First, this happened on RAW (From WWE.com):
Paul Heyman addressed The Undertaker
Give Paul Heyman credit: When The Undertaker isn’t in the building, the advocate for The Beast Incarnate Brock Lesnar can talk a pretty good game. Without The Phenom himself looming in the ring, the mad scientist had all the room he needed to prophecy the downfall of The Undertaker’s fabled Streak at Lesnar’s hands, using Lesnar’s record against The Deadman’s previous WrestleMania opponents as evidence. “I know it’s an uncomfortable thought,” said Heyman, “But on April 6, The Undertaker and The Undertaker’s Streak will rest in peace.”
And then we all heard ‘Taker would be addressing this on Main Event. Say what?
Okay then, again from WWE.com:
WWE Main Event Results: Promising to slay The Beast at WrestleMania, The Undertaker declared he’ll be coming for Brock on Raw
The Undertaker sent frightening message to Brock Lesnar
Before The Demon of Death Valley appeared on WWE Main Event, a reluctant Paul Heyman journeyed to the empty ring, delivering a message from his client, Brock Lesnar, that The Streak will definitively come to an end at the hands of The Beast Incarnate.
However, moments after the portentous gong rang through the arena, The Phenom surprised The Mad Scientist, appearing from nowhere to bring Heyman to his knees and delivering a message of his own – that he would “slay the Beast” on The Grandest Stage of Them All. He also made it clear that he would deliver that message personally this Monday on Raw.
Now, for those wondering why on earth this happened on Main Event, and not on RAW when ‘Taker was actually there (it was practically in his backyard, of course he was gonna be there!) and appeared to team up with John Cena in a dark match after the broadcast … oh, you didn’t know about this? Allow me to share!
Anyway, why push this to Main Event? My theory – to “encourage” more people to sign up for the WWE Network. You know, beyond that whole “one week free!” dangling carrot.
Now, I have heard that when you sign up for the one free week, you have to provide your credit card details anyway, so it’s not exactly a “try us for a week, for free, and then if you like it, you can sign up and pay” deal. More like you’re getting six months with an extra week tossed in for nothing.
Ah, guys? Given it’s $9.95 a month, that’s not exactly a big sweetener. So I suspect a bunch of folks have gone to sign up, been asked for credit card details and said, in effect, fuck that and not gone ahead.
I mean, why would you? The bloody thing’s apparently hardly working anyway. They keep yanking content down – the official word is to “fix music or audio issues”, but more than likely it’s because they forgot it’s got something controversial in it and no longer want it seen.
There was a statement from WWE a few weeks back about the ongoing issues which said:
“Notwithstanding the overwhelmingly positive response to WWE Network, we want to ensure subscribers have the highest-quality experience watching WrestleMania 30 and all our programming, and thus have put in place significant quality assurances. These steps include increased capacity to handle high volumes of transactions, logins, and concurrent live streams, daily ‘stress’ testing of all systems over an extended period, and the addition of technology experts to review our plan and procedures. We’re confident that we’ll be ready on Sunday, April 6.”
In other words, don’t bet on being able to see WrestleMania 30 live streaming on the WWE Network.
So in order to bolster the flagging or non-existent interest in the WWE Network, they’ve tossed one of their biggest drawcards onto a show that is now only seen on the Network. Except for us Aussies, where we still get it on TV. Yeah, way to go there, WWE – you rock. Not.
Undertaker 18 March 2014 – Main Event Photos
So again, we get Heyman out running his gums first, and then ‘Taker does his “appear in the ring out of darkness” fake-out entrance. Honestly never gonna get tired of that!
Still wearing the “RIP PB” tights – I like that.
As for Paul E. grabbing his chest like that? Yeah, I’d do it too if I turned around and saw that big luscious hunk of manflesh looming over me. Probably for different reasons though! 😉
And yep, might not take me long to be on my knees either!
Too much information? 😉
So yeah, WWE digitals totally suck balls (Hello? If ‘Taker is such a huge drawcard, how come you can only come up with three digitals?), so I snagged these next three from Facebook 😉
Awesome close-up screengrab of an angry Deadman!
Ahhh, if they’re going to zoom in that close, ‘Taker needs to be touching up the beard re-growth a little more often! 😉
{I totally understand, white hair re-growth used to be the bane of my freakin’ existence until I stopped colouring that segment of my hair. One of things we redheads have – yeah, we go white rather than grey – and you would not believe the number of people who refuse to believe my white hair locks are Mother Nature rather than a talented colourist. But generally our hair also grows faster, so re-growth is a maintenance nightmare. #GingerProblems 😉 }
However, I can overlook the beard re-growth issue because it appears that there’s chest hair there! (Or it’s just funky lighting.)
Either way, man’s looking just fucking fine!
(This one’s from the WWE’s Official Facebook page.)
Yep, really looking like there’s chest hair there – me likes!
Back to WWE’s pitiful digitals for this last one, which is of course an iconic image.
WWE.com at lease has video here and holy crap, take that puppy full screen and yep, the ‘Taker’s got himself one hairy chest there!
God love him, I do love chest hair on a man!
(I would have grabbed a screenshot but I was too busy drooling!)
Oh, and thanks for the heads up, ‘Taker – we’ll all be watching RAW on Monday to see what happens next! (Hint: It will involve Heyman on the mic, not Bork. That’s my bet anyway!)
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The Brothers of Destruction 