Blue’s Reviews: It’s Time For Dodger Baseball!

It’s a tall order, but the Dodgers will try to “outlast” Tim Lincecum in today’s game, writes Jesse Sanchez of MLB.com. It’s similar to how they were able to get a late victory against Arizona on Thursday – if they can make the great starter throw a lot of pitches, they can at least give themselves a chance against the bullpen.

Hey.  It was a good plan.

And it might have worked if it hadn’t been for that nosy knuckleballer!

So, there’s not much to write about the game itself that I attended on Saturday afternoon when the Dodgers took on the Giants other than the Stadium looked fantastic, the Dodger Dogs tasted great, and it was indeed a beautiful day for a ballgame.

It just felt good getting to the Stadium early this year after it was nearly the season’s end before I got there last year.  Just seeing Blue Heaven On Earth brought a smile to my face.

Now, the buzz for the first week of home games unfortunately wasn’t the Dodgers’ play, it was the crowd.  We all heard the horror stories from Opening Day – fights in the crowd, public urination, people in pools of their own vomit needing to be carried out.  Bad, bad stuff.  In all honesty, I figured things were being blown out of proportion a bit but the back of my mind had me a little worried.

I’m happy to report that with the exception of a pretty extended verbal argument at one point in the game, things never escalated beyond that.  I’m sure they did in other parts of the Stadium – especially with a sizable Giants contingent on hand (they were everywhere!) but in my area, it was pretty chill.

As for the food, I went with my typical Super Dodger Dog and nachos along with a water and a beer.  So, I can’t really report on the new food items that were added to the menu.  Everything smelled delicious (especially those damn Garlic Fries) though.  The Super Dog was everything I had hoped for and made me REALLY feel like the season had started.  The nachos seemed… different.  They were using different packaging – that much I know – but the cheese?  The salsa?  Something wasn’t right there.  Maybe they changed ingredients?  I don’t know but it was different.  Not bad… just different.  Bottled water this year is coming in the form of a Dodger blue colored bottle – a new way for some added revenue.

Oh, and speaking of added revenue… there are FAAAAAR too many dudes with flags waving me to my parking spot when I get there.  They seriously were about every 10 feet and I actually had two of them put me in my spot.  If we cut out about half of those guys, maybe we can afford a bullpen arm.

All in all, it was a great day at the Stadium.  Yeah, the game sucked but “it’s still early” and I was just happy to be there and hope I could help the ball club.  I want to take it one day at a time and the Good Lord willing, things will work out.  As a fan, I hope to give it a hundred and ten percent.

Crash Davis would be proud.

Until next time, Dodger fans!

Blue’s Reviews: Comics

I bought comics a couple of weeks ago for the first time in a while.  I’d love to be buying them on the iPad but I’m not there yet and neither is the comic industry as a whole.  So, I went out to the local store and dropped $50 to see what I could see.  Like I said, it’s been a while so I ended up just kinda picking stuff up, paging through it, and buying stuff that appealed to me in that limited preview.

Today, I finally finished reading the batch that I had bought so I thought I’d review them.

WARNING:  There will be spoilers in here for comics that are a couple weeks ago at this point.  READER BEWARE!

SIEGE :  I have to admit – I’m a sucker for a good “big event” book.  Things like Identity Crisis and the like are some of my favorites ever.  So, when I saw the first three issues of Siege on sale, I thought I’d give it a shot. Man, those were some fun books.  The “Previously On…” helped a bit in getting me up to date on what’s been going on since Civil War (which I did read) and got things going.  Brian Michael Bendis typically has put out quality stuff that I’ve enjoyed and there was no disappointment in this one.  From the return of Captain America at the end of the first issue to how friggin’ badass they turned both Ares and The Sentry to the death of Area and the return of Iron Man and the fall of Asgard… man, this is some good stuff.  I’m really glad that of all the books I bought, issue #1 of this was the first thing I read because it made me want to power on through the other two.  

