#i write mostly tna

[indirectcomedian]

also for my new followers, i also write! havent written in a bit but if you like niche kayfabe lesbian wrestling fanfic my ao3 name is possvm :)

[amrcnnightmre]

WHO I WRITE FOR!

Hi! this is a space to see who i wrote for & some tid bits on what i prefer & how to request ! <3

As stated in the Info about requests feel absolutely free to ask/inquire & request any wrestler/s that aren’t in my masterlist & I will see what I can do, I really want to write for as many people you all are interested in reading as possible ! 🎀🪄

ALSO! as we know there are handfuls of wrestlers who have been in more than one of the companies I write for so feel free to request for any of the listed wrestlers and any company they were in! but please explicitly state Time frame, era, & their gimmick at the time!

I.e. Jeff Hardy ( TNA antichrist era) x Reader! + a description of what you want the imagine to be about!

OR Jeff Hardy ( 2000s team xtreme ) x Reader!

you get the idea i hope! hehe : ) I love a lot of wrestlers eras & gimmicks across TNA/WWE/AEW so please request for things like that! 🩷

NOTE: I am okay with doing some wrestler x wrestler writing, for example, Jeff Hardy x Trish Stratus ( a personal favourite of mine )

LIST!

WILL UPDATE THIS LIST OFTEN! :)

• Cody Rhodes

• Roman Reigns

• Cm Punk

• Jeff Hardy

• Matt Hardy

• Lita

• Trish Stratus

• Triple H

• Jey Uso

• Edge ( Adam Copeland )

• Christian Cage

• James Storm ( TNA )

• Jon Mosley/Dean Ambrose

• Seth Rollins

• Rhea Ripley

• Liv Morgan

• Zelina Vega

• Dominik Mysterio

• Rey Mysterio ( 2000s mostly )

• MJF

• Will Ospreay

• Jack Perry

• Damien Priest

• Roxanne Perez

• Joe Hendry

• Angelina Love

• Velvet Sky

• Tara/Victoria

• Gail Kim.

• Aj Styles

• Finn Balor

• Hook

• Drew Mcintyre

• Austin Theory

• Grayson Waller

• Uncle Howdy/Bo Dallas

• Randy Orton

• Darby Allen

• Kenny Omega

• LA Knight

• Nick Jackson

• Matt Jackson

• Nic Nemeth/dolph ziggler

• Darby Allen

[edgessunflower]

I have another request for you. It's for "The Queen" Charlotte Flair. You can write whatever you want

Against the odds

Pairing: Charlotte Flair x Fem reader

Description: Charlotte helps you during physical therapy after getting badly injured and the will to get back for Wrestlemania

The past few weeks have been a rollercoaster for you after getting injured during a triple threat match against Bianca Belair and Rhea Ripley for a match against Sasha Banks at Wrestlemania. During the match you jump on the top rope since you were mostly a high flyer going for a corkscrew flip but as you start to jump Becky Lynch comes out of nowhere and shakes the rope making you lunge forward as you start to turn landing on rhea but also in between the barricade and half of a table hearing a crack screaming in pain as rhea quickly turns while lightly squeezing your arm asking if you were okay crying and shaking your head unable to move your leg having to be carried by rhea backstage with a concerned bianca following behind after dealing with becky crying more as you're looked over with rhea holding one hand and Charlotte holding the other before paramedics wheel you off with charlotte and Shotzi going with you while the match finishes with rhea getting the match against sasha. You get many calls and visits from everyone in the hospital after finding that you had fractured your leg but also tore your ACL as you lunged and landed on rhea due to the quick change of the angle when the ropes shook under you, you felt frustrated and depressed knowing that all the hard work and endless nights of stress it had all just went down the drain zoning back from your thoughts to start your physical therapy stopping halfway through not only from the pain but also from the thought of giving up your career after what had happened turning when a hand grabs your own to see charlotte beside you "You can't give up just because of an injury" tears that you held in so long finally poured as charlotte holds in a tight and long hug telling you how far you had come from your start in TNA to NXT and now in WWE for the past four years "You have more heart than anyone I have met and it would kill me to just let you give up" you stare at her before getting up holding her hand as you finished the session even doing extra to make up the little bit of time you lost from not having any will to. The next few weeks are a blur as charlotte is by your side for the rest of your many bouts of physical therapy and rehab on your leg until you were finally given the clear to wrestle having a rematch against rhea and bianca leading to you winning and getting the match with Sasha plus getting a tag team with charlotte and your two friends faced against becky, Sonya Devile, Bayley, and Liv Morgan which was one hell of a match even getting some dirty tactics on becky thanks to the girls distracting the ref and attacking the others before getting a pin and winning becoming women's championship at wrestlemania despite your severe injury and long absence with only a week to prepare for wrestlemania but you flew beyond the odds thanks to help and will from charlotte.

[imtrashraccoon]

Question for all you lovelies...

I'm rather bored at the moment and struggling to make a decision with what project I should focus on (so I don't start a new one lol). I should mention that this poll is mostly to give me some direction and not necessarily what I will end up doing. See below the cut for a run down on each of the options.

The Lavender Den is a causal ask series with my Tumblr sona, Tumble, that I'm trying to keep up with. There isn't really any lore, yet, but anything you lovelies send in could end up in a future installment. I have one ask that I'm still working on so this project wouldn't take long to finish.

Cricket's Backstory (I have yet to name this oneshot) is a bit of a peek into the origins of my fae Sona, Cricket. I've admittedly been struggling with this one because it deals with some darker subjects than anything I have written to date. I have big plans for it but part of me worries it won't turn out as good as what I imagined. This one is something I think I want to sit on a bit longer as I want it to be good.

Skull is something I've been meaning to draw for a while for my fic, Swarmed by Sirens. I previously drew Red and Sans (also the Reader and another secret character...) so I want to draw him as well. He's a cephalopod siren though and the thought of trying to draw all those tentacles is rather daunting. I may just use my drawing tablet rather than my sketchbook to save my sanity. Otherwise, Chapter 4 is done! This could take me a little while to be completely happy with, depending if my perfectionist nature decides to rear it's head or not.

The Hand We've Been Dealt is my first fic and one that's been on hold for a while. I've been meaning to get back into writing it so that I can actually finish another project but I've been busy. Chapter 56 is partially written though so it wouldn't really take much to do.

To Defy A Dream is the Dreamswap oneshot I've teased on here before. It takes place in an alternate universe to The Nightmare of Apathy where Dream and Nightmare have opposite roles. I've written two sections so far but I think this oneshot is too ambitious for my original plans so I don't know when I'll end it just yet. For whatever reason, I struggle with writing Passive Nightmare too. I don't know how much longer this one will take.

