Battlebowl

Legacy Review

Battlebowl

November 20, 1993 from the Pensacola Civic Center in Pensacola, FL

Commentary: Tony Schiavone and Jesse Ventura

After being featured on the past two Starrcades, Battlebowl (and by extension the Lethal Lottery though that name strangely isn't used on this show) takes over as its own PPV in the brand new November WCW PPV slot. Teams are "randomly" drawn throughout the night to participate in 20 minute time limit tag matches, and the winners all face each other at the end in the Battlebowl battle royale for the grand prize of the night. Sadly, this not being a New Japan show, it's not a big honking trophy.

Mean Gene and Fifi are handling the drawing duties tonight. Vader hilariously knocks over the blonde jobber in front of him whose name I honestly can't recall when his name is called. Okerlund calls for Kole (Booker T) but Kane (Stevie Ray) comes out instead. Tony says "It's one of Harlem Heat, who cares?". Booker's reaction to his brother getting stuck with Charlie Norris is also pretty funny, and understandable.

WCW World Heavyweight Champion Big Van Vader and Cactus Jack (w/Harley Race) def Charlie Norris and Kane in 7:34- Big shock recent blood rivals Vader and Jack end up on the same Lethal Lottery team. As soon as they see each other on the ramp they start fighting. Vader punches Race! It didn't look accidental either, Vader just wanted him out of the way. The other team slowly works their way in and the bell rings with Jack and Kane in the ring. Race convinces Vader to see the big picture, you gotta win to get in Battlebowl. Vader pummels Kane on the floor. Jack punches Vader aside. Race manages to make peace between them. Give that man a Nobel Peace Prize, he'd be far from the worst winner its ever had. Tony goes through their history, mentioning amnesia and Cleveland. Yeah, we don't actually ever need to bring any of that up again thanks Tony. Vader tags in with zero issue and scalps Norris. Vader bomb! He tosses Norris to the floor, and holds him for Jack to hit a cannonball senton off the apron! Bang bang! Norris might be legit knocked loopy, Vader tries to whip him and he just spins in a circle. Or that might just be Norris. Vader tackles him anyway. Jack hits a back suplex. Kane breaks the pin up, gets tagged in and gets some offense in. A Norris big boot sends Jack to the floor. Norris runs out of moves and hooks in a chinlock. Vader says screw your rest holds. Jack kick wham DDT on Kane. Tag to Vader. He fantastically no sells all of Norris' offense and runs him over to a pretty big pop. Big splash. He lifts Norris up for a powerbomb, legit loses his balance and gets saved by the ropes. It was ugly, but that gets the pin. Vader and Jack put in enough effort into the wrestling and angle to make this borderline watchable despite all the dead weight they had to drag. *1/2

We cut back to Okerlund and he's molesting Fifi. "She looks good enough to eat, I don't mind saying". Talk about lines that would be a lawsuit nowadays. This stuff goes on all night every time they cut to Okerlund and Fifi. It gets old really quick.

 

WCW World Tag Team Champion Brian Knobbs and Johnny B Badd (w/Missy Hyatt) def Erik Watts and Paul Roma in 12:56- Well. We have three guys of various degrees of suckage, and Badd, who's getting better but not nearly good enough to carry all this. Roma and Badd start. Knobbs gets mad at Badd for breaking clean. They do a bunch of hip toss reversals that go into the ropes. Knobbs is still mad. A couple of speed runs end with Badd armdrags. Knobbs tags in and knocks Roma around, then tells Badd that's how you do it. Knobbs super sells a Watts kneelift and gets dropkicked to the floor. Now Badd's mad at him. Badd tags in and has a Code of Honor handshake with Watts before going into some fair play wrestling. When Knobbs gets back in he goes back to the fisticuffs before running into Watts armdrags. More arguing. Badd and Watts mat wrestle some more. Double back elbow on Badd for 2. Roma hits a powerslam. Hyatt distracts the ref and Knobbs elbows him from behind. Knobbs trips Roma. Badd hesitates to follow up. Hyatt wants Badd to attack Roma on the floor and he refuses. Even Tony is telling him to try to win the damn match at this point. Knobbs suplex for 2. Abdominal stretch. Badd, predictably, refuses to play the illegal leverage game. Roma gets a boot up when Knobbs comes off the second rope, hits an enzuguri and tags. Watts hot tag run. He hits Knobbs with a crossbody. Knobbs rolls through it, grabs a handful of tights and gets the pin. Badd is unhappy about how they won but it won't stop him from being in the final later. If they cut the match in half it might have been OK, but the second half drug ass. 1/2*

