Thread for the Netflix series

Seriously watch it. It’s good

Will have to re-sub to Netflix for this.

How much new stuff is there for well-versed wrestling fans? I imagine this thing is pointed more toward casual viewers.

I'm a few episodes in.

I don't understand this whole Wendy Richter supposed screwjob that came up here and also in a DSOTR episode. It looks like such an obvious work, and it looks like they're Kayfabe-ing and pretending that that was also a screwjob...it was even more obvious and annoying to watch in the DSOTR episode.

You can even watch the match on youtube, after the supposed screwjob, the 2 women continue to work together. Worked punches, worked kicks, lifts, etc. The whole thing is a joke who are they trying to fool?

I'm 3 episodes in, and I'd say the answer to this is "very, very little".

Ya there’s nothing earth shattering to an invested wrestling fan whose head wasn’t buried in the sand, but I still found it compelling as ****

First 4 eps are nothing new and the same rise of wwe story they’ve been telling for years.
I found eps 5&6 interesting and enjoyed those the most

It was mostly well made, and I wasn't ever bored, but it was almost entirely just a nostalgia trip.

Biggest revelation to me was that apparently Steve Austin "doesn't believe" in CTE.

To any non wrestling fan who watches this, I imagine some stuff can be pretty misleading. They'll often say something that seems to be about real life stuff, and then show footage of "theatrical wrestling work." Or sometimes they'll talk about a character and then show a clip that doesn't necessarily tie in right. For example, people talk about The Rock's initial baby face push not working, and then show crowds chanting "Rocky Sucks". I could be wrong, but I really don't think crowds actually ever chanted this when he was in his babyface push, they just werent excited about him. Crowds are generally too dumb to do stuff like that. They all just mark out and cheer for whoever the babyface is and root against whoever the villain is even when the villains are awesome.

Sometimes of course the blurred lines of wrestling are very blurry. For example, the Trish Stratus bark like a dog scene. If a scene like that happened in a movie or TV show, nobody would make any issue of it. I actually gain respect for Trish because she doesn't make a big deal out of it or say she was any sort of victim. But what makes the scene interesting that in real life he is not only her boss but also a major creative source involved in the show. He wanted to go out there and do that scene in from of thousands of people (and millions on TV). That's very odd.

But I enjoyed it. Could've been 20 episodes there's so much interesting history.

I also think that in an interview of this series Bret Hart makes some comments that make it sound like he took steroids. Not a direct admission, but a line that seems to say "we were all doing it." I have never seen him make a direct admission of this, its not the way he brands himself. When you see pictures of his young physique it seems pretty unlikely he was natural when he was bigger as a star. But he always had a physique that was far more believable as possibly natural than guys like Hogan or Luger or Warrior. or Sid

I watched wrestling regularly pretty much only from 1997-2000 but I've always enjoyed learning the broader stories and seeing key matches outside that era.