Inside The Ropes Can Kiss My Clickbait

Earlier today, I came across this headline on the Inside The Ropes website, which you can check out here:

So you’re reading that headline and you figure, “Oh man. Heartbreaking end of an era? What could that possibly be? No more Hall Of Fame? No more commercials. Going back to smaller arenas? Cutting back on pyro? No chance in hell they’re bringing back the ring carts?” Clearly something terrible must have happened if we’re going to label this as “heartbreaking.” The kind of buzz word that baits people into clicking your articles.

Inside The Rope has a tendency to do this quite a bit, using very vague terms to avoid telling you what the article is all about. “42-Year-Old WWE Star Pooped Their Pants. Blames Tony Khan” or “Former WWE Champion Pissed On Wrong Side Of River” or “38-Year-Old AEW Veteran Gives Dave Meltzer A REDACTED” and so on and so forth. I mean, it’s incredible the lengths these people will go to avoid telling you what the article is about in their headlie.

And so what was this heartbreaking update on a Wrestlemania tradition that spurned curiosity?

Continue reading “Inside The Ropes Can Kiss My Clickbait”

State Of The Blog – Late-March/April 2026

Hey, folks. Normally, I would be posting one of these State Of The Blog things at the beginning of each month (or close to it.) However, I felt the need to sort of do another one because there has been a chance of plans here and there… yeah, I know. You’re as shocked as I am.

Unfortunately, I’ve been under the weather and there have been some real life issues that needed attention. Also, other technical issues and such. So here’s the SOTB for the next six weeks and we’ll do another one in May.

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Review #1293 – Magical Tetris Challenge (Nintendo 64)

After almost three years of untouched and unloved dormancy, Nintendo 64 returns to the spotlight in grand fashion… in the form of a video review spotlighting a Tetris game featuring classic Disney characters. Did you honestly expect anything less?

But if that doesn’t tickle your fancy… No Mercy hits Monday. That’ll be a jam up game.

WCW Monday Nitro (March 11th, 1996) – Not Even Steiner Math Can Save This One

We open today’s edition of WCW Monday Nitro with the Giant NOT making short work of Hacksaw Jim Duggan… because he ain’t doing a job without getting his shit in, tough guy! Hey, at least now I know it’s not just a lack of wanting to put over that German kid Alex Wright in ’99; this was fairly consistent behavior for an otherwise swell guy.

Speaking of Alex Wright, he gets beat by Lex Luger in a thing that happened and Hulk Hogan and his band of merry idiots (the Macho Man and the BOOTY MAN… fucking shoot me) overcome the odds… but the most significant piece of business is the return of the STEINER BROTHERS to WCW, where they have a match with the Road Warriors that turns out to be quite a fun spectacle before Rick eats a spiked weapon from Animal and gets pinned by Hawk. Well, that was odd… but then again, maybe it’s odd now knowing which of these teams stuck around and which didn’t.

Yeah, so other than the one tag match, this Nitro didn’t do much for me… but then again, it’s hard to get excited for this show when we’re building towards one of the most worst WCW PPVs to ever be conceived by human hands: WCW Uncensored 1996.

You know… the one with the Doomsday Cage match.

If you don’t know, here’s a refresher.

Now you do.

Fuck.

COMIC REVIEW – JLA: Act Of God (DC, 2001 3-Issue MiniSeries)

This comic book is a questionable piece of shit… I say questionable because the premise that it presents on paper is intriguing and could serve as a potential dramatic piece, but the execution of that premise ends up making the concept less so.

A three-issue Elseworlds mini-series published in prestige format (fancy cardstock cover and premium paper pages), Act Of God begins with a wave of black light that permanently depowers all the super-powered beings, rendering them normal humanoids or equivalents. That means you get stuff like Superman suddenly acting like a drunkard, Green Lantern obsessing over that guy who beat him up, and other heroes being hopelessly lost before some of them decide to be trained by Batman so that they can keep fighting crime or something. Every affected hero reacts differently to their new circumstance, but most of them react so poorly and their reactions are often in conflict with their traditional portrayals.

Somewhere in the thought process lied an interesting idea that could have developed into an interesting story. What was the cause of this Black Light event that depowered the heroes? How do the heroes cope to their new circumstances? How does this affect the overall power structure and hierarchy? Is this just an Earth thing? There are so many ways you could go with this thing and Act Of God approaches this in the most banal way possible that it almost comes across as parody.

The only real positive to be found is in Dave Ross’ artwork. While there are some panels of questionable quality that might have slipped through the cracks, I thought the art was really well done here. I only wish that it wasn’t tied to three issues of utter rubbish that could have easily been confused for something that was written today.

Absolute garbage. Avoid like the plague.

Review #1292 – Parodius (Famicom)

Yes, we are doing a Parodius game before we’re even sniffing a Gradius game… though it’s not for a lack of trying, let me tell you. But yes, it’s about time we dive into that stash of Famicom carts that I’ve got laying around here and start playing these bloody things for once.’

Been doing some trial runs with adding borders to the NES/Famicom widescreen footage and then I found myself playing a bunch of Parodius and having a blast with it, so I figured why not? Not the first time that I’ve tackled a series out of order, nor will it be the last.

Yes, we’re reshuffling reviews here. A couple changes here and there, but we should be on track… somewhat.

Sunday Gimmick Table #53 – Thirteen Fruits… One Bar… Eh…

One apple and twelve strawberries compressed into one bar… that’s it.
And…?

Another lightweight gimmick table… and this one was filmed some time last year. It’ll be a while before the more interesting stuff comes along, but in the meantime, enjoy these quick food things that won’t last the month.

 

WWE Elimination Chamber 2026

Happy one less hour of Daylight Daylight Savings time for those who follow it. And for those who don’t, I envy you.

A bit of a treat for you folks, as a recent stopover at a friend’s place during the week meant that we were able to watch the Elimination Chamber show from last week because they had a subscription and I don’t. We had very little to say on the show, skipping over most of the in-between stuff and if I’m being honest, I genuinely don’t care about anything that’s happening on this show nor do I particularly care about the road to a Wrestlemania that seems not only to be underperforming, but is also shaping up to be a show that has no potentially interesting match ups. I’ll post some thoughts, but I can sum it up in three words; dull and boring.

I’d normally throw a banner for this thing, but I honestly didn’t care enough about this show to whip one up, so you get mystery box thing instead.

Continue reading “WWE Elimination Chamber 2026”

Review #1291 – City Connection (NES)

The game so awesome it got a video game company named after it… and just for shits and giggles, I’ve even included a mild tribute to a long defunct personality of sorts that has been a frequent subject matter of this webzone years ago. Hope he’s doing well these days.

Honestly, I think this review needed to happen sooner than later and I was surprised that I had never touched this one back in the day considering it was the game being covered.

For those who want to watch the video commentary, you can do so here.