The Nightmare of Apathy: Chapter 7 is pretty self-explanatory. I don't think this one is as urgent to finish but I have been excited to write it for months, except now the scene is giving me trouble. Writing each of these chapters can take me around one to two weeks, depending if I get stuck or busy of course.

[sabrinatvband]

Notes on Comic Art #3: Dynamicism [again]

I've recently been devouring Tim Eldred's writings. Eldred is not a very famous artist, but you're almost certainly familiar with his work. He's been a storyboard artist and / or director on Extreme Ghostbusters, Avengers EMH, Teen Titans (2003), and every Spider-Man show beginning with TNAS, as well as many, many other shows.

But before primarily becoming a board artist, Eldred worked in the comics industry. He did a lot of work on anime/manga-inspired comics, and was a staff artist at Malibu Comics for a few years.

One of the many odd-jobs he did in his career was create art for a few of those Christopher Hart "how to draw X" books you've probably seen. Don't worry, Eldred has credibility; he thinks the books are shit and he only accepted the work to make ends meet. But he thinks an example of good comicbook storytelling that he did for one of Hart's books mostly holds up, if you ignore the writing Hart added around his examples.

I recommend you read Eldred's post about this first, and then come back around here to read my own commentary.

An entire book drawn like this first example would eventually start to feel like those comics laid out by Jim Shooter. Shooter's comics are a many notches above this, but the effect of having few dynamics would basically be the same.

Eldred says he constantly saw direct downshots in pages from beginners during portfolio reviews. I don't think Eldred is lying, but the weird thing is that I can't recall ever seeing a direct downshot in a comic. I guess it's because none of those beginners ever got published. Either way, I do agree that it's an awkward, mechanical angle. There might be an occasion where it's the correct choice, but I can't imagine when that might be.

Anyways, Eldred was trying to make a point by having these pages use six panel grids; he's implying they're boring. I think Hamm's rebuttal to this POV is the best one I've ever read:

Varying the size and shape of panels or their points-of-view doesn't "add drama," it adds visual interest. And narrative is more important than visual interest. Some of the most gripping comics have mostly same-sized panels: Watchmen, V, Toth's work, much of Los Bros Hernandez, not to mention most comic strips.

You can also throw in Steve Ditko, Jack Kirby, and many other gold / silver age artists. The Dark Knight Returns is built using a sixteen panel grid.

There are many other things that can be said about this "worst" example, but my final comment is that the first, fourth, and sixth panels of the first page, and the first panel of the second page, are all completely fine. I'd even argue that there's nothing really wrong with the third panel of the second page. The big problem with most of these panels is that they lazily flatten objects that could've had depth, mostly cars, and I don't really see that problem in the ones I mentioned [aside from 1-4, but that's appropriate].

Here's what Eldred calls the "intermediate" example. Something we start to see here is figures breaking out of panels. Once again, Jesse Hamm has something to say:

Panel borders are a symbol that helps the story move swiftly and clearly. Like punctuation. Each time you break them, letting figures or objects jut out of them, you slightly erode their effectiveness. You can break them occasionally to good effect…but broken often, they lose power, and it looks gimmicky. Be judicious!

I think all of the panel breaks across these two pages are not only completely superflous, but they're also actively detrimental to the artwork. Especially the one in the second panel, which makes the left side of that panel feel more tangent-y than it would otherwise.

I have a lot of problems with the following quote from Eldred:

The big panel in the center is what I later learned to call a “three-quarter downshot.” I learned the term once I made the jump into TV animation and found out that (like the direct downshot) it was a common default angle for storyboards. Everyone used it without understanding what a cliche it was. You almost never see it live-action filmmaking, for example. Once it was beaten out of us, we all learned how to find better alternatives. But until you get that training, you just think of it as a helpful way to convey geography.

Once again, I don't doubt that some people in the storyboarding world think that the "three-quarter downshot" is bad. But it's perfectly fine for comics. There are two reasons you don't often see this kind of shot in live action filmmaking:

-It requires either a crane or a cameraman moving onto a building. One of those things is expensive, and both of them eat up a lot of time, which is always in short supply in filmmaking.

-Because live action filmmaking is live action, our eyes are always being bombarded with a lot of information. It takes too much time for a viewer to spot the relevant figure in a three-quarter downshot composition, and so it's mostly useless in live action.

In comics, budget is not a problem, and time works differently so a reader can have a second to discover where the relevant figure is standing. There are some comics, like RoboCop vs The Terminator, that would've been served quite well by a few three-quarter downshots, because they don't do enough to convey geography.

It's worth mentioning that the first example uses 12 panels to convey what the second example conveys in 9. I haven't said it outright yet, but aside from the panel breaking stuff, I do think the second example is better than the first.

Anyways, here's the "advanced" example:

Whenever I see a book dominated by compositions like this, I always make the same mental note: I'm not reading this. The actual mental note is more of a This artist lacks discernment and this is visually incoherent, but the end result is that I'm still not going to read it. My eyes immediately glaze over; it's too much work to parse the tilted panels and constant panel breaks. Everything is cranked up to 11 and I have no time for any of it.

Canted angles work just fine when the composition is canted while the panel borders are normal; that's easy to understand. But I don't enjoy this Gene Colan-type stuff. This is why I've never read Spawn, or a lot of newer manga.

While I was reading Eldred's post, I kept expecting him to say something to the effect of "You should mix and match stuff from these different levels, because the loud 'advanced' example is not always appropriate", but he never says that. Maybe he just didn't think it needed to be said?

What are the lessons here? Sometimes good artists give bad advice, and sometimes people can try so hard to be cutting-edge and smart that they get in their own way.

Let's look at one last thing, a similar demonstration from How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way. There are a lot of things that can be said about how much of the advice in How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way is destructive, but let's just ignore that larger discussion for now.

Obviously the left page is the boring, non-Marvel page, and the right page is the Marvel page. Notice how much more dynamic the Marvel page is without changing the panel grid, or breaking any borders. Dynamics, in many cases, really does come down to using high or low angles and creative blocking / composition. And, once again, there are instances where some of the panels on the left page might be more desirable than compositions on the Marvel one; context is key.

Varying the size and shape of panels or their points-of-view doesn't "add drama," it adds visual interest. And narrative is more important than visual interest.

[war-dawrgz]

introduction i guess

hi! i've decided that i want to do like a proper introduction cause that feels right.

name| toki

pronouns| he/they/it

age| 21

p.s| can i call myself a "self-taught" writer? like does that make any sense.

ao3| 144proof | Archive of Our Own

other socials| md4rfrlife

writing| i mostly write mlm x reader fics but i am trying to expand what i write this year. i am a multifandom account, the main fandoms i write for are: AEW, NJPW, IMPACT (TNA), WWE, ROH, DDT, Andy Black (Black Veil Brides), Spencer Charnas (Ice Nine Kills), Psych, Criminal Minds, Resident Evil Village, Fury (2014 movie), Jackass

requests| i will be opening my requests at the end of july, i will take five requests every month. BUT i will NOT be taking WWE requests, i haven't been in the mood to write for the WWE

[zoeywades-husband]

I definitely wish PB would have a little more variety in how they write GOC LIs.

