Wrestlemania Count-Up – Wrestlemania V (2013 Redo): Long. Very Long.

IMG Credit: WWE

Wrestlemania V
Date: April 2, 1989
Location: Trump Plaza, Atlantic City, New Jersey
Attendance: 18,946
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Jesse Ventura

Hercules vs. King Haku

The Rockers say they can handle the Twin Towers.

Rockers vs. Twin Towers

Akeem KILLS HIM with a clothesline (Jesse: “I think he irritated Akeem!”) but Boss Man misses a top rope splash. The Rockers hit some double dropkicks (one of which sees Shawn completely missing Bossman) but a top rope rana is countered into a wicked powerbomb by Boss Man. Akeem crushes Shawn with a splash for the pin.

Ted DiBiase talks about hanging out with Donald Trump and having them here to see him beat up Beefcake.

Ted DiBiase vs. Brutus Beefcake

Brutus gets to the rope so they slug it out some more with the barber taking over. Now Beefcake throws on his own sleeper but gets sent out to the floor in a counter. Virgil interferes a bit to distract Beefcake but DiBiase stupidly goes out to the floor as well. They brawl to a double countout to a big boo from the crowd.

Rating: C-. This was mainly a punching match as well as a pretty big fall for DiBiase. To go from the main event to the third match on the card in a year is a pretty big fall, which is saying a lot as DiBiase was still a very evil heel. Brutus was getting very popular very fast and would be paired with Hogan soon after this for a BIG rub.

Brutus beats up Virgil post match and chases them off with the hedge clippers. You know, assault with a deadly weapon as Jesse calls it.

We go to the Wrestlemania brunch with the Bushwhackers eating a lot and trying to talk about their match with the Rougeaus.

Bushwhackers vs. Fabulous Rougeau Brothers

Anyway Ray puts on an abdominal stretch as a fan or two chants USA. In theory that would be for the Rougeaus here who are the All American Boys facing the guys from New Zealand. The Rougeaus prematurely hug and get caught by the Battering Ram and a double gutbuster is good for the pin on Ray out of nowhere.

Mr. Perfect vs. Blue Blazer

They slightly botch a flip out of a hiptoss and Blazer dropkicks Perfect to the floor. Blazer hits a quick hiptoss (why is that so popular here?) of his own and a dropkick for no cover. A modified northern lights suplex gets two for Blue but a top rope splash hits knees. Off to a reverse chinlock for a few moments by Perfect but Blazer fights up and hits a standing powerslam and a belly to belly for two each. A crucifix gets two more but Blazer spends too long arguing with the referee and the PerfectPlex ends this clean.

Jesse is presented to the crowd again like last year.

Mr. Fuji allegedly runs a 5K run in a tuxedo.

We recap the double tag team turn at Survivor Series 1988 with Fuji leaving Demolition to hook up with the Powers of Pain.

Tag Titles: Demolition vs. Powers of Pain/Mr. Fuji

Ronnie Garvin vs. Dino Bravo

Brain Busters vs. Strike Force

This is the return of Strike Force after Martel had a bad injury. Blanchard and Martel start things off and Rick almost immediately has to punch out of the wrong corner. Off to Anderson who gets rammed face first into the mat before being put in his own test of strength on the mat. Arn catches Martel in a body scissors but Rick turns it over into his signature Boston Crab.

Blanchard makes the save but Tito immediately comes in to put him in the Figure Four. Martel puts one on Anderson as well as things break down. We get some near falls by Tito but he accidentally hits the forearm on Martel to take him out. Rick gets ticked off as Tito is basically in a handicap match. The Busters get to take over on Tito but you know Santana can hang with either guy.

Rating: B-. Best match of the night so far as all four guys were moving out there. Tito could go with the best of them and he had some of the best of them to do that with in this one. Martel and Santana would feud on and off for about a year until they just stopped fighting out of nowhere.

Donald Trump likes hosting Wrestlemania.

Ventura goes into a hilarious rant against Hogan for invading Hollywood because Hogan needs a job after Savage beats him tonight. Jesse shouts that Hulk can drive his limo and storms off.

We recap the Megapowers feud as intermission continues. Basically Savage won the title at Mania 4 then teamed up with Hogan. Hogan kept getting the pins and finally at Main Event II, Savage accidentally wiped out Elizabeth. Hogan took Liz to the back to get attention but it left Savage alone. Finally Savage slapped Hogan and turned heel again, leading to the heel promo of a lifetime as he ERUPTED on Hogan, letting out every bit of his pent up rage and jealousy before blasting Hogan with the title in the medical room.

Hogan says it was Savage eaten alive by the jealousy and the title is coming home tonight. This somehow turns into a talk about destroying the Trump Plaza, which I think he touched on last year too.

Andre the Giant vs. Jake Roberts

Andre looks so different than he did two years ago. In Detroit he looked like a killing machine but here he looks like a lumbering oaf. Giant steps on Jake a few times but Roberts comes back with some strikes. He knocks Andre into the ropes and chokes away, only to see Andre get his arm loose and choke Jake right back.

Sensational Sherri wants to fight Rockin Robin and hopes Liz gets hurt today.

Greg Valentine/Honky Tonk Man vs. Hart Foundation

We recap Rude vs. Warrior which is basically just because Rude attacked Warrior at the Rumble Super Posedown and the champion wants revenge.

Intercontinental Title: Ultimate Warrior vs. Rick Rude

Warrior is defending but Rude has the belt imprinted on his tights. Rude tries a knee to the ribs but hits the belt by mistake. Warrior immediately takes over with the power game and LAUNCHES Rude into the corner. The champ throws on a bearhug for a bit until Rude finally pokes him in the eyes to escape. Rude busts out a MISSILE DROPKICK for two but gets launched off Warrion on the kickout.

Warrior beats up Heenan post match. Remember that for later.

Bad News Brown vs. Jim Duggan

Red Rooster vs. Bobby Heenan

Just to drag this out EVEN LONGER, the Brawler beats the Rooster up, because WE HAVE TO PUSH BROOKLN FREAKING BRAWLER.

Tony Schiavone and Sean Mooney fill in even MORE time.

WWF World Title: Hulk Hogan vs. Randy Savage

Savage escapes being posted and sends Hogan in by mistake. After sending Hulk back in, Randy yells at Liz a bit more and shoves her up the aisle. The referee ejects Liz, making the only interesting factor a nonfactor. Back to the floor and Savage drops the ax handle off the top to send Hogan throat first into the barricade. Savage goes after the throat with various evil measures but the elbow only gets two. Hulk Up, big boot, leg drop, new champion.

Hogan celebrates forever to end the show.

Ratings Comparison

Hercules vs. King Haku

Original: C-

Redo: C-

Twin Towers vs. Rockers

Original: C

Redo: C

Brutus Beefcake vs. Ted DiBiase

Original: D+

Redo: C-

Bushwhackers vs. Fabulous Rougeau Brothers

Original: D-

Redo: D

Mr. Perfect vs. Blue Blazer

Original: B-

Redo: C+

Demolition vs. Powers of Pain/Mr. Fuji

Original: C-

Redo: D

Dino Bravo vs. Ronnie Garvin

Original: F

Redo: D

Brain Busters vs. Strike Force

Original: B-

Redo: B-

Jake Roberts vs. Andre the Giant

Original: D

Redo: D

Hart Foundation vs. Honky Tonk Man/Greg Valentine

Original: D+

Redo: D+

Rick Rude vs. Ultimate Warrior

Original: B

Redo: B

Jim Duggan vs. Bad News Brown

Original: F

Redo: D-

Red Rooster vs. Brooklyn Brawler

Original: N/A

Redo: N/A

Hulk Hogan vs. Randy Savage

Original: C+

Redo: B-

Overall Rating

Original: D+

Redo: D

Wow that was a rather boring redo.

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/03/12/history-of-wrestlemania-with-kb-wrestlemania-5-hogan-vs-savage-and-thats-about-it/

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Wrestlemania Count-Up – Wrestlemania V (Original): They Collide

IMG Credit: WWE

Wrestlemania 5
Date: April 2, 1989
Location: Trump Plaza, Atlantic City, New Jersey
Attendance: 18,946
Announcers: Gorilla Monsoon, Jesse Ventura
America The Beautiful: Rockin Robin

This show is more or less the WWF waking up and realizing that not announcing your main event until 20 minutes before it happens isn’t really a good idea. The tagline for this show was very simple: The Mega Powers Explode! Simple concept that’s as old as wrestling itself: Hogan helps Savage become champion, Hogan gets the spotlight even without the belt, Savage’s jealousy gets the best of him and he snaps over a certain incident.

In this case, the incident was on my first birthday in a tag match with Akeem and Big Boss Man against the Mega Powers. Savage got tossed through the ropes and landed on Elizabeth. Hogan carried her back to get help and Savage was left all alone. They argue in the back with Savage cutting the best promo of his life as all of the anger he had stored up inside him erupts and he attacks Hogan to set up this showdown for the gold. Liz says she’s going to try to remain neutral in the main event.

The Women’s Champion sings America the Beautiful and does an ok job at it. Kind of a bland voice though.

Haku vs. Hercules

This match is part of a very unnoticed storyline where Hercules was part of the Heenan Family but was then “sold” to Ted DiBiase. This upset him and Hercules said he was a free man. He went on a small war with Heenan’s stable and I guess you’d call this the climax of that. The feud was nothing at all and it went nowhere as Hercules just wasn’t over at all. This is a power vs. power match that pleasantly surprised me as it has a fair amount of solid wrestling on it and not just all power.

The powder blue tights just don’t do it for a guy with the name of Hercules. Donald Trump is in the front row again which makes sense as he owns the place. Haku is really getting outworked here. Hercules’ offense is a lot more diverse as opposed to chops and bearhugs with a kick thrown in here and there. That’s kind of the storyline of this whole match too and you can see that in the ending.

Haku is the King of Wrestling here and for some reason that isn’t on the line in this match. It was an odd kind of semi-title where you would be proclaimed king and get to wear a crown and have a bunch of muscle jobbers bring you out on a throne but other than that it never really went anywhere. Savage got it and held it for like a year or so and it more or less died after that.

This is about as bland as you can get but it’s surprisingly decent. Hercules worked better as a face because here he has something to fight for in his own pride. Back when he was a heel he had nothing special about him and was just a generic henchman. He’s more interesting and well rounded here though which is what a turn is supposed to accomplish.

Hercules lands a belly to back suplex into a bridge but shoots his shoulder up to avoid the double pin, which was exactly the same thing he lost to the year before. That’s a very subtle touch to his character that a lot of people don’t realize. It shows that he’s capable of learning something new and has adapted a new style over the last year.

Rating: C-. There’s a story here and there’s some decent action, but at the end of it all it’s just not that great. Good and not boring, but not great. This wasn’t much at all from a ring work standpoint but it was surprisingly good. I’m not sure why I like this match but I kind of always have and while it’s certainly an odd choice to open Wrestlemania with, it’s not bad.

In the back we see a team called the Rockers. This Marty Jannetty guy is a freaking STUD. I could see this guy winning something like the IC title, maybe some tag titles or something like that. His partner just does nothing for me though as he’s very bland.

Twin Towers vs. The Rockers

Twin Towers are Big Bossman and Akeem, aka the One Man Gang in case you weren’t sure. Rockers had been around for a few months at this point but as they would wind up doing for their whole run they were still trying to find themselves as a team.

This is about as simple of a story as you can get: power vs. speed and it works fairly well here. Akeem seriously may be the greatest gimmick of all time. For those of you that don’t know, One Man Gang and his manager Slick found out that he was of African descent, despite being the palest Caucasian you’ll ever find.

He starts embracing his African roots and doing these weird dances and wearing weird outfits. To see him doing this is just hilarious and something that you should check out for a good laugh and I’d like to give whoever thought it up a ham sandwich.

Cool spot where Bossman has Jannetty up in a bear hug position and Akeem just slams into him. Simple yet effective. Jannetty gets his head handed to him the majority of the match. Slick screaming about how a black referee would count faster and wouldn’t cheat is just such a great touch when his wrestlers are whiter than snow.

Becca shouldn’t watch this match as Akeem just about kills Shawn with one of the best clotheslines I’ve ever seen. Bossman kills him even worse with a spinning powerbomb and then a splash by Akeem and Shawn is finally given a break as the pin goes down.

Rating: C. This was a solid performance by the Rockers but they really didn’t stand much of a chance. Some good spots make this quite passable though. What’s with the back to back generic matches to start off the biggest show of the year though? Is this really the best they could find?

Ted DiBiase is rich and likes to talk about it. He’s also got a new belt that he likes showing off.

Ted DiBiase vs. Brutus Beefcake

Hearing DiBiase having different homes for each season is just a perfect touch to the gimmick that makes him so much more fun to hate. Still say he’s the best heel of all time. Brutus finally has his awesome music here. Jesse describes Brutus’ pants perfectly: it looks like a grenade went off in his pockets. Ted talks to Trump before we start.

What exactly did Brutus expect to do with those huge hedge clippers? This is a balance of the sleepers. According to Gorilla this is one of the reasons the fans are here for. Something tells me that’s not the case. DiBiase cheats almost immediately as the heel he is. What a fall he’s taken in a year. From the main event to this. Wow.

We get a pretty nice back and forth sequence to start as both guys are moving pretty well out there. Jesse drops some names as they slug it out. It’s turned into a standard kick and punch match which isn’t interesting or anything but it fills in time pretty well I suppose.

DiBiase gets a nice shot off the middle rope but doesn’t cover or anything. Why do that anyway? No one gets pins off moves like those anyway. Brutus gets a small package for two. Double clothesline and Ted gets up first. There’s the Million Dollar Dream but Beefcake gets the rope. More kicking and punching sets up Beefcake’s sleeper. Virgil gets Beefcake on the floor and DiBiase follows, leading to a double countout. Gorilla kind of scoffs at the ending.

Rating: D+. They were just kind of there. Pretty boring too. Nothing interesting here at all. I’ve always loved the falling punch DiBiase used. Just something sweet about it. This is power versus technician but it just doesn’t come off that way. Beefcake was supposed to be a power guy I think but he wasn’t that good at it. It’s also not a power move to use a sleeper. Yeah this match was pretty weak.

There used to be a thing called the Bagels and Biceps Brunch. What the point of this was, I’m not sure but it apparently was a tradition. The Bushwackers, one of which licked my face at a house show, are about to face the Rougeaus.

Bushwackers vs. The Fabulous Rougeau Brothers

The Rougeau’s music of We’re All American Boys is nothing short of amazing. Just an awesome song and one of Jimmy Hart’s great touches. The Bushwackers are just out there even by today’s standards. How these guys lasted nearly 6 years in a completely different gimmick than they started with is beyond me.

The Battering Ram is one of the dumbest yet most awesome moves I’ve ever seen. Now this is a match that I remember only one thing about. During a scoop slam, Luke of the Bushwackers clearly rubs Ray Rougeau crotch. It’s not on accident either. He puts his hand there and rubs up and down. Just a disturbing sight.

Other than that this is nothing but a comedy match. The 80s were so awesome in the area of tag wrestling that they even managed to have jobber tag teams on a regular basis. There’s nothing going on here with the Bushwackers running around for a minute, the Rougeaus controlling for two minutes and the finish. To end this in a hurry, Bushwackers win with their rib breaker move.

Rating: D-. The crotch rub never fails to surprise me. Just not something I want to think about. The match completely sucked though and just never went anywhere at all. What is with all these fillers? DiBiase vs. Beefcake is by far the biggest matchup so far and even it is nothing special and could have been on any house show that year. Weak show so far and a weak match here.

Sean Mooney, one of my all time favorite broadcasters gets licked by a Bushwacker while talking to some fans in a pointless segment.

Mr. Perfect vs. The Blue Blazer

Yes that’s Owen Hart under the mask. This is another match that is more or less just there for the sake of being there but it should be pretty good. Perfect is still undefeated here. Jesse thinks this is going to be tremendous. Hennig gets a nice hiptoss to start.

He slaps the Blazer and doesn’t get drilled as a result for some reason. Ah there’s the slap and Owen speeds things up a bit. And then we slow them right back down. Baseball slide hits Perfect. Owen was WAY ahead of his time here as he could move like no one else could and was busting out Japanese and European stuff which was unheard of in America at this time.

Blazer is dominating here as Perfect has no idea what to do with him. BIG top rope splash eats knees though. That looked awesome as he got way up in the air and nailed the knees perfectly. Jesse has a surprise for Gorilla.

Powerslam by Blazer gets two and a belly to belly gets two as well. Jesse thinks Perfect has Mania jitters. Crucifix gets two for Blazer. And then a big shot gets Perfect the advantage. Perfectplex gets the easy pin.

Rating: B-. Pretty solid little match here with both guys moving very well. It was speed/flying vs. technical style out there and it worked very well. It helps having two guys that can work a variety of styles. Perfect hit two moves the whole match which hurts this though. Still solid stuff and Owen looked awesome in this.

Yet again, Jesse is introduced to the crowd as a “major Hollywood star” (he had done some supporting roles in some fairly big movies like Predator). There was apparently a 5K run with Mr. Fuji, in tuxedo and bowler hat, running in a decent time. He’s in the handicap tag title match later on if you’re wondering what the heck this is for. He finishes without even breathing hard and Lord Alfred Hayes suspects shenanigans.

Now for something just completely out of place, Run DMC performs the Wrestlemania Rap. This thing goes on and on and on.

Tag Titles: Mr. Fuji and Powers of Pain vs. Demolition

Storyline on this: Demolition was by far and away the most dominant tag team the late 80s had ever seen. They held the titles for about a year and a half which is still the longest amount of time ever. They were brought in as heels around Wrestlemania 3 and won the belts at Wrestlemania 4. Sometime between 3 and 4, they got Mr. Fuji as a manager.

Over the course of the summer, the fans realized how truly awesmoe Demolition was and they began to cheer them. Around the same time, the Powers of Pain, comprised of the Warlord and the Barbarian debuted as faces. The problem was more people liked Demolition than the PoP. So what was the solution you ask? The answer was the incredibly difficult and even rarer double turn.

At the 1988 Survivor Series, the teams had been feuding over the tag belts and were captains of their respective Survivor Series teams. Late in the match, Fuji pulled the top rope down and Smash fell over the ropes and landed on the floor. Ax got in Fuji’s face about it and Fuji answered with I’m The Boss! Demolition beat up Fuji and were counted out. The Powers of Pain helped him up and soon thereafter he was their manager.

So all of that leads us here to the showdown with Fuji and his team in a 3-2 match with Demolition for the tag titles. Fuji does what Heenan did last year with a shot here and a shot there, but at least with Fuji he had a very successful tagging career, including a reign that at the time was the longest in the history of the title. This match is what you would expect from it.

The formula is exactly what you would expect in a match like this. Demolition beats down the Powers, they beat them back, Fuji comes in and beats them up a bit, which is to say he kicks them twice, and then he runs away. This isn’t anything we haven’t seen a thousand times before and it’s not particularly entertaining. Naturally it gets about 9 minutes.

Demolition holds their own but eventually gets beaten up by all three, until Fuji makes a mistake. He misses an elbow from the top rope which is impressive in its own right, then eventually throws salt that was his trademark but misses. He’s then hit with the Demolition Decapitation, which might be the worst double team move of all time, and pinned.

Rating: C-. I liked this match but then again I like Demolition. Fuji actually knew how to wrestle and was only in his early 50s at the time so he still could go in the ring to an extent. Demolition is a simple team at heart: beat the tar out of their opponents. That’s hard to mess up and they did it as well as any team ever did. The lack of drama hurts it a good deal though and it shows.

Tony Schiavone tries to talk to Macho Man but gets thrown out.

Ronny Garvin vs. Dino Bravo

Umm, ok? What the point to this match is I have no idea, but after the introductions, Jimmy Snuka is introduced to the crowd for some reason. Literally, they announce Bravo and Garvin, and then the Fink says there is a special guest tonight. Snuka comes out in full apparel and to his music and gets in the ring and poses. He has absolutely nothing to do with this match and isn’t seen again all night.

Anyway onto the match. I have never liked Ronny Garvin. The man just absolutely bores me to tears in the ring. How he became the NWA Champion and even defended it at Starrcade 87 is beyond me. Bravo was ok in the ring but just never really did it for me either. As I say that, Garvin puts on a sleeper which is perfect because I’m falling asleep watching this.

