Customer Reviews

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Pro Wrestling

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

I'm a total wrestling fan, been following it since the late 80s explosion, through the early 90s recession, and into it's current media frenzy. This guide gives some great historical information and facts on the subject of wrestling. What ruins it are multiple (almost one per page) errors about relatively simple subjects, like wrestler's names and moves. An extra day of editing, by true blue fans, would have totally made this book worth owning. As it is, I only recommend it for the young and stupid who don't know any better. So basically, if you're a fan of Konnan, David Flair, or WCW in general, this is the book you'll want to worship. For you WWF fans, who know what wrestling is, try reading it yourself, and circle the errors. You'll learn some things, but the constant mistakes just ruin the whole experience.

This book is so badly-written as to make me wonder exactly who the market audience would be. The only person I could really see benefitting from Albano's and Sugar's frequent factual errors and glossing-overs would be someone who has seen wrestling on TV a few times, found it to be less awful than they expected, and want to know more about what they're watching. Anybody with more than a passing interest in this form of entertainment will be left sorely disappointed.

So many things about this book bugged me: the fact that half the time, the authors act as if wrestling is real (especially Albano, when he is recounting his days in the WWF)...the fact that they suggest that the reader only follow one federation (so we don't bite off more than we can chew, supposedly)...the fact that their description of "the moves of pro wrestling" don't explain that the moves for the most part DON'T hurt the opponent...the fact that they consistently refer to Real Life in wrestling as "real-real" (when any mark or carny knows it's "shoot") and to the bad guys as "villains" (not "heels," as they're known to wrestlers). A thousand factual errors share pages with a thousand typographical errors.

Basically, this is a book which purports to be an "insider view" of professional wrestling, but which is written by two people from the outside who feel the need to keep the illusion of "wrestling as real-life violence." There's some interesting information about the earliest days at the turn of the 20th century, but it's hard to believe it as gospel when ten pages later the authors are telling you that Kane and the Undertaker are really brothers, that the first ladder match was in ECW, that Onita's barbed-wire cage uses real live electricity, and not just fireworks.

Rather than really explain what goes on in the industry (from backstage to in the ring), they try to get the reader to choose one of the two major companies (now, of course, there's only one) and believe that it's real. This may have been the way fans were in the 70s, but by now, for some reason, we are all in on the gag. All of us, apparently, except Albano and Sugar.

If you are in fact a Complete Idiot, and you need to spend 19 bucks to have someone tell you that you can look up a favorite wrestler on search engines for more information, then go ahead and buy this book. Otherwise, steer clear or get it at a Salvation Army like I did.

There aren't that many books about pro wrestling to start with, so when you come across something in the mainstream press, you have to hope for the best. Unfortunatly, The Complete Idiot's Guide is filled with factual errors concerning the history of the sport, not the least of which is poor coverage of the 'fake versus real' issue.

If you are seriouis about the history of wrestling, pick of Have a Nice Day or the new Dynamite Kid book instead.

As my title suggests, the idea behind an Idiot's Guide to the sport of professional wrestling is excellent, but I must mimic what others are saying about this book. I couldn't even finish the work, because it was chocked full of more errors than any such book of its kind. Names were wrong, dates were wrong, winners were wrong, federations were wrong, and that's just scratching the surface. I'm a longtime fan and scholar of professional wrestling, I'm a bigtime news man on several of the bigger sites devoted to the sport, and I'll read almost anything about it, but halfway through this one I just couldn't do it anymore. If you're trying to learn about the sport, check out Jeff Archer's book or PLEASE go and purchase the yearly Pro Wrestling Illustrated Almanac (may already be unavailable for this calendar year) and do it that way. Check out the three real autobiography projects, Mick Foley's by himself, and Page's and Rock's with assistance. That's my two cents, until next time.......................

Lou Albano and Burt Sugar give you all the low down on the wrestling industry, including real names. Did you know that The Rock's real name is Rocky Melvin? I didn't. I bet he didn't either.

This book is definitely only for complete idiots. There is absolutely nothing of any interest in this book. THey are stories with huge, necessary chunks cut out. And this is all not to mention the grammatical, spelling, and factual errors that you'll be able to find on every other page. If you know nothing about wrestling, then this is the book for you. But If you've been watching for at least 6 months, then there is no point in wasting your money on this book.

To paraphrase Bret Hart, professional wrestling is a lot more real than people realize. It is a highly competitive and physically demanding endeavor, both unrecognized art form and brutal, sleazy sideshow. The Complete Idiot's Guide does little to capture this essence of pro wrestling, instead treating in the same half-hearted manner that so many books and articles have in the past. To make matters worse, the Guide contains several factual errors and gaps, most glaringly when dealing with the legitimacy of wresting as an actual physical contest. The reality is that no one really knows when wrestling became "fake," in the sense of matches having pre-determined outcomes and workers co-operating with each other. The real, factual history of pro wrestling will probably never be known. We do know, however, that the wrestling of today is a direct ancestor of 19th century carnival wrestling, where match outcomes were, at best, manipulated.

It is ironic that this book came out only a few months before Mick Foley's Have a Nice Day. The two books could not be more different. Foley is insightful, never talking down to the reader, and avoids the huckster's wink that seems to accompany most wrestling books, including the Idiot's Guide. The very last thing wrestling needs is another "fun send-up."

As alternatives, I would suggest in particular the Foley book, the new Dynamite Kid autobiography, and Dave Meltzer's Tributes. If you can find it and are interested in the early history of pro wrestling, I strongly recommend Fall Guys: The Barnums of Bounce. Though written in 1937, it seems to be describing the wrestling of today.

I thought this book would be an interesting read about one of my favorite hobbies, but I was mistaken. There is nothing particularly enlightening in here...basically anyone who has ever watched wrestling once or twice will know the majority of information that is given in the book. I mean, I know it is called the "Idiots" guide, but I guess I didn't realize that the authors took it so literally. I thought that the biographies of wrestlers past and present would be interesting, but they too were just superficial sketches. I also found a number of factual errors in the book, which took away from its credibility. I like the idea of this book in theory, and it is nice to see a book such as this being sold in the mainstream, but I didn't like the way it actually turned out. Hopefully someone will try a similar concept but do it better.

If you're a complete wrestling addict, this book will fail to enthrall you. There are a few nuggets of entertaining information, but for the most part, this book is for people who really don't know much about the world of sports entertainment. The bios on the wrestlers are dated and are angled from the character's aspects, rather than the real life stats of the wrestlers themselves.

It is quite sad that Lou Albano, who had such long history in wrestling, is apparently clueless as to what the current state of wrestling is about. And what is up with Bert Sugar? I can't stand that guy. His commentary on boxing is horrible, and his commentary on pro-wrestling is even worse. This book is full of grammatical and factual errors remarks. Not recommended for ANY wrestling fan, even the most casual and naive marks.