While I personally don't consider masculine behaviors to be "male coded" and there are a fair share of GOC LIs that I felt worked fine with the female version (Gabe and Cas, Kieran, Manu, Yvette, Rory, Dakota, Hayden), I think it is fair to say that PB does write with the male version in mind a lot of the time- which is why we've pretty much never seen a GOC LI with more feminine behaviors.

I'm tired of customizable LIs but if that's what PB is gonna stick to for most books, they could at least make a GOC LI that's more feminine for once? And not just for the f!LI romancers, but for m!LI romancers too. I'd love if Alpha turned out to have MC be the more Alpha role and LI was the naive newbie (but even the chances of PB getting rid of their VIP system are higher than the chances of PB giving us that in this book).

Exactly!

And while I agree that “masculine behaviours” in and of themselves are not male-coded but I've found in Choices stories that if there’s too much of it and not enough changes it can turn the female LI (in the single LI books I've mostly found this) into basically a male-coded character. That's mainly because there are behaviours and actions with the GoC LIs oftentimes that seem unrealistic when it’s a sapphic relationship compared to a straight relationship that can make the female LI appear male-coded as well. However, it really depends on the story.

I think PB has done decent with some books like Gabe and Cas especially as well as Dakota and Hayden (Guinevere and Lancelot as well!) but there are definitely a lot of others that (like TNA, Cursed Heart, Untameable, etc.) that make me very hesitant of single LI books since it really ruins the experience when you’re romancing a woman and yet she’s acting much more like how a cishet man would behave in those situations than a woman (especially when it’s a sapphic relationship).

I think if PB was going to write a female LI that behaves in more masculine ways or is gender non-conforming (can be both here) it has to be done with thought. When you’re just copying and pasting the text and not adding a lot of depth those behaviours can definitely be perceived as male-coded. We live in a heteronormative society and you can definitely see that in their writing (which is very disappointing but not surprising tbh). There's a lot they're not taking into consideration especially with gender roles and portrayals of masculine and feminine behaviours.

I really like your point about making more feminine LIs! Especially feminine male LIs we need more of those!! And I hope that's the Alpha book we're going to get because that would be AMAZING. It would be such a fun change but I doubt that's how it going to go unfortunately.

[lorbanery]

And while I'm complaining about this, let me get really petty and just say that I'm really disappointed in how little Dick appears in these comics.

Dick had a decent amount of screentime in BTAS, and while he appeared in fewer episodes in TNA he still played a central role in the plot of most of the episodes he did appear in. In fact, several of the episodes he appeared were focused on him — "Old Wounds" was about why he quit being Robin, "Animal Act" was about him investigating a series of crimes happening around Haly's Circus.

But in the "The Adventure Continues" comics, he exists solely as a plot device — usually not even as a glorified plot device. There's exactly three issues (as of this writing) where he shows any kind of personality. One is in the service of establishing Boston Brand's personality and backstory; one is in the service of establishing a bit of information about Bruce that becomes plot-relevant later; and one is frankly arguable because they mostly just needed someone to rescue Babs.

Every other appearance by him is just a couple of panels because they needed someone to ask Bruce a particular question during a debrief, or to report in about something on patrol. Or, even more frustratingly, on the cover of an issue he doesn't even appear in.

I don't need Dick to be the main character. I don't even necessarily need him to be a major character. But I would appreciate it if he were at least a character instead of just a body they can throw in whenever they need an extra one.

Uch I'm so disappointed.

I was so excited when DC announced the new BTAS comic and that it was being headed by Paul Dini, and even more excited when they said they were going to be working Jason into the existing canon.

But then I never really heard much about it?

And now that I've finally read it, I understand why.

I'll just admit, I don't like the "Jason is a legitimate evil supervillain" characterization. I know there's folks out there who prefer it, fine, it's not my cup of tea and I don't like the way they did it here anymore than I like it when they do it in the main continuity.

But what really gets me is that they wrote him as being evil and unsaveable even as a child. Jason goes on a villainous rampage through Batman's rogues gallery as a tiny baby Robin. Not because he was angry at the harm they were causing, but because he just kind of reveled in the violence.

And to make it even worse, Alfred of all people is the one who tries to convince Bruce — before Jason even officially became Robin — that there was something "wrong" with Jason and basically that he was an irredeemable monster who couldn't be changed and couldn't be saved.

ALFRED.

I can't even wrap my head around how you justify writing this character who has, historically been an advocate for every single child who's come through his manor, and say "yeah this guy would totally write a FOURTEEN YEAR OLD CHILD off as horrible person who can't be helped."

AND THEN

AS IF TO JUST RUB SALT IN THE WOUND

Dick? Is nowhere to be fucking found. He appears in NAME ONLY in that ENTIRE storyline. Even the mainstream comics — which HATED Dick at the time Under the Red Hood was originally published — included Dick in the beginning of the story. They even used his presumed death as fodder for Jay to needle Bruce with!

But here? When they're rewriting this whole story from the bottom up, when they have free reign to do whatever they want — there's not even an embargo on using Dick anymore like there was when TNA was airing! Nothing. He may as well not exist for all that he has anything at all to do with this story. He's name-dropped solely to remind people who Alfred and Tim are talking about when they mention the first Robin.

It's so egregiously bad that we don't even know if Dick knows that Jason even EXISTS. The whole timeline works out such that Jason's entire tenure as Robin took place while Dick was traveling the world and he didn't come back until Tim was recruited. And of course the justification for why he was never mentioned or even gestured towards in the cartoon is that Bruce "never talks about him", leaving the implication that that is very literal and only the people who personally met Jason knew anything about him or his tenure as Robin.

So you have a scenario where Dick never met the kid at the time, and may not have heard of him after the fact. And since he doesn't appear AT ALL during that storyline, he never addresses it at all (partially because he barely exists in even the REST of the series).

So yeah! I genuinely have no idea if Dick Grayson even knows who Jason Todd is, nevermind that he was Robin!

And honestly it just comes off as them just not wanting to make that decision. Or just not wanting to deal with Dick, since he's such a NON-ENTITY even in the issues he actually shows up in.

It's so fucking disappointing, coming from the series that really made me love the Robins in the first place.

[itlivesproject]

what’s y’all’s guilty pleasure tropes in media? (e.g. tropes that are so bad it’s good, or smth you’re a tad embarrassed about loving!)