 

The Shockmaster and "Mr. Wonderful" Paul Orndorff def WCW World Television Champion Lord Steven Regal and Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat (w/Sir William) in 12:26- Tony points out the past three TV champs are in this match. Ventura: "And Shockmaster fell through a wall!". Shockmaster starts out the "Paula" chants and Orndorff gives him a "c'mon man" look. Steamboat and Orndorff start with some speed. Steamboat skins the cat and pulls Orndorff to the floor. Chop/punch exchange. Steamboat catches Orndorff coming off the top rope and hits a kneelift for 2. Orndorff lays in some corner forearms. A Steamboat atomic drop in the corner leads to a collision of heads and both guys tag out. Regal looks at Shockmaster, has a think about what he's getting into then gets tossed right out of the lockup. Regal switches gears and tries to maneuver around him. Shockmaster no sells a European uppercut. He catches a Regal crossbody and slams him. Orndorff and Shockmaster have a disagreement and Shockmaster starts up the Paula chants again. Well that's just mean. Orndorff and Regal have a Code of Dishonor handshake and crank up some....straight up, above board wrestling. Steamboat is on the apron getting more agitated by the minute. If you were coming into this cold you'd think he was the heel and Regal and Orndorff were the faces. They swap a full nelson around with Regal getting a sweet escape using Orndorff's leg. Steamboat's had enough of the fair play and tags himself in. Orndorff catches him on a leapfrog and gives him a hot shot. Shockmaster misses an elbow drop. Regal refuses to tag back in. Shockmaster makes him and flips him in. Regal dodges an avalanche. He covers, then quickly rolls off and Orndorff elbow drops Shockmaster. Regal grabs the brolly from William. Steamboat naturally has an issue with that and tries to take it away. Regal ends up taking it in the face. Shockmaster splashes him and covers for the pin. Rock solid with some fun psychology. **1/2

Next up is some hype for the big 10th anniversary Starrcade next month. We cut to video footage of Okerlund hosting a press gaggle to announce the show's host city. Vader and Race are present as well. Apparently it's been an Olympic style bidding process, with bids coming in from all over the world, but the big winner is.....Charlotte, NC. Right down the road from where the first Starrcade was, the old Jim Crockett home base in Greensboro. Ric Flair comes in, says he wants to be in the main event again and hands Vader a contract. Vader lists all the guys he's put out of action the past year and tells Flair he needs to sweeten the pot. Flair says to read the contract. It says that if Flair doesn't take the title from Vader at Starrcade, he will retire from wrestling. Vader happily accepts.

 

WCW United States Heavyweight Champion "The Natural" Dustin Rhodes and King Kong def The Equalizer and Awesome Kong in 5:55- Poor Dustin is going to snap his back in half trying to carry this thing. I'd say it took years off his career, but he's still wrestling for a major promotion in 2022 so that joke doesn't really work. He starts off outwrestling Equalizer. Equalizer counters a backdrop and tags out. Kong 1 (they're completely indistinguishable) no sells some dropkicks, so Dustin eye pokes him and dropkicks him in the back, then rolls him up for 2. Dustin tags out and it's Kong on Kong. Except it's not, as Kong 2 has no interest and tags right back out. Dustin armdrags Equalizer and now Kong 2 will get in. It's slow motion wrestling time. Slugfest. Dustin bionic elbows Kong 1 for 2. A sunset flip triggers the night's first proper donnybrook. The three useless slugs all pile on top of each other in a corner. Dustin bulldogs a Kong (who knows if it's the right one or not) and gets the pin. 1/4*

 

