Menu

Top-Down Smackdown: Ted DiBiase Jr.’s Making a Documentary on His Dad


Ted_dibiase_jr.jpg

On the heels of the semi-success of the Iron Sheik documentary (which still needs distribution, but will almost certainly find it), a Million Dollar Man film is now seeking donations on Kickstarter. And the co-director is none other than DiBiase’s son, Ted Jr., who walked away from wrestling when he failed to get any of the fans interested in him, ever he decided spending time with his family was more important. It would seem he is actually taking the old “Legacy” gimmick seriously.

I’m not as interested in DiBiase’s tale as I am the Sheik’s because it’s a more conventional arc: troubled childhood + talent = fame and fortune = women + drugs = failure + Jesus = redemption. Not quite the same as Sheikie’s evolution into the foul-mouthed celebrity-culture critic of Twitter. But the perks, if you’re willing to spend big, are like the ultimate fan fiction: For $2500, DiBiase Sr. will actually reenact one of his old Million Dollar Man vignettes with you in the role of either Virgil or the “mark.”

Keep reading for the trailer, and a few post-Mania thoughts.

Well, my predictions for WrestleMania were a little bit off, but I found every single deviation from them to be a promising one. Quite surprising that they spent so much time building a Miz storyline around the Battle Royal and then doing nothing with him, but that’s creative for you. Kofi Kingston is clearly the new Shelton Benjamin (which is better, I guess, than being the new John Morrison), and Cesaro is about to get a huge push that I hope he can augment with better promos.

As a Brock Lesnar fan – his Iron Man match with Kurt Angle is maybe my favorite match ever – I was obviously happy to see him beat the Undertaker. I’ve seen people argue that it’s bad business sense, and that Lesnar is a jerk, and even I argued prior to the event that there was no upside. Here is what I would say in return now:

1. Undertaker looked bad. Like, really bad. He comes into the ring looking like a sunburned tomato, and lacked any substantial in-ring energy. It’s time for him to stop. The character of Ric Flair – to cite one example – can sustain looking like a crazy old guy who’s out of it in the ring. The Undertaker cannot.

2. The upside to Lesnar winning is that he can continue the Undertaker pattern, fighting few enough times that he doesn’t have to lose on any given night and look beatable.

3. Undertaker is an MMA fan, and I suspect this was something he wanted. He has the clout to make that call, and could have walked like CM Punk if he disapproved.

4. To the arguments that Lesnar is a jerk and doesn’t care about this business, I would ask: what does he owe you? The answer is that he owes you good matches, and for the most part (vs. Triple H and CM Punk) they have been. He also put Cena over clean, which is something a guy like Goldberg would probably not have done. And if you hate Lesnar because he has a supposed bad attitude, you must love John Cena who has a great attitude, right?

But speaking of supposed jerks with bad attitudes – Batista did a lot better in the main event than I expected. It looks like he’s learning from his mistakes.

Finally, if you missed Mr. T’s Hall of Fame speech, here is the Cliffs Notes version:

Big things usually happen on this particular Raw. Talk about them below.