Boy do we some answers for you, anon

Maggie

Oh I have soooo many. Mostly I love a good romancing the bad guy/villain trope where the villain has questionable if not downright dark morals. And I’m not talking a bad boy with a heart of gold. I mean a totally fucked up piece of shit who absolutely does not care about anyone but themselves and MC.

Also, one I recently got some flak for was “LI says mean thing behind MC’s back and MC overhears and is hurt and LI then has to work to get back into MC’s good graces.” I’m a sucker for drama and questionable morals and I will not apologize.

Lindsay

My guilty pleasure is Choices

I also like slow burns. And Ethan ramsey 🤢

Julia (writer)

Does bed sharing count? I'm a huge sucker for bed sharing, even though it's cliche as hell. Also I am not immune to the glass cannon trope, i.e. a character who is super powerful but also super fragile.

I also like problematic power differences in relationships, and you can quote me on that. I love all the problematic tropes actually. Anything problematic you can think of, I probably read that.

Alex (writer)

I actually liked tna LMAO. Like i know it's overdramatic and extremely unrealistic, but it was still really fun to read and i always looked forward to the discussions around how ridiculous it was.

i also like really terrible movies, like my favorite movie is the worst thing i have ever watched in my life but i love it so much

And you could say that i multiship like an insane person. Way too many pairings to make sense.

Evie (writer)

Ok so for me, i think the femme fatale? does that count as a trope? i just love a woman being sexy, owning it, and using it to be morally corrupt. it doesn't even need to be well-done, or done in a feminist way. i see hot lady being evil, gay brain goes brrrrr

i also love love love the berserk button. a character that's usually cool and collected absolutely LOSING IT and going WAY OVERBOARD when someone they care about being hurt? or simply because They've Had Enough? absolutely love it, go off queen

I’m just trying to find the least triggering/pot-stirring way to say i actively look out for the worst possible shit on ao3. My guilty pleasure is reading my favorite characters get [redacted], [redacted] and [redacted]

M

I just love spectacle in movies.

Aku (artist)

Yandere x Tsundere

Eri

Berserk button is a godly trope as Evie well said. But I don't consider it a guilty pleasure, cause it's objectively good in my humble opinion. My guilty pleasure is Whump (first writing event I ever participated in was Whumptober lol). It can be as intense as it gets without permanent (physical) damage to the character, as long as there's a hopeful ending with a lot of comfort for good measure. Also, slightly-out-of-character hurt-comfort fics (out of character in the sense that said character would not accept the comfort under regular circumstances)

Sugar

i love the bad guys, i also love when characters go through the most terrible of things, it makes me (as a reader) feel something. anything flies as long as there’s a happy ending

[monaownsmyass]

I completely agree with the whole questioning how it’s okay to write the Noah sexual scene but I can’t help but wonder why people weren’t saying this back in ROD time considering MC was also in high school

Hello, thanks for bringing up a valid question.

Here’s the thing, when there’s a sexual scene in games like these, players often tend to sexualise the LIs and not MCs because MCs are who they’re imagining themselves as. Given that we weren’t sure about the ages of our LIs in MTFL (until PB rushed to add that they were 18, very sus of them), they could’ve been sexualising a minor. And lemme just say to everyone, saying that “they’re 18, it’s fine,” is really fucking creepy, pls go check yourself. They’re still high-schoolers and 18 isn’t some magic number.

Not only that, the biggest thing for me was that the way that sexual scene was written was explicit and more in line with something from Witness and TNA (both books that are meant to be erotica) rather than something from old Choices books that are much vague and not in-detailed. I wouldn’t mind if they skimmed over it ‘cuz after all, sex is normal and teens do experience it. But to make it so explicit isn’t the way to do it. Instead of focusing on writing explicit sexual scenes, they could’ve focused on the first time experience thing. Emotions, feelings, clumsiness, not something straight out of a porno.

Another thing, MTFL was marketed as a coming-of-age story and because the fandom mostly consists of adults, I’m assuming that’s where their target audience was. Writing sexual scenes in a coming-of-age story is completely normal but presenting it as sexy isn’t. Presenting a high-schooler who’s discovering sex for the first time as something to be sexualised especially when their main audience are adults is really fucking weird.

And lastly, to the grown-ass adults who are saying people are overreacting and are fine with sexualising high-schooler, when teens express their discomfort over adults sexualising characters in similar phases of their lives, maybe don’t tell them that they’re being dramatic? It makes y’all look dumb asf.

[kcnnarys]

how will you rank this year's choices books? i would love to see ur take on it

hey queen so i used a combination of the wiki and my memory (NOT reliable) to compile the list of books that were releasing throughout the year so forgive me for any missing books. i wont be talking about baby bump 2 bc it's too soon for me to pass judgement

1. oph 2 - yall already knew this was coming 😁 this book had its moments and ill never forgive pb for the raf & g*ssing situation but when it was good it was SO good

2. blades - i am a lover of the fantasy genre so i enjoyed this a decent amount. it fell short in the li department but the art/visuals were incredible and it was an interesting story

3. tna - some of yall bout to be real mad at me but it must be said. this book was a lot of fun and i liked sam 😁 mason and mickey are my sons and i cant wait to see them again <3

4. qb - this book was hit and miss for me but it was fun and the last chapter had so much flavour that i was floored and am now looking forward to book 2

5. baby bump 1 - harmless. not particularly exciting, some goofy ass moments, a friend group that makes no sense, and a bilingual character written by someone who is clearly not bilingual, but had some sweet moments

6. trh 2 - LISTEN. when you look at the list of books im working with this will make sense. trh is nonsensical as fuck but liam and the baby salvage what scraps they can and make it playable

7. trh 3 - makes absolutely no sense henry cavill ???????.gif moments coming out the wazoo. too many p*nelope moments not enough liam scenes or madeleine content but there have been some fun chapters and the art is BEAUTIFUL

8. mtfl - i actually adored this book in the beginning but it's not the bi rep that i was hoping it would be and the pacing is quite bothersome actually. intimate scenes between minors 🤢🤢🤢 pb is so wrong for that

9. ds - FLOP !! ds clan coming to get me for this one but it must be said. there were some cool moments i guess but on the whole this book was a snoozefest with an atrocious ending

10. witness - trying to be a chapters book but missed the mark imo. mc was a buffoon. last 10 chapters of the book were definitely the best in the book but still. it wasnt extreme cringe enough to be a chapters book and not good enough to be a choices book which left us at an awkward middle

11. ame 3 - this mostly released during 2019 but it finished releasing in january 2020 so i thought id add it 😁 i cant believe those clowns tried to make me marry ad*m ...... that was so wrong

12. rt - on god some of pbs worst work. this book is MEGA eco fascist and the writing is major cringe. complete snoozefest. robin and cassidy im so sorry queens/kings you deserved better

[wrestlingisfake]

Rebellion preview

Rich Swann vs. Kenny Omega - Swann is the Impact Wrestling men's world champion, and Omega is the AEW men's world champion. Both prizes are on the line; it will be champion versus champion, title for title. This isn't the first time top champions from different promotions have squared off, but it usually only happens at a minor-league level, or when one group is in the process of absorbing the other. Truly interpromotional champion vs. champion battles at this level are rare, and even rarer when both titles are defended. So even though it's "just" Impact, and even though AEW has only been around for "just" a couple of years, it's still fairly special.