WCW World Tag Team Champion Jerry Saggs and Sting (w/Missy Hyatt) def Ron Simmons and Keith Cole in 13:14- Keith Cole (not to be confused with Harlem Heat's Kole) is one half of the Cole Twins tag team. The Cole Twins are....well put it this way, if you look up "vanilla jobbers" in the dictionary there's a picture of the Cole Twins. Simmons is in the midst of one of those slow burn heel turns where he's pissed off at the world for disrespecting him, he was world champion dammit (to which he had a point). After arguing on both sides over who's going to start Saggs and Simmons lock up. Simmons cranks up the speed and hits a football tackle. Cole comes in and does arm work. "We want Sting" chant. Saggs hits a short clothesline and plays with the crowd by refusing to tag Sting in. Cole with an armdrag. Double reverse elbow on Saggs for 2. Now he'll tag out. Sting and Simmons shake hands and hook it up. Simmons hits shoulderblocks. It looks like they mess up a roll up, then Sting almost legit runs the ref over hitting the ropes. He gives Simmons some shoulderblocks back. Cole and Sting compare their near identical hairstyles. Sting with a backslide for 2. Saggs walks into an armdrag. Once again Cole locks in an armbar. I think he's taking the List of 1004 Holds a little too literally. Saggs works Simmons over a bit. Sting with a crossbody and clothesline on Simmons. They get in the ropes again. Simmons breaks, then turns around and punches Sting right in the mouth! That changed things. Tony is shocked. SHOCKED I tell you. Simmons powerslam. Cole comes in and goes right for ANOTHER ARMBAR. Someone get this kid a new move. Simmons loses patience with him and tags back in. He pummels Sting down some more, then tags back out for Cole to finish him off. With what? To the shock of no one he grabs a wristlock. Punishing finisher you got there kid. Simmons is exasperated. Sting backdrops Cole and rolls through some rapid fire power moves. Stinger Splash! But Saggs blind tagged himself in when Sting hit it. Saggs goes up top, drops an elbow, and that's all that's needed to finish Cole off. After the bell Simmons takes his frustrations out on Cole and plants him with a spinebuster. Cole was bloody useless, Saggs was Saggs, but the whole Sting/Simmons dynamic was a ton of fun and they had good wrestling chemistry to boot. **3/4

 

"Nature Boy" Ric Flair and "Stunning" Steve Austin (w/Col. Robert Parker) def 2 Cold Scorpio and Maxx Payne in 14:31- Lots of Flair/Austin disagreement as they've also had a side feud going. Flair lets Austin start with Payne. An Austin takedown attempt fails and Flair struts on the apron. Austin loses another exchange, reaches for a tag and gets some Slick Ric in return. Austin spends another couple of minutes making Payne look good, then Austin and Scorpio have a nice back and forth sequence, other than the blocked hiptoss that almost put Austin down on his head. Austin bails and finally Flair tags. He has a good mat wrestling exchange with Scorpio. They need a couple of tries at the bridge up spot. Flair slips out of a backslide fight. WOOOOOOOO! He fakes a tag out to Austin. Payne slams Flair off the top. Flair dodges an elbow drop and tags. Austin takes a backdrop and slides out. Flair lays in the chops on Scorpio. Scorpio hits a tackle in the corner and suplex. They trade standing switches and Scorpio rolls Flair up for 2. Another huge chop floors Scorpio. Scorpio hits a superkick on Austin. He goes up top. Austin knocks him down and joins him. Superplex! Arrogant cover by Austin only gets 2. Scorpio does a Bret bump and Flair hits a kneedrop for 2. Austin hooks in an abdominal stretch. He grabs the top rope for illegal leverage. Flair has none of it, and all the good teamwork they'd had over the last few minutes goes out the window as they start shoving again! Cooler heads prevail and Flair gets back on Scorpio. Chops and delayed suplex for 2. Austin kneedrop off the top. Payne breaks the pin up. Scorpio counters and Austin runs face first into the top buckle. Spinning kick and both guys are down. Tags on both sides. Flair gets right on Payne. Payne no sells chops, punches Flair across the ring and hits a backdrop. Flair dodges and Payne goes knee first into the corner. Figure four! Payne quickly gives it up as Austin holds Scorpio back. Scorpio held his end up fine but this match was all Flair and Austin being awesome. Unfortunately the teased feud between them would fizzle out because it would have been fantastic and WCW couldn't have that. Austin would finally get his long promised US title run in '94, but how good would a proper Austin/Flair world title feud have been? ***1/2

 

WCW International World Heavyweight Champion "Ravishing" Rick Rude and Shanghai Pierce def Tex Slazenger and Marcus Alexander Bagwell in 14:50- Rude tosses Bagwell around to start with. Forearms and release suplex. Rude fights out of Slazenger arm work and tags Pierce. Rude: "Beat his ass!". The regular heel partners refuse to fight and a frustrated Rude tags back in. Pierce hits him on the way out and Slazenger takes advantage. Bagwell and Pierce do some stuff. Bagwell splash for 2. Rude comes back in and doesn't seem at all interested in letting Bagwell get anything in. He's ornery tonight. Bagwell and Pierce do some more stuff. Rude pulls the top rope down and Bagwell falls to the floor. Apron shot. Back in Rude gives Bagwell a front suplex. Gutbuster. Pierce knee off the second rope for 2. Rude hooks in a bear hug. They do the phantom tag spot and Rude and Pierce get a double team in. A WCW watermark suddenly appears on the screen. Sadly it's about the most interesting thing in this match. Why now? Did the Turner graphic boys just now figure out how to do it? "Hey, what's this button do.....well would you look at that. Should we keep it?". Pierce hits a big boot and gutwrench powerbomb. Slazenger breaks the pin up! Bagwell crawls under Pierce's legs and tags. Now Pierce and Slazenger go at it! It's an all out brawl! The ref misses Rude getting a blind tag so they have to do it again. Rude comes in, nails Slazenger with the Rude Awakening, and good night. After the match Pierce and Slazenger make up by beating Bagwell up some more. This was way too long for what they had to offer. A pissed off looking Rude working Bagwell super stiff and refusing to let him do anything on offense for no discernible reason was amusing though. *1/2

