Ah, it's great to finally see the Four Horsemen alternate with their logo as the GIF image was SUPPOSED to do all along - only it wasn't doing it when it was uploaded via the Blogger inbred image uploader! Doubly satisfying to see this now, because not only it sticks it to Blogger, it's also sticking it to MSN SPACES, which is providing the GIF image you see above here indeed. Only, MSN SPACES -pardon, it should be "MSN Windows Live Spaces" it appears; more dead than alive but still they insist on the word "Live" being a part of it- MSN Windows Live Spaces, thus, had threatened to take all of my precious images down, due to the fact that I had, among them, several pictures of MERMAIDS, see... Yes, they have it DEEP against mermaids and *nipples* as it is - as a mermaid is, naturally, ten times out of twelve, topless... Those were, for the most part, artsy PAINTINGS, nothing even remotely erotic (much less pornographic) but still, MSN Windows Live Spaces threatened and threatened again, demanding the deletion of these "offending" pieces of ART... They could have deleted themselves - which is obvious since THEY store ALL of these images for me and they could easily SHUT IT ALL DOWN, without notice, when I did not comply with their inane demands... But, no, it had to be *ME* doing the symbolic deletion - and making act of contrition with that?
Pathetic, is it not?
The Four Horsemen would have never put up with shit like this, in the years listed at the top. They were the original gang, the elite, the rulebreakers that ran roughshod over all of their competition AND the rules as well! They dominated and were the BEST at what they did because so it was dictated to them by their chosen symbol of excellence: those four fingers raised up in the air.
(They were also masters at ''selling'' all of their opponents' moves; making them look better than they were themselves, in the process! But that is another story; no time for it now!)
Certainly it helps that the term ''Horsemen'' comes from a certain Good Book, too; that it has the added plus of having Biblical resonance, the Four Horsemen some exegets have come to identify as Death, Conquest, War and Pestilence - overlooking Famine, downgrading it as a mere end result of war... These were the Horsemen that Arn Anderson spoke of, at first; but then, in the course of the wrestling saga that ensued, they truly were evoking the example of excellence set by college football legends hailing from Notre Dame - imagine that: four kids, really, that nobody remembers anymore...
It is certainly not as if the likes of Ric Flair, Tully Blanchard and Arn Anderson were competing for the unenviable roles of "Famine" or "Pestilence" though (with the attribution of the role of "Death" going retroactively to the logical choices in different eras of the faction's long and somewhat tortuous history:
Ole Anderson, Lex Luger, Barry Windham, Sid Vicious...
Brian Pillman... Chris Benoit... Mongo... Iceman Dean Malenko?) ... unless "War" would be... Ole? Or Sid!
However, the GIF image, above, places them in a peculiar order
one that us wonder what their attributed roles truly are:
as if Arn was... Conquest?
Ric would be what then...?!?
J.J. Dillon, their manager, as... Pestilence?!?
(What else?!?)
And Tully comes 4th... Death?!? But I digress, really - a hell of a whole lot, this time!
....
The original aim of posting something else evoking my nostalgia of NWA wrestling
(that soon begat WCW in the 1990s)
was this, actually:
Ever since Tully Blanchard became one of my "MySpace friends" (MySpace - never to be confused with MSN Windows Live Spaces! They made the changes in the name to ensure just that; although, deep down, the hypocrites only WISH that they'd be confused for the other guys and get as many users as they routinely do! It would necessitate making "Bill" as cool as "Tom" though - and not even all the millions that monopolistic Microsoft could infuse into THAT "project" would succeed in making THAT happen! But I am digressing yet again...!) - hence, ever since Tully is my new buddy, I have been meaning to ask him THIS:
"Mr. Blanchard, I'd like to have your opinion on this following idea of mine. You were a Horseman for five years and know Ric Flair as well as anybody can; so, you tell me what the odds would have been to see the scenario that follows unfold... WrestleMania 24: Ric Flair decides to do the RIGHT THING. He catches Shawn Michaels' boot, blocking that silly "sweet chin music" finisher and swiftly changing the storyline agreed upon for the match. He nails HBK with a low blow and tosses him out of the ring - because the referees would only do as VKM tell them to do anyway. Then, probably, Arn and several others could join him in the ring - and he'd speak out much longer than he did on that final RAW appearance... "No, Vince McMahon - this is not the way the GREATEST CAREER IN ALL OF WRESTLING will end. Not in this lifetime, pal! Woooooooooo!" You recognize his style there, hmm? "I did say that I would NEVER RETIRE... And I am NEVER GOING TO RETIRE in one of your creations, pal! THIS is NOT the "grand-daddy of 'em all" - and don't YOU ever say that it is, J.R. - EVER AGAIN! You SELL-OUT!" Okay, maybe the attack on Jim Ross could be omitted... He has it coming though. "I-WILL-RETIRE-ONLY-ON-THE-TRUE-GRANDEST-STAGE-OF-THEM-ALL - and that is STARRCADE! Wooooooooooooo! The TRUE grand-daddy of them all - and you RESENT IT, Vince, still to this day, you RESENT THAT YOU DIDN'T HAVE THE VERY FIRST PAY-PER-VIEW IN THE HISTORY OF WRESTLING! It wasn't YOU, pal, and it sure wasn't any of your creations; it was ME, it was REAL WRESTLING, it was the NWA, it was Jim Crockett, it was your competition, pal! The same competition that ran with you, neck-in-neck, for YEARS; YEARS, pal - just like I said on the final WCW NITRO!" Wouldn't that have been grand, huh? And then he would wrap with this: "And that's the way it's going to be, Vince; I will be having my final match on STARRCADE, or I will NEVER RETIRE... officially! And that's the bottom line 'cause the true icon... the living legend... the dirtiest player in the game - playing one more on *you* tonight... the limousine-riding, jet-flying, wheeling-dealing, kiss-stealing son-of-a-gun... the 22-time World Heavyweight Champion - 22, not 16 Vince... the only king of wrestling kings... the NATURE BOY... RIC FLAIR... said so! Wooooooooooooooo!" And then a final accomplice shows up - Steve Austin? Everyone who's ever been part of the NWA/WCW tradition, basically, should have been part of such an insurrection... Note my manoeuver to "deblasphemize" the oft-used blasphemous title bestowed upon Jean-Paul Levesque aka Triple H; confining it to their field and setting things in proper order while we're at it, within its confines still. It's all about boundaries...! My question is, Mr. Blanchard - would Ric Flair have considered doing this, if someone had proposed it to him (even if it meant renouncing all the profits bound to be made with future merchandizing sales?) - would he have done this?"
I wonder what Mr. Tully Blanchard - Pastor Blanchard - would reply to that!
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Born in the Age of Aquarius, destined to seek out truths in many an art form, trained as a historian and a journalist but truly a prose-lover... Luciano is out to dispel any clichés and reinvent them all both to the tune of a little something called the truth as also to his own image - and being old-fashioned, he does not mind that distinction one infinitesimal tiny bit at all...! "There are two ways to spread the light; be the candle... or the mirror that reflects It." I have chosen to be the latter... okay? ~*~
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