CBS's Justice League of America(1997)

In 1997 CBS acquired the tv rights to The Justice League, except for Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman. Despite not being able to use the big three of DC Comics, CBS pushed ahead and produced a Justice League pilot, which failed to even show in the US.

Taking place in New Metro, USA, the show opens with two meteorologists tracking a tornado coming towards the city, one of the meteorologists is played by Miguel Ferrer, best known for his role on Crossing Jordan, the other is played by a lady who would go on to "star" in Son of the Beach, a Baywatch parody.

Justice Leaguers get a distress call and begins to assemble, having to put their regular lives on hold: The Flash getting kicked out of his apartment, Fire dressed as a giant banana, and The Atom teaching high school science.

In place of Batman, Superman, and Wonder Women, we get Fire, The Atom, and later on, Ice; second and third string characters that only the nerdiest of nerds would recognize.

The only antagonist that they're going up against is The Weatherman, who is very very very loosely barely based on Flash villain, The Weather Wizard.

The Weatherman, sporting an East L.A. gang member look, demands 20 million dollars or he'll destroy the city. Golf balls begins to rain down on the city and hit a damsel that is clearly in distress. 

Green Lantern shows up and shields her with an umbrella he created with his power ring. They share a moment as she's oblivious to the fact that she is standing right in front of her boyfriend with a small mask on his face.

 Meanwhile, in another part of town, granny is having bushes thrown at her while she tries to get Mr. Whiskers to come out from under the house. Fear not, The Atom and 90's special effects come to the rescue.

Green Lantern and Fire rescue some construction workers, with Fire making sure to get in the quip, "break time is over,boys."

The Flash gets rid of the tornado and the episode shifts to a sitcom formula. 

The homeless Flash gets taken in by Green Lantern and The Atom and the three have a ham-fisted conversation about The Flash's life that goes on far too long. 

Blonde meteorologist is in the weather center's basement and science happens,giving her freezing powers. She boots it out of there freezes a body of water while trying to rescue a drowning man.

The League infiltrates some gala event to get files on The Weatherman. The Atom has a Superfriends moment and limbos with a security laser, complete with Limbo Rock playing in the background.

Blonde lady discovers Miguel Ferrer meteorologist is The Weatherman and smash cut to The League bringing blonde lady under a bridge and in a secret door.

I was hoping that they'd maybe bump into The Power Corps from the Double Dragon movie, but dream never come true in made for tv movies.

Instead of a young Alyssa Milano, we get a fat Martian Manhunter wanting Blondie McMeteorologist to join the Justice League.

I have to point out that the Martian Manhunter is one of the strongest characters in DC, on par with Superman. So why is he playing Zordon to The League? 

David Ogden Stiers was the man behind the manhunter, he was 55 at the time and had granddad bod. 

The Weatherman's demands weren't met and now he plans on destroying 60% of New Metro's population with a tidal wave. Green Lantern flys off like Mary Poppins to confront him and everyone else springs into low budget action.

Green Lantern reaches The Weatherman, who unleashes deadly stock footage waves onto the city. Fire and The Atom are green screening their way through the city's sky.

Pandemonium hits when Green Lantern fails to stop the tidal wave, but blonde lady gets her Queen Elsa on and freezes it.

The Weatherman is caught and becomes an afterthought to middle aged white in costumes talking to each other. Blondie short-hair gets sworn in and the credits start to roll, highlighting the actors.
Fire was played by Law and Order: SVU's Michelle Hurd, Matthew Settle, our low rent Green Lantern, would go on to be featured in Band of Brothers. John Kassir, who played The Atom, is best known for voicing The Crypt Keeper, and Kenny Johnston, hobo Flash, would go on to do stuff. oh, and ice ice blondie was played by Kim Oja.

I didn't find this to be particular bad, the effects and costumes are a level above Power Rangers quality, but I can look past that, considering that it's a tv production from the 90s.
The characters were nothing like their comic counterparts and the show pushed more of out of costume small talk, more sitcom than superhero.

