Picked up a bunch of DVD's....

I've been busy for the last four weeks or so scouring used bookstores and video places for cheap DVD's, and I have to say I've been pretty lucky. I've attached some mini-reviews, and also how much I snagged them all for:

Hardy Boyz: Leap of Faith ($7.99)
Okay, I'm not a huge Hardy Boyz fan, but for that price, I certainly couldn't pass it up. The story itself is pretty lame, though it is interesting to see their backyard wrestling footage (or rather, backyard promos). The matches, from what I've seen so far, aren't bad at all, though nothing other than the famous No Mercy ladder match I watched with any particular interest.

Raw X ($5.99!)
...and that's the ONLY reason I bought it. Don't know if I've relayed this story before, but I was actually supposed to be in New York, travelling on business, the morning after Raw X. So I switched my flight to the night before, and figured I'd try to get in at the last minute (After all, my hotel was all of 20 minutes away from The World). But then customs in Toronto hits a major snag and I didn't even land at Laguardia until like 11 p.m., missing the entire show.

As I've since seen, that probably wasn't a bad thing. The awards ceremony was nothing short of horrible, especially given the lack of surprises they had. The Rock's cameo was terrible and received by the fans accordingly (cementing his later heel turn), and there was nothing on the show that did it for me. That said, the extras, tons of Raw moments and skits, were fun to relive, and for that reason, the purchase was worth while.

Wrestling Gold: Busted Open ($12.99)
This is another one of those Cornette-Meltzer deals that repackages old footage and has insider commentary taped over it. Well, the commentary is great, but the matches mostly suck. Larry Zybsko vs. Scott Casey, Gino Hernandez and Tully Blanchard Vs. Two Masked Jobbers, Adrian Adonis vs. Bob Orton... even the few that had some potential fell short. Still, seeing as you can't get this kind of non-WWE owned footage anywhere, I had to at least check it out.

Cheating Death, Stealing Life: The Eddie Guerrero Story ($26.99)
Okay, I paid full price for this one, but for good reason. It had several of my favorite Eddie Guerrero matches on it, plus a few that I've wanted to see, AND I'd never seen the actual UPN special when it first aired.

Like The Hardyz one, the story part was very overwhelming. Compared to the Stone Cold, Hogan and especially the Chris Benoit ones, you'd think they could have done something special with this. I mean, Eddie's life is a fascinating story, but given that, they don't really work overtime to make it SEEM spectacular. If that makes any sense.

But the real reason to buy this one is for the matches, and I wasn't disappointed here. In fact, I almost bought No Way Out a few months back, solely for the awesome Guerrero-Brock Lesnar match. But seeing as its on here already, there was no need. Plus his Hallowe'en Havoc match with Rey Mysterio was fantastic -- even if I already had it on another DVD (the Rey one). But the Michael Cole, Rey and Eddie commentary was very good.

Which brings me to another point. WHY do they let Todd Grisham do any of these guest commentaries with the wrestlers? Is there no one else available? His drab, pointless remarks make for a slow and dragging commentary, and he brings the wrestlers (on this DVD it was Eddie and Dean Malenko) down with him. Cole was fine, let him do it from now on. PLEASE!

Anyways, this one was certainly my favorite of the bunch, just because it's one I know I'll be watching several times over. Now all we need is a Jericho compilation and I'll be thrilled.


Walking Tall (rented it)
I didn't catch this one in the theaters, and apparently, neither did 99 % of the moviegoing public. For good reason -- it just wasn't anything special.

The first thing you notice is, the movie is short. Really damn short. As in it feels like it's an hour in total. In reality, its a bit longer than that, but not much.

The story is interesting enough, and it certainly kept my attention. But really, other than The Rock, there were no strong characters here (Johnny Knoxville was passable as comic relief, but the villian was a joke). And by the time things really get cooking, they've wrapped the film in a nice, neat little package.

Hopefully, Rock's next movie will be a hit, because he needs it if I wants to keep landing big roles. But this one, sadly, wasn't the right vehicle for him.