 

Road Warrior Hawk and Rip Rogers def "The British Bulldog" Davey Boy Smith and Kole in 7:55- Oh yeah, Rogers is the blonde jobber that Vader bowled over back at the start of the show. We laughed at him then, but he went on to be WWE's trainer of the stars in the OVW years. Rogers is really, really excited about being teamed with Hawk. Hawk gets annoyed and punches him out on the apron. Both Bulldog and Kole kick him while he's down. Literally. He's still on the apron when the bell rings and Hawk has to wrestle by himself. He and Bulldog have some lockup stalemates, then a test of strength stalemate. Kole gets pissed at Bulldog for the kid gloves treatment so Bulldog tags him in. Kole pounds Hawk down. Hawk pounds back and slams Kole. SPINAROONIE! Was that the first one ever? Kole pops up with a clothesline. Side suplex for 2. Rogers has reached the ring apron. Kole hits him again. Very lethargic and frankly dull back and forth while Bulldog stands on the apron and openly roots for his opponent Hawk. Hawk's actually selling though. After a few minutes Rogers is about to his feet. Hawk scoops him up, presses him, and throws him into Kole. I guess the ref considered that a tag because he counts the pin. Yeesh. 3/4*

Commentary kills some time making Battlebowl predictions and Okerlund has a hot mic moment where he says something like "Am I throwing a curve to Ventura for crying out loud?". Tony and Ventura keep it professional though Tony looks like he's about to bust out laughing.

 

Battlebowl Battle Royale- Rogers is still wobblelegged. Everyone stares down in the ring until Hawk says screw this and grabs someone, and everyone follows suit. This year there's a very specific rule that throwing over the top to the entrance ramp does not count as an elimination, it has to be all the way to the floor. That's one side of the ring completely useless then. Rogers quickly goes out. Vader's mask is off. Pierce is eliminated. Shockmaster is sitting on Orndorff. Flair and Austin find each other and take the fight to the floor. Orndorff dumps Badd onto the ramp. Badd was supposed to be eliminated, so he gets back in so Orndorff can dump him out on a different side. Kong and Shockmaster have some superheavyweight action. Jack sets Vader up for a suplerplex. They stand there forever before Vader finally throws Jack back down. I think they were going to do the superplex but no one would get out of the way for them. Vader eliminates Jack. Dustin eliminates Orndorff. Shockmaster clotheslines Kong but he can't get over the top so they have another go at it. Kong is gone. The Nastys run up and dump Shockmaster. Vader presses Sting but dumps him on the ramp. Race thinks Sting should be gone. Vader and Flair pair off. At this point with 9 guys left the match really bogs down with a long no eliminations stretch, right at the point it should be picking up steam. Vader and Rude have a moment, highlighting the fact the WCW world title is technically disputed. Sting wipes out both Nastys but Vader hits him from behind before he can dump them. Commentary starts to get antsy at the lack of plot development. Austin and Dustin fight on the floor. Dustin gets posted and busted open big time but keeps going. Dustin eliminates Knobbs. He lifts Saggs up but Austin comes in and throws them both out. Hawk eliminates Rude. Vader eliminates Hawk. It's down to the final four: Vader, Austin, Sting and Flair. They pair off but with a lot of visible confusion on where to go. Typical WCW planning. Flair dodges a Vader avalanche. Flair and Race fight on the ramp. Flair suplexes Race on the ramp! That gives Vader an opening to come in with an elbow drop. He splashes Flair on the ramp! Sting and Austin join the fray on the ramp. A stretcher comes out to haul Flair away. The other three guys stand around while Race tries to get more shots in (you can see it on the wide shot, they're literally standing and waiting). Once Flair's been carted out and declared unable to continue by the refs Sting hulks up in the ring. Austin whips Sting into a Vader tackle. Sting gets knocked around between the heels. Vader hits some splashes. Sting dodges and goes in hulk up mode again. Austin gets him back down. Vader bomb. Sting dodges Austin coming off the top. Vader accidentally avalanches Austin. Sting dumps Austin onto the ramp. Vader clotheslines Sting onto the ramp. Austin rolls to the floor, which means he is now eliminated. Never change, WCW. Sting is still in it thanks to the ramp rule. He gets back in and he and Vader go back at it with the look of two guys who want nothing more than to hit the showers and get to the hotel and/or bar. Eventually Vader dodges a Stinger Splash and Sting falls to the floor to give Vader the win and make him the 3rd Battlebowl winner. Nearly 30 minutes was way too much for this. It's amazing how the layout of most WCW battle royales look like they were put together by a class of second graders that had never watched a wrestling match before. Flair's stretcher job was good build for Starrcade, but everything after that was textbook going through the motions and killing time from three normally ubertalented guys. There's also a strong argument to be made for an Austin win here to help elevate him even more, but that would require something like forward planning on WCW's part. *