Omega also holds the AAA mega championship, but it looks as though that title is not at stake. Last month Swann unified the Impact title with Moose's unofficial TNA world title, but he's still carrying around both belts, so I'm not really sure if they're both on the line here. So technically this isn't winner take all. Maybe we can call it winner take most?

This match has been brewing since December, when Impact executive Don Callis made a guest appearance on AEW Dynamite, and helped AEW executive Omega win the AEW title. Since then, Callis and Omega have been throwing their weight around in both promotions. Swann took offense at the idea that Omega is the "real" world champion, and Omega expressed an interest in collecting more top championships. After Omega pinned Swann to win a six-man tag team match in January, it became clear that they had to meet one-on-one and put it all mostly on the line.

Omega is clearly the heavy favorite to win. They've all but said that in the storyline, with Callis trying to get in Swann's head about how he really has no chance. The minute Callis said he was bringing Kenny to Impact, everyone started fantasy booking past "Omega beats Swann" all the way up to "Omega invades New Japan to collect more belts." It's going to be tricky to lay this match out in a way that doesn't make Swann look like a second-rate chump. But Kenny is the guy who took a lot of guff from people who thought he made Allan Angels look too good in a squash match last year. If he can manage that, I'm pretty sure he can and will protect Swann.

The bigger question is what happens after Impact puts their world title on an AEW guy. Impact will have a outsider as their champion, who only wrestles for them on special occasions, and they can't plan a date for him to lose the title without clearing it with Tony Khan. For a company the size of Impact, that's a small price to pay to have the prestige of Omega carrying their richest prize. But it's risky business not having an endgame planned out, and I doubt their fanbase will have an appetite for Kenny Omega playing Brock Lesnar with Impact's top guys. But that issue will have to play out later; for now we just get to wait and see if the inevitable really happens.

Juice Robinson & David Finlay vs. Doc Gallows & Karl Anderson - FinJuice suddenly showed up in Impact a couple of months ago and won the Impact men's tag title from the Good Brothers. Then they took the belts back to New Japan Pro Wrestling, and now they're back to give the former champs a rematch.

The story of the feud is that Robinson and Finlay were "young boys" back when Gallows and Anderson were the top team in New Japan, but now the tables have turned. What's more interesting, though, is the metanarrative: If NJPW is sending FinJuice to fight the Good Brothers in Impact, and AEW is sending Kenny Omega to team with the Good Brothers in Impact, then sooner or later NJPW and AEW will end up directly working together for the real fantasy matchups. If FinJuice retain here it strengthens the idea that the NJPW/Impact relationship isn't a one-off; if they drop the belts then it could go either way. That's kind of more compelling than anything about the match itself.

I'm a fan of Juice, so I'm always up for seeing him getting to win big matches and capturing championships. But seeing FinJuice in New Japan with the Impact tag belts felt a little hollow, because I know they're only doing that because they're not figured into major programs in New Japan. So I'm not sure where I want to see them end up after this. For now, though, I'll be rooting for them to keep frustrating the Good Brothers.

Deonna Purazzo vs. Tenille Dashwood - Dashwood improbably won a six-way hardcore match to earn the right to challenge Purazzo for the Impact women's championship. It's a little weird booking a heel vs. heel match, but Purazzo has kinda cleaned out the division so there aren't a lot of better options. No offense to these two, but this is basically a one-match show no matter what they put on the undercard, so if they have something better in mind it makes sense to save it for, say, Slammiversary.

I always felt like Dashwood was undervalued by WWE and never got a strong run anywhere else to prove her worth. So it'd be neat if they put her over now, but her current character is so two-dimensionally vapid that it's hard to take her seriously. Purazzo's gimmick is that she's really fucking good at wrestling, and Dashwood's gimmick is that she's only really interested in her Instagram or whatever. So on paper Purazzo has to clobber this chump; if she gets bamboozled by a distraction from Kaleb with a K then she looks like a giant idiot, and Tenille is just the chump who beat a giant idiot.

Now, if they want to have Dashwood turn it up a notch and remember it says "marquee" on the wrestling, then great. But I'm not expecting them to do that. Deonna should retain.

Ace Austin vs. TJP vs. Josh Alexander - This is a three-way match for Austin's X division title, so the first man to score a fall over either opponent wins the match and the championship.

I think this match is a three-way because Austin won the title in some other three-way. They do three-ways for this title a lot. I mean, I'm grateful they finally quit doing Rohit Raju vs. TJP vs. Chris Bey, so that's something. But I'm pretty sure the last time I wrote about an X title match on an Impact PPV I just bitched about why multi-man matches suck and don't settle anything. I bet I said that the winner will just end up feuding with the guy who wasn't pinned, and then a third guy will interject himself to set up another multi-man that doesn't settle anything. I wish Kenny Omega would collect this belt and put it out of its misery.

Matt Cardona vs. Brian Myers - Cardona and Myers came up through WWE together as the Major Brothers and later as Zack Ryder and Curt Hawkins. They were both cut from WWE a year ago, and Myers quickly signed with Impact while Cardona had a cup of coffee with AEW. It seemed like they had gone their separate ways until Cardona turned up in Impact, which Myers resented. Now they're finally squaring off to settle their differences. But considering Myers is playing a conniving heel that tries to weasel out of stuff, I get the feeling he won't give Cardona the chance to settle anything in the ring. This match feels it'll either end in a disqualification or a fuck finish.

Sami Callihan vs. Trey Miguel - This is billed as a "last man standing" match, so if a wrestler is on the ground and fails to get up to answer the referee's ten-count, his opponent is the last man standing and the winner. Other than that rule, anything goes.

Miguel had spent a few years in Impact as part of the Rascals with Dezmond Xavier and Zachary Wentz, but then all three got a big sendoff back in November. Dez and Wentz signed with WWE and have since captured the NXT tag team titles as Wes Lee and Nash Carter. Trey unexpectedly returned to Impact in January, and Callihan has been giving him shit about being alone. Callihan keeps trying to provoke and manipulate Miguel into becoming Sami's protege. So it's kind of a thing where Trey has to either pull out all the stops to get a big win over a top guy, or fight so savagely that he turns to the dark side and accepts Sami as a mentor.

