Royal Rumble 1998
Date: January 18, 1998
Location: San Jose Arena, San Jose, California
Attendance: 18,542
Commentators: Jim Ross, Jerry Lawler

We have seen our savior and he is called Austin. So it’s official: Steve Austin ranks somewhere just below free beer in terms of popularity at this point and is the undisputed king of the company. There’s just one thing: he’s not the world champion yet. It’s about as clear as you can make it that Austin is going to win the title at Mania, so this is another formality. However, a few things have happened in the last two months or so.

Number one: Montreal. We have no Bret Hart and Shawn and Vince are now pure evil, especially the latter. The other thing is Starrcade 97, where Hogan’s ego has managed to almost single handedly kill the massive lead that WCW was enjoying. Therefore, even though the results are clear, they have to do this right because if they do, the WWF could actually catch up to WCW (which they did).

Your other main event tonight is Shawn vs. Taker in a casket match, and you know what happens there. I’ve always felt the main event should have been someone else but I’ll get to that later. Anyway, Kane is now apparently face and will be here to help Taker, and you know he wouldn’t ever do anything like turn on him 6 days after joining him or anything like that.

As for the rest of the show, the roster has filled out a lot more now with a lot of the familiar Attitude Era people there now, such as Shamrock, Rock in his more famous form, face Mankind and the Outlaws. Actually a lot of the wrestlers are the same but now they’re in their best forms, which is often the most important part. I have decent memories of this show and it’s certainly important as far as history goes so let’s get it started.

The opening video is about being champion, which is what the show is mainly about so at least it makes sense. The set for the Rumble isn’t elaborate yet as it’s still the circular one that was used for years. Why were there always blimps in the arenas for these things? I’ve never gotten the point of that. Oh yeah Mike Tyson is here tonight too in what turned out to be a big deal for the company as far as going mainstream went. DANG he is getting booed out of the arena.

Vader vs. Goldust

This is actually the Artist Formerly Known As Goldust but I didn’t want to type that out more than once so he’s just Goldust in this. Let’s see: green hair and what we’ll call yellow and blue striped tights. More or less he’s just insane at this point where he’s expressing himself or something like that. It never made a ton of sense but it was different if nothing else.

Vader has just fallen through the floor as far as meaning anything went by this point for no reason that I’ve ever been able to come up with. Well I’ll give him this: he’s still energetic and the fans are WAY into him. Of course that means he’s not worthy of being anything but a jobber in Vince’s company, so there we go. Lawler actually says that he’s glad Goldust is back in men’s clothing for this match.

I think that sums up the Attitude Era pretty well. Vader is just beating the tar out of Goldust at this point. He throws Goldie into the stairs in the worst, weakest looking shot I’ve ever seen. Goldust stopped about 6 inches before he hit them and then tapped them. It looks horrible. We have a hot crowd if nothing else. After a decent comeback, Goldust kisses Vader, and you know what’s coming next.

Apparently Austin isn’t here yet. Why is it that he never got to the arena on time? After putting him down, Vader sets for the Vader Bomb. This takes literally thirty seconds. He deserved the low blow he got from that. There is little more entertaining to me than a big guy just dropping down on someone else.

In a cool looking visual, Luna jumps on Vader’s back as he’s setting for the Bomb again. He’s like screw it who cares and does the move with her on his back. The sight of Luna flying through the air and just stopping dead when Vader lands is great for some reason. Naturally this ends it.

Rating: B-. For an opener, this was a very good choice. The fans were into Vader and he looked quite solid out there. It was a standard beatdown and the ending spot looked cool. It wasn’t epic and it wasn’t supposed to be, so this was exactly right and I’m perfectly fine with it. For the life of me I don’t get the complete lack of push for Vader.

Austin is here and the Godwins follow him. Apparently all 29 other guys want to kill him.

Max Mini/Mosaic/Nova vs. Battalion/El Torito/Tarantula

Yep it’s a mini match. Sunny is referee here to give anyone a reason to care. The three faces combine to weigh less than 260lbs. That’s just amusing. They kept having these matches for no apparent reason other than an attempt at capitalizing on the Luchador craze, which I guess was a better idea than trying to use bad luchadors like they would do in a few months. Max weighs 87lbs and is very fast if nothing else.

Everyone has very generic gimmicks with Batallion being an army guy or something. We’re about two minutes into this and we just saw our 8th arm drag. It’s Trios rules here as in if one of the guys goes to the floor, that’s the same as a tag. We go split screen to look at Tyson who looks like he’s hamming it up for the camera, and to his credit he looks genuine at least. Like I’ve said a dozen times: if you don’t want to be there, at least try to look interested, and Tyson is certainly doing that.

The crowd doesn’t care about anyone in there other than Max. For no apparent reason, Sunny helps Max throwing dropkicks at the other guys. It made no sense but it got a pop so there we go. We hit the floor and there they go. It’s your standard everyone runs to the ropes and hits a big move and it works really well here.

I’ll say this for these guys: they’re not boring. They’re not particularly interesting but they’re not boring either. Max goes to the top (which to be fair is like from the top of a cage for a normal size guy) and hits a rana which leads to a cradle for the pin. This was so far ahead of last year’s Lucha stuff that I can’t even see it back there.

Rating: B-. Again, it wasn’t great, but it was exciting if nothing else. It kept you paying something close to attention so that’s better than nothing at all. Max was more over than all 5 other guys combined so it was smart to have him be the focus of the match.

Granted that might be because he was by far the most talented. Compared to last year’s old guys doing nothing for 11 minutes, this was a good deal shorter at about 8 minutes which helped it out a lot. That doesn’t sound like a lot of time, but three minutes can mean a big difference in a match. Think about how many matches you’ve seen that are about three minutes long. A lot of TV matches are, so there’s time to do a good amount of stuff in there. By keeping this one shorter it was FAR better.

The Nation is looking for Austin but all they find is a foam finger.

Vince and Shane are with Tyson. Shane looks so much more comfortable talking to him than Vince does.

We get a recap of Shamrock vs. the Nation, including Henry turning on him to join the Nation. This was when Rock was taking the leadership of the group over from Farrooq and is also IC Champion at the time, having been handed the title after Austin forfeited the belt to go after the World Title. Cole is with the Rock as we cut to a clip from the Free For All of the Nation arguing over who would win the Rumble.

Cole says that apparently there are problems in the Nation. Rock says apparently you’re an idiot. I love Rock ripping on Cole. It was always priceless. Rock offers advice to Clinton, continuing his gimmick of offering his input on social matters of the time as only he could. It helped play up the People’s Champion thing, and more importantly led to an interview with Gennifer Flowers at Mania where he debuted a rather famous line because of it, if you smell what I’m cooking.

Intercontinental Title: Rock vs. Ken Shamrock

Rock comes out alone here. The crowd is way behind Shamrock here as Rocky was flat out hated. We start with a fairly long feeling out period and then we all of a sudden get going. Shamrock is pretty good at the moves he could do, but the problem is he didn’t have a ton of things that he could do well. Since we’re in the Attitude Era, there’s a lot of brawling going on here which makes sense for Shamrock at least.

What doesn’t make sense though is Rock being able to go toe to toe with Shamrock in that area. If he’s supposed to be the best fighter of all time like JR keeps telling us, Rock is amazing then. In an amusing bit, Rock goes for a chinlock but does the arm motion that he would do for the People’s Elbow by swinging his arm around really slowly to hook the chinlock on. I love that.

JR says this isn’t the seniors’ tour which is a clear jab at WCW and how much they messed up the previous month’s show. As Shamrock goes insane, here’s Kama to allow Rock to get some knucks to knock out Shamrock. Now in a brilliant move Rock puts them in Shamrock’s tights. Ken kicks out and hits a belly to belly for the pin and the title. Rock gets up a bit later and says to check his tights. You can see the ending coming from here and the decision is reversed.

In a great moment, the referee is checking his tights and points to the crotch and asks what is that? It’s as humorous as it sounds. Yep, the referee gets the ankle lock too. They would do a similar screw job ending at Mania where Shamrock was named the winner again but didn’t get the title again. Rock would finally lose the belt at Summerslam in an epic ladder match with HHH. On a replay we see Rocky hitting him with the knucks.

We also see the problem with it as the knucks are on the back of Rock’s hand, but the way Rock throws punches, the part where the brass is sticking out wouldn’t have touched Ken’s head, but why should we care about that?

Rating: C+. This was what it was. It wasn’t meant to be anything great and they didn’t try to make it something it wasn’t which is the smart thing to do. The ending was at least somewhat creative so they get points for that. I don’t get why they did the same kind of ending at Mania, but whatever. This was fine. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t terrible given what they had to work with here.

We see exclusive footage of Rock in his locker room taking off his boots when Shamrock jumps him. For some reason Shamrock has had time to take a shower and put on jeans while Rock doesn’t even have his boots off yet, despite Rock having left first.

Los Boricuas are looking for Austin. They find the DOA instead and of course they fight like they did for months. I think a combined 5 people cared in all those fights.

We recap the LOD vs. the Outlaws which more or less consists of old school vs. new and it’s not that interesting but it’s ok I guess. Basically the LOD are old and cool and the Outlaws are jerks. Nothing is different I guess. Oh and they beat up the LOD and shaved Hawk’s head while wearing Cartman shirts. Seeing South Park being considered cutting edge and underground stuff is just ridiculous to think of.

Tag Titles: New Age Outlaws vs. Legion of Doom

They’re wearing Favre jerseys for no apparent reason. Oh apparently Favre just beat the 49ers and we’re in the Bay Area. Hawk and Animal look at clips of them being beaten up and say that this is about pride or something. Animal is completely insane in this promo. Why are the LOD referred to as American Originals? I’ve never gotten the point to that reference. I’m sorry to shock those of you with heart conditions, but this starts out as a brawl. I know I can’t believe it either.

The heels try to run and naturally that doesn’t work at all. JR actually mentions the Horsemen on a WWF program. He follows that up by saying this might be a matter of time, more or less giving away the ending. There’s zero flow to this match at all. It’s just random insanity and I don’t recall any tagging here at all. That’s fine in spurts but it needs some sort of structure to be legitimate at all.

To further the insanity here, Hawk gets handcuffed to the turnbuckle while the injured Animal is beaten on. We shift over to a one on two match here with Animal fighting for all he’s worth. He hits a powerslam and has it won when a chair from Road Dogg breaks it up for the DQ as we STILL can’t have a clean ending in a match that means anything. They start the beatdown, but Hawk and the power of the 80s breaks the handcuff and after a bunch of chair shots, the LOD reign supreme.

Rating: D+. This match can almost sum up everything about the Attitude Era as a whole. You have a classic team like the LOD that got world title shots back in the 80s and then you have these two guys that aren’t great workers to begin with but get heat based off of shock tactics. There was little tagging and most of this match was brawling. There’s the Attitude Era in a few lines.

Some chick in Tennessee wins Austin’s truck.

We get a recap about how Austin is a marked man or whatever. In other words we get a package to futher drill into our heads that Austin will indeed win the Rumble tonight.

Royal Rumble

Fink claims that it’s every 2 minutes for intervals. It’s really closer to 90 seconds if you pay attention and considering the whole thing lasts 56 minutes, 2 minute intervals are impossible unless the last guy is thrown out before he gets to the ring. Cactus Jack is first and apparently Jack, Dude Love and Mankind got into a fight over who would be in the Rumble and Jack won.

Second is Chainsaw Charlie, who is more commonly known as Terry Funk in some weird crazy man gimmick. When I say crazy I mean crazier than usual. He brings a fake chainsaw with him, so Foley throws chairs at both him and it, which produce no sparks. There’s about 5 chairs and a saw in the ring and we’re underway. Aww the referee gets the saw out of the ring. Anyway, Funk says for Foley to blast him with a chair so he does.

Foley hands it to Funk so Funk can have a free shot. This is either cool or mind blowingly stupid. Tom Brandi is 3. Think Santino but less talented and stupider and that’s what you have. In a move that shocks no one, he’s thrown out in about 10 seconds. This is a weird hardcore kind of thing here as Funk has his customary convulsions. Number four is Rock to some weak heat. Ah ok there it is. Foley hits him with a trash can to show off their future hardcore epics.

The hardcore guys beat him up as Lawler is panicking. Mosh is fifth as I’m starting to hate the Attitude Era. He gets the biggest pop of all five guys so far. Naturally Funk goes for the moonsault and it misses. I don’t get the point in having such an insane start to the match. Phineas is 6th. He and Hank are heels here and it just failed on so many levels. More or less they switched to creepier music and wear the rebel flag so now they’re heels.

Yeah it bombed big time, so naturally they were pushed for about another year or so until the company woke up and let Hank go and changed Phineas to Mideon. Funk throws some chops and the wooing begins. Number seven is 8-Ball to continue the greatness of this Rumble. Seriously, considering there’s three world champion out there, this is just boring so far. Funk puts out Cactus as the crowd couldn’t care less.

Allegedly someone has attacked Austin but King won’t say who. Bradshaw replaces Cactus at number 8 to really enhance the greatness in there. Owen Hart is number nine, but Jeff Jarrett and Jim Cornette who were representing the NWA of all things jump him as Ross declares Cornette a stain on the underwear of life. For the love of all things good left in the world, someone lobotomize JR before he hurts himself. For some reason Owen gets huge cheers from Tyson. That’s just odd.

Owen can’t get in the ring and is just laying on the floor. Steve Blackman is tenth. He’s a complete WWF rookie at this point despite having a ton of experience in other companies before this. We mull around even more as the ring is way too full. All of the guys I’ve listed are in other than Jack and Brandi. Owen is still down as number 11 is D’lo Brown. There are 5 members of the Nation in the Rumble tonight which is kind of impressive.

Shamrock may have been the guy that got to Austin. Rock goes the heck off on Blackman with some insanely fast kicks. At this point we’re just waiting on some monster to come out and get rid of some of these guys. No one cares as there is zero chance Austin is going to lose.

Number 12 is Kurrgan. Now this was an interesting character to say the least. He was completely dominant so of course they made him a comedy character by the fall. He gets rid of Mosh so if nothing else he’s done his job. How weird is it to think that Bradshaw of all people would wind up having a 9 month world title reign out of all these guys in there? Mero and Sable come out at 13. Good grief Mero was a depthless character.

Blackman is gone via Kurrgan. Bradshaw beats on him a bit which at least looks kind of cool. Shamrock comes out to a BIG pop. He goes straight for Kurrgan and knocks him down with relative ease to allow a big group of people to dump him out. In 20 seconds, Shamrock has managed to get the crowd to actually cared about the match which the other 12 hadn’t been able to do in almost half an hour. Thrasher comes out at 15.

The ring is WAY too full at this point. There’s a very loud Sable chant. Lawler keeps talking about how he wants to fight Tyson which is just perfectly good cheap heel heat. 16 is Mankind as we hit one of my all time favorite Rumble bits. Yes, all three of Foley’s personas are in the Rumble. He puts out Funk with relative ease. In a very unintentionally funny moment, Shamrock is trying to get Rock out in the corner.

The tape freezes just for a second and Shamrock’s arms are under Rock and his head is laid on his stomach and the look on his face looks like he’s lovingly smiling. It’s just great. Anyway Goldust is 17th and this time he’s rocking a silver body suit with painted on women’s lingerie including g-string. The ring is WAY too full here. I would list them all off for you, but it would be Austin Fodder #1, 2, 3, 4 etc. There’s about 10 guys in there and no one cares about most of them.

Goldust puts out Mankind who wasn’t a big deal just yet. Jarrett is 18th and Owen finally gets in and beats the living tar out of him. After skinning the cat, Owen dumps Jarrett. There’s a big rant coming on Owen later so stick around for that. And from out of nowhere Honky Tonk Man is 19th. Rock puts out Shamrock as HHH and Chyna come out. HHH is hurt and not in the match. Owen tries to get rid of Goldust, allowing HHH and Chyna to use a pair of crutches to eliminate him.

Ok screw waiting for later. At the end of the previous In Your House, Owen had jumped Shawn to end the show, making his first appearance since Montreal. He beat Shawn up and then ran off into the crowd. Every single sign in the world said that Owen vs. Shawn would be the title match at the Rumble. Think about it: Owen comes back to avenge his brother’s honor so the drama and story are already there.

Owen can actually hang with Shawn in the ring so it’s not like the match would be boring or something. Owen was getting insane reactions from the crowds at this point so it’s not like they wouldn’t buy it. So given how obvious this was, Shawn vetoed it. Owen made the epic return and was promptly fed to HHH.

Yes, instead of going with the money match at the Rumble of Owen vs. Shawn, I’m assuming Shawn was afraid that Owen would either upstage him or shoot on him, so he somehow convinced everyone that the best choice was for Owen to just go back down into the midcard and job to HHH and Jarrett and stay far away from the title picture, and showing the power of the Clique, it worked.

Owen was made to look like a joke over the next three months, having a tiny feud with Jarrett that went nowhere and then jobbing to HHH to make him look good. At least Shawn got what was coming to him all those years later in the casket match, which he lobbied for. I hate to say it, but he got what he deserved.

Ahmed Johnson is number 20 and no one cares. He was just completely wasted by this point and it failed miserably. The crowd is pretty much dead here. Lawler lets it slip that Honky is his cousin. We accidentally hear someone say that someone isn’t cleared to wrestle which we’ll get to in just a few moments. Mark Henry is 21st. In a great stat, Henry is one of 17 people in this Rumble that have never been in one before.

Ross says Henry is handling the big Johnson. I’m not going near that one. There is no number 22 and everyone thinks it was supposed to be Austin. It turns out that it was supposed to be Skull, but he was hurt earlier in the attack by the Boricuas and was who the accidental voice was talking about. Phineas and Ahmed are gone with Phineas landing on a referee in an amusing spot. The crowd really couldn’t care less here.

Kama is number 23, and here’s the best recap I can give you: Rock, 8-Ball, Bradshaw, D’Lo, Mero, Thrasher, Goldust, Honky, Henry and Kama. Holy jobber fest Batman. Austin it 24th to an EPIC pop. I mean the fans went insane for that glass shattering. Literally everyone in the ring turns to the entrance to jump him, but he comes through the crowd and knocks out Mero and 8-Ball with relative ease.

Why in the world did they insist on constantly making Brown a big deal or at least trying to? Never mind he’s been upstaged by the failure that is heel Henry Godwin. We start the final five with Savio, who leads the completely worthless Boricuas who all go after Austin despite not being in the match. Naturally they’re easily dispatched. There are WAY too many people in there. I’m counting 11 I think.

Farrooq is 27th as all 5 members of the Nation are in there now. Naturally he beats on all of the other 4 members. I’ve always thought they missed the boat with Farrooq. He was clearly a great athlete with a solid character yet they never pulled the trigger on him. Rock and Austin go to the floor through the ropes. Dude Love is 28th which gets a nice pop. Foley was such a brilliant character when you think about it.

Kane was Isaac Yankem and Fake Diesel etc. Kama was Papa Shango, Godfather etc. The thing is, those other characters are never mentioned. They’re simply repackaged to give them a fresh start and that’s fine. Foley took it completely the other way. They made him all three characters at once with no attempt at hiding it. That’s very unique and I don’t think it’s been done otherwise. Anyway he puts out Bradshaw in about a second.

Rock does the overrated elbow on Brown and gets beaten up by Austin for it. At least Austin recognizes overrated moves. Chainz, another guy I thought could have been more than he was, is 29th making Vader number 30. There goes Brown to lighten us up a bit.

Ok, so with all 30 in, here are your possible winners: Rock, Thrasher, Goldust, Honky, Henry, Kama, Godwin, Vega, Farrooq, Dude Love, Chainz, Vader and Austin. I wonder who the win…never mind that joke is just stupid. Who thought it was a good idea to have 13 people in at the end? Vader puts out Honky. The crowd still doesn’t care at all. There goes Thrasher to a tiny pop.

Kama is gone as we’re starting to clear the ring out. Ross thinks Brown is still in for some reason. There goes Vega as Austin has dropped three in a row now. Goldust puts out Vader because Vader can’t do anything since he’s an over character. Instead we have to have a freak character be put over again. Henry and Goldust go out. Farrooq just shows off by throwing out Henry.

Chainz was put out by Austin over the corner and slammed into the steps which just looked SICK. The final four are Farrooq, Rock, Dude Love and Austin. I’ve always loved Dude’s Sweet Shin Music. Farrooq eliminates Dude. Say that out loud and see how ridiculous it sounds. Ross is ticked off for some reason at Rock resting while Farrooq fights Austin.

Farrooq was in for about 10 minutes while Rock had already wrestled earlier and had been in over 50 minutes at this point. I guess according to JR that’s nothing. Anyway the final two are Rock and Austin. They slug it out and the fans are buying every bit of it. After a Stunner Austin shocks no one as he’s going to Wrestlemania.

Tyson is happy too. We get a quick interview with Tyson, who despite calling Austin Cold Stone, which to be fair sounded far more like a slip of the tongue rather than him just not knowing what he was saying, says he’s very happy and looking forward to the main event. If nothing else, he’s very enthusiastic and sounds like a legit fan.

Rating: D+. This was a bad Rumble in every sense of the word. The big problem here is clear so I’ll ignore that. The problem is there’s no one out there that was even a potential challenger. There was almost no flow to this either. The closest thing to a story was the Nation but it got no play at all.

That’s the problem here: there’s no story or drama at all and it just crippled the thing. We knew Austin would win, but the question was how. The problem was there was no way to disguise the fact that he was going to win and it really hurt the match. There really was no way to make this great, but they at least could have made it ok.

We recap Taker vs. Shawn. More or less they were trying to just pick up their rivalry from the fall like nothing ever happened. Good night Shawn took a beating in the Cell. Kane has broken away from Paul Bearer and apparently has joined Taker to help him fight off DX. For some reason Taker accepted his brother that hated him with no issue at all. I’ll give you two guesses as to how that’s going to work out.

Casket Match: Undertaker vs. Shawn Michaels

Fink looks REALLY weird for some reason here. It looks like he’s being forced to announce at gunpoint or something. We get a weird comment from JR about Shawn: He may not be in a class of his own but it doesn’t take long to call the role. Wait, what? If he’s the world champion and the best big match guy ever, why wouldn’t he be in a class of his own? Also, Ross tries to say HBK has a better record in big matches than anyone including Hogan. That’s just laughable.

Shawn’s overselling of Taker putting the lights back on is great. Shawn of course has to run here and punch where he can, but we get my favorite spot that Taker keeps using as he just grabs Shawn by the throat and throws him into the corner. I’ve always loved that. In a very cool spot, Shawn goes for a crossbody from the middle rope and Taker catches him in a two handed choke. That looked great. And there it is.

Shawn is backdropped over the top rope and slams him back on the casket, more or less shattering it and putting him on the shelf for four and a half years after Wrestlemania. You can tell something just isn’t right with him at this point, and oddly enough a fan shouts out BREAK HIS BACK while Taker is beating Shawn up. As usual, Taker is just beating the living heck out of Shawn.

That’s your formula for the majority of this match: Taker beats up Shawn, Shawn hits a little something, Taker beats up Shawn some more. Eventually Shawn hits a kick out of nowhere, but Taker doesn’t really do much about it. We go near the casket a few times which is always good, but the best part is Shawn in the casket and trying to get out while Taker pulls him back in.

It’s a very cool shot that’s been done many times since but never as well as there. Eventually the tombstone hits and Shawn is dead, but Los Boricuas (which is incorrect grammar but whatever) and the Outlaws run out.. Cue Kane, but of course he turns on Taker to throw him in the casket to keep the title on Shawn. That’s not the end though, as Kane nails Taker into the casket and starts walking it back up the stage.

In one of the most famous scenes of his career, he covers it in “gasoline” and lights it on fire. JR is FREAKING as we go off the air. Of course Taker magically disappeared from the casket, setting up his return just in time for a Mania match with Kane.

Rating: B. This one is hard to mess up. These two worked very well together and this was no exception. They’re just perfectly suited to one another and they showed why here. Granted they more or less did the exact same thing as they did in the Cell, but it still worked.

Obviously the bigger story here is Shawn’s back, but that’s been covered more elsewhere because no one knew how bad he was hurt at this point. The match was fine, but it was clearly more about the angle than the match, which is ok here.

Overall Rating: C-. This is a show where the individual matches don’t add up to the final grade. This is a lot more like a transition show than anything else, with most of what you see here just setting up stuff for later on. It set up Shawn vs. Austin which had to happen for the company to survive as well as Taker vs. Kane, but other than that there’s just not much here.

I really didn’t like this show all that much, but it was ok I suppose. There have been worse Rumbles, but not that many. Watch it if you haven’t seen it before I guess, but you likely won’t want to again.

 

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Royal Rumble 1991
Date: January 19, 1991
Location: Miami Arena, Miami, Florida
Attendance: 16,000
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Roddy Piper

So it’s 1991 now and the US is at war (kind of). Therefore, the main event here, other than the Rumble of course, is Warrior defending the world title against Slaughter. This is a major changeover from the old Rumble formula which was a bunch of nothing matches followed by the big battle royal to close the show. Well at least on PPV that is. This would become the norm after this (other than in 1992) so let’s get to it.

We open with the national anthem to really hammer home the AMERICA ROCKS theme.

We get the usual list of a bunch of people in the Rumble.

Piper goes on one his big America rants about how much he loves the troops.

Rockers vs. Orient Express

The Express are Kato and Tanaka. Kato is a white guy named Paul Diamond in a mask pretending to be a Japanese guy. Shawn gets jumped to start and hit with a big double backdrop. Marty dropkicks Kato to the floor and superkicks Tanaka down as the Rockers take over. The Rockers hit stereo suicide dives to take the Express (popular names for tag teams no?) down on the floor.

The crowd is LOVING the Rockers here because they’re AMERICAN! Jannetty and Kato start things off with Kato getting caught in a headlock. Things speed up already and Marty controls with a headscissors on the mat. That gets turned into a backslide for two for Jannetty and we have a standoff. Marty makes the Express collide with each other before working on Tanaka’s arm.

Shawn comes in off the top with another shot to the arm but Tanaka comes back with a kick to the face and a chinlock. We get an overly complicated running the ropes spot which results in the Express having their heads rammed together. It’s still Tanaka vs. Shawn here and we go from a chinlock to a sleeper by Shawn. Marty tries to come in for no apparent reason, allowing Kato to blast Michaels in the back to give the Express control for the first time.

Everything breaks down and we get multiple do-see-do sequences, finally resulting in the Express being rammed into each other and being sent to the floor. Shawn busts out a kind of prototype 619 before the Rockers dive on both members of the Express in a cool spot. Back to Kato vs. Marty and we hit another chinlock. Shawn comes back in for a vertical suplex but Tanaka breaks up a monkey flip by guillotining Shawn from the apron.

Tanaka comes in and we get the World’s Greatest Tag Team spot of Tanaka jumping over Kato’s back to land on Shawn’s back as Shawn is draped over the ropes. A shot to Shawn’s throat keeps him down and it’s off to the nerve hold. Things slow down a lot as Kato comes in to chop away. A superkick puts Shawn down again (how appropriate) but he comes back by slamming Tanaka’s face down into the mat.

