Everybody loves binary decisions, especially wrestling fans! In This Or That, we’ve forced ourselves to choose between two options that relate to wrestling.
Over four questions, @TimWelcomed, @typicalROHfan and @TomBlackett will have to choose one of two options and give their reasoning on each of their choices. You can then vote on which one you’d choose, giving you the false impression that you’re somehow involved and we care about your opinion chance to join the conversation!
Before we start, here’s last week‘s results:
Who will be WWE Champion by the end of Elimination Chamber?
Randy Orton – 56%, Anyone else – 44% (You voted correctly)
Who gets the bigger return pop?
Hulk Hogan – 54%, Undertaker – 46% (You voted incorrectly)
Who appears on RAW first in 2014?
Sami Zayn – 72%, Evan Bourne – 28%
Cooler sports feat to accomplish?
Hit a Home Run in a MLB game – 63%, Slam dunk in a NBA game – 37%
More likely to main event Wrestlemania 30: Triple H vs. Daniel Bryan or Undertaker vs. Brock Lesnar?
We can all agree that Batista vs. Randy Orton does not currently seem like a viable option
Tim:
Every time I have to think about the Wrestlemania card, my eye twitches. I honestly see Triple H going over Bryan here and I doubt they’ll let that end the show (and they sure as hell would be asking for a horrible ending if they let Orton vs Batista round it out) so I can see Wrestlemania 30 ending with The Undertaker’s streak being retained.
It’s probably for the best since they are sticking to their guns unless they decide to add a stipulation where if Bryan beats Triple H he can be in the title match with Orton and Batista, which is highly unlikely. To me the story was always about Bryan getting the belt and that would make him the “face of the company.” Triple H was just one person in the way and not the endgame. Not saying it is the endgame but it just seems like the natural time to pull the trigger on Daniel Bryan’s big title win. I can’t believe they are going to ignore something so organic. It’s just doesn’t sit right with me at all. Anyway, Lesnar and Undertaker will probably have a compelling-for-WWE-in-2014 build-up and an okay match.
Brock Lesnar vs. The Undertaker
typicalROHfan:
All alone in the boat excited for Triple H vs. Daniel Bryan, I am! To be fair, I’m not necessarily excited but I think it’s the right main event at this point. As much as it sucks to say for those of us who miss the days of valued titles, I view Daniel Bryan beating Triple H to close Wrestlemania 30 as a bigger moment than if he were to beat Randy Orton for the Championship.
My main complaint from Elimination Chamber is that Kane has been doing the dirty work for Hunter and crew thus taking away a bit of the effect. WWE showed fans looking as apathetic as ever to end the show in a way to portray this story, unfortunately rightfully so. If going this route, why not have Triple H flat out come out and give the Pedigree shades of Summerslam?
All that aside, I understand the reputation and believe it but beating Bryan would be an absolute new low for Triple H. I refuse to believe they are that ridiculous with their mindsets in WWE. Bryan closing out Wrestlemania by slaying HHH is the main event that will and in my mind needs to happen.
Daniel Bryan vs. Triple H
Tom:
The idea of Batista and Orton headlining Wrestlemania is just incredible. Like, I can’t even imagine how vicious it would get, so I’d be fascinated to see it end the show. However, if WWE has any sense whatsover, it doesn’t seem like they’ll go that way. As far as what would be more likely to main event… it’s tough to say.
It does seem like being ‘the face of the WWE’ has become more prestigious a prize than holding the title, so I could buy Bryan getting a win over Triple H and 80,000 people doing the yes chant to close out the show, but it seems more likely that they’ll go with the streak being retained to send people home happy. I can also imagine the argument being made for the streak to main event over the title because there is some precedent to it, whereas I think Triple H might be hesitant to place himself in the main event (regardless of how much he might want to).
Brock vs. Undertaker
[poll id=”54″]
Bigger WWE Network sell: The library of WCW/ECW PPVs or being able to watch live WWE PPVs?
Two of the main selling points of the WWE Network, which is a bigger buy for you?
Tim:
I’ll definitely say the WCW/ECW PPV library once those start working well for me but until then the live PPVs for $9.99 a month is more than worth the price… well, maybe.
Live WWE PPVs
typicalROHfan:
This may be horrible to say but I’m saying it anyway! The only aspect of live PPVs that is truly appealing to me most shows is bullshitting around on Twitter. It’s fun to make jokes and observations about wrestling with similar minded folks while not wearing pants in the comfort of your own home! Sure, there’s some great matches but those are easy to find elsewhere.
The ability to find any WCW or ECW show you want to watch at any point with little to no effort or time searching and downloading is a bigger sell for me. I can quit watching live shows any time I need or want to but I’ll never break the spell of the ghost of wrestling past. Of both those things, give me the old stuff.
WCW and ECW PPVs
Tom:
It’s kind of difficult to comment objectively on this because my experience with watching old shows on the WWE Network has been a little frustrating (which I think has been pretty common amongst most people). I’ve started watching a bunch of old ECW and WCW shows, but they always end up crapping out on me before I can get more than five or ten minutes in.