In a strange ending (Thank God) Garvin is up in the corner punching Bravo but gets caught with an atomic drop and is side suplexed to pin him. Garvin gets up and hits Bravo and then uses what has to be the stupidest finisher of all time on Bravo’s manager, the Garvin Stomp. Randy Orton I believe has used this recently. He starts at the arm and goes around the body stomping the opponent. Just looks bad.

Rating: F. I was bored to tears and don’t like either one. This is a biased rating and I could care less. This is a Ronnie Garvin match and therefore it sucks.

Strike Force vs. The Brainbusters

Strike Force (a breath of fresh air after that awful match that just aired) is teaming together for the first time in a long time. Martel was injured by Demolition and was gone for almost a year. In the time off, Santana wrestled in singles matches. Upon Martel’s return, he asked Tito to reform Strike Force which he eventually did. This is their first match back against Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard. After this match, the Busters would go on to feud with Demolition over the tag belts.

It sounds wrong to hear Gorilla talking about a Horsemen match and calling them a couple of really tough dudes. Jesse and Gorilla bickering is always funny. it says a lot when Martel is by far the worst technician in a match. Big brawl to start and surprisingly Strike Force wins it.

Martel gets a very nice counter from a body scissors into the Boston Crab. That was impressive. Everything breaks down and Strike Force gets a pair of Figure Fours which has to be at least a mini-rib on the Horsemen.

And now we get the meat of the match as Tito accidentally drills Martel with his flying forearm and down he goes onto the floor. After about a minute Martel gets back up but he’s all shaken up. The Busters work the referee and the tag rules like the masters that they are.

Santana keeps trying to come back and finally does by slamming Arn off the top. Yeah that has to be a rib. Tito finally gets away and goes for the tag but Martel won’t tag and then leaves, heading to the dressing room.

Arn yells at Santana WHERE’S YOUR PARTNER to just be a jerk. The ramp/aisle is really long here so it takes Martel like two minutes to get back. Tito fights back as well as he can but he’s outnumbered and after a few minutes the spike piledriver ends it.

Rating: B-. Half tag and half handicap so it’s unique if nothing else. I always liked both teams and I like what I see here. The post match promo is solid too so it gets a good grade. Very interesting here as this obviously causes the split between the two. They would feud on and off for nearly two years after this with neither one really winning the feud. What’s forgotten in this is the Brainbusters. They are their usually great selves and but on a solid match.

Martel blames Tito and says it was Tito’s idea to reform the team and all that jazz. This is his heel turn if you didn’t get that. He wouldn’t be a face again for like 8 years until he was in WCW.

Piper’s Pit

This gets one of the biggest pops of the nights. One of the funniest lines I’ve heard in a long time from the Fink: I am pleased to introduce to you a man who needs no introduction. We get a really long intro for Piper and out comes the man that creeped me out more than anyone else as a kid: Brother Love.

Seriously, the guy had a red face. That’s just incredibly scary looking to a two year old. Throw in his voice and it’s just scary. His character was based on high energy Christian televangelists such as Jimmy Swaggert. You all might know him better as Bruce Pritchard who was a creative team member until a few months ago.

Love then says his guest on the Brother Love show is Rodney Piper. He then imitates Piper in something that is either dead on or awful and I can’t tell which. He asks questions as Love and takes his glasses off and changes chairs to be Piper. Then out comes the guest, Morton Downey Jr.

This show aired nearly 20 years ago and until I looked him up just seconds ago, I had no freaking clue who this guy was and I’ve seen this PPV at least 30 times. Turns out he was a talk show host that was the inspiration for Springer, Maury etc. His show was viewed as amazingly Right Wing based and he would often berate anyone that disagreed with him. He was later replaced by Rush Limbaugh.

Anyway, Downey is smoking a cigarette which Gorilla refers to as weed. This made my jaw drop. Gorilla said he was puffing on weed. Gorilla Monsoon isn’t supposed to talk about weed blast it! Downey trash talks with Brother Love until they’re interrupted by the Fink who says Piper really is here. Out comes Piper for his first WWF appearance in 2 years.

Piper talks down to Love because of the kilt that Love is wearing. He asks him questions but keeps pulling the mic away saying he doesn’t want to know that badly. I’d forgotten how funny Piper was in his prime. He turns his attention to Downey who is still smoking and keeps blowing smoke into Piper’s face which Piper doesn’t approve of. Downey keeps using the standard insults.

My favorite line: Piper mentions that Downey used to have warts all over his face. Piper: What did you with the warts? Downey: I gave them to a homeless warthog. Piper: (without missing a beat) I didn’t know your girlfriend was homeless. Downey calls Piper is a transvestite before blowing more smoke in his face.

Piper asks for a cig for himself. Downey turns to light it and for no reason at all, Piper has a fire extinguisher under his chair. In probably his second most famous bit after the coconut, Piper sprays him down and leaves.

About as appropriately as possible, Downey would die of lung cancer in 2001.

BREAKING NEWS-Hulk Hogan is making a movie! It’s called No Holds Barred. That movie truly was nine kinds of awesome.

Sean Mooney is talking to Donald Trump. Apparently WM 4 and 5 have been successes.

Jesse is TICKED OFF. Hogan is invading his territory because after he loses to Macho he needs a job. Jesse says he can drive his limo and storms off. Gorilla plugs the movie again and recaps the show so far. We get a video recapping the Mega Powers rise to glory and their split.

Hogan says he can’t believe how this all came about in just a year. He goes into another of his insane promos about everyone being swallowed up by the Earth when the Trump Towers fall apart. Makes little if any sense. Then he talks about winning the title.

Andre the Giant vs. Jake Roberts

Big John Studd is the referee here for no apparent reason. He comes out to what would become Jim Duggan’s music oddly enough. No real reason is given as to why he’s the referee here. Andre is back with Heenan. The point of this match is Andre is terrified of snakes.

This resulted in a scene on television where Andre had a “heart attack” when Jake put the snake on him, yet he’s wrestling again just a few months later. Remarkable. Around this time, Jake was insanely popular, arguably the third biggest face in the company after only Hogan and Warrior.

Somehow before the match starts one of the turnbuckle pads is off and Roberts gets slammed into it. Gorilla says that Jake is like David against Goliath and Jesse says David had to use a foreign object to beat him which makes me want to write the Bible from a wrestling perspective one day. In a funny bit Andre chokes Jake in the corner and Studd goes to count Andre and you literally can’t see Jake other than his feet. Jake stood 6’5.

It’s your standard Andree match from this era. He just could not move to save his life at this point and was a complete shell of his former self. They do the tied up in the ropes spot and Andre is reeling. More pain and punishment goes in until Heenan gets the arm loose and here comes your unfriendly and not likely from your neighborhood Giant.

Something happens in this match that I’ve never been sure of. Andre is throwing shoulders to Jake’s ribs in the corner and falls backwards and down to one knee. He doesn’t hit his head on anything that I can see. Always thought that was just odd. Andre and Studd finally fight while DiBiase of all people runs out and steals the bag with the snake in it. Roberts catches him and throws the snake in the ring to get rid of Andre. Jake wins via DQ.

Rating: D. This is just a strange combination. Andre just didn’t mesh well with most because he was too big. Roberts tried his best but it didn’t go that well. Studd served no real purpose here at all either. They tried but it didn’t work that well.

Sherri will get the title back apparently and doesn’t like Liz at all.

Rhythm and Blues vs. The Hart Foundation

The newly face Harts face off with their old manager’s new team of Honky Tonk Man and Greg Valentine. To me this was just before Bret’s prime. He’s so smooth in the ring that I’m gaining a new respect for him. The announcers refer to Pat Patterson as a relic. That’s just amusing.

This is the most basic of basic tag matches I can remember in a long time. I mean NOTHING happens here. The faces start in control, the heels take over and dominate for a bit, then we get a hot tag and the finish begins.

Honky hits the Shake Rattle and Roll on Bret but he tags in Hammer for the figure four which clearly is a mistake. Back and forth and Jimmy tosses in the Megaphone which is intercepted. After a solid shot to Honky’s shoulder Neidhart pins him.

Rating: D+. Bret makes this one pretty good for a glorified squash. This went nowhere at all and it’s MORE FILLER. We’ve had ONE match break ten minutes tonight: the Beefcake match got up to 10:01. That’s saying a lot. Just another match that went absolutely nowhere at all.

We get a recap of the Warrior/Rude feud. It involves a posedown and a lot of talking.

Intercontinental Title: Rick Rude vs. Ultimate Warrior

The idea of this is the two competed for who had the best body. They had a pose off at the Royal Rumble and Rude attacked the Warrior with a steel exercise bar. Not much of a story but this was the second biggest match on the card.

For some reason that God alone knows, these two had freaks chemistry together. It’s rare to ever see a bad match between them. I have no idea why this is the case but that’s how it always was with them. To have one of the worst workers ever and another who’s character was great but in the ring wasn’t great but wasn’t bad either be able to put on such solid matches really is a strange thing.

Warrior beats the tar out of Rude early on. This is a solid beating and Rude sells it like there’s no tomorrow. Warrior works the back with some very powerful whip ins and a BIG bearhug. It looks like it’s going to be a quick little match but a piledriver slows Warrior down and it’s Rude in control.

Rude’s back is injured but he stays in the game as long as he can. Rude beats on him for nearly four or five minutes as he becomes one of the only people to actually beat down the Warrior and have success at it.

And so much for that as Warrior makes his comeback but as he’s trying to suplex Rude back in Heenan hooks his leg and holds it for the pin and the huge upset. Heenan gets beaten up by Warrior afterwards and because Warrior was so bad in the ring he legitimately hurt Bobby in this.

Rating: B. While not the best workers and a weak story, they again manage to put on a good match. I didn’t give it the description it deserves but that’s really all there was to it. Very well done though. The freaky chemistry these two had continue and I have never gotten it at all.

Jim Duggan vs. Bad News Brown

This is the epitome of a filler. Nothing of note happens here at all as it’s a brawl that the announcers don’t care about at all. It’s about 3 minutes long and ends in a chair vs. 2×4 duel that Duggan wins.

Rating: F. No one cared and they knew it.

Red Rooster vs. Bobby Heenan

Backstory: Rooster, who has what to me is the worst gimmick of all time, (he literally acted like a rooster, complete with going cock-a-doodle-doo and strutting like one. He passed up the Mr. Perfect gimmick and got this instead) used to work for Heenan but Heenan said he wasn’t that good. This is the Rooster trying to get revenge.

Heenan comes out with the Brooklyn Brawler. This match literally doesn’t last a minute. Heenan jumps the Rooster and whips him into the corner. Rooster gets out of the way and Heenan hits the post and is covered for the pin. Brawler comes in and beats up Rooster who fights back and wins. Wow.

Rating: N/A. This was a total waste of time. But hey, the Brooklyn Brawler got PPV time!

We recap the WWF Title match. Hogan helped Savage win it a year ago and then more or less stole the spotlight for the next year. Liz got involved and Savage thought she was sleeping with Hogan. He went off on him on February 3 (I was turning 1) and turned heel, setting this up.

Hogan says Savage went crazy. That’s just amusing. This is the promo where Hogan absolutely loses his mind and goes on a rant about the building being swallowed up by the Earth or something and Donald Trump being worried about falling into the ocean.

WWF Title: Hulk Hogan vs. Randy Savage

They were trying to make this the second coming of Hogan/Andre but there was far less mystery of who was going to win. Liz is at ringside as an independent observer and she actually does just that: nothing. This match has the big match feel to it but looking back it was obvious which way it was going. Savage comes out first if that tells you anything.

Liz gets her own entrance and Jesse says she’ll leave with whoever wins. Gorilla says that sounds smart to him. To say this match is huge is a dramatic understatement. Jesse: this is what the term main event is used for. This is the main event. He’s absolutely right too as this drew INSANE money as they had built up the mega match between these two forever.

Hogan shoves Savage with ease and there he goes. The announcers argue about managers which is kind of funny. Savage keeps running in fear from Hogan and it’s basic stuff so far. He throws Liz in front of a Hogan punch but Hulk stops in time.

There’s Hogan’s wrestling quota for the year as he uses a four move combination to break down Savage and get a front facelock. Savage overpowers him in a surprise by backdropping him. Savage takes over a bit by getting a top rope double axe in. The champion works the arm for some reason. LONG sequence with the arm and then a headlock as we fill in time.

Hogan gets an atomic drop to counter but misses an elbow drop. Hogan’s eye was cut earlier on and it gets rammed into the buckle to open it up even worse. Savage slaps him and here comes Hulk. He slams Savage to the floor and Liz helps him up. They fight on the floor and Hogan gets rammed into the post.

Now Liz helps Hogan up. I guess she wants a double team later on. Hebner, the cock blocker that he is, throws Liz out. Savage hits the double axe off the top to send Hogan’s throat into the railing. Steamboat was out for three months because of that. It doesn’t even get two on Hogan. Savage slams him and there’s the big elbow. Hogan shoves him off, three punches, big boot, big leg, you know the drill I think. Lots of posing ends the show.

Rating: C+. Well it’s not bad, but the problem here is that it is completely underwhelming. This was supposed to be the biggest match ever and it’s just pretty standard fort he most part. Hogan wins the title again and shrugs off Savage’s best move. Not a fan of that at all but it’s the 80s so what are you going to do?

Overall Rating: D+. This is the first of the second era of Wrestlemanias that follows the now traditional Wrestlemania formula. There’s some ok stuff on here and it probably has the oddestok card yet. Pretty much every big star is here, the titles have good matches, the midcard matches are bad, and you have the WM main event.

This show also has the first instance of setting the stage for the future. 1989 was the first year of the big four PPVs so there were other feuds that would be needing to be closed at big shows. Feuds like Hogan and Perfect which sparked Hogan and Warrior, Roberts against DiBiase, and the continuation of Warrior and Rude which led to Warrior against the Heenan Family all spawned from this.

You could arguably call this the first standard Wrestlemania, and I would just barely give it that name over WM 3. Overall this is pretty weak show and the problem with it is mainly the match lengths. TWO matches broke ten minutes and one went past 10:01. I used to really like this one but it doesn’t hold up at all. Pretty bad show but it’s watchable I suppose. That’s about it.

 

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




Royal Rumble Count Up – 1989 (2013 Redo): They Went To Pay Per View For Him?

IMG Credit: WWE

Royal Rumble 1989
Date: January 15, 1989
Location: The Summit, Houston, Texas
Attendance: 19,000
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Jesse Ventura

Dino Bravo/Fabulous Rougeaus vs. Jim Duggan/Hart Foundation

Slick says the Twin Towers (Boss Man and Akeem) are probably winners of the Rumble but denies knowing anything about shenanigans with DiBiase. Sean Mooney has footage (the original Vickie Guerrer) of Slick and DiBiase together and suddenly Slick realizes he misunderstood Mooney the first time. He has no comment though.

Rude runs his mouth a bit about beating Warrior. This must be intermission.

Jesse is sitting on the throne that will go to either Haku or Race. He thinks he might just run for King because the chair is comfortable.

King Haku vs. Harley Race

Time for more Rumble promos, with Beefcake, Greg Valentine (both of whom say they just need their fists), the Powers of Pain (Fuji does the talking for them), Big John Studd (freshly back in the company), Mr. Perfect (pretty new at this point) and Savage (insane of course).

DiBiase is much happier about his number now.

Hogan gives his usual promo with the focus on Boss Man and Akeem this time.

Royal Rumble

Warlord is #20 and Hogan clotheslines both Busters out at the same time. Warlord poses on the apron, gets in, and is clotheslined out in 2 seconds flat, setting a record that would last 20 years. Hogan also dumps Bad News, but it takes out Savage in the process which adds even more fuel to the Mega Powers Exploding in less than a month. Liz comes in to play peacemaker and the Powers shake hands.

A cross body is caught and Akeem dumps Martel to get us down to Studd, Akeem and DiBiase. Akeem pounds on Studd as DiBiase gives instructions. Studd pulls Ted in front of a splash and dumps Akeem to get us down to two. DiBiase offers money but Studd shakes a finger at him. Studd actually fires off some suplexes to the shock of Monsoon. The elimination is academic and Studd wins.

Jesse and Gorilla wrap things up.

Ratings Comparison

Jim Duggan/Hart Foundation vs. Dino Bravo/Fabulous Rougeaus

Original: C+

Redo: C

Original: C-

Redo: D

King Haku vs. Harley Race

Original: C

Redo: D+

Royal Rumble

Original: C+

Redo: C-

Overall Rating

Original: C-

Redo: D+

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/01/08/royal-rumble-count-up-1989/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




Royal Rumble Count-Up – 1989 (Original): The Confusing One

IMG Credit: WWE

Royal Rumble 1989
Date: January 15, 1989
Location: The Summit, Houston, Texas
Attendance: 19,000
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Jesse Ventura

We have arrived at Pay Per View for this one and just looking at the card you can tell things are…about the same actually. Again there are just four matches and a segment, although this one is an improvement. The matches not called the Rumble aren’t exactly jumping off the page at me, but looking at a few names in the Rumble it’s a massive improvement with guys like Hogan, Savage, Andre, and DiBiase in it.

The segment is also better as it’s a posedown between Ultimate Warrior and Rick Rude who were kind of feuding at the time. You can just tell that the show has a much higher production value and has had more time put into it which likely will mean a much better product. Granted that’s just on paper.

I wonder how the show itself would turn out. I wish there was a way I could find out. Oh. I guess I could just watch it. I think I’ll do that, and I might as well write about it too, so why don’t you come along? If I get hungry I can always eat your leg.

Our opening video is Vince listing off all of the participants in the match. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not because it keeps surprises from occurring which is one of the highlights of the match. I get what they’re going for here but at the same time it’s just a bit odd.

Jesse’s shirt has a big shark on it. That’s most odd. He and Gorilla run down the card and we’re ready to go.

A bunch of guys take WAY too long to say they’ll win.

Dino Bravo/Rougeaus vs. Hart Foundation/Jim Duggan

What is with the Rumble and 2/3 fall matches? This makes three in two years. Isn’t that a bit of overkill guys? This is really just about two feuds being lumped into one match which is fine. They say it’s international rules to justify the 2/3 falls which is fine, but the choice is just odd indeed. It’s not necessarily good or bad but just odd. The heels have Frenchie Martin and Jimmy Hart with them.

Monsoon says that the 2×4 is a mascot and not a foreign object. That’s just odd indeed. The Harts do this weird thing of taking Bret’s glasses off and make it a spectacle. I don’t remember them doing that ever before. We start with power vs. power in Bravo vs. Neidhart. They reference the weightlifting thing from last year which makes me want to rip my hair out. The USA chant goes up for an American and two Canadians (Neidhart has dual citizenship).

They’re going really slowly here and I’m not sure if I like that. They talk about Bret’s awesome in ring ability which is completely true. It’s good to know that they saw the talent that far back. Bret then takes the side suplex from Bravo and the elevated seated senton from the Rougeaus (both of their finishers) to make it 1-0 for the heels. Bret has to start the next fall as we are LIVE IN HOUSTON!

Gorilla once again botches the use of the term literally as no one is hanging from the rafters. I don’t know why but I will never stop marking out for the jumping reverse elbow from anyone. That move is just awesome. Once again Bravo does his stupid little dance before he makes a tag. I’ve never gotten what the deal was with that. Bret is still in there by the way. Again, it never ceases to amaze me when fans chant USA for two Canadian wrestlers.

Monsoon tries to cover for them by saying it’s for Duggan, but why chant for him when he’s not even in the match at the moment? Either way it’s just stupid. We hit a rest hold with Bret getting beaten on even more than usual in this match. Not sure why he’s been in there so long but it’s probably the best thing they could do. The Rougeaus do a switch and for the life of me I don’t get how people couldn’t tell them apart.

They look nothing alike. The abdominal stretch is hooked and Gorilla complains. Good thing that some things never change. FINALLY Bret tags out and Duggan is in. After a lot of double teaming Duggan pins one of the Rougeaus to tie us up at one. For some reason Hacksaw is over and by far and away the biggest star in this match. I don’t get that and never will.

The heels take over for a very short time as Bravo idiotically (at least he’s living up to his reputation) tries to ram Duggan’s head into the turnbuckle. The face comeback lasts all of a second though as Duggan is beaten on even more. After the luke warm tag to Bret, we have a big thing of calamity and Duggan pops Bravo with the board to let Bret pin him. I love faces getting away with everything they want to.

Rating: C+. Nothing bad at all here, but I just don’t get the 2/3 falls aspect. I mean really, why do that? Do these six guys need an extra ten minutes or so? I get that there’s a lot of time to fill and a ton of the roster is taken, but I don’t get it. To be fair though, the match was fine and there’s nothing to complain about from an in ring perspective. It wasn’t anything great but perfectly fine.

We see some people picking their numbers.

DiBiase doesn’t like his number but pulls in Slick and offers him a deal.

Luke and Butch both get theirs and trade them.

Honky hates his.

Bad News likes his.

Demolition and Jake are indifferent.

The Rockers wish each other good luck.

Super Posedown

This is more or less a body contest between Warrior and Rude. Well that’s more interesting than Bravo’s weightlifting I suppose. Warrior is IC Champion here. Monsoon says Warrior is pumped up all the time. Make your own steroids joke. Rude is rocking the mustache here. The first pose is the double bicep. Popular support wins this so take a guess as to who is going to win. This is really quite boring.

Jesse and Heenan try to make this seem legit which is helping things out a lot. We move to the abdominal pose for which Heenan has to oil up Rude. That’s just creepy to an extent. The third is just called most muscular. If nothing else they’re keeping this moving fast. That’s the best part about it unlike last year when it took 20 minutes. Also, this is actually in the ring. We go through the third pose and still no one cares. The fourth is a medley which takes up even more time.

Was there supposed to be a point to this? In a shocking development, Rude jumps Warrior and beats the tar out of him with an exercise bar. That was the whole point of this thing and it took too long. Again though, it was far better than the weightlifting thing last year. Warrior gets up and destroys all of the referees and suits that try to help him up and chases after Rude. This was all to set up Rude vs. Warrior at Mania.

Women’s Title: Rockin Robin vs. Judy Martin

Robin was this random chick they put the belt on and since she was the epitome of the bathroom break match, they kept the belt on her for over a year. It was retired in 1990 because no one cared and remained that way until Alundra Blayze came along and held it for about a year, then after about another year of various feuds and champions it was dropped (into the trashcan on Nitro) and didn’t come back until the Sable era.

She was just flat out boring, plain and simple, yet of course Vince stuck with her because no one really gave cared about women’s wrestling anyway and it was based on wrestling rather than athleticism or looks. Sherri, the woman that Robin took the title from, challenges the winner for a title shot. She wouldn’t win. Just after the start of the match she jumps on commentary. There’s something that even the commentators aren’t sure about but they think it was a DDT.

Again I want to know what the point of hooking the head on a slam is. I don’t recall any man other than Earthquake doing that. Sherri sounds like Michelangelo from TMNT 2. This is really short and a relief that Wikipedia has an error. They claim this is about sixteen minutes when it barely breaks five.

I thought this might have been clipped but I can’t find a single instance where it goes sixteen, so we’ll say that’s an error, which is a relief. Robin wins with a second rope cross body after faking one then getting the second. Robin’s music is really annoying.

Rating: C. I have to go with average here because other than the ending I don’t remember anything about this match. I know that doesn’t sound good, but the time in this match and everything in it are complete blanks to me. Nothing at all of note happened in it other than the ending, which was kind of cool as the fake out isn’t something that you see that often. I think I get why the division was dropped in about a year.

Sean Mooney is with Slick and the Twin Towers, Akeem and Big Boss Man. Akeem might be the funniest character in wrestling history. Slick denies the deal with DiBiase from earlier. Sean shows the footage of them talking about a deal earlier, which Slick tries to play off as something about a shoe shine. That was just odd.

Harley Race vs. Haku

A few notes about this match: first of all, it wasn’t on the home video release at first so quite a few of you have likely never seen it. It’s only been released on the Rumble Anthologies and the original broadcast plus online. Second, this is a one night only return for Race who got really badly hurt against Hogan and had to drop the crown. Haku took it but never beat Race, so Race is back to take his crown.

Before the match, Jesse is sitting on the throne and says he likes it. Thanks for that Jess. I’ve actually never seen this match all the way through so these will be my legit first thoughts on seeing this in its entirety. When I say not all the way through, I mean I’ve seen a few stills of it and never any actual video so here we go. Heenan manages both guys so he’s set no matter what. I’ve always liked the throne entrance the king got, but DANG that jobber needs a shirt.

He must weigh about 320 and he’s in just regular tights. That’s not right. Both guys come out to the same music and in a funny bit, Race is introduced as “The Former King, Harley Race!” That just sounds funny. Race, the king of the heels, jumps Haku early. Both guys have the regal purple on which is amusing as well. I think Race is somehow the face here, which just makes me feel dirty.

The tattoos on Race always looked odd to me as he seems too clean for them I guess you would say. This was a very rare thing here as we have heel vs. heel with Race being the less heelish guy. Race is just old here and is being asked to carry this because he’s the only one of the two that knows how to work a good match. Jesse says that he has to give the experience advantage to Race. Well DUH Jess. How can it be something that’s debatable?

One guy has wrestled longer than the other. It’s not really subjective. The fans are cheering Harley. This just isn’t right. They do one of the all time worst collision spots with Race going to the floor. It looked like they were in slow motion on that one. Heenan is his usual masterful self cheering for both guys at various times. This is called the Battle For the Crown because this is a match that was dying for extra billing.

Speaking of dying, Gorilla tries to say that the crowd is hushed in anticipation for the Rumble. You have to give it to Gorilla: he never gave up. Race gets a bad piledriver on the floor as it seems like this is in slow motion again. They’re just both so slow that it’s almost painful to watch. Race simply had no business being in a ring at this point and it wasn’t even his fault. He was just old and injured which certainly isn’t something you can pin on him.

He was broke due to a bad business thing (that wasn’t his fault) in Kansas City so he had to keep wrestling to pay the bills. He was good for stuff like this: putting over guys that can’t wrestle well enough on their own. I love how you can have a guy do some chops at an angle and all of a sudden he’s a martial arts master. Goodness that was a lot of A’s in a row. After Race dominates for a bit, he misses a punch and gets caught by what we would call Sweet Chin Music to get pinned.

Rating: C-. I feel sorry here because the wrestling and the in ring stuff isn’t actually that bad at all. The problem is that it feels like this is in slow motion like I’ve said a few times. That’s really the best way to put it. Race was just so old out there that I’m very glad he went to WCW and became a manager which was what he was far better suited for at this point.

He just was too old here and it was showing bad. Haku was someone that had to be carried and this was his night to be put over and while he wasn’t bad, he certainly wasn’t good. The match was bad but the wrestling was ok if that makes any sense at all.

More people say they’ll win.

Gene talks to Rude and Heenan about the pose down where Rude says he won. They bail quickly, I’m assuming afraid of the Warrior.

Royal Rumble

I’ll spare you from another rule explanation because I’m sure you know it and I already listed them off once. This year they point out the everyman for themselves rule though, which is a change from last year. That opens a big door though as it implies face vs. face and heel vs. heel. Number one is Ax of Demolition. The interval is set at two minutes again and this year they actually make it possible as the match goes over an hour, so sit back because this is going to be a long review.

Actually don’t sit back because you might not be able to see the screen. Sit in the middle I guess. Number two is Smash, so we have Demolition going at it to start us off. I love how random of a thing this is, and it’s happened at least one other time that I remember with the Steiners I think, and then the Hardys came in at 1 and 3 in 2001. They’re the tag team champions here, in the middle of their epic year and a half or so run.

To their credit they beat on each other. It just doesn’t look right though. This is like Bubba and D-Von fighting. They’re just not good at fighting on their own. There’s something about seeing partners fight that just doesn’t work. Matt and Jeff were complete failures in their feud, and I think a lot of it is people would rather have them be partners rather than opponents. They just didn’t click as opponents and that’s a shame.

Andre comes in at three and this is an historic moment, as Demolition immediately beat him to the ground with what looks like ease. Andre looks like Rey Mysterio getting beaten on like this which is something you’ll never hear again. Mr. Perfect is 4 which sucks because I wanted more Andre vs. Demolition. Think about this for a minute. Demolition did in about ten seconds what it took Hogan fifteen minutes to do. That’s insane.

No wonder those three plus Jake were the best Survivor Series team of all time. All three of them go after the Giant and Andre just shoves Smash out after Perfect distracts him a bit. Perfect is a very young guy here in the company and is rocking just regular tights. Being the Rhodes scholar that Axe is he goes after Perfect and gets beaten up by Andre for his trouble. Number five is the best possible advertisement for murdering something I’ve ever seen: Ronnie Garvin.

He is easily the most worthless wrestler this side of the Junkyard dog in wrestling history. How in the world did they ever decide to put him over RIC FLAIR for the world title? I just do not get that and never will. Everyone goes after Andre but he just sits on Axe, literally. Greg Valentine is in at six, hopefully willing to use a hammer to crush the cockroach known as Garvin.

We have four against one here with literally everyone that’s been in the match so far attacking Andre. Gorilla calls everyone that’s beating on Andre a star. That’s just amusing. ANDRE GETS RID OF GARVIN!!! I officially love this man. Get him a cow and a vineyard of wine right now!

Jake Roberts is seventh to a huge pop. He was probably the second third biggest face at the time as Warrior wasn’t quite there yet and Hogan and Savage were untouchable. Andre just chokes the life out of Jake in the corner which is sweet. That’s what I love about Andre: after being quadruple teamed he just grabs someone and chokes them. There’s something completely awesome about that.

He beats anyone that tries to stop him from beating on Jake. That’s just sweet. He’s protecting Jake so he can have the honor of hurting him. Ron Bass is here now as we get closer to reaching our jobber quota. Just after Bass comes in Andre throws Jake out. Bass is freshly bald thanks to a bad comedy angle with Beefcake. Andre is the white elephant in there at the moment as it’s really just about trying to get him out with various incredibly short term alliances.

That right there is why there needs to be at least one giant in every battle royal. They offer the main source of a story in one of these, because traditionally these matches are void of any kind of a story because it’s a complete free for all, which is fine because that’s the point.

Having someone like Andre in there for about fifteen to twenty minutes gives you a way to have something running through a large part of the match and hold it together, which is the main weakness of all battle royals not known as the Royal Rumble. The next guy in is HBK, who at this time is next to nothing. Perfect throws Axe out.

Shawn and Perfect go at it in what would eventually be one of the most overhyped feuds in wrestling history as the build was awesome but the match kind of sucked, which to be fair was what likely was inevitable. Perfect shows off his brains early by staying in after going over the top. Andre keeps choking people as that was the essence of his offense around this time. I really miss the old school stone looking Rumble logo. The thing was just cool looking.

Jesse says if he were in there he’d go to a neutral corner. Gorilla says if Jesse were in there he’d be out of there. And people wonder why Monsoon got some strange looks at times. After about a minute and a half of waiting, Butch of the Bushwackers gets us into double digits. As he’s coming to the ring, Jake runs back out with Damien and Andre eliminates himself. That’s a smart way to keep the feud hot, keep Andre looking credible and get rid of him to keep the match going.

The five jobbers lumber around the ring for a bit because there’s no big name in there for them to do anything with, which is the issue with a lot of these things. The timing is getting shorter and shorter here as Honky comes in at 11. Honky had recently lost the IC belt and was in desperate need of a reason to keep his job. He was worthless without the title so until they put him in Rhythm and Blues there was little for him to do.

Of the six guys in there, Shawn is the only face according to Gorilla in some slightly different words. Oh Butch is there too. Yep, Shawn is the only face in there worth anything. Tito balances things out a bit at 12 to a solid pop. I don’t get why he never got another big push. He was still great in the ring and was getting big reactions, but of course he was made a jobber to the stars for guys like Barbarian and Warlord.

Gorilla and Jesse discuss some theory about what is considered a good number as not a lot is going on at the moment. To be fair though the crowd is staying hot so there we are. Bad News comes in at 13 as he should have been a far bigger star than he was. Brown vs. Hogan could have been awesome if they had some guts and did it right. Honky is eliminated pretty fast to a decent pop. That’s a good sign if nothing else: he’s still getting reactions.

This has really slowed down a lot and we need some big names to come in and clear out some of these jobbers. Naturally the next guy in is Marty Jannetty, so if nothing else we have a tag team in there now. A double dropkick that was NOT stolen from the Rock N Roll Express (really, we promise we’ve never heard of those guys that we stole half our name from. Honest) takes out Bass to get us back down to seven people. I think Tito’s knee is hurt.

Thankfully Savage, the WWF Champion and on the brink of a heel turn for the ages, comes in to get the crowd WAY into this. He freaking mugs Bad News who he was having a short but very intense feud with. Arn Anderson comes out next as Savage knocks out Valentine. In the epitome of an IWC wet dream team, Anderson and Savage team up to eliminate Shawn. Dang that was just flat out odd to type. Tully Blanchard is in at 17 as this is slowing down again.

The Brainbusters beat the tar out of Jannetty and prove why they’re awesome. They dump him and heeeeeeere’s Hulk at possibly his lowest number ever: 18. I would have loved to have this be a legit draw and see him get like 4. Let’s see, how many people does Hogan get rid of to make him look like Superman. Perfect is the first victim as Hogan saves his handshake buddy Savage from him. He beats up the Brainbusters but doesn’t eliminate them, which allows them to get rid of Tito.

Since it’s gotten a bit crazy, for a recap we have Butch, Hogan, Anderson, Savage, Brown and Blanchard in at the moment. Amazingly, Butch has been in there about fifteen minutes which has to be his biggest accomplishment in the WWF. That’s actually quite surprising. At 19 we have the other Marching Moron who licked me at a house show once. Brown puts out Butch to keep us at six guys.

Anderson beats on Hogan which makes me flash back to Nitro just before the NWO showed up. Anderson beat him two weeks straight on Nitro which was a series I always liked. It gave Arn the spotlight that he never really got and definitely was qualified to have. In at 20 is the Hall of Famer Koko B. Ware. That just flat out doesn’t work no matter how many times you write it. How in the world is that thing in the HOF but Savage isn’t?

I don’t care how many times he had Stephanie, enshrine him already! Hogan dumps Koko to a pop. Even the fans didn’t like him. There goes Luke and Hogan’s total is at I think three. With three clotheslines inside of 30 seconds he adds both Brainbusters and the Warlord who sets the shortness record at 2 seconds. He stepped in and got a running clothesline to put him out.

To get the record to eight, Hogan runs over and puts out Brown and Savage, the later being by mistake. This would be a major point in the heel turn in about two weeks. Savage is TICKED! Liz comes down to try to straighten things out as Savage offers the handshake to fix things for now. Savage and Liz leave as Boss Man gets in.

He’s about 100lbs heavier than his traditional weight. This began another Rumble tradition of the one on one showdown. These two had been the big feud for a good while and the showdown hadn’t really come yet so this was a pretty big deal. Not surprisingly Boss Man takes over and Gorilla defends Hogan with the somewhat legitimate argument that Boss Man is fresh.

Hogan takes a decent piledriver and eventually gets back to even as the buzzer rings about three and a half minutes after Boss Man came out. And in a SHOCKING, yes SHOCKING I say, turn of events, it’s Boss Man’s partner Akeem. Now here’s something amusing to me where the bias towards the main event is as evident as ever.

Gorilla starts whining and complaining about how DiBiase must have had something to do with this because there’s no way that tag partners could have consecutive numbers and wind up in this position against Hogan. He’s completely backwards there. First of all, this is the third time in this Rumble where partners have come in back to back (Rockers and Brainbusters, which more or less gives away that this isn’t a random draw).

On top of that, how could DiBiase have known that Hogan would have been in there at this moment all by himself? If nothing else, this would prove that DiBiase had nothing to do with it as there is no reason for him to assume that Hogan would have A, been in there already when the Twin Towers came in, and B, that Hogan would be alone.

In order to do that, DiBiase would have had to find out what Hogan’s number was, and the only ways he could have done that would be to find out Hogan’s number directly from Hulk which is unlikely or to have found out all 29 other spots AND managed to spread enough deals around to make sure that Akeem and Boss Man had consecutive numbers after Hogan.

I’m supposed to believe that he managed to pull all this off in less than two hours with the help of just Virgil? Give us some credit there Gorilla. Granted I don’t think he put that much thought into what he said, but that’s the point of these reviews: to break down things like that and show how stupid some stories can be. In a quite anticlimactic moment, Hogan is hit with a double splash and thrown out. Really, that’s all there is to it.

That just came out of nowhere and all of a sudden the fact of how stupid that may have been kicks in. Tell me oh great and mighty Vince: why should I care about the rest of the match? Your top faces are all gone now with about ten entries to go. This wasn’t smart booking at all as they backed themselves into a corner for what is likely going to be a weak finish. Hogan of course pulls Boss Man to the floor and beats on him as Beefcake comes out. It’s a big tag team brawl minus the tagging.

Hogan says he’s going back in and the referees finally do their jobs and keep him from doing so. Hogan pulls Boss Man out AGAIN because this is all about him again, despite him not being world champion or even in the title picture. He and Boss Man fight to the back and they’re going to say Boss Man is out because Hogan pulled him over the ropes. In at 25 we have someone that might even be less useful than Garvin in the Red Rooster.

I finally got the joke/idea behind the name of his finisher the Five Arm. It’s one better than the forearm. Get it? That lowered my IQ a good bit. The announcers try to figure out who the final five guys will be and naturally they know them inside of 4 seconds. The two faces do the generic beating on the heel because that’s Rumble Theory 101. Gorilla actually agrees that Hogan cheated. I never thought I’d hear that.

Barbarian is in next to make what should be a completely one sided match. Barbarian, the genius that he is, beats up the faces and then goes after Akeem on his own. I love idiotic heels. Despite this being 1989, Big John Studd is somehow still a relic here. He goes straight for Akeem in what would become a running theme for the end of this match which I’ll get to in a minute. John is a face here on one last hurrah I guess you would call it.

Basically John keeps throwing people out of his way so it’s just him and Akeem, which can be translated into the guy that he can do the least with while still looking like he’s doing something. Hercules comes in at 28. Just like I thought it would, this has REALLY slowed down since Hogan left and it just doesn’t feel right at all. The next to last entrant is Rick Martel, the returned face who is just about to become a heel and a model.

The final guy is DiBiase to few people’s shock. If he was supposed to be the big heel, two things: one, he should win, and two he should go on to something big after this. At Mania 5 he had a throwaway match with Brutus. Studd is just a complete waste of time out there as he hasn’t actually beaten on anyone other than Akeem. The final eight, all in the ring, are DiBiase, Akeem, Studd, Martel, Red Rooster, Beefcake, Hercules and Barbarian. What a motley crew that is.

Rooster is finally gone and we’re at seven. Studd finally fights someone else in the Barbarian. I don’t believe it. DiBiase and Barbarian put out Beefcake and Hercules to bring us down to DiBiase, Barbarian, Studd, Akeem and Martel. Martel puts out Barbarian and then gets knocked out maybe four seconds later to get us down to three.

The heels double team Studd as I can’t wait for this to end. Akeem is put out after a mistake and we’re down to Studd and DiBiase. He offers money and Studd isn’t interested. After a few power moves, Studd causally throws DiBiase over for the most lackluster ending in the history of the Rumble. Virgil comes in and gets beaten up as well. Wow that was dumb.

Rating: C+. This is the first of its kind in a way so you have to take it with a grain of salt. They didn’t know what they were doing with the thirty man formula, but I just don’t get the point in having Studd win it. I suppose the issue was that they didn’t think it was a big deal yet so they gave it to a random guy like they did last year. That’s the only thing I can think of at least.

The match really suffers at the end though because once Hogan is gone, there’s just no drama or anything at all. Studd winning was almost obvious but not quite. Also, Akeem has been in the final three in both of the first two Rumbles. How insane is that? This was a big improvement over last year, but they still had a lot of bugs to work out. Not bad, but it would be massively improved in the coming years.

In the locker room, Savage goes on a rather long rant about how it was a misunderstanding, but you can see the heel just dying to get out. Liz says that it wasn’t a fight or anything like that. The Mania main event was coming and would be obvious today, but back then it was built up so well that it was shocking.

Gorilla and Jesse say some basic stuff before we get a highlight package to end it.

Overall Rating: C-. Average. That’s the only way to put this. There’s nothing at all here that is going to be considered great by any means, but nothing at all is really all that bad. You’re not going to see anything that rivals Steamboat vs. Savage but there’s nothing here that wouldn’t hold your attention for the most part. This is where the Rumble is still being fleshed out but you can see the elements there that made it such a great concept for a show.

It’s not great and it’s not bad, but a lot of work was needed. For once though you could clearly tell that they had the right idea though and things would be much better next year where they would really get it right. I’d say this show is worth seeing once maybe, but you won’t be missing anything if you don’t see it. If you catch it and have some time to kill you won’t think it was a waste of time but you won’t be thrilled either. Not bad, but nothing great at all.

 

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

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Survivor Series Count-Up – 1989 (2018 Redo): I Get Why People Like It

IMG Credit: WWE

Survivor Series 1989
Date: November 23, 1989
Location: Rosemont Horizon, Rosemont, Illinois
Attendance: 15,294
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Jesse Ventura

This was one of two options for me to redo this year and since I did the 1996 show just two years ago and this is my favorite era, it wasn’t all that hard of a choice. It’s actually an interesting show as there are a few experiments taking place which could make for something fun to watch. Let’s get to it.

We open with the Saturday Night’s Main Event style promos from people on the show. This is already off to a cool start.

Hulk Hogan is happy that he’s healthy, but also for his team of Hulkamaniacs at the Survivor Series. I’m very glad he pointed out the name of the show we’ve paid to see.

Ted DiBiase is happy that he’s rich.

Jake Roberts is happy for the DDT.

Demolition is glad that they don’t have to fight each other. Fair point.

Randy Savage and Sherri are happy that he’s the only man worthy of being the Macho King.

Jim Duggan loves the USA. Sounds like a run of the mill day for him.

Dino Bravo is glad to have the Earthquake on his side.

Dusty Rhodes likes his polka dots.

Big Boss Man likes dishing out justice.

Brutus Beefcake likes wrestling, strutting and cutting. I wonder in what order.

Rick Martel is glad for his good looks.

Rick Rude is thankful for his ravishing body. Narcissism must run in the Rick family.

Roddy Piper is thankful for not being Ricky Rude.

The Genius….I think you can guess this one.

Mr. Perfect for being perfect. Kind of one dimensional no?

The Bushwhackers are glad for stuffing in turkey. Freaks.

Bobby Heenan is thankful for spending time with his family. The HEENAN Family that is.

The Ultimate Warrior for intensity. I’m stunned.

Vince McMahon narrates a card rundown. There’s something so weird about him being the voiceover guy. I miss those squares that show the match participants. Oh and team names other than Team Insert Name Here. You can’t think of some alliterative name? Like Rotten Writers?

One thing I’m thankful for: that the dark match was dark. This night got started with Boris Zhukov beating Paul Roma. I wouldn’t wish that on Vince Russo.

Enforcers vs. Dream Team

Big Boss Man, Bad News Brown, Rick Martel, Honky Tonk Man

Dusty Rhodes, Brutus Beefcake, Red Rooster, Tito Santana

As usual, this is mainly about the captains, but at least we get some Jive Soul Bro and Brutus Beefcake music, because the 80s were that awesome. Actually almost everyone involved here had great music. Again, the 80s were awesome. Dusty even has Boss Man’s nightstick because stealing things is part of the American dream. Tito and Honky Tonk start things off because Tito vs. Martel on pay per view wasn’t allowed for some reason. An early armbar has Honky Tonk in trouble but a cheap shot allows Martel to come in.

The pace picks way up as they run the ropes and Martel scores with a dropkick. Tito is right back with an atomic drop into a rollup for two so it’s off to Boss Man, who gets armdragged in a hurry. Dusty comes in and you can feel the energy go up. I’m not the biggest fan but that man had more charisma than almost anyone ever. With the dancing jabs out of the way, Brutus comes in and gets pounded down by Boss Man.

Honky Tonk misses a right hand so it’s back to Martel for a backbreaker. Some knees to the back don’t do much so it’s off to Rooster as it becomes clear how much better the names were back then. Boss Man, Dream, Model, Bad News, Brutus and….well ok there was no saving Rooster. Speaking of Rooster, it’s his turn to get beaten up by a revolving door of villains. Ventura is right there talking about how the size difference is working against Rooster, almost like he’s a real analyst.

A sunset flip finally gets two on Honky Tonk and a collision puts both guys down. That’s enough for the tag off to Tito for some serious house cleaning but it’s too early for the Figure Four. Martel slams him down and misses his elbow that always misses. Tito grabs a rollup but Martel reverses into one of his own and a grab of the trunks (not sure how much that would help here) gets rid of Santana at 9:15.

Dusty comes in and we cut to a shot of a “fan”, who will later be named Sapphire. Considering she hasn’t been officially introduced yet and would be gone just after Summerslam 1990, it’s kind of remarkable that she was only around for about nine months. Anyway Martel gets taken down with a dropkick and the big elbow gets two. It’s back to Rooster for what looks like some dancing and a headlock, which is quickly countered into a backbreaker.

The bearhug from Boss Man has Rooster in even more trouble until he bites his way to freedom. Boss Man tags Bad News (again, great names) but he doesn’t want to come in, meaning Rooster has to pull him in. Ever the serious one, Bad News isn’t about to have any of this stupid gimmick and beats the heck out of Rooster.

Boss Man comes in without a tag and accidentally hits Bad News. Oh dear I don’t see this going well. Before Bad News can use them all as floss, he walks out on his teammates and is counted out at 15:30. The melee allows Brutus to come back in and hammer on Boss Man until an elbow to the jaw cuts him down. Honky Tonk comes back in for two off a belly to back suplex and shrugs off some right hands (90% of Brutus’ offense). He can’t shrug off the high knee (5%, along with the sleeper for the remaining 5% as Brutus wasn’t exactly versatile) and it’s 3-2 at 17:24.

Martel comes in next and chinlocks Brutus down, followed by a backbreaker to put Brutus on the apron. Brutus comes back in with a sunset flip though, and after Martel gets caught grabbing the ropes, Boss Man is on his own at 20:13. Rooster comes in (Dusty is kind of a lame partner) and tries some forearms, only to get caught in the Boss Man Slam for the elimination at 21:00. Now Dusty is willing to come in for the big right hands and Brutus adds some chops. Boss Man is rocked so Dusty comes in with with a crossbody for the final pin at 21:59.

Rating: C-. It was dull at times, but there’s only so much you can get out of some of these people. Honky Tonk was past his expiration date, Rooster was Rooster, Brown was barely involved, Tito vs. Martel should have been its own match, and Dusty was only in there for a little while. The match wasn’t bad and it was a good way to start things off, but there were only two feuds of note in the whole match.

Post match Slick throws Boss Man the nightstick and it’s a heck of a beating for Dusty and Brutus. Dusty even gets handcuffed and beaten down on the ropes, drawing some blood. Well….were you expecting anything else from him? Brutus finally makes the save with the clippers.

In the back, Boss Man says Dusty is his prisoner. Well your prisoner is currently in the middle of a big arena and being let out of handcuffs. I see why Boss Man left the prison job.

Jim Duggan, Ronnie Garvin, Bret Hart, Hercules

Randy Savage, Canadian Earthquake, Dino Bravo, Greg Valentine

Bret comes in to work on the arm and Duggan sends said arm into the buckle. It’s off to Hercules for some forearms on the also legal Bravo but Earthquake comes in, runs him over, and hits the Earthquake for the elimination at 3:57. Duggan tries his luck with some shoulders that have no effect, so Bret gets behind Earthquake to trip him down on a third try. Garvin comes in and I suddenly want to see Earthquake crush him like a grape.

The Court starts taking turns on Garvin, including a top rope ax handle from Savage. A quick backslide gets two on Bravo but it’s already back to Savage for the snap jabs in the corner. Valentine comes back in though and since we’re not ten minutes into the match yet, Duggan makes a blind tag and clotheslines him out to even things up at 7:32.

Savage comes in and snaps Duggan’s throat across the top rope and it’s back to Earthquake for some forearms to the back. The Court is certainly making good tags to take their turns. Earthquake misses the big elbow so it’s off to Garvin to chop and headbutt Bravo. There’s the Garvin Stomp (it’s stupid when Randy Orton does it too) but Bravo rakes the eyes to break up the Sharpshooter.

It’s off to Hart vs. Savage and Randy PANICS as the crowd really wakes up. You better believe those Bret pops were being noticed, even if it took two years to get to the solo run. Savage gets taken down and runs off for the tag to Bravo so Bret beats him up instead. Garvin comes in again and is IMMEDIATELY side suplexed for the elimination at 11:18. I never get over how much Garvin absolutely sucks. He just got pinned clean by DINO BRAVO. What in the world does that say about your career?

Duggan hammers on Earthquake again before handing it back to Bret for a matchup I never knew I wanted to see. Bret wants Savage though and Jesse, a big fan of both guys, is rather pleased by these developments. Savage gets tied up in the ropes and Duggan, ever the All-American, chokes behind the referee’s back. A missed knee drop makes things even worse for Savage and Bret gets two off a backbreaker. Bret misses the middle rope elbow (a regular one as he didn’t have his signature version down yet) though and it’s back to Bravo for the bearhug.

It’s back to Earthquake for some choking and a two count with the fans being rather pleased by the kickout. Bret avoids a Savage charge to send him into Bravo though and now the hot tag brings Duggan back in. For reasons of temporary insanity (or maybe sanity in his case), Savage drives Duggan into his own corner so Hart can tag himself in. A quick missed charge hits the post though and Bravo adds a shoulder breaker, setting up Savage’s elbow for the elimination at 19:07.

So it’s Duggan alone against Bravo, Earthquake and Savage, meaning Jim is looking completely fine. Earthquake unloads on him in the corner and the level of fine is starting to come down. Duggan beats up all three of them without much effort (Behold the power of AMERICA! Ignoring that Savage is from AMERICA of course!) and tosses the whole team outside.

As the announcers try to figure out who is legal, Earthquake comes back in and drops the big elbow for two. Savage hits the ax handle but misses the running crotch attack. Since the guys kind of suck at this, Sherri low bridges Duggan to the floor and it’s a countout at 23:25 to finish Duggan off.

Rating: D+. The strange ending aside (Duggan can’t take a pin here? Not even 3-1 with the new big monster and RANDY SAVAGE on the other team?), this wasn’t all that thrilling of a match. Other than the fans going coconuts for Hart, it was a lot of punching and kicking and very little more. It also wasn’t the biggest surprise, as any team with Hercules and Ronnie Garvin on the team and JIM DUGGAN as the brains of the operation is in serious trouble.

Dusty Rhodes is very hurt but Gene Okerlund is sure that he’ll be dishing out Americana soon enough.

The Genius has a poem saying he’s smart and how stupid the fans are. That’s such a simple gimmick but it’s one that would work so well today. Give him a guitar and he’s basically Elias with a better vocabulary.

Million Dollar Team vs. Hulkamaniacs

Ted DiBiase, Powers of Pain, Zeus

Hulk Hogan, Demolition, Jake Roberts

I’m not going to explain Zeus in full again because it just makes my head hurt. You know what doesn’t make my head hurt? The most awesome Survivor Series team in the history of the planet. I mean seriously, Hogan, Roberts and Demolition. Someone please try to find something that matches that level of amazing so I can point at you can call you stupid.

Just in case it’s not enough yet, the villains won’t let them in the ring (Jesse: “Count all four of them out!”) so Jake throws Damien in, because the most awesome Survivor Series team in the history of the planet has A BIG FREAKING SNAKE TOO! Still one of my favorite moments ever and something I still throw on if I need a smile.

Zeus wants Hogan to start so Gorilla goes into his weird questions about what the Z on Zeus’ head is for. Like….what else do you think it’s for? He’s a big Zorro fan? I mean, he should be because Zorro is so awesome that he would be first on the list if this team ever needed a fifth man but I still don’t get that rant. Hogan of course can’t hurt Zeus to start as the right hands and clotheslines have no effect.

A jumping knee does nothing so Hogan rakes the eyes and gets in a slam, which does all the damage of a standard slam. Zeus pops up and cranks on Hogan’s neck, in a spot that the Giant would use to put him on the shelf for weeks in WCW. A bunch of choking and a shove of the referee are enough for the DQ to get rid of Zeus at 3:20.

Zeus won’t stop choking and it takes the combined forces of the Powers of Pain and DiBiase offering money to get him off. Hogan is mostly dead so DiBiase comes in to drop some knees. More choking keeps Hogan in trouble but he finally gets a boot up in the corner and brings Jake in. The beating begins in a hurry and it’s off to Demolition for the rapid fire pounding to the back (I could watch that for at least a minute). Hulk is fine enough to come back in for a middle rope ax handle as Gorilla goes on about the Z on Zeus’ head again.

DiBiase elbows Ax in the face and brings in Warlord because the Powers of Pain vs. Demolition is still a thing a year after it was a bigger thing at the previous year’s show. A clothesline gets Ax out of trouble but Mr. Fuji trips him up, allowing Warlord to drop a headbutt for the pin at 9:52.

It’s off to Hogan to beat up Warlord in a match you would think would have happened at some point. Jake comes in and the fans want the DDT but have to settle for Smash hitting an ax handle to the back instead. Not quite the same thing. Barbarian kicks him in the face though and it’s DiBiase coming back in with a middle rope ax handle (the most popular move on the show).

The falling punch (still cool) gets two and we hit the chinlock. DiBiase misses the middle rope falling elbow (as always) but Smash still won’t tag for no apparent reason. Barbarian tags himself in and takes Smash’s head off with a top rope clothesline for the elimination at 13:44. Jake comes in but can’t DDT Barbarian no matter how many times he tries. The beating continues as Hulk is dying for a tag.

Some knee drops and a piledriver get two on Roberts but Barbarian misses the Swan Dive. There’s the hot tag to Hogan (Jesse: “Uh oh.”) and it’s time to clean house. The rapid elbows and a suplex give Hogan two (you don’t see him getting many near falls) and he clotheslines both Powers down. They pop back up and hit a spike piledriver….for a double DQ at 19:51, sending Jesse over the edge in an awesome rant. And yeah, that’s completely bogus, especially with Hogan and Roberts now having a 2-1 advantage over DiBiase.

The Million Dollar Dream has Hogan in trouble and Roberts has to save Hogan at two arm drops (Jesse: “THAT’S THREE TIMES! THREE TIMES! HOW COME ROBERTS WASN’T DISQUALIFIED???”). Hogan fights out of another attempt and punches DiBiase out of the air (because he was trying ANOTHER ax handle). The latest hot tag brings in Roberts for a neck snap across the top rope, giving us another great DiBiase sell.

Cue Virgil with his bad hand so Roberts beats him up too, including a DDT to a big pop. With Roberts down, DiBiase gets in the fist drop and throws his feet on the ropes to get rid of Jake at 23:42. Hogan is still down from the Million Dollar Dream so DiBiase picks him up and hits a clothesline for two. A chinlock goes on and Hogan slaps DiBiase’s arm, which would be shocking to see today. The comeback gives us a double clothesline but Hogan is up first and hits exactly what you would expect to set up the legdrop for the pin at 27:32.

Rating: C-. I love the face team but my goodness they picked a really weird way to get to the finish here. Hogan and company were either even or ahead for most of the match and Hogan just wins with ease in the end. What’s a better way to go here: the usual, or Zeus, who Hogan is feuding with at the moment, wrecking Hogan so badly that DiBiase pins him to set up a title program with DiBiase down the line? I wasn’t feeling this one, but the energy (and Jesse ranting) helped it a lot.

Jesse is LIVID post match, saying the referee probably even disqualified Virgil too.

Savage and Zeus, who face Beefcake and Hogan in a cage match in a few weeks, are ready to take care of business inside the cage. Sherri waving her hands in the background for some reason is a little distracting.

Hogan comes in to Beefcake’s locker room and they’re ready to win in the cage. Sherri comes in and throws powder in their eyes so the beatdown can be on.

We run down the remaining two matches.

As intermission continues, Jesse talks about issues inside the Heenan Family, including pushing and shoving in the locker room.

The Rude Brood is ready to win tonight. Rick Rude talks about his great teammates, Mr. Perfect knows how to get rid of Jimmy Snuka and the Rougeau Brothers have been training extra hard.

Roddy Piper can’t get his team to quit eating before the match. I remember this from when I was a kid and it’s still bizarre.

Rude Brood vs. Roddy’s Rowdies

Rick Rude, Mr. Perfect, Rougeau Brothers

Roddy Piper, Jimmy Snuka, Bushwhackers

There’s no Heenan with Rude, playing up the issues in the Family. Perfect jumps Luke from behind to start so it’s already off to Butch for a bite of the leg. Piper and Snuka bite the arm and it’s back to Butch to bite the back for a second helping. Jacques comes in and nips up but stops for a hug from his brother. We settle down to Jacques flipping over Snuka but getting taken down by a flying headbutt. A chop keeps Jacques in trouble and Snuka….I want to say dances? With Jacques down, the Superfly Splash is good for the elimination at 4:01.

Rude comes in for a leapfrog and a hip swivel before handing it off to Perfect. A botched low bridge sends Perfect outside as the Brood can’t get anything going at all. Luke comes in for a snapmare on Perfect and Snuka punches him in the face. The fast tags continue with Butch coming in for a few knees to the back. Piper’s atomic drop knocks Perfect over for the tag to Raymond, whose backdrop is countered into a sunset flip for two. Raymond gets two off a superkick but Piper grabs a piledriver for the second elimination at 7:39.

Perfect is in next for a snapmare of his own on Piper but gets catapulted into the corner as only Perfect could do. Butch comes in for some near falls off some stomping but a single kick to the chest knocks him into the corner. That means it’s back to Piper for some right hands and a hip swivel at Rick as Perfect is turned inside out. Butch adds another bite but gets rolled up for the elimination at 10:45.

Piper is right back in for a rollup of his own and Snuka adds a top rope chop to the head. It’s Luke’s turn to hammer away and a headbutt to the ribs gets two. Perfect is able to make a tag but Rude gets punched out of the air. Not that it matters though as a kick to the ribs sets up the Rude Awakening to even things up at 12:14.

So now we can have the match that they wanted in the first place, which definitely sounds better. Rude chops Snuka down and throws in a hip swivel before handing it back to Perfect, who gets kicked in the face. It’s already back to Rude for a chinlock, which goes nowhere either so Perfect comes in and gets small packaged for two. You really can tell that the energy has gone out of the arena and they’re just going through the motions with this one.

A ramming of the heads puts Perfect and Snuka down (should have knocked Perfect silly) and there’s the double tag. They slug it out, which is never a good idea against Piper. The fight falls to the floor and it’s a double countout at 18:36. So we’re down to Perfect vs. Snuka with Perfect making the mistake of ramming Snuka’s head into the buckle. Dude have you ever watched a Snuka match? A dropkick puts Snuka on the floor but he’s right back in for a pinfall reversal sequence. Snuka’s high crossbody is reversed into a cover for two but it’s the PerfectPlex to finish him at 21:27.

Rating: D. I’ve never liked this match as it was basically a delayed start until we got to the match that they really wanted to do. It also doesn’t really advance anything as Snuka vs. Perfect wasn’t a feud and Piper vs. Rude is right where it was before. At least Perfect got the win though and that’s what really matters, because he should have been ready to move up into the main event.

Post match Snuka goes after Perfect and Genius but the smart (and perfect) villains get away.

The Rude Brood says to not worry about Heenan’s whereabouts and promise to celebrate the ravishing way.

The Ultimate Warriors are ready to go. Jim Neidhart laughs a lot, the Rockers are their usual confident selves, and Ultimate Warrior says they all have organ donor cards. My goodness imagine the drug bills.

Ultimate Warriors vs. Heenan Family

Ultimate Warrior, Rockers, Jim Neidhart

Andre the Giant, Arn Anderson, Haku, Bobby Heenan

Heenan is out there because Tully Blanchard failed a drug test and is leaving, never to wrestle in a national promotion again. The fight starts before Warrior even shows up but here he is to save Neidhart as the bell rings. Three clotheslines put Andre on the floor and it’s a countout at 27 seconds, which is totally different than Zeus being eliminated earlier. Anderson’s “DANG IT” face is great, as always.

We settle down to Anderson getting beaten up by anyone who can get their hands on him, including the running tackle in the corner from Neidhart. Andre finally gets up and staggers out, with the Rockers getting in a few cheap shots. Haku comes in for some forearms to the back and Heenan chokes in the corner as Jesse says he would take Heenan over Gorilla in a fight. Before Gorilla can freak out, Haku superkicks Neidhart for the elimination at 3:31.

Michaels comes in to pick up the pace with a monkey flip before it’s off to Marty to start on the arm. Marty’s crossbody is caught but Shawn hits the dropkick to the back for the near fall. It’s back to Anderson, who can’t get a suplex, but Haku comes in to make it a double suplex, which is caught by Shawn in a nice save. Double superkicks get two and it’s off to Warrior for a backdrop. Heenan refuses the tag (well duh) so Anderson gets caught in an armbar instead.

Anderson takes him down with a shot to the ribs, hands it off to Heenan for a kick to the ribs, and then comes back in when Heenan gets touched once. That was the only way to go and it’s worth a chuckle. Anderson beats the heck out of Jannetty and Haku adds a few shots to knock Jannetty silly. Heenan comes back in for some stomps on Jannetty and a knee drop….for the clean pin at 8:54.

Egads how far have you fallen when you’re losing clean falls to Heenan? It’s instantly back to Anderson, who gets caught in Warrior’s bearhug. A rake to the eyes gets Anderson out of trouble so Haku gets bearhugged as well. It’s off to Michaels, who gets sent outside so Warrior has to toss him back inside. Heenan’s front facelock doesn’t work so here’s Anderson again for some stomping in the corner. Shawn is back up and rubs Anderson’s face into the mat, blinding him so badly that he tries to tag Warrior.

A Rocket Launcher gives Shawn two but for some reason it wakes Anderson up enough to take over again and bring in Haku. That just means a missed charge though and Shawn gets rid of him with a high crossbody at 12:54, leaving us with Shawn/Warrior vs. Anderson/Heenan. Four Hall of Famers isn’t too shabby. Heenan is willing to come in and punch Shawn a few times but Warrior scares him into the corner.

Some running shoulders have Anderson in trouble but he sidesteps a charging Warrior to send him outside. Heenan goes up again and again comes back down. Now Heenan is willing to come back in but when the no selling begins, Heenan’s time in the ring quickly comes to an end. Anderson sends him into the corner but Heenan won’t tag in again, probably being as smart as he can. Warrior rams them together and hits the gorilla press into the splash to get rid of Anderson at 18:16.

for a shoulder and the splash for the final pin at 20:27.

Rating: D+. Heenan alone almost made this entertaining but there’s only so much that even he could do. The wrestling isn’t the point here and there’s nothing wrong with that. Warrior winning was never in doubt as his biggest challenge was eliminated in less than thirty seconds. Not a good match, but Heenan made it fun enough.

Post match Heenan staggers to the back, with Warrior running up behind him for one more clothesline.

A stills package ends the show to Warrior’s music.

Overall Rating: D. This one really didn’t work very well with a lot of punching and kicking matches and very little else. The storylines weren’t so much advanced as much as just storylines staying in one place. Having Hogan in the middle and Warrior in the main event was certainly an experiment but it was more odd than anything else. The energy goes away at the end of the third match and you can feel it being gone. I love it for the nostalgia, but there’s just not enough here.

Ratings Comparison

Dream Team vs. Enforcers

Original: B-

2012 Redo: C+

2018 Redo: C-

King’s Court vs. 4x4s

Original: B+

2012 Redo: D+

2018 Redo: D+

Hulkamaniacs vs. Million Dollar Team

Original: D-

2012 Redo: C

2018 Redo: C-

Rude Brood vs. Roddy’s Rowdies

Original: D

2012 Redo: C-

2018 Redo: D

Ultimate Warriors vs. Heenan Family

Original: C+

2012 Redo: C-

2018 Redo: D+

Overall Rating

Original: D+

2012 Redo: D

2018 Redo: D

My original reviews continue to amaze me.

Here’s the original review if you’re interested:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/11/08/history-of-survivor-series-count-up-1989-includes-a-bonus-review/

And the 2012 redo:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2015/10/28/survivor-series-count-up-1989-its-already-going-bad/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




Survivor Series Count-Up – 1989 (2012 Redo): The Warrior Experiment

IMG Credit: WWE

Survivor Series 1989
Date: November 23, 1989
Location: Rosemont Horizon, Chicago, Illinois
Attendance: 15,294
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Jesse Ventura

Hogan is thankful for time with his family and to be the strongest force in the universe. And for his team.

Jake likes his snake and the DDT.

Duggan is proud to be an American.

Bravo is glad Earthquake is on his side.

Dusty is thankful for his polka dots.

Beefcake for cutting hair.

Martel for his looks.

Rude for his body.

Genius for being the smartest man in the world.

Perfect for being his name.

The Bushwhackers for sardine stuffing.

Heenan for being surrounded by the Heenan Family.

Warrior should be thankful that Ritalin is soon to be available.

We run down the cards with those nifty squares showing each team member.

Dream Team vs. Enforcers

Dream Team: Dusty Rhodes, Brutus Beefcake, Tito Santana, Red Rooster

Enforcers: Big Boss Man, Bad News Brown, Rick Martel, Honky Tonk Man

Boss Man destroys Dusty with the nightstick and cuffs him to the ropes to keep up the beating. Brutus makes the save with his clippers.

Boss Man brags about what he just did.

4x4s: Jim Duggan, Ronnie Garvin, Bret Hart, Hercules

Bret finally breaks free and tags Hacksaw in again so he can slam Savage. And never mind as Bret tags back in about 15 seconds later. Bravo works over the mostly beaten Bret and Hart misses a charge, going shoulder first into the post. A shoulder breaker sets up the Savage Elbow to make it 3-1.

Duggan chases them off with the board.

The Million Dollar Team is ready for a Thanksgiving feast in the form of the Hulkamaniacs.

Dusty Rhodes is hurt badly.

The Genius reads a poem about Thanksgiving.

Hulkamaniacs vs. Million Dollar Team

Hulkamaniacs: Hulk Hogan, Demolition, Jake Roberts

Million Dollar Team: Ted DiBiase, Zeus, Powers of Pain

Savage and Zeus are ready for their tag team cage match on PPV two days after Christmas.

Rude Brood: Rick Rude, Fabulous Rougeau Brothers, Mr. Perfect

Ultimate Warriors vs. Heenan Family

Ultimate Warriors: Ultimate Warrior, Jim Neidhart, Rockers

Heenan Family: Andre the Giant, Arn Anderson, Haku, Bobby Heenan

Off to Heenan but Warrior quickly Hulks up so we see some more Anderson. Warrior fights him off as well and whips Arn into Heenan to knock Bobby to the floor. The gorilla press and splash get us down to one on one. Warrior sneaks up on Heenan and what do you think happens here? A shoulder block and splash take care of Bobby in short order.

Warrior sprints up the aisle and clotheslines Heenan as he leaves to end the show.

Ratings Comparison:

Dream Team vs. Enforcers

Original: B-

Redo: C+

Original: B+

Redo: D+

Hulkamaniacs vs. Million Dollar Team

Original: D-

Redo: C

Original: D

Redo: C-

Ultimate Warriors vs. Heenan Family

Original: C+

Redo: C-

Overall Rating

Original: D+

Redo: D

Bonus Match

Original: B-

Redo: B

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/11/08/history-of-survivor-series-count-up-1989-includes-a-bonus-review/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




Survivor Series Count-Up – 1989: With A Bonus

IMG Credit: WWE

Survivor Series 1989
Date: November 23, 1989
Location: Rosemont Horizon, Rosemont, Illinois
Attendance: 15,294
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Jesse Ventura

Well, a year has passed and you all know how Wrestlemania 5 went. Hogan is champion again and Savage is a heel now, but Ultimate Warrior is on the rise and it’s very fast. Not a lot other than that has really changed. The first four shows can really be grouped together as it’s not until 1991 and the fifth show where we have anything other than a Survivor Series match at one of these shows.

Until then all we’ve had is matches that further the main feuds along. The other things that have changed as far as the style of the show is that the tag match idea has been dropped which is great to me. It makes room for a fifth match which means there’s no match on the card that cracks 28 minutes, meaning that the pointless filler goes WAY down. The matches are now 4 on 4 and they have team names sot this is far closer to the traditional style that we’re accustomed to.

The style works better as it allows for more matches which means less stupid ones. This was a huge step in the evolution of the show which therefore makes it much better in my mind. All that being said, let’s do it.

We get a two minute and twenty second video of clips of the city, the fans, the production truck, and the arena. The souvenirs are oddly called novelties here. It just looks odd. There’s no commentary for this, but only a late 80s WWF theme song playing in the background. Back in the day, all of the shows had their own themes that you would hear once a year. It was kind of a nice touch I always thought. We go to a montage of wrestlers saying what they’re thankful for.

Hogan: health, family, Hulkamania. He speaks for the other members of his cult as well. Somehow this takes a minute for him to say.

DiBiase: he’s rich and you’re not.

Jake Roberts: Damien and the DDT.

Demolition: that they don’t have to fight each other.

Savage: that he’s worthy of being king. And that he’s not in Memphis where an army of Lawlers would miss punches thrown at him.

Duggan: that he lives in America.

Bravo: that Earthquake is on his side.

Dusty Rhodes: his polka dots. And for not having to pretend to have talent against Flair anymore.

Boss Man: for justice. And for the League. And for America. Yeah that was terrible.

Beefcake: his cutting and strutting. And that Hogan lets him keep a job.

Martel: his good looks.

Rude: having a great body.

Piper: that he’s not Rick Rude. Ooo burn.

Genius: for being smart.

Perfect: for being perfect, duh.

Bushwackers: for having stuffing. They practically kiss after saying this. There’s something a bit odd about these two.

Heenan: spending Thanksgiving with the Heenan Family.

Warrior: for war? I have no idea what he said.

Vince runs down the card, which looks ok. I’ll save this for later. This is a montage of pics, introducing every member of each team and every team’s name. It sounds long and boring but this is quick and solid. I like this actually.

Gorilla is the only person that can rock a red sports coat.

The captains will be listed first.

Note: the heir to the throne, Shane McMahon, at the ripe old age of 19 here, is the outside referee all night long.

Enforcers vs. Dream Team

Enforcers: Big Boss Man, Bad News Brown, Rick Martel, Honky Tonk Man
Dream Team: Dusty Rhodes, Tito Santana, Brutus Beefcake, Red Rooster.

First things first: Dusty and Beefcake’s music was AWEOME. No Sapphire at this point so my world is still awesome. Ah yes the feuds for this. Dusty and Boss Man are feuding, mainly due to Dusty stealing his hat and both guys needing a feud. Santana and Martel are STILL feuding years later over a team that was together less than a year. Beefcake and Rooster are just there, as are Honky and Brown.

To be fair though, Brown is a substitute for an injured Akeem, who was Bossman’s tag partner at the time, so it’s not like he’s even supposed to be there. Yes, despite what happened last year, Honky and Brown are fine again. We’re starting with Tito vs. SWT (Santino With Talent), the Honky Tonk Man. See, you need talent to play a character like they do. Honky has it which is why he’s memorable. He’s a wrestling Elvis impersonator. That’s saying something.

Jesse says that this is a main event anywhere in the country. Maybe at a bad indy show but that’s it Jess. Strike Force is going at it AGAIN, which even I’m sick of. Jesse says they’re now defunct. I won’t make fun of that as they’ve only been broken up for about 7 months at this point which isn’t that long ago right now. They’ve also not had the big televised match so that’s fine. I think they finally met on SNME but never on PPV, at least not one on one.

Dusty and Bossman go at it now, renewing a rivalry from WAY back in the NWA days. In one of the coolest moments I’ve ever seen in wrestling, Dusty shattered a wooden chair over Bubba (Bossman). What did the big man do? He straightened his tie. Dusty, the massive face at the time, had no clue what to do and ran. Ok so he kind of stepped with a bit more speed but you get the idea.

Brutus comes in, which is odd as it’s his first time not being the first face in the match, but he’s still in the opener. That’s either really good or really bad and I’m not sure which. You can really see the old 80s look here but the 90s are wanting to break through and start up. How in the world has Terry Taylor kept a job this long? Was Little Beaver, which has to be the best name ever for a wrestler, not available? Gorilla says he can dance like Honky. That’s an image I might want. Not sure though.

Jesse’s pro-cheating stuff is just greatness. They’re mentioning the lone wolf aspect of Bad News already so I think we know how he’s going to be eliminated. The fans are popping for Santana against Martel. Why we never got the big Mania match with these two is beyond me. We did however get the epic Martel vs. Koko squash to open Mania 6 though, so that’s nice. Santana jobbed to Barbarian in that match. Why they didn’t just wrestle each other is beyond me.

I think it was planned for them at Summerslam 90, NEARLY A YEAR AFTER THIS, but it didn’t happen as Martel was injured. Martel pins Santana using the tights to finally get rid of someone after 9 minutes. This was far better though as it at least makes things go faster. We have 7 people left instead of 9 so we’re far closer to being done as opposed to the past two years. They keep referring to Bossman vs. Rooster as a mismatch and that’s true.

It’s talent vs. no talent which is a mismatch if I’ve ever heard of one. Bad News doesn’t want to get in the ring as the foreshadowing is absurd at this point. And there it is. In the EXACT SAME SPOT as last year, Bad News gets hit by his partner. Yep after an argument Brown is leaving. See, Dusty’s team is smart here as they don’t do anything to Brown or the other team. If they’re going to go after each other why not just let them? It’s what I’d do.

It never ceases to amaze me how much bigger of a star a wrestler can become by just simply hanging out with Hulk Hogan. What is so great about Beefcake? He has some kick great theme music, but other than that what has he ever done on his own? He’s a barber for crying out loud, yet he’s a major star simply because of Hogan’s association with him. That’s how you know you’re a big star: when by simply being around someone else you make them a major star. That’s saying a lot.

You could say the same thing about Hillbilly Jim too. He got big because of Hogan but he then carried it himself. Anyway, Beefcake takes out Honky with a high knee, doing something that no midcard guy could do for over a year: pin him. That’s actually quite impressive when you think about it. Honky went a LONG time without losing to someone on his level. We’re at 3-2 with the Dream Team in the lead now. Brutus takes care of Martel after being beaten on for awhile.

It made sense though as it was on a sunset flip, which at least makes it look like it’s a surprise. Rooster lasts about 20 seconds against Bossman so thank goodness he’s gone after a Bossman slam. Brutus hits a very odd looking spot as he comes is whipped in and comes back and just kind of raises his knee into Bossman’s chest. He doesn’t jump or anything so it’s not technically a high knee, but instead he just knees him in the chest. It just looked odd, but effective.

Dusty jumps at him and the bell rings twice to end this. Post match Dusty gets beaten half to death by the nightstick. The epic fatness saves him though. Dusty’s overselling here is great. Brutus helps Rhodes out as his music plays and an ugly woman cheers him on. This woman would soon be known as Sapphire.

Rating: B-. See, this is similar to last year’s, but it’s 8 minutes shorter. That makes this miles better. We don’t have 8 minutes of chinlocks or armbars, but rather much faster stuff and less time between eliminations. There were periods of almost 20 minutes with 2 eliminations last year. That’s just dull. This was MUCH better organized as far as time goes and it made for a much more interesting and much better match. It’s still not great, but it’s far better than last year.

Boss Man says Dusty got what he deserved.

The King’s Court all say they’re going to win and that they’re liking this team. The old interview area was always awesome.

King’s Court vs. 4x4s

King’s Court: Randy Savage, Earthquake, Dino Bravo, Greg Valentine
4x4s: Jim Duggan, Ronnie Garvin, Bret Hart, Hercules

Two things: Either Earthquake or Bravo is replacing Widowmaker, who is more commonly known as Barry Windham. I’ve heard either answer so it could very well be either one. Earthquake was a rookie at this point so my guess would be him as Bravo had been around for at least 3 years at this point. Second, Bret and Neidhart are being tested here to see how they do in singles stuff, and Neidhart is actually in the main event. Third and most importantly: Ronnie Garvin still sucks.

Oddly enough the captain leads his heels down the aisle. I like that as it looks like he’s leading them into battle. There’s actually a point to this feud as Hacksaw lost the crown to Savage and he wants it back, leading to this feud. Other than that there’s no real point to these matchups. Based on the commentary, Earthquake is the replacement as it sounds like Jimmy Hart was bought off for this. All of the faces have 2x4s.

That’s either really smart or really stupid and I’m not sure which. In spite of what Gorilla would tell you, the people are not literally hanging from the rafters. Hercules is showing off all kinds of power out there which is actually pretty impressive. Dang Bret is getting a reaction. For a career tag team guy, that’s impressive. Oh yeah Garvin and Valentine are feuding here so it’s only four pointless guys out there. Somehow, Garvin is a former world heavyweight champion.

I think Earthquake and Hercules had a match at Mania and Bret and Bravo had some house show matches if I remember right, so there’s at least some minor stuff from all of these guys. Earthquake sits on Hercules’ chest in about 4 minutes to end him. How awesome of a finisher is that? He just sits on you to get rid of you. I love that.

Yeah Bravo went after Hart so I’d assume they were having a small feud at this point. Ah nice it’s beat on Garvin time! I officially love the King’s Court. It’s weird hearing Jimmy Hart cheering on Savage. Jimmy really is a great manager when you think about it. You can see he’s having a blast out there every time he’s in the arena and that’s all you can ask for out of a performer. Dang it doesn’t last long as he slips a blind tag to Hacksaw who hits the three point clothesline to beat Valentine and even us up.

Earthquake and Hacksaw do some stupid looking brawling for awhile until both tag out so we get more Garvin. Oh yay. He jumps in the air and slams his head into Bravo’s. Yeah that was stupid. Why was the Garvin Stomp supposed to mean something? It’s the same thing that Orton does now where he goes around in a circle with kicks, but Garvin does it somehow more slowly than Orton does. Let that sink in for a bit.

It also looks even stupider than when Orton does it. He’s just kicking the guy. Why is that supposed to be some awesome move? Holy crap it’s Savage vs. Hart. In a GREAT looking scene, Savage runs at Garvin with reckless abandon but as soon as Hart is tagged in Savage stops dead and backs away. The pop is there and Hart all of a sudden looks like a god. Right there, that is how you build somebody.

You take a veteran and an a-list guy like Savage and you have him make Hart look like they’re even. That was perfect. The announcers are helping too by implying Bret can match Savage move for move, which he could, but how many people noticed it for the first time because of what Gorilla said? Of course, they screw it up by having the camera on Sherri for about 10 seconds so we miss the initial contact. Thank you horny Vince.

The crowd is going freaking off for Bret so at least they know what they’re talking about. Savage of course bails in about 40 seconds to bring in Dino Bravo. What was the appeal of this guy anyway? Did he ever actually do anything? Not that I can remember. Correction: he just eliminated Garvin so he is now on my all time top 5.

It’s time for more brawling with Duggan and Quake. Seriously, why is this the thing we keep going back to? It didn’t work the first time so why are we seeing it again? Why not more Bret and Savage, since they’re the most talented people in this match? Of course that’s what I get when I say it. Now for the main thing: Bret wins here. He doesn’t eliminate Savage, but he certainly out fights him here. What more can you ask Savage to do for Bret here?

It kind of worked too as after another run with Neidhart, Bret would begin his singles career. WOW. They fought for about 2 minutes and I don’t think Savage had any offense. He was only able to tag because he got out of the way of an elbow from the middle rope. That’s probably the best job of putting someone over I’ve ever seen. That was absolutely perfect. You have to remember that just 7 months prior to this, Savage was on the end of a yearlong world title reign.

It’s not like he was just a guy that was hot at the time. This would be like Miz or Swagger beating on Cena for a few minutes and Cena not getting in a single blow for the whole times. The announcers argue about Duggan with Gorilla saying he doesn’t know the meaning of the word quit. Jesse responds in perfect timing with the gem of so what? There’s lots of words he doesn’t know the meaning of.

I’ve always wondered why wrestlers didn’t watch the tapes and kill Jesse for what he said about them. Same goes for today. Announcers insult people all the time, so why don’t the wrestlers go after them? I certainly would. Ok so I’d get fired and arrested for it but I’d still do it. Geez, Bret takes a beating for about 5 minutes from Bravo but Savage comes in and Bret makes his comeback. I hope Bret bought Savage dinner after this. He owes him either that at least.

Now you’re going to see the brilliance that is Jim Duggan and his great leadership. Bret is out of it after that huge beating but he FINALLY gets the tag so that Duggan is in. Duggan is in for FIFTEEN SECONDS before tagging Bret back in. At this point, Duggan deserves to lose. That’s just freaking stupid.

Now we get something you might never see again. Bret hits the post with his shoulder, and Bravo ACTUALLY FOLLOWS UP ON IT! He hits a shoulderbreaker, which is actually making sense. My goodness people, the WWE guys today need to watch Dino Bravo matches as that was the best psychology I’ve ever seen from him. He had something handed to him and he followed up on it. He then tags to Macho who gets the elbow for the pin.

Jesse swears no one can kick out of that, obviously forgetting Hogan doing just that earlier in the year. It’s Duggan against three guys now. Jesse says Duggan wants the capacity house to get behind him. That’s some weird wording. They really make Duggan look good here as the heels don’t tag for a bit and he holds them all off. Macho is really putting people over tonight, which makes sense as he certainly was the most accomplished person in this match and it wasn’t even close.

Other than Savage only Valentine and Hart had won titles, with Hart’s tag title reigns and Valentine being a completely different character at this point. His IC title reigns are completely forgotten. This is basically just Duggan trying to survive…which I guess is the point of the whole show so maybe Duggan is smarter than all of us.

He gets knocked to the floor and due to the managers and Earthquake he doesn’t get back in time. That’s saying a lot. They didn’t have him get pinned. He clears the ring with the board. Now, is that his board, or did he steal it from someone else from earlier? What a great American role model.

Rating: B+. I really liked the psychology here. Duggan not getting pinned, Bret being made to look AWESOME, Hercules not lasting long at all and Garvin getting killed means this was fun. The heels more or less dominating was fine here and this was exactly what it should have been. Savage was 10x anything on the other team and there was no reason his team should have lost. The best way to describe this match was that it made sense, which means a lot in my mind.

DiBiase is with his team and says that his team is awesome and that Hogan will lose. Now that would be possible if he wasn’t going up against perhaps the greatest Survivor Series team ever assembled. More on that later.

Over to Gene who has a report on Dusty’s condition. He says it’s bad but that Dusty will be back.

The Genius has a poem. It’s catchy I guess.

Million Dollar Team vs. Hulkamaniacs

Million Dollar Team: Ted DiBiase, Powers of Pain (Warlord/Barbarian), Zeus
Hulkamaniacs: Hulk Hogan, Jake Roberts, Demolition (Axe/Smash)

See what I meant by greatest team ever? Seriously, show me a better four man team EVER. This was the second Demolition reign as they had just gotten the belts back from the Brainbusters. Hogan is the world champion, and Roberts didn’t need a title to be a huge name. I defy you to find me a more balanced team. Also, for ONCE, this is perfectly done.

Hogan and Zeus are feuding, and there was actually a glimmer, and I do mean a glimmer, of a chance that those two would have headlined Wrestlemania 6. To fans like we are in that era, this scared the heck out of us. Everyone that knew anything knew that Zeus was bad, but the Hollywood aspect of this was actually getting Vince believing that it would work in front of 65,000 people. That speaks volumes about how big this feud was.

For every fan out there, you should be thanking whoever booked tonight’s show, because this was Warrior’s main event audition. If this failed, it would have been Zeus vs. Hogan at Wrestlemania. Demolition and the Powers of Pain were feuding earlier in the year so this was either the very end of it or it was already over and we were waiting on their transition to facing the Heenan Family of Haku and Andre. Finally, DiBiase and Roberts are going at it.

Amazingly, no entrance for the heels as they’re in the ring at the end of the poem. I knew Genius couldn’t get that kind of heat on his own. Anyway, all of the faces here have awesome music here. The pops for all four faces are huge, as I really don’t get why this is in the middle of the show. Chicago is notorious for hot crowds and this is no exception.

Good grief the people loved Hogan. The heels won’t let the faces get in. You know what the solution is. BIG FREAKING SNAKE! I am in full mark out mode here as this is just awesome. Hogan’s music is playing the whole time just to make it even cooler. The bell ringing kind of brings me back to reality.

Gorilla’s commentary about Zeus is cracking me up. “Is that big Z on the side of his head in case he gets lost or something?” Gorilla and Jesse are perhaps the best duo of all time. They just are perfect together to say the least. Hogan and Zeus start us off, giving us that epic wrestling encounter we all know they have inside of them. Zeus is actually the same height as Hogan. That surprises me a bit.

I would have thought Hogan was taller. Gorilla will not let up on Zeus as he’s now talking about his belt. Zeus completely no sells everything. Even a jumping knee to the chest does nothing as apparently Hogan is now an MMA guy. He goes to the eyes and slams Zeus who pops back up. This stuns Hogan. Why? It’s a freaking bodyslam, not a Jackknife. Barbarian interferes and Hogan has his head and neck twisted.

That move by Giant in 1995 would put Hogan on the shelf for 3 months, yet here he keeps fighting. What that tells me is that Giant (Big Show for all you newcomers out there) is WAY stronger than Hogan. Zeus chokes away but throws the referee across the ring for the DQ. Everyone runs in and it takes DiBiase promising money to get Zeus off of Hogan. Now some of you might not get why this was the right thing to do. I’ll explain it to you. Zeus makes Khali look like Lou Thesz.

Now, I’ve explained the whole issue with Zeus in far greater detail in my Summerslam review, but in short, Zeus was an actor from the movie Hulk made called No Holds Barred. He wasn’t a wrestler and therefore couldn’t do much in the ring. This would be like having Shaq be in the main event of a PPV. Now, having him do one or two matches would be fine as he could get a crash course in wrestling and his natural athleticism could carry the rest of it.

However, imagine Shaq vs. Cena for the world title at Mania. It’s crazy to even think of. Thankfully, Hogan and Zeus had their feud blown off on a special PPV which was the movie No Holds Barred followed by Hogan and Beefcake against Savage and Zeus in a cage. Hogan hit three legdrops and pinned him to end it and save for a short promo, Zeus wasn’t seen in a ring again for over 6 years.

DiBiase comes in and beats the tar out of Hogan, which shows why this wasn’t the smartest booking in the world. Instead of Zeus going out first, you should have the other guys eliminate each other and put Hogan’s team at a disadvantage so that Hogan can make more of a superman comeback. Jake gets in and he half kills DiBiase. I’ve always loved Demolition’s style: hit people a lot. There’s no thought to it and it’s just mindless violence. What more can you ask for?

They beat down Andre the Giant, so I’ll take them over anyone else as far as brawling goes. Now here we have the stupidity of the way this match was booked: Hogan is already fine about 2 minutes after that horrible beating. I get that they were trying to hold out for Hogan vs. Zeus, but give me a break here. Now the ending is completely obvious as Hogan of course is going to survive, so why should I watch the next 20 minutes of this match?

Now I already know how the rest of it goes, but even if I hadn’t I could call this a mile away. Hogan’s team will get eliminated and he’ll beat DiBiase one on one for the “huge comeback” win. This is what I hate about late 80s booking. The ending works fine most of the time, but getting there makes NO SENSE. However, we do get a fun spot where Hogan and Demolition beat down DiBiase. Why did Hogan and DiBiase never have that big match?

If there has even been one major match that was built up for years and never had the trigger pulled on it, that was it. They just never got to it and that’s not good. They had a match on SNME, but never that big blowoff match on a major show. I would have made that the main event of Mania 6, with DiBiase saying he had enough of paying people to get the job done and he was going to do it himself.

Now for the key: I would have had DiBiase win it. Hogan loses at Mania anyway, so why not to DiBiase? Then have Warrior take it at Summerslam or whatever to lead up to Mania 7 like always. See it’s not that hard. My booking train of thought is completely derailed here by a Monsoon line. “I don’t care if you have a Big Z on the side of your head, that’s not legal.” The greatness of this line cannot even be put into words.

That line is so corny, so horrible, and so freaking stupid that is completely AWESOME. Jesse has NO CLUE what to say to that, so Gorilla keeps complaining about Zeus. Does Tom Lister owe him money or something? Now we move on to the completely stupid elimination of Axe. Fuji trips him, Warlord drops a standard elbow on him, and he’s out. He was relatively fresh so it’s not like he was worn out or something.

If he was worn out completely then that ending makes sense, but why was that all it took? It was a simple elbow drop. That’s the issue I have with the People’s Elbow. It’s an elbow drop. It takes 20 seconds to set up and the effects of the Rock Bottom are wearing off, so it’s a basic elbow. Why should that be able to win matches? That was just freaking stupid.

Yep, Hogan is still fine and this match still sucks. I think that was the issue with this team: they were too good. There’s no way that the heels were going to be able to win here, so therefore, the faces should have lost. That choke thing should have gotten rid of Hogan and the faces should have gone down. How big of a shock would that have been? It sets up Hogan to beat Zeus at the special PPV and DiBiase at Mania, like I SAID WOULD WORK.

Why did I have to be not even two back then? Despite not doing anything for most of the time, we get a rest hold. Good night this is just boring. DiBiase does a weird looking falling elbow from the middle rope which misses. Barbarian clotheslines the heck out of Smash to pin him. It’s Jake and Hogan against the Powers of Pain and DiBiase. I’ve always loved Jake’s blind punches. If he ever hit one of those he would probably half kill someone. That’s better than killing someone I guess.

Roberts, being the better at selling, gets his snake loving head nded to him. Barbarian misses the diving headbutt as Hogan looks like his doggy has been run over as he always does. Hogan fights off both of them as I’m about to snap if I hear Gorilla call Hogan the champ one more time. The referee disqualifies both Powers of Pain for double teaming to make this 2-1 as this is just freaking stupid at this point. Jesse is ticked off and I can’t blame him.

Gorilla is just blatantly being biased at this point and even I’m ticked off too. Why does Hogan have to be pushed THIS strong? He’s the freaking world champion and a single loss in a team match isn’t going to hurt him one freaking bit. Immediately after this, Hogan survives a LONG Million Dollar Dream as even I’m sick of this stupidity at this point. Jake comes in and beats the tar out of DiBiase. I love Ted’s flips. Watch him get knocked around sometime and you’ll see what I mean.

They’re perfectly fluid and they look excellent. Virgil interferes and takes a SWEET DDT to knock him out, but DiBiase drops the falling punch and uses the ropes to pin Jake. At least with the ropes it makes a bit more sense, but Jake not even moving until the three is on the way down was just stupid looking. Did he wake up all of a sudden?

So it’s one on one and Hogan is spent. Gee, I wonder what this is going to be like. Could it be, oh I don’t know, THE SAME FREAKING THING I SAID IT WOULD BE??? Gorilla once again calls Hogan the champ as I feel like I’m watching a Flintstones cartoon. It was always the champ that they wanted to watch on TV. The booking here is just awful as we have our comeback but the double clothesline kills that off.

Yep the legdrop ends this THANK GOODNESS. Hogan poses for TWO AND A HALF MINUTES while holding the belt in DiBiase’s face. See, wouldn’t that be a great buildup for WRESTLEMANIA in 4 months? Heck no let’s just have Hogan reign supreme AGAIN when he didn’t need to.

Rating: D-. Now I’m a Hulkamaniac and I always will be despite what he did in WCW and all the politics he played etc. He’s the greatest and biggest wrestler of all time and he always will be, but this was AWFUL. The booking was just completely stupid here and it backed them into a corner so that the main event had to be Hogan against either Zeus or Warrior. As Gilbertti said, if someone is pinned clean, why should we want to see that match again? I certainly wouldn’t.

DiBiase and Hogan was the money match that had been teased since at least Mania 4, so why did we never get it? Instead we got Hogan and Warrior, which was fine, but they completely blew this one. Why does Hogan, the world champion, have to win here? If Zeus is supposed to be this unstoppable monster, why should Hogan pop up and be fine two minutes later? This just could have been done so much better than they did it, and I don’t get and, nor do I like anything about it.

Savage and Zeus are in the back now as they’re back to being BFFs and they plug the special PPV.

Hogan and Beefcake do the same, but the heels run in and beat them up.

We run down the rest of the card as we have to be at an intermission at this point.

Jesse runs down Hogan and talks about how stupid that was, as well as talking about how the Heenan Family is arguing.

Sean is with Rude’s team and they all say they’ll win. This takes a long time and The Rougeaus are funny.

Roddy leads his team down the hall as all three of them try to smuggle turkey to the ring and leads them in a song/chant. This is bizarre but actually funny.

Rude Brood vs. Roddy’s Rowdies

Rude Brood: Rick Rude, Mr. Perfect, Rougeau Brothers
Roddy’s Rowdies: Roddy Piper, Jimmy Snuka, Bushwackers

So let’s take a look at these teams. First of all they mostly match up with Snuka and Perfect not feuding but they at least are on about the same level. However, let’s break this down. Rude’s team. Here we have Perfect and Rude, both IC and US champions and two of the best to never win one of the two big world titles. They’re teaming with the Rougeaus who are some of the most athletic and crisp guys you’ll ever see.

On the other team we have four guys that have a combined two titles in WWE. Piper has both of them, with the IC title in 1992 and the tag titles with Flair in the 2000s. Yep, if there’s ever been a perfect distribution of talent, this is it. Seriously, even on paper this match looks like a joke. Perfect is with the Genius here. He and Hogan would have a small feud, but no one bought it. Now if that happened a few years later, we’d certainly be on to something. The Rougeau music is AWESOME.

They’re All American Boys! This is one of my all time favorite wrestling songs and is just pure awesome. Rude comes out sans Bobby. This went nowhere really as Heenan stayed with him until he left the company in about a year. He did pick up Henning in a bit though. Snuka has done nothing ever in WWE. Name one match that he won that wasn’t a squash.

He had the cage dive that apparently influenced about half of the wrestlers active today though. Bushwackers, called the marching morons by Jesse, never won anything either. Piper, who won all of two matches that meant anything in WWF, is by far and away the most accomplished member of his team. His pop is great. The bagpipes are completely awesome as always.

We start off with Perfect and Luke. Rude’s tights put RVD’s to shame on all levels. They’re completely awesome. Everyone bites Perfect. I wonder if he needs salt. Jacques does the Jeff Hardy head over heels rope flip which always looks awesome. He then lays down and does a kip up. Yeah these guys were awesome as far as athleticism. They came in during the apex of tag wrestling though and it was hard for them to really break though.

Take my word for it though: they were sweet. Superfly really isn’t all that impressive to me. He had some flashy moves but there’s not a ton of substance here for me. He does have a sweet big splash though and that ends Jacques as Jesse can’t say the name of the face team. They beat up on Perfect for awhile as this is remaining ok I guess. Now no one believes that the Bushwackers are going to beat Perfect, but it’s at least not a bad waste of time.

He finally gets out and it’s Raymond against Piper now. Well this should be….different. Piper eliminates him in about a minute after Ray beats on him for awhile to make it 4-2 and now even I can see how this is going to end. We know it’ll get down to 2-2 and it’ll be the big stars left. Yeah, it’s not hard to figure out at this point. I love how the Bushwackers are completely insane yet they’re trained wrestlers. That’s always been amusing to me. What was training them like?

In case you can’t tell, I’m quite bored at this point as we’re just filling in time before we get down to the big names. Piper and Perfect is a pretty interesting matchup actually. It’s a complete clash of styles and it works very well. What more can you ask for out of this match? I know that we’ve got a gimmick show here but there’s a lot of singles matches that I think would have been better here. Granted they weren’t feuding here but still that’s a feud I’d like to see.

Rude is flat out ROCKING that mustache. Butch bites Perfect’s trunks. Seriously dude, that’s just getting stupid. Perfect takes him out with a rollup. I wonder if Bobby ever motivated him like that. Bite him on the trunks and he’ll start fighting better. Luke bites Rude on the face and it leads to the Rude Awakening to get it down to the predictable ending.

The heels beat on Snuka for awhile here as it’s quite boring at this point. Piper yelling come on Jimmy makes me think of the movie The Wizard and Video Armageddon. I hate this match. It’s so bad. I better get some Lee rep for that one. Anyway, Snuka powers out of a cover and Perfect lands on the referee with the back of the referee’s head in Perfect’s crotch. When is tea time anyway? Jesse keeps saying Snooka and it’s getting annoying.

Rude rakes the back and Jesse calls it a Piper move. That’s a Hogan move actually Body. The future governor says that this is a standard tag team match now. That’s not true either as it’s elimination, not standard. Why does Jimmy wrestle barefoot? That has to be annoying at times. What if he stubs it or something? Yoda Monsoon says “head to head they hit.” I guess the hand next to the head when Roddy punches is a boxing thing. That’s all I can think of.

So we have our two captains and it lasts a minute and a half as they go to the floor for the double count out to make it one on one. Yeah I’ll spoil it for you: Perfect is going to win. They tried so hard to build him up as credible but he just failed in house shows against Hogan as no one thought he was a legit challenger which is why Perfect never was a real option for a PPV opponent, despite the AWESOME set of promos about how Perfect he really was.

Yeah Perfect is dominating and it’s looking like a squash. Short comeback should happen in about a minute or so. Yep I was right. I officially hate this match. I’ve called half the sequences in it and this is just boring me to death at this point. We get a decently fast paced sequence, but naturally the savage falls victim to the Perfectplex. Why would you ever put your head down in front of a guy that uses a suplex as his finisher? Even Snuka is smarter than that isn’t he? Snuka beats up the Genius afterwards.

Rating: D. I HATED this match. It was just flat out awful and the lineup gave away the ending the whole way. You knew the tag teams would cancel each other out and it would get down to the main guys. At that point, there was no way that we were going to have a face team win. Snuka was a jobber to the stars as you remember him being the first victim of the Streak. This was no exception and it was a lot of filler as well, so I’m certainly not impressed.

The Rude Brood celebrates but Rude won’t talk about Heenan.

The Ultimate Warriors, a pretty bad team, says they hope they spoil Thanksgiving for the Heenan Family.

Heenan Family vs. Ultimate Warriors

Heenan Family: Andre the Giant, Bobby Heenan, Arn Anderson, Haku
Ultimate Warriors: Duh, Rockers, Jim Neidhart

This was the epitome of a last second switch. The Brainbusters, Anderson and Blanchard, were being thrown out as they were just too good and Vince knew it. However, Tully failed a drug test earlier in the day and that was all the reason needed to fire him. Bobby was put into this match as a result. He’s dressed like Andre which amuses me. Even the announcers sound generally surprised about Bobby being out there, so maybe there was something to the idea of this being a legit surprise.

I can’t believe this. I like the Rockers’ music. Yeah Shawn Michaels is in the main event of the Survivor Series. What’s with the high knees in this show? Andre jumps the faces and beats the tar out of them until Warrior comes out and saves them, clotheslining Andre three times to knock him out cold on the floor. That’s how banged up he was. That was as long as he could last at the moment.

Yes, that man would be a champion before the year was over though, giving Andre a completely token title reign to end his career. That would actually be the main event of a LOT of house shows around this time: Warrior beats Andre in less than a minute. So let me get this straight.

We have a young tag team and a powerhouse teaming with an unstoppable force in the Warrior in his main event tryout against a good wrestler in Anderson, a strong guy but more or less a career jobber to the stars in Haku, and a manager. Yeah, this is a FINE way to end the show. What is so special about Jim Neidhart? You hear no real complaints about him, but what did he ever do? He and Bret were a great team, but Bret is obviously the more talented guy.

Neidhart was a jobber for awhile as I don’t remember him winning any singles matches, yet he’s remembered FAR more fondly than his counterpart, Marty Jannetty. However, Jannetty has a pretty decent resume of his own: IC and tag champion. That’s not a bad little career. Now of course it’s nothing great, but that’s not bad either. How many wrestlers don’t have that kind of record? Andre looks downright depressing.

He can’t stand up straight, he’s hobbling around and he’s just shouting unintelligibly. Why was he allowed near a ring at this point? A simple two and a half years before this and he looked fine at Mania 3. This is just sad to see though. Jesse talking about how great and tough Heenan is has me cracking up. Haku hits a kick to the back of Anvil’s head to even us up at three.

Shawn is in there now, and it’s just amazing to think that he’s by far the biggest star left in this match. Who in their right mind would have guessed that? Now we get to some solid stuff as it’s Rockers vs. real wrestlers. I’d LOVE to see this be against the Brainbusters instead of Arn and Haku which is as odd of a pairing as you could ever imagine. Other than a short Warrior thing which was also ok as I like power vs. power at times, this is the best part of the whole show.

The Rockers are really underrated as a team in my eyes. They can bring it with the best of them. Also, they hit a double superkick. Shouldn’t Arn be out cold at this point? That’s a move that I could actually give a break to for Shawn about how it knocks people out now but not then. You could argue that he started practicing it more and got the mechanics of it down better and worked his leg harder to get it stronger, so I can live with that actually.

Heenan comes in, hits a knee, gets punched in the ribs and is out. If Santino did that every week, I’d almost like him. Ok that’s a lie but it would amuse me. Haku and Anderson KILL Marty so that Brain can come in and hit a few stomps and a knee to win it. We have an answer as to why Neidhart is remembered more fondly. He lost to Haku, who got a few world title shots in the next year. Jannetty lost to a guy that tripped over the tail of his weasel suit.

What is this book they keep talking about? I’d love a copy of that book. Warrior comes in and within 12 seconds it’s rest hold time! We get another one a few seconds later. Both are bearhugs by the way. You really can see that Shawn is the star in the making. He has that look in his eyes that people talk about. Actually that might be cocaine, not sure.

The faces use the Midnight Express’ Rocket Launcher which has to make Arn laugh, as he and Tully dropped the titles to them so they could leave the NWA. Shawn with a GORGEOUS high cross body takes out Haku. We now have Bobby Heenan against Shawn Michaels. That is just hilarious. Heenan goes UP TOP! Make that the middle rope. Ok it’s the apron. Yeah he’s not doing anything.

This is the epitome of the coward and it’s working perfectly. OH NOW I GET IT! He’s using his brain! So he’s using himself? Is he his own pimp? Is Godfather needed? Ok I’m done. Shawn and Arn are going at it now as that’s a fine match. Arn with the Anderson Drop, takes out Shawn. Wait the what? When in the world did the spinebuster have a name??? I love that. That’s what it should be called. It’s an awesome name.

More or less it’s Arn by himself against Warrior which leads to at least one funny moment: he goes for a tag and Heenan says no way. Arn is MAD. For his troubles he gets gorilla pressed and splashed for the pin, and guess who’s the last heel standing. The look on his face is priceless. Warrior goes commando and sneaks up on Heenan which is funny as well. Sadly this is a borderline comedy match.

Heenan’s face is killing me as that could be an avatar with ease. I could be convinced to give up Link for a shot of that. Heenan is running as much as he can but it’s not working. He almost gets up the aisle but it doesn’t work. You know the ending already. Warrior, the jerk he is, chases him up the aisle and clotheslines him in the back of the head which I don’t think Heenan knew was coming, which is not only unprofessional but very dangerous. Yeah Warrior was kind of horrible.

Rating: C+. The comedy here is just ok and again, WE KNEW WHO WAS GOING TO WIN! Andre simply had no business being out there and it’s just plain sad. Now this would have been miles better had Tully been in it, but on mere hours’ notice, what can you ask from Vince? It’s ok and the fans went home happy, so I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt here. Also, the Rockers/Heenan Family stuff was pretty sweet.

Overall Rating: D+. And that’s being VERY generous. The first two matches are pretty good, but the last three have some of the worst major show booking that I’ve ever seen in my life. It made little sense, it accomplished nothing at all, and it was as predictable as possible. This was just awful at the end. Unless you’re a hardcore 80s WWF fan, stay away from this. However, next year we get a few twists and a HUGE debut.

WAIT!

Just so I can say I reviewed it, you’re getting a bonus match. No Holds Barred was later shown on a special PPV called The Movie and the Match. All it consisted of was the movie and then a special cage match between Hogan and Beefcake vs. Savage and Zeus. That’s all it was: a movie and a match, but it was the closest thing to a definitive blow off between Hogan and Zeus that we ever got so let’s give it a shot.

Hulk Hogan/Brutus Beefcake vs. Randy Savage/Zeus

We start with Sean giving a very brief introduction, saying that this is a real challenge to Hulkamania etc. This was in Nashville at a Wrestling Challenge taping in December of 1989 with the PPV on December 27. The heels are already in the ring when we start this up, which can’t be a good sign. Hogan is world champion here. Your commentators are Vince and Jesse. Hogan brings his own chain to lock the cage. That’s just odd.

Beefcake gets in first but as Hogan is getting in, Sherri slams the door on him so it’s 2-1. Savage grabs Hogan to hold him on the ground. The referee runs over to help him, despite having no actual authority here. As he’s doing this, Sherri locks the door so Beefcake is stuck. However it’s the late 80s so we have to make this completely pointless to close out the decade, so Hogan gets loose and climbs in about a minute later.

Beefcake is down now though, so I guess there was at least a thought there. The cage is moving a lot, which is a flaw of the old school kind. The faces are all of a sudden dominating. Dang Hogan liked raking men’s skin. He did that a lot. However, Zeus rams both guys’ heads into the cage to turn it around for the second time in less than four minutes. The rules here are both guys have to get out to win. There’s no pins or submissions.

Savage nearly gets out but Beefcake makes the save. Here’s Sherri though showing off that tremendous figure of hers. I really think Brutus was underrated as a worker. He suffered from having his career turned upside down by the face injury and some of the absolute dumbest gimmicks of all time. Savage and Zeus are completely dominating here. They both try to go up though and the faces make the saves and here’s your comeback.

All four are down after a quadruple cage shot. For no apparent reason, the referee opens the cage, and Sherri slams the door on his head in one of the SICKEST sounding things I’ve ever heard. I mean there was a thud when that door hit him. Despite it being no holds barred, we need to keep the official out of the way. Sherri slips Savage the chain. In a laugh out loud moment, Jesse says Vince has no authority here. I love lines like that.

Savage jumps off the top of the cage with the chain around his hand but misses Beefcake and here come your faces again. A chain shot takes Savage down but of course doesn’t knock him out. You’d be amazed how immune to pain cocaine can make you. Zeus pounds on Hulk. I’ll give you two guesses as to how that goes for him. Beefcake gets up the cage after knocking Savage off and does this big celebration before leaving. Thanks for leaving your partner you freaking traitor.

He pulls Savage out. So let me get this straight: Beefcake leaves Hogan and then tries to help the other team win. What kind of a freaking excuse for a friend is he? What’s next: joining the heel stable as a completely over the top character that can only say two words and apparently losing his calling as a barber? Good grief I love wrestling. Only in wrestling could that even resemble making sense. Four cage shots leads to three leg drops. WOW he must have hated Zeus.

Three Hogan leg drops is equal to the combined power of the militaries of Bolivia and the Death Star. Wait, Hogan gets the pin? There were no pins mentioned before. At least the 80s are going out in style: a short cage match with over the top characters and rules that are changed on the fly. Jesse’s line of “I don’t believe it he did it again” cracks me up.

Rating: B-. This was literally just a match at a TV taping that was thrown on at the end, so what do you expect from it? It’s about ten minutes long and exactly what you would expect it to be. It’s nothing great but it sent the fans home happy and ended Hogan vs. Zeus so there we go. It did what it was supposed to do also: gave the people a reason to buy the movie. This was eventually put out on a home video compilation tape called Supertape, so it’s whatever. This was perfectly fine.

 

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2004 Monday Night Raw Reviews (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/08/26/new-book-and-e-book-kbs-complete-2004-monday-night-raw-reviews/

And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:

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Summerslam Count-Up – 1989 (2013 Redo): Zeus Is Loose

IMG Credit: WWE

Summerslam 1989
Date: August 28, 1989
Location: Meadowlands Arena, East Rutherford, New Jersey
Attendance: 20,000
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Jesse Ventura

We get an intro video similar to the opening of a regular TV show with various highlights and people enjoying the warm weather.

Hart Foundation vs. Brain Busters

Anvil completely no sells some chops to the chest and sends Tully into the buckle before bringing Bret back in. The fans are all over Heenan with a Weasel chant while Bret works on a hammerlock. Tully grabs a top wristlock but Bret bridges off the mat to escape and the Busters are sent to the outside. Back in and Bret wins a slugout with Tully but gets suckered into a chase with Blanchard making a blind tag to Arn who blasts Bret from behind.

Dusty Rhodes talks about how the man in the blue suede shoes told him he can dance better than the Honky Tonk Man. This is a bit of a step down from Hard Times.

Honky Tonk Man vs. Dusty Rhodes

Rating: D-. Who in the world thought this deserved ten minutes should be carried into the street and shot. Between the leg lock and the WAY too long chinlock, this could have been cut in half and nothing would have been lost. Honky was fine as a jobber to the stars at this point and he would maintain that position for months to come. This was way overbooked for what it was worth, but the fans loved Dusty which is the point of the match.

Honky asks someone to help him find the stage and wants to know where Priscilla is.

Demolition and King Hacksaw Jim Duggan are ready for their six man tag against the Twin Towers (Boss Man/Akeem) and Andre the Giant.

Mr. Perfect vs. Red Rooster

Survivor Series is coming.

The Rockers/Tito Santana vs. Fabulous Rougeau Brothers/Rick Martel

This should be awesome. Martel teases getting in there against Tito to start but sends Jacques in instead. As is his custom, Jacques requests a handshake but sneaks in some choking on Tito instead. The Rockers come in without tags and the good guys hit stereo dropkicks to send the French Canadians to the floor. Things settle down to Marty vs. Jacques with the latter going to the middle rope and head faking Marty, but Jannetty is faking the head fake and punches Jacques on the way down.

Martel tries to hide in the corner but gets caught in a huge backdrop to send him running even further. A dropkick and a suplex put Martel down and the top rope right hand gets two as everything breaks down. Tito hits the flying forearm to send Martel to the floor and Marty rolls up Jacques, only to have Martel slide back in and blast Jannetty with a right hand, giving Jacques the pin.

We recap Rude vs. Warrior. Rude attacked Warrior during a posedown at the Rumble before stealing the IC Title at Wrestlemania with help from Heenan. Tonight is the rematch with rude defending against a ticked off Warrior after Warrior spent months fighting through the Heenan Family. This was also used to set up Warrior vs. Andre the Giant over the winter.

Intercontinental Title: Ultimate Warrior vs. Rick Rude

Roddy Piper laughs about costing Rude the title, setting up his first feud after returning to the ring.

We go to an intermission, which is just a graphic with a countdown clock until the show continues.

Twin Towers/Andre the Giant vs. Demolition/Jim Duggan

Greg Valentine vs. Hercules

Post match Garvin announces Hercules as the winner, which apparently is good enough to get Valentine disqualified. Like I said, this is the time to turn your brain off.

Randy Savage, Zeus and Sister Sherri gather round a cauldron and predict bad futures for Hogan, Beefcake and Liz. The late 80s were weird in case you were wondering.

Ted DiBiase vs. Jimmy Snuka

A quick stun gun sends Snuka into the top rope and Ted can stomp away like a good 80s heel. DiBiase works on the back with knees to the spine and a backbreaker for no cover but a middle rope elbow misses. Jimmy slams Ted down and hits a middle rope headbutt but Virgil breaks up the Superfly Splash. Snuka chases him around on the floor but gets sent into the post by DiBiase for the countout.

Post match Snuka hits the Superfly on Virgil.

Genius recites a poem about Summerslam, saying he thinks Zeus and Savage (his real brother) will win.

Zeus/Randy Savage vs. Brutus Beefcake/Hulk Hogan

Ratings Comparison

Hart Foundation vs. Brain Busters

Original: B+

Redo: B

Honky Tonk Man vs. Dusty Rhodes

Original: F

Redo: D-

Mr. Perfect vs. Red Rooster

Original: C+

Redo: D

Rick Martel/Fabulous Rougeaus vs. Tito Santana/Rockers

Original: B+

Redo: B

Ultimate Warrior vs. Rick Rude

Original: A-

Redo: B

Jim Duggan/Demolition vs. Andre the Giant/Twin Towers

Original: C+

Redo: C

Hercules vs. Greg Valentine

Original: F-

Redo: D

Ted DiBiase vs. Jimmy Snuka

Original: D

Redo: D

Hulk Hogan/Brutus Beefcake vs. Randy Savage/Zeus

Original: B-

Redo: D+

Overall Rating

Original: B-

Redo: C+

About the same this time.

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/07/23/history-of-summerslam-count-up-1989-gather-round-the-cauldron/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/


And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:


http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




Summerslam Count-Up – 1989 (Original): Those Two Have Chemsitry

IMG Credit: WWE

Summerslam 1989
Date: August 28, 1989
Location: Meadowlands Arena, East Rutherford, New Jersey
Attendance: 20,000
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Jesse Ventura

So we’re a year removed from the first Summerslam and quite a bit has changed in the WWF. Savage is now a full heel and no longer the champion, having dropped the title to Hogan at Mania 5. Their feud continues though as Hogan is now teaming with Beefcake to face Savage and Zeus in the main event. Now the Zeus storyline was, ahem, interesting I guess you would say.

Here’s the idea: Hogan made a movie called No Holds Barred. To wrestling fans, this was and still is proof that there’s a god and that he has a sense of humor, as this may indeed be the worst movie ever filmed. It’s corny, it’s stupid, and it’s nothing but a way to push Hogan down our throats. Seriously, this makes Cena look like Clark Gable.

Anyway, Zeus the character, real life name Tom Lister, wanted revenge on Hogan the wrestler, not Hogan’s character Rip from the film. If that made no sense, it would be like villain from 12 Rounds, whoever that was, coming to Raw to try to kill John Cena. See why this feud was bad from the beginning? Wouldn’t Zeus be angry at the screenwriters and not Hogan? Shouldn’t he be heading for a board room or something like that?

Dang this guy needs a new agent. Anyway, there’s one major flaw with this storyline: Lister wasn’t a wrestler, but an actor. This leads to one big issue: he doesn’t know how to do anything in the ring other than choke Hogan. This proves to be a storyline that’s looked back on fondly as it was something I grew up watching, but in modern times this is pretty stupid.

Anyway, this is a big tag match, even though there’s another one in a cage a few months later that’s the real blow off to this, and likely a better match. Your other big match, which oddly enough was the first time those words could be used to describe this series, is Rick Rude vs. Ultimate Warrior for the IC Title in a rematch from Mania 5 where Rude stole the belt in a stunning upset.

Other than that, it’s mainly filler matches that no one really wanted to watch. It looks like a far better card on paper than last year’s show, which isn’t saying much to be fair, but let’s see how it is.

First thing we see: big freaking sign saying that the show is tonight at 745. Well thanks for letting me know that since I’M WATCHING THE SHOW. How stupid were the 1980s? That music is sick though and I love it. Pure retro WWF music is something that will never be topped. Why in the world did I not have a Hulk Rules shirt? Oh and we have a tag line: Feel The Heat.

Well ok then I’ll make sure to do that. Tony and Jesse do your run of the mill intro talking about the two big matches until Tony says away we go. Apparently we’re going away to another intro. This one is of wrestlers squashing jobbers with cuts of non wrestling people doing various summer things: softball, ice cream, swimming, etc.

This is like a weird intro to Wrestling Challenge or something like that. It ends with Hogan hitting Zeus with a chair and Zeus slowly turning to face him before we hear some familiar music.

Hart Foundation vs. Brain Busters

Busters just recently won the tag belts from Demolition, ending their epic reign that will simply never be topped. However, this is non title because the Busters won the titles after this match was signed, which I guess is trying to protect the belts while keeping the Harts strong, but it still doesn’t make it sound all that great. The champions still have no music for no apparent reason while the Harts music sends the crowds into the official land of the insane.

This was around the time that everyone knew the Harts were the best tag team in a LONG time and perhaps the best team ever, and that the belts were rightfully theirs. I’ve always like the jog that the Busters did on the way to the ring for some reason. Makes them seem more serious or something I suppose. I also like the no music. It makes them seem like two guys that do nothing but just go out there and wrestle. That’s a gimmick in and amongst itself.

Lance Storm made it work very well, as did Arn Anderson. According to Jesse, if the Harts lose they might not get a title shot again for another year. In this era, there’s an excellent chance that he’s correct. That’s how competitive the tag division was at the time. In two months you’d see a tag team survivor series match with some TEN TAG TEAMS. I don’t mean two random guys put together and called a team.

TEN sets of guys that were legitimate teams. To say that the Harts dominate the first half of this match is an understatement. I don’t think the champions have control in that time frame at all, but they somehow never look like they’re completely out of it either. That’s a nice touch and something that’s rather difficult to do if you think about it. But wait, what’s this? The champions….are starting to win? What a concept!

The champions are winning a match in the style they’re champions of! That’s a great idea indeed and makes the match better as it extends it, making it back and forth. Arn hits the ropes and Bret uses a knee to his back to break his momentum. That’s a pure heel move but it gets a massive face pop here. I love how in wrestling the fans are so preconditioned to cheer and boo for certain people. That’s something you only get here.

We get a brawl once Hart gets the tag and eventually it’s Blanchard and both Harts in the ring. He gets the slingshot shoulder block which I’ve always marked out like crazy for, followed by the powerslam/splash move where Jim picks up Bret and reverse powerslams him onto Tully for the cover. Arn with a double axe handle, which normally is just a basic move, apparently knocks Bret out here for the pin.

Rating: B+. This was some classic 80s tag team wrestling which is what the 80s were best at. All kinds of double team work and back and forth style which is just a treat to watch all over the place. Harts dominate but the champs come back in the end to steal the pin, which is a very nice touch as both teams look strong. Very good match and the perfect opener.

Dusty Rhodes, wearing Big Boss Man’s hat and holding his nightstick, is going to face Honky Tonk Man, which was a weird feud to say the least. He’s not worried and it takes him about a minute and a half to say that which includes 28 complimentary lisps.

Dusty Rhodes vs. Honky Tonk Man

Yep, it’s a comedy match. This was just an odd feud to say the least and I’m not quite sure who thought this would work well on camera. Neither guy could carry a match so I guess it falls on Dusty here. Dusty has a reputation for being one of the most lazy as well as one of the most inept guys in the ring and this is no exception. We’re 2 minutes into it and what do we get from Dusty? A rest hold of course!

And not just any rest hold mind you, but the lethal slight ankle twist…….OF DOOM. Hart on the megaphone is always great stuff as you could tell he loved every second of being out there. This cameraman has way too much of a tendency to focus the camera on Dusty or Honky’s pants. That’s not something I want to see a lot of. Dusty of course no sells the offense which makes Honky look even more ridiculous as we get even more rest holds since neither really has a big offensive range to speak of.

Think about it: what do you remember Honky doing other than a swinging neckbreaker? What stands out for you from Dusty other than a bunch of elbows? Dusty fights back, leading to a Honky rest hold. Literally, we’ve probably had 40-50% rest holds so far. What the heck are they resting from? Oh here’s Dusty’s next comeback and it’s the more interesting variety of elbows and punches rather than punches and elbows this time.

Ref goes down and Jimmy accidentally hits Honky with the guitar, leading to a BIG elbow drop from Dusty for the pin. Sean Mooney picks 18 seconds after Honky gets hit by a real, not the Jeff Jarrett breakaway kind, of guitar to interview him. Honky thinks he’s Elvis, that Jimmy is Priscilla and that he needs to kiss Lisa Marie before he gets on stage tonight. That’s an image that I don’t want coupled with one I do want actually.

Rating: F. This was atrocious. Both men had issues wrestling anything close to a passable match and were asked to put on a good match out there. That’s a bad combination and Dusty apparently was sleepy as he was in about 18 rest holds in a 10 minute match. That was the biggest issue of the whole thing for the most part. Honky was a great comedy heel, but even he couldn’t escape from the gravitational force of the suckage that comes from Dusty’s stomach.

Duggan, in Demolition mask, along with his partners for later tonight Demolition, talk…about something. I think it’s about training for their match later.

Mr. Perfect vs. Red Rooster

Perfect is a guy that can do anything and everything perfectly. Rooster is a man that walks around making chicken noises. My goodness what a gimmick can do for someone. There’s a bit of a joke here as Rooster was offered the Perfect gimmick buy turned it down and was given this I believe as a punishment. Hennig took it just so he could have a job in the WWF.

I think we know who made the right choice. It might be this gimmick but I’ve never been able to stand anything about Terry Taylor. He’s the most worthless wrestler I have ever seen. Dude, did Taylor botch a slam? Hennig is what, 250? How do you botch a move like that? Tony says that a dropkick was totally awesome! DANG that didn’t sound right coming from him.

They fight on the floor for a bit as I think Rooster is injured. He’s limping around a lot and I don’t remember Hennig doing anything to his leg. I think so even more as they go back in and NOW, you’re going to see a Perfect Plex! I mean they’re inside and within a second he’s got the headlock on him. That has to be a fast ending. Taylor can’t even sell the Plex right, as he sells it like he’s out cold. It’s a suplex with a bridge, not a power bomb. You don’t sell it like you’re dead.

Rating: C+. This was WAY too short to really be anything as it was less than 3 and a half minutes I’d say. However, if Taylor actually was hurt that’s not their fault at all. For the time they were out there it was good though. I think it was the slam where he got hurt though. He was on a big offensive run at the time and a quick slam would have fit in there perfectly. After that it fell apart which I think was due to the injury. I’ll go with the decent ranking when both were healthy instead though.

BLAST IT! At least that’s the clean version of what Gene Okerlund has to say when the Summerslam logo falls behind him as he’s trying to interview Rude. The funny part is it falls, he hears it, he looks down at it, and THEN he says the word. They cut away immediately and Tony tries to imply nothing happen as Jesse is completely losing it on commentary. This was hilarious.

Tito Santana/Rockers vs. Rougeaus/Martel

Random six man tag. This should be good I suppose given the guys out there. Oh and Jannetty will be ok too. It’s a classic tag feud mixed with singles feud so…ROUGEAU MUSIC!!! Holy goodness I love this song as it just awesome all around. As I check, yes indeed Jimmy Hart wrote it. With lyrics like “we don’t like heavy metal and we don’t like rock and roll. All we listen to is Barry Manilow.”, seriously, how can you go wrong?

Eighties wrestling music was so mind blowingly great it’s hard to stop. Slick managed Martel? I don’t remember that. As expected given the names in this match, everything goes insane in just a few seconds. The Rockers are in and it’s dropkicks a go-go all over the place, followed by the tag team throwing Santana into Martel. As they would today, the heels take over when we’re back in the ring. After that, it’s standard material that works pretty well I’d say.

Everyone in there is at least a decent if not good worker. After about 5 minutes of heel dominance, we get to the inevitable brawl with the faces taking over. Hart gets on the apron but is cut off by Jannetty, who is rolled up but reverses the rollup into one of his own. Martel runs in and lands a devastating…punch, which knocks him out for the pin. Tony screams that neither was the legal man, but who cares about that?

Rating: B+. This can be summed up in one word: fun match. You had six….that was two words wasn’t it? Oh screw it. I’m a political science major because there’s no math so who in the world cares? Anyway, these guys just went out there and had fun. They had almost 15 minutes and made the most of it. Great little match that was fast paced for about 90% of it which helps it a lot. Makes the heels look strong while holding off on the Martel vs. Santana match, which is a plus.

Recap of Warrior vs. Rude, which was actually an epic rivalry. These were two guys that for no reason at all had amazing chemistry together. I don’t ever remember them having an actual bad match, which is odd for Warrior. It started at the Rumble where they had a pose down and Warrior had the IC belt.

At the end, Rude hit Warrior with a steel exercise bar and choked him out with it. Warrior chased him down and didn’t catch him until Mania, where Rude had Bobby Heenan hold Warrior’s foot to steal the title. Since then, they’ve been randomly feuding on and off as Warrior fights the whole Heenan family and a week before Andre beat him up. This is your rematch.

Wait, we need more rambling. Warrior talks about…Andre of course. Oh he throws in Rude too.

Intercontinental Title: Ultimate Warrior vs. Rick Rude

Rude does his standard intro that seems fresh despite being used about a million times. As he says hit the music, my tape jumps and I get a split second of the Gobbledygooker egg at Survivor Series 1991 which I’ll be getting to later on. That was really quite odd. Warrior is of course completely insane as he comes to the ring as Jesse wonders what asylum he was let out of.

In this series, Warrior would almost always dominate early on and this is no exception. I like that, as it fits Warrior’s character very well. Also, as they did at Mania, Rude’s back is hurt. Rude’s selling of the atomic drops are nothing short of classic, rivaled only by that of the Genius. Warrior goes to the top twice, which is just odd to see. However only one works as the Ultimate balls are crotched on the top rope.

He also throws on one of the best reverse chinlocks I’ve seen in a long time. It’s closer to a camel clutch but who cares? Rude goes for the Rude Awakening and just has it ripped off. As this is going on, images of Warrior in full character start coming to me. This is absolutely classic stuff as him freaking out on his trainers is nothing but funny stuff. They go back and forth as the ref gets bumped.

Powerslam by Warrior but a slow count allows Rude to get his foot on the bottom rope. This match has some drama to it. Rude hits kind of a weird jumping punch off the top rope which isn’t something you see every day. Rude gets a piledriver as Roddy comes out, whom Rude had been feuding with lately. As he’s there, Rude gyrates at him for no apparent reason, resulting in Roddy mooning him. This gives Warrior the time to heal, leading to the slam and the splash and the IC belt.

Rating: A-. This was a very fun match. Like I said, these two just have freaky chemistry together for no reason at all and every time they’re in the ring it works well. Warrior is slowed down in these matches and it works quite well for him. Rude was a completely opposite style than his but for some reason they just meshed so well. Great match that made sense and furthered Piper vs. Rude like it was supposed to do. Warrior would hold the title until he vacated it after winning at Mania.

Sean Mooney is in the audience and says it’s awesome in a completely pointless scene.

In the back Gene is with Mr. Perfect, who says that Rooster was just a stepping stone, while using for what may be the first time, his signature line: Nobody beats Mr. Perfect, NOBODY. That’s actually a very good line.

Without cutting at all, Roddy shows up to be interviewed by Gene, who makes jokes about showing his back to Rude. Piper is either so coked up he can’t see straight, or he’s the best promo man that’s ever existed.

Again, with no change in the camera shot at all, Ronnie Garvin is here as my level of appreciation for this show falls. In case I haven’t made it clear, I hate this guy. He says he has a special assignment but Heenan runs in to complain and absolutely lose his mind over what Piper just did. This is great as Heenan is completely insane at this point. We have to be on an intermission here as this is the 4th interview in a row. Rude comes in and freaks out with less comedy.

Jesse agrees with Bobby.

Following that 5 minute barrage of interviews, we get a recap of the main event feud. Apparently Hogan and Zeus were feuding on the set of the movie, and Z appeared on SNME. Macho and Zeus hooked up in July to continue Savage’s feud with Hogan. Yeah this recap is really boring. We get the famous scene of Zeus attacking Beefcake and Hogan smashing him with a chair and Zeus just turning around.

This was SO much better when Dusty and Boss Man did it in the NWA. That’s the really famous one where Rhodes took the wooden chair and smashed it over Boss Man’s (then called Big Bubba) head, shattering it into a bunch of pieces. Bubba no sold it and just adjusted his tie. That’s awesome stuff right there. This goes on for five minutes and it’s just not needing that much time.

Big Boss Man/Akeem/Andre the Giant vs. Jim Duggan/Demolition

This is just a straight old grudge match which should be fun. We get Jive Soul Bro so everything is right in my world. Andre just looks bad here. The heel team is 1,300 pounds. That’s freaking scary. When the 400lb+ Boss Man is the smallest guy on the team, that’s saying a lot. Duggan is in the Demolition mask here and Jesse makes a Jason Vorhees joke for no apparent reason.

He’s also King at this point which didn’t last that long. Ah ok the mask does look like a black Jason mask so that works fine. He has an American Flag painted on his face so Jesse has to go on a big rant. The 2×4 has a crown on it which is kind of cute. Duggan and Akeem start us off and Duggan defies the laws of PG with some harsh language.

The faces work over the African Dream a bit here which is smart as he’s definitely the easiest target of the three. And so much for that as Boss Man is in now. Now they work over him too as I’m noticing a theme of some sort. Some double team shenanigans allow Andre to come in and Axe is in trouble. Andre sits on him and it’s amazing that he’s still alive.

For once the USA chant makes sense as Andre is a Frenchman. Akeem, the wrestling master that he is, allows Axe to get the tag and bring in Smash. He gets a slam on both guys to put the heels in trouble. And then Andre smacks him in the head to take care of that. Akeem gets a second rope splash on Smash but Duggan pops him with the board to take care of that and get the pin. Big pop for that also which is kind of surprising.
Rating: C+. This was just a good old fashioned fight and there’s nothing wrong with that. Given the 6 guys in there, what were you expecting out of this match? These guys were just beating on each other for the sake of beating on each other and it was fun. Fun little match that worked quite well for what it was.

Survivor Series ad.

DiBiase says he’s going to beat Snuka.

Hercules vs. Greg Valentine

Ronnie Garvin is the surprise ring announcer. What did the fans do, burn something huge? How in the world he got a pop and earlier in his career actually BEAT RIC FLAIR FOR THE NWA WORLD TITLE is beyond me. He’s fighting with Valentine over something and he insults Valentine and Hart in his introduction. These are the worst insults of all time.

He says Valentine claims to weigh 249 but looks to be overweight by 30 pounds. Is that actually an insult? He’s saying Valentine weighs less than he looks? “When he goes to his manager for advice, Little Jimmy can’t give him any.” What kind of a mean thing to say is that? Dear god this guy is awful. He says Valentine has two left feet. Garvin is insulting his ability to dance now??? In case you can’t tell, I really hate Garvin.

This match goes on for about 3 minutes and I think Hercules uses 18 punches and a suplex. Valentine uses his feet on the ropes and gets a pin. Garvin, the guy this match is focused on is, says that he feels Hercules is the winner. Based on this, the referee disqualifies Valentine. Herc and Garvin beat up Valentine.

Rating: F-. I hate Ronnie Garvin. He’s involved in this match, so it sucks.

We then get what has to be the weirdest promo of all time. Gene is with Sherri, Macho and Zeus, around a freaking cauldron of all things. They say….something about bad things coming to the faces tonight but I really was too confounded to listen. This was far stranger than it sounds.

Ted DiBiase vs. Jimmy Snuka

DiBiase, still with no music, mentions he ended Jake Roberts. Snuka comes out to NO reaction at all, but Tony tries to tell us otherwise. Jimmy is rocking the zebra tights instead of the tiger ones he usually has. They’re really not working for him. Standard stuff here that’s really not interesting to say the least.

Punches, kicks, occasional suplex, DiBiase misses a big move, Superfly goes for the splash but Virgil makes the save, Thanks to Virgil we get a count out. Post match he beats up Virgil and splashes him which gets a ton of flashbulbs.

Rating: D. This was boring beyond belief and really didn’t need to happen. It is the definition of filler which this show was full of. They seriously need to get to the end of the show NOW.

Mooney is in the audience…..again.

Beefcake and Hogan say they’ll win. Apparently they drove their Harleys across the river. Hogan uses some very un-Hulk like language, even saying sexy, to describe Liz and her “headlights.” Kind of makes me wonder what he was riding.

Hulk Hogan/Brutus Beefcake vs. Zeus/Randy Savage

Genius has a poem about Liz and Hogan which was a way to start paving the way for Hogan vs. Perfect very soon. As annoying as Beefcake was, he had a SWEET theme song. How in the world did I never get one of those Hulk Hogan teddy bears? What kind of a gimmick is a barber? That’s the best they could come up with for him? Hogan’s music hits and the fans go crazy. That’s saying a lot.

Hogan was so loved that the people would sit through three and a half hours of crap save for one or two matches for Hogan and Hogan alone. As Ventura puts it: THIS IS MASS HYSTERIA! No Jesse, THIS IS HULKAMANIA!!! My goodness that looks sweet in all caps. Screw all the people that say Hogan sucks and plays politics. He is the greatest thing in the history of professional wrestling. Hogan tells Fink he has something to say. The pop for this is absurd.

She gets a pop on the level of the Warrior from earlier on. Macho is going nuts over this, as was expected. Macho is in gray/white tights, which just don’t work for him. My tape has a glitch in it as one minute Savage has Hogan in an Orton special, and the next Zeus is beating on Hogan. It’s a standard main event tag like last year but with more time given to it and it’s likely a better match because of it, but we’ve seen the formula before.

Face gets beaten down, mini brawl, other face takes over, gets beaten down, and then it’s hot tag to Hogan. Oh before I forget, Zeus is invincible unless you poke him in the eye first, and THEN punches hurt him. Why do I feel like I’m watching a mix of Zelda, the Three Stooges and Summerslam?

Sherri’s purse is loaded, which was later revealed to have a brick in it I believe, but THAT doesn’t drop Zeus. However, the slam and the leg drop do for the pin. Liz takes out Sherri and they cut her hair. Posing and recaps follow.

Rating: B-. This was fine for what it was, but it wasn’t anything we haven’t seen before, namely LAST FREAKING YEAR. It’s an ok tag match that no one would remember after the cage rematch 3 months later so this wasn’t anything too bad. Hogan of course looks dominant and another of his buddies gets a rub.

This would continue with Zeus for a few more months until the cage rematch where Hogan pins him with three leg drops as he apparently wanted to crush his immortal soul. Three leg drops are the equivalent of a nuclear explosion, so it’s no wonder Zeus didn’t wrestle for 7 years.

Overall Rating: B-. What an upgrade from last year! This was a million times better but that’s not really saying a lot. There were two featured matches this year so therefore the show looks a lot bigger. However, MY GOD THERE’S A LOT OF FILLER. This show never seems like it’s going to end as there’s probably 2-3 matches that could be completely cut. DiBiase’s could have been accomplished in a promo to say the least.

Hercules/Valentine could have been a short promo with Garvin running down Valentine (or being trampled under the hooves of stampeding camels), and the 6 man was just to get Andre and Demolition on the show. It’s light years ahead of 88, but next year the show really starts to get it right. Watch it if you’re a fan of 80s stuff and are quite bored.

 

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s History Of In Your House (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/05/31/new-paperback-kbs-history-of-in-your-house/


And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:


http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6




Wrestlemania Count-Up – Wrestlemania V (2015): One Long Wait

IMG Credit: WWE

Wrestlemania V
Date: April 2, 1989
Location: Trump Plaza, Atlantic City, New Jersey
Attendance: 18,946
Commentators: Jesse Ventura, Gorilla Monsoon

King Haku vs. Hercules

Rating: D+. Not the worst match here but this was a strange choice for an opener. I mean did they really think that it made sense to push Hercules as something special? At the time they were actually pushing him as a third Mega Power, which meant “the guy that would take a fall in a six man” but it was really just in name only. This was a pretty pedestrian power match but that superkick to stop Hercules was a nice touch. Haku always had a good superkick and it was cool to see him use it, even in a nothing match like this.

Rockers vs. Twin Towers

Rating: C+. This was fun for how well the Rockers bumped for the monsters here. That clothesline and the powerbomb to Shawn were particularly awesome as Shawn looked dead off both moves. The Twin Towers had just come off feuding with Hogan/Savage but for some reason it never led to the Tag Team Titles or even a serious shot at them.

Ted DiBiase vs. Brutus Beefcake

Back in and even more right hands stagger Ted until Virgil trips Brutus to give the boss an opening. A middle rope elbow gets two for DiBiase and a suplex sets up the Million Dollar Dream. Brutus grabs the rope and makes his comeback, sending Ted face first into the buckle ten straight times. DiBiase finally knocks Brutus to the floor where Virgil gets in a few shots. Ted follows and they brawl to a double countout at 9:57.

Post match Brutus cleans house with the hedge clippers to claim a moral victory. As usual, Jesse is on point by calling that assault with a deadly weapon.

Fabulous Rougeau Brothers vs. Bushwhackers

Mr. Perfect vs. Blue Blazer

Jesse is presented to the crowd for the third year in a row. For some reason Gorilla is surprised and says he was set up for this one.

Run-DMC performs the Wrestlemania Rap. Was Gladys Knight busy this year?

Demolition is ready to beat up Fuj the Stooge.

Tag Team Titles: Demolition vs. Powers of Pain/Mr. Fuji

Dino Bravo vs. Ronnie Garvin

Bravo attacks from behind and forearms Garvin in the back as Gorilla and Jesse argue over how strong Bravo really is. A kick to the chest gets two for Dino and even Jesse rips on Bravo for thinking that would get the pin. Garvin suddenly starts his comeback with a bunch of right hands (his finisher back in the NWA) and a sleeper but Bravo is right in the corner. A sunset flip gets two for Ronnie but he walks into the side suplex for the pin at 3:55.

Brainbusters vs. Strike Force

The Brainbusters (Gorilla: “Two really tough dudes!”) are Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard with Heenan in their corner. Strike Force has been inactive for a long time due to Martel being injured but he begged Tito to reform the team. Blanchard starts with Martel and Arn is cheating just a few seconds in with a knee to the back. Everything breaks down and stereo dropkicks put the Busters on the floor.

Donald Trump thinks this has been a great event for the Trump Organization and that the casinos have been doing very well. Sean Mooney sounds incredibly nervous here.

Long recap of the Mega Powers forming and splitting to get us to the main event. Like I said, Hogan was taking a bit too much of the spotlight, including getting the win at Survivor Series after Savage did most of the work. It was finally too much for Savage and he snapped to set up the Mega Powers exploding.

Jake Roberts vs. Andre the Giant

Jake catches DiBiase and brings in the snake to clear the ring.

Sean Mooney gives us a worthless report from the cheap seats.

Honky Tonk Man/Greg Valentine vs. Hart Foundation

Intercontinental Title: Ultimate Warrior vs. Rick Rude

Warrior comes right back with another bearhug and the referee is even nice enough to stop Rude from poking the eyes again. Rude gets out off something we missed because the camera was on Heenan and a piledriver gets a very delayed cover. The kickout is a lot weaker this time and Rude follows up with a jawbreaker.

Rating: B. This was a pairing that never made sense as neither guy was known as the best in ring performer on their own but they meshed together very well and produced some good stuff. Rude was still goofy and Warrior was still insane so this was a major upset and big surprise all around. Good match too.

Bad News Brown vs. Jim Duggan

Red Rooster vs. Bobby Heenan

Heenan can barely walk after the beating from Warrior. Right hands, Heenan misses a charge and hits the post, Rooster pins him in 30 seconds.

Post match the Brooklyn Brawler comes in but gets beaten up by Rooster. This is really the last match before the main event at WRESTLEMANIA.

Tony Schiavone says the locker room has all gone into the arena to watch the match.

Sean Mooney polls fans on who is going to win. My goodness ENOUGH FILLER ALREADY.

WWF World Title: Randy Savage vs. Hulk Hogan

We hit the armbar from the champ but Hogan fights up and uses the trunks to pull Savage to the floor. Back in and Hogan drops a bunch of elbows for two but Savage pulls him into a chinlock. Hulk has a cut over his eye and Savage knees him into the buckle for two, even with a handful of trunks. Hogan fights up again and just slams Savage over the top to the floor.

A lot of posing and raving from Jesse take us out.

Ratings Comparison

Hercules vs. King Haku

Original: C-

2013 Redo: C-

2015 Redo: D+

Twin Towers vs. Rockers

Original: C

2013 Redo: C

2015 Redo: C+

Brutus Beefcake vs. Ted DiBiase

Original: D+

2013 Redo: C-

2015 Redo: D+

Bushwhackers vs. Fabulous Rougeau Brothers

Original: D-

2013 Redo: D

2015 Redo: D-

Mr. Perfect vs. Blue Blazer

Original: B-

2013 Redo: C+

2015 Redo: C+

Demolition vs. Powers of Pain/Mr. Fuji

Original: C-

2013 Redo: D

2015 Redo: D

Dino Bravo vs. Ronnie Garvin

Original: F

2013 Redo: D

2015 Redo: D

Brain Busters vs. Strike Force

Original: B-

2013 Redo: B-

2015 Redo: C+

Jake Roberts vs. Andre the Giant

Original: D

2013 Redo: D

2015 Redo: D

Hart Foundation vs. Honky Tonk Man/Greg Valentine

Original: D+

2013 Redo: D+

2015 Redo: C

Rick Rude vs. Ultimate Warrior

Original: B

2013 Redo: B

2015 Redo: B

Jim Duggan vs. Bad News Brown

Original: F

2013 Redo: D-

2015 Redo: D

Red Rooster vs. Brooklyn Brawler

Original: N/A

2013 Redo: N/A

2015 Redo: N/A

Hulk Hogan vs. Randy Savage

Original: C+

2013 Redo: B-

2015 Redo: B

Overall Rating

Original: D+

2013 Redo: D

2015 Redo: D-

It just keeps getting worse.

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/03/12/history-of-wrestlemania-with-kb-wrestlemania-5-hogan-vs-savage-and-thats-about-it/

And the 2013 Redo:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2013/03/14/wrestlemania-count-up-wrestlemania-v-the-first-wrestlemania-sequel/

Remember to follow me on Twitter @kbreviews and pick up the paperback edition of KB’s Complete 2000 Monday Nitro and Thunder Reviews Part 1 (also available as an e-book) from Amazon. Check out the information here:

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2019/02/22/new-book-kbs-monday-nitro-thunder-reviews-volume-vii-january-june-2000/


And check out my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:


http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6