Yeah, my twitter was crammed with a bunch of people who only watch WrestleMania, and they seemed to love the show. And I'm just over here rage tweeting.

If the only fans that hate it are the IWC and those in attendance, does that mean Reigns is actually near-universally loved?

It's actually pretty funny to think of a relatively small group of 50,000 angry smarks just going around packing every arena in the country while tens of millions of really happy casual fans sit there watching TV in total confusion about why the **** every crowd is just packed to the gills with huge jerks.

Pretty sure that's what Dids thinks is actually happening.

People who watch Wrestlemania only and don't bother the rest of the year probably just watch it for the spectacle, like a giant Super Bowl halftime show. They obviously don't care about stories or character development or building stars because they don't watch any of that stuff.

From Meltzer:

WrestleMania 32 Fallout

Undertaker was selling people that last night was his final match, even though he's booked in tag matches on the European tour. We'll try and get more clarification on that but it is said that's why he left his gloves in the ring. It was also noted that many years after WrestleMania he says it's his last match and comes back the next year.

The number of people in the building legitimately was 97,769, or more than the 93,000 plus that was believed to have been the total last night. I'm not sure how many events have claimed 100,000 in the stadium but legitimately there have only been a few as this was one of the largest legitimate crowds in the history of AT&T Stadium (wrestling is far from the only people who exaggerate numbers). WWE announced 101,763 as the attendance and a $17.3 million gate. The gate is either accurate or very close to it. Lots of standing room tickets were sold the day of the show and they used a smaller stage so opened up a lot of seating in the last week. The walkup was huge as building officials were expecting 89,000. As noted, there were all kinds of problems getting into the stadium last night because of the wireless being down and they couldn't scan tickets. A lot of people who came early missed one to three matches but the place was packed by the time of the PPV.

It appears based on odds swings that most of the finishes were finalized on Saturday, at least when it came to the ladder match with all the betting on Zack Ryder. Charlotte winning was known before the show, but it had changed at one point from Sasha Banks.

No serious injuries at last night's show, even though there were some serious injury risks.

Google searches for WrestleMania were 2 million, which would be above anything in UFC except a Ronda Rousey or Conor McGregor headlined show. It was second yesterday behind Walking Dead searches. Shane McMahon was the most searched individual with 200,000.

And a suplex counter.

In hindsight, just knowing the top two billed matches were Shane McMahon vs undertaker, and triple h vs Roman Reigns should have led all viewers to expect total suckiness

I guess the surprise though, is that everything else on the card sucked too, for the most part.

What's probably the worst part about this Mania is it's hard to see any really promising stories on the horizon. I'm reading last year's thread and Rollins winning instantly set up like four different feuds, but the aftermath of this show is ????

I guess that's a cost of having so many random part-timers who just go home after Mania.

97.7k is still hugely impressive. It's a credit to them that they only had to exaggerate < 4k people for their fixed number. I really didn't think they'd do it after drawing a legit 65k last year. Never underestimate how many people are suckers to *make history ".

The draw of Wrestlemania, is Wrestlemania. That's what Vince has always wanted (both for Wrestlemania and WWE in its entirety). People go, because it's Wrestlemania. Don't really think making history has much to do with it at this point, it just happens to be a huge venue.

Also, +1 to closing the wrestling forum. It's time.

Next day random thoughts:

- I wouldn't really call it a trend anymore. It's more just the way it is now. But once again we were shown that part timers from the glory days are way more important on the show that any concern about making new stars. We've talked about the Rock/HBK/Foley/Austin moments, but how about the fact that there was a match which had an entire build up for a match about someone willing to go through hell to stop an unstoppable monster. That they would take an insane beating and just getting back up. that you would have to kill them to keep them down. And his match ended after one F5 while 40 something Shane got the spot of "I just got my ass beat but I'm going to be defiant and ask if that's all you got". That's just insane to me. I also love Shane, he's a crazy bastard, so I hate bitching about something he did. But man isn't that spot a lot better with Ambrose saying it to Brock?

- Regardless of any disappointment, there are some really neat things that happened big picture wise. There's a photo of Generico and Steen on top of a ladder in what looks like the living room of a damn retirement home. Then you put it next to Owens and Zayn staring down each other in front of 93 thousand (literally!) people cheering for it. That is an amazing journey and an amazing moment.

- The entire PPV seemed to be designed to beat fans into submission into cheering Reigns, which sounds silly but I think is actually possible. Every heel won with the exception of Ryder, and while it was a nice surprise the real face there was Sami.

why close the forum, a lot of us quite enjoy bull****ting with each other, and I know the forum is what kept me from quitting full time when I stopped for 6 weeks around fastlane last year.

I'm not sure why we'd close the forum. Lots of us have fun with each other and wouldn't without the forum. Not like it's taking valuable space.

My point was that they didn't sell out last night ear and exaggerated the real attendance by 20k. They got 30k more people yesterday. I think a lot came to just make history by being part of a huge attendance. Perhaps I'm wrong.

Closing the forum is a terrible idea

and this is where they ended up (couldnt find a pic of their staredown all alone in the ring, but this is crowd at least)

That's awesome man!

I stole this sequence from maffew, thought it was better since Jim's second pic doesn't even have Owens in it. :P

I only watch 2 PPVs a year and I enjoyed it, marked out at least 3-4 times (glass shattering, shane's spot, ladder spot, charlotte's moonsault), has some legits lols (e.g. hhh's entrance) However I fast forwarded through several parts, e.g. the majority of the ME until the big spots started.

I had as positives: ladder match good, women's match good, shane taker worth it for the jump, nostalgia segments fine, production value (pyro, video promos) good, I might forget some.

I guess not being invested in the characters was a good thing. Of course even for me some booking decisions were cringeworthy, like Jerichold winning, but I don't care so whatever.

edit: Compared to recent WMs, it was definitely bad. But I still enjoyed it.

Enjoyed the ladder match and the women's match. Isn't Ryder winning the IC title a reward for him. Like Kane and Foley winning the world title. Reward as in, being with the company for so long and always doing stuff for them etc.

Maybe it is a reward for him for being with the company for so long and doing his job. But if so, it is sad that the Intercontinental title has descended to gold watch for company service level given where it once was.

Foley was legit a great all around performer, in the ring, on the mic, as a character. Ryder isn't a good wrestler or promo.

Why would we close the forum because WWE put on a ****ty show? The active product is just a percentage of the stuff that goes on around here.

I apologize, shouldn't have posted that, I was clearly wrong.

All good, After reading and posting in here I saw the related posts in the "Viewing" thread and I can see where where you (and others) were coming from. Was actually coming back here to post that.

This. Except the god part.