The place is really getting into the Rockers here as Kato takes his belt off. The Express tries to clothesline him with it but Shawn dives onto the belt to ran both Express members into each other. Hot tag brings in Marty to clean house and a powerslam gets two on Kato. Tanaka breaks up a backslide attempt so Shawn trips up Kato to retaliate. Everything breaks down again and Tanaka breaks up the Rocket Launcher. Kato slingshots Marty into a Tanaka chop and Jannetty is in trouble. They load it up again, but Shawn blasts Tanaka, allowing Marty to counter the slingshot into a sunset flip on Tanaka for the pin out of nowhere.

Rating: B+. This would have been a masterpiece if they had cut out a minute or two of the chinlocks. Still though, this follows the Nitro formula to the letter: take four small guys, give them a long time, get an exciting match. That’s the perfect choice for an opener and it worked well here. The Rockers would continue to be awesome for the rest of the year until splitting in December in the famous Barber Shop incident.

Macho Man wants a shot at the winner of the title match. Slaughter has agreed to this idea for some reason, and Sherri is on her way to the arena to get Warrior to agree to the same.

Here’s Sherri on the platform (yeah back then they had an interview platform along with the one in the back) to call out Warrior. Savage is watching in the back and Sherri takes forever to get Warrior to come out. She begs the patriotic Warrior and tries to seduce him (oh dear that’s a terrifying thought) and gets on her knees, only to have Warrior shout NO. Savage LOSES IT in the back over this. Somehow these segments took like seven minutes.

Big Bossman vs. Barbarian

This is part of a storyline that worked quite well until the ending. Rick Rude had insulted Boss Man’s mother, but Boss Man was told he had to beat every member of the Heenan Family before he got a match with Rude. Unfortunately Rude left the company before Boss Man got to him so Boss Man got Mr. Perfect at Mania….but he didn’t win Perfect’s IC title and that basically ended the storyline. Still though, the build was good and it gave Boss Man something to do for months. The eventual payoff was him literally dropping a big metal ball on Heenan’s ribs.

Anyway Barbarian pounds away to start but gets kicked in the head and elbowed down. They head to the floor for Boss Man to send Barbarian into the post before heading back inside. Barbarian goes up but jumps into a punch, sending him right back to the floor. Barbie suplexes him down and punches Boss Man in the face, knocking him into the ropes where his feet get tied up.

Barbarian pounds away a bit before ramming Boss Man back first into the post. Off to a bearhug by Barbarian followed by an elbow for two. Back to the bearhug for a little bit longer until Boss Man headbutts (bad stereotypes!) his way out. A splash in the corner misses and Barbarian gets two off a rollup, only to have Boss Man get the same off a clothesline. They hit head to head and both guys go down.

Barbarian is on his feet first and goes up and hits his top rope clothesline for two. There’s the Boss Man Slam but Boss Man walks around before covering, allowing Barbie to grab a rope. An awkward looking piledriver puts Boss Man down for no cover again. Barbarian goes up for a cross body of all things but Boss Man rolls through it for the pin.

Rating: C. This was a fine match but the ending is kind of weird. I have no idea why they didn’t have the Slam end the match here but for some reason it kept going for another minute or two afterwards. Still though, decent enough match and Boss Man was just CRAZY over at this point. The hot crowd helped a lot here.

Slaughter and General Adnan rant for a bit and say Slaughter is winning the title tonight. For some reason while Slaughter is talking they shift to another camera so he has to turn ninety degrees.

The Warrior isn’t worried about Slaughter and says he’ll give the orders tonight.

Quick recap on the world title match: Slaughter is a former American patriot and is now changing over to Iraq because he’s that kind of a villain. Warrior is defending and that’s about all there is to it.

WWF World Title: Sgt. Slaughter vs. Ultimate Warrior

Gorilla gives a disclaimer, saying that Slaughter and Adnan’s views don’t represent those of the WWF or most of America. If that was anyone other than Gorilla Monsoon, I’d say he wasn’t allowed to speak for America, but Gorilla Monsoon speaks for me. There’s a t-shirt idea in there somewhere. The belt is purple tonight in case you’re wondering. Yeah Warrior went a bit nuts (shocking I know) with having multiple belt colors for some reason. The heels try to attack him with the Iraqi Flag but Warrior will have nothing of it and clotheslines them both down.

Slaughter gets the flag shoved into his mouth and Warrior pounds away. He chokes Slaughter with said flag and chops away in the corner as Slaughter is in trouble. Warrior sends Slaughter into the corner for his over the buckle bump to the floor. Here’s Sherri to trip up Warrior and draw him back up towards the entrance. Savage is waiting on Warrior and beats the tar out of the champion with light fixtures as Slaughter gets a breather.

The Sarge wisely stops the count a few times, allowing Warrior to get back in. Slaughter pounds away in the corner as he starts softening up the back for the Camel Clutch. Apparently the middle eastern moveset comes with becoming an Iraqi sympathizer. The crowd absolutely HATES Slaughter here and boos anything he does. Warrior gets sent into the buckle but they clothesline each other down. Naturally a single clothesline is enough to counteract that long run of offense by Slaughter and get us back to even.

Slaughter gets up first and puts on a bearhug for a LONG time. Warrior breaks it up but walks right into a backbreaker for two. There’s the Camel Clutch but Warrior’s legs are under the ropes. Warrior Warriors Up and beats Slaughter down but here’s Sherri again to frenzy up the crowd. Warrior loads her up in the gorilla press and throws her onto a charging Savage in the aisle. Savage pops up again and blasts Warrior in the face with his scepter, allowing Slaughter to drop an elbow for the pin and the title, STUNNING the crowd.

Rating: D+. The match was dull for the most part but the heat was insane. The crowd audibly calls this BS and you can’t really argue that point. Aside from that, this sets up Wrestlemania really well, as we need a REAL AMERICAN to take the title back. Pay no attention to the fact that the war had already been over by Wrestlemania.

Gorilla LOSES IS when the title change is announced.

Koko B. Ware vs. The Mountie

The crowd is still in shock at this point so here’s a match to pass some time. Mountie has Jimmy Hart with him here and is doing the shock stick gimmick still. A lot of stalling to start things off here until Koko hits that dropkick of his. Ware cranks on the arm after Mountie hides on the floor for a bit. Mountie backdrops him to the floor in a big bump and takes over. Hart gets in a shouting match with Frankie the parrot as this match drags on and on. Koko gets a quick two on a sunset flip as Jimmy argues with Frankie some more.

A piledriver is broken up by Ware but Mountie pounds away even more to stop the comeback. Koko grabs a neckbreaker and hits a few headbutts to put Mountie down. The missile dropkick (Koko hits the kick and lands on his feet. That’s AWESOME) drops Mountie again and a cross body gets two. Koko hits the ropes a few times but charges into a…..into a……I think it was a choke takedown or something like that. Whatever it was it gets the pin for Mountie.

Rating: D. This match sucked but it was the only thing they could have done here. They had to do something to give the fans a chance to breathe after that previous title match and while it didn’t really work, they made the right move here. Mountie would be IC Champion the next year while Koko would be in a tag team I believe.

Savage says he’s the next WWF Champion and runs away with Sherri as he can hear Warrior pounding on the door.

Gorilla and Piper lament Warrior’s loss.

Slaughter says he told us all he’d win.

Gorilla and Piper rants some more.

Some fans get to send messages to some American troops in the middle east.

We hear about Hogan going to various American armed forces bases because he’s not allowed to go to Saudi Arabia at the moment. Thankfully Piper mentions that he and Hogan don’t agree on everything.

We hear from some Rumble participants: Roberts, Earthquake, Valentine, Tornado, the LOD, Undertaker (still with Brother Love), Duggan, Martel, British Bulldog, Perfect (IC Champion here) and Tugboat.

Piper talks about having lunch with Virgil today. Remember that.

DiBiase and Virgil are ready to face Dustin and Dusty. Ted talks about having bought and paid for Virgil, who glares as DiBiase talks.

Ted Dibiase/Virgil vs. Dustin Rhodes/Dusty Rhodes

Dustin is BRAND new here as this is his first WWF match. It’s also Dusty’s last in the WWF/E for over fifteen years. This is the blowoff to DiBiase vs. Dusty which started at Summerslam with Ted buying Sapphire and taking her from Dusty. Sapphire left soon afterwards because she didn’t want to be away from Dusty. Anyway the Rhodes Family takes over to start with elbows a go-go, sending the heels to a huddle on the floor.

Dustin, only 21 here, starts with Virgil who barely ever wrestled at this point. I mean it was like once every year or two. Dustin hits a clothesline and a dropkick to send Virgil (the real name of Dusty for you trivia geeks) to the floor as DiBiase is getting frustrated. Another clothesline puts Virgil on the floor again and Ted yells a lot. Off to DiBiase to backdrop the young gun but a second attempt results in a face jam.

The Rhodes dudes hammer DiBiase back and forth with elbows to send him to the floor as well. Here’s Big Dust who puts on a sleeper but Virgil breaks it up. Back to Dustin for a dropkick for two, but a charging knee at Virgil misses to put Dustin down. Virgil stays on the knee and wraps it around the post, as does his boss. The heels try some double teaming, but Virgil accidentally clotheslines DiBiase. Ted beats the tar out of him, allowing Dustin to tag his dad. Said dad is rolled up for the pin almost immediately by DiBiase.

Rating: D+. Another dull match here but it was almost all for the ending and post match stuff. Like I said, the Rhodes guys were on their way out so they didn’t have a chance at all in this one. Dusty stopped meaning anything months before this and it was the right move to go back to WCW for him where he could do what he wanted and book as well.

Post match we get the important part of the match. DiBiase yells at Virgil and says he’s tired of having to save his worker. He tells Virgil to get the belt and wrap it around his boss’ waist, but Virgil is mad. DiBiase keeps running his mouth, talking about how Virgil needs this job. DiBiase turns his back on Virgil and turns into a belt shot to the head, drawing one of the handful of pops in Virgil’s entire career.

Hogan is ready for the Rumble and wants the title from the un-American too. Gene tells Hogan that Slaughter might have just defaced the American Flag. Oh you know it’s on now. Hulk goes into such a rant that he forgets the name of the guy America is at war with (Sadaam Hussein) in a semi-famous bit.

Royal Rumble

Bret gets #1 for the second time in four years. He and Neidhart are tag champions here and he gets to face Dino Bravo at #2. Feeling out process to start until Bret clotheslines Bravo to the apron. Bravo comes back but misses an elbow. We go to an annoying wide shot as Greg Valentine is #3. I think he’s a face here but it was such an unmemorable turn that I can’t remember if it had happened yet or not. Well he’s fighting Bravo so I’d assume so. Actually he does a bit better than that by eliminating Bravo quickly.

Bret atomic drops Greg down and adds a clothesline for good measure but he can’t get the elimination. Here’s Paul Roma of Power and Glory at #4. Actually the team might have broken up by this point. Again they weren’t that memorable, just like most of this time period aside from the top stars. Bret rams their heads together, causing Roma and Valentine to fight for a bit.

Here’s Kerry Von Erich to give us I think three faces and one heel, or at least two faces a heel and a tweener. Bret misses an elbow drop off the middle rope and everyone pounds away on various people until Rick Martel is #6. Bret almost puts Martel out but Roma makes a save. Well no one ever accused him of being all that bright. Saba Simba (Tony Atlas as a tribal guy. It didn’t last long) is #7 as things continue to go slowly. Von Erich puts the Claw on Martel and that’s about the extent of the highlights.

To really liven things up, Butch is #8. That’s actually not sarcastic as the fans do the Bushwhacker arm swing. Martel puts Simba out to keep us at an equal number of average guys and Bret. Don’t get me wrong: these guys are talented, but other than Bret, most of them never got above the midcard. Jake Roberts is #9 to go immediately after Martel and give us an actual feud (Martel blinded him, leading to an AWFUL blowoff match at Mania).

Martel bails under the bottom rope and Jake goes right after him through the ropes. Martel gets put on the apron and punched in the face as everyone else just punches people. Hercules is #10 to give us Power and Glory in the ring. Why would I have thought they were broken up? They had a match at Mania. Bret gets double teamed in the corner but nothing comes of it.

There are too many people in the ring at the moment at I think eight. Tito Santana is #11 as Roma misses a cross body to eliminate himself. FINALLY we get someone to clear some of these guys out with Undertaker coming in at #12. He’s still this unknown monster at this point and would be that for years. Taker puts out Bret as soon as he gets there and beats up Von Erich for fun. That could have been a solid house show feud.

Jimmy Snuka is #13 as Taker throws out Butch. There are still way too many people in the ring, as we currently have Valentine, Tornado, Martel, Roberts, Hercules, Santana, Snuka and Undertaker. Taker chokes on Von Erich a bit in the corner before shifting over to Valentine. The freshly returned British Bulldog is #14 and guess what happens. The correct answer would be nothing, so here’s Smash at #15. No one cares as Demolition would be done at Wrestlemania, so he’s another nobody for all intents and purposes.

Good grief there are ten people in there now. Martel gets knocked to the apron and FINALLY puts Jake out to get us down a little bit. Superfly headbutts Martel and Hercules for a reaction from the crowd and Hawk is #16. STILL nothing of note happens and it’s Shane freaking Douglas at #17. Taker FINALLY puts out Tornado and Hawk puts out Snuka to get the numbers down a bit.

No one is #18, which would later be revealed as Randy Savage, who isn’t in the match because he’s running from Warrior. This is called continuity, which you don’t get enough of in wrestling today. Animal is #19, allowing the LOD to double clothesline Taker out. Martel uses the distraction to knock Hawk out and we’ve got eight in there again: Santana, Martel, Smith, Smash, Animal, Hercules, Valentine and Douglas.

The ninth person in the ring and #20 overall is Crush, Ax’s replacement in Demolition. Jim Duggan is #21. I’m not saying much between the entrances because there’s nothing to talk about. Literally it’s people pushing others on the ropes and a lot of punching. WAY too many people in the ring again and the match is really dull so far. Martel gets caught by Animal but gets out via a thumb to the eye. That’s an exciting moment at this point.

Earthquake is #22, giving us an insane eleven people in the match at once. Animal staggers Quake with some clotheslines but a third misses, resulting in Animal getting dumped. Perfect is #23 to get us back to eleven in the ring at once. The first person he sells like a crazy man for: Duggan, but Jim gets eliminated by Perfect pretty quickly. I’m not going to bother listing everyone in there for awhile due to it being nearly impossible to tell. Seriously, that’s how full the ring is.

FINALLY Hogan comes in at #24 and you know some people are going out now. It’s Smash thrown out first and Hogan goes straight for Earthquake, who he was technically still feuding with at this point. Bulldog and Perfect have a very energetic slugout as Haku is #25. Hogan dumps Valentine after a near record breaking 44 minutes. Hogan finally gets his own shirt off as Martel and Haku fight.

Jim Neidhart is #26 as Earthquake dumps an exhausted Santana after thirty minutes. A bunch of heels work over Hogan in the corner but Shane Douglas breaks it up. In a semi-famous moment, Luke is in at #27 and is immediately dumped out by Quake after about four seconds. He immediately marches back to the locker room. Brian Knobs of the freshly debuted Nasty Boys is #28 and after doing nothing for awhile, he dumps Hercules.

Warlord is #29 and he goes straight for Davey Boy. Crush goes up on the corner to punch Hogan and deserves the elimination he gets for trying. Hogan clotheslines Warlord out as the ring is FINALLY emptying out a bit. Tugboat is #30, giving us a final group of Perfect, Tugboat, Knobs, Douglas, Neidhart, Martel, Smith, Haku, Earthquake and Hogan. Quake and Tugboat go at it as Knobs dumps Douglas. Brian Knobs gets to eliminate two people? Really?

Tugboat goes after Hogan but only gets him to the apron. Hogan gets back in and clotheslines him out to get us to eight. Bulldog dropkicks Hennig off the ropes to the floor and Martel, who has been in there over 50 minutes, shattering the record, puts Neidhart out. Bulldog dumps Haku and we’re down to five. Martel goes up top but gets crotched and clotheslined out by Smith. That puts us at a final four but Smith is put out before I can type out said four. We’ve got Knobs, Earthquake and Hogan. That’s a step below Rude, Hennig and Hogan last year I’d think.

The heels double team Hogan of course and Quake splashes him down. The Earthquake hits Hogan but it’s no sold as you would expect. Big boot puts Knobs out but Hogan can’t slam the fat man. Quake hits an elbow drop and a second one as Hogan goes into his spasms. There’s the powerslam, there’s the Hulk Up, there’s the big boot, there’s the slam, there’s the winning clothesline for Hogan.

Rating: D. This is one, if not the worst Rumble I’ve ever seen. It’s just boring all around and there’s no other word to describe it. There were at least three moments where there were TEN people in the ring at once. The prime option for the Rumble is about six to seven at most at a time, not freaking TEN. There was never a moment where this got exciting and it was really boring at times too. Not good at all here.

Hogan poses a lot and waves an American flag to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+. The opener is really good but the rest of the show is mostly boring stuff. 1991 was a really boring time for the company and things wouldn’t pick up until the end of the year when Flair and Undertaker gave some jolts of life into things. This didn’t work for the most part though and it was a chore to sit through. Nothing to see here other than a really awesome tag match to open the show.

Ratings Comparison

The Rockers vs. The Orient Express

Original: A

Redo: B+

Big Boss Man vs. Barbarian

Original: B

Redo: C

Sgt. Slaughter vs. Ultimate Warrior

Original: D

Redo: D+

The Mountie vs. Koko B. Ware

Original: D

Redo: D

Ted DiBiase/Virgil vs. Dustin Rhodes/Dusty Rhodes

Original: B

Redo: D+

Royal Rumble

Original: D+

Redo: D

Overall Rating

Original: C-

Redo: D+

What was I thinking on that DiBiase match? I must have REALLY liked the angle, but it happened after the match.

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

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/01/10/royal-rumble-count-up-1991/

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 1991
Date: January 19, 1991
Location: Miami Arena, Miami, Florida
Attendance: 16,000
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Roddy Piper

Well, there’s a few big things, but a lot is still the same. Warrior is champion here, defending against Sgt. Slaughter who is in the heel turn as the Iraqi sympathizer. Who cares if the war was already over? The other thing is that about two months ago, Undertaker debuted. This really is about the same as last year’s, but you can see a lot of the stuff that would shape the new era coming.

For one thing, Bret is featured at the opening of the Rumble, as his singles push was just around the corner. This show really is more designed to set up Mania, as the Rumble itself really didn’t know its purpose yet. The title shot at Mania wouldn’t become official until 1993. The card is considered underrated, so let’s see if it lives….up, I guess would be the right term.

We open with a shot of the American flag as it’s apparently one of those shows. It’s always cool to hear the Anthem though. The problem here though is simple: the war was less than a month from being over and that was fairly obvious. The angle should have ended here with Slaughter coming in as champion, maybe having won it at Summerslam or something like that. Three months later when Hogan beat him for it the war was already over.

That was just kind of pointless. Anyway, the regular intro is just that: regular. It’s the same old thing of the participants being listed, although this time it’s by Gene. I almost didn’t recognize his voice though. The first name: Hogan. The second: Bret. That’s saying a lot. Piper always ranted with the best of them.

Rockers vs. Orient Express

This apparently is an encounter, not a match. That’s the Fink for you. I’m still waiting on the explanation of how they’re tag team specialists, yet they had far more success as singles wrestlers. They start immediately when they hit the ring which says that this should be good. Oh and it’s Tanaka and Kato the masked man here as this is the NEW Orient Express despite them having been a team in the AWA and half of the NEW Orient Express being the same as the old Orient Express.

Marty is knocked out to the floor and therefore worthless about 4 seconds in. Well it’s good to know he’s improving. He redeems himself by throwing a superkick at Tanaka that misses by about 4 inches or so. Hey Marty’s ON tonight. The Rockers hit stereo suicide dives on the Express. That’s completely unheard of at this time as Gorilla doesn’t even have a name for it here, calling them cross bodies.

We get a HUGE USA chant as we’re finally in the corners for a regular tag match. To say the crowd is hot is like saying Norcal is a bit popular around here. They are moving ridiculously fast out there with some great chain wrestling. I feel sorry for Marty as he really was talented. His partner just happens to be one of the best of all time. Speaking of which, Shawn is in now and beating on Tanaka.

They’re never staying in one spot for long at all. The crowd is insane here too so that’s a major plus. This was around the time where you realized the Rockers really were good and not just two pretty boys. Their stuff was getting to a level that was just below the Harts and could even be compared to them. That’s appropriate too because the Harts would split after Mania of this year. Shawn uses a HHH leaping knee to the face. That’s gimmick infringement boy.

They use a decent amount of rest holds, but they’re moving out of them quickly which is all I ask for. To be fair they’re all over the place in this. A We Will Rock You sing a long starts up. That’s actually something I’ve never thought of.

A sleeper gets a pop. That’s just not something you see often at all. Piper goes into a weird discussion about what is a legal vs. illegal punch/strike. Good night this is fun. Shawn goes up for ten punches in the corner and comes off with a moonsault to take out Kato. Again, that doesn’t even have a name. We’re about ten minutes into this and they’re still all over the place.

Naturally the announcers say that it’s been fifteen or so but whatever. Shawn does a freaking 610! Ok so it was sloppy as all goodness but it was the same move. They follow that up with stereo cross bodies from the top to the floor. This is AWESOME stuff. Double teaming and Fuji gets control for the Express. We get the inevitable “this is the first match!” line, which is wrestling speak for “we know the rest of this is going to suck and we’re sorry.”

The Express are using moves that were considered great when the World’s Greatest Tag Team was using them. On no. It’s a NERVE HOLD! This is the epitome of a weak rest hold as all you do is grab the other person’s neck. It allegedly cuts off the flow of blood or something and you lose feeling in your arm. Oh good it’s now a less bad chinlock. The crowd is still going nuts.

As per the Rockers’ formula, Shawn gets beaten up to set up the Jannetty tag. In a very cool and smart spot, the Express pull off their sash to use for a clothesline but Shawn avoids it. Instead he dives on it, pulling the Express together so they crash. That’s very smart. Marty comes in to get a paycheck so he can….uh…buy model trains. Yeah, that works.

He’s going to buy model trains with the money he makes tonight. Lots of them, in a dark alley. Yeah, that’s right. His dropkicks aren’t that good, mainly because at least one foot misses. He makes up for it with a jumping back elbow though so I’m fine. The Rockers “hit” a double superkick to put Kato down and go to the top.

They set for what I think was going to be a rocket launcher but it doesn’t get to launch thanks to Tanaka. The Express set for a move where Kato slingshots Marty into Tanaka for a chop. It works so naturally they do it again. This time though, Shawn hits Tanaka, allowing Marty to jump over him for a sunset flip to win it! That was SWEET looking.

Rating: A. This was greatness plain and simple. It was a bit sloppy, but this was one of the most fun matches I’ve ever seen. They were all over the place and doing stuff that wouldn’t become popular until WCW’s Cruiserweight days. The Rockers truly were greatness in tag wrestling. They would split in less than a year though, which might have been a shame. Excellent match here though and well worth going out of your way to see.

Randy Savage has a statement to make. He more or less declares himself the number one contender for the world title. He and Sean watch on the screen as Gene and Sherri come into the arena. She calls Warrior out, saying how honorable he is. More or less she tries to seduce him into giving Savage the next title shot. Naturally since he’s the Warrior and well past certifiable, he turns her down despite her being on her knees in front of him.

We do find out that Warrior’s eyes are hazel. This is just amusing to see as the acting is painfully bad. Warrior is the better of the two as the only thing he says is NO one time at the very end. To be fair though, I think this was meant to be awful. The pop for her getting down on her knees is WAY bigger than it should be.

Warrior looks odd in his gear, the belt and a leather jacket with a flag on the back. The belt is purple by the way. In the back, Savage is TICKED, destroying his locker room and sprinting off after Warrior.

Big Boss Man vs. Barbarian

This was during what was likely Boss Man’s biggest storyline as a face, as he was feuding with the Heenan Family one by one over comments that Rick Rude had made about Boss Man’s mother. It would culminate with Boss Man vs. Perfect at Mania, where for some reason that absolutely no one gets, Boss Man didn’t win the Intercontinental Title, which more or less ended him being an important character.

This is just another match so it’s likely going to be a glorified squash. Piper says Heenan is intelligent. I’m blown away. This is power vs. power obviously but they’re doing the right thing here and having them go back and forth with big shots. That’s the best way to do these if there is such a thing I guess. Bossman really was talented. Somehow this is probably the best Barbarian match ever.

Boss Man at least made you want to care about a match, which is a lot more than most characters from this time were able to do. After a decent display of back and forth stuff, we naturally hit the bearhug because it wouldn’t be a Barbarian match without one I guess. The crowd is staying in this one so I have to hand it to them. They do some more slow stuff but for some reason this is holding my interest very well.

Both hit their finishers but both opponents get the ropes. Or at least Barbarian was supposed to, but he never actually reached it. He goes for a piledriver and I think Boss Man slipped out of it or something but it looked pretty bad. Crowd is quiet now. Scratch that. I like Boss Man’s shirt coming open like it does. It gives him that working man look that I think was part of what they were going for with him. Little things like that can make a character so points for it.

In one of the weirdest endings I can ever remember, Barbarian goes up for a freaking cross body from the top but Boss Man rolls through it for the pin. Well that was odd. During the celebration they go slow motion on Boss Man on the ropes raising his arms which looks really cool.

Rating: B. This was a lot better than I expected. They took two guys of the same style and got a solid match out of them. That’s just flat out impressive. This could have been far worse but it really was entertaining. Boss Man had that it factor around this time that made you care about him and that’s exactly what happened here. For some reason all that got him was a Mania match with Perfect where he didn’t get the belt or a rematch but whatever. This was a lot better than I expected it to be.

Iron Sheik and Slaughter have a bit to say. Slaughter’s chin puts Jay Leno’s to shame. He’s just flat out creepy actually which is a good thing. He says that he’ll be the new leader and you haven’t even begun to see turmoil yet. So is he saying he’ll be an awful leader that causes turmoil? Apparently that’s an order.

Gene is with Warrior, who he calls orier. That just came out as odd. Speaking of odd, Gene tries his best to walk Warrior through a coherent promo but the guy whispers almost everything he says and it’s just hard to understand. He says he’ll win I think.

WWF Title: Sgt. Slaughter vs. Ultimate Warrior

Gorilla has to give a disclaimer about Slaughter’s views, saying they don’t reflect Arab Americans or the WWF. Piper goes nuts as a patriot, talking about how the troops are fighting for freedom. There’s a complete argument there that I’ll stay out of. Piper says we ain’t talking skim milk here. I love Piper’s complete insanity. How exactly does one go bananas? Warrior really was WAY over. How did he manage to screw this up?

Warrior beats up the likely senior citizen Sheik and rips up the Iraqi flag. You have to be interested in how war validates things that would otherwise never be allowed. Warrior hits a knee lift, which I’ve never seen him do otherwise. The commentators are so unbelievably biased here it’s unreal. Slaughter really was good as a bumper. For no apparent reason, here’s Sherri with her fine self. That thing really is impressive.

Warrior’s isn’t bad either, but that could be because his tights are white which I have a bit of a thing for. She gets Warrior’s attention and he chases her back to the entrance where Savage is waiting on him. He beats Warrior up for a bit which of course the referee sees none of, despite Savage wearing BRIGHT PINK clothing against a black backdrop. Yeah that just blends in perfectly.

