During this past week my free time has been completely filled watching every kung-fu film in my library. While your instant thoughts may have been that kung fu films are nothing more than ballets with punches my instant thought was something quite different. Kung-fu films are nothing more than wrestling matches with Chinese participants.
In order to enjoy kung-fu films or wrestling we are asked to suspend our logical beliefs. No, men can not walk on walls or have impenetrable skin (Five Deadly Venoms). Nor can they sustain a leg drop from a 300lb. behemoth from six feet in the air. Yet both arts have their loyal fan followings even though much of their action is completely fictional.
This thought was really brought to light recently when I watched an episode of Ultimate Fighting Championship on Spike TV. One of the competitors slapped a simple (in wrestling matches) rear choke hold on his competitor which caused a quick tap out and an end to the match just 3 minutes in. My first thought was this guy who tapped out is a sissy. Then I switched off my WWE mentality and realized, that move must hurt! I quickly ran to get the first wrestling DVD I could find. There were at least 10 types of choke holds applied in the matches I watched. Each time the move was applied, the longer they were in the hold it seemed to give them strength to muscle out of the move. That in itself is a straight contradiction to reality.
Have you ever punched someone? It hurts like hell to smash your fist into someone’s head. How many times are punches thrown and landed in a single match? Countless times would be a likely response. Yet, we still watch. As ridiculous as the dubbed voices of kung-fu films are, I still watch. As unrealistic as wrestling is we still watch. Without droning on you can think of a million things that make wrestling a stretch of the imagination? Boxers take months off between fights because of the beatings they take. We get treated to return matches the night after PPVs. If you question that, it kills the fun of the sport.
The difference between the fan that enjoys and the fan that does not is that some of us have forgotten to suspend our beliefs when watching wrestling and it takes away from the actors’ (yes, that is what they are) performances. For the last two weeks I have been as giddy as a school child in the middle of June while watching wrestling. Instead of saying, “He blew his spot!” or “What are the bookers thinking?” I just watched and suspended my insider’s knowledge.
By suspending reality just for 2 hours wrestling has become a sort of entertainment that outsiders can not appreciate and I love. Just think of the enjoyment that a completely choreographed, cheesy dance scene with sweaty, grown men in tights can give us if we put aside our sense of reality and replace it with a desire to be entertained. That is what makes wrestling such an entertaining sport.
While this seems simple in concept and fairly obvious, is it really? The Internet grapevine reveals that many people are watching but not enjoying wrestling. In case you fit that description remember to cast aside your sense of reality, your knowledge of backstage lingo and be a wrestling virgin all over again. You may find that your 2 hours spent watching are much more enjoyable that way.
Skip the spoilers, skip the jerk who has an answer for everything headlines, and definitely skip the chat rooms.
Just suspend your beliefs and enjoy the hell out of it. That is until someone (usually a miserable hater) interrupts you in the middle of the match to remind you that wrestling is fake!
Post Column
It has been an honor and privilege to be recruited by so many web masters and column administrators to write for their sites. While I enjoy the exposure being on 20+ web sites brings, effective today, I am going to limit the number of web sites that Mr. Brown’s Class will appear on. For those of you that will look for my work, this column will be able to be read exclusively at the following sites:
Thewrestlingvoice.com
Nodq.com
Wrestletalkradio.com
TBLWrestling.com
Wrestlingexposed.com
Again, thank you to all of my readers and administrators. I hope that you will take the time to find my column at one of the sites listed above.