This may sound weird, but Callihan almost seems like Impact's equivalent to Bray Wyatt in WWE. Not, like, in terms of magic powers or whatever (although he does seem to teleport now and then). What I mean is every Sami Callihan storyline is kind of overwritten with all these layers of character development and intrigue about how Sami is trying to make the babyface recognize some subtle point. It's all so psychological, but then it just boils down to a vicious brawl, and Sami usually loses, so it kind of doesn't matter. Then they do it all over again and act like it's so deep, as if we hadn't seen him do it eight times already.

I think Trey should probably win if they're going to do anything with him. But on the other hand I think Sami needs a win at this point. But if Sami beats Trey I'm a tag concerned that Trey will become his crustpunk disciple or something, which is a little too close to what Eric Young is already doing.

Eric Young & Rhino & Cody Deaner & Joe Doering vs. Eddie Edwards & Willie Mack & Chris Sabin & James Storm - Young's team is Violent By Design. The group started feuding with Sabin and Storm a few weeks ago. (Storm became Sabin's regular tag team partner when Alex Shelley decided to sit out until he can be vaccinated, for the good of his physical therapy patients.) I don't really remember how Edwards and Mack got pulled into this, but it was inevitable as VBD is one of those groups that all the babyfaces are going to end up feuding with.

I read that Young tore his ACL during the last set of TV taping, and he worked through it in a number of matches. I don't know if this is one of them, because I don't know if this show is live or if it was taped weeks ago. Either way, it's possible Young just won't do anything during the match. Or they'll do an angle to write him out immediately before or immediately after the match. I'm not sure what happens to VBD while he's sidelined. But in the moment, I think they're the favorites to win this match.

Kiera Hogan & Tasha Steelz vs. Jordynne Grace & ??? - Hogan and Steelz (Fire & Flava) are defending the Impact women's tag team title. Grace earned this shot when she and her partner Jazz defeated the champs in a non-title match. However, Jazz had recently put her career on the line in a match she lost, so to honor the stipulation she declined to participate. So Grace gets a different partner for this match, who probably won't be identified until right before the bell rings.

Impact has been hyping the return of Taylor Wilde, but somehow I don't feel like she'd fit in this spot. If I remember right, Jazz said she had someone in mind for Grace's partner, and it's hard to imagine either of them deciding Wilde is a good fit with their team. ODB would make more sense, except she already came in to team with Jazz and Grace, so it'd be anticlimactic to just go there again. I think it's highly unlikely that anyone WWE let go on April 15 would be available for this show, so don't get your hopes up for Mickie James or Chelsea Green.

Usually you would expect the team with a mystery partner to blindside the other team for a big win to hype up said mystery partner. But it's possible they could do a swerve--the mystery woman could turn on Grace, for example. Without any idea who Grace's partner will be, I'd personally rather see Fire & Flava keep the belts. So if there is going to be a title change, I really hope they have somebody who can win me over.

[stubbornjerk]

2020 Fanfiction Review

tagged by @northisnotup. i. thanks, dad.

i... am horrified of having to round all this up because 2020 feels like it’s like 7 years crammed into 1 but here we go.

Fics Written This Year:

I wrote a lot in 2020 before quarantine. I transitioned between fandoms too, which is expected since I’ve been doing that consistently for the past five years since I began writing as a hobby. So from Good Omens (of which I wrote half of my stuff for this year) , I transferred onto Penumbra (which has monopolized most of my writing stuff this year and shall remain so until I see fit).

This year alone I published fifteen (15) things, two of which were poems (one poem I didn’t count because I wrote that in 2017). There’d be a lot more but we don’t talk about that.

According to AO3 (minus the collabs where I was the artist or voice for something), I wrote around 145.7k words this year, ignoring the 57k I have discontinued and deleted and will remain in my laptop’s memory drive until the heat death of the universe.

Takeaways from your kick-ass writing, or kick-ass lack of writing, during a year more focused on survival than perhaps any other:

Well, I was fortunate enough to have no significant struggle with the quarantine since where I live, it’s illegal for me to get out of the house at my age without a pass. I did still have school to do despite that. I did as much writing this year as I did in 2015-2018, when I was still in junior high, which is mostly because apart from picking up art as a hobby to healthily space out my writing time, I also gave myself a rigid schedule to work around. Well, for the most part. 

Like, while I was writing halcyon days, I was also writing and drawing for the TNA minibang that I did with Ger and Jeans at the same time, while also writing some fluff on the side like the Andromeda piece I did for Stes on the earlier days of halcyon days, while also still taking time to draw something indulgent and dumb between everything. So, take my “rigid schedule” with a grain of salt. I find that I like to be busy so that I’m barely conscious of the progress that i have for most projects. 

Otherwise, I start doubting if it’s even something people would read. 

[long and haunted stare at all 57k of my unpublished work]

Most surprising fic you wrote this year:

I don’t think I have one specific thing I’m surprised I wrote this year? It all feels like something I would have wanted to read or write as a challenge, or something I expected to have come from me specifically. 

I think in terms of structure, the most surprising thing I wrote this year would be my poem, three doors | tatlong pinto, which isn’t really fic because it’s a poem but I digress. I never really thought I would be publishing poetry for anything fannish.

In terms of actual fic, I think it’d be my birthday fic bridges to burn, because I’ve never really tried to blend both my art and fic before? I wrote most of the fic around the illustrations I already made beforehand, then decided that they’d illustrate the fic itself instead. It was an interesting experiment, to say the least.

How you grew as a writer this year:

I would like to think that I was as poetic in my prose as I used to be but I know that’s not true. Some of my more recent writing is very poetically structured and I think that’s due in large part to how I wrote halcyon days, which had to be poetic because of the nature of the AU source material, Hadestown. 

Well, that and the fact that for some reason people have grown to like my simplistic poetic prose? So I’ve been trying to develop that further.

What’s coming in 2021:

I have three to four things definitively lined up for 2021 and, since I’m in like, two events, it’s gonna be a doozy.

My bang fic is the one I’m most apprehensive of since it’s very personal to me and I kinda want people to receive it well but I also feel like that’s hoping for too much because it’s a) self-indulgent, and b) so incredibly niche and not really serving much for the current state of TPP fan content that I don’t see it going over well. But we’ll see.

I have maybe two completely new VesBud things I’m planning? Depending on how I’ll be handling the first two months of 2021, I will have to see how I’m going to fit that in my timeframes.

I have one JuPeter one I’m planning for an upcoming birthday that I’m very excited to work on. It’ll come out on February, keep an eye out for it.