BLUE’S REVIEW:  HIGHLY RECOMMEND

ULTIMATE X #1:  So, apparently the Ultimate Universe “rebooted” since the last time I saw it and it seems like it’s just getting started so I thought I’d give it a shot.  I’ve got an issue with the Ultimate Universe already but I’ll get to that.  This book, written by Jeph Loeb, was actually pretty good.  It told a really simple story of a young man who knows there’s something “different” about him only to find out by the end just how different he actually is.  It also tells a nice story of parents afraid to tell their son the truth about himself because of what may happen when he knows.  I enjoyed this as more than your standard “superhero” book and look forward to seeing what’s next.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  HIGHLY RECOMMEND

AMERICAN VAMPIRE #1:  Ugh.  I had some high hopes for this.  A Vertigo book involving Stephen King? Sounds like a winner.  But it dragged and dragged and dragged.  It had an interesting finish but I had no desire to read a second one.  The back half of the book had another story but it got so dull, I ended up just putting the book down.  This one was a mistake and I should probably give it away to someone who might get more enjoyment out of it than I did.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  PASS

BATMAN #697:  I’ll be honest.  Two things got me to buy this book – 1) the cover promises to reveal the identity of the Black Mask… which really doesn’t mean anything to me since I don’t know who that is but I thought the revealing of anyone’s identity might be interesting and 2) it’s issue #697 and I thought I might like to see the lead up to issue #700 (which I can’t believe they’re at.)  The book was… okay.  There’s some interesting stuff in there with Dick Grayson trying to be Batman as well as Bruce Wayne (who is apparently lost in time but more on that later.)  Also, there was an interesting Batman/Catwoman moment before the horrid revelation of a CATGIRL that made me weep tears of blood.  I could really go either way with this one. It didn’t do much for me but I might stick to see what #700 has in store.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  YOU MAKE THE CALL

BATMAN & ROBIN #10:  Again, I’ll be honest.  Two things got me to buy this book – 1) the image of Robin about to take a swing at Batman’s head with a sword and 2) the cover says “THE RETURN OF BRUCE WAYNE BEGINS HERE!”  Batman has always been my favorite superhero.  Every time I start buying comics again, I usually always start with Batman.  Now, I had heard bits and pieces over the past few months about Bruce Wayne “dying” and being replaced by Dick Grayson.  Then I had heard something about Bruce Wayne not dying but rather being “lost in time.”  AND I had heard something about Batman having a kid with Talia.  Whew.  Lots of “buzz” in the Batverse.  Does it pay off?  Yes and no.  I kind of liked Bat Jr. being in the board room… but liked him less as Robin.  I like Dick Grayson as Batman trying to play the World’s Greatest Detective role… but was a little lost as to what is going on.  Apparently Talia’s got Bat Jr. as some kind of a “sleeper agent” – no idea what’s going on there.  What happened to Tim Drake though?  There’s a mention of Drake going crazy or some such.  Why is he not Robin?  Where is he?  All in all, this probably had enough to have me give it another shot.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  SOMEWHAT RECOMMEND

ULTIMATE ENEMY #2:  No idea what happened in this book at all.  I was totally lost throughout the whole thing.  Apparently there’s an “enemy” amongst the superheroes who is going after their families which I guess is somewhat interesting but very sloppy in execution.  This is a Bendis book which surprises me since it was so messy.  Maybe if I’d read the first issue?  Don’t know.  I won’t go out of my way to find it though.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  PASS

TEEN TITANS #23:  Here’s an interesting theory – a good comic book will not only make you want to see what happens next, it’ll also make you want to see what happened before that.  That’s what makes the Siege books stand out and the Ultimate X book and the Batman & Robin to a lesser extent.  This one does the same.  I ADORED this book and I’m not even a big Titans guy.  But seeing Grayson hanging around Wally and Wonder Girl and all the others as Batman was just awesome.  There was some really great flashback sequences in this one that really made it feel like you were witnessing a huge moment in Titans history.  Probably my favorite DC book that I bought.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  HIGHLY RECOMMEND

