dead along with wife Nancy and his 7 year old son Daniel...Benoit had killed them both then killed himself, I don't want to go into the gory details, there's enough places on the internet that will tell you what probably happened step by step and I don't want to talk about if it was roid rage or too many concussions.

I wanted to talk about Chris Benoit: a wrestler I looked upto, he was arguably the most gifted technical wrestler wrestling today, a wrestler who I cheered for endlessly when I saw live, a wrestler I tuned into see regularly during the Monday Night Wars and beyond, a wrestler I shed a tear when he and Bret Hart fought in memory of Owen, a wrestler I so much wanted to be World Champion because he deserved it, a wrestler I choked up most when he spoke of his friendship with Eddie, that Wrestlemania XX ending, hell his matches against Jericho or Booker T which I loved so much.

But those memories are not gone, there tainted...tainted forever, Chris Benoit, a performer I looked up is a child killer, a murderer, plain and simple. It's knocked me for six honestly, it's hammered home the world is a bad place- stuff like this happens, stuff like this happens from people you'd never think. Benoit used to stand for what is right in wrestling now he stands for what's wrong in the world.

I'm not trying to write anything here that hasn't been said before I just wanted to get written down the events and how they effected me like many wrestling fans, and it's probably the most major wrestling incident ever...

Bret Hart: The Best There Is, The Best There Was, The Best There Ever Will Be It's not hype...this is by far the best DVD the WWE have ever released, better then the brilliant Ultimate Ric Flair Collection, better then the Rise and Fall of ECW, better then Mick Foley's Greatest Hits and Misses, this is the greatest wrestling DVD/release of all time... Hell froze over and Bret "The Hitman" Hart and the WWE reached an agreement and got Bret's full involement (the original title was going to be called Screwed: The Bret Hart Story, as you can see it focused somewhat on the Monteral Screwjob), anyway this three disc set is absolutely perfect- disc one houses the excellent Bret Hart documentary, which like I said thanks to Hart's involvement- you here multiple sides to the story, and the documentary gets very emotional at times, when talking about his father and his brother, Owen (there is also a short extra where Hart talks about wrestlers who passed away), and deals with Stampede Wrestling (we get to see some Stampede footage), The Hart Foundation, Intercontinetel Championship, WWF Championship, the Anti-American Hart, the Screw Job, WCW, Owen's death and the end of the career, nothing is sugar coated over, everything is said how it seemed to go down. the documentary is one word is perfect. The 2nd and 3rd discs house an whole bunch of awesome matches (disc one also has a couple of matches), the stand-out matches are of course Bret vs Owen from Wrestlemania X, Bret v Austin in a submission match from Wrestlemania XIII, Perfect and Hart from Summerslam 91, and the sole WCW match, the Owen Hart Tribute Match vs Chris Benoit, you can't ignore the other matches, because Bret Hart, as his catchphrase and the title of this DVD goes, he was the Best there was. If your a wrestling fan, there is no excuse (NO EXCUSE!!!) why you shouldn't be buying this, even if in his day you was never a huge Bret Hart mark this DVD is still a must own. *****