And the last actual thing lined up is going to be the sequel to Vespa Ilkay and the Case of the Murderous Mask, which will have its own two-parter podfic as well, if we can help it. So if you liked our little VesBud-centric reverse AU, that’d be something to look forward to!

I... don’t really have that many people I can tag on tumblr for this kjshfd most of the writers I know and are mutuals with are on twitter so.... if you wanna do this, i’m tagging you? you, who is currently reading this? whatever

[thefirstcourtesan]

You write/wrote fics for some books, have you ever considered re-writing TNA?

No, I haven’t. I don’t write often these days (mostly the mental exhaustion of having 3 children home 24-7) and if I were to take on a massive rewrite, it would be one of hte ones I had been considering: my Revenge-TRR AU or my OH reimagine. But TNA needs a rewrite, I agree, thanks for the ask @librarian-witchling

[gdwessel]

G1 Climax 30 Night 3 - 9/23/2020; RIP Road Warrior Animal (9/12/1960 - 9/23/2020); Finlay v. Romero in ROH Pure Tournament; Fredericks on Last Night’s Prime Time Live

G1 Climax 30 resumed today, with A Block matches live from Hokkaido. You can see it now on NJPWWorld. 

- 9/23/2020, Hokkaido Prefectural Sports Center Hokkai Kitayell

Gabriel Kidd d. Yuya Uemura (Double-Arm Suplex, 7:21) 

G1 Climax 30 A Block: Jeff Cobb [FREE] d. Shingo Takagi [Los Ingobernables] (Tour Of The Islands, 11:44)

G1 Climax 30 A Block: Kazuchika Okada [CHAOS] d. Yujiro Takahashi [Bullet Club] (Money Clip, 12:01)

G1 Climax 30 A Block: Taichi [SZKG] d. Minoru Suzuki [SZKG] (Black Mephisto, 12:11) 

G1 Climax 30 A Block: Will Ospreay [CHAOS] d. Tomohiro Ishii [CHAOS] (Stormbreaker, 18:20)

G1 Climax 30 A Block: Jay White [Bullet Club] d. Kota Ibushi (Blade Runner, 20:28)

Switchblade is now 2-0 against Kota Ibushi since Ibushi bested him at the G1 Climax 29 Final last year. Naturally, he declared he will win G1. And he might! Ospreay will not win G1, but is on a streak anyway, because NJPW are high on him and don’t care if he got a woman blackballed from the industry. 

Taichi had a very good homecoming to Hokkaido for once, getting the win over his Boss. NJPW are now calling Okada’s Cobra Clutch the “Money Clip.” And still trying to make it a Thing. Shingo is 0-2 so far, but that means he’ll be assured a good late run. Gabriel Kidd gets his first ever singles win in NJPW!

Current A Block standings:

Ospreay: 4pts (2W 0D 0L) Taichi: 4pts (2W 0D 0L) White: 4pts (2W 0D 0L) Cobb: 2pts (1W 0D 1L) Ibushi: 2pts (1W 0D 1L) Okada: 2pts (1W 0D 1L) Suzuki: 2pts (1W 0D 1L) Ishii: 0pts (0W 0D 2L) Takagi: 0pts (0W 0D 2L) Yujiro: 0pts (0W 0D 2L)

(L-R: Road Warrior Hawk [Michael Hegstrand], Road Warrior Animal [Joseph Laurinaitis], Power Warrior [Kensuke Sasaki])

Just as I was getting ready to start writing this post, it was reported that Road Warrior Animal (Joseph Laurinaitis) had passed away at the age of 60. The Road Warriors are, of course, one of the most famous and well-regarded tag teams of all time in the wrestling business, and Japan were a huge part of their stomping grounds, although in terms of number of matches, they were more known in All Japan Pro Wrestling than NJPW. The majority of Animal’s matches in NJPW came in 1996, when the Road Warriors were still with WCW, and some of those were in tandem with Kensuke Sasaki in his Power Warrior persona (long story). Nevertheless, the Road Warriors were huge in Japan, working in AJPW, NJPW, Tenryu’s WAR promotion, and even Riki Choshu’s ill-fated Fighting of World Japan Pro Wrestling company in 2003. (Road Warrior Hawk, Michael Hegstrand, would die later in 2003.) Animal even wrestled a select number of matches in Battlarts in 1998 and 2000.

Animal’s brother John is pretty well-known in the wrestling biz, having not only been an executive, both on-screen and off-, for WWE, but also as Johnny Ace, most notably in AJPW, where at one time he had a very well-regarded tag team with Kenta Kobashi, among others. His son James played college football at Ohio State University, as well as an 8-year NFL career, mostly at the then-St. Louis Rams, before retiring after a season at the New Orleans Saints in 2017.

Regardless, there’s nothing I can write that will adequately say what Animal, and the Road Warriors, meant to pro wrestling. Our thoughts and condolences to his loved ones and close friends.

While left out of G1 Climax selection yet again, David Finlay Jr. is keeping himself busy, competing in Ring of Honor’s Pure Tournament. This is the revival of ROH’s former Pure Championship, which was unified and abandoned with the ROH World Title back in 2008 in a classic (but ultimately costly, for the competitors involved) match between Brian Danielson v. Nigel McGuinness. 

Finlay’s opponent for this round was Rocky Romero, who he would defeat. This match is on the current episode of ROH TV, but I’m not even sure which Sinclair Broadcasting sub-network it’s on nowadays (Comet? Charge!? It’s not on YouTube in full). We’ll see how far he gets in this. I can’t imagine he’s happy working ROH again tho.

In other news, the LA Dojo’s Karl Fredericks appeared last night on the United Wrestling Network’s iPPV event Prime Time Live #2, shown on FITE TV for $7.99. This concept is through United Wrestling Network, Billy Corgan’s National Wrestling Alliance and Thunder Studios, being run out of Championship Wrestling from Hollywood, a weekly PPV concept. I hesitate to remind that this is how TNA/Impact started.

Fredericks defeated Slice Boogie in the semi-main event of the show. Danny Limelight, late of NJPW Strong, was also on this show, losing to Kevin Martenson. The main event saw Thunder Rosa retain the NWA Women’s Championship against Priscilla Kelly, which is good as it maintains the storyline Rosa is having in AEW right now.

Tomorrow’s show also comes from Hokkaido, and features the second group of B Block matches, including one that may have some implications down the line depending on how the results go.

