I've been using this trial to try to get through as much ECW as possible. I just watch promos/angles and match finishes, so I can get through most eps of TV in 10-15 minutes. I do watch the PPVs in full. Some thoughts up to Wrestlepalooza 1998:
The Raven/Dreamer angle is easily the worst of all the major ECW storylines. I have no idea why it was ever held in any regard. It's complete cartoony nonsense that would have been utterly savaged by that audience if it was on Raw or Nitro. It stands out because most every angle in ECW that came before and after it is fairly organic and start in the ring. Then here comes Johnny Polo with an intentionally affected gimmick who is mad about something that happened at summer camp when he was 12 and features fake pregnancies, lesbianism, and regular motivation changes. It's actually quite telling that the side feuds that happened in the middle of this angle are actually far better and more heated than the main angle itself. Dreamer vs Brian Lee is far more of a blood feud, and Raven/Sandman gets far more personal and violent than Tommy/Raven ever gets. Dreamer gets into a feud with Louie Spicolli around this time because he was so annoyed with Louie too sweeting too much and it's better than Raven/Dreamer
Paul E. being able to write a legacy that he made a bunch of stars seeing things in people no one else did is some real horseshit. From day one, even before Paul came in, the company was always supported by established names to bring in the fans. Once they picked up some momentum, Paul was able to use his contacts in the business to get a lot of guys to work as a favor to him, and once they got to that point it was the purgatory between WWF and WCW. I'd say by 1995 at the latest it was basically a mix of early era TNA and current era PWG, a place for guys between the majors stopping by to slum it up until they can get on their feet and where hot "indie" names got booked and ECW got to take credit for them before one of the bigger companies scooped them up. The actual list of ECW "stars" that Heyman can take credit for is exceedingly short: Taz, Dreamer, Sandman, Rhyno, Steve Corino....that's pretty much it.
Taz's most miserable man gimmick is actually pretty great, I feel a kinship to it, and it's 100% consistent no matter what happens, but he gets so exposed in matches that go more than 5 minutes.
Every PPV through the first five completely shit the bed, some for the entire show like Hardcore Heaven 1997, some for just a few of the marquee matches. Every match with Shane Douglas on PPV has been dreadful, Taz vs Sabu was a huge let down, the Sabu/Sandman matches are absolute disasters, Sabu vs RVD was nonstop botching, every show has to have a big swerve even if it doesn't make any sense. It's really amazing how consistently and regularly major PPV spots end up failing completely. Probably the worst/best one being the main event SWERVE at Living Dangerously 1998 that has to be seen to be believed.
Shane Douglas was already breaking down before he even left to the WWF, then while there had a back injury that Vince thought he was lying about and got him fired, then he returns to ECW and pretty obviously gets on the gas and the injuries just keep piling up. He has a chronic arm injury that keeps popping up since around the middle of 1994, they have him drop the TV title so he can get some rest...then put the world title on him a few months later, and by the middle of 1998 he's got a broken elbow, torn whatever, broken face, broken palate, and they won't take the title off of him despite clearly not being able to work.
By mid 1997 or so they get really bad at ending storylines. All of them either just fizzle out and fade away or have a disappointing blow off that is immediately ignored and moved on from to start the next angle. Some of this is because of guys leaving to WCW or WWF in the middle of an angle, but more often than not there just wasn't anything planned out and when Paul or the fans got tired of something they'd just kind of drop it and move on. Examples: Raven vs Dreamer had a year of feuding with Raven always winning, it got dropped for like 6 months, after it was announced Raven was going to WCW they do a loser leaves town match, Dreamer wins...immediately the lights go out and the WWF invasion with Jerry Lawler starts, Raven vanishes from the ring during one of the blackouts and that's that. Sandman vs Raven ends with Sandman getting his kid back and Raven winning what seemed like 8 TV matches in a row. Sabu vs Sandman is 5 months of Sabu beating Sandman every time in every kind of gimmick match. Sabu vs Taz was one of if not the biggest feud for 2 years, they do a disappointing PPV match, a TV rematch, Sabu then moves on to be a WWF invader and Taz moves on to the TV title. Anything with Terry Funk has no real ending because he was frequently in and out.
Letting these great names like Malenko, Guerrero, Mysterio, Benoit, Psychosis have 30 minutes to do whatever they want almost always led to never ending dull as hell matches with no flow, no story, no storyline, just "great matches" that weren't nearly as good or entertaining as the 5-10 minute matches the same names were having on Nitro/Saturday Night/Thunder that had some, even most minor, of purposes to them. The only time this kind of thing worked was with Sabu vs RVD series in 1996, because they were crazy and coming up with shit that only they could possibly come up with. Dean and Eddie would chain wrestle for 6 minutes, do some twisty head scissors or power bomb, then do a few stand offs, then back to chain wrestling for a half hour.
Joey Styles was fucking terrible. For all the wild shit he talked about WWF and WCW announcers for making jokes and not knowing names of holds, he'd constantly make shitty jokes and make up or misname moves. The first Rey/Psychosis match started with him making a Taco Bell joke and proceeding to not know the name of any of the moves. Everything ended up being a "one and a half into a xxx" or "Name of Wrestler Driver/Bomb". Having to constantly involve him in angles with his terrible angry or exasperated acting, constant smarky bullshit. I'll take WWE video game commentary over this fuck.
They spend more time sucking their own dicks about how popular they're getting than anything else. WWE took the same approach with NXT once they started touring and it worked for them just the same nearly 20 years later.
The Tommy Rich/Guido/Tracy Smothers version of the FBI is
and probably the most entertaining act in all of ECW for its entire existence.
