30 Years of GamBoy: How I Persevered Through the 90s with Nintendo's Brick at my Side!

Over the past couple weeks social media has been buzzing with tributes and testimonials for the legacy of the GameBoy on its 30th anniversary of its Japan launch and fast approaching North American launch in 1989. There was also that pic a couple weeks ago of Chris Evans and Scarlett Johansson playing linked two player Tetris that went viral that sent waves of nostalgia down my spine! Like countless other 90s kids I had a devout affection for the GameBoy’s (and its 1998 Color update) enduring legacy into 2001 when its true successor, the GameBoy Advance launched. So it is time to lay out my history with the little gray brick that could, but before I do I would be remiss if I were not to point you towards someone who has been doing phenomenal work chronicling the GameBoy’s history first. Retronauts host, Jeremy Parish has been painstakingly crafting videos detailing every GameBoy release for America and Japan in chronological order and currently is nearing the end of covering games released through 1990. So if you want to catch up and find out about the early hits and likely a plethora of titles you have never heard of before, then click here to dive in.

Unlike a lot of the excellent retrospectives I have been reading these past couple of weeks, minus a couple exceptions, I did not play that many of the AAA GameBoy titles from Nintendo. I was a sucker for licenses from my favorite sports leagues and watered down ports of the latest console games as you will later read about. It was not until I much later got the Official GameBoy Player’s Guide with my first Nintendo Power subscription a few years after I got a GameBoy that I realized what were the key titles for the system. However even after re-reading that bible of GameBoy knowledge multiple times I was adamant on avoiding the powerhouse first party titles like Super Mario Land, Metroid II, Link’s Awakening and Donkey Kong in favor for eye-blinking double take titles you will discover in a bit. My childhood preference of games went against the grain to say the least. With that out of the way, let us flashback to 1993….

I remember begging my parents for a GameBoy for Christmas in 1993 when I was 10. I cannot specifically remember why, but after ruminating about it I pinpointed it down to the fact in 1993 I still had a NES and my parents understandably did not want to budge on dropping $200 for the 16-bit upgrade. The GameBoy was at its height of its popularity at this time and advertisements for the green and black handheld dominated my Saturday morning cartoon lineup. The GameBoy launched at $90 in 1989 so by 1993 I think it was going for around $70 which seemed like a much more realistic sell to my folks at being my one-and-only ‘Santa’ gift for Christmas.

Also around this time I was going through serious pro-wrestling withdrawal. From about 1988 until early 1993 I was an avid WWF kiddo. Big Bossman and The Rockers were my favorites, and I have fond memories of braving the classrooms of Catholic school with my Big Bossman tennis shoes. However, growing up with three other siblings who detested the squared circle made it a battle for control of the household’s sole television. Eventually, the numbers game caught up and I got so use to being bullied out of getting my weekly then-WWF fix that I went nearly three years from early ’93 until late ’95 not watching my favorites on the airwaves. The only other way at that time for me to get my dose of wrestling at home was in the mostly mediocre-to-horrible wrestling games on NES. I played far too many hours of duds like Wrestlemania and Steel Cage Challenge than any kid should have, and double that for the decent at best grapplers on the system like Pro Wrestling and Tecmo World Wrestling.

Enter 1993 and Royal Rumble for the Super Nintendo and Genesis. I lost track at the number of times I would play that game setup on free play at store kiosks. I was dazzled by Royal Rumble’s superior 16-bit graphics and standout feature, the Royal Rumble match that saw up to six wrestlers in the ring at once trying to throw everyone out and subsequently replaced with a fresh combatant until the game went through its entire 12-man roster. It seemed as close as it was going to get at the time to the insanely awesome Rumble match in one of my all-time favorite arcade games, WWF WrestleFest. Being able to participate in the chaos of the Royal Rumble match with a controller after endless hours of only one-on-one and tag team matches on various NES games was mind-blowing to 10-year old Dale. All the gaming magazines at the time were echoed my sentiments and gushed with glowing reviews which only served to exacerbate my demand.

Again I pleaded for a SNES and a copy of Royal Rumble for Christmas and again I was denied courtesy of its tall asking price. It was then I went with the aforementioned plan b for the GameBoy. Also hitting NES and GameBoy in 1993 was WWF King of the Ring. King of the Ring sported inferior 8-bit graphics and had a smaller roster of wrestlers and no awesome Royal Rumble match to play, but it did have the not-so-great King of the Ring tournament to play which was only a series of one-on-one matches, but most importantly it would be portable and I could play it anywhere and not have to worry about battling for control of the TV with my siblings to play it. Looking back now those were the catalysts to relentlessly ask my parents for the GameBoy.

Growing up with divorced parents meant celebrating most holidays and birthdays twice. I got to celebrate Christmas first with my dad a few days before the actual date of Christmas and was elated to unwrap and discover my very own GameBoy with a copy of its killer-app, Tetris! Over the next couple of days I played an un-healthy amount of Tetris. ‘Gee, if this block-puzzle game I barely heard of before is this awesome, imagine how good the wrestling game would be’ naïve me daydreamed of at the time. However, before I could get to that moment, something unexpected and terrible transpired!

On Christmas Eve I was with my family that night going to church for its annual Christmas Eve dinner gathering. To get through the night of being with my family I brought my new electronic best friend with me and snuck in as much Tetris as I could between bites. After we wrapped up and my family got back into the car to go back home my GameBoy was not as snugly tucked into my pocket as I thought and as I shut the car door my GameBoy slid out of my pocket and collided with the blunt force of me shutting the door onto it. As you can see in the screenshot here, the incident caused about 95% of the screen to get cracked and impossible to see and I balled my eyes out that entire night. Kids, do not bring your GameBoy to church or God will strike down upon you when least expected!

To make matters worse on Christmas morning the next day I opened up a copy of WWF King of the Ring for GameBoy from Santa. I plugged it into my cracked GameBoy and was stunned to see it still worked and played the music and it would display the miniscule amount of graphics that were possible in the tiny corners of the GameBoy screen that were not damaged. I must have begged my parents for days to see if they could get the GameBoy replaced or returned or something. I feel horrible now for how irritating I must have been at that time. To my surprise, my mom came through a week or two later and got me a new GameBoy. Once again I was thrilled and beyond belief of how those past couple weeks played out, but from then on I was extra careful with my GameBoy and to this day I still own both my busted and replacement brick GameBoys.

For a few months all I had was Tetris and King of the Ring. I loved Tetris and even found a classmate to link up and play two player with a few times and it remains in my GameBoy library to this day! However, even with my childhood adoration for wrestling I could tell King of the Ring would be nothing more than a middling wrestling game and nothing compared to its 16-bit brethren (though it did have some rocking wrestler chiptune entrance themes). At this point a few months into 1994 our local videogame shop was a place called Tiger Play, which was essentially a modern day GameStop that bought, sold and traded new and used games. It was the same store where I persistently requested to put Royal Rumble for play in its kiosk to the chagrin of the employees. I have no idea how they tolerated me back then. I decided it was time to part ways with King of the Ring and trade it in for something else.

Not having a 16-bit console at the time I got my MK fix at home with the GB version and did what I could with its stripped down roster and limited gameplay. At least the GB version as pictured above was only version of original at the time where you could play as Goro!

In early 1994 Mortal Kombat fever was running wild with the sequel dominating arcades and the home release being super popular with all my classmates. Mortal Kombat did not come out for NES, but it did for GameBoy and the now much wiser 11-year old Dale thought the GameBoy version would be just as good as the SNES, but only not in color and was thrilled to hear Tiger Play would happily do a straight-up trade of King of the Ring for Mortal Kombat. Right away I could tell something was not right to discover it was missing Johnny Cage from its roster and it ran a significantly slower framerate. I still remember having to ever--so—slowly--like--this input the button sequences for the special moves in order to get them to work. Even worse, facing Shang Tsung on there was super cheap because he would automatically cast a projectile when one input away from pulling off a special move so I had to learn to beat him without special moves which took forever, but I eventually pulled it off. The GameBoy version of MK did have one thing going for it over the rest and that would be it was the only version of MK that let you play as Goro! Goro was unstoppable, but even with that trump card, the handheld MK was pretty lousy, but I forced myself to get some enjoyment out of it before marching back to Tiger Play a few months later and trading MK in for Bo Jackson: Baseball and Football. Turns out ‘Bo Knows…’ how to endorse subpar sports game, but the sports nut in me played that to death for a couple years because Tiger Play closed its doors around this time and it would be a few years until our town got another videogame store.

After that brief flirtation with trading games in I would only receive two games a year for GameBoy from 1994 through 1998 shortly before I got my first job and could afford my own games then. At that period in my life those two games a year meant everything to me. As hinted above, I was still drawn towards games based on my favorite licenses at that point and Bart vs. the Juggernauts was one of my early games I received as a present. The mini-game collection featured a lot of hair-pulling cheap controls, but I forced myself to stick with it and lit up when it became one of the first games I ever finished. A much better game I got as a present that I also finished was Donkey Kong Land. I have no idea how Rare was able to get graphics that seemed somewhat comparable to the SNES Donkey Kong Country, but I remember loving playing it, but being bummed at its lackluster ending of only ‘congratulations’ with no accompanying DK crew victory graphic. At least Bart vs. the Juggernauts had a wicked ending with Bart getting rewarded with his very own ‘Truck-a-Saurus.’

I learned my lesson from Bo Jackson and MK to do my research for better games on the GameBoy….actually no because I kept asking for more fighting and sports games for Christmas and birthdays, but at least getting varying degrees of better ones this time. The original NFL Quarterback Club on GameBoy I had a ton of fun with. It only featured the ‘Quarterback Club’ mini-games, but no actual game of football that was playable in its console versions. That was not a problem though as me and my siblings had a surprising amount of fun alternating back-and-forth with the various QB drill mini-games available and I could not help but crack up that my sister only played as Jim Kelley because of how close it sounded to ‘Jim Carrey’ who was wildly popular in the mid-90s. NFL Quarterback Club ‘96 was only actual football and no mini-games, but that was fine because it featured a far better handheld rendition of football compared to Bo Jackson and even a season mode with password save option! Yes, I still have my passwords saved inside the instruction manual

Ken Griffey Jr. Presents: MLB is an awesome port of the SNES original and blew away the baseball from Bo Jackson. It had a battery-save season mode along with the ability to trade players with no restrictions so I created my team of all-stars and rocked through an entire season throughout many family car rides. Mortal Kombat II is a huge upgrade from the first portable version, and while it also had a scaled back roster it did feature more precise gameplay, more friendly controls to pull off special moves and fatalities and a stable framerate resulting in me not trading this one away and playing it way too much.

That wraps up all the games I got as gifts and by the time I got my first job the GameBoy Color hit the market so I eagerly picked that up. There were a couple classmates over the years I met where we borrowed games to each other. I did not discover many new gems that way as most kids were also picking up the dreck of LJN licensed games and I could one can only tolerate so much out of WWF RAW, Fist of the North Star and Home Alone on GameBoy before getting out of the game borrowing market. I managed not to get swept up in PokeFever as I was just a couple years older than that targeted demographic. I did pick up Pokemon Blue shortly after its release after reading about the hype for it and got a little ways into it before my younger brother noticed me playing it and asked to borrow it around the time it was blowing up with younger kids so I did not mind letting him hold onto it until it for his GameBoy until he remembered to give it back to me about ten years later.

Since the GameBoy Color was only on the market for a few years I will not meander on as long about it. With that said, the GameBoy Color far surpassed the meek GameBoy in every way with the exception of not having a backlit screen. Other than that, it was smaller, fit more comfortably in my pocket, took two less batteries and well….the addition of color! Yes, I picked up a few too many sports and wrestling games on it again that were mediocre at best, but I did have a lot of fun with some enhanced NES re-releases on there with Super Mario Bros. Deluxe, the first three Dragon Warrior games and Micro Machines 1 & 2: Twin Turbo. For original titles my favorites were Mario Golf and Mario Tennis. For people familiar with the recent Golf Story on Switch Mario Golf is a lot like that where it is a sports-RPG hybrid where it has a fairly in-depth narrative at attending a golf/tennis academy to become the best player and being able to take lessons and play mini-games to level-up and prepare for the tournaments. Super Mario Bros. Deluxe had a lot of fun extras and even a two player competitive mode to see who can finish a stage first that I absolutely ate up.

A couple years ago some unearthly thing got me craving the basic, watered down platformers that dominated GameBoy and I hunted down the five Turok games released for GameBoy platforms and I played through the entirety of the first one on the original GameBoy and had a somewhat decent time with it. I did not play it on the actual GameBoy, mind you but instead on my TV courtesy of the Retron 5. I should mention I am a proud owner of the Super GameBoy, GameBoy Player and Retron 5 which made it convenient to bust out these portable games at a much friendlier resolution and not have to worry about the GameBoy’s non-backlit screen. In honor of the 30th anniversary last week I popped in the GameBoy Color version of Turok 2 and played a couple levels into it. For as weak and watered down most handheld versions of console games were, there was something about it that kept me coming back to them.

The GameBoy helped me through my childhood, too many family trip car rides to count and several summers on a farm. I probably had an unorthodox library of games for my GameBoy compared to the average owner who probably owned a majority of vastly superior games released by Nintendo, Capcom and Konami. What can I say, I was too young to realize what to ask my folks for. No matter how strong or weak each game wound up, I made sure to get the absolute most out of each game. Thank you Nintendo for releasing and supporting the GameBoy well after you should have throughout the 90s and enabling me to enjoy games anywhere! Thank you to everyone who got through this indulging my childhood memories of portable gaming with me! I hope you all have just as many great childhood handheld system gaming memories as I did whether it was on GameBoy, GameGear or later generations like GBA, PSP, DS, mobile, etc.

Avengers: Infinity War

Last night was the soft opening for the 11 years in the making MCU phase/season/arc/whatever finale that is Avengers: Endgame, but today Friday, April 26th is the official opening day. Yesterday I went to a friend’s place who has a big ‘ol 4K TV and I watched my first UHD in the form of last year’s Avengers: Infinity War (trailer) as a nice refresher going into one of the biggest cinematic releases ever this weekend. I am glad I did experience it again in 4K HD because there were so many little things I forgot and so much transpiring that it made the two and a half hour runtime breeze by before I knew it. Like with my entry on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 yesterday, I will probably tiptoe into light spoiler territory for Infinity War so reader beware!

Unlike the previous Avengers film, Age of Ultron, Infinity War does not kick off with the Avengers on another routine mission kicking ass. It is a polar opposite where quintessential Marvel villain Thanos (Josh Brolin), yes that same Thanos who was teased in the post-credit scenes of the previous two Avengers films has finally arrived and lays immediate waste to Heimdall (Idris Elba), Loki (Tom Hiddleston), Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) and Thor (Chris Hemsworth). It is in this opening scene where it is established Thanos is after the six Infinity Stones that were seen scattered throughout previous MCU films to gain ultimate power and use it to instantly eliminate half the world’s population. The dark nature of the opening scene foreshadowed what would be the grimmest, darkest film yet in the entire MCU. While this is a more serious, high-stakes film, there is still a fair amount of witty exchanges and zingers throughout, especially once the Guardians of the Galaxy and Spider-Man (Tom Holland) get in the mix.

Infinity War sees Thanos and his children travel to all reaches of the galaxy to acquire all six Infinity Stones. This leads to many awesome CG battles involving nearly the entire roster of the MCU sans a handful of characters who are explained why they are absent. This also leads to the fun dynamic of experiencing heroes from different films interact with each other for the first time and sometimes putting differences to the side to combat Thanos or at other times getting in a dispute of 1ups-manship in the case Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) and Thor. I will give props to the masterful MCU directors Joe & Anthony Russo for experimenting and segmenting off the traditional teams in order to see how new hero mash-ups play out on screen, and they nearly all gelled wonderfully together and resulted in a ton of awesome ‘What If’ scenarios coming to fruition on the big screen.

A couple quick favorite team-up scenarios that stood out for me was early team-up scenes with Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch), Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr) and Hulk/Bruce Banner colliding with Thanos’s forces. Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper), ‘teenage’ Groot (voiced by Vin Diesel) and Thor venture out in their unique arc in order to find the ultimate weapons to take on Thanos in what was an odd, but fun pairing to see unfold. When we get to the final act two huge battles play out simultaneously. A huge battle on the planet, Titan unfolds with Iron Man, Spider-Man, Nebula (Karen Gillan), Peter Quill, Drax (Dave Bautista) and Doctor Strange as they attempt to combine forces in one last gasp to takedown Thanos in one-against-all war that was one of the top highlights of the film.

While the battle on Titan is happening, almost every other MCU hero imaginable teams up in Wakanda to engage in a gigantic war with Thanos’s army. This was a CG delight to consume as almost every hero no matter how big of a lead or periphery they were in past films gets a chance to shine in what is easily the biggest confrontation of any MCU film. I thought it was awesome the Russos’ gave the women time to shine where Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) and Okoye (Danai Gurira) rally up against Proxima (Carrie Coon). This Wakanda War has a finale and payoff that will be one of the most memorable for not just comic book movies, but nearly all of cinema. Needless to say, JAW-DROPPING MOMENTS OF CONSEQUENCE occur from the fallout of the end of the Wakanda clash and it all builds up perfectly to get everyone primed and ready to see the follow-up to this in Avengers: Endgame.

It would not be fair for me to go this whole time without one little quibble, and it is a feint one that I cannot fully get behind, but bears mentioning. This is a star-studded cast, and props for Marvel Studios for squeezing almost everyone in. Unfortunately, this expectedly has the side-effect of some standout stars getting short shrift so everyone can get a modicum of screen time. I was surprised Captain America (Chris Evans) came off as a bit player compared to others and ditto for at least several others. I still am stunned that Nick Fury (Samuel Jackson), who is a constant for many past MCU films, is only in one scene. For what it is worth it seems at least every person I felt who got slighted in screen time at least has a moment or two to have the spotlight on. It oddly reminded me of recent Wrestlemanias where WWE’s roster got to be so enormous the last couple installments went on to be nearly seven hours in order to cram almost the entire roster on the show in some way or another.

While I watched the 4K UHD at a friend’s, I made sure to pull my BluRay out of my backlog box to dive into the extra features. Coming right off GotG2, I love how Infinity War follows the same format for extra features with a making of special, gag reel, deleted scenes and a commentary track. The Marvel gag reels are always a riot, but this one clocks in short at only two minutes! The deleted scenes are worth checking out because it is the only place where Happy (Jon Favreau) makes an appearance and it is where Quill and Drax have a fun argument for control of music over Quill’s precious Zune player. There are four brief making-of specials that combine for just over a half hour. A couple of the specials that focus on the huge cast and another on Thanos feel more like extended trailers with brief interview snippets, but the back half dealing with both of the final act battles are worth checking out as the cast and crew have a lot to show in how they pieced together these huge battles on the big screen.

Finally, the commentary with the Russo brothers and writers Christopher Markus and Stephan McFeely is a recommended commentary track worth your listen, or read which I will tip my hat to Marvel to for being one of the few companies out there to subtitle their commentary tracks! Commentary highlights are constant fascinating reactions to the unique hero pairings throughout, love for Brolin’s acting in his mammoth mo-cap setup, interesting insight on why the Russo’s were determined to make sure they got one specific hooded Infinity Stone protector back into the MCU and hearing all four react to the powerful scene between Gamora (Zoe Saldana) and Thanos. Other than the making-ofs being a little on the lacking side, this is another fine set of extra features from Marvel Studios.

I realize I am many weeks late to saying this, but I highly recommend giving Infinity War a viewing again before going into Avengers: Endgame. I absolutely loved this film from beginning to end, especially on this second viewing. With a year going by after seeing it in the theaters there was so much I forgot that transpired in these two and a half hours. I have not seen such a fast-paced film of at least this length since Inception. Somehow, I have managed to avoid all trailers for Endgame as I did not want a hint of what to expect out of it and I am insanely amped up to see this MCU event that has been building to this finale all the way back since 2008! If you do not have time to give Avengers: Infinity War a re-watch then I hope this entry has at least brought you back up to speed on the broad strokes of it going into Endgame. I cannot think of a better way to wrap this up by quoting what the man, Stan, would say: Excelsior!

Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs

3
12 Angry Men (1957)
12 Rounds 3: Lockdown
21 Jump Street
The Accountant
Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie
Atari: Game Over
The Avengers: Age of Ultron
Batman: The Killing Joke
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice
Bounty Hunters
Cabin in the Woods
Captain America: Civil War
Captain America: The First Avenger
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Christmas Eve
Clash of the Titans (1981)
Clint Eastwood 11-pack Special
The Condemned 2
Countdown
Creed
Deck the Halls
Die Hard
Dredd
The Eliminators
The Equalizer
Dirty Work
Faster
Fast and Furious I-VIII
Field of Dreams
Fight Club
The Fighter
For Love of the Game
Good Will Hunting
Gravity
Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2
Hercules: Reborn
Hitman
Indiana Jones 1-4
Ink
The Interrogation
Interstellar
Jobs
Joy Ride 1-3
Man of Steel
Man on the Moon
Marine 3-6
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster
Mortal Kombat
National Treasure
National Treasure: Book of Secrets
The Replacements
Reservoir Dogs
Rocky I-VII
Running Films Part 1
Running Films Part 2
San Andreas
ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Shoot em Up
Skyscraper
Small Town Santa
Steve Jobs
Source Code
Star Trek I-XIII
Take Me Home Tonight
TMNT
The Tooth Fairy 1 & 2
UHF
Veronica Mars
Vision Quest
The War
Wild
Wonder Woman
The Wrestler (2008)
X-Men: Days of Future Past

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

I hope you all are as ridiculously amped up as I am for the opening of Avengers: Endgame this evening! It marks the primary conclusion of all major story points from nearly every Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) film going back to where it started with the original Iron Man from 2008. It is a cinematic event 11 years in the making and is being forecasted to break all kinds of box office records. This week I have been preparing by watching the latest two MCU films in my video backlog to refresh me with the latest story arcs. I will begin by first covering 2017’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (trailer).

Marvel Studios and James Gunn wasted no time jumping on a sequel to the surprise breakout success of the first GotG. As I detailed in my entry covering the first GotG, I still recall being blown away by how won over I was by an unorthodox crew of larger-than-life characters that came together to rescue the galaxy. That same gang returns in an awesome opening piece that sees Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Drax (Dave Bautista), Rocket (voiced by Bradley Cooper) take on a mammoth of a gelatinous octopus-esque creature while the now fun-sized ‘Baby’ Groot (voiced by Vin Diesel) dances away in the background to the requisite 1970s pop-rock soundtrack. It is a goofy dumb sequence that I took gleeful joy in jamming out at home to with a pair of surround sound headphones.

The primary hook in GotG2 is that after vanquishing said blobby monster, the Guardians run into a jam when collecting their reward from the golden skinned race of beings known as Sovereign. They high tail it out of there with Sovereign right on their tale when a mysterious being assists the Guardians in escaping. They meet up with this being who introduces himself as Ego (Kurt Russell) along with his servant Mantis (Pom Klementieff). Ego breaks the big news to Peter that he is his dad and invites the Guardians to join them on his home planet to clear his origins up and catch up on the past. Of course there is more than meets the eye to Ego’s claims, and there are periphery matters happening with Yondu (Michael Rooker) and his Ravagers once again meddling with the Guardians throughout and Gamora and her sister Nebula (Karen Gillan) quarreling out decades worth of family disputes too.

There are a ton of lighthearted jokes and gags throughout GotG2 like its predecessor. A lot of them hit and crack me up throughout, but the opening half hour Marvel Studios went overkill with them. I could not help but think that even though I was enjoying the heck out of the opening scenes that Marvel Studios could have dialed it back a smidge or two. I have to struggle with this criticism however because ultimately I am talking about a cast of bombastic figures such as a talking CG tree and raccoon and a whole host of colorful, galactic species waging war to a killer ‘70s soundtrack so in the end it may be wise for me to give GotG2 the benefit of the doubt to get away with double-to-triple the gags of the average MCU film. I also settled on giving this qualm a pass because I convinced myself for all future GotG viewings to go into them two beers in and that will help put that nitpick I have at bay and take in the ride that is GotG. I am also 100% down with any film that gives the Zune some love, being an avid Zune user myself to this day much to the ridicule of several podcast hosts over the years.

There is so much in Vol 2 that I loved. I will highlight a few of my favorite takeaways while doing my best not to go into too much detail. Drax had a few nicely timed dry humor moments originally, and Marvel Studios went all in with Drax’s dry wit being peppered throughout with lots of priceless exchanges with Mantis. Baby Groot is over-the-top adorable in his naiveté and cute facial expressions. The in-house faction wars in the Ravagers between Yondu and the astutely named Tazerface (Chris Sullivan) was a fantastic periphery arc that climaxed with a unforgettable exchange with Rocket and later Yondu going all out with another dazzling display of his arrow skills.

I would be remiss if I were to forget to mention how spectacular the CG is here. It is in a class of its own with the already high bar established by the rest of the MCU films. Aside from the stunning space dogfights, Ego’s planet is a literal marvel and features some breathtaking use of CG to showcase flashbacks. The final act blows away the already-stellar final act of the first GotG with everything coming to a boil between Peter and Ego in a near half-hour long epic battle to get the hell off Ego’s planet and escape his wrath. Props again to James Gunn hand picking another star studded ‘70s pop-rock soundtrack along with an accompanying heroic original score that kicks in at all the right beats and combines for easily the best aural experience of all the MCU films.

The GotG2 BluRay has the ideal amount of extra features I want on a BluRay. It has a five star gag reel like most of the other MCU home video releases. There are a few minutes of deleted scenes with my standout being more extended love for the Zune. There is a 37 minute behind-the-scenes feature split up into four parts highlighting the soundtrack, visual effects and cast and crew love for director James Gunn, which was quite fascinating to see now in hindsight after the whole James Gunn Twitter controversy that temporarily removed him from the upcoming third GotG until the cast and crew fought vehemently to bring him back. Finally, James Gunn has a solo commentary track for the feature. Minus an occasional lull, he was pretty entertaining and a few quick highlights from it was Gunn referencing his work on the Lollipop Chainsaw game for inspiration for special effects in the movie, getting one of Quill’s big speeches mostly from a dream he woke up from in the middle of the night and Gunn justifying the use of five post-credit bonus scenes and how they all came to be.

It is rare for superhero films to meet and surpass expectations, especially sequels. Re-watching Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 only assured me that those expectations were righteously knocked out of the park. I loved the first film, and somehow James Gunn found a way to make the sequel far better. I am intrigued in how Gunn stated in the commentary how he feels the Guardians films are like independent movies with a big budget because of the near-limitless creative freedom Marvel Studios allows him. It is because of that freedom that these films are in a class of their own and find a way to standout amongst themselves in the constantly rising number of unique MCU properties and I cannot wait to see what awaits the Guardians of the Galaxy this weekend in Avengers: Endgame!

Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs

3
12 Angry Men (1957)
12 Rounds 3: Lockdown
21 Jump Street
The Accountant
Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie
Atari: Game Over
The Avengers: Age of Ultron
Batman: The Killing Joke
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice
Bounty Hunters
Cabin in the Woods
Captain America: Civil War
Captain America: The First Avenger
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Christmas Eve
Clash of the Titans (1981)
Clint Eastwood 11-pack Special
The Condemned 2
Countdown
Creed
Deck the Halls
Die Hard
Dredd
The Eliminators
The Equalizer
Dirty Work
Faster
Fast and Furious I-VIII
Field of Dreams
Fight Club
The Fighter
For Love of the Game
Good Will Hunting
Gravity
Guardians of the Galaxy
Hercules: Reborn
Hitman
Indiana Jones 1-4
Ink
The Interrogation
Interstellar
Jobs
Joy Ride 1-3
Man of Steel
Man on the Moon
Marine 3-6
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster
Mortal Kombat
National Treasure
National Treasure: Book of Secrets
The Replacements
Reservoir Dogs
Rocky I-VII
Running Films Part 1
Running Films Part 2
San Andreas
ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Shoot em Up
Skyscraper
Small Town Santa
Steve Jobs
Source Code
Star Trek I-XIII
Take Me Home Tonight
TMNT
The Tooth Fairy 1 & 2
UHF
Veronica Mars
Vision Quest
The War
Wild
Wonder Woman
The Wrestler (2008)
X-Men: Days of Future Past

Mortal Kombat Legacy II

I have been meaning to get to this for awhile, but have neglected today’s entry in my backlog for far too long and with today being the release day of Mortal Kombat 11 on PS4, Xbox One & Switch it seems only appropriate for my long overdue blog for 2013’s Mortal Kombat: Legacy II (trailer). For those that may not recall, this is the web series from director Kevin Tancharoen. He initially made an unofficial independent Mortal Kombat: ReBirth short in 2010 and accidentally clicked the ‘public’ option on YouTube when he meant to initially show it to a few colleagues. It instantly went viral and lead to Kevin meeting with Midway and Warner Bros. bigwigs that landed him a gig for the first Legacy web series in 2011. The sequel hit in 2013 and instead of releasing as weekly episodes like before, Warner released them all at once.

Click here for my take on the first season of Legacy. It had mostly standalone origin story shorts while the sequel sees a more cohesive story play out, and watching all the episodes back-to-back in one 92 minute sitting has a more movie-like experience to it. In Legacy II we have more origin stories interspersed with scenes of the cKombatants arriving and encountering each other in Outworld. The signature character in the sequel season is Liu Kang (Brian Tee) who goes off the deep end after losing a loved one and goes on a terror in a couple of standout scenes in a intense karaoke bar duel and dominating Johnny Cage (Casper Van Dien) and Stryker (Eric Jacobus) in Outworld.

Scorpion and Sub-Zero are also featured periodically this season with their long clan rivalry being shown through flashbacks before ultimately coming to blows with a signature fatality to finish one off. In my childhood I ate up the MK lore for Scorpion (Ian Anthony Dale) and Sub-Zero (Eric Steinberg) in the arcade attract screen bios and even the ancient Blood & Thunder and Battlewave Malibu comics series. Seeing their fabled squabbles and history play out in live action was a delight! Kenshi (Dan Southworth) and Ermac (Kim Do Nguyen) have a fascinating origin tale that reveals how Kenshi’s trademark blindfold came to be and seeing them have their final confrontation had a convincing payoff.

The ninja sisters of Kitana (Samantha Jo) and Mileena (Michelle Lee) continue their off and on rivalry that comes to a boil after an encounter with Johnny Cage. There are several other smaller appearances from the extensive MK cast of memorable fighters, but I will round off the cast highlight by saying it was insanely wicked to see Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa return to the role of Shang Tsung after an 18 year absence from the character from the original MK film. Props to see WB Games bring Tagawa back again to use in the new Mortal Kombat 11 game too.

While you can pick and choose which episodes to watch at your own leisure from the web series, I highly recommend doing it in one sitting so that way Legacy II plays out like a whole movie. I like how they kept bouncing back and forth from origin story to modern day in Outworld and it brought back memories of how Lost did their flashbacks….just without the over-the-top gore brought on by MK’s signature fatalities. The choreography of the fights is more involved and gripping in the second season, and the special effects have more pop too with Ermac especially having some flashy attacks.

My only qualm is while the story on the back of the BluRay boasts how the tournament has begun and the early story beats here countdown the days until the tournament, once all the fighters are on the island Shang Tsung never declares any rules or have any official arenas for the fighters to officially square off in like they did in the film and in other fighting game movies like Tekken and Dead or Alive. Here characters kind of bump into each other and exchange awkward eye contact which is impetus enough for them to start battling until the death, which is ok I guess because it leads to some gruesome fights, but part of me cannot help but get the feeling that it comes off as tacky.

While the first Legacy BluRay had several behind-the-scenes bonus features, the second season BluRay has nothing aside from a trailer. The second season concludes saying the web series will return, but unfortunately that was not the case. Kevin Tancharoen was suppose to return to direct season three of Legacy and a reboot film, but left before filming begun to pursue other opportunities and we never heard officially of the web series and reboot film again. I would have loved a third Legacy season or reboot film, but I get a feeling it is not meant to be. Instead, the second season of Legacy and the story mode cinemas from the latest three Mortal Kombat games do an excellent job at holding us over. Speaking of which, happy Mortal Monday Mortal Kombat 11 Day everyone!

Past TV/Web Series Blogs

2013-14 TV Season Recap
2014-15 TV Season Recap
2015-16 TV Season Recap
2016-17 TV Season Recap
2017-18 TV Season Recap
Adventures of Briscoe County Jr: The Complete Series
Baseball: A Ken Burns series
Angry Videogame Nerd Home Video Collections
Mortal Kombat: Legacy - Season 1
OJ: Made in America: 30 for 30
RedvsBlue - Seasons 1-13
Roseanne – Seasons 1-9
Seinfeld Final Season
Star Trek: Next Generation – Seasons 1-7
Superheroes: A Never-Ending Battle
Superheroes: Pioneers of Television
The Vietnam War: A Ken Burns series
X-Men – The Animated Series: Volumes 4-5

Fast Five

I am having slightly better turnaround times at getting to my latest installment covering the Fast and Furious franchise with today’s film being 2011’s Fast Five (trailer). The rousing success of the fifth film served as the blueprint for all the films following it until this day. I went in with no fears that it would still hold up well nearly a decade later.

As mentioned in my entry for Fast & Furious, the films were starting to evolve from the core trilogy that were primarily about late night car tuner culture and street races and shift more towards implementing these rides in elaborate heists. Fast Five goes all in on this concept and minus a few subtle callbacks throughout the film, ditches the street race focus of the first three films entirely. Now the heists are at the forefront and became larger than life where director Justin Lin went on to state in the commentary he learned to ‘embrace the ridulous-ness’ and go all out with fantastical stunts that I recall leading to many popped eyes in my initial viewing in the theater.

Fast Five sees Dom (Vin Diesel), Bryan (Paul Walker) and Mia (Jordana Brewster) reunite in Brazil after freeing Dom from custody at the end of the previous film. They meet up with their old pal, Vince (Matt Schulze) who we have not seen since the original film. The four of them group up for a job involving a train that has some spectacular stunts to kick things off. During the job they discover there is more than meets the eye and they encounter the antagonist of the film by the name of Reyes (Joaquim de Almeida). The four decide to assemble a team to take down Reyes and claim his millions of dollars stashed away in a vault. And thus we now have the new framework for the series where ‘Team FF’ are the ultimate pros at big jobs and work together in the name of ‘FAMILY’ to take down evil-doer crime lords.

The team they assemble is a all-star roll call of supporting players from previous films including Roman (Tyrese Gibson) & Tej (Ludacris) from 2Fast 2Furious, Han (Sung Kang) from Tokyo Drift, and Gisele (Gal Gadot), Leo (Tego Calderon) & Santos (Don Omar) from Fast & Furious. To cover their bases of a gang having the prerequisite computer wiz, Tej stepped up and added pro-hacker to his resume aside from fun-party-rides guy from the second film we knew him as. They receive some unexpected assists from federal agents Hobbes (The Rock) and Elena (Elsa Pataky). They are the surviving two members of a squad of federal agents (who the Giant Bomb commentary track consistently refers to as ‘Team Wildlands’) sent from the USA to track down Dom, Bryan & Mia and haul them back to America until their squad mates met their demise from an ambush sent out from Reyes. Now with a common enemy and mutual respect between the two after an adrenaline-pumping, full-on red meat, wall-pouncing, show-stealing duel, the two alphas align in a fist-bumping moment for the ages when Hobbes & Elena help out Team FF.

Somehow, director Justin Lin managed to make this ensemble cast gel together all at once. Nearly every team member has a few pivotal scenes throughout where the spotlight is on them. I was fully invested when the team is formed by the second half and is going through the stages of setting up the ultimate end-scene safe heist. Watching them all flawlessly work together and overcome every obstacle Reyes threw at them was a ride I was thrilled to tag along in. It reminded me why I loved (some) of the Ocean films and enjoying the journey of planning everything out and trying to piece together all the little things that pay off when the heist plays out. When it comes time for Team FF to swipe Reyes’ safe from his seemingly impenetrable fortress, Fast Five did not disappoint. I recall seeing this in the theater for the first time and simultaneously thinking this is the most unrealistic way to steal a safe but also loved how brazen Lin was to simply go for it and own this scene and take you on the ultimate thrill ride unlike any other heist film before it. It was like Lin stated earlier, just roll with the balls-out nature of the film and good times will be guaranteed.

As with the previous films I have been re-watching, I watched this with the commentary track from the Giant Bomb crew. Aside from them cracking me up with their ‘Team Wildlands’ nickname, their commentary has lots of fun watch-a-long insight such as regretting bringing Coronas to the viewing party after realizing Fast Five is the first film in the series not to feature them, ironic love for Paul Walker’s acting prowess and being in constant disbelief at Ludacris’s newfound tech skills. Vinny never saw the film before so hearing his reactions to the bigger stunts was a riot. I also listened to Justin Lin’s solo commentary on the BluRay and he is a pro at mastering solo commentaries with nonstop facts about the cast, crew and filming process. Some highlights include hearing the love he got from doing overseas press tours on the fourth film was what brought him back for the fifth, pointing out the tiny additions to the extended cut and being careful on where to film in Brazil.

Aside from the commentary, there are 12 bonus features totaling 75 minutes on the BluRay. About half of them are must-see. Usually most bonuses breaking down stunt scenes I am accustomed to in a lot of action films and I get kind of tone-deaf to them, but with Fast Five’s ambitious stunts I got a lot out of the bonuses detailing how they filmed the opening train heist and closing safe heist. Hearing how they got a mini-truck inside to drive the safe around was something else. There is also a recommended extra, On Set with Justin Lin, where Lin is shown behind-the-scenes hustling for the ultimate shots of what seems like a inconsequential scene from an earlier part of the film, but to see how Lin got it all come together to get the very best out of everyone was simply awesome. I got to see some of that too in the extra Dom vs. Hobbes where they dissect that fight scene and hearing how Lin halted production for two hours to hear Vin Diesel make his case for the inclusion of ONE MOVE in that entire fight goes to show the passion the cast and crew has for the brand. Overall it is a tremendous smattering of extra features to dive into!

Fast Five is the reason why the franchise has been a mainstay in pop culture since that one hit theaters. If you have managed to elude the mega-popular brand all these years but have been pondering on giving one of them a chance, then make sure it is Fast Five. The later films are still good, over-the-top awesome heist films, but Fast Five is easily my runaway favorite of the series.

Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs

3
12 Angry Men (1957)
12 Rounds 3: Lockdown
21 Jump Street
The Accountant
Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie
Atari: Game Over
The Avengers: Age of Ultron
Batman: The Killing Joke
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice
Bounty Hunters
Cabin in the Woods
Captain America: Civil War
Captain America: The First Avenger
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Christmas Eve
Clash of the Titans (1981)
Clint Eastwood 11-pack Special
The Condemned 2
Countdown
Creed
Deck the Halls
Die Hard
Dredd
The Eliminators
The Equalizer
Dirty Work
Faster
Fast and Furious I-VIII
Field of Dreams
Fight Club
The Fighter
For Love of the Game
Good Will Hunting
Gravity
Guardians of the Galaxy
Hercules: Reborn
Hitman
Indiana Jones 1-4
Ink
The Interrogation
Interstellar
Jobs
Joy Ride 1-3
Man of Steel
Man on the Moon
Marine 3-6
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster
Mortal Kombat
National Treasure
National Treasure: Book of Secrets
The Replacements
Reservoir Dogs
Rocky I-VII
Running Films Part 1
Running Films Part 2
San Andreas
ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Shoot em Up
Skyscraper
Small Town Santa
Steve Jobs
Source Code
Star Trek I-XIII
Take Me Home Tonight
TMNT
The Tooth Fairy 1 & 2
UHF
Veronica Mars
Vision Quest
The War
Wild
Wonder Woman
The Wrestler (2008)
X-Men: Days of Future Past

Wrestlemania 34

Happy Wrestlemania (WM) week everyone and happy birthday to me, and what better way to celebrate the big day than by doing my annual write up of the prior year’s ‘showcase of the immortals.’ Wrestlemania 34 (WM34) gets the dubious honor of being WWE’s sole 2018 BluRay release in North America due to the declining sales of the home video market. In my entry on last year’s BluRay I chastised it for skipping out on the usually included pre-show matches. For the WM34 BluRay, WWE heard the feedback and included all three pre-show matches……..but decided to cut the usually included Hall of Fame ceremony, and once again save on budget costs and skimp out on subtitles two years in a row! Shame!

I would have been furious for WWE cutting out the Hall of Fame ceremony from the BluRay, especially since two of my all-time favorites Mark Henry and Bill Goldberg were inducted last year and both delivered tremendous speeches in addition to the Dudleyz having a surprisingly fun acceptance speech courtesy of D-Von’s late discovery of humor, but last year’s ceremony will be notorious for having the Hillbilly Jim induction. Hillbilly Jim got the HoF spot usually reserved for fun opening act talent to come out and have a few laughs and share a few career highlight moments and be out of there before you know it while getting the crowd started up for the rest of the night, much like an actual opening match. I was originally looking forward to Jim’s speech because I recall him being the only highlight on Legends House with his affable light-hearted levity in that train wreck of a show. Instead, Mr. Jim had the longest speech of the night at nearly 35 minutes where he meticulously laid out his entire career and droned on about his action figure payday.

Because of Jim’s speech I found myself surprisingly gracious WWE excluded it this year, and I can always watch Henry’s and Goldberg’s speeches on the Network or YouTube. WWE had key excerpts from Henry’s speech in an excellent retrospective they recently put on the network you can check out by clicking here, so watch that instead. The DVD version of WM34 includes a code for a digital copy of the HoF ceremony, but since that is absent from the BluRay version being covered here, and for my own sanity, we will be omitting my usual Hall of Fame coverage. There is a good substitute bonus feature for the HoF, but we will get to that in a bit.

The trio of kickoff matches for WM34 featured both the Andre the Giant Memorial Battle Royal and first ever Fabulous Moolah Memorial WM Women’s Battle Royal. The men’s match sadly saw Jim Ross’s and Jerry Lawler’s only commentary for the night. It paled to previous year’s editions with only a few notable eliminations like Ryder getting pounced out by Mojo. The end saw Bray Wyatt return after an absence from his ‘Ultimate Deletion’ match with Matt Hardy only to join forces with him here and help him win the Andre cup! The women’s royal featured half the participants padded out with NXT and Performance Center filler. It had an awful clunky beginning that dragged on and the only spot of note from it was the ending that transpired in the middle of Sasha’s and Bayley’s hard-to-watch rivalry where Bayley instantly turned on Sasha and disposed of her. She was then stunned by Naomi’s presence and essentially laid down for her so she could easily eliminate her in a head-shake inducing moment of the night to emerge the winner of the….curvy hip trophy. The women delivered a far superior battle royal effort at the Evolution PPV later in 2018 that told a fantastic story beginning to end so watch that instead. The cruiserweight title match between Cederic Alexander and Mustafa Ali was the sole highlight of the WM Kickoff. Ali debuted his glowy Sub-Zero-esque ring attire here, and the bout told a gripping narrative of the two representing the heart and soul of the 205 division. After some intense near-falls, Alexander walked out victorious after hitting his Lumbar Check finisher.

Onto the main card, it opened with what turned out to be the best pure match of the night with the Intercontinental title triple threat between Miz, Seth Rollins and Finn Balor. I completely forgot about the Miz-tourage until I saw them here. Unlike a lot of other triple threats, there were rarely any lulls here and several near-falls that got the crowd rocking with the highlight being Finn breaking up a pin with his Coup de Gras. Ultimately, Seth won the title after hitting his Stomp for the pin. The SmackDown Women’s Title was on the line next that saw Charlotte Flair end Asuka’s record-setting undefeated streak. I recall being stunned at this outcome as Asuka had a ton of momentum at the time and following a couple equally bummer losses to Carmella on the following PPVs she has never really recovered. She got a paper champion reign recently where she was rarely seen on TV throughout it until she suddenly dropped the title to, surprise, Charlotte. Despite it being a great WM match for the women, I will remember this as being the beginning of the end for Asuka.

So in-between WM33 and 34, believe it or not Jinder Mahal got a half year title reign as WWE Champion and WWE will tell you it was not because he got suddenly jacked while they were trying a hard market push into India. Mahal lost the title a few month prior, but he got a nice consolation prize leaving WM34 the new US champion in a Fatal Four Way match between him, Randy Orton, Bobby Roode and Rusev in a solid, but forgettable match-up. Speaking of forgettable multi-person title matches, the SmackDown tag title triple threat between the Usos, New Day and Bludgeon Brothers fit that billing in what was a showcase for the on-the-rise Bludgy Bros. Unfortunately, the Bludgies specialize in plodding, big-man offense that did not capture this WM crowd when they eventually hit their top-rope powerbomb on Kofi to win the titles. The Bludgeon Brothers eventually evolved into a decent team and were starting to have some seriously good matches by Summerslam, but then Luke Harper suffered an ill-timed injury and the team was forced off TV. On a quick aside, I will give my sympathies to the Usos have only wrestled on WM entirely in pre-show matches for nearly a whole decade before finally making their primary WM card debut here to only lose the tag titles in a quick get-it-over with match.

What was not forgettable transpired next to be my overall best match of the night. While the IC title match was the best ‘pure’ wrestling match, the mixed tag between Triple H & Stephanie McMahon against Kurt Angle & Ronda Rousey had the unbeatable combination of great charisma, energy, wrestling, action and moments to produce an enthralling encounter I did not foresee to be anywhere near this entertaining. The huge X Factor going in was how good would Ronda Rousey be in her WWE debut, especially with only several weeks training going in and reports of her training at the WWE Performance Center being curtained off so no one could see or take video. Rousey surpassed all expectations and premiered a WWE star-making effort as soon as she tagged in. Steph was tremendous in playing Ronda’s foil in sneak attacks and begging for mercy. Ronda was exceptional with her ruthless offense on Steph and even a memorable encounter with Triple H. Props to the announcers who accentuated the match with classic calls by Corey Graves like ‘call the cops’ as soon as Ronda was tagged in and on the precipice of unleashing her fury. I vividly recall going nuts along with the crowd throughout this match with all the big moments that played out in a brilliantly booked match-up that saw Rousey & Angle win when Rousey made Steph tap to her armbar.

The much anticipated match between John Cena and Undertaker happened next and I am still trying to make sense out of it a year later. This has been a longtime WM dream match, but it featured an awkward TV buildup with Cena repeatedly calling out the Undertaker to answer his challenge on TV for several weeks only to have no response back. Cena then said he would enjoy WM in the crowd with the fans and did just that and partook in some brewskis with the fans for the first five matches before an official informed him that Undertaker was in the building. Cena darted to the back to prep up and came out at this point ready for the ‘Taker, but ‘Taker once again did not show. Eventually acoustic-savant Elias came out and sang a diddy trashing Cena until John heard enough and sent Elias packing. Cena was about to leave the arena until the trademark gong hit and eerie special effects occurred with a nice nod to the end of WM33 which was where we last saw the Dead Man. A perplexed Cena ran to the ring for the now official match…..and was promptly ‘routed’ (as Cole appropriately called) by Undertaker in less than three minutes before succumbing to the Tombstone in a one-sided match that was all Undertaker. I know Cena has been focusing more on Hollywood efforts and Undertaker is especially up there in years and perhaps this quick match was all his cardio was capable of. That was what I thought anyways until Undertaker delivered fleshed out matches later on in the year at both Saudi Arabia shows, so ultimately I have no idea why this match turned out like this. One day I hope we get interviews from both Cena and ‘Taker filling us in on what the hell happed that determined the match play out this way. That said, both individuals are mysteriously absent from the WM35 card, and if ‘Taker winds up not on the show it would be his first time missing WM since 2000. With WM35 already ridiculously overbooked currently at 15 matches, I still would not mind seeing another impromptu chapter play out between these two in someway this Sunday.

Next up was the obligatory roll call for the previous night’s HoF inductees. Mysterious by his absence was celebrity wing inductee Kid Rock (though a couple of his songs were played throughout the night as the official WM34 theme songs). I could not help but chuckle at an off-handed backstage comment by Goldberg earlier in the night from the WWE 24 special on WM34 where Goldberg stated he intentionally showed up a few hours past his expected call time to avoid idle boredom. What was not a chuckling matter was Daniel Bryan overcoming WWE doctors’ three year ban on him from competition to wrestle again in a WWE ring. His long overdue return saw him tagging with Super Shane-O Mac to take on Amazing French Canadians 2.0 Kevin Owens & Sami Zayn. I am still shocked to see Shane McMahon compete here considering within the preceding month he survived a helicopter crash and suffered a hernia he postponed surgery on so he could make his WM and Saudi Arabia paydays. Shane played the partner-in-peril to perfection building up to the white-hot reaction for Bryan returning with fire hitting all his vintage moves, and somehow Shane was able to recuperate and pull off his Coast to Coast too. Eventually Bryan hit his running knee for the feel-good win of the show.

WWE tried to build up the RAW Women’s Title match as another feel-good moment of overcoming bullying between Nia Jax and Alexa Bliss. It was difficult to convey this though because until a few weeks before Nia’s whole shtick for her near two years on WWE TV was using her size advantage to bully others, and all of a sudden cameras picking up on Alexa disparaging Nia’s size one time was suppose to get everyone sympathetic for Nia. It did not click and it resulted in a weak reaction for this despite both putting in a considerable effort for a good match that saw Nia win the title with a Samoan Drop from the middle turnbuckle. It did not help matters that within several weeks Nia was back to being a villain again so Rousey could have a metaphorical monster to slay (in all seriousness, Nia legit gels with Rousey and so far this past year I feel Rousey’s best matches have been with Nia) in her quest for gold.

Another disappointing match followed between AJ Styles and Shinsuke Nakamura for the WWE Title. I recall getting burnt out and in desperate need of a break at this point in the night of my original viewing and was hoping it held up better second time around. That was not the case, as the bout had a good initial chapter, but the two rarely got out of second gear until the closing minutes of the contest where things really amped up. It was a little better watching this with a fresh set of eyes, but not much and a far cry from their epic NJPW encounter at the beginning of 2016. Shinsuke’s heel turn though was well executed and fun to relive where he could not handle defeat and therefore delivered his first of many to come low blows to ‘The Phenomenal One.’

Re-watching the following RAW tag titles match next though with a fresh set of eyes was interesting where everyone wondered who the hell Braun Strowman would pick to be his tag team partner against Cesaro and Sheamus. I had no idea either and thought WWE would resort to a retired legend or celebrity and was taken aback when Braun wandered the crowd aimlessly before settling on a ‘fan’ in the form of a middle schooler going by Nicholas who later on was revealed to be the referee of the match’s son. This was the perfect placement for this type of match because I was in serious need of levity and needed something like this to recharge me for the remainder of the night. I got a kick when Braun tagged in Nicholas briefly for an awkward eye contact moment with Cesaro before Braun quickly tagged back in and finished him off with his powerslam to make Nicholas the youngest ever tag team champion....until they had to relinquish them the next night due to Nicholas’s school obligations. Turns out Corey Graves was correct when he had the line of the night upon their victory when exclaiming “Doesn’t he have Algebra and stuff?”

As bizarre and befuddling as the John Cena/Undertaker match was, I was doubly befuddled at the conclusion of the main event Universal title match between Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar. The crowd was dumping on this match throughout with nasty chants and eventually having more interest in executing the wave. Brock had a prolonged beatdown on Roman which saw a total of 10 overhead/german suplexes and six F5s. It was reminiscent of the Summerslam 2014 throttling of John Cena. I (and the crowd) felt the beatdown on Roman was foreshadowing Roman ‘hulking up’ for the eventual win. Every Roman kickout lead to more and more boos because presumably I/they did not want another rah-rah Roman win to end WM. Roman took some nasty blows from Brock to open him up BAD as he was gushing all over the ring that was the catalyst for his comeback until he was caught with a sixth and decisive F5 from Brock for the abrupt end to the match that I think no one saw coming and I am still scratching my head over. A big part of me was relieved when it happened, but another part was shocked that WWE pulled the trigger on that finish. Even more jaw-dropping to me is when watching the aforementioned WWE 24 special on WM34 that shows after the match Brock emerging backstage and giving the cold shoulder walk past Vince and literally tossing the championship he could not care a single iota about directly onto Vince’s lap and Vince yelling at him ‘YOU ASSHOLE’ to Brock’s back. I know I always heard Brock is only there for his limited days for the big-money contract and keeps to himself, and seeing his genuine not give a damn reaction to Vince and the rest of the staff was a real eye opener. I will still root and cheer for Brock and his unique style he brings to his matches , but damn was this a way to end WM with the rare occasion where a heel left WM champion.

I mentioned earlier WWE had a decent alternative to the HoF as extra features on the WM34 BluRay. That came in the form of the entire day-after RAW and a couple key moments from the next SmackDown. The entire RAW was just over two hours since there are no commercials. I am not going to recap the whole thing here, but it was cool reliving it for the raucous WM-weekend crowd and the expected NXT call-ups that debuted that night and looking back on the past year to see how far they have come. This was a nice substitute to the HoF, and as much as I jest about being relieved it was left off this year, I do hope the HoF is included in next year’s BluRay. Overall, I would have to give WrestleMania 34 a thumbs in the middle. Of the 14 matches only four of them are must-see (205 title, IC triple threat, Mixed Tag, RAW Women’s title) and a few matches underperformed/disappointed. Add to the fact the bonkers nature of the Cena/Undertaker and Universal title matches and it tallies up to a WM that can be best to jump around to the key moments of.

Past Wrestling Blogs

Best of WCW Clash of Champions
Best of WCW Monday Nitro Volume 2
Best of WCW Monday Nitro Volume 3
Biggest Knuckleheads
Bobby The Brain Heenan
Daniel Bryan: Just Say Yes Yes Yes
DDP: Positively Living
Dusty Rhodes WWE Network Specials
ECW Unreleased: Vol 1
ECW Unreleased: Vol 2
ECW Unreleased: Vol 3
Eric Bishoff: Wrestlings Most Controversial Figure
Fight Owens Fight: The Kevin Owens Story
For All Mankind
Goldberg: The Ultimate Collection
Impact Wresting Presents: Best of Hulk Hogan
Its Good to Be the King: The Jerry Lawler Story
The Kliq Rules
Ladies and Gentlemen My Name is Paul Heyman
Legends of Mid South Wrestling
Macho Man: The Randy Savage Story
Memphis Heat
NXT Greatest Matches Vol 1
OMG Vol 2: Top 50 Incidents in WCW History
OMG Vol 3: Top 50 Incidents in ECW History
Owen: Hart of Gold
RoH Supercard of Honor 2010-Present
ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery
Scott Hall: Living on a Razors Edge
Sting: Into the Light
Straight Outta Dudley-ville: Legacy of the Dudley Boyz
Straight to the Top: Money in the Bank Anthology
Superstar Collection: Zach Ryder
TLC 2017
TNA Lockdown 2005-2016
Top 50 Superstars of All Time
Tough Enough: Million Dollar Season
True Giants
Ultimate Fan Pack: Roman Reigns
Ultimate Warrior: Always Believe
War Games: WCWs Most Notorious Matches
Warrior Week on WWE Network
Wrestlemania 3: Championship Edition
Wrestlemania 28-Present
The Wrestler (2008)
Wrestling Road Diaries Too
Wrestling Road Diaries Three: Funny Equals Money
Wrestlings Greatest Factions
WWE Network Original Specials First Half 2015
WWE Network Original Specials Second Half 2015
WWE Network Original Specials First Half 2016
WWE Network Original Specials Second Half 2016
WWE Network Original Specials First Half 2017