CAPTAIN AMERICA #603:  Hrm.  I have mixed feelings about this book.  The last time I made a trip to a comic store to buy a Cap book was during the Death of Cap story which was SO FRIGGIN’ GOOD – I just hate to see what happens next.  So, Bucky became Cap.  I can live with that, I guess, although I probably would have just let the character go for a while.  And then apparently the original Steve Rogers was placed in suspended animation ages ago so they just reanimated him?  Ugh.  I don’t like that explanation.  I wonder how well it went over amongst the Marvel faithful.  I recognize they probably need Cap alive for the movie hype but… yeah, that doesn’t work for me.  The book itself was… weird.  Bucky and the Falcon going after the reanimated Cap who is crazy.  Is this the same reanimated Cap that’s in Siege?  Cause that Cap seems pretty well-adjusted and on the same page with Bucky.  Confused.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  YOU MAKE THE CALL

NEW ULTIMATES #1:  I liked it.  I guess.  I liked the Tony Stark aspect of it at least.  With this one, I’m more curious to see what came before this book than what comes next.  I might check it out next time. Maybe.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  YOU MAKE THE CALL

GREEN ARROW #31:  This was another good book.  Another one where I wanted to see what led up to it. This one didn’t even have much of a “previously on…” but it did such a good job in the writing at getting across the pain that Oliver is in.  My favorite moment is when Hal, Barry, and Dinah show up to confront him. So many good character moments there – so many nods to the past.  When Hal tells him about what happened to him after Coast City was destroyed (I was in high school for that, damn it!) and tells him to look at him – Oliver replies with a “Can’t, Hal.  It’d hurt too much.”  So much in that one line.  So much awesomeness.  I dug this book a ton and I can’t wait to see what comes next in this one too.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  HIGHLY RECOMMEND

Like I said, I can’t wait for the day I can download these on my iComicBookStore every week and read them on my iPad while ANYWHERE… but we’re not there yet.  Until then, I can make the trip down to the ol’ comic book store every couple weeks to see what’s new.

Blue’s Reviews: Album #1 of 52 – Ben Lee – Ripe

One of the things I really wanted to do upon starting this site is to celebrate the album format by doing a review of a different album every week.  Not always a new album… not always something I’d never heard… but just a different album every week.  Obviously, since we’re mid-way through March, I haven’t accomplished that yet but I haven’t given up the ghost on doing 52 album reviews in 2010.

As we enter an era of 99 cent songs filling up our music library, everyone has forgotten these artists are making full albums that actually tend to make the songs better in the right context.  I miss the days when I knew the name of every artist and song I had in my music library. I miss the days when I could tell you the order of the songs on an album and where the B-Side started.  And yeah, I even miss the days of “secret songs” that you somehow stumbled upon when you forgot to stop the tape at the end.

And so it begins.

BEN LEE – RIPE

To start off this little project, during a trip to Amoeba a couple months ago, I went through the used CD section and scooped up a bunch of stuff that I thought I just might enjoy listening to… and if it was cheap?  Even better!  This one I grabbed for five bucks – just my speed when it comes to music I haven’t heard before.

Ben Lee is an artist that I was late to the party on.  In fact, when “Catch My Disease” was all the rage on the radio, I couldn’t STAND that song.  Later, I would learn to enjoy it but I was very anti-Ben Lee for the longest time.  Some time passed and one day I read a story that Ben Lee had recorded a song with Mandy Moore.  Now, I make no apologies for hearting Mandy Moore muchly.  I’m not the biggest fan of her music but I just think she’s too cool for school and enjoy checking out her work both musically and dramatically.

So, it was with great interest that I listened to “Birds And Bees” which just happens to be on this album.  I was hooked.  It was the perfect duet – giving me the grins from ear to ear with playful lyrics and back and forth awesomeness.  As I went a little deeper into some Ben Lee stuff, I found more and more stuff that I liked – not the least of which is the EP from The Bens, his side project with Ben Kweller and Ben Folds that I adored.

But until now, I’ve never listened to an entire Ben Lee album – and that’s the whole point of this exercise.  To discover entire ALBUMS worth listening to.  

As the first song, “Love Me Like The World Is Ending,” kicks in, you instantly have to give Ben Lee credit for one thing – his complete unabashedness at making a nice, fluffy pop album.  This is the kind of song I’d expect to hear on a TV commercial for the CW’s latest show – making me feel nostalgic for The Heights’ “How Do You Talk To An Angel?” and yes, to me, that’s a good thing.