OVERALL SHOW THOUGHTS- Another dreary PPV in WCW's disastrous second half of '93, but this one is aided by the fact that there's some entertainment value built into the Lethal Lottery thanks to the surprise drawings and odd couple tag team dynamics. The Lethal Lottery and Battlebowl concept would be shelved after this and only brought back one more time by WCW, at Slamboree '96. Meanwhile, after a year break the November PPV in '95 would feature another new twist on the battle royale format: World War 3.

OVERALL SHOW GRADE: C-

In Your House 10: Mind Games

Legacy Review

In Your House 10: Mind Games

September 22, 1996 from the CoreStates Center in Philadelphia

Commentary: Vince McMahon, Jim Ross and Mr. Perfect

Another piece of the coming Attitude Era falls into place, as this is the first PPV after Vince Russo was promoted to a more prominent position within the creative team. The change is immediately apparent.

Caribbean Strap Match: Savio Vega def Justin "Hawk" Bradshaw (w/Uncle Zebekiah) in 7:07- Bradshaw is the future JBL. He had a brief run out at Summerslam but this is his first PPV match. This was set up during the Free For All when Bradshaw bitched to Vince about not being booked while Vega was defeating Marty Janetty, then he attacked Vega again like he had done at Summerslam. Good thing Vega always traveled with a strap in the bag just in case I guess. Vega charges right in and gets whipped. Bradshaw chokes him with the strap. More whipping. Finally ref Harvey Wippleman gets Vega strapped up. As soon as he does and the match is fully legal Bradshaw goes right for corners. Vega stops him at 2 and falls out of the ring. Bradshaw gets pulled into the post. As Vega walks around on the floor he gets beer spit in his face by a fan! Wait, it's not a fan, IT'S SANDMAN! ECW IS HERE! Tommy Dreamer is hanging around with him too. They try to jump the rail but security stops them. Vince: "There's a local wrestling group here trying to make a name for themselves". Is it trying too hard to recreate Hall and Nash showing up on Nitro in that worked shoot style? Maybe, but it's still well done and the Philly crowd obviously loves it. Meanwhile, there's still a match on. Bradshaw drags Vega to 3. Vega barely holds him back from 4 and hits a back suplex. Now it's Vega's turn to get some whips in. JR gets "whipped like a government mule" in. Vega gets 3 corners before Bradshaw pulls him away. Vega hits clotheslines and the spinning heel kick. He gets 3 corners, dives for 4 but gets roughly jerked back by Bradshaw. Bradshaw big boot. Clothesline from....well, that was not quite stiff enough to be from hell. It's early days. Clothesline from purgatory? Clothesline from Newark Airport! Anyone that's flown through there will tell you it's the 6th circle of hell. Read Dante. After that they do the usual Vega strap match finish of Vega getting corners behind Bradshaw's back and beating him to the last one. They had a lot of distractions and a match type that didn't lend itself to a wide variety of layout options to fight against, but the raw physicality pushes it up to about watchable. He may not have been the most gifted wrestler but Bradshaw was never afraid to get snug in the ring. *3/4

During Cornette's entrance for the next match cameras cut to the back, and Vega is getting beat up by guys wearing Razor Ramon and Diesel's gear! Fake Razor and Fake Diesel are here! They run off before we can get a good look at them. JR brags that he's delivering on his promise to get them in, an angle that lead to the short lived and universally panned JR heel run. Vince dismisses it as a "ratings ploy". Oh yes, the Monday Night Wars are getting interesting.