Ah but there’s the USA chants and the power of patriotism gets Warrior up again. Wisely, Slaughter keeps stopping the count. Roddy, being a decent analyst, points out that very thing. In a bit of forshaddowing, Slaughter does a version of the Hogan ear bit. It’s all Slaughter right now as he spits on Warrior. Yep that’s some great offense. He’s also rocking the curled up boots which are a fashion risk but I’d wear them.

A double clothesline takes both guys down. In a dumb looking spot, Slaughter follows Warrior around with his arms up for a double axe and then puts on a bear hug. You would have to see it to get why it was stupid. Ah, the powers of patriotism are rising up again! Apparently that only works for the yellow and red though as Warrior is still in trouble. Gorilla says Warrior is only half conscious right now.

Wow he’s in better shape than usual. Warrior gets out of the bear hug with a double axe that I don’t think actually hit. The comeback lasts just a bit though as Warrior obviously doesn’t love America enough. He must be a commie or something. Oh wait. He’s from Parts Unknown. Everything is explained now. The Cobra Clutch, which in this case means a camel clutch, is on put Warrior’s legs are hanging out. In a weird camera angle the referee is blocked by the guys so it looks like there’s no one there.

Why is the camel clutch used primarily by Arab themed wrestlers? Think about it: Sheik, Sultan, Muhammad Hassan, Slaughter in this gimmick. What’s the deal with that? Vince may not be racist but he tends to have a lot of racial stereotypes to his characters. Here comes Warrior’s Hulk impression as he can’t feel pain. Warrior hits a flying shoulder which Gorilla calls a heabutt. Well that wasn’t even close.

That’s by far the biggest mistake Gorilla has made that I can remember. Sherri is back again as you can see the screwjob coming. Being the genius that he is, Warrior does the same thing he did earlier which resulted in him getting beaten up. This time though he press slams Sherri as Savage runs out. Slaughter knees Warrior in the back to put him in position for a 619, but Savage blasts him with the scepter.

An elbow drop of all things gives Slaughter the title in a move that really should have come four months earlier to get maximum heat. Piper is FURIOUS. I love how the madder he got the higher pitched his voice got. Warrior runs to the back presumably to get Savage as Slaughter is awarded the title. Everyone is TICKED, with Piper being the most of them all. Slaughter the solider holding a purple belt is rather amusing looking.

Rating: D. This was all about the angle. As for the match: it was awful. Granted given the two guys out there, what were you really expecting? This was all about setting up Mania though, and it did a great job of that.

Still though, the timing of the war ending really hurt them, which is why having Hogan get it back here and then doing something else at Mania would have worked better. What that something else would have been is beyond me though. Maybe Hogan vs. Savage again or something like that, but as it turned out the moment was good, but not in the real world terms. As for this, the match was bad but the angle was good, simple as that.

Savage and Sherri are with Sean and say that this was because Warrior said no to Savage. Randy says that he’s the best ever as someone is trying to get in, presumably the Warrior.

Piper and Gorilla are mad. Monsoon is rocking some purple glasses.

Gene is with the new champion and Sheik. They cut him off as Slaughter says I told you so. That belt looks odd indeed.

Gorilla calls Slaughter the Ultimate Puke. WOW. Piper rips his own headset off so he can curse for a bit. That was one of the funniest bits I’ve ever seen and it was completely unintentional.

Mountie vs. Koko B. Ware

This is cut from the Coliseum Video version and incredibly rare, but I got lucky and found an original recording of the show. I’ll go with a very condensed version here though as it’s a ten minute squash. This is the debut of the Mountie character who was either a bad comedy bit or the results of a Vince coke binge. For those that have noticed I make a lot of cocaine references, think about it.

For one thing, it was the 80s when cocaine was running rampant. Second, there are a ton of stories of Vince being a coke head at times. Third, is there any way that he could come up with half of his ideas without drug use? I mean really, Repo Man? Anyway, let’s get to the Hall of Famer Koko’s latest masterpiece. WOW this is boring.

It’s a squash, but it’s the kind that’s supposed to let Mountie show off all of his stuff, but the problem is it’s just putting the people to sleep. I have a feeling I know how this is going to end, which makes it all the more stupid to have to go this long just to get to that one moment. Yep there it is: Mountie shocks him. That’s the whole point of this match: getting that into the Mountie’s system. Wow that was brutal.

Rating: D. This was pretty bad. It was a waste of 10 minutes in what should have been a 4-5 minute match. Why did we need to see all of Mountie’s stuff? Better yet, why did we need Koko’s? This was about the Mountie, but they gave Koko all of that offense. It makes him look like he has trouble beating a simple jobber which is the last thing you want to do with a heel character. I don’t get this.

Some people talk about their relatives in the war. Ok, we get it: the WWF supports the troops. Holy throat crammage Vince let it go. Note: saying guys and gals sounds stupid. They’re girls or women, not gals. It’s not the freaking 50s anymore.

Children attempting to be sentimental should be dragged through the streets attached to a chariot and then set on fire as goats eat their flesh. Or even worse: be forced to listen to how annoying they sound. I don’t like kids on camera in case you couldn’t tell. Now regular kids I love spending time with as they’re cool, but not kids on a camera that are “so adorable.” No, they’re really not.

Apparently Hulk wanted to go to the Middle East and visit the troops but the Department of Defense stopped him so he’s going to bases in America. Not sure if that’s true, but if it is, that’s pretty cool even if it was the company’s idea and not Hulk’s.

Jake Roberts says he wants Martel.

Earthquake says a lot of people are going to come after him and he’s ready. He calls out some guys, including Hogan and Taker. Yeah that’s brilliant buddy.

Greg Valentine, sweating profusely for some reason, says bring them on.

Texas Tornado says he’ll win. I always liked him.

The LOD say that if life is a roller coaster you wouldn’t want to ride them. Um, ok?

Brother Love speaks for Taker, saying that he’ll bury 29 men. I love how so many people assume that there will be no eliminations by the time they get there.

Duggan says he’ll win. He punches his board for no reason.

Martel says he’ll look good while he wins. He’s ripped here.

Davey Boy Smith says he’s glad he’s a bulldog. Ok then.

Perfect and Heenan say that Perfect will be the last man standing.

Tugboat says he’ll jump right in the middle of things and if it comes down to him and Hulk, TOOT! That made less than zero sense.

Piper has been working with Virgil. Oh dear.

DiBiase says Virgil is more or less his slave. That looks like a face’s face to me on Virgil. Nah that could never happen though. Perish the thought!

Dustin/Dusty Rhodes vs. Ted DiBiase/Virgil

Dusty and Ted had been feuding since Summerslam and Dustin had been in the crowd at SNME watching his dad when Ted went after him. The rest is about what you would expect. Dusty was gone less than a month after this, heading back to WCW though so there we are. No polka dots either. Apparently they’re Americana. Oh great. If nothing else here the two theme songs are so awesome words can’t describe it.

They’re really building up the Virgil face turn here as they have been lately. My goodness Dusty is fat. Dustin is a complete rookie here with very little experience. He was naturally talented though so he’s not bad. A big brawl starts us out here as it occurs to me how little experience Virgil has in the ring. Dustin is WAY taller than Virgil and it looks quite funny.

It’s also amusing that of these four, Dustin would have by far the most successful WWF career. The future gold enthusiast has to duck under Virgil’s leapfrog. It never really occurred to me how tall Dustin is. DiBiase says Virgil is embarrassing him and Virgil is frustrated. You can feel the turn coming and you know it’s going to be awesome. We’re about five minutes in and Dusty hasn’t been in yet.

You know what, I’m not even going to bother typing the joke here. You all know what’s coming. Dusty, I’m begging you, either put a shirt on, hit a gym, or invest in blow away. You need it. After Virgil and Dustin come in, Dustin hits his knee on the buckle and is down. Naturally (oh I kill myself sometimes) the heels work it over. Just like Jesse used to, Piper gets a bit annoyed with Gorilla’s babbling about what body part is hurt.

He says Dustin’s leg is hurt, end of discussion, and that’s why Piper is awesome. Virgil accidentally hits DiBiase and gets punched and chopped for his efforts. Dustin and Dusty are really just placeholders for DiBiase and Virgil here. As I type this Dusty goes from being dominant to getting rolled up and pinned. Well that was pretty weak. However, we have a post match angle here. Roddy says that the father and son can come back.

Granted they both did but a good many years later. Ted says that Virgil has his price and that he needs to put the belt around his waist. Oh and he insults Dusty and Dustin. The Virgil chant is massive here and the countdown is on. Virgil really is built. Piper is disgusted by Virgil giving in again and washes his hands of him. That lasts all of about 20 seconds though as Virgil throws the belt down. He eventually gets on his knees after DiBiase orders him around even more.

DiBiase turns around and Virgil blasts him in the face with the belt. The crowd E-FREAKING-RUPTS over this. For years and years DiBiase had ordered him around and made him look pathetic and finally Virgil had enough. The payoff was completely worth it here in a very cool moment that had me smiling.

Rating: B. I’m going B here because this wasn’t as much of a match rather than an angle. The angle after the match was just flat out awesome. That needed to happen and they built it up beautifully. They had a match at Mania which Virgil won by count out. The problem was simple though: what in the world do you do with Virgil now? He had no gimmick and he just kind of floundered after this, but dang it was a great moment.

Time for more Rumble promos.

Tugboat uses a bunch of boat analogies which make me think Shockmaster was the better of his gimmicks.

Smash reminds me of the Joker for some reason.

Dino Bravo says he’s not afraid of Earthquake.

Crush says no one will be safe, not even Smash.

Perfect says he’s the only perfect athlete and he’ll win.

Hogan of course gets his own special interview where he says exactly what you would expect him to say. He dedicates the match to the troops. Say it with me: Hulk will win. In between the promo, Gene gets a message saying that Slaughter has just defaced the American flag. Yeah that’s not foreshadowing Mania at all.

In one of the absolute funniest things I can ever remember, Hogan forgets the name of the Iraqi leader (Sadaam Hussein). That was PRICELESS. He dedicates the match to the troops and freaks out over the flag issue, but wait, who are they fighting again? That was great.

Royal Rumble

It never ceases to amaze me how great the pops are for the Rumble. Bret is number one. That’s saying a lot for what they knew he had. Two is Bravo as we go over the rules. His hair is dark blond here and it looks bad. Naturally Bret looks great out there. This right here is why you need to keep an eye on your midcard and tag guys (the few that are left): you never know what kind of greatness you’ll be seeing.

The tag line of OVW is Tomorrow’s Superstars Today. Considering at a WWE house show in 2002 I saw two guys named Prototype and Leviathan go at it, truer words have never been spoken. Those two would later be known as John Cena and Batista, so there you are. Bret almost immediately gets Bravo out but not quite. They discuss the Iron Man record which is a by comparison pathetic 44 minutes at the moment.

Three is Greg Valentine. He goes after Bravo despite his being a heel at the time. Hammer puts him out, and Piper starts writing stuff down just as he did at Survivor Series. It was funny then and it’s still kind of funny now. In at four is Paul Roma. For the life of me, this guy was a Horsemen? I will never understand that no matter how long I think about it. Maybe I shouldn’t try to. Maybe that’s the secret to it.

Bret is really being pushed as a big deal here which is certainly a good thing. In a smart move, Bret just sits back and lets Hammer and Roma fight. See, that’s something almost no one does but Bret is smart enough to do it. Kerry Von Erich is fifth, giving us two faces and two heels. Piper apparently has issues with calling so much action at once. There’s two fights. How is that hard? Martel is in next, which is pretty lackluster.

I guess we’re setting up the jobbers for the big name to come in and clean house. We get some heel on heel violence as this is just boring. Saba Simba comes in at seven to dead silence. Even Gorilla isn’t sure of his name. He’s cut like few others I’ve ever seen though. You guys know him better as Tony Atlas. In a dumb thing, all six guys are in one corner. That’s just not right. Tornado has the claw on Roma for no apparent reason.

In at 8 is Butch to up the level of talent out there. Simba and Model both go over but Martel saves himself so we’re still at 6. In case you’re wondering, it’s Hart, Valentine, Von Erich, Martel, Butch and Roma. Despite commentating on it a second ago, Gorilla has forgotten about Saba being tossed. These matches go a lot faster when I’m reviewing them.

Jake comes in at 9 and of course goes right for Martel who had tried to blind him recently. This led to the blindfold match at Mania which just gets dumber and dumber every time I see it.

In a funny spot, Martel tries to eliminate himself but isn’t allowed to. We hit double digits with Hercules. The ring is WAY too full right now as we need someone to come in and clear out some of these guys. This is a lot of punching and kicking and bad attempts to throw someone out. There are eight guys out there at the moment and there’s the clock.

The eleventh entrant is Tito Santana to even further overfill the ring. Roma goes out to get us back down to eight. After about a minute the clock is up again for number twelve, which is THANK GOODNESS the Undertaker. We needed a monster to clear out some of these guys, so let’s see what he’s got. He dumps Hart in about four seconds. Taker no sells the Tornado Punch as Von Erich is a pure jobber at this point despite being IC Champion very recently.

About a minute and a half after Taker gets in, Snuka comes in at 13. Ring is WAY too full. Butch is thrown out by Taker as well to get us to eight guys out there. To recap, it’s Taker, Valentine, Martel, Hercules, Von Erich, Snuka, Santana and Roberts. Valentine and Von Erich are trying to get rid of Taker. The huge amount of people in the ring is just killing this thing. Again with the shortchanging of the clock! It’s British Bulldog to get us to 9 people in the ring. That’s just absurd.

Snuka just doesn’t look right with an afro and long tights. That’s just odd. It’s the soon to be gone Smash in at 15. Well if nothing else the ending should be good. Jake goes out to get us back down to nine in there as that just sounds stupid. Martel has a freaking scary look on his face. Hawk is the first of the second half as this match is just bad. There are too many people and there’s been more or less no story at all.

All we have here is a bunch of people leaning on the ropes and punching each other. To make this even BETTER, Shane freaking Douglas is in at 17. Dang what were they thinking on this show? It’s awful. Yes he was in WWF for awhile. We finally get rid of a bit of the crap out there as Von Erich and Superfly both go out within about 5 seconds of each other. Note: I don’t think they’re bad wrestlers, but they’re just filler here and everyone knows it.

There’s no 18, and Gorilla speculates that someone was afraid to come in. It was supposed to be Savage but he was running from the Warrior so there’s your explanation that comes at the end of the match. Piper says that the 18th entrant has until the clock starts to still come in. Doesn’t the clock always run but we just don’t see it? Why am I trying to make sense of him? 19 is Animal so we have the LOD in there together.

Apparently 18 has forfeited his spot according to the great and mighty Gorilla. Hawk and Animal put out Taker and then Hercules and Martel put out Hawk just afterwards. At least the numbers are going down a bit. There’s only eight in there now with 11 more to come. Crush of Demolition cracks the twenties.

At the moment we have Crush, Smash, Martel, Valentine, Animal, Santana, Davey Boy, Shane and Hercules and all of them are joined by Duggan at 21. He throws the board down and I guess we’ll call it runs to the ring.

Twenty two is Earthquake. Please, I beg of you, get rid of some of these guys! He takes out Animal pretty quickly. About maybe 80 seconds after Quake comes out, the Perfect entrant is in at 23. Even Piper thinks something is wrong with the clock. Perfect is more or less crawling to the ring. It took about 30 seconds to get there. That’s saying a lot. He does take out Duggan so that’s better than nothing I guess.

Wow we’re running low on people left to come in. They’re talkinga bout how long some of the people have been in there and it really is impressive. The twenty fourth is HOGAN! Yep, he should get a few people out. He gets a massive pop, so naturally he gets beaten on by Smash and Perfect. Never mind as Smash is gone almost immediately. He’s on Earthquake now as I don’t remember seeing a crowd freak out that fast after being dead for so long before.

The twenty fifth is Haku as we’re really getting close here. Hogan puts out Valentine who was in there for forty four minutes, just shy of DiBiase’s record. Martel just looks dead out there. Neidhart comes in next to get us down to four to go. Tito punches the heck out of Earthquake and is then thrown over with ease. Oh look. It’s Luke in at 27. Bets on how bad this will go anyone? He steps in, Quake grabs him and takes him to the other side of the ring and he’s gone in four seconds.

Well then there you go. To his credit he never stopped marching. Quake actually uses a full nelson on Hogan. Wow that’s like, a real wrestling move. That’s surprising. Nasty Boy Knobbs is the first of the final three. Man was the Brawler busy or something tonight? The penultimate spot goes to Warlord as absolutely nothing of note is going on here. Hercules is dumped out. Hogan tosses Crush as I just want to get to the end of this now.

Martel has the Iron Man record. Hogan knocks out Warlord as we’re at the last countdown of the match, and number 30 is Tugboat, thereby confirming that Savage no showed. Ok, so remaining in the match we have Hogan, Earthquake, Tugboat, Martel, Perfect, Douglas, Knobbs, Bulldog, Haku and Neidhart. See what I mean when I say this isn’t much of a Rumble? They figure out that Warrior ran Savage off. Knobbs throws out Douglas.

Wow that kind of shows where his career was at. Tugboat picks up Hogan and dumps him to the apron, so Hogan throws him out. He would turn heel in a few months based mainly on this, becoming Typhoon and more or less saving his career, before a good bit of electrocution ended that. Bulldog hits an amazing dropkick on Perfect to put him out. Perfect was sitting on the top rope and Smith caught him with at least one foot square in the face. That was impressive.

Martel actually puts Neidhart out clean. That’s very surprising. Smith puts Haku out with a backdrop as we’re trying to get rid of the jobbers. Smith follows that up with a clothesline to put Martel out to a pop. That’s saying a lot that the fans noticed that. I’m proud of them for that one. That gets us to the final four of Smith, Hogan (there’s a pairing that could have been interesting to say the least), Earthquake and…..Brian Knobbs?

And people say Hogan didn’t do good stuff for his friends. The heels team up and knock out Smith to get us to three. Hmm, I never thought I’d see this: Hogan stuck against two heels. I mean, this could never happen! How could he possibly get out of this one??? To further secure the Hogan victory, Earthquake hits the Earthquake and of course pops up. Piper cheering Hogan is just flat out wrong on so many levels. A boot takes out Knobbs and it’s Hogan vs. Earthquake.

Surprisingly they go at it for awhile with Quake dominating. And of course Hogan winds up winning it. After another Hulk Up, Hogan knocks out Quake with a clothesline. A HUGE celebration ends with Hogan waving the flag to emphasize America is Great angle of the show.

Rating: D+. This was just bad. It was boring for the most part with Hogan’s winning being about as obvious as you could possibly imagine. Martel was the only running story and you knew he wouldn’t stand a chance at all. Seriously, Brian freaking Knobbs was in the final three. How does that make a good match? It felt like a bunch of jobbers just killing time for Hogan, which is exactly what it was. That doesn’t make a good Rumble at all.

Overall Rating: C-. We have a great opening match, a decent match, a bad squash, a very bad title match that was all about building up Mania, another bad match and a very lackluster Rumble. My goodness that Rockers/Express match carried a lot of this show, and that’s just not a good thing.

It’s just not that good overall and while it has some moments, it’s just not there. I think Vince started realizing that this formula wasn’t working and he needed to change a thing or two, and DANG did he ever for next year. This show isn’t worth seeing, but the Rockers vs. Express match is must see stuff.

 

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:

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Survivor Series 1991
Date: November 27, 1991
Location: Joe Louis Arena, Detroit, Michigan
Attendance: 17,500
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Bobby Heenan

This show marks a change of pace from the Survivor Series formula and it was for the better. The fans saw little to no reason to buy a pay per view with nothing on the line, so giving them a traditional main event to look forward to. The rest of the show follows the normal formula though, and thankfully there are no eggs here. Let’s get to it.

We open with a clip from Superstars with Savage being tied up in the ropes as Jake made the cobra bite Savage’s arm. Piper immediately ran down from the broadcast booth to try to help. Liz came out screaming as well. This is when Savage was a commentator and retired but looking for reinstatement.

The key thing is he had been scheduled to be on the PPV as a captain against Jake’s team, but because of this, both captains were pulled off the show with three days’ notice as mentioned above. The actual match between the two of them would be a week later on a different PPV called Tuesday in Texas, which was another $20. It felt like a total ripoff because that’s exactly what it was.

Anyway back on Superstars, Savage can’t stand up because of the snake bite but he keeps trying to fight Jake. They finally get Savage on a stretcher and start wheeling him away but he falls off. Now we get to the unintentional comedy. Savage falls off the stretcher and Vince is freaking out on commentary. The camera cuts to a crying child in the crowd and Vince loses it, audibly cracking up on air and trying to talk about “complete chaos” while clearly laughing.

We get the announcement from WWF President Jack Tunney that Savage and Roberts won’t be allowed to wrestle at Survivor Series. This is translated as “HAHA WE GOT YOUR MONEY ALREADY!”

Gorilla and Bobby talk for a bit.

Team Ric Flair vs. Team Roddy Piper

Ric Flair, Ted DiBiase, The Mountie, The Warlord

Roddy Piper, Bret Hart, Davey Boy Smith, Virgil

It’s also back to the simple team names this year. Roddy was Flair’s first feud in the company and not only did you know the matches would be good, but the promos would be awesome too. Bret was feuding with Mountie over the Intercontinental Title, Smith was feuding with Warlord over who was stronger and Virgil was feuding with DiBiase because who else was he going to feud with?

Flair has the REAL World Title with him here, which is censored but if you know your titles, you can see a WWF Tag Team Title, which looks really weird if you’re in the arena (for clarification, the short version is Flair was NWA Champion, left the NWA, wasn’t paid back for the deposit he put down on the belt, brought it to the WWF, got sued, and couldn’t use the title in the angle they were doing anymore so they would substitute in another belt which was censored in storyline.)

Big reaction for Bret, who has finally split from Neidhart and is Intercontinental Champion as of Summerslam. DiBiase starts for his team against Piper, which is a pretty awesome match by itself. No managers are allowed at ringside this year but Sherri is there anyway. Flair sneaks in and blasts Piper in the back to give Ted an early advantage. Piper atomic drops Ted and Sherri comes in to choke him, which somehow isn’t a DQ. Piper kisses her and punches DiBiase to take over.

Sherri is sent to the back and Roddy brings in Smith. The good guys work over the arm of DiBiase with Virgil of all people getting the biggest pop. After all four go in they start going around again with all four getting in another set of shots on the arm. Bret stays in but misses a knee in the corner to put himself in trouble. They trade near falls before Bret takes Ted right back down by the arm.

DiBiase hiptosses him down and wisely tags in Flair. Bret starts with some of his favorite moves before tagging in Davey Boy to slingshot Flair into the corner. Piper wants in but Flair stops the tag. There’s the gorilla press to Flair and the tag to Piper, drawing a BIG pop from the crowd. Piper goes nuts with punches, knocking Flair to the floor for a Flair Flop.

Back inside and it’s off to Warlord who Piper wants to try a test of strength against. Piper is just playing though and brings in Smith for the big power match. Smith hits some shoulder blocks but misses a charge and it’s off to Mountie. Bret tags in and Mountie immediately hits the floor like a cowardly heel should. Instead here’s DiBiase who gets elbowed off the middle rope for two. Ted and Bret hit head to head and both guys are down.

Mountie is willing to get in there now but it’s back to Davey instead. Smith gorilla presses Mountie and pumps him about three times before slamming him down for no cover. Off to Flair who chops away at the Bulldog which doesn’t work at all. DiBiase and Flair try a double team but get double clotheslined instead. There’s the powerslam to Mountie but he’s not legal. Flair comes off the top with a shot to the back of Smith’s head for the pin and the elimination. Both guys were legal too so well done on keeping order.

Piper immediately charges in but Flair tags DiBiase back instead. Flair comes in to face a downed Piper but Ric is put in the Figure Four almost immediately. That goes nowhere so it’s off to Mountie vs. Virgil and Mountie can’t get a tag out from anyone. You know, because everyone is afraid of Virgil. Flair comes in and has zero luck so it’s DiBiase vs. Virgil again. Ted powerslams him down and it’s immediately back to the Warlord.

Virgil gets sent to the floor and Flair whips him into the steps, with Virgil doing an awful job of pretending to slam into them. The Warlord’s full nelson goes on but everything breaks down and Bret comes off the top to take out Warlord, giving the illegal Piper the pin to tie us up at 3-3. It’s Piper vs. DiBiase now before Virgil is quickly tagged in. Virgil slaps the Million Dollar Dream on DiBiase but Ted sends him into the buckle to escape.

Here’s Flair again with a belly to back suplex before it’s back to Mountie. Every remaining heel takes their shots on Virgil in what is likely the best possible option. Flair covers him for two and puts his feet on the ropes because that’s what Flair does. DiBiase comes in and ducks his head, only to get caught by a swinging neckbreaker. There’s the hot tag to Piper who no sells everything Flair throws at him. Everything breaks down and Flair is sent to the floor. That’s important because the referee disqualifies EVERYONE in the ring, but Flair was outside and is the sole survivor.

Rating: B. Gah this was going AWESOME until the pretty lame ending. Having Flair be the sole survivor is a smart move though as it makes the fans hate him even more. This was a GREAT setup though and was on pace to be a classic before the ending. To be fair though, at the pace they were going the match would have been an hour long if they were going to do a full version. Still though, what we got was very good.

Gene is on the platform and brings out Savage to talk about Jake, because we can’t have the match on this show so let’s talk about it instead. Savage talks about being bitten by the snake and being able to see and hear Liz crying, which is the worst thing Jake could do. He promises to be all over Jake like melted butter. Oh man stuff just got REAL. Liz comes out in what is presented as a bigger deal than it should be. As usual, she has nothing to say.

Gorilla thinks Tuesday in Texas may be on TV! I think he might be wrong here.

Team Mustafa vs. Team Slaughter

Colonel Mustafa, Berzerker, Skinner, Hercules

Sgt. Slaughter, Tito Santana, Jim Duggan, Texas Tornado

Skinner is an alligator wrestler from the Everglades and Berzerker is a crazy viking who tried to stab Undertaker with a sword. A lot of these guys are on their way out. Hercules would be in WCW by May, Tornado would job to the stars until leaving in July, as would Mustafa (Iron Sheik). The rest of the guys would do nothing of note for the rest of their time in the company.

Kerry looks high as a kite and almost falls off the apron getting into the ring. This is pretty recently after Slaughter’s face turn as he was a heel at Summerslam. This isn’t exactly the most talent laden match ever and the only feud is Slaughter vs. Mustafa due to their recent split.

Tito and Skinner start with Santana taking over with a headlock. There’s the flying forearm out of nowhere and Skinner hits the floor without a cover. Off to Berzerker vs. Tornado, which would work a lot better down in Dallas. Berzerker misses a dropkick and it’s off to Mustafa. After some very brief offense, Kerry tumbles to his corner and brings in Duggan to face Hercules, which took place in the first ever match at Survivor Series.

Duggan gets taken down by double and triple teaming and it’s off to Mustafa. He loads up his curled boots and does nothing with them. Duggan pounds away and backdrops Mustafa down before the hot tag to Slaughter. The big showdown is an atomic drop and a clothesline to Mustafa for the elimination.

Berzerker comes in with some clotheslines and a kick to Slaughter’s fat gut. A boot to Slaughter’s face puts him down and it’s off to Hercules for some two counts. Back to the viking who gets crotched on the top rope and kicked in the legs. Off to Duggan who clotheslines Berzerker to the floor, only to have Berzerker come back in for a backdrop back out to the floor. Tornado comes in and pounds away on him before it’s off to Hercules again.

Tito gets a blind tag and hits a forearm to the back of the head (El Paso Del Muerte) for the pin and the elimination. Skinner comes in as it’s 4-2. I don’t see this going well for Mustafa’s team. A blind tag brings in Slaughter who rolls up Skinner for the elimination. Slaughter whips Berzerker into Duggan’s clothesline for the elimination and the win.

Rating: F. The match was awful, it was never in doubt, and the biggest deal on the heel team was Skinner, who would get an Intercontinental Title shot soon after this. What a horrible match and one of the most worthless ones in the history of the show so far, which is covering quite a bit of ground. Nothing to see here at all.

Here’s Jake to plug Tuesday in Texas some more. To be fair, Jake saying “trust me” in that evil voice of his was amazing. Jake swears he didn’t know that the snake had venom in it still but making Liz cry excited him. God has told Jake that God doesn’t like Okerlund, so let’s blame everyone but Jake. I said he was awesome, not that he made sense. No reptiles are allowed at the match between Savage and Roberts. He wants to kiss Liz and that’s about it.

We recap Hogan vs. Undertaker. Flair confronted Hogan in the Funeral Parlor (Undertaker’s interview segment) and went off on him about hearing about Hogan for years. Now Flair is here and wants to know what Hogan is going to do about it. Hogan pulled off the shirt and Undertaker came out of a standing casket behind Hulk and hit him with the urn. Piper and Savage ran out of the broadcast booth with chairs but Undertaker literally swatted away Savage’s swing. Undertaker rips Hogan’s cross off ala Andre in 87 and leaves.

WWF World Title: Undertaker vs. Hulk Hogan

Undertaker is “undefeated” here, which means overseas tours and house shows don’t count because Tito Santana beat him in Spain and Warrior beat him on a bunch of house shows. Feeling out process to start with no one being able to get a real advantage. Undertaker shoulders Hogan and Hulk regroups a bit while Undertaker reaches to the urn. Back in and Undertaker chokes away in the corner in a shot you see in a lot of his video packages.

Bearer chokes Hogan a bit and Undertaker slams him. A big elbow misses and the place cheers loudly. Hulk pounds away but he can’t put him down. A slam doesn’t work, nor does an elbow to the head. Hogan clotheslines UNdertaker to the floor where the Dead Man lands on his feet and pulls Hogan outside. Back in and Undertaker chokes away some more and Bearer does the same. Undertaker starts smothering him as you can see the Hogan super fan, a guy who dressed up like Hulk (including yellow trunks) sitting in the front row and freaking out.

This hold goes on for a good while, which is just Undertaker having his hand on Hogan’s face and doing nothing else. By long I mean like two and a half minutes. When the whole match is only thirteen minutes, that’s quite the stretch. Hogan comes back with some shoulder blocks that don’t do much, only to haveUndertaker clothesline him down again. There’s the Tombstone but Hogan is up before a cover. He pounds away on Undertaker and knocks him down to one knee which is a very rare sight.

Hogan gets a good slam as Flair is on his way to the ring in his spiffy black and white robs. Hogan takes out Flair with a right hand and big boots Undertaker, only to have Bearer grab his leg. Undertaker loads up the Tombstone as Flair slides in a chair. The piledriver on the chair gives us a new champion and a decisive face pop for the Dead Man. Undertaker holding the title like it’s a coupon for a free coffee at a gas station is a nice touch.

Rating: D. Yeah this match completely sucked but we have a new champion and a reason to watch Flair vs. Hogan, which never happened for various reason. Hogan would beat Undertaker for the title at Tuesday in Texas six days later, but the title would be held up and decided in the Rumble, where Flair would win it and set up Wrestlemania. Bad match, but a BIG moment.

People come out to check on Hogan as Gorilla rips into Flair. Hogan takes a while to leave, likely to let the fans get over some of their shock.

Roddy is in the back and goes on a big rant against Tunney and Flair andUndertaker.

Flair and Perfect say they told us this would happen and now they’ve been proven right. Flair is the REAL World Champion now.

Intermission, which means we see a graphic for fifteen minutes. Seriously, there’s nothing other than a graphic and a countdown clock.

Gene recaps what’s happened so far in case someone ordered the PPV halfway through for some reason.

The Natural Disasters and IRS are ready for the Legion of Doom and Boss Man. That’s the main event. They’re not even hiding the ripping off of the fans anymore.

Legion of Doom and the Boss Man are ready too. Seriously there’s nothing else to say here. They say exactly what you would expect them to say and nothing else. Hawk gets ready to do the WHAT A RUSH line but as he loads it up, Sean interrupts him to say Gene is with Jack Tunney. Hawk gives him a look that would stop a tank and says his catchphrase, then lets Sean throw it to Gene.

Tunney announces Hogan vs. Undertaker II at Tuesday in Texas. He’ll be at ringside as well, driving the boredom levels shoot through the roof, if that’s even possible.

Team Nasty Boys vs. Team Rockers

Nasty Boys, Beverly Brothers

Rockers, Bushwhackers

This is right before the Rockers split and they’re already having issues. This is regular rules, which means individual eliminations and not one loss means both team members are gone. Butch and Knobbs (Brian Knobbs of the Nasty Boys along with Jerry Sags) get things going as Gorilla and Bobby talk about Hogan vs. Undertaker II. Butch hits a running knee lift and it’s off to Luke. Luke and Butch take over on the Nasty Boys with a pair of double clotheslines.

The Beverly Brothers come in and do about as well as Knobbs and Sags with both Brothers taking a Battering Ram. The Rockers double dropkick the Nasty Boys and the good guys have cleared the ring. It’s Shawn vs. Beau Beverly (the other is Blake) now as the announcers debate which guy on either team is the brains. A backbreaker puts Shawn down and it’s back to Knobbs. Luke comes in and avoids a splash in the corner but whacks his arms too much, allowing Knobbs to hit a middle rope clothesline for the elimination.

Off to Shawn vs. Sags with Jerry suplexing him down. Gorilla talks about how tonight will culminate at Tuesday in Texas. Some annoying fan stands up and poses for the camera so the shots keep cutting away a lot. The Rockers work on Sags’ arm before it’s off to Blake. Gorilla somehow can’t tell the Rockers apart, even though they pretty much look nothing alike and have been together for years now.

A superkick puts Blake down but he comes back with knees in the corner. Marty comes off the middle rope and shoves the referee for no apparent reason. It doesn’t go anywhere so I guess it was a mistake. Off to Beau who doesn’t do much other than allow a tag to Butch who cleans house. The Beverlies double team him with a backdrop into a facejam for the pin and the elimination.

It’s Nasty Boys/Beverly Brothers vs. Rockers now with Marty coming in again. Marty monkey flips and hurricanranas Beau down for two as Heenan and Gorilla trade statements of excitement. An enziguri puts Beau down again and it’s off to an armbar. It’s also off to Shawn, who doesn’t do as well as you would expect against one of the Beverly Brothers. Off to Blake who jumps over Beau and lands on Shawn’s back in a move later used by the World’s Greatest Tag Team.

Out of nowhere Shawn grabs a backslide on Beau for the pin to make it 3-1. Sags is in next as Gorilla thinks Marty should reach further for a tag. Even though the Rockers would split less than a month later, it wasn’t clear yet who would have gotten the super push. The Nasty Boys head to the floor and Shawn clotheslines Sags off the apron and superkicks Knobbs down. Back in and Sags takes over again. Marty’s eyes are just gone and he looks awful.

Blake comes in again and gets kicked in the face, allowing for a falling tag to Marty. A big jumping back elbow takes Knobbs down and a snapmare gets two. Knobbs takes Jannetty down again and Heenan talks about Tuesday in Texas. Off to Sags with a powerslam and a belly to back suplex before it’s back to Knobbs. Marty gets his knees up to stop a middle rope splash and there’s the tag to Shawn. Everything breaks down and Marty swings Sags’ feet into Shawn’s face, resulting in Knobbs rolling Michaels up for the pin.

That leaves us with Marty vs. Blake and the Nastys. Shawn freaks out on him before he leaves too to even further tease the tension. Marty starts with Knobbs and hits a middle rope bulldog but Jerry takes him down almost immediately and knocks him to the floor. A powerslam from Blake puts Marty down and the Nastys head to the floor. Jannetty dives on both of them and slams Blake’s face into the mat. Marty hooks a terrible looking small package on Sags but Knobbs rolls them over to give Jerry the final eliminating pin.

Rating: D. Man alive this was a long match. That’s the problem the rest of this show has created: there’s nothing else worth watching for the rest of the night and now they’re just filling in time to say that you’re getting a PPV that means something, when really you need to see the sequel to get the full thing.

Gorilla and Bobby plug Tuesday in Texas again.

Legion of Doom/Big Boss Man vs. IRS/Natural Disasters

This is your main event people. Let that sink in for a minute. The LOD are the Tag Team Champions and IRS (Irwin R. Schyster, a tax auditor) and Boss Man are having a worthless midcard feud. Boss Man and IRS start things off with the tax man getting thrown all over the place. Off to Animal vs. Earthquake which wakes the crowd up a bit.

They collide and Animal’s cross body is caught in a backbreaker in an impressive display of strength from Earthquake. Back to IRS to face Hawk with the latter working on the arm. Typhoon gets the tag, only to have IRS thrown at him by Hawk. Off to Earthquake who carries Hawk to the heel corner. IRS and Boss Man come in again and it’s a briefcase shot to Boss Man’s head for the elimination.

It’s Typhoon vs. Animal now and the Disasters double team Animal in the corner. Earthquake suplexes him down as Monsoon talks about Bobo Brazil. IRS hits a top rope right hand for two and Typhoon puts on a bearhug. Animal escapes and hits a clothesline before tagging in Hawk. IRS misses a briefcase shot to the head and hits Typhoon by mistake, giving Hawk the easy pin.

Earthquake wants to fight IRS now but walks off with Typhoon instead, making it the LOD vs. IRS. Hawk powerslams IRS down but a charge goes shoulder first into the post. Hawk gets sent face first into the steps as we continue to fill time by having IRS look like he has a chance. We hit the chinlock as the announcers talk about Thanksgiving dinner. A not very hot tag brings in Animal who cleans whatever is left in the house. IRS tries to walk out but runs into Boss Man in the aisle. Back in and Hawk hits a top rope clothesline for the win.

Rating: D+. We go from Hogan vs. Andre II to this in five years? That should give you a good idea as to what you’ve got going on with this show. The match was nothing and there was no reason to get excited about it, because the whole reason the match was happening had been postponed to Tuesday. In Texas.

Hogan won’t talk to the cameras about what happened.

Gene is in the bowels of the building with Bearer and Undertaker. Hogan will rest in peace. In Texas. They look in a casket to end the show.

Overall Rating: D-. Let’s take a look at what we had on this show: a really good opener, a horrible second match, a bad yet historic third match, a bad fourth match, and a worthless fifth match. This is all interspersed with a bunch of commercials for Tuesday in Texas, which is possibly the biggest bait and switch in company history. This show made me mad because it’s a big flip off to the fans, and that’s not acceptable. Watch the opener and that’s about it.

Ratings Comparison

Team Flair vs. Team Piper

Original: A-

Redo: B

Team Slaughter vs. Team Mustafa

Original: F

Redo: F

Undertaker vs. Hulk Hogan

Original: C-

Redo: D

Team Nasty Boys vs. Team Rockers

Original: D

Redo: D

Legion of Doom/Big Boss Man vs. IRS/Natural Disasters

Original: D

Redo: D+

Overall Rating:

Original: D+

Redo: D-

A little worse this time, but the same problems still plague this show. Screw you Vince.

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

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/11/10/history-of-survivor-series-count-up-1991-here-lies-hogan/

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 1991
Date: November 27, 1991
Location: Joe Louis Arena, Detroit, Michigan
Attendance: 17,500
Commenators: Gorilla Monsoon, Bobby Heenan

Ok, so due to Microsoft and their annoying automatic updates that no one actually knows what they’re good for, I lost 91-94, so this is the second time I’ve reviewed these four shows. Therefore if I seem a bit ticked off, that’s why. Anyway, the main thing here is simple: Vince has more or less given up on the idea of having all Survivor Series matches and has given us a traditional main event match, in this case, Taker challenging Hogan for the world title.

Also, Flair has jumped ship to the WWF in a huge botch on WCW’s part. Finally, the hottest feud in the world right now is Jake Roberts vs. Randy Savage, but I’ll get to why I’m ticked off about that in just a few minutes. Other than that, the show is pretty much what you would expect.

The roster is changing a bit though; with it being more like the early 90s look than what we had seen for years before. It was a pretty bad show when I watched it two weeks ago, so maybe it’s somehow improved since then.

We get the logo and everything with a huge banner over it saying 5th Annual. Is it really something we need to know that badly? Within 30 seconds of the start of the show we’re hearing about the Roberts vs. Macho situation. So here’s the idea: Savage lost the career ending match at Mania and is officially retired. However, he’s trying to get reinstated since no one really stays retired (are you listening Ric Flair?).

Roberts had been supposed to feud with the Warrior for a huge program but Warrior was a jerk and got fired, which you can read about in my Summerslam 91 review. Anyway, they instead paired him with Savage for this. This past Sunday (this show is airing on Wednesday which was the tradition back in the day) Roberts got Savage into the ring and tied him up in the ropes before pulling out a cobra. Before I go on, does that sound like some latent sexual issues or is it just me?

Anyway, Savage get bit by the cobra and they can’t get it off of him. The crowd is so into this it’s unreal. Eventually they get him out of it and Savage tries to fight back but can’t stand up because of the “venom”. In one of the absolute funniest moments I can ever remember in wrestling, Vince is FREAKING over this and actually doing a great job on the mic which is a lot more than he usually does.

However, as Savage is being put on the stretcher, we cut to a kid in the audience crying and Vince absolutely loses it. He’s cracking up and since Piper ran to the ring to help Savage, there’s no one to bail him out here. It’s just great as he’s trying to stay serious but just can’t do it because he’s holding back laughter.

I guarantee that whoever did that cut was fired. I can’t imagine they weren’t. So anyway, after all that (they showed the entire segment which was about 4 minutes long), we go to Jack Tunney who says that this is his fault and he’s to blame for what Jake did.

Now we get to the big part: Savage will not be allowed to wrestle tonight, and Jake has been pulled from his match as well. HOWEVER, Savage is reinstated and will face Roberts at ANOTHER PPV called Tuesday in Texas, SIX FREAKING DAYS AFTER THIS SHOW. Remember, the incident that they’re referencing was three days prior to this. They’re changing the main event three days before the show so that they can hook in more PPV buys for ANOTHER show six days after it. That my friends is nonsense.

I’m sorry but that just doesn’t work. The fans are already paying 30 dollars for this show and they don’t get the real main event out of it? Hogwash. Instead Vince says for only 20 dollars more you can see the main event that you paid for here. I get that Vince was running low on money at this point, but there comes a point where you’re just screwing the fan too much. This is stupid on all levels. If you want to do this, give the people more than 72 hours notice.

How many people do you think might have missed Superstars and not known about this until after the show had started and their money had been paid? Again, that’s nonsense. I’m legit ticked off again over this, with the only thing that’s keeping me calm being Tunney’s licking of his lips in this promo. It’s just weird looking. He looks like he’s getting ready to eat an ice cream cone or something. This whole segment was just designed to tick  off fans.

But hey! In six days, you can pay us MORE money to see this match, so make sure you order the other show. Gorilla and Bobby plug the show even more before we start our first match, 6 minutes into the show. Ok make that 7.

Roddy Piper’s Team vs. Ric Flair’s Team

Piper: Bret Hart, Virgil, Davey Boy Smith
Flair: Ted DiBiase, Warlord, Mountie

The feuds actually match up here as Piper and Flair were feuding, DiBiase and Virgil had just finished feuding, Hart and the Mountie would clash over the IC belt in a few weeks and Smith and Warlord were arguing over who was stronger. Wow a match that actually works out well in that area. I don’t know what to say. Sherri is with DiBiase here.

Actually, all four heels have managers, with (going in order listed above) Mr. Perfect, Sherri, Harvey Whippleman and Jimmy Hart. They can’t stay at ringside though. Flair is out now with a censored belt. Ok so this deserves an in depth explanation as well I guess. Back in the 80s, wrestling was based on the territory system as you likely know. Most companies were part of the NWA but all had their own champions and talent (think of it like the NCAA with its conferences).

However, there was still an NWA world champion that went around the country defending his title everywhere. This you likely know or have at least heard of. Now like I said, there were all kinds of territories. One guy in the south started to buy a bunch of them and join them into a superterriory.

This man’s name was Jim Crockett who you’ve likely heard of. He turned it into what you now know as WCW, but it wasn’t known as that at the time. Anyway, he tried to go to war with Vince but just didn’t have the money to do it. He eventually sold to Ted Turner, who changed the name to World Championship Wrestling.

Turner slowly started to fade away from the NWA stuff as he and Crockett had realized the same thing: WCW was the NWA at this point. He owned all the talent and the NWA championship (the big gold belt was made by Crockett for Flair. Before that they had used a different one.) Now at the time, Flair was still the NWA champion, but was also the WCW champion.

This was represented by the same belt though, as more or less it was the same title but officially it wasn’t. It’s very complicated no matter how you look at it so if that doesn’t make sense to you, don’t be surprised. So Turner brought in a bunch of people that had no freaking clue how to run a wrestling company, with the main one being Jim Herd. Herd looked at Flair and thought that he was washed up and past his prime.

This was abdsurd as well since Flair was not only world champion but the top draw still. Herd thought the Nature Boy gimmick was stupid and wanted to change Flair into, and I’m not making this up, a bald gladiator. Yes, he wanted to drop one of the most famous gimmicks in history to make him a stupid character.

As Kevin Sullivan put it, “after we change Flair’s gimmick, let’s go change Babe Ruth’s number.” Flair, having a brain, told Herd that this wasn’t going to work. Herd, being the idiot that he was, decided he knew more wrestling than Flair and told him that Flair would do it or be fired.

Now this is where Flair had him. Since, like everyone that knew what they were talking about, Flair knew that he could walk straight into the WWF and be launched right to the top of the show, he didn’t back down. Herd fired him and Vince got a nice big present called Ric Flair just handed to him. Now let’s get to the interesting part. When he was fired, Flair was still WCW and NWA champion.

Yes, Herd was dumb enough to fire him BEFORE changing the title. See what kind of idiot he was? He was stripped of the WCW Title which was then put in a match between Luger and Barry Windham, which was booed out of the building with chants of WE WANT FLAIR! The winner didn’t matter, because no one was going to take them seriously as champion, and why should they have? They never beat Flair for the title so they were in essence fighting for the number one contender spot.

No one bought it and the title was hurt badly for the next year and a half since instead of watching fake champions, they turned the channel to USA to see how the real WCW champion did in the WWF. Now the REAL interesting part lies in the NWA title. Like I said, Flair held both titles which were represented by the same belt.

The NWA had a policy for its world champions: you win the title, you pay 25,000 dollars as a deposit on it. The deal was done to prevent people from showing up in other companies with the title. In other words, you rented it. Once you lost the belt you got the money back with interest on it.

Now that’s fine and good. Flair paid the deposit and all was well and good. However, once he was fired from WCW he was stripped of the belt and was told to return it to the NWA. Flair said he’d be glad to do it as soon as he was given his money back. Problem: the NWA didn’t have it. Flair says well then you don’t have a belt either. He took it to Vince and used it in a gimmick, calling himself the REAL world’s champion.

The NWA panicked since there was no way they could let this happen. They took Flair to court over it and were laughed out of the room since they had absolutely no case. They made a deal with Flair and weren’t living up to their end of it. Therefore, there was nothing they could do to keep Flair from using the title on WWF TV. It was his property so he could do whatever he wanted with it.

Eventually Flair went back to WCW and let them use the belt after they paid him what he was owed. The big gold belt became the WCW Title and the rest is history. WCW left the NWA in about 1993 and the NWA tried to revive itself with a tournament in Philadelphia. I think you know what happened there.

Anyway, the point of this was that during this time, the NWA got a temporary injunction against Flair to keep him from using the big gold belt but the angle kept going anyway with other belts being used in its place. Tonight it’s a tag title, which is blacked out but at times you can see the edges of it. How weird would that have been? Flair is just standing there holding up one of the tag titles. Oh yeah we’ve got a match to do too. Let’s get to it.

Hart’s pop is INSANE. They knew what they had here and that would be made apparent as next year at this time he would be world champion. We start off with DiBiase vs. Piper. That’s a very interesting match that I don’t think ever had a big time feud. They of course have a great match here as my amazement never ends as to how DiBiase never got a title run. They of course have a great mini-match here since they’re both awesome.

Sherri comes in for interference but it of course backfires since Piper was practically a main eventer and such things don’t bother him at all. Now we get Virgil, who for some reason gets a pop. This is even more reason for me to hate what they’re pulling tonight. The crowd is white hot, so instead of giving them a big match, let’s give it to people in a week. Yeah that’s very good work there guys. Way to support your fans.

The face team spends about three minutes just killing DiBiase with all three guys getting in a lot of work on him. Finally he gets out and we get Flair vs. Hart. Even back then we knew it was something special. Bret was so on at this time that it’s unbelievable. The Heenan cheering for Flair is just funny stuff. Now the faces take their turns beating up on Flair. About 5 minutes straight is just faces beating on DiBiase and Flair.

Despite that, this is very entertaining either way as both guys are big time heels so the beatings work well and the crowd is WAY into this. Piper comes in to beat up Flair some and it’s so loud you can barely hear much. He finally gets out and we have Warlord and Bulldog in a test of strength. Due to some expected heel cheating, Bulldog is in trouble now as the Mountie continues to crack me up with how completely over the top he is with his gimmick. It’s so ridiculously insane that it’s greatness.

We get a funny bit as we see Jimmy in the back PANICKING since he can’t be out there with the Mountie. Managers really are a lost art indeed today. They’re something that can really enhance a character yet for some reason they’re never used anymore. I don’t get that. Being a manager requires two things: being able to talk and being able to take a beating once in awhile. Seriously, is that something that sounds next to impossible or next to that difficult even? I don’t get it.

It’s just not that hard to me, at least in theory. Instead we get people like Santino and Abraham Washington. Why not make one of them a manager? Nope, instead everything has to be about comedy instead of enhancing a character. Yep, you have to love that.

Bret comes in so Mountie bails as fast as he can, giving us Bret vs. DiBiase again so I can’t complain. Smith comes in after about 8 seconds of this as Mountie is tagged in. It’s brawl time and note: Gorilla says that the legal men are Flair and Smith, which would be wrong. Anyway, Smith hits the powerslam on Mountie but Flair goes to the tope and hits a double axe handle shot to the back of Davey’s head.

He rolls him over and pins him as Gorilla is freaking out about how Flair wasn’t legal, despite him saying that he was not 20 seconds before this. I love the confusion that is Gorilla Monsoon a lot of the time. Piper immediately runs in to beat on Flair, despite him not being legal in the match but who cares about something stupid like legality? All four people beat on Piper for a bit as the fans are still way into this match. That’s a good sign that after about eleven minutes we’re still this into a match.

Piper puts the figure four on Flair to a HUGE pop. Virgil comes in to fight Mountie who is terrified of him. For some reason, no one wants to fight Virgil. Why not? The guy just wasn’t that big of a deal. All that mattered in his career was that he beat DiBiase one time. That’s all anyone ever actually cared about and it was indeed a cool moment. However, once that angle ended, which it had by this point since DiBiase got the belt back, he was just Virgil, a bald guy that threw decent punches.

There’s just nothing really to market there and it turned into nothing at all because there was just nothing they could do with him at this point. It’s the quintessential difference between having a gimmick and being a character. A gimmick is something like Repo Man. He was something that you could throw in with anyone at all and the gimmick would work fine. John Cena is a character. He’s just a man that goes out there and wrestles really well.

There’s more depth to him, but it’s harder to put him with someone because you have to build something up with him. Also, it takes away from the creativity of the storylines with him as you can’t really do much other than have it be about respect or a challenge or so and so wants the title etc. It leads to some very boring and generic storylines.

There’s no right or wrong answer about what’s better, but for someone like Virgil with limited skills and charisma, a gimmick would have worked much better for him. The same holds true for Cena as a gimmick would be awful for him. It’s usually the bigger a star you are, the less you need a gimmick. He and Flair go at it for a bit and as usual, Flair loses at first only to make his comeback and look dominant.

A lot of people say that Flair’s style is boring. I disagree. Yes, he does the same stuff a lot of the time, but how many truly bad Flair matches can you remember, and I’m not talking about when he was all old and likely not legally considered alive. I’m talking about when he was in shape and not old. Think about it: the guy had good matches because he had a formula.

Flair gets beaten on, he makes a small comeback, gets beaten on again, makes a big comeback, goes for the leg, gets the figure four, the face gets to the ropes, and then the finish. The matches worked though and that’s all that mattered. Then you would get idiots like Dusty Rhodes who of course just couldn’t do things the intelligent way and had to have his style of match with Flair, which made them a lot worse.

Those aren’t Flair’s fault. Dusty is to be blamed for those since he’s the one that screwed them up by having to wrestle his horrible style. Dang I’m going on a lot of tangents here. Anyway, Hart does the nice thing and throws Virgil back in to get beaten on some more.

Full nelson goes on but Bret breaks it up to let Piper pin Warlord in the exact same thing that got rid of Bulldog. Well played Hitman. Everybody beats on DiBiase a bit more, with even Virgil getting in some solid stuff. Flair however just ends that as he becomes my hero. Heenan is singing Flair’s praises which never gets old as he even threatens to have Gorilla thrown out. The response of silence is just funny.

Virgil gets beaten on for about three minutes to set up the ending that I hate. He gets DiBiase down and heads for the corner. Both Piper and Flair come in for a big fight, but then the other four come in. Flair gets knocked to the floor and we have a big brawl. Then to end the match, 5 people are disqualified except for Flair because he was on the floor, making him the sole survivor. I get that they wanted to push Flair, but this match was so awesome up to this point that I wanted to see them go longer.

It’s not like they were short on time. Later on the tag team match gets twenty minutes. You could have given this another ten and it would have been fine, but then again, I’m no professional.

Rating: A-. This match was awesome. The crowd was way into it, the wrestlers were all on fire, the feuds made perfect sense, the pacing was good, and then the ending screwed all that up. Yeah here the main issue is the ending, which was just flat out bad. It put Flair over which was the point of the match, but I wish there was another way they could have done it. Either way, this was a very fun and entertaining match. Now if only the rest of the show is this good, which I doubt.

Savage and Liz say to buy Tuesday In Texas. Screw you both. Actually no, just screw Vince and his greed.