- 9/24/2020, Hokkaido Prefectural Sports Center Hokkai Kitayell

Yota Tsuji v. Yuya Uemura

G1 Climax 30 B Block: Hirooki Goto [CHAOS] v. SANADA [Los Ingobernables]

G1 Climax 30 B Block: Hiroshi Tanahashi v. Toru Yano [CHAOS]

G1 Climax 30 B Block: Juice Robinson v. KENTA [Bullet Club]

G1 Climax 30 B Block: YOSHI-HASHI [CHAOS] v. EVIL [Bullet Club]

G1 Climax 30 B Block: Tetsuya Naito [Los Ingobernables] v. Zack Sabre Jr. [SZKG]

[some-triangles]

OH RIGHT

I enjoyed a lot of podcasts this year 

1. The Bugle

The joy of the Bugle this year was discovering who did and didn’t work in the rotating cohost spot; happily I feel like the best of the new folks are significantly better at the job of managing/coping with a pun-based satirical podcast led by Your Wacky Dad than John Oliver was, and also happily made my podcast feed less straight, white, and male, which is sorely needed at this point.  The stories Anuvab Pal brings in from India alone make him a strong MVP candidate.  (I think he’s also the best pure comic they have.)  In the end though I have to give the nod to Alice Fraser, who does what nobody else can: she’s capable of breaking Zaltzman’s momentum.  It’s a thing of beauty that this invulnerably pointless man has met his match in an extremely rude Australian woman who will happily match him pun for pun.  

2. Crime In Sports 

This is a true crime podcast where two basic white dude comedians you’ve never heard of tell the life stories of professional athletes who end up in jail - stories which inevitably bring up issues of race, class and mental illness - and I will tell you that they do okay with that stuff, not perfect, but okay,  and that exceeded my expectations to the point where I ended up listening to enough of it to start to care about these mooks and their in-jokes and their running gags, and again, I seem to have a soft spot for dumb guys who are doing their best, and I probably got more laughs out of this thing than any other podcast I listened to this year.  Your mileage will probably vary.

3. Nancy

WNYC’s Gay Podcast, hosted by two Asian urban millennials who in their cohosting rapport demonstrate and embody WLW/MLM solidarity at all times. It’s exactingly correct about things and is what I listen to after Crime in Sports to detox.   It’s also pretty good journalism, if you’re a fan of/can stomach the studiedly casual bespectacled “umm”-ing modern NPR vibe which has become de rigeur with this kind of thing.   The episode where a younger butch woman finds the older butch woman who gave her her “ring of keys” moment and tells her what she meant to her will make your heart explode.

4. The Adam Buxton Podcast 

OK, Zaltzman isn’t really your wacky dad - he’s more your weird uncle.  Adam Buxton is absolutely 100% your wacky dad, and he’s trying his best.   He’s the middle aged guy who asks dumb questions about race and gender because he genuinely wants to understand - the aging hipster who took being right on for granted and is gamely trying to keep up as the world shifts around him.   He’s kind of like Marc Maron in that respect, and in a number of others; the podcast follows the same basic format as WTF, and Buxton is the same kind of insecure overcompensating former cool kid that Maron is, except replace the aggression and Jewish neurosis with the deeply repressed performative childishness of an English public schoolboy.  Reading back I have failed entirely to make this seem enticing, so let me highlight the bit of this that works; Buxton starts every podcast with a walk through the countryside with his dog, who he talks to sometimes.  Buxton is cozy.  If you like the Maron idea but don’t like all the personal abrasiveness, this one may be for you.

5. Killing the Town with Storm and Cyrus

To explain this podcast I am going to have to tell you a story.

The first thing that you have to know is that Calgary is generally considered to be the capital of Canadian professional wrestling, because the Hart family is from there, and Bret Hart is the most famous Canadian wrestler of all time.  But: earlier this year a tweet made its way around wrestling social media suggesting that Winnipeg should actually be considered the wrestling heart of Canada, because while Calgary might have given us Bret and Owen and Lance Storm,  Winnipeg gave us Chris Jericho, Kenny Omega and Cyrus.

To which even hardcore wrestling fans might reply: who the hell is Cyrus?

It turns out that Don “Cyrus” Callis, AKA the Jackyl, was a) responsible for the tweet and b) a complete nobody who was on TV for a cup of coffee in the late 90s and hadn’t been seen since.  The closest he came to mainstream success was as the manager of a justly-forgotten WWF heel faction called the Truth Commission, a group of pro-Apartheid afrikaaner militiamen.  (1996 was a very, very bad year for professional wrestling.) He almost became the manager of a group called the Acolytes, who were at least kind of a big deal during the attitude era, but after his first TV appearance with them (in which he got on the mic and shouted “VIOLENCE TURNS ME ON”) he was fired.  He bounced around ECW and TNA and that was it.

Cyrus had also just started a podcast with Lance Storm, on which he claimed to the best talker the business had ever seen, among other things.   It became clear to listeners that while he may not ever have caught the brass ring, he was a wrestler to his core - i.e., a bullshit artist, a carny and a fraud - and that he had paid his dues working shit matches in the middle of nowhere Canada when he was a kid, and was now happy to spend a seedy retirement bullshitting with his friend Lance and pretending to be a forgotten legend.  

Except things kept happening for Cyrus.  Piggybacking on that tweet and the imaginary Calgary/Winnipeg feud, he became a public champion of Kenny Omega, the hottest name in pro wresting outside of WWE, and a man who didn’t have a lot of supporters among the old guard.   Omega met up with Cyrus because of this (it turns out Cyrus’ old manager the Golden Shiek was Kenny’s uncle!), and put in a good word with his bosses at New Japan - and suddenly Cyrus became one half of NJPW’s English commentary team.  (This improved their commentary immensely, to the point where the wrestlers complained when NJPW used Jim Ross for their American special.)  Callis then used his position to broker the hottest wrestling angle of the latter half of 2017 - he approached Chris Jericho with the idea of wrestling Omega in Japan, Jericho’s first match outside of WWE in decades - and managed to get himself in the ring when the angle played out, getting laid out by Jericho as he tried to defend Omega, his friend and meal ticket.

It was then announced that Cyrus had been hired to be a new Vice President of TNA/Impact Wrestling (in its umpteenth rebranding and reshuffle of the year.) In this capacity he will be co-booker for the whole promotion.  As of this writing he has yet to be forced out.

So: in a way this podcast itself is the wrestling story of the year.  It’s also pretty entertaining, albeit absolutely saturated with ads, as one might expect from a pair of born grifters.  Lance Storm is a smart dude with mostly good opinions and fun delivery and Cyrus is a lovable scumbag.  They do their share of complaining about how young wrestlers these days don’t know how to throw a punch but because Cyrus is obligated to defend Omega at every turn they can’t drop too far into old coot territory, and because Storm trained several of the current new crop of wrestling women he is at pains to put over women’s wrestling whenever he can, even as Cyrus is a poop about it.  They get people on to interview who you’ve never heard of but who were allegedly legendary to someone at some point in some territory or other and who all have insane stories, some of which might even be true.   It’s a fine time, and if current trends continue Cyrus will be WWE head of developmental by this time next year, so stay tuned.