 

Jose Lothario def Jim Cornette in :56- Cornette sells the few things Lothario is capable of doing and loses with zero drama. It's a match that exists. They kept it under a minute so I won't completely trash it. NR

Brian Pillman comes out to the ring wearing a "Don't Call 911" shirt with a handgun on it. Unintentional foreshadowing. He's been claiming Bret Hart personally told him and Owen Hart that he would show up tonight to make his first TV WWF appearance since Wrestlemania. Bret taped a response from the WWF's South Africa tour, saying that Pillman and Owen were full of horse manure. Pillman runs Philly down then brings out Owen. Owen claims he and Bret have patched things up and says again Bret promised he'd be in Philly tonight. He says Bret is scared of Steve Austin, who also now comes out. Austin had been challenging Bret for months to no response. Austin drops his famous "If you put an S in front of Hitman you'll know what I think of Bret Hart" line. Good promo segment that wasn't a complete waste of PPV time, but still would have been better on Raw.

Before the next match a delirious Cornette signs away the rights for the Bulldog and Owen to Clarence Mason, a move Mason has been trying to make happen for months.

 

WWF Tag Team Championship: The Slammy Award Winning Owen Hart and "The British Bulldog" Davey Boy Smith (w/Clarence Mason) def The Smoking Gunns (c) (w/Sunny) in 10:59- Billy and Owen start. The dynamics are interesting as Owen and Bulldog are clear heels, and the Gunns have been heel-leaning tweeners since winning the titles back and hooking up with Sunny. The Philly crowd is of course firmly behind Owen and Bulldog. Mason coming out distracts Owen and Billy rolls him up for 2. They roll through some good basics. Owen hits a crossbody and Billy bails for his corner. Vince starts in on fake Razor and Diesel again. JR: "You got the benefit of the doubt when you were indicted". Insert shock reaction GIF here. Owen gets a flash small package for 2. Bulldog avoids a Bart knee and rolls him up for 2. Owen takes Bart's knee out with a huge chop block and Camp Cornette goes to work on it. Bulldog works in the vertical suplex and hits a legdrop for 2. Owen cranks a spinning toe hold. Bart grabs a small package out of that for 2. Owen enzuguri! Billy breaks the pin up, then grabs Bulldog's hair when he hits the ropes. Bulldog gets beat down on the floor. The Gunns double team. Billy looks ready for a singles run. The Gunns hit their sidewinder finisher. Mason distracts the ref and Owen takes Bart out from behind. Both guys are down. Bulldog crawls over and covers for 2 before going in peril again. He slips out of a Bart powerslam and pushes him into Billy. Billy pushes Bart back! Bulldog powerslam! Owen cuts Billy off with a spinning heel kick, allowing Bulldog to get the pin and the titles! HUGE Philly pop for that win. After the match Sunny looks so pissed someone might have to charge her with domestic terrorism. She says "I gave everything to you!", clearly implying she's been riding some cowboys, and fires them. This was the best WWF tag title match in a good long while. Owen and Bulldog would hold them about 8 months while helping to rebuild a tag division that had gone pretty far down the toilet. This was also the kickoff of the Gunns' breakup angle and Billy Gunn's eventual singles run. **3/4

 

Mark Henry def Jerry "The King" Lawler in 5:13- Oh great, Lawler's coming out with a mic. Fortunately Vince or the video package drowns most of it out. After doing commentary at Summerslam in his first official WWF appearance after signing, Henry is making his in-ring debut here. Calling him green is almost generous, he's literally just started training. Lawler says Henry can't get out of a headlock before losing the mic. After the mandatory Lawler stalling Henry shows he can in fact get out of a headlock. Lawler tries a slam which no shock doesn't work. Henry press slams him. Lawler bounces off Henry trying to shoulderblock him. Finally Lawler gets desperate and gets the knucks out of his trunks. Henry no sells it all. He hooks Lawler in a Canadian backbreaker and Lawler gives it up. Lawler walked Henry through it as best he could. 1/2*

The main event for the next In Your House has already been set: Undertaker vs Mankind in a Buried Alive Match, which they call the first unsanctioned match in WWF history. After that is a recap of the Taker vs Mankind and Goldust feud. It's speculated Goldust was the mastermind behind getting Paul Bearer to betray Taker and align with Mankind.