Team Slaughter vs. Team Mustafa

Slaughter, Duggan, Texas Tornado, Tito Santana
Colonel Mustafa, Berzerker, Skinner, Hercules

Oh this is going to be bad. It’s like the 80s died and this is the corpse. Basically, it’s America vs. not America here, with Mustafa being more commonly known as Iron Sheik. He had managed Slaughter during his heel run but now Slaughter is red white and blue again so all is fine and dandy. Duggan makes sense to be there, Tornado and Santana are midcard faces. Berzerker, Skinner and Hercules…eh they’re just there to fill in the dates their contracts say they have to work.

Yeah this is going to be pretty bad. Look at the face team. It’s a former world champion, a former NWA champion, a two time IC champion, and Duggan who was always in the upper midcard. They’re against a guy that used to be world champion but that’s not mentioned here and three career jobbers. Yeah this is going to go GREAT. I love how Slaughter can go so evil and then in just a few months he’s a beloved face again. Yeah it’s stupider than it sounds.

The most entertaining part about this match is Gorilla and Heenan arguing. You can tell they’re fairly bored out there and I can’t blame them at all. This match is just boring. There’s no point to it, there’s no reason to want to watch it, and there’s nothing of interest going on. You can tell this was just thrown together and that’s never a good thing. I don’t care about seeing these people fight because they’re just beating on each other with no particular rhyme or reason.

Heenan says some lines about Middle Eastern people that are borderline racist but not quite. Now we get to the best part of the match: the part where the bookers thought it was ok to have Sheik in there for over two minutes straight. Seriously, why? The guy can barely move and he’s going to carry the match? Yeah I think you’re getting why I hate this imbecile. They fill in the void by talking about the Taker vs. Hogan match which is fan better and more interesting.

Sheik gets pinned by a Slaughter clothesline that wasn’t anything special at all. Yeah, this might be the worst Survivor Series match of all time. It’s just flat out boring in all aspects. After about 5 minutes since Sheik got beaten, the other three heels are dispatched in less than two minutes total. Duggan dances around like this is a big deal. Apparently he was captain?

Rating: F. This was just awful. It wasn’t interesting, there was no story, the winners were never once in doubt, and it was just not any good. This was just completely pointless on all levels and was just there to fill in about 20 minutes counting the introductions. Egads what a horrible match.

The winning team walks down the hallway and says they can’t wait to see this match on video. Yeah that wasn’t pointless at all.

Jake Roberts says you should buy Tuesday in Texas. Somehow this takes five minutes to say.

We recap Hogan vs. Taker. They don’t mention how he got the title shot, but they make it obvious that Flair is going to be involved in this. On the Funeral Parlor, Taker’s segment, Flair confronted Hogan which led to Taker beating him down with the urn. Savage and Piper ran out to help him and couldn’t really do anything.

Savage hits Taker with the chair but Taker just knocks it away. That was awesome. Also, Taker rips the cross off the neck of Hogan, which is a direct homage to Andre 4 years prior to this. Taker was billed as undefeated here, despite having lost a bunch of matches to Warrior.

WWF Title: Undertaker vs. Hulk Hogan

So this is the first non Survivor Series match in the history of the show, which I think was what was needed. Since it’s the main event, of course it’s the shortest match on the show. We could have a problem here though as neither guy is going to sell crap here. Gorilla tries to convince us that they’re the same size. That’s just amusing. He goes on to say that Hogan has quickness and agility. I’m sorry but that’s just hilarious.

Hogan looks scared to death which is awesome. Bearer of course gets in his shots as Taker is in control. You have to remember that he’s only been around about a year at this point. This would be like Cena vs. Swagger in the main event of a major PPV for the title. Apparently it’s a big deal that Hogan can’t slam Taker despite him hitting Hogan as he goes up. Yeah that’s not a big deal at all. Taker gets clotheslined over the ropes and lands on his feet.

That’s always a cool looking spot and it makes it look like the move did nothing at all. The never ending debate about what’s in the urn continues. Was that ever answered? Taker’s tattoos interest me. Given his gimmick, what must that day in the tattoo place have been like?

Gorilla is of course freaking out over Bearer as Heenan says his monitor keeps kicking in and out. Monsoon says he’s going to start kicking Heenan in and out in a bit. Those two are just great together. There’s a Hogan lookalike at ringside who is leading cheers. It’s really quite amusing. Taker uses a smother on Hogan. That’s an interesting move as he just covers Hogan’s face with his hand.

That’s both good and bad as it looks a lot more effective than some moves do, while at the same time really being nothing at all. Heenan naturally can’t hear Monsoon, which is odd as he has that big headset on. Ok the smother doesn’t need to go on for two minutes. Taker does the eye roll that never gets old. Hogan makes his comeback but after more interference he takes a tombstone. Naturally he pops right up and starts his finishing sequence.

Bearer’s reaction to Hogan popping up is just great. As he goes for the legdrop, Flair comes out and touches his belt. Hogan, feeling a sense of animalistic pride, goes out and stops him. He puts Taker down again and goes for the leg but Bearer grabs him.

As he’s got the referee, Flair puts in a chair and Taker tombstones him on it for the title to more or less kill Hulkamania. Taker’s slow walk to the back with the belt is nothing short of greatness. Also, if Hogan isn’t legit hurt here, he needs an acting award. He looks completely gone.

Rating: C-. Again, this is a match where the historical aspect far outweighs the wrestling that you saw on display. Hogan losing at this point was a big deal, but he was getting very little reaction in this match. His time had simply gone by this point and it wasn’t working anymore.

That’s all fine and good, so Vince decided to take a BIG gamble and have him lose here. There would be a rematch in 6 days, but Hogan would only hold the title for a few days before it was declared vacant with the winner of the Rumble getting it. Hogan wouldn’t hold it again for over a year.

All the faces say they’re going to win.

All the heels say they’re going to win.

Tunney announces the rematch with Hogan and Taker for next Tuesday. Yep, it’s only 20 dollars and you get two main events, which you were supposed to get tonight, but screw that idea.

Nasty Boys/Beverly Brothers vs. Bushwackers/Rockers

The Rockers are on the verge of splitting up at this point with the Barber Shop happening in just under two months. As for the other three teams, they’re just there. Yes, this is the match that gets over 20 minutes and is the longest of the night. What in the world was Vince on tonight? This makes tonight even more of a slap in the face of the fans as we get 23 minutes of this and no Savage/Roberts.

Yeah that’s just great Vince, thanks for screwing over every person that pair their money to see this match. The Rockers are just ungodly over here, so of course they were being split up. We start off with Butch and Knobbs. Gorilla says no one knows more about surviving than the Bushwackers. Um, what? They do their comedy act as I can’t believe they still had jobs at this point. Somehow they would last until 1994.

Yep, no one cares about this match at all, but since the theme of the night seems to be how can we screw the audience over even more than we have earlier on in the night, it of course goes on and on and on. Luke, who once licked my at a house show, is gone fairly early due to a Brian Knobbs flying clothesline. Yep, that’s the kind of match that this is going to be: the kind where a flying clothesline that more or less sucked can get an elimination.

Can’t you tell how excited I am to be reviewing this match AGAIN? Oh I’m in heaven here people! Anyway, Marty comes in then and is looking either confused or stoned out of his mind. It’s likely both. Heenan, being as bored as ever, starts an argument with himself.

Heenan goes on to say that had Hogan not gone after Flair he would have won, which is likely correct. After more bad offense from both teams, Butch is put out following a weird double team move. It was supposed to start with a backdrop and end with a facebuster, but instead it looked like a bad botch. It was kind of like a 3D but nowhere near as cool looking or effective.

I think the Beverlies were supposed to be rich guys but I’m not sure. We’re down to Rockers vs. all four. Shawn starts getting his head handed to him as I’m sure Becca would love to steal it but that’s a different story. After getting beaten on forever, Shawn hooks a quick backslide and pins Beau. So now it’s Marty’s turn to get beaten up on for a good while as still nothing happens. We’re nearly 20 minutes into this and Marty puts on an armbar.

Yeah and you wonder why Shawn was given the big push. Shawn gets the tag leading to all five guys being in there at once. During this, Marty slams Sags but his feet hit Shawn in the face to let him get rolled up for the pin. Shawn is MAD. He looks like he’s about to kill Marty but it doesn’t happen and Shawn goes to the back to leave it at three on one.

Jannetty fights as much as he can but even after some cool looking spots, he goes out to a bad small package. Seriously, it just looked awful. Marty’s shoulder was up and yet he got counted down anyway. It was just bad on all levels.

Rating: D. This was just BORING. Look at the opening match and then look at this one. The first one was a minute shorter yet I had FAR more to say about it. This was just boring and it’s a great example of how two matches can be completely different. The first one was interesting, sharp and fun. This was long, boring and sloppy. Granted it could be more about a lack of talent in this one but I digress.

This was just not good and there was absolutely NO need to give this nearly 25 minutes. You had a great match to open the show that would have been an A+ had it been given a few more minutes. The world title match could have used another 2-3 minutes. Yeah I know I say that a lot and in most cases there just isn’t enough time to go around. In this case, there should have been all kinds of time to go around but instead it got wasted here. That’s inexcusable.

With nothing else to say or do, it’s main event time.

Legion of Doom/Big Boss Man vs. IRS/Natural Disasters

Yep, this is the main event. Even at a house show this is a weak match, but here at the “Let’s screw the fans show”, it’s the main event. Apparently this was supposed to be Sid on the face team and Roberts on the heel team. Sid got hurt so they were going to put Savage in, but due to the move on Sunday, which means Vince’s greed, he got pulled and they took off Roberts too, since IRS is FAR ahead of Roberts on the company totem pole.

Anyway, IRS and Boss Man start, despite having no animosity at this point in time. LOD and the Disasters were feuding, but other than that, there’s little point to this. I really want this to end soon. Nope, apparently we’re in for the long match here as it’s generic offense all around to start. Yep, again, no one really cares about this match because we haven’t been given a reason to care.

The announcers clearly aren’t interested in the match at all as they bicker. Rule of thumb: the more bickering you hear between the announcers, the more bored they are. Finally after five minutes of people hitting each other and doing shoulder blocks, we get something interesting as Boss Man has IRS in trouble but he gets a metal briefcase to the head and is pinned. Unfortunately this messes up Gorilla’s rant about how Flair stole the title from Hogan.

Also, apparently there has to be something in the briefcase because it being made of metal isn’t enough to knock out Boss Man. Yeah that makes sense. So now it’s LOD against the three of them. Since they’re the tag champions at the moment, I doubt they’ll lose. As I say this, we get the fourth plug for Tuesday in Texas. We get it already guys.

Vince wants our money and if we want to see the big matches we were promised we have to pay another 20 dollars next week. As if we haven’t had enough excitement in this match, it’s time for a BEARHUG. Gorilla: I think he’s wasting time with this hold. I would agree if the last word was match. IRS goes for the briefcase again but it misses and hits Typhoon in the head and eliminates him. Quake is TICKED.

He’s mad enough that he leaves with Typhoon. So it’s IRS 1-2 with the tag team champions. What happens of course? It goes on for 6 minutes. My goodness give me a break. Finally the LOD wake up and hits a top rope clothesline to end this which Gorilla says was inevitable. See, even he knew this was how it was going to end. Hey let’s plug Texas again. Heenan says it’ll be better than tonight. It couldn’t be much worse.

Rating: D. Again, this was BORING. There was no point to this being a six man. If they wanted to just have the faces win to end the show, do the smart thing and just make this a tag team title match. A few things are accomplished by doing that. Number one, it makes the match at least seem important.

Sure the LOD would keep the belts, but at least it would have had a sense of meaning to it instead of just a random match like this. Second, it would have been far more logical than this. Anyway, this was just bad and boring, but the faces won and the fans went home happy, so that’s good I guess.

Gene is in the catacombs of the arena. Joe Louis Arena has catacombs? Cool? Anyway, Bearer says that Hulkamania died tonight and plugs Texas to end the show.

Overall Rating: D+. And that’s being generous. The first match on this show was awesome. It goes downhill fast. I don’t know what the heck they were thinking on this show. Wait, yes I do. The fans will buy one PPV. That means they’ll but a second. Seriously, this was sickening to see from the WWF. There’s no call for pulling the big match three days before the show just to have a one on one match six days later. I’m sorry but that’s not right.

Also, it was a Survivor Series match tonight. How hard would it have been to have them in there but just have them do a double count out with Jake running away or a double DQ or something like that? You give the people what they paid to see, you tease them with the big match just a bit more, and THEN you put the big match on the card in six days. That’s fine with me, but don’t advertise this as being the big match between Randy and Jake and then not have it.

Let them have their quick thing here and then let them do the match Tuesday. That’s all well and good. Other than that, this historic moment with Taker winning his first title mixed with an awesome opening match isn’t enough to make this work anything though, so it’s not recommended at all. The first match is worth seeing though.

 

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:

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Summerslam 1992
Date: August 31, 1992
Location: Wembley Stadium, London, England
Attendance: 80,355
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Bobby Heenan

This is probably the most famous of all the Summerslams even to this day as we’re not only outside but for the first and only time ever, a regular PPV is being held in England. It’s another double main event tonight with Savage vs. Warrior for Savage’s world title, along with Davey Boy Smith challenging Bret for the Intercontinental Title. This show was originally going to be held in Washington D.C. with Shawn winning the title from Bret in the first ladder match but the change was made very close to the date of the show. Let’s get to it.

Also note that this is on a two day tape delay, which you would NEVER see for a PPV today.

For reasons I’m not quite clear on, nearly every version of this show you can find online has the dark matches included, so you’re getting some bonus stuff tonight.

We open with kids arguing over whether Warrior or Savage sold out to Perfect and Flair. Another kid says British Bulldog is going to win whether he likes it or not.

Heenan puts on a crown and declares himself Sir Bobby, King of England.

Dark Match: Nasty Boys/Moutnie vs. Jim Duggan/Bushwhackers

The aisle to the ring is REALLY long so the entrances take extra time this year. Duggan is so beloved that he can get a USA chant going in London. Both teams take turns playing to the crowd before we get going. It’s a big brawl to start with the heels being rammed together in the middle of the ring before rolling to the outside. We finally start with Knobbs vs. Luke but everything breaks down almost immediately with the heels running away.

Things finally settle down with Sags clotheslining Butch down….and everything breaks down a third time in less than five minutes. Duggan sends the Bushwhackers into the corner with the battering ram to all three heels at once to fire up the crowd even more. The Nasties and Mountie are whipped into clotheslines from Duggan but a Jimmy Hart distraction finally lets the heels jump Luke from behind to take over.

The fans chant USA as Mountie hits a jumping back elbow to take down the New Zealander Luke. The Nasties choke away in the corner as Vince is freaking out over the rules being broken this badly. Sags and Mountie both hook reverse chinlocks as the classic six man tag formula is in full effect. Knobbs comes in for a hard whip into the corner but a middle rope splash hits boot. The hot tag brings in Duggan to clean house with clothesline after clothesline. Everything breaks down again and it’s a Battering Ram, the three point clothesline and a missed top rope elbow from Sags to Mountie for the pin by Duggan.

Rating: C+. This was an extended but nicely done tag match. The fans were WAY into Duggan and the pop for the win was a nice response for a dark match. I was surprised by how well this match worked. Most dark matches just drag along and are nothing but rest holds and punching/kicking but this went nearly thirteen minutes and never got dull.

Dark Match: Tito Santana vs. Papa Shango

Shango used to scare me to death. Tito is El Matador so he has the awesome gold jacket. Papa jumps him from behind to take over and hits a splash in the corner to have the bullfighter in trouble. Tito comes back with some clotheslines and a dropkick to send Shango out to the floor. They head back inside where Tito gets two each off a middle rope clothesline and a cross body before hooking a sleeper.

Shango sends him into the buckle to escape as Heenan makes bull jokes about Tito. The voodoo guy keeps up the generic power offense by headbutting Santana down and walking around the ring. Santana avoids a middle rope elbow and makes his comeback but the flying forearm only gets two. Shango pops up and hits a shoulder breaker for the pin.

Rating: D. Shango was all character and no substance in the ring. This is a good example of what most dark matches are like: short, dull and nothing that I’ll remember in about five minutes. Santana was good in this kind of role as he makes everyone look good, although there was only so much he could do with a guy like Shango. Who knew the answer was to make the voodoo guy a pimp?

Dark Match: Tatanka vs. Berzerker

This is the final dark match and is held right before the main event but I’m putting it here for the sake of simplicity. Berzerker wants a test of strength to start and easily takes the smaller Tatanka down. The Native American comes back by easily shoving Berzerker to the floor before they slug it out back inside. They collide after a crisscross but Berzerker misses a dropkick, allowing Tatanka to fire away on the leg.

A World’s Strongest Slam gets two on Tatanka before a regular slam puts him down outside the ring. Back in and Heenan makes Indian jokes as Berzerker kicks Tatanka in the ribs. A backdrop puts Berzerker on the floor before Tatanka starts his war dance back inside. The Papoose to Go is enough for the pin on the viking.

Rating: D. To give you an idea what this match was, think of nothing. Now take away any possible interest that nothing has and you’ll have this match. It was very dull and uninteresting and the fans clearly wanted to see the main event instead of more worthless wrestling. Tatanka would become a pretty big deal against Yokozuna in about a year.

Money Inc. vs. Legion of Doom

This is on the main card with no real fanfare at all. The LOD comes to the ring on motorcycles along with manager Paul Ellering and……dang it…….Rocco the Dummy. There’s nothing more to it than that: it’s a ventriloquist dummy named Rocco who was the team’s “inspiration.” DiBiase is in his white trunks which I couldn’t stand when I first did this show but for some reason they work for me now. Vince gets in one of my favorite lines ever: “The Legion of Doom is well known for their psychology in the ring.” I’ll pause for a minute to let that one sink in.

Hawk starts with DiBiase and it’s Ted sliding to the floor to avoid a right hand. Animal jumps DiBiase on the floor and sends him back inside, only for Hawk to clothesline him right back to the floor. The fans are WAY into the LOD here. Off to Animal vs. IRS with Animal whipping him into the corner and standing on the tie like a smart man would. A gorilla press gets two for Animal before it’s back to Hawk for some arm work.

Irwin comes back with a sleeper but it’s only good for two arm drops before Hawk rams him into the buckle. The top rope clothesline misses IRS though and Hawk falls out to the floor. IRS drops some elbows as for two the fans won’t stop chanting for LOD. Back to DiBiase for some knee drops followed by a chinlock. Jimmy Hart, one of the greatest managers of all time, is yelling at Rocco the dummy. Money Inc. changes off without tagging to send Vince into his usual hysteria.

Hawk finally fights up and rams Ted into the buckle but the hot tag is broken up. The place is going to go nuts when Animal gets in. Ted drops some knees on Hawk and puts on a front facelock but the bird man carries him over towards Animal. IRS breaks up ANOTHER hot tag attempt but gets caught in a double clothesline with Hawk. Animal FINALLY gets the hot tag and cleans house but IRS breaks up the Doomsday Device. Not that it matters much as Animal powerslams DiBiase down for the pin about three seconds later.

Rating: C-. The crowd was HOT for this but it wasn’t much of note. This was part of the three way tag team feud with the Natural Disasters over the fall which ultimately saw Money Inc. coming out with the titles. This was the last appearance for this incarnation of the LOD for years in the WWF because of Rocco. Seriously, Hawk snapped over the idea and didn’t go back to America (to be fair though everyone knew the snap was coming sooner or later).

Ric Flair, in ring gear despite not being in action tonight, is happy to be in London. Gene asks him whose dressing room Mr. Perfect is in. “He’s in the dressing room of the winner of course. WOO!” Touche.

Virgil is ready for Nailz tonight.

Virgil vs. Nailz

There isn’t much to Nailz. He was an escaped convict who wanted revenge on Big Boss Man for abusing him in prison and that’s about it. He attacked Boss Man with the nightstick and Virgil is standing up for his injured friend. Nailz immediately chokes Virgil into the corner but Virgil comes back with some jobber offense. A rollup gets no count on Nailz and it’s back to choking from the convict. We head to the floor and Virgil is rammed into the apron, sending him into a bad acting session. Back in and Nailz hooks a standing chinlock/choke for the win.

Rating: F. There isn’t much to say here. Neither guy was interesting and the match was little more than a way to set up the blowoff match against Boss Man. The problem with that is no one cared about Virgil so all we had was a Nailz squash. Nailz just wasn’t any good and after the Boss Man feud he didn’t have much, other than a horrible sounding feud with Undertaker. Then he went nuts and choked Vince in his office and said he wanted McMahon dead during the steroids trial, basically saving Vince from prison. That’s Nailz’s entire WWF career for all intents and purposes.

Nailz lays Virgil out with the nightstick post match.

Alfred Hayes can’t find Mr. Perfect, nor can he get into Macho Man’s dressing room.

We recap Shawn vs. Rick Martel. Shawn cost Martel an IC Title shot, so Martel started hitting on Shawn’s manager Sherri. Sherri then started coming out to support Martel, setting up the showdown tonight. However since Sherri thought both guys were handsome, she made the rule that there was to be no hitting in the face.

Shawn Michaels vs. Rick Martel

This is the rare heel vs. heel match. Rick is dressed for tennis for some reason I don’t quite grasp. The back of Sherri’s dress is missing, sending Vince into a frenzy over the sight of a thong. Martel grabs a headlock to start and avoids a right hand before doing some jumping jacks. Shawn slides between Martel’s legs and takes over with a dropkick. Apparently dropkicks to the face are legal.

Martel misses a cross body and Shawn cranks on the arm to take over. They trade nip ups but neither guy can bring themselves to throw a punch. Instead Martel, playing the face in the match, sends Shawn over the top to Sherri’s feet. Rick heads to the floor and hugs Sherri who seems very pleased with both men. Back in and they trade rollups with handful of tights each, resulting in Shawn’s tights barely staying on.

Sweet Chin Music to the chest gets two for Shawn and a knee to Martel’s face gets two. Martel rolls him up as well and now they’re ready to fight. They trade slaps to draw Sherri up to the apron…..and she faints. The guys get in a fight over who gets to give her CPR with the fisticuffs breaking out, resulting in a double countout. Sherri pokes her head up to reveal she’s playing possum.

Rating: D+. This didn’t do much for me but it was more of an angle than a match. Sherri would be gone soon after this which kept the story from going anywhere but the match here wasn’t terrible. Shawn would be launching through the roof soon after this by dominating the midcard for the next few years while Martel wouldn’t do much else in the company.

They fight up the aisle until suits break them up. Shawn carries Sherri out but Martel knocks him down, dropping Sherri to the floor in the process. Martel picks her up and carries her a few feet but Shawn decks Martel, knocking Sherri to the floor yet again. Martel finally runs out with a bucket of water to wake Sherri up.

The Nasty Boys talk about the world title match for some reason. They ask Jimmy about a title shot but Jimmy Hart, also the manager of Money Inc. is notably anxious, which is hinting at his face turn.

Tag Titles: Natural Disasters vs. Beverly Brothers

The Brothers are managed by the Genius and are challenging here. Genius messes up his poem by getting some dates wrong but the fans are already cheering for the fat champions anyway. The challengers try to jump the big guys early on but the champions take their heads off with clotheslines. Both Brothers (Beau and Blake) are crushed in a fat man sandwich, leaving us with Typhoon to start against Blake.

Typhoon pounds away on the smaller man but Blake manages to lift him up for a slam. He can’t turn it over but it was a nice try at least. Everything breaks down for a few seconds until we’re back to more Disaster dominance. Quake accidentally splashes Typhoon in the corner and the ocean themed guy is down. The Brothers double team Typhoon with a splash but he launches Beau to the floor on the kickout.

Hang on a second: Shawn Michaels has left Wembley Stadium!

Back to the match with Blake hitting a middle rope headbutt for a delayed two. Beau holds Typhoon on the ropes so Blake can jump on his back in a move later used by Charlie Haas and Shelton Benjamin. The Brothers take turns pounding on Typhoon and draw Earthquake in, allowing them to double team Typhoon even more. A headbutt gets two for Blake and it’s off to a front facelock.

Typhoon finally makes a tag but the referee doesn’t see it, likely due to being bored by the match so far. Beau drops an ax handle onto Typhoon’s back but the big man FINALLY clotheslines both Beverlies down but stops to slam Beau instead of tagging out. Blake dropkicks his brother into a cross body on Typhoon for two and Quake has had enough. His save attempt is broken up by Genius’ metal scroll to Typhoon’s back as this match just keeps going. Quake breaks up he cover and gets the hot tag to clean house. A powerslam and the Earthquake are enough to retain the titles.

Rating: D. This just wouldn’t stop as the Brothers got WAY too much offense in here. The problem is the same as it was last year: there was no doubt as to who was walking out with the belts and that makes for a rather boring match. Also, the Beverlies are pretty average size guys so there’s only so much they can do against people like the Disasters.

The Bushwhackers speculate on whose corner Perfect will be in. Gene Okerlund makes some very bad British jokes.

Hayes can’t get into the Warrior’s dressing room either. He tries to barge in and calls Warrior rude for locking the door. Even HEENAN points this out to him.

Repo Man vs. Crush

Repo tries to jump Crush but has no effect and earns himself a gorilla press slam. We head to the floor for a clothesline from Crush before heading back inside for some kicks to Repo’s ribs. Crush pounds on the ribs even more and hits a backbreaker, only to be poked in the eye to break the momentum. Repo hits a belly to back suplex but Crush no sells it and snaps off a belly to belly. A top rope knee drop misses and Repo goes after the knee with some very basic stuff. An elbow drop gets two and Crush easily fights up, catches Repo coming off the top in a powerslam and hooks the Head Vice for the submission.

Rating: D. This was a glorified squash to make Crush look good. They were this close to making Crush the next big thing in 1993 so seeing him look good here isn’t surprising at all. Repo Man is really impressive as he went from Smash to the new gimmick so smoothly that I didn’t realize it was the same guy until years later.

We recap the world title match which is summed up in one question: who sold out? This was THE story of the summer as everyone was wondering if Savage would sell out to be able to beat the man that ended his career a year earlier or if Warrior sold out to guarantee his second WWF Title. Why both guys would want a manager who wasn’t even managing the world champion is anyone’s guess. Savage’s line of “I’m the WWF Champion and you’re not!” is great stuff.

WWF World Title: Randy Savage vs. Ultimate Warrior

There’s no sign of Perfect or Flair with Warrior. Warrior is also in a singlet here instead of in his usual trunks. There’s no one with Savage either though, meaning we have to wait even longer to find out who sold out. Savage offers a handshake to start but Warrior accuses him of selling out and won’t shake. Scratch that as he does shake but they pull each other together and it’s on.

It’s a feeling out process to start with Savage shoving him away and hitting a knee to the ribs. A clothesline to the back of Warrior’s head puts him down as the fans are booing. Savage goes up top but Warrior punches him in the ribs to break up a double ax handle. A pair of atomic drops puts Randy down and some shoulder blocks do the same. Savage pounds away and hooks a chinlock, only for Warrior to break it up with a jawbreaker.

A bit right hand staggers the champion in the corner and Warrior stomps away for good measure. Warrior hits a clothesline but Savage ducks away, sending Warrior chest first into the buckle. The champion clotheslines him out to the floor for a bit before hitting the top rope ax handle back inside. It has no effect at all though as Warrior starts marching around the ring. Savage elbows him in the face to put him back down though and goes up again, only to dive into a backbreaker for two.

Warrior whips the champion hard into a corner a few times before putting on a bearhug. Instead of hanging onto it though he lets Savage go almost immediately and gets a two count. Another backbreaker gets two but Savage comes back with a small package for two of his own. A neckbreaker puts the challenger down but a delayed cover only gets two for Randy. Warrior comes back with a hard clothesline and starts pounding away on Savage’s weak back.

A suplex puts Savage down for a close two as the fans are getting into these near falls. Warrior charges at Savage but falls out to the floor by mistake. Randy goes up and drops yet another double ax onto Warrior’s back before sending him into the steps for good measure. Back in and a sunset flip gets two for Savage but Warrior slams him down. Here are Flair and Perfect to ringside as Warrior’s splash hits knees.

Savage and Warrior clothesline each other down which gets two each for both guys. Randy is up first but Perfect trips him down, signaling that Warrior is the sellout. Back up and Warrior punches him down before choking Savage into the corner. Warrior throws Savage into the corner again but the referee is bumped in the process. A slam puts Savage down and Warrior goes up top for a right hand to the head, although there’s no referee.

The referee finally comes over to count the two and Warrior is visibly frustrated. Back up and Savage hits a knee to send Warrior into the referee again before hitting a piledriver on the Ultimate one. There’s no referee again though so Savage goes to check on him. As Randy is out on the floor, Flair and Perfect take out Warrior behind Savage’s back. Randy drops the big elbow but the referee isn’t there in time for a count. Flair and Perfect are huddling on the floor.

Warrior starts his comeback with Savage pounding away on his back but to no effect. He runs over Savage with clotheslines and the flying shoulder block before loading up the gorilla press. Savage is in big trouble but as Warrior sets up the splash, Flair hits him in the back with a chair. Note that Savage didn’t see what Flair did.

Savage doesn’t know what to do now but he realizes Flair and Perfect did something. The champion goes up top but he isn’t sure. Instead of dropping the elbow though he dives at Flair, but gets knocked out of the air by a chair shot, injuring Savage’s knee in the process. Savage is counted out but retains the title.

Rating: B+. This was another really good match between the two and a great rematch from their first classic a year and a half earlier at Wrestlemania 7. The idea of having someone turn was a great incentive to watch the show, and having neither guy do the turn was the right move. The ending of the match is important soon after this.

Post match Flair puts Savage in the Figure Four with Perfect adding in more shots to the leg. Warrior finally saves Savage with a chair and helps him to his feet.

The official attendance is announced.

Undertaker vs. Kamala

Kamala was Undertaker’s Monster of the Month at this point and is managed by Harvey Whippelman. Undertaker rides to the ring on the back of a hearse to kill even more time. Taker fires off uppercuts to start and chokes away in the corner before avoiding a charging Ugandan. Harvey breaks up Old School but Kamala can’t hurt Taker at all. He clotheslines the dead man to the floor but Taker no sells everything Kamala throws at him. Back inside and Taker easily chokeslams him down and hits the Tombstone but Kamala’s other manager Kim Chee comes in for the DQ.

Rating: D. Nothing to see here as it was setting up the coffin match at Survivor Series. This was during the bad period for Undertaker as he fought a bunch of monsters with no particular rhyme or reason. Kamala was nothing special and spent most of his career trying to be intimidating but getting destroyed every time.

Post match Kim Chee helps Kamala lay Undertaker out and the big man hits a top rope splash to Undertaker, but the Dead Man pops up a few seconds later.

Tatanka vs. Berzerker happened here.

British Bulldog talks about fighting hard for two years to reach this point. Yes Bret is the Champion and his brother in law but when they get in the ring together, Bret is a stranger to him. He hopes the families reunite after the match but he’ll be the champion.

Bret says that Davey might not know him but he can look Bret in the eye and see the man that got Smith his start in the company. This is a total heel promo from Bret, which is the right move given where they are tonight. Tonight, Smith’s dream becomes a nightmare.

Here are some Highlanders playing the bagpipes. Their featured performer: Roddy Piper of course.

Diana Hart-Smith, Bret’s sister and Davey’s wife, will be neutral tonight. She just wants them to get along after the match.

Intercontinental Title: Bret Hart vs. Davey Boy Smith

Bulldog has British Commonwealth boxing champion Lennox Lewis leading him to the ring and carrying the Union Jack. The place comes unglued for Davey but Bret isn’t booed at all, as his style is perfect for a crowd like this. Bulldog shoves him into the corner to start before hitting a hard shoulder to send the champion to the floor. Back in and they head to the mat with Bret grabbing a headlock to take over. Bret gets a few near falls off some rollups and it’s right back to the headlock.

Back up again and Davey grabs a hammerlock but Bret hits a HARD elbow to the face to escape, drawing the ire of the fans. Davey takes him down with basic technique and cranks on the armbar. The hold stays on for a good while with the fans getting louder and louder the longer Smith has control. Bret finally sends him into the ropes to escape and drives a knee into Smith’s ribs. The fans boo Hart out of the stadium for a basic move like a knee and boo even louder for a chinlock.

An atomic drop (called a reverse piledriver by Vince) puts Smith down and Bret blocks a crucifix (which worked earlier) in a Samoan Drop for two. Another chinlock is quickly broken but Davey charges into a boot in the corner to put him down again. A bulldog puts Bulldog down but he slams Bret off the top a second later. Davey misses a top rope splash and is sent to the outside, drawing a ton of heat for Bret.

The champion tries a dive to the floor but lands on Davey’s back, nearly breaking several bones in the process. Bret sends him into the post before heading back inside pounding away with European uppercuts. Hart hooks a chinlock for a good while before loading up the Five Moves of Doom. He pulls Bulldog up by the hair to show how evil he is and it’s off to a sleeper. This stays on for a LONG time as well but Smith rams him into the corner to escape again.

They slug it out but Davey drops him out of a gorilla press into the ropes. Three straight clotheslines get two for Smith and a gorilla press gets the same. The delayed vertical and the chest first bump into the buckle get the same. Bulldog hits his powerslam finisher but Bret gets out at two, with far less of a reaction from the crowd than you would expect. Bret rolls through a suplex for two of his own, only to get superplexed down for a near fall.

Back up again and a double clothesline puts both guys down, giving the fans a needed breather. While laying on his back Bret hooks the Sharpshooter ala last year against Mr. Perfect, terrifying the fans. Smith gets the rope so Bret tries a suplex, but Davey drops to his knees and hooks both legs for the pin and the title. The place ERUPTS on the three count.

Rating: A+. This took awhile to get going but once those near falls started it turns into an instant classic. Davey had to win here and it was a perfectly clean pin in the middle of the ring. Bret, ever the critic, doesn’t like this match and basically blames the whole thing on Smith for being spent five minutes in. Those of us in the real world see it for what it is: a masterpiece.

Bret, Davey and Diana embrace to end the show.

Overall Rating: B+. This is a show where the matches don’t add up to the whole rating. The thing to remember is this show is less than three hours (not counting dark matches which I don’t count towards the show’s rating) and nearly an hour of that is spent on two great matches. The rest of the bad stuff is pretty short and the two main events more than make up for it. This is easily the best Summerslam so far and one of the best ever. Check this out if you’ve somehow never seen it.

Ratings Comparison

Jim Duggan/Bushwhackers vs. Mountie/Nasty Boys

Original: B

Redo: C+

Papa Shango vs. Tito Santana

Original: D+

Redo: D

Tatanka vs. Berzerker

Original: C

Redo: D

Legion of Doom vs. Money Inc.

Original: C+

Redo: C-

Nailz vs. Virgil

Original: C

Redo: F

Shawn Michaels vs. Rick Martel

Original: B

Redo: D+

Beverly Brothers vs. Natural Disasters

Original: D+

Redo: D

Repo Man vs. Crush

Original: C+

Redo: D

Ultimate Warrior vs. Randy Savage

Original: A

Redo: B+

Kamala vs. Undertaker

Original: C

Redo: D

British Bulldog vs. Bret Hart

Original: A+

Redo: A+

Overall Rating

Original: A+

Redo: B+

I was WAY too nice to this show the first time. It’s great but it’s not THAT great.

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

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/07/26/history-of-summerslam-count-up-1992-a-tape-delayed-ppv-yes-really/

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 1992
Date: August 29, 1992 (aired on PPV August 31, 1992)
Location: Wembley Stadium, London, England
Attendance: 80,355
Commentators: Gorilla Monsoon, Bobby Heenan

We’re a year removed from the nearly complete and utter crap that was Summerslam 1991. After Warrior was fired, he was back a mere 6 months later to save Hogan from getting beaten up by Sid. After a feud with Papa Shango, he was given a world title match at Summerslam against Macho. However, Flair and Perfect were still mad that Flair had never gotten his title match, so they’ve injected themselves into this.

The story goes like this: Flair says that they’ll be in the corner of one guy, but they won’t say whom. Both Savage and Warrior think someone is going to turn and the fans bought into it completely. Even I thought someone was going to turn. That’s main event #1. #2, and the real main event, was Bret Hart vs. Davey Boy Smith for the IC Belt. This had another great storyline attached to it as Smith’s wife was Bret’s sister.

The angel was that she couldn’t decide whom to cheer for, which makes sense as who are you supposed to side with in a match like that? There’s no right or wrong answer and she eventually went with she hoped no one got hurt. That match is considered by many to be the greatest match of all time.

Now I’m not sure if I’d go that far, but it’s way up there. However, that’s more or less the only match most people remember from the show. This was the first PPV in a country other than the US or Canada, so let’s see how the first truly international show is.

So yeah, screw this up and had written all the way up to the start of Warrior/Savage and the computer died, ending my file which is going to have to be redone. I’m a bit ticked off about that. Actually I’m a lot ticked off about that. Let’s get this freaking thing going…again.

We open the show outside for no apparent reason as we hear the opinions of the fans of whose corner Perfect would be in. Dang some of these people are hard to understand. Learn English people. One of the kids says Bulldog is going to win, whether he wants to or not. Uh, I’m not the smartest wrestling fan in the world, but wouldn’t you want to win every match you’re in?

We hear some horns playing and more random shots of London before going to the stadium. The only thing I can say: DANG! This place looks awesome as the whole place is full and it’s second only to WM 3 as far as I can remember. Heenan is wearing a crown of course. Vince says this is the Summerslam you thought you’d never see.

I know 91 sucked but were they not planning on having another one after it? Were there issues in the company that I just didn’t recall? That’s Vince for you though as he rarely made sense. I have three dark matches on my tape, so let’s get to them.

Jim Duggan/Bushwackers vs. Mountie/Nasty Boys

Matches like these, which are usually not shown on official releases, are always cool to see because they’re unique. Not to mention it’s bonus wrestling so how can it be a bad thing? Mountie’s music is just nothing short of great. He sings it on the way to the ring, adding in commentary to it as he goes. That’s either brilliant or stupid. Heenan makes a Michael Jackson reference.

This is being written for the second time on the 4th of July, ten days after his death, and it still is hard to comprehend that the King of Pop is dead. Heenan goes on to say that New Zealand is a suburb of London as Shadow is face palming. For some reason Duggan, one of the biggest patriots in wrestling history, is cheered. Only a British crowd would chant USA in London for a team mainly made of people from New Zealand.

Both teams try to get cheers from the crowd in a bit of a contest to start. After two of these we get going. I always loved the Bushwackers, mainly because one of them, I believe Luke, licked me at a house show when I was 3-4 years old. Bobby is on fire here with the jokes. This is following a very simple formula: little wrestling, little brawling, lather rinse and repeat. The heels take over or it wouldn’t be a traditional tag match.

As this happens, the fans chant Butch. There’s a bunch of jokes there but I’d get banned for them. The Wackers use their battering ram on a pile of the guys in the corner, bringing forth the really bad Earl of Sandwich jokes from Vince. The bias from Vince is just flat out sad as he cheers when faces cheat and claims it’s horrid when heels do it. I get that he’s a face commentator but this is boarder line Gorilla Monsoon territory.

In a bit of a weird spot, Knobbs and Mountie lock hands for a double clothesline but instead use a boot to the stomach. Just looked odd to me. The announcers argue over the rules again and Heenan asks what’s in Vince’s book? That’s a very interesting idea actually. Can you imagine what a real Vince McMahon autobiography, as in not a WWE-PG one would be like? Some of the stories in there would be insane.

Duggan comes in and amazingly enough we get a big brawl. I think they botch the spot at the end again here as Duggan is set for the three point clothesline but Mountie doesn’t get up. Duggan goes to pick him up but Mountie gets up on his own and Duggan gets back in position, so maybe he was just late. Sags misses a top rope elbow onto Mountie to end it as Duggan gets the pin.

Rating: B. This was perfect for an opening dark match. It wasn’t serious in the slightest and was there to do nothing but get the crowd into the show. That’s just fine and it worked perfectly. Nothing great, but to open the action for a major PPV, this was just fine.

Papa Shango vs. Tito Santana

Now with Shango you have someone that absolutely scared the living tar out of me. He was the voodoo guy and he actually beat up the Warrior. That’s saying a lot when you think about it. Their blowoff match was in Rupp Arena so I was likely there for it. Shango was coming off a huge program with Warrior and they weren’t sure what to do with him at the moment as is evidenced here with him in a dark match.

Santana was in his El Matador gimmick at the time which was the height of stupidity. These two might add up to being the dumbest collection of gimmicks in one place at one time until being eclipsed by the gimmick battle royal. Santana was a guy a lot like Finlay or Regal today in that he could have a very solid match with just about anyone. Since he can do that, why would you ever get rid of him?

That’s what Vince realized so even once Tito was no longer a major player, you could still put him into a program and get a solid performance that you could depend on out of him. That’s a great asset to have and will almost always guarantee you at least employment. Santana gets NO reaction at all. They go back and forth for a bit, but Shango more or less no sells the big forearm, meaning that the move that nearly knocked Savage out isn’t good enough to get a two on a guy like Shango.

The ideas around finishing moves apparently depend on your place on the card which has always seemed bogus to me. He’s rocking the pink boots here, offering further proof that only Bret Hart can pull that off.

Now he hits another forearm and it’s a move of death, so thanks for the continuity there guys. I watch this match and the idea of how absurd Shango’s character is begins to dawn on me. A voodoo medicine man is supposed to have tights, wrist tape, weigh in and have boots? Anyway, he hits what has to be the worst finishing move possible: the shoulder breaker, to pin Santana.

Rating: D+. Yeah this was bad. It just never felt like it got going at all. Shango just didn’t know how to make a match work and with the shoulder breaker, he looked absurd out there. A character like his could have worked very well, but he just didn’t get the way the thought process should have been going at all.

Tatanka vs. Berserker

If you recall what I said about two gimmicks never being more absurd, forget it. These two are miles beyond what the last match had to offer. Tatanka is the Native American and Berserker is a Viking that wants to stab people. I say this with all sincerity: I wonder how many people there had no clue what Tatanka was. Apparently quite a few as he gets a big pop.

I think this match was actually filmed after the show as it’s completely dark except for the lights now, as opposed to the previous matches where sunlight could have lit the arena. For no good reason at all, Tatanka beats him up for the opening of this match. In the only interesting thing you’ll hear from Vince all night, Tatanka means Raging Buffalo. The structure to the ring is kind of weird as there’s the aisle and then some steps to get to what we would call the outside.

I kind of like that, but it’s similar to the setup that caused the end of Rick Rude’s career. They fight on the floor and the racial stereotype takes Berserker down the mini stairs to slam him and then comes back up them. After that waste of time it’s more stereotyping as the Papoose To Go ends it. I wonder if I can get a Papoose for eating in?

Rating: C. It was better than the previous match but that’s really not saying a lot. There was just a weird flow to this match and while it wasn’t horrid, it certainly wasn’t something you wanted to see more of.

Now it’s time for the real show as we get a very standard yet good early 90s opening. In something I like we just go straight to the first match.

Money Inc. vs. LOD

This was in the middle of the interesting three way feud over the tag titles between these four and the champions, the Natural Disasters. Of course, that would all be thrown out the window so Hulk and Beefcake could fight the mega heels at Mania. Part of the reason that match wasn’t the LOD somehow was because of what you’re about to see here: Rocko the Dummy. Yes you read that right.

For some reason that only Vince would know, the LOD were given back their old manager Paul Ellering (which was fine, although it would have been nice for them to tell us who in the world he was as he was their manager in the NWA). The problem came with Ellering’s friend Rocko. Rocko was a ventriloquist dummy. There was nothing more to it than that. He was a wooden dummy that the manager would bring with him and he would talk in the promos.

At least with Head and Al Snow it was a joke. This was with a serious tag team. Hawk got sick of it and quit very soon, maybe even at this show but I’m not sure. Anyway, the intro for the LOD is sweet as all three come in on Harleys. That’s actually really awesome looking, aside from the dummy being on the fornt of the first bike.

As if that’s not enough, Paul carries the stupid thing around at the ring. No wonder Hawk quit over this nonsense. Vince says that the LOD are known for being strong and for their great psychology. Excuse me for one second.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!

LOD having freaking PSYCHOLOGY??? WOW, and I thought the people that want Kane to remask were imbeciles. They hit people hard. That’s their psychology I supposed. Yeah, that’s just a freaking joke all around. After I laugh very hard at that, I come to a screeching halt as I see something that’s just an ungodly abomination upon mankind.

Ted DiBiase, the Million Dollar Man, to me the greatest heel of all time, is wearing WHITE TIGHTS!!! WHAT IN THE HECKIS THIS NONSENSE??? DIBIASE, A HEEL, DOES NOT WEAR WHITE!!! EVER SINCE HE DEBUTED IT’S BEEN BLACK WITH DOLLAR SIGNS, BUT NOW HE’S WEARING WHITE??? THAT JUST DOES NOT WORK!!! After about three minutes of frustration, I think I’m ok now.

After Hawk beats him up for a minute (absolutely right he should get beaten up) both tag, as Vince says Animal will now start the match for his team. Riiiiiight. The LOD get beaten up with sleepers and a slam on the floor by white tights Magee over there. Not only that but his kneepads are long so it looks like he’s wearing stripper boots. Hart is yelling at Paul about the puppet on the floor which shows that Hart is always thinking out there.

He’s a bit annoying but the guy has always been around and always works as hard as he could. The heels dominate much of this which makes perfect sense here as they’re the thinking wrestlers and all they had to do was wait for LOD to make a mistake. Wow both the heels are over 260? That’s a big surprising.

Eventually Animal gets tagged in and the LOD starts throwing Money Inc. all over the ring. The ending comes out of almost nowhere as they get DiBiase up but IRS dropkicks Animal so he drops him. DiBiase gets powerslammed and pinned to end it. Just a very abrupt ending.

Rating: C+. Certainly not a bad match, but it just didn’t have any flow and while it was a 12 minute match, it felt like about 5. DiBiase’s tights are something I just can’t let go as it’s the dumbest thing I’ve seen in a long time. This just felt really fast and the ending looked odd to me. Not bad, but just didn’t work that well in my eyes.

In the back, Flair, in his wrestling attire despite not wrestling that night, which is a thread in and amongst itself, is with Gene. I really like this promo by Flair as Gene is demanding to know where Mr. Perfect is. He asks if Perfect is with Savage. Flair opens his mouth and then chuckles. He asks if Perfect is with Warrior.

Flair opens his mouth and then chuckles. Gene demands to know the whereabouts of Mr. Perfect. Flair says “why, he’s in the dressing room of course!” Whose dressing room? “Why, the dressing room of the winner of course. WHOO!” This comes off really well as Flair is just epic on the stick here.

We go over to Sean Mooney and Virgil, who is fighting Nailz tonight. More on Nailz later. Virgil is REALLY bad at promos. He shouts on weird words, he moves around too much, and I think he had 5 catchphrases inside of a 40 second promo. I feel sorry for the heat he gets though. I’ve heard stories of him being at wrestling conventions and autograph shows where he’ll sit at his table for 5 hours and maybe get 4 people that talk to him.

No he wasn’t ever a big star but he’s bigger than that. He’s wrestled at Wrestlemania and Starrcade, so it’s not like he’s never done anything of note. I’d certainly talk to him for awhile. Apparently he’s trying to get revenge for his best friend (WTF??) the Big Boss Man.

Nailz vs. Virgil

Nailz is a character that it’s very possible a lot of you don’t remember and that’s very understandable as he was on the roster less than a year. He had a great bit of psychology to him because he was supposed to be a convict that Boss Man had beaten up in prison for a crime that he didn’t commit. Therefore, Nailz had no training and only used punches, chokes and kicks etc. That makes a lot of sense when you think about it.

After a match Boss Man had with a jobber, Nailz ran out and beat up Boss Man, putting him out for about 5 months. This match is for Virgil to try to get some revenge for his buddy, and you can guess how this is going to go. Before we get to this match though, let’s go over how Nailz left the company because it’s a story unlike any you’ve ever heard. Nailz tried to kill Vince McMahon. I mean that literally, as in he was choking Vince and Vince was turning blue.

Nailz wanted money but Vince wouldn’t give it to him. Obviously, he was fired immediately thereafter. Nailz was also a guy at the steroids trial that was one of the big witnesses, but his testimony was so far over the top that it actually helped Vince out. Nailz was scheduled for a big feud with Taker as they were on the cover of the WWF magazine, had a staredown on Superstars and had some house show matches.

It’s saying a lot that he was being given Taker to work with and then all that other stuff happened. He was in WCW for all of a week, jobbing to Sting before he was out of the mainstream. Kind of sad as I always liked him.

As for the match, what are you expecting here? It’s a guy that needs wins to prove himself against a glorified jobber. Nailz dominates early but Virgil takes over, leading to the chokeout win. I know that’s really short but that’s the commentary for the whole match. It’s like 3 minutes long and there’s just nothing at all of note in it. Afterwards Nailz beats up Virgil with the stick.

Rating: C. This was really hard to grade so we’ll call it average I guess. It was a squash and it got the point it was trying to make. Virgil fights but loses while Nailz looks dominant, leading up to the return of the Boss Man and their blowoff match at the Survivor Series.

Alfred Hayes can’t get into Savage’s dressing room.

Shawn Michaels vs. Rick Martel

There’s a very interesting pair of twists here. First of all, both guys are heels. Second, there’s an agreement not to hit each other in the face. That’s not something you hear very often. This is still the boy toy era for Shawn as he wasn’t a huge deal yet but was getting there. Sherri’s outfit has no back so she’s more or less in a thong which Vince notices IMMEDIATELY.

Martel cartwheels out of the way of a backdrop and does some jumping jacks. Shawn takes over for the most part early on and Martel is in trouble. And never mind as it’s more or less even. Shawn pulls back to throw a punch but stops. Martel is the de facto face here which is interesting as he was a pretty solid heel.

Shawn is down on the floor as Martel asks Sherri to come with him. They hug and Shawn doesn’t really see it. The cameraman keeps getting shots of Sherri’s back which isn’t that bad I guess. Both guys use the tights as it’s kind of interesting to see all of the heel vs. heel tactic. Also do you think that’s enough back shots in one match?

Sweet chin music hits the chest which makes sense here. Shawn hits a knee to the face and goes for the ropes with his feet but can’t reach them so the referee stops the count before he got there. In other words he’s not counting because they’re following the rules. Ok then. They start slapping each other and Sherri starts to freak.

They square off with fists up as Sherri “faints”. Dang she falls really well. Vince of course thinks she’s had a heart attack. Shawn DRILLS Martel when he tries to give her mouth to mouth. They slug it out in the aisle and it’s a double countout. Sherri gets up to see what’s going on and then pretends she’s out again.

Shawn comes back to carry her off as Vince and Heenan make jokes. Martel runs down and drills him, sending Sherri crashing to the floor. He picks her up and Shawn drills Martel, sending Sherri flying sprawling to the floor again. This is kind of funny as it’s coming off almost like a Weekend At Bernie’s thing which is meant as a good thing. Martel comes out and throws water on Sherri for no apparent reason.

Rating: B. I really liked this actually. It’s definitely a different kind of idea and it worked very well I thought. It’s not often you get a good heel vs. heel match but you certainly did here. This worked very well and the post match stuff was funny yet good at the same time. I liked this far more than I expected to and it worked well.

The Nasties say they’ll get their tag title shot, but for no reason at all they talk about the world title match. You see the beginnings of Jimmy’s jumping to Money Inc and the to his face turn.

Tag Titles: Beverly Brothers vs. Natural Disasters

I’m sure most of you know who the Natural Disasters are, but how many of you know who the Beverly Brothers are? I’m guessing not many of you, because I can fairly safely say that this is the highlight of the WWF run. I think their gimmick was being spoiled rich kids but that was never really explained. They were really just tag team jobbers and little more.

They were a huge deal in the AWA where they were the only tag team to win rookies of the year. They were gone in less than two years and no one noticed they were gone. Anyway, this is a standard tag with the Naturals dominating early but then the heels taking over as Heenan makes fat jokes. BREAKING NEWS: SHAWN MICHAELS HAS LEFT WEMBLEY! Since Typhoon sucks more than Quake, he’s the face in peril.

A shot to the back with the metal scroll of the Genius has no effect which makes me wonder what the point of that was. Quake beats up the Beverly Brother so Typhoon is on his own and can make the tag. Naturally, the talented Disaster known as Earthquake kicks some Beverly faces in. A brief double team leads to the Earthquake to end this.

Rating: D+. The low rating is for one reason: there is a total and complete lack of drama in this. No one believed the Beverlys had a chance and they didn’t at all. It was a title match for a title match’s sake, which never turns out to be anything good. This was a waste of time, but I guess the match itself was fine.

Gene interviews the Bushwackers who want to talk about Perfect being in someone’s corner. Gene makes some dumb British jokes which aren’t funny.

Alfred Hayes can’t get in Warrior’s dressing room either.

Repo Man vs. Crush

Crush is once again a guy that could have been a big star but he never got a push that he needed. It’s a Demolition reunion here as Smash meets Crush. This is pure filler and nothing but a way to kill some time before the world title match. Repo’s offense is about 9 punches, a thumb to the eye, and a belly to back suplex. That’s it. Other than that, we get Crush using the head vice and dominating the whole thing. Boring and quick match which was just a filler, so how much can I complain?

Rating: C+. This was pure filler so what do you really expect from it? Crush looked dominant so he’ll be getting a bit better push. Oh wait he’s about to start feuding with Doink. Nevermind.

We hit the recap button on Warrior and Savage’s feud which is WAY too long. There’s two holes I see in this storyline. For one, Perfect tells both guys he’ll be in their corner. Ok, that’s fine, but couldn’t either guy put two and two together and get they’re being played? I guess that one’s forgivable though as either guy could have planned to lie to the other one.

However, the one thing I can’t get: if Perfect’s such a great manager, WHY IS THE GUY HE’S MANAGING NOT CHAMPION ALREADY? Since when did Perfect become this hot commodity all of a sudden? Savage’s line of “I’m the WWF Champion and you’re not!” is just great stuff.

WWF Title: Randy Savage vs. Ultimate Warrior

Oh apparently it’s the Ullllllllllllllllllltimate Warrior according to Vince. Of course Perfect doesn’t come out with either guy at first to build even more suspense which is actually a good move. It’s twilight in London so the scene of the whole stadium is really cool looking. Huge staredown to start which shows off the point that Warrior is now wearing a flesh colored singlet. This was huge for the theory that Warrior was on steroids which he pretty much was a guaranteed user of.

The start of this is a style that I like as nearly the first ten minutes is almost completely back and forth work. Neither guy can get anything substantial going and they just hammer away on the other one, looking for an advantage. Savage is getting booed here so I guess he’s supposed to be the heel? Anyway, eventually he takes a slight advantage as he knocks Warrior to the floor.

They come back in and I guess Warrior botches a spot as Savage is trying to pull him into the turnbuckle but Warrior falls short. You can tell it was a botch as they do the exact same thing about two seconds later. In a weird spot that I kind of like, Savage hits the double axe but Warrior does his hulk up thing. The second takes him down, but he catches the third in a powerslam. Just kind of a weird looking sequence.

Anyway, Warrior takes control as we get a nice little story going of neither guy being able to get a definitive advantage going for them. Warrior hurts Savage’s back and Savage hurts Warrior’s neck. They slow it down now with Warrior having a slight advantage. This is a slower paced match which is fine, as it’s going longer so the slow page helps it a lot I think. After a minute or two of this, Perfect and Flair come down.

This is where I really wish they hadn’t been involved, as Warrior and Savage were putting on a great match so far that had me very interested in it. Warrior does something weird (stunning right?) as he slams Savage, goes to the apron, and turns right back around and comes into the ring. What the heck? He misses a splash which he sells like he got shot in the ribs. Vince freaks because Perfect hasn’t gone to either corner.

Since when are there designated corners for a singles match? Perfect pulls the leg of Savage as Warrior is instantly the heel. I know my jokes have been lacking here, but this has been a great match and it’s hard to make fun of something that you really like. I think Warrior has set a record for most body slams in one match. After another one he goes to the top which I guess was the spot he wanted to do earlier. Maybe he stopped because Perfect and Flair were coming.

That would make sense I guess. Oh the ref is down too. He gets up and Warrior argues with him, leading to a much bigger ref bump. Piledriver from Savage which looks awesome. This time Perfect holds Warrior as Flair hits him with, well I guess since we’re in England it’s a natural born object. Savage however doesn’t see it. After slam #38 the elbow hits but due to no referee, we get a two despite Savage pulling the tights which is acknowledged.

Hulk up by Warrior as he starts the sequence that ended Mania 7’s match. Perfect tries to grab his foot during the set up for the splash but Flair gets him with a chair to the back on the other side as everyone is sure Savage is the guy that bought Perfect’s services. Apparently the crack of a chair, Flair moving away suddenly, and the Warrior suddenly falling down on his face aren’t enough proof that he did anything for the referee.

There’s another very nice little touch to this as Savage hasn’t seen anything that Flair or Perfect have done. Earlier the piledriver could have put Warrior down for as long as Savage was helping the referee, but this time he knows he didn’t touch Warrior, so someone else must have. That’s a nice little touch to add to it. Savage is ticked off that someone is helping him, so no one knows what’s going on.

He sets for the elbow but can’t take the win that way, instead jumping at Flair, WHO HAS A CHAIR! The obvious happens and Savage jumps into the chair, knocking himself nearly out as I can barely believe how stupid that was. This leads to the fastest count out of all time in an ending that I’m really not wild about at all. Apparently the chair hit Savage in the knee as Flair and Perfect destroy Savage soon thereafter but Warrior makes the save.

This would lead to the injured knee of Savage that would eventually cost Savage the title to Flair on a match that is very hard to find. The announcers conclude that no one sold out, which is about as obvious as the statement that Vince is an imbecile at times. He goes on to say that both men are champions. Not really Vince, not really. Savage would lose the belt two days later, before one Hitman would win it about a month and a half afterwards.

Warrior hands him the belt and helps him to the back with the music playing as we go to Perfect and Flair in the back. Since this is integral to the match, I’ll lump them together. They say that the deal was made, but it was between Perfect and Flair. They mention Plan B but won’t say what it is. Spoiler: it’s getting the title back to Flair. Gene thinks this is earth shattering news when it’s really not.

Rating: A. The only thing keeping it from being an A+ is the lack of a definitive ending, which I guess was required to have Savage drop the belt two days later. Anyway, this was an excellent match as both guys beat the tar out of each other and neither really gave an inch.

It may not have been as epic as their Mania match, but it’s good on its own. Perfect and Flair added something to it and I’m very glad neither guy turned as it would have hurt the match in my mind. Great match, but somehow this isn’t the best match on the card.

Official Attendance: less than Mania 3 so who cares?

Undertaker vs. Kamala

Harvey Whippleman does Kamala’s intro, saying he’s from the dark continent of Africa. I was under the impression that there’s lots of sunlight in Africa, so is that a very sly racial joke? I was under the impression that Africans’ skin darkened as a natural defense to the amount of sunlight on that continent. Racial stereotypes rule I guess?

Anyway, this is really just a mini-feud for Taker before the Giant Gonzalez shows up, much like, oh I don’t know: THE SAME FREAKING THING THEY DID WITH DAIVARI, MARK HENRY, MUHAMMAD HASSAN AND KHALI??? Could that be it? Could it be that they just took the EXACT same stupid story and redid it, hoping that no one was watching 13 years ago? Yep, that’s exactly what they did.

I swear these jokes write themselves when you’re making fun of WWE’s writing. Kamala used to scare the HECK out of me when I was like 2 years old. The dude was just freaking creepy. He wants to cook Taker apparently. Taker comes to the ring in the back of a hearse that I think has a sunroof. Oh never mind he’s standing on the bumper. There’s a coffin in the hearse, which is foreshadowing the coffin match at Survivor Series in a month or two.

This is a very quick match and is only to fill in time between the two main events and let the crowd catch its breath for a bit. Taker absolutely destroys him and as he’s going for the tombstone, Kim Chee runs in and hits Taker with his helmet for the DQ. Kamala hits three splashes, including one from the top rope and Taker just sits up. Kamala runs, and we set up for the main event.

Rating: C. I think I’m going to start giving C’s to matches that are too short to grade. The problem is there’s just not enough time in a 3 minute match to tell whether its good or not. It did its job I guess which is to set up the big match next PPV and fill in time here, so I can’t complain I guess.

Mooney is with Davey Boy Smith, talking about the family pressures which was a nice touch that I think the match needed. He says that once they get into the ring, Bret isn’t his brother, but a stranger. Mooney says what will the pressure of wrestling in front of 80,000 people be like. “That’s not pressure. That’s a dream.” That line is either epic or clichéd. Not sure but I’m leaning towards the former.

Bret says that Smith wouldn’t be anything without Bret as Bret introduced Davey to his wife and got him started in the WWF. He says Smith is ungrateful and I am completely hyped for this match.

Some bagpipe players play Roddy Piper’s theme music, which is ALWAYS cool. Oh they’re the Balboa Highlanders. Piper is with them, and the marking out continues as he gets a huge pop. This is actually really cool looking as Piper gets a solo and isn’t half bad. Granted I know nothing about the bagpipes. They play Scotland the Brave, which is an awesome song so this is sweet.

Mooney is with Diana Smith, who says nothing that you wouldn’t expect her to say. Mooney rudely cuts her off and asks who she thinks will win. He cuts her off AGAIN as you can tell she really doesn’t want to do this, or she’s a great actress. Could be a combination of both as this actually isn’t that bad of an interview. She sounds really upset about this, which she should be. Mooney cuts her off a THIRD TIME to send us to ringside. Dang, Mooney was a jerk in this.

Intercontinental Title: Bret Hart vs. Davey Boy Smith

Smith comes out first to the hero’s pop. Lennox Lewis carries the flag for him as a relative unknown at the time which is always cool. The pop for Smith is huge, while Bret gets the textbook definition of a mixed reaction. He’s not exactly a heel, but he’s certainly not the guy the crowd wants to win. As for the match, I’ll be brief about it. I’m sure you’ve all seen it, but if you haven’t, WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH YOU?

This is an absolute classic and is in the running for greatest match of all time. While it seems that there’s no doubt who would win looking back, at the time, this was a huge upset. Smith had never really done anything of note but was getting the singles push for over a year leading up to this night. Everyone knew Hart was a god in the ring and this was the blowoff match to launch him into the main event scene where he would be for the rest of his career in the WWF.

I’m going to skip the play by play here as I can’t do it justice and go straight to the end of the match. It runs over twenty five minutes as opposed to the already forgotten near 30 minute masterpiece we saw earlier for the world title. Both guys are absolutely spent as this has been back and forth the whole time with Smith wrestling a different style than he usually did and throwing off Bret.

Bret is his traditional perfectly timed self with a balanced assault all around, mainly working on the back though to set up for the Sharpshooter. The crowd is hot the whole match as they pop over every single move. This is a match where it’s two guys doing any move they can think of instead of using the same standard stuff that they always use. Clothesline puts both guys down and Bret tries to do the same thing he did last year to Perfect to get the title in the first place.

Smith does something that’s allegedly never been done and gets to the ropes. Someone else might have done it before but I’m not sure. The announcers royally screw this up by making it sound like Bret had him in a headlock. Hart hits the ropes and goes for a sunset flip and Smith goes for the famous counter of dropping to his knees to get the pin and the title as the place erupts.

The music not playing lets things sink in a bit better as Bret can’t believe it. They announce Smith as the new champion to another epic pop. Bret gets up and eventually holds up Smith’s hand as Diana comes in and they all pose to end the show.

Rating: A+. This is one of the greatest matches of all time and is required viewing for anyone that calls themselves a wrestling fan. That’s all that needs to be said.

Hart would go on to win the WWF Title in October in a complete shock in Canada while Smith would really be a transitional champion, losing to Shawn in about two months to launch Shawn’s singles career. This match and title change was really just for the English fans, but dang, what a treat for them and the moment is certainly worth it.

Overall Rating: A+. This is a fantastic show and unless there’s something I’m completely missing, the best Summerslam ever. The only one that pops into my mind to even approach it would be 2002, but that’s way too far in the future to worry about. There’s two absolute classics along with some other very good stuff.

The fans went home happy, there was a huge crowd, and not really a single bad match as everything is at least watchable. The worst match is by far the tag title match, but even it’s not that bad. Excellent show and it gets my highest recommendation.

 

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Summerslam 1991
Date: August 26, 1991
Location: Madison Square Garden, New York City, New York
Attendance: 20,000
Commentators: Bobby Heenan, Roddy Piper, Gorilla Monsoon

This is a show that almost no one remembers other than one match. The main event is Hogan/Warrior vs. Slaughter/Adnan/Mustafa, which would have been a much better match a few months ago when Slaughter was still a threat. Other than that we have the wedding of Savage and Miss Elizabeth who reunited at Wrestlemania VII in one of the best moments in company history. Let’s get to it.

We open with Savage in the back getting ready while Alfred Hayes asks him questions. Savage says that he’s ready and in the danger zone, but HAYES’ TIE IS CROOKED. “NOW YOU’RE OK AND IT’S TIME TO GO CHECK MY BABY BLUE EYES!”

We get the regular intro with the theme of a match made in Heaven and a match made in Hell.

Ricky Steamboat/British Bulldog/Texas Tornado vs. Warlord/Power and Glory

Steamboat is just The Dragon here, complete with what looks like a lizard man costume and breathing fire. The heels get the jobber entrance and have Slick with them. Steamboat and Roma get things going as Gorilla is listing off the rest of the card. Roma slams him down and mostly misses a dropkick before posing. Paul goes to the middle rope but dives into the armdrag and Steamboat cranks on the arm even more. Ricky hits a much better dropkick to put Roma in the corner for a tag to Hercules who gets caught in some armdrags of his own.

Off to Tornado and the fans go nuts as he rams Herc’s head into the buckle. Ten right hands to the head in the corner have Hercules in even more trouble but it’s off to Warlord vs. Bulldog which was a decent power feud. Bulldog hits the suplex for two and it’s off to Steamboat for a top rope chop to the head. Warlord blocks a monkey flip though and it’s back to Roma with a suplex of his own for two. Three straight backbreakers have Steamboat in even more trouble before it’s back to Hercules for a gorilla press.

Steamboat starts fighting back but gets caught in a big hotshot to put him down. Here’s Warlord again but he dives into two feet from Steamboat, allowing for the tag off to Tornado. The Texan cleans house but makes a blind tag to Bulldog who hits a cross body. That plus the Tornado Punch to Warlord is good for two as everything breaks down. Bulldog powerslams Roma down and Ssteamboat adds the high cross body for the pin.

Rating: C+. Nothing wrong with this as it was a basic six man tag to fire up the crowd. Everyone looked fine and the crowd was WAY into the smark god known as Ricky Steamboat. The heels were all about to be gone from the company with only Warlord making it to 1992.

Sean Mooney says to call some hotline to hear prerecorded comments from Liz and Savage!

Mr. Perfect says he’s an awesome champion.

Intercontinental Title: Mr. Perfect vs. Bret Hart

Perfect has been champion since last November so he’s a pretty big deal. He also has his Coach (former wrestler John Tolos) with him. Stu and Helen Hart are in the audience to watch their son. Feeling out process to start with Bret scoring first by hip tossing Perfect to the floor. Back in and Bret grabs a headlock followed by a crucifix for two. Bret puts the headlock on again as Heenan and Piper are going to war on commentary. Gorilla: “WILL YOU STOP???”

Perfect grabs at the hair to escape and chops Bret’s chest off. A slam puts Bret down but he kicks Perfect away and slams him down, only to have Perfect kick him right back. Bret is all like screw this wrestling stuff and clotheslines Perfect to the floor. The champ tries to run but Bret throws him back in and the dude in pink is mad. Perfect gets in a HARD kick to the ribs and Bret is sent to the floor where Coach whistles at him.

Bret tries to get up but is knocked off the apron and right on top of a production guy who has a very confused look on his face. Back in and Bret jumps over Perfect in the corner and gets two off a rollup. The fans are WAY into this so far. Perfect sends Bret chest first into the buckle to take over again as Heenan is starting to lose his marbles. Another hard whip into the buckle gets two for the champion followed by the Hennig neck snap for two more.

Hart is sent to the floor for a bit and they both come back in on the top. It’s Bret crashing down to the mat to give Perfect two as Heenan is thinking Perfect should get himself disqualified. The champ hooks a sleeper but Bret fights up into a crucifix, only to be dropped down into a Samoan drop for two. The PerfectPlex looks to finish Bret but it only gets two, sending MSG into delirium.

Back up and Bret fights back, sending Perfect across the ring and crotch first into the post. A suplex and small package get two each for Bret and it’s Five Moves of Doom time. Bret yells at the referee and gets rolled up for two before Bret starts going after the knee. He loads up the Sharpshooter but he has to knock Coach to the floor. The distraction lets Perfect get in a shot to take over. Perfect drops a leg between Bret’s legs but as he tries it again, Bret grabs the leg and puts the Sharpshooter on from his back. He turns the hold over and Perfect submits really fast but it’s good for Bret’s first singles title.

Rating: A. Oh come on it’s Bret vs. Perfect from Summerslam 91. Do I really need to explain this one? It’s one of the best matches of all time and holds up over twenty years later. The counter by Bret is a great way to show how solid of a mat wrestler he was. Kicking out of the PerfectPlex was the perfect idea as Bret took the champ’s best shots and still won. It’s still excellent and required viewing for wrestling fans.

Bret celebrates with his parents.

The Bushwhackers are ready for the Natural Disasters and Andre is ready for Earthquake, the man who broke his leg a few weeks back.

Natural Disasters vs. Bushwhackers

Andre looks terrible here and would be dead in less than 18 months. The Whackers sneak up on the big men on the floor and poke them in the eyes. We finally start with Butch vs. Typhoon and the big man being bitten on the trunks. Earthquake tries to come in but splashes his own partner by mistake. A double clothesline puts Quake down and the Bushwhackers are in full control.

Earthquake finally realizes he weighs more than both Bushwhackers put together and pounds Butch down with a few shots to the back. Heenan makes an obscure Newhart reference as Quake slams Butch into the corner but misses an elbow drop to the back. The second attempt connects though and it’s off to Typhoon for more fat man offense.

Off to an over the shoulder backbreaker on Butch which transitions into a bearhug by Earthquake. Heenan leaves to go find Hogan and embarrass him which we’ll get to later. Quake finally hits Typhoon with a clothesline by mistake as everything breaks down. The Bushwhackers hit Battering Rams on both Disasters but it’s finally the big men crushing Luke and the Earthquake for the pin.

Rating: D-. This was a waste of time and everyone knew it was going to be from the moment the bell rang. The Bushwhackers were the epitome of comedy bumpkins and there’s nothing wrong with that. I’m not sure why they picked them of all teams for Andre to back and the match was horrible.

Post match the Disasters go after Andre but the LOD comes out for the save. This was Andre’s last appearance for the company.

Heenan goes to Hogan’s dressing room with the NWA World Title to issue a challenge. “Hogan” (you never see him) opens the door and slams it in Heenan’s face. For the life of me I can’t get over seeing that belt in the WWF.

Virgil recaps his feud with DiBiase. You’re probably familiar with this one: Virgil was his bodyguard for years but at the Rumble, DiBiase pushed him just once too often and Virgil snapped. DiBiase lost to Virgil via countout at Wrestlemania and tonight it’s a rematch with the Million Dollar Title on the line.

Million Dollar Title: Ted DiBiase vs. Virgil

This is one of the very rare defenses of this title. DiBiase has Sensational Sherri with him. Piper is Virgil’s mentor so the commentary is going to be rather slanted. Virgil starts fast and hits three straight clotheslines to send DiBiase out to the floor. Heenan is back on commentary but doesn’t want to talk about Hogan. Virgil misses a dive to the floor and DiBiase sends him into the steps to keep him down. Back inside and Ted is in full control but he brags too much and gets caught in the Million Dollar Dream. The fans go nuts but Sherri comes in and blasts Virgil with her loaded purse for the DQ.

Rating: D. Actually hang on a minute.

The referee says the match MUST continue, sending Sherri to the back and Roddy into delirium. Virgil pounds on DiBiase in the corner but since he doesn’t have much experience he can’t do anything. He tries to whip DiBiase across the ring but gets countered into a ref bump to put both guys down. Ted yells at Piper like the true heel that he is before suplexing Virgil down. A piledriver lays Virgil out but sicne there’s no referee, DiBiase rips the turnbuckle off instead. Ted yells at Piper once too often though, allowing Virgil to ram him into the buckle twice for the pin and the title. Piper goes NUTS.

Rating: D+. This is a good example of a match where the crowd and announcing make it much better than it would have been otherwise. Virgil just wasn’t that good and this was his one and only storyline with the company due to there being nothing else to his character. How the guy kept a job for so many years with both WWF and WCW is beyond me.

The Mountie is ready for his Jailhouse Match with Boss Man. We get a clip of him shocking a handcuffed Boss Man from a few weeks ago. Moutnie insults the New York cops who take the loser to jail later tonight.

Boss Man says Mountie is going to jail tonight.

Mountie vs. Big Boss Man

Mountie talks trash to start so Boss Man punches him in the mouth to take over. They slug it out with Boss Man hitting a back elbow and a splash for two. Boss Man hits his running crotch attack to the back of Mountie’s neck followed by the sliding uppercut. Mountie dives into a good looking spinebuster for two but Boss Man chases Jimmy Hart instead of following up, earning him a trip into the steps.

Back in and Boss Man misses a splash in the corner as Heenan says it’s not Mayberry for the Boss Man tonight. Mountie gets two each off some elbows and a dropkick but the kickout sends him to the floor. He pulls Boss Man to the floor as Gorilla calls Jimmy a walking advertisement for birth control. Back in and they slug it out with Mountie hitting a piledriver for no cover. Instead Mountie gets his shock stick but only hits the mat. A hard uppercut sets up the Boss Man Slam for two (I don’t remember anyone not named Hogan kicking out of that) before another piledriver attempt is countered into an Alabama Slam to end Mountie.

Rating: D+. I’ve seen far worse and Boss Man’s high impact offense is always worth a look. This is the perfect blowoff to the feud which is something you rarely see anymore. Today feuds just keep going with some random gimmick match which may or may not fit the feud. This was the logical ending to it and it was tailor made for the blowoff. Why thy don’t do this anymore is beyond me.

Mountie is dragged away by cops.

DiBiase goes on a huge rant about the title, saying that Virgil stole it and he’ll get it back.

Bret says this is the best day of his career and he waited a long time to prove how great he is. I’m pretty sure we’re in intermission.

The Natural Disasters are going to eat the Legion of Doom for dinner.

Boss Man asks Sean Mooney what kind of bird can’t fly. A jailbird of course. He brags about winning a bit more.

Savage is nervous for the wedding.

Speaking of the wedding, here’s the phone number again, complete with a countdown clock for a five minute intermission. Seriously they just count down five minutes of dead air time. AND THIS WAS ON THE HOME VIDEO.

Mountie arrives at the jail and shouts that the cops can’t do this to him because HE’S THE MOUNTIE! He tries to read the cops their rights and gets thrown in a cell.

Jimmy Hart is panicking while his Nasty Boys are read for the LOD. It’s a street fight later tonight.

Mountie is tricked into having his picture taken.

The Legion of Doom wants the tag titles. Hawk says once they win the belts they’re going to chew up the Natural Disasters and spit them out “like the tartar that sticks to your teeth.”

Mountie yells about having being fingerprinted. These bits are so overblown that they’re hilarious.

Sgt. Slaughter and his cronies are excited about having a 3-2 advantage. Slaughter says he might have a surprise for later.

Sid Justice, the referee for the main event tonight, says that he’ll call it down the middle. Gene shows us a video of Slaughter and company offering Sid a spot on the team but Sid says they stopped him but he turned them down.

Tag Titles: Nasty Boys vs. Legion of Doom

The Nasties are defending and this is No Countout/No DQ, making it a street fight in modern terms. The champions are sent to the floor and the fight is on early. Back in the ring Animal hits a quick powerbomb on Knobbs for two followed by Hawk enziguring Sags down. We get down to the stupid tagging part of the street fight with Sags sending Hawk to the floor and hitting him with a bucket of water.

Back in and Knobbs works over Hawk in the corner before Sags sends him into the steps. A back elbow gets two for Knobbs and a top rope version gets the same for Sags. Brian goes up top again but jumps into Hawk’s boot, finally allowing for the hot tag off to Animal. Everything breaks down and Sags hits Animal in the back with Jimmy’s helmet for two. Hawk steals the helmet and lays out both Nasties, setting up the Doomsday Device on Sags for the pin and the titles.

Rating: D. This SUCKED as the street fight rule was barely used at all. It was little more than a few shots with the helmet when the referee wasn’t looking anyway. Hawk and Animal barely broke a sweat out there as they were already talking about the Natural Disasters earlier tonight instead of worrying about winning the belts. This win was a long time coming though.

The Mountie is put in a cell by some VERY sweaty policemen.

I.R.S. vs. Greg Valentine

Uh…..sure. Feeling out process to start so Gorilla recaps the show so far. Valentine takes over with a quick shoulder block and a clothesline. Somehow we’re nearly two minutes into the match with this much action. IRS rolls to the floor as Gorilla says Undertaker and Jake Roberts might be here. Back in and Valentine slams him down, sending IRS right back to the floor.

The tax guy heads in again and puts on an abdominal stretch followed by a jumping clothesline for no cover. Off to a chinlock before IRS misses a knee into the corner, giving Greg the opening on the leg. The Figure Four is quickly broken by a grab of the ropes and a second attempt at the hold is countered into a small package for the pin by IRS.

Rating: D. The match wasn’t even that bad but it had no business being on a pay per view. This would be the equivalent of the Divas match on a modern show to give the fans a breather between the big matches. Valentine was long past his point of being a star but he could still put people over like he did here.

Buy Hulk Hogan’s PPV, which is a Best of Hogan show. I’ve heard of worse ideas.

Hogan and Warrior talk about their victims in the main event.

Ultimate Warrior/Hulk Hogan vs. Sgt. Slaughter/Colonel Mustafa/General Adnan

Sid Justice is guest referee and Hogan is WWF Champion. Hogan and Slaughter get things going but the Sarge wants to stall. Slaughter pounds on him in the corner but gets caught between the right hands of both superheroes. Off to Warrior for a clothesline followed by a double big boot to put Slaughter down again. A clothesline gets two for Hogan and it’s back to Warrior. This is completely one sided so far. Hogan comes back in with a middle rope ax handle for two.

Sid breaks up some choking in the corner and the distraction lets Slaughter get in some shots on Hogan. Adnan, an old manager, comes in to rake Hogan’s back and slowly pound away in the corner. Off to Mustafa (Iron Sheik) for the gutwrench suplex and the camel clutch but Warrior makes the save. Slaughter comes back in to choke away in the corner and send Hogan into Sid for a staredown. Sarge jumps the distracted Hogan and stomps away on the back.

Warrior breaks up a top rope something by Slaughter, allowing for the hot tag to the painted one. Warrior cleans house on Slaughter but runs into Sid for another staredown. Back to Mustafa who gets caught in a suplex but Slaughter blocks a tag. Slaughter puts Warrior in a chinlock, only to have the Ultimate One fight up and clothesline Sarge down. There’s the hot tag to Hogan as Hogan chases the lackeys to the back with a chair. More on that later as Hogan throws powder in Slaughter’s face and drops the leg to win.

Rating: D+. I’m not a fan of this one as the match was never in doubt at all, but above that the Iraq War had been over for six months so the interest in the feud was done long ago. Nothing to see here but the fans reacted pretty well to it. This would have been better as a house show main event instead of the main event of Summerslam. If nothing else there was a match around this time on a Coliseum Video with Slaughter/Mustafa/Undertaker against the superheroes. Wouldn’t that make a much better main event here?

Hogan and Sid pose for a long time post match.

Mountie is in jail and a fat biker hits on him.

Hogan and Sid are STILL posing.

We get the video of Savage proposing to Liz and her responding with an OH YEAH. We also get a four minute music video highlighting their entire history together to a sappy love song.

The ring is set up like a chapel for the wedding. Savage comes out in a shiny tux with a big feather on his hat. Heenan: “Why is the second most important guy called the best man?” From what I’ve read this is a legit renewal of vows as the two were already married in real life. There isn’t much to say here other than it’s a wedding and no one interrupts it. This takes like ten minutes.

With the show in the arena done we go to the reception with Savage telling Heenan to beat it. Gene Okerlund does the ceremonial toast. They have the first dance and everything seems to be fine. Now we eat cake before heading over to the gift table where things get interesting.

First off, “WE GOT A BLENDER!!!” Savage freaks out as only he can as you would think he just got the WWF Title instead of a blender. Liz goes to open a present…..and there’s a cobra inside. She freaks out and Savage tries to pull her back, but Undertaker comes in and bashes him in the head with the urn. Jake Roberts comes in and holds the cobra in front of Liz’s face until Sid makes the save with a chair to end the show. This would set up Roberts vs. Savage in the feud of the year which resulted in Undertaker’s face turn.

Overall Rating: C-. This is an interesting show in that the first half is a much higher quality than the second half. The second half has all predictable matches where the winners were never in doubt, but that doesn’t exactly make it terrible. The show is definitely entertaining and set up a lot of stuff down the road while launching Bret Hart up to the next level. It’s worth a watch if you can find it in full but I wouldn’t expect to be blown away.

Ratings Comparison

British Bulldog/Ricky Steamboat/Texas Tornado vs. Warlord/Power and Glory

Original: D

Redo: C+

Bret Hart vs. Mr. Perfect

Original: A+

Redo: A

Natural Disasters vs. Bushwhackers

Original: C-

Redo: D-

Virgil vs. Ted DiBiase

Original: B

Redo: D+

Big Bossman vs. The Mountie

Original: D

Redo: D+

Legion of Doom vs. Nasty Boys

Original: D

Redo: D

Irwin R. Schyster vs. Greg Valentine

Original: D+

Redo: D

Hulk Hogan/Ultimate Warrior vs. Sgt. Slaughter/Colonel Mustafa/General Adnan

Original: D

Redo: D+

Overall Rating

Original: D

Redo: C-

Dang this show ticked me off the first time.

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

http://kbwrestlingreviews.com/2011/07/25/history-of-summerslam-count-up-1991-a-wedding-that-goes-badly-what-a-new-concept/

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 1991
Date: August 26, 1991
Location: Madison Square Garden, New York City, New York
Attendance: 20,000
Commentators: Bobby Heenan, Gorilla Monsoon, Roddy Piper

Obviously it’s a year later and there’s few differences. The main one is that Hogan is once again the world champion (stunning isn’t it?) and the Deadman has arrived. Other than that, there are very few differences. Hart is a singles wrestler now, so that’s the last major difference that I was forgetting. This card is really forgotten over time if you look at it from an historical standpoint.

The main event is Hogan and Warrior against Slaughter and his two cronies in a handicap match, meaning that Sheik Adnan al-Kaissie and the Iron Sheik are supposed to be equal to Hogan or Warrior? Remember Adnan? Neither do I. He was a manager in the AWA and that’s about it. The other big deal is tonight is the marriage of Savage and Elizabeth, because marriage, the most holy of unions, has to be on PPV right???

Other than that, this card is really forgettable. The main interesting point in this is what the Warrior did. He allegedly threatened to no show the PPV unless Vince paid him some obscene amount. He pulled this a few days before the PPV, and Vince really had no choice but to do what Warrior said.

This is where the “I couldn’t wait to fire him” line came from. Warrior got to the back after the match and was fired immediately. Other than that, there’s next to nothing of interest here, but I’ve seen worse cards be watchable, so maybe this one will be as well. Let’s find out.

Very standard opening with the song playing and the announcers talking about the big stuff that evening. Standard, but fine I guess.

Ricky Steamboat/Texas Tornado/British Bulldog vs. Warlord/Power and Glory

Steamboat is just called the Dragon here, and this is the famous scene where he’s dressed as a human lizard that breathes fire into the air. That’s a shame that he’s fallen this far this fast. He’d be back in WCW in just a few months where he was at least given some decent feuds and no stupid costume. Commentators completely ignore the match to talk about the matches later on in the show. Wait, they mentioned the six man.

You know I think these six…no it was just a quick thing about it. I feel like I’m watching a Nitro taping. Tornado comes in and all of a sudden they can’t stop talking about the match. I think that’s a bit of a shot at Steamboat by Vince. Literally, he was in there two and a half minutes and got one line about him. He leaves and the commentary is all about the match. We’re about 5 minutes into this and I’m still looking for a point to it.

I think it’s supposed to be Warlord vs. Bulldog, but I’m not sure really. It’s just a random group of faces vs. three heels with the same manager. I’m so utterly bored by this match that I can’t actually think of the words to explain it. It is just so standard and basic that I could see it at an FCW show. The wrestling is fine, but there’s no thought here at all. Faces win.

Rating: D. This was just so boring. Like I said, the wrestling was fine, but dang it was just there. There’s no thought, no story, no reason for this to take place. It’s an ok opener, but I would have wanted to see anything else.

Hey kids! Call this number if you want to hear a prerecorded comment from Savage or Liz about their fake wedding! Your parents won’t mind!

Mr. Perfect says he’s a great champion.

IC Title: Bret Hart vs. Mr. Perfect

Dang this was on second? This is by far and away the best match on the card and a lot of people, including Norcal, says that it’s one of the best matches ever. These two had such a magnificent chemistry together and it’s hardly ever been topped. I defy you to find a better pair of guys to have such consistent matches with. Stu and Helen are there…again. Has there ever been a match with Bret that they haven’t been at?

You don’t see them at Owen’s matches. No wonder Owen was the bitter one. Coach is there with Perfect, and sadly enough his death got NO coverage due to Misawa dying a day later. They start with a great set of back and forth stuff with no one being able to get an advantage. It’s one of those types of openings where you have a guy in control but he’s not dominating at all. Hart does that here by just having on a basic headlock.

Heenan continues to show why he’s as important as anyone on the roster as his lines about Bret’s parents make you want to cheer for Bret more than anyone else could. Perfect gets his singlet literally ripped apart by Hart which makes him look almost crazed about the match. He looks like he’s in a war despite this having been going about 7 minutes at this point. This is a great dynamic for a match as you have the young lion Bret facing the established veteran in Perfect, who has the exact same style.

Crowd is way into this one too, which is making it better. Perfect’s hair looks like he got a bad shock as his perm has practically exploded. He takes over though as Heenan is singing his praises. We get a hair toss, which isn’t something that you see that often in a men’s match. That would hurt like heck too. Imagine being tossed by your hair. If that’s going to happen to me I better be getting paid for it. There’s a good story playing out here as Perfect counters everything that Hart has.

Hart kicks out of the Perfect Plex as the fans and Heenan lose their minds. Heenan says that no one has ever done that, which is ridiculous as Warrior did it in 1990. Hart brings up the original 5 moves of doom to put Perfect in “a whole heap of trouble.” Coach breaks this up though so Perfect has control again. He drops a let between Bret’s legs and backflips out of it which is cool looking.

He does it again, and in one of the SWEETEST counters I’ve ever seen, Bret grabs his leg, puts the Sharpshooter on him on the mat from his back, spins him over and then pulls back on it for the tap out. That was freaking sweet. Bret runs over to his family to celebrate. We get to hear Stu’s voice, which I never recall hearing other than this.

Rating: A+. These guys were spot on the whole time. It was a nearly 20 minute match and I didn’t see a single botch or anything resembling a botch at all. That counter at the end was absolute perfection and it played so well into the rest of the match. These two had so much chemistry they might as well be a magnet high school. Great match all around.

Hulk Hogan has a special PPV coming up, which is nothing but his “biggest” matches. Forerunner to 24/7 I guess.

We cut to the back to see the Bushwackers and Andre the Giant, which has to the weirdest pairing of all time. Andre was completely gone at this point with big crutches holding him up. This is explained by Earthquake being the guy that injured him. This was his last major WWF appearance save for popping up at a battle royal in London a few months later, which wasn’t televised until on 24/7 and some special releases.

Bushwackers vs. Natural Disasters

It’s so sad to see the Bushwackers have to walk so slow to let Andre keep up with them. He just didn’t need to be out there at this point but you can see it in his eyes that he’s having a ball out there. His love for the business was so obvious and it’s a shame he wasn’t around for the big boom in the 90s, at least to see it if nothing else. Now in case you’re an idiot and can’t figure it out, this is a comedy match.

GREAT line by Piper. Heenan says if he were the manager of the Bushwackers he’s kill himself. Piper says go apply for the job. Piper was a freaking riot when he didn’t like someone. To further make this stupid, the Bushwackers beat them up to start. Can someone explain to me why this makes sense? Piper says that two guys from New Zealand are Americana personified. He can be a riot but he can also be a moron.

Heenan with a Larry, Darryl and Darryl joke to take the lead in the best commentator of the night race. Andre continues to point and grunt about various things. Heenan leaves to interview Hogan as the ND finally take control and the match gets boring in a hurry. Did the Wackers EVER do anything of note? I can’t remember anything.

Anyway, as expected, this ends with a Bushwacker, the one that licked me at a house show, getting pinned. Afterwards the Disasters go after Andre but the LOD run out for the save and the showdown that I’m not sure ever occurred.

Rating: C-. It was a comedy match. What do you really expect here? It was however, pretty short so it could have been far, far worse.

Heenan goes to Hogan’s dressing room with the NWA title to continue what should have been the biggest showdown of all time, but they somehow screwed it up. Heenan’s unveiling of the NWA Big Gold Belt in 91 still ranks in my top five most awesome moments in wrestling history. Hogan (never seen or heard) slams the door in his face.

More Savage/Liz phone line ads. Macho is shown on the phone line. This is just stupid.

DiBiase and Mooney recap the Virgil/DiBiase history. As bad as Virgil was, this match was actually kind of epic as the pop for Virgil finally turning was pretty big. This is the rematch from Mania 7 where Virgil won by countout.

Million Dollar Title: Ted DiBiase vs. Virgil

The wrestling here isn’t the appeal. Virgil has had very few matches at this point while DiBiase is one of the best in ring workers of all time. Surprisingly enough, DiBiase dominates early on. It’s pretty basic with punches and kicks with a roll-up here or there. There’s just not a lot to say about the first half of this match. Both guys are going pretty light out there which is fine I think, as it’s really more about the storyline than the match itself.

Piper was Virgil’s mentor so he’s cheering wildly for him. Heenan gets in a great line about Virgil being so dumb he’ll try to bronze the gold belt. After about 5 minutes of Virgil getting beaten up, he catches DiBiase in a Million Dollar Dream until Sherri runs in to cause the DQ as Piper absolutely snaps.

HOWEVER!

The referee decides that’s not fair and sends Sherri to the back while ordering the match to continue. Now we get a better match as they’re going a bit harder but Virgil is hurt after being hit by the loaded purse. DiBiase proceeds to kick his body guarding self from one side of the ring to the other, but the ref was bumped so we have no one to count the pin.

A piledriver (which is what love feels just like sometimes) puts him nearly out as DiBiase takes off the turnbuckle. Virgil counters and rams him in twice. I don’t like the ending though as it takes Virgil about 20 seconds to get the cover and the win. Piper goes insane over this.

Rating: B. As I said, this was all storyline and it was a very fun one. Virgil rising up to face DiBiase and say that he’d had enough, leading to the big blowoff of him winning the title that literally was DiBiase’s was just perfect. The wrestling was pretty bad, but the emotion makes up for it.

The Mountie says he’ll win tonight.

Big Bossman says he’ll win tonight.

Jailhouse Match: Big Bossman vs. Mountie

The loser spends a night in a New York jail, which is kind of an interesting idea. This was around the time that Mountie was using this stupid shock stick to attack people. Monsoon says this will be a classic. That’s just comical. Piper would finally beat Mountie as he had a vest or something that absorbed the electricity, which is actually brilliant. There’s all kinds of bad prison jokes by Heenan here as this is supposed to be a huge match.

Apparently the loser also gets arrested and will have a criminal record. Dude, seriously, this is absurd. I still can’t get over the fact that Mountie beat Bret Hart and Hogan. You’d think he was Edge or something. This is a pretty boring match as once again it’s all about storyline as the match really just doesn’t live up to the hype.

Gorilla says that Hart is the best advertisement for birth control he’s ever seen. It just kind of happens slowly and no one cares about this match. Bossman wins and they take Mountie to jail, in one of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen.

Rating: D. I can’t believe I liked this as a kid. The styles just didn’t mesh. Mountie was better when he wrestled as a light weight, not this. Boss Man was outliving his usefulness at this point, but that can be attributed to them never really giving him a serious push. This whole gimmick as just dumb and the match was even worse.

DiBiase is mad that he lost the title, which was stolen from him.

Hart is happy about winning the title.

Jimmy Hart is with the Natural Disasters and is FREAKING OUT over Mountie. This is a pretty funny bit from him. The Disasters want the LOD. That’s not a good idea.

Boss Man makes fun of the Mounite as we must be on an intermission.

Gene is talking to Savage who is nervous, so let’s plug his phone call thing.

Holy

Freaking

Goodness

They actually put the intermission clock on the screen! It’s 5 minutes of dead silence, with the Savage phone number on the screen. You can hear the crowd cheering something. Boy it would be fun to actually SEE what they’re cheering for wouldn’t it? This is freaking stupid. I’m sitting here for 5 minutes waiting on a clock to count down. Why in the world was this left on the home video? I don’t want to look at a countdown.

Right now I’d rather read a book or something like that. We would have had to pay for this back in the day. After turning off my Best of Starrcade DVD which is more interesting to look at the box of than this countdown, we come back…to the Summerslam logo! My goodness people wonder why no one bought wrestling PPVs back in the day. At least give us some promos or something. Is it really that hard to do?

We go straight to the jail, where Mountie is arriving. My goodness, WHY WASN’T THIS USED DURING THE BREAK? If you want to have a live intermission that’s cool but don’t waste the money of the people paying by making them watch a freaking clock. That’s just stupid. Yeah this isn’t funny.

The Nasty Boys are in the back and Jimmy is still losing it. This is going to be a street fight for the belts against the LOD. The champions leave but first, we go back the jail where Mountie is panicking over everything, this time being photographed which is apparently like taking his soul.

Gene is with the LOD who say this is right up their alley. This promo is more about the Natural Disasters than the title match they have next. But before that silly thing like a tag title match, we go back for more “comedy” as Mountie is offended by getting his fingerprints taken.

MORE promos as I’m just sick of these now. Slaughter and company say they’ll win. This is just freaking ridiculous as we’ve gone 20 minutes since the end of the last match.

Screw it I give up. Sid has to do a promo now since he’s the referee for the main event. Did we really need the 5 minute clock with all these promos? Was this intermission half an hour? We see a video of Sid being offered a spot with Slaughter’s team.

Tag Titles: Nasty Boys vs. Legion of Doom

What the heck, you mean you don’t want to interview the caterers? Like I said this is a street fight for the belts. It’s kind of funny hearing Gorilla have to play babysitter between the two commentators. LOD is WAY over. Piper says that stands for look out dummy. Actually I believe it stands for Legion of Doom there Roddy. Big brawl of course to start us off.

We talk about Sid a lot as the referee tries to get people to tag in and out. I will never get the point of that in a street fight. And after the first few minutes it becomes a regular tag match. Well sure why not. Hawk plays Ricky Morton in a weird casting decision. Sags hits a top rope elbow on Hawk for two as Animal saves.

Animal comes in off the fairly hot tag and yeah this is going to be dominance. The Nasties get in a helmet (Jimmy’s trademark with them for some reason) shot to Hawk which does nothing for the most part. Hawk hits both guys with it and the Device on Sags gives them their first WWF Tag Titles.

Rating: D. This was pretty weak for the most part. It started and ended fairly hot but the middle is just dull. It’s a tag team match for about 5 minutes and the rest is nothing at all. There’s nothing here worth anything other than the LOD getting their first tag titles which took them forever to get. Pretty weak here but it was quick. One thing though: did ANYONE not see the title change coming? Anyone? Nah I didn’t think so.

Uh oh. I think that crazy Mountie might be up to more hijinks. Let’s see what kind of shenanigans he’s gotten himself into this time, that little rascal. Oh look at this! That hilarious Mountie got put inside a cell! What kind of improbably circumstances could he find himself in there? Wait and see!

Survivor Series promo.

I.R.S. vs. Greg Valentine

Yep, it’s a filler on a show with a 5 minute intermission. I wonder if this qualifies for the worst booked show of all time. Valentine was completely done at this point and this was to do nothing but put over Irwin. Both guys here are great workers though so if you can ignore the stupidity of putting this on next to last after the ridiculous amount of filler we’ve already had, this could be a good match.

Apparently Roberts and Taker are in Madison Square Garden which is a huge deal. Yeah it’s not like those two could be on the card or something like that. Oh hey, did you hear that Mountie is in jail? Not sure if I made that clear, but Mountie is in jail for the night. About five minutes into this match, we address it. Remember what I said about this might be ok? I was wrong, this match sucks.

Valentine puts the figure four on him but he gets to the ropes without really selling it at all. He goes for it again and gets rolled up with a shoulder up and kicking out before the three, but I guess the referee says end this suckage now and I’ll buy you an Air Supply album. That’ll keep Valentine distracted for hours.

Rating: D+. I feel so bad for guys like this when the commentators aren’t the least bit interested in the match. At least give them something to work on. No one wanted to see this and it would have been better being much earlier in the show. It was pretty bad, but if the announcers had actually tried, it would have been at least watchable.

Hogan says to buy his PPV in the fall.

Hogan and Warrior are feeling patriotic apparently. The big problem with the whole Iraq storyline was this: the war had ended 6 months ago. There’s a running story/joke that Vince was hoping the war went until May so the main event of Mania would have made sense. Of course, since the writers were lazy even back then, which I believe the writers consisted of Vince back then, let’s just keep it going for another 6 months instead of having a real main event at Summerslam.

Slaughter/Mustafa/Adnan vs. Hogan/Warrior

Let me make this clear: no one cares. Sid is the referee instead of having him face Warrior in what could have been a big match, or a Warrior/Hogan vs. Slaughter rematch which also would have been an interesting match. Ok no it wouldn’t have been but it would have been a real main event. The world champion is in a freaking handicap match at Summerslam. This is so stupid. Let’s get this nonsense over with please.

In case you can’t tell, I freaking hate this show. The faces dominate early as the fans cheer and no one is surprised. The only interesting thing here is to watch Warrior as he knows it’s his last match. Nothing special from him as Hogan gets beaten down and has to get beaten up by a couple of 50 year olds. He even takes the camel clutch from the man he beat for the world title 7 and a half years ago. That’s just weird to think about.

Hulkamania was born less than 8 years before this. They actually acknowledge that he’s the Sheik which I didn’t remember them doing. Hogan makes his comeback and tags Warrior, who beats up the heels but then gets beaten down himself. My goodness where do they come up with this brilliant storytelling? I’ve never seen anything like it (tonight at least)!

Warrior with his comeback and then it’s a brawl, no one is interested, Warrior grabs a chair and chases the two near senior citizens to the back because he can’t beat them on his own where he’s promptly fired. Hogan uses some powder and pins Slaughter with Sid doing absolutely nothing of note the entire match. Posing ensues as Sid joins him. This was a BIG waste of time.

Rating: D. There is absolutely no thought in this match at all. It’s two faces against three heels. I don’t think there was any buildup, and if there was it’s not mentioned here. Hogan was about to drop the title to Taker in two months, and Taker isn’t even on the card.

There was a home video released where this same match happened, but Taker was in it instead of the old guy not named Iron Sheik. Now wouldn’t that have been better here? This was called the Match Made In Hell. That’s a perfect title, because it would be perfect in the 8th circle of eternal torment. Horrible match and I’m glad it’s over.

And one more time, we see the Mountie in jail, this time being hit on by a fat biker. See, it’s funny because the biker wants to screw Mountie. See why that’s funny? I want to make sure it’s known that this is designed to be a joke, because I don’t think they made it clear enough. That’s a bit risqué for 1991.

We get the whole promo of Savage proposing to Liz, as this is the match made in heaven. See what they did? Match made in heaven and its opposite? See how intelligent Vince was to imply one was good and one was bad? Oh yeah that’s awesome indeed. In case that’s not enough emotion for you, we get a 4 minute music video, highlighting their entire history. The thing at Mania was amazing stuff and for the simple reason of it was spontaneous. This is just overkill.

The wedding is of course in the middle of the ring, which is of course set up to look like a chapel. Savage comes out first, in his hat, which has a, I’m not making this up, two foot high feather on it. We even have stupid flower girls and ring bearers. Could this get any sappier? Liz comes out looking stunning of course as the only thing that’s appealing about the whole thing. They say I do and the show ends.

Now for the actual good part: the reception. This was a bonus on some versions of the tape that has some of the best comedy I’ve ever seen. We get the standard stuff: toast, first dance, cake, etc. One thing that’s funny here is Gene says Mr. and Mrs. Macho. Shouldn’t it be Mr. and Mrs. Savage? Now we get to the really good part, as they open their wedding gifts.

Savage opens one and finds a blender. “WE GOT A BLENDER!!!” For some reason this is just freaking hysterical to me. He sounds like he won the WWF Title or something. Anyway, they get some candlesticks to which Savage shouts that next time they should send money. Liz looks at him, wondering what’s this about next time. Savage turns back and yells KIDDING! Then it kicks off as Liz opens a box to find a King Cobra.

Taker appears out of nowhere and blasts Savage in the head with the urn. Did no one see the SEVEN FOOT TALL GUY IN ALL BLACK AND A COWBOY HAT??? Jake comes in with a snake handler’s glove and another snake, yet no one stopped him either. Sid comes in with a wooden chair to run them off as we end with me laughing my head off at it.

Overall Rating: D. This show sucked. It has ONE good match. The rest is bad comedy and a horrible main event. I literally couldn’t remember what the main event was at this show when I was trying to think of it the other day. That should happen at Judgment Day or something, not freaking SUMMERSLAM.

Half the show was dedicated to an unfunny angle that was a waste of time. There is one match that’s bringing this up to a D from an F-. Watch that, and that’s it. This might be the worst of the big four that I’ve ever seen, including WM 11.

 

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

Superstars
Date: June 20, 1992
Location: Rupp Arena, Lexington, Kentucky
Commentators: Vince McMahon, Mr. Perfect

This one might seem random but it’s a more personal option for me. In this case, it’s because a four year old KB was in the audience for this show and since my best friend’s dad used to run the Rupp Arena box office, I was on the aisle in the front row. Therefore, it’s going to be a rather fun night of looking back and seeing how many times I can see myself. Let’s get to it.

Opening sequence.

The announcers talk about…..National Pest Control Week? Perfect makes a bunch of bug jokes and goes off to find a can of Raid.

Legion of Doom vs. Barry Hardy/Tom Bennett

It’s so strange to wonder how many people I might know in the crowd shots. Hawk runs Bennett over with ease and hands it off to Animal for the powerslam. The Beverly Brothers pop in to call the Legion of Doom the Legion of Sissies because they’re mamas boys in makeup. Hardy comes in and gets clotheslined in the corner. The Doomsday Device completes the destruction.

UPDATE! With Gene Okerlund! And brought to you by WWF Ice Cream Bars!

WWF Champion Randy Savage can wrestle or brawl and is willing to do whatever he has to do to beat Ric Flair. He’s living on the edge of a lightning bolt and won’t apologize for that. Savage will even consider BREAKING THE RULES to retain the title.

Mr. Perfect and Ric Flair say Savage is living on borrowed time in Flair’s shoes. It is Flair’s destiny to be champion again.

Papa Shango vs. Chris Hahn

Shango TERRIFIED me back in the day and the same is true for Hahn. Ask my mom, who can be seen as he walks to the ring. Actually hang on as Hahn’s hand is suddenly on fire so there’s no match as he gets medical attention. Well yeah he probably should.

EVENT CENTER! With Sean Mooney!

Crush (Crush: “Hi. I’m Crush.”) likes to crush things but he’d rather thank the fans for sticking by him. He’s not nice or friendly but he’s fair, which wrestlers will find out when they face him. There is no Hawaiian accent to speak of here and it would do a lot of good, just for the sake of personality.

The Nasty Boys want competition. There is no point to this other than reminding us that they exist and

Sgt. Slaughter vs. Red Tyler

And there I am, with Papa KB holding me up for possibly my first ever high five from a wrestler. At another show, I would get Slaughter’s helmet so this one means a bit more to me than it should. Slaughter hammers and chokes away in the corner to start as we hear from the Mountie and Jimmy Hart, who are ready for the mother of all battles, even on Father’s Day. The Slaughter Cannon sets up another Slaughter Cannon for two with Slaughter pulling him up. Instead it’s the Cobra Clutch for the easy win.

Buy WBF Magazine, with an article on the long term effects of steroids.

Repo Man vs. Brian Costello

Repo Man, who apparently rode over on a repossessed ten speed bicycle, chokes on the ropes to start as we get the inset promo from British Bulldog, who is coming for Repo Man. A kick to Costello’s leg sets up a half crab for the submission. AHA! So Repo Man is Lance Storm!

Post match Repo Man ties his feet together with the rope for a pull around the ring.

EVENT CENTER! WITH THE NERVE TO HAVE A THIRD OF THESE THINGS ON ONE SHOW!

Bret Hart has been under a lot of pressure since becoming Intercontinental Champion but he likes the heat. He even likes it from Shawn Michaels, who can have a title shot, just like anyone else.

Rick Martel is a model, and he’s even better now that he has Tatanka’s buffalo feathers. Everyone is wearing them because he’s a trendsetter. I love how clear they make the gimmicks back in the day. How many people today can you explain almost in full in one sentence? Not everyone can be like that but it helps to have some of them around.

Crush vs. Brooklyn Brawler

Hey there we are again. Crush gets reversed into the corner and punched a bit, only to have the power game get him out of trouble. Perfect wishes his dad a happy Father’s Day as Vince talks about how awesome Perfect’s dad was. A torture rack backbreaker sets up the head vice to finish Brawler in short order.

Gene brings out Shawn Michaels and Sherri, carrying the mirror, for a chat. Sherri doesn’t think it’s vain because Shawn deserves this much attention. Shawn can’t blame anyone for wanting to look at him because he’s the hottest thing he’s ever seen. Gene: “Oh it’s on fire all right.” In addition to the best looking man in the company, Shawn sees the next Intercontinental Champion. He’s surprised that they didn’t beef up security for Bret because Shawn is still in the building. That’s enough for right now though because Shawn is worried about the women rushing the barricade. Here’s looking at you kid.

We go down to Miami, Florida where Razor Ramon pulls up in a custom made Cadillac to talk about how people in the Caribbean are living like pigs with people telling him what to do. No one tells him what to do though and he’s coming to the WWF. No one is going to tell him what to do there either because he is el jefe.

Undertaker vs. Dwayne Gill

Undertaker slowly knocks him down and hits the chokeslam with some additional choking. Old (When was it new?) School sets up the jumping clothesline and the Tombstone completes the greatest hits squash.

Post match, Gill gets the body bag treatment. Vince wants to see Mr. Fuji and the Berzerker get the same treatment. Can’t he just fire them instead?

Shawn Michaels has LEFT THE BUILDING.

Money Inc. vs. Rock Werner/Butler Stevens

Non-title and we get one final shot of the three of us during Money Inc.’s entrance. Stevens gets kicked in the face and double clotheslined early on as we go to a Money Inc. inset interview. It’s Father’s Day and they like the Founding Fathers, or at least hose on 50s and 100s. The Write Off (jumping clothesline) finishes Werner in a hurry.

ONE MORE EVENT CENTER! IT’S LIKE THIS SHOW’S WRESTLING ISN’T ENOUGH TO FILL OUT A SHOW!

High Energy want the Nasty Boys. They call them the Fat Boys, but it’s not ok for the Beverly Brothers to call the LOD the Legion of Sissies?

Tatanka wants his feathers back. Now that’s a unique complaint.

A preview for next week wraps us up.

This show is certified 100% Grade A Ground Beef. That’s the best branding they can come up with?

Overall Rating: D+. This is what you had until Raw came on the air and really, there are a lot of elements from this era that I’d like to see come back today. How many people got a thirty second promo to let you know that they’re still here? It’s not much and a lot of them didn’t advance anything but it lets you know that they’re still there. That’s better than having people go weeks and weeks without making an appearance. I get that you can’t have two minute long squashes throughout the show, but cutting the match lengths down to get more people involved would be a good place to start.

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