John Cena and Randy Orton Vs. The Raw Roster

The more things change, the more things stay the same. This was ever apparent at Wrestlemania 32, The Showcase of the Immortals became the showcase of the 90's, as 17 wrestlers that were active during The Attitude Era appeared on the show.

The WWE wasn't completely to blame for having to rely on retired and part-time talent, there was a wave of injuries that plagued their roster heading into the Granddaddy of them all.

The biggest names on the dl were John Cena, Randy Orton, and Seth Rollins, who was WWE World Champion when he got put on the shelf. This put WWE into panic mode and the fans weren't,and still aren't sold on Roman Reigns. In his place as champion, the WWE went with the obvious choice for World Champion, Triple H.

This kid is going places

Today, I'll be jumping in the WABAC Machine, going back eight years to 2008, the WWE World Champion at the time was Randy Orton, with John Cena nipping at his heels and Triple H muscling his way into the title feud.

RAW-March 17th, 2008

Coming from my hometown of Lafayette, LA. The main event of the night was John Cena and Randy Orton tagging together against the rest of the Raw roster. This match was devised by Triple H, with the added stipulation of if either man walkout on the other, then that man will be booted from the main of Wrestlemania 24.

An IWC nightmare

Send out the jobbers

Being pitted against more than ten men is quite a handicap, oh what am I saying, this is Orton and Cena, their rockets were strapped snugly on their asses.

This is the most personality he's ever shown

That yellow-toothed, foot fetishist, baby killing Snitsky starts things off and gets the heat on Cena, but it's all for not, as Santino tags himself in. 

 







The Canadian-Italian misses a salute drop and gets rolled up for the 1-2-3, but Trevor Murdoch gets the heat back for the midcarders with clubbering an a clobbering on Cena.

Cena figures he's sold enough and gets Murdoch in the STF(U), his tag partner, Lance Cade, tries to make the save, but gets stopped by Orton.

Cade eats an RKO and follows his partner by being eliminated. Umaga takes out CENTON with a double clothesline right before the commercial break. The Samoan Bulldog still had some monster left in his booking, but it was more monster of the week.

We're to assume that Umaga tagged in Super Crazy, who was eliminated by Orton during the commercial break. JBL Pearl Harbors Orton and works him over till he tags in Jim Duggan, who gets a bigger crowd reaction that Orton's entrance.

Duggan gets in a few punches and tags in Cody Rhodes, who tags in Snitsky? Sorry, that's actual Val Venis.

Venis tags in Carlito, who tags Hardcore Holly, who tags in one of The Highlanders, who gets eliminated by a flying fameasser.

David Hart Smith, who now wrestles as "British Bulldog" Davey Boy Smith Jr., gets five-knuckle shuffled and an AA. I'd like to point out that Smith's real name is Harry Smith and that he was born in Canada, but I guess "The Canadian Bulldog" Harry Smith doesn't have the same ring to it.

 Paul Burchill's main event time gets cut short as Orton RKOs him from outta his corner. The fat, bald, and pale Val Venis is the next to go, but he'll be back on tv in less than two years time, getting a clean victory over Christopher Daniels in TNA and then leaving two months later to go smoke pot in CMLL.

Cody Rhodes gets back in the match to take a RKAA, leading to a schmoz breaking out. JBL and Umaga stay on the apron while everyone left in the match beat down on Cena and Orton.

Everyone lines up to take a chairshot from Cena, except for Brian Kendrick, he just sneaks out of the ring and heads to the back.

Orton ducks a chairshot from JBL, hitting Umaga instead, but he's a Samoan, so it has no effect on, if only they'd give this gimmick trait to Roman Reigns and The Usos.

Umaga spikes Orton and then turns his attention to JBL, who boots it to the back with Umaga trailing him. With Orton and Cena both down, it's time to play the game, and that game is steal all the heat.

This feud would continue past Wrestlemania 24, adding JBL to the mix at Backlash, but we know what JBL is.