 

Final Curtain Match: The Undertaker def Goldust (w/Marlena) in 10:23- The rules for this one and only "Final Curtain" match in wrestling history are you can only win by pinfall, nothing else. Taker comes out without a hat or jacket and goes right for Goldust. Pillar to post beating. Legdrop for 2. Goldust rolls out. Taker gets snapped across the top rope and Marlena slaps him. Goldust swinging neckbreaker. Situp. Taker big boot and suplex. Rope walk drop. Taker sends Goldust over the top to the floor. Marlena hands him a bag and Goldust throws gold dust in Taker's face. Between that and the gold discs that were dropped during Goldust's entrance like usual the ring is a hell of a mess. We need 2016 Kenny Omega out here to clean it. Goldust goes into punchy kicky beatdown mode. Taker takes a shot on the Spanish announce table. Not the last action it'll see tonight. Goldust clothesline for 2. Taker fights out of a claw/smother hold. Goldust starts feeling himself up and Taker grabs him by the throat. Goldust powerslam for 2. Situp. Taker flying clothesline. Goldust goes up top. Taker goozles him and gives him a super choke slam. Tombstone and good night. *1/4

A little personal "beauty of wrestling" moment: as I'm typing this last match up from 1996, Dustin Rhodes is wrestling CM Punk live on Dynamite in 2022, and still doing it all. The man's had one hell of a career.

 

WWF Championship: "The Heartbreak Kid" Shawn Michaels (c) (w/Jose Lothario) def Mankind (w/Paul Bearer) by DQ in 26:25- The story here is Mankind's bizarreness has thrown Shawn off his game, hence the Mind Games title for the show. Foley has definitely gotten the Mankind character down to perfection at this point. A casket is brought out to the ring for Mankind's entrance. The lid is lifted and Mankind is inside! Well done. Quick Mankind start. Cactus Clothesline! Bang bang! He starts pulling the floor mat up. Shawn dropkicks him under the mat, then jumps and stomps on him! Reverse crossbody off the second rope to the floor! Mankind takes a light Foley bump on the floor. Back in Shawn hits an early elbow off the top and starts tuning up the band. Mankind gets the hell out of town. Bearer gives him the urn and he takes a moment to get it back together. A corner slugfest turns into an all out brawl. Mankind blocks a snap mare and tries to hook the mandible claw in. Shawn blocks it and lays in some ground and pound. They go to the floor again. Mankind moves the Spanish announce table closer to the ring. Shawn dives over it onto him! Mankind gets suplexed into the steps! Shawn clips his knee and rams it into the casket. Knee work follows. Dragon screw leg whip! Figure four! Mankind punches out. Shawn dropkicks the knee and hooks in a half crab. Mankind gets to the ropes. Shawn leaps, possibly for a hurricanrana, but Mankind catches him and gives him a hot shot! Bearer hands Mankind what looks like a pen and Mankind jabs it into his knee to get feeling back into it. Mankind hits a running knee in the corner and some faceplants. Shawn counters with a back suplex, then slides under Mankind and gets a leg takedown. Shawn flip! He gets stuck in the tree of woe. Another Mankind running knee while Shawn is trapped! He hits a legdrop to the back of Shawn's head. A high kick sends Shawn to the floor. Shawn dodges another running knee and Mankind crashes into the stairs. Drop toe hold into the stairs! They have a suplex standoff on the apron. Shawn gets on the apron, dodges, and Mankind runs into the post! Shawn powerslam for 2. Mankind gets hung in the ropes. When Shawn gets close he puts on the mandible claw! Hebner gets everyone free. The claw gets slapped on again on the floor! Shawn pulls Mankind by his pants and he falls into Carlos Cabrera! Shawn blocks a punch with a chair! Chairshot to Mankind's knee, then his hand! Smart. Taking out the mandible claw hand. Shawn bites the hand and starts picking it apart. The claw glove comes off. Shawn charges but gets backdropped to the floor. Mankind elbow off the apron. Swinging neckbreaker on the floor. Double underhook DDT in the ring! Shawn kicks out! Piledriver from Mankind. Shawn kicks out again. Mankind freaks out and starts pulling his hair out. He tosses a couple of chairs in the ring, then opens the casket and gets Shawn in it. Shawn fights out. Flying forearm! Kip up! Shawn crossbody off the top for 2. He goes up top again. Mankind runs into the ropes and Shawn gets crotched. They both get up top. The Spanish announce table is still set up down there......BOTH GUYS FALL OFF THE TOP ROPE THROUGH THE SPANISH ANNOUNCE TABLE! When they get back in Shawn kicks a chair into Mankind's face and covers. Vader runs in! The bell rings for a DQ. BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. Shawn knocks Vader out of the ring with a flying forearm. Sid comes out and fights Vader off. Mankind hooks Shawn in the mandible claw again. He opens the casket up again.....UNDERTAKER IS IN THE CASKET! The crowd is going ballistic. Taker chases Mankind off. There's still a few minutes left so Shawn dances around and shows off his ass tattoo for the ladies. I'll resist the urge to knock the match down for that. Back to that, the match was absolutely sensational. Pitch perfect with both guys wrestling their style and meshing perfectly. The only reason I'm not giving this the full monty is because it has a DQ finish, a small quibble in what's otherwise pretty damn close to a masterpiece. ****3/4

OVERALL SHOW THOUGHTS: Outside the Iron Man Match the main event is probably the WWF's match of the year so far. The rest of the show is nothing special wrestling wise, but it's the most direct pre-Attitude Era show yet with the worked shoot (shooty work?) style slowly becoming more and more prominent.