If they had it working as well as something like Netflix and skipping through shows to get straight to specific matches worked perfectly, then I’d love that. Until that’s feasible, it is really the live WWE PPVs that I’m looking forward to. Watching wrestling is just so much more fun when it’s done as a shared experience, so even if the future PPVs aren’t great, I’m still looking forward to seeing them (assuming they actually work).
Live WWE PPVs
More sex appeal: Roman Reigns or Dean Ambrose?
A question submitted by reader of the site, @WrestlingFanRJ! Reigns and Ambrose have become the two stand-out sex icons from The Shield, but who does it most for you?
Also, if you have any This Or That suggestions of your own, we want to hear them! Just post them in the comments section or on Twitter.
Tim:
I have somewhat of an unpopular opinion when it comes to Roman Reigns and I’ve always been a Dean Ambrose guy, myself. I think it is something about his voice. More Leather Jacket Ambrose, please.
Dean Ambrose
typicalROHfan:
Boo to you all. Booooo! It’s clearly Seth Rollins but since he isn’t part of this, I think it’s because we all know he’s most sexy and the other two wouldn’t have a chance.
I honestly don’t rank either that high on my subjective sexy wrestler scale. At the end of the day, it comes down to one thing. Which is less grating – The sight of Roman Reigns tattoo or the sound of Dean Ambrose’s voice?
Roman Reigns
Tom:
Honestly, if you had told me when they’d debuted that Seth Rollins is the one who’d be largely forgotten about when it came to people choosing their Shield sex icon, I would have been surprised. However, both Ambrose and Reigns do have an undeniable magnetism, despite being almost complete opposites. I think Meghan Lovell aka SailorSwayze (who we’ve previously featured on the site in Art Is Wrestling and in a 4 On 4) summed up their appeal best in this cartoon:
For me, Reigns is really pretty hard to beat. I can understand Ambrose’s bad boy charm, but there’s a creepy edge to him that I can’t get on board with. Also, my wife (aka Sydney of Wrestling With Food fame) has taken to calling him ‘old, fat Ambrose’, despite the fact that he’s neither of those things – he just seems to have a very middle-aged soul. Like, even though I can clearly see that he’s in good shape under that shirt (I study VERY closely), I’d be disappointed if a pasty beer belly didn’t spill out when he pulled it off.
Roman Reigns
[poll id=”56″]
Better sitcom: Friends or Seinfeld?
Remember the 90’s? These were the biggest sitcoms at the time.
Tim:
Oh man. I just finished up a run through of Seinfeld last week. It is one of the best shows ever, without a doubt. Friends gets a lot of undeserved hate and will always be in my top five right along with Seinfeld. Every episode of both shows have at least one incredible moment you’ll recognize the episode for. Friends is so entertaining to me that it’s one of the few shows that I’ll look over the continuity errors for.
I can always watch reruns of both shows and not get tired of them. Both have characters that I love but when it comes down to it I have to go with Friends because they have some main characters that are actually likable. I love Seinfeld for it, but I like it in a “Jerry, you’re a douche,” “Elaine, you’re pretentious,” “George, you are an ass and are embarrassing me in an unfathomable way” way.
It’s part of it’s charm that everyone is awful and… my argument can’t really hold up as I love both of these shows a lot and maybe Friends is the lesser of the too because Seinfeld really is something extremely original and strange but… ummm… so what I’m really trying to say is: At the end of the day I can’t put a show that has the lovely Chandler Muriel Bing and the grandest buffoon, Ross Geller, in second place.
I WAS NOT PREPARED FOR THE HARD HITTING QUESTIONS.
Friends
typicalROHfan:
Never in a million lifetimes would my teenage self think I’m giving this answer but I’m going with Seinfeld. I LOVED Friends as a kid into my teen years, especially when watching on syndication and didn’t really get Seinfeld.
Today it’s a bit different. I feel like the Friends model of sitcom humor has been done so much that it’s difficult to watch it as often as I may have in the past. Seinfeld on the other hand, I can watch at literally any time and be entertained.
Also, Seinfeld did a great episode about soup. I love the concept of soup too much to pick against them.
Seinfeld
Tom:
Friends is a weird show. Like… it’s good, but sort of crap with it. It’s craply good. You know? Though, having said that, it is incredibly watchable and before it collapsed in on itself in the last few seasons, it had some genuinely amazing episodes and moments. So maybe it is just properly good? Man, I don’t know.
On the other hand, Seinfeld is really kind of television treasure. It was never such a big deal in the UK, and it would only get played very late at night so it felt like it was a secret thing and that made it even more appealing. Like, I think of it as similar to ECW in some ways because that was another thing which wasn’t easy to find on British TV and you’d have to stay up late to track down. Furthermore, without Seinfeld, you wouldn’t have the Seinfeld2000 Twitter account or this incredible music video that they did:
Seinfeld