Lyrics like, “Baby can you hear the message I am sending?  Love me like the world is ending” isn’t likely to win Ben Lee “street cred” but for someone who can enjoy a catchy pop rock song, it hits the right spot.

“Birds And Bees” is the third song on the album and is every bit as glorious as it is every time I hear it.  People always claim to have favorite bands… favorite songs… whatever… but generally, even when something is your “favorite”, there are times you just can’t stand to hear it, watch it, eat it, whatever the case is.  That is SO not the case with me and this song.  I can’t think of a single time that this song has come on that I’ve not wanted to listen to it.  Hell, I’m usually even singing along to the super-sappy but oh-so-adorable lyrics, “Birds and bees and songs like these… cause we want what we want and it’s natural, baby.”

This album is full of moments just like that – just fluffy, pretty pop songs that make me happy to be listening to them.  Things like “Is This How Love Is Supposed To Feel?”, “What Would Jay Z Do?” and “Just Say Yes” just light up the room when you listen to them.  Even when he goes off in a different direction with something like “Blush”, I’m curious.  ”Blush” makes me extremely happy that I’m doing this project – listening to full albums to review them – because it’s the kind of song that makes this experience a beautiful thing.  It comes off in a quasi-pop country sound to it… something completely unexpected.  I never would have though there would be a song quite like this on a Ben Lee album so it’s a total surprise.  But while it has country overtones, you can still feel the actual Ben Lee style coming up from underneath.  A darker sounding song but still worthy of inclusion here.

In fact, when it comes down to it, I had a hard time finding any song that I genuinely disliked on the album which makes me incredibly happy that this is the first album I randomly pulled out of the Amoeba bag this morning for this review.  This is the kind of album that people should be praising for the entirety of the album and not just knowing one or two songs off it like I did before this afternoon.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  RECOMMEND

The album can purchased on iTunes right now for $9.99.

You can hear the studio version of “Birds And Bees” here:

Or see a live version here:

 

Blue’s Reviews: Movies I Saw Weeks Ago!

I SOOOOOO should have done this a while back.  I really meant to!  I did!  It’s been sitting on my Things reminder app on the iPhone AND on my MacBook Pro for weeks but I just haven’t gotten around to it. 

So, here I am… weeks after seeing these movies… and now I shall attempt to review them.  Wish me luck.

TYSON

Thanks to the wonders of Netflix Watch Instantly on my XBox 360, I finally caught this documentary that I had been wanting to see since it was in the local indie theater last year.  Of course, this documentary is about former boxing World Champion “Iron” Mike Tyson and tells his story from childhood to his ultimate fall from grace.  

 

The first thing that will strike you immediately about this doc is how much of it is told through closeup shots of Tyson.  There’s no voiceover narration by someone to lead us along Tyson’s life – it’s all him.  He talks about his childhood in a bad neighborhood and having his first fight on the streets which absolutely terrified him.  He tells us about getting sent up to juvenile hall.  He tells us about Cus D’Mato and his influence over his life.  All of this is through the words of the man himself.  And most of it is done through a truly unique and interesting visual style.  Of course, we also get the old news footage and still photos but it’s such an engaging visual presentation, it’s hard not to get swept up in that aspect of it.

But if you can manage it, you’re in for a treat because as reviled as this man is by many and as much of a laughingstock as his career became, he has had a truly fascinating life and it’s enthralling to hear him tell his story.  He has a lot of bitterness in him towards people in his life that have, in his eyes at least, wronged him – Robin Givens, Don King, and Desiree Washington – among others.  It’s bizarre to hear him tell about the Buster Douglas shocking knockout and later, the Holyfield fights including the infamous biting incident.

Towards the end of the film, Tyson tells a story of redemption.  A man who no longer wants to fight and doesn’t seem to care if he’s the “baddest man on the planet” anymore.  But rather, he wants to be a good father and be someone his kids can look up to.

Whether you love him or hate him, I think almost anyone can find something to take away from this film.

BLUE’S REVIEW:  STRONGLY RECOMMEND!