OVERALL SHOW GRADE: B-

Clash of the Champions XXV

Legacy Review

Clash of the Champions XXV

November 10, 1993 from the Bayfront Arena in St. Petersburg, FL

Commentary: Tony Schaivone and Jesse Ventura

With the upcoming Battlebowl PPV being comprised of nothing but Lethal Lottery matches this Clash is all about the title matches, with every WCW belt up for grabs.

 

Mean Gene is here! He had made his WCW debut the week prior on TV. And he immediately starts shilling the hotline. Fantastic. The pieces of the Bischoff era continue to slowly come together.

WCW International World Heavyweight Championship: "Ravishing" Rick Rude (c) and Road Warrior Hawk double countout in 5:23- Jawing start followed by lockup stalemates. They do a little pose off. Hawk tosses Rude across the ring and then bitches about a phantom hair pull. If he'd used your hair to throw you that far you'd have no hair left back there. Now Hawk wants a test of strength. Rude stalls before suckering Hawk in to some forearms. Hawk no sells (I know, shocking) buckle shots and pummels Rude with them. Hawk suplex for 2. Rude eye rake and backbreaker. He comes off the top rope but Hawk gets his boot up. A clothesline sends Rude 360 over the top to the floor. They brawl on the floor and both guys are counted out. Lame. I know Hawk's got a thing about jobbing, but if you're in there with the world champ (or a world champ), lie your ass down and take the loss or we'll put someone else in there that will. Forget about first gear, this match barely got out of park. No effort at all. 1/4*

 

The Shockmaster def The Equalizer in 2:29- And if you thought the last match was bad....Gird your loins folks, this one ain't going to be pretty. Even Shockmaster's music sounds like it can't be bothered. It takes forever to even notice it's playing. Equalizer jumps before the bell and gives Shockmaster some buckle shots. They need two tries at a simple spot where Equalizer snaps the rope and that knocks Shockmaster back. Equalizer back suplex for 2. Shoulderblock standoff. Shockmaster with a big boot. He wraps Equalizer in the bear hug and drops him down for the pin. By far the best thing I can say about this is it was short. DUD

 

We get word that there's been some kind of commotion between Rude and Davey Boy Smith backstage. Apparently the Bulldog wants a try at another belt he won't get.

 

WCW World Television Championship: Lord Steven Regal (w/Sir William) (c) def Johnny B Badd in 6:33- Well we should be pretty sure this will be better than the first two matches at least. Badd was still a year or two away from becoming a solidly decent worker but Regal was a full on awesome British style mat wrestler and great character to boot. A Regal slap in the corner fires Badd up. Badd rolls through some flash near falls that frustrate Regal. They get into some decent mat and counterwrestling with Badd controlling most of it with a headlock. After a bit Badd goes for broke with a dive, but Regal dodges and Badd crashes into the top rope. Regal European uppercuts. Snap mare and boot sole eye rake. Badd drops Regal with a straight left. Regal's out. William gets on the apron to protest the technically illegal closed fist, which gives Regal time to recover enough to get a foot on the rope when Badd covers. Badd argues with the ref. Regal comes from behind with a roll up and grabs a handful of tights for 3. Decentish. **

 

"Stunning" Steve Austin (w/Col. Robert Parker) def "Flyin'" Brian Pillman in 9:12- Well here we are, the Hollywood Blondes explode. These guys were thrown together into a tag team that wasn't supposed to go anywhere, and they (as in Austin and Pillman) turned it into the hottest act in the company through their sheer awesomeness. Management had no choice but to put the tag belts on them. Then Pillman got hurt, jeopardizing footage that was pretaped months in advance, and when he came back the team broke up for.....reasons. There's no real reason why this match is happening, it just is. To show even more how little the powers that be care about this Pillman has a jobber entrance during commercial. When Austin hits the ring Pillman jumps him. Both guys are still in full Blondes gear. Pillman chases Parