My Year As a Wrestling Fan

According to my TimeHop today was the first day I watched WWE. This technically isn't a true statement. As a kid in the early 90's I loved wrestling and would watch every Saturday morning. I absolutely adored Doink the Clown and Jake the Snake and Bret Hart and of course Hulk Hogan. Hulkamania ran so deeply in my veins that two decades later I can still find reasons to quote Suburban Commando in any given social situation.

I Was Frozen Today!

One of my prized possessions to this day is a VHS taped copy of Wrestlemania X that my grandfather taped off Pay-Per-View for me. For years (specifically after his death) the tape was a symbol of how much my grandfather loved me. Now it's also a plus to know that my grandfather taped for me arguably the best WWF pay-per-views ever. 

I don't remember what made me stop watching wrestling. Maybe it was that feeling of betrayal when I found out that it "wasn't real" but I missed out on a lot (like every second of the Attitude Era).  So what brought me back in? Two things.

First was booking bands. Turns out there's a shocking amount of people in bands that love Wrestling. I'd constantly hear members of bands I was friends with talking about the latest PPV or episode of Raw. Wanting to (a) understand why these people were so into it and (b) wanting to be able to join were both big factors.

The other factor was having a hulu account. I always already paying for hulu and rarely using it (specifically since almost every show I enjoyed in 2013 got cancelled or had its final season), so I figured I might as well get my moneys worth.

I remember watching that first episode of Raw and feeling bored. It started with easily a 10 minute speech from John Cena and I spent the whole time thinking "How do people like this guy so much?" However just as I was about to turn it off... this happen.

The Wyatt's captivated me immediately. The Shield was soon to follow. Soon I was talking to people about wrestling, I was convincing friends to watch it with me, I was pirating Survivor Series and sneaking off into the basement during Thanksgiving to watch it. I very quickly became hooked.

The first night in my new house I got my roommate to watch a shitty live stream of Elimination Chamber with me. The Wyatts/Shield match was so unique that he even became a bit of a fan. The next day the WWE Network was launched and the first thing I did when I awoke was drop my $9.99 and begin watching. For a good 4-5 days it was the only thing I'd watch. Old Raw from 1993, Countdowns, Behind the Ring Stories, I constantly was consuming history of the sport.

There were Pay-Per-View parties every month and in the summer I attended my first live event (a house show). In a quick year wrestling went from something I never thought about to something that I planned my week around and would talk about constantly on my podcast.

So what did I learn in this year (beyond the fact that I am a wrestling fan)? I learned that Wrestling provides great excuses to socialize with others. People come over frequently just to watch a Pay-Per-View or a Countdown episode. More of the people who come over are  non-fans or casual fans but the excitement of hanging out and cracking jokes is too enjoyable to ignore.

The other thing I learned is that as far as Wrestling fans go, they're never happy. If something happens that's predictable they they complain that it's too predictable. If something happens that's unexpected they complain that the writers are idiots and don't know what they're doing.

Maybe I have the advantage of seeing things through the eyes of a writer but I typically find myself enjoying every moment of most Pay-Per-Views and Raws (Smackdown is mostly a glorified recap show so I don't always have a blast with that).

Alright maybe not EVERY moment

I don't get bugged by a guy I like losing, because at least he's getting air-time. I don't consider every lose a clear sign of someone being "punished" (someone has to lose the match after all, and again at least they're still on camera doing something) and I honestly don't mind John Cena. Sure he's a little dull and over used... but I was a 90's Hulkamaniac so, I get it. 

All I can ask is for a good display of athleticism (which I usually get from a good Ziggler/Cesaro match), something to make me laugh (basically any second Mizdow was on screen), something mind-blowingly spectacular (The Shield vs. Evolution) or something completely unexpected (Undertaker's WrestlemaniaXXX match). 

I can immediate that not every idea ends up being a winner, but in general I'm just there to have a good time. I'm excited for many more good times over many years (as well as keeping warm in my new Dean Ambrose hoodie).

Matt Kelly is the host of the popular podcast The Saint Mort Show, a frequent contributor to Geekscape.net, the founder of Chords for Cures and the co-writer/co-director of the upcoming comedy Describing the Moon. He also loves it when people surprise him with purchases from his Amazon Wishlist… just saying.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 31: Night of the Living Dead (1990)

For the last few years I always do a 31 days of Halloween month. The past few years I re-read all the original Goosebumps books and before that I'd watch 31 horror movies. However I realized every single time I watched 31 Horror movies I exclusively picked ones I enjoyed. I decided to do something slightly different. I composed a list of every horror movie I owned and put them in alphabetical order. Then using a random number generator I generated 31 numbers and watched the movies that corresponded with those numbers. Some are great films and others… well… are less than fun let's say. I hope you enjoy!

Day 31: Night of The Living Dead (1990) (Movie #340)

I always loved this remake. It does the things I want to see in a remake. It sticks to the original as closely as possible but still does it's own unique twists on things. The plot is simple enough. The dead raise from their graves and a group of strangers find themselves hiding out in a house together trying to figure out what's going on and how to survive.

The script follows the original pretty closely until about halfway when they make one major change that (a) improves the film and (b) makes this it's own unique version of the story. Barbara toughens up. In the previous movie Barbara (at best) was a screaming prop, in this movie she raises up to the insanity and becomes a leader.

This lone element not only changes the tone of the film but also the ending (for better or worse) to the original. The biggest issue with this remake is that is loses some of the racial commentary in the previous film. HOWEVER I also question how intentional that was originally or if people saw it and Romero just went along with it.

All in all this was a fun and quick little film to end this years 31 Days of Halloween. I lucked out. 

Matt Kelly is the host of the popular podcast The Saint Mort Show, a frequent contributor to Geekscape.net, the founder of Chords for Cures and the co-writer/co-director of the upcoming comedy Describing the Moon. He also loves it when people surprise him with purchases from his Amazon Wishlist… just saying.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 30: Xtro

For the last few years I always do a 31 days of Halloween month. The past few years I re-read all the original Goosebumps books and before that I'd watch 31 horror movies. However I realized every single time I watched 31 Horror movies I exclusively picked ones I enjoyed. I decided to do something slightly different. I composed a list of every horror movie I owned and put them in alphabetical order. Then using a random number generator I generated 31 numbers and watched the movies that corresponded with those numbers. Some are great films and others… well… are less than fun let's say. I hope you enjoy!

Day 30: Xtro (Movie #509)

Xtro was one of those films I always read about on Horror Sites but could never find. My local video stores all seemed to have only purchased the sequels for some reason. It wasn't until about two years ago when I bought the double disc DVD of Xtro 1 and 2 that I finally saw the movie.

Going into rewatching this the only thing I remembered about the movie was the infamous birthing scene. Alien has it's chest-burster which terrified me as a kid (when I saw it parodied in Spaceballs) but it holds nothing to watching a woman give birth to a full grown man. It's so gross and disturbing that you simply have to applaud the film as whole for that moment alone. That being said, there's a lot to applaud with this movie.

There's no downtime in this movie. Not a single second of it's running time is wasted. It starts off with the alien abduction of a boy's father, we jump to three years later instantly with the boy having nightmares and bleeding all over his bed (but not his blood) and by ten minutes we're introduced to an awesome practical effect alien and the insane birthing sequence I mentioned earlier. 

I'll stop beating around the bush. This movie was fucking awesome. I don't know how I forgot how awesome it was. In fact as soon as I finish writing this I'm going to rewatch parts 2 and 3 and see how they hold up.  

So closing notes. Watch this. It's probably my favorite film I watched this month. 

Matt Kelly is the host of the popular podcast The Saint Mort Show, a frequent contributor to Geekscape.net, the founder of Chords for Cures and the co-writer/co-director of the upcoming comedy Describing the Moon. He also loves it when people surprise him with purchases from his Amazon Wishlist… just saying.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 29: Nightmare on Elm Street Part 4 - The Dream Master

For the last few years I always do a 31 days of Halloween month. The past few years I re-read all the original Goosebumps books and before that I'd watch 31 horror movies. However I realized every single time I watched 31 Horror movies I exclusively picked ones I enjoyed. I decided to do something slightly different. I composed a list of every horror movie I owned and put them in alphabetical order. Then using a random number generator I generated 31 numbers and watched the movies that corresponded with those numbers. Some are great films and others… well… are less than fun let's say. I hope you enjoy!

Day 29: A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 4 - The Dream Master (Movie #346)

The Dream Master starts off with a lot going against it. It's not easy following The Dream Warriors (arguably the best horror sequel of all time). This film also gets a ton of flake for being the film that turned Freddy into a straight up stand-up comedian. Watching the 4 hour documentary Never Sleep Again there's a lot of behind-the-scenes stories that explain a lot about why this movie feels the way it does. Specifically the amount of times Robert England and Director Renny Harlin refer to this as the MTV Generation Freddy.

That being said, looking past that issue (and a handful of other flaws) this movie isn't that bad. I certainly prefer it over the next entry The Dream Child. The biggest reason I always like this movie is the cockroach kill which I think is the best death in this franchise (and possibly horror in general). It's so gross, disturbing and taps into my hate of bugs that it will always strike a chord with me.

The other plus is Renny's directorial choices. The scene in which Kristen is falling asleep due to sleeping pills her mom cooked into her diner has some incredible camera movements and the cockroach kill I mentioned earlier has a surreal moment where Freddy throws a barbell at the audience causing a mirror to shatter.

There's also some bad ideas. Like the invisible karate sequence. It's probably best we forget that ever happened in a movie.

Matt Kelly is the host of the popular podcast The Saint Mort Show, a frequent contributor to Geekscape.net, the founder of Chords for Cures and the co-writer/co-director of the upcoming comedy Describing the Moon. He also loves it when people surprise him with purchases from his Amazon Wishlist… just saying.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 28: The Beast

For the last few years I always do a 31 days of Halloween month. The past few years I re-read all the original Goosebumps books and before that I'd watch 31 horror movies. However I realized every single time I watched 31 Horror movies I exclusively picked ones I enjoyed. I decided to do something slightly different. I composed a list of every horror movie I owned and put them in alphabetical order. Then using a random number generator I generated 31 numbers and watched the movies that corresponded with those numbers. Some are great films and others… well… are less than fun let's say. I hope you enjoy!

Day 28: The Beast (Movie #35)

I love and miss the days of the TV Movie/Mini-Series. It always seemed like one of the best places for horror novel adaptations. The 90's had a ton of classic mini-series' Stephen King's IT!, The 10th Kingdom and this THE BEAST based on the novel by Peter Benchley.

I love this mini-series. Even though it hasn't aged well, that almost makes me love it more. I love films that take place at sea, they are the few horror films that terrify me. Peter Benchley is amazing at creating tales of that claustrophobic feeling of being trapped at sea with a beast underneath you.

Now if you've seen the superior film Jaws than you've already seen The Beast. It's the exact same story just with a squid in place of the shark. Jaws is a superior film but I think The Beast is a superior book (Jaws might be one of the worst books I've ever read. Please let me hate mail in the comments). A small town is terrorized by a giant squid, it's up to a group of local fishermen to kill it. 

While the special effects aren't that great, they're actually pretty impressive for a TV-Movie. In general the squid looks cool throughout and really that's all I ask for. 

Matt Kelly is the host of the popular podcast The Saint Mort Show, a frequent contributor to Geekscape.net, the founder of Chords for Cures and the co-writer/co-director of the upcoming comedy Describing the Moon. He also loves it when people surprise him with purchases from his Amazon Wishlist… just saying.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 27: Species

For the last few years I always do a 31 days of Halloween month. The past few years I re-read all the original Goosebumps books and before that I'd watch 31 horror movies. However I realized every single time I watched 31 Horror movies I exclusively picked ones I enjoyed. I decided to do something slightly different. I composed a list of every horror movie I owned and put them in alphabetical order. Then using a random number generator I generated 31 numbers and watched the movies that corresponded with those numbers. Some are great films and others… well… are less than fun let's say. I hope you enjoy!

Day 27: Species (Movie #441)

I remember watching this movie during a birthday sleepover in like 5th or 6th grade. There was one reason we wanted to watch it. Boobs. What can I say, I was a cliche'd prepubescent kid. However luckily for me the movie was pretty good!

It's been quite a few years since I've seen this movie. I just recently purchased it when a store was having a going out of business sale. The only things I remembered from watching it as a child was the nudity, the "kiss of death" scene and the very last shot. Watching it now I was most shocked by how well known the cast is. Also while she hasn't been in a big film in a while Natasha Henstridge is still absolutely gorgeous.

The story follows a group of scientists who must track and kill an alien/human hybrid created by a Government organization. Her primary goal is to mate and reproduce as quickly as possible. She will kill anything that gets in her way (ripping the spine out of a rival woman for example). 

What really shocked me was how hard it was to watch the beginning of the film where a young Michelle Williams is transformed into a cocoon. She has no control over what's happening to her and begins crying and clawing at her face and hands where tentacles begin to stem out of her. It reminds you that she didn't choose this, she was created. It's rare that you actually have a moment where you feel genuine sympathy for the "villain" in a horror movie.

I recently rewatched Splice from a few years ago and if you're looking for a double feature, this and Splice are perfect.

Matt Kelly is the host of the popular podcast The Saint Mort Show, a frequent contributor to Geekscape.net, the founder of Chords for Cures and the co-writer/co-director of the upcoming comedy Describing the Moon. He also loves it when people surprise him with purchases from his Amazon Wishlist… just saying.

31 Days of Halloween - Day 26: Dead Alive

For the last few years I always do a 31 days of Halloween month. The past few years I re-read all the original Goosebumps books and before that I'd watch 31 horror movies. However I realized every single time I watched 31 Horror movies I exclusively picked ones I enjoyed. I decided to do something slightly different. I composed a list of every horror movie I owned and put them in alphabetical order. Then using a random number generator I generated 31 numbers and watched the movies that corresponded with those numbers. Some are great films and others… well… are less than fun let's say. I hope you enjoy!

Day 26: Dead Alive (Movie #110)

There are some movies that you will never forget the first time you saw it. At the time I had a friend named Adam that we would rent and watch horror movies together every weekend. I had read multiple times about Dead Alive on websites like Video Graveyard and BadMovies.org, the back cover provided lots of prepubescent nightmare fuel for me years earlier and the advertisement bragging "the goriest movie ever made" all forced me to HAVE to watch this movie.

This is a movie that you don't see, you experience it. While I enjoy watching this film by myself it's definitely a film that works ever better with a big group. As far as plot goes there's nothing super new. It's a zombie movie and follows most of the rules of zombie movies. It's the sense of humor, the level of gore and the general insanity and fast pace that makes this film stand out amongst the rest.

After watching this movie I don't think I was affected by gore ever again. I was completely desensitized to it until recently when films like Hostel and Human Centipede upped the levels of gore and tried to make everything more realistic. For me I'll always prefer the over the top cartoon violence of this infamous film. 

Matt Kelly is the host of the popular podcast The Saint Mort Show, a frequent contributor to Geekscape.net, the founder of Chords for Cures and the co-writer/co-director of the upcoming comedy Describing the Moon. He also loves it when people surprise him with purchases from his Amazon Wishlist… just saying.