 

Sunshine Cleaning

Another one I saw through the wonders of Watch Instantly, Sunshine Cleaning is the story of two sisters who form a cleaning company that specializes in cleaning up areas where people have died.  I eagerly anticipated seeing this movie when the trailers were out for it because it seemed like the kind of quirky indie comedy – something along the lines of a Juno or Little Miss Sunshine – that I dig.

Boy, was I wrong.

It has so much going for it too.  A strong cast, a decent premise, and at times, the movie sparkles with what could have been.  But ultimately, I think this movie suffers from trying to be more than it is.  It could have been a simple, charming comedy with heart but they tried to tackle every subplot under the sun and they tried to do it in a way that – and man this sounds bad – they come off trying to be smarter than they are.

Ouch.  I know.

But that’s the feeling I got from it.  They tried to do too much and in the end, it hurt the overall film.  I talked to a friend after seeing it who told me he turned it off after ten minutes.  Well, I made it through the whole thing but I just didn’t take enough away from it to tell him that he missed anything of note.

BLUE’S REVIEWS:  DO NOT SEE!

 

Yes Man

This was a movie I was totally prepared to hate.  I mean, can anyone name the last Jim Carrey move they enjoyed?  Bruce Almighty maybe?  I don’t know.  For a long while, it seemed like Jim Carrey was fine with playing Jim Carrey in any movie that came down the pike and cash his paycheck.

And in all honestly, this isn’t much different in that respect.  He pretty much plays the standard Jim Carrey role and the movie is pretty much your standard Jim Carrey plot.  Average guy is living his life just a little bit wrong, something happens to make him change his ways, even when trying to do the right thing – he does the wrong and makes matters worse, and then truly finds the answers he’s looking for in time for the big happy ending.

That’s all here.

But it does it in a way that’s heartfelt, satisfying, and best of all, it’s actually funny.

Now, there’s something to be said here for managing expectations.  I went into this with expectations that were rock bottom and truth be told, I only watched it because it co-stars Zooey Deschanel who I heart muchly.  But I was surprised.  It’s no Truman Show or Liar Liar or even Bruce Almighty but what it is is a harmless, fun, charming flick that you could do far worse then to spend two hours watching.

Did I mention it co-stars Zooey Deschanel?  Just checking.

In fact, pair this with one of my favorites of 2009, (500) Days Of Summer, for a Zooey double feature!  It’s brilliant!

But seriously… give this one a shot.  I don’t think you’ll regret it.

BLUE’S REVIEWS:  RECOMMEND!

 

 

 

Blue’s Reviews: PaleyFest 2010 – LOST

The Missus and I made the rainy trek last night to Beverly Hills (ooh la la) for this year’s edition of the PaleyFest and their Lost panel.  For those unaware, PaleyFest is a two week series of panels put on by the William S. Paley Center Of Media every year honoring some of the best shows on television along with their creators, crews, and casts.  For a few years, we had talked about wanting to attend and last year, we finally made it for the Battlestar Galactica and Caprica panel.  We had a lot of fun so when we saw this year’s lineup including some of our favorite shows, we decided to check a few out.

The festival kicked off on Saturday night for Modern Family – one of my favorite shows but not one I felt especially compelled to go see the cast and crew talk about.  Lost on the other hand is quite the horse of a different color.  

I feel a special bond with Lost.  When I first saw the teaser commercials for Lost and when I first read the premise, something about the show fascinated me.  I strongly encouraged my co-workers at the time to check it out and was happy that they did… and even happier that they were happy that they did.  Some of my fondest memories at that particular job were the mornings after Lost where we gathered around to discuss what happened and in some cases, explain to each other what we missed.  As the presenter of last night’s panel remarked, “we were all so innocent then.”  And it’s true.  We weren’t talking about candidates and time travel and constants.  Instead we were trying to convince someone that there weren’t dinosaurs making that noise in the jungle.  We were trying to figure out why there was a polar bear on a tropical island. And just what in the hell is in that hatch.

We’ve come a long, long way since then, baby, and we’ve still got a little bit more to go.  With every week, we get closer and closer to getting all (some?) of the answers we’ve been looking for and to a world without Lost.  It’s bittersweet for me and many people I know who view the show every week so I can only imagine what it must be like for the cast and crew and especially the creators who have all poured their hearts and souls into making such compelling television.

In fact, that was kind of the theme of the evening last night at the Saban Theatre in Beverly Hills as both cast and crew at often times seemed a little bit sad at having to say goodbye to the island of mystery we’ve all watched for six seasons now.  There was an especially poignant moment when they were asked by the moderator to name their favorite moment on the show – something you would presume might be in-character (at least that’s what the moderator was looking for, I think) and almost all of them were talking about little things, little moments that they shared when the camera stopped rolling.  Whether it was Terry O’Quinn smiling and laughing as he talked about Jorge Garcia (Hurley) singing Elvis’ “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” during a break in filming or Nestor Carbonell (Richard Alpert) talking about Michael Emerson (Ben) always having an umbrella with him during filming – it was the little things that made the actors and crew smile and made the PaleyFest record 1900+ fans in the crowd laugh right along with them.

Of course, there was the dirt.  Everyone wanted the dirt.  We all knew going in that we couldn’t get much and that we shouldn’t expect it.  As someone who has seen Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof do this kind of panel a few times now, I knew not to have my hopes up.  But in the end, there was just enough to whet our appetites but leave us wanting more.

Here’s some of what we got:

 

• We may find out why the bird said Hurley’s name
• We may see Walt once again
• We WILL see Charlie again – and Vincent the dog too!
• Jacob WAS telling the truth that someone is coming to the island
• We WILL find out if Desmond was really on the plane this season
• We WILL learn more about Hurley and Libby
• Jack is married to someone in the new timeline that we’ve seen before
• Richard and Ilana will have words to share soon
• And a big no comment to us finding out why women can’t have babies on the island

 

We also got some insights into the creative process involved with other executive producers and writers on the stage as well talking about the art of breaking the show and directing it.  We heard discussions of set design and visual effects.  We heard a lot about the actors being given very little information and having to play the words on the page as they are written – something that all four actors seemed nervous about and uncomfortable with at first but grew to find liberating.  

There was talk (sarcastically) of a Lost attraction taking over Tom Sawyer Island at Disney World.  There were your typical uncomfortable questions from a Q&A – mostly a very accusatory toned query about the lack of LGBT characters on the show.  And while Carlton and Damon are the faces of the Lost creative team, it was producer/writer Adam Horowitz last night who often left us in stitches with his amusing banter with… just about everyone.  After hearing Adam talk, it became more obvious than ever why Lost is also so damn funny at times.  

There was the obligatory Star Wars reference when the last question of the night from the crowd asked if the writers have “daddy issues.”  Lindelof mentioned that so many of them have Star Wars as their main creative influence which is a story of the “ultimate daddy issues.”  

And in the end, there were two things that really stuck in my head and left me pondering.

Carlton and Damon made it very clear that they do not plan on commenting on the series finale after it airs. They expressed the desire to see Lost live on in an almost organic sense where the fans will continue to discuss and ponder it for long after it’s gone.  They seem to not feel the need to explain exactly what they meant by every seen – perhaps having seen what Ron Moore went through last year helped them make that decision.

And when asked for one word to describe the three episodes of the show that have yet to been filmed?

“Water.”

And Lindelof was serious when he said it.

At the end of it all, it was a fun-filled night and completely worth the time and effort to get to Beverly Hills for the show.  It was the first year in this new venue and while I greatly missed the convenience of the event being at the ArcLight, I can understand the desire for a bigger venue after consecutive years of near sell-outs across the board.  They have had trouble moving tickets for a few of the events on this year’s slate though so you have to wonder if maybe they went “too big.”

Ultimately, it didn’t matter on this night as we got to enjoy one more night of poking and prodding the creative team, the forces behind the show, and the actors that bring life to some of our favorite characters before the show slips away from us later this year.

I still feel that bond to Lost – that need to defend it even when it seems indefensible.  I still feel “the buzz” of knowing I have it to look forward to every Tuesday night – that little shiver of excitement just before it comes on.  I’ll be sad when it’s gone – just as I was for Battlestar, just as I was for The Shield – but part of me knows it’s time and a bigger part of me knows that in order for the show to finally get us where they’ve wanted us to go all along, it needs to come to an end.  I’m just glad we’ve gotten six seasons of amazing television to get us there and I’m especially glad I got one more night last night to enjoy being a part in-person of that quirky, obsessed, yet oh-so-fun Cult Of Lost.

Tune in later this week (hopefully Friday) for my review of Thursday night’s panel on Dexter.

 

Blue’s Reviews: The First Episode Of WWE NXT

In all honesty, if you eliminate the January 4th WWE/TNA throwdown from the competition, I can not remember the last time a wrestling show was so eagerly anticipated on the Internet than last night’s debut episode of NXT.  It’s probably the return of ECW to television.

And you know what?  It was well worth the anticipation.

It wasn’t perfect.  It was nowhere near perfect, in fact.  But what it was was something a little bit different.  A little bit fresh.  And a little bit of breaking the mold of what we’re using to seeing on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays.

Wow, there’s a lot of wrestling on TV now.

Ahem… back to the point…

What did I like?  

I liked Daniel Bryan and the Miz… every friggin’ second of it.  I liked “you tap or you snap.”  I liked a WWE crowd starting to get behind a short, pale guy who they had no idea who he was.  I liked the WWE putting over someone for something they did outside of the WWE.  I liked a new guy getting a Main Event against the World Champ… and actually looking good in it.

I liked Michael Tarver and his MMA gimmick.  More importantly, I liked his promo where he talked about his background.  Heck, I liked ALL of those promos where they gave us a crash course in knowing who these characters were before they hit the ring.  They could take a lesson from this and use these mini-promos on new guys they debut on Raw and Smackdown as well.   Tarver didn’t look like he had a ton in the ring but he might just have been nervous.  I liked the way he carried himself though both on the mic and in the ring and with a little seasoning, he could be damn good.

I liked the announcing.  Matt Striker as an in-your-face backstage announcer getting reactions was awesome and a perfect use of him.  Michael Cole found his niche as a dick who hates the Internet.  Say what you want about it being over-the-top but it’s far better than the guy on Raw that I’d have to check for a pulse to see if he was even alive while talking.  And I really like Josh Matthews and I’m happy he still has a job with ECW going under.

I liked the way the show looked with the different camera angles.  It was just… different… and felt that way.  It’s probably the kind of thing that TNA should have tried on January 4th.

I liked David Otunga doing the EXACT gimmick that I thought he should do – Mr. Jennifer Hudson.  He was gold on the mic… but again, not so hot in the ring.  I’m going to chalk this week up to nerves though and hope we get something better next time out.

What didn’t I like?

I wasn’t fond of Tarver losing to Christian already.  With the MMA gimmick, he seemed like he might get over with a few wins under his belt.  I would have preferred to see him in a squash.  Also, I would have liked to see more out of Heath Slater to see what he’s got.  I think I dig him but I’m not sold yet.  On the same note, Carlito did nothing for me as a Pro and I think it’s a waste of a spot.

CM Punk’s “rookie” Darren Young didn’t get to show anything but his hair… which may have been the idea. Oh, and add Punk’s reaction to Young under the “what I liked” column.  For some reason, when I heard about this concept, I thought we’d get less of their characters and more of the guy behind the characters when it comes to the Pros.  So, I never imagined Punk would show up with the Straight Edge Society and be annoyed that he had to be there.  It was perfect.

I understand the need to not overwhelm the viewer on the first show so I’m not as mad as others seem to be about the lack of description of the show’s “purpose.”  Of course, eventually we need to know how someone “wins”… how someone’s “eliminated”… the usual reality show stuff.  But I don’t need to know it immediately.  For me, getting to see new blood and even more, getting to see Daniel Bryan, one of my favorite wrestlers on the planet, taking on Chris Jericho, one of my favorite wrestlers on the planet, in the American Dragon’s first night on television?

Yeah, I’ll take that.

And I can’t wait to see what happens NXT.

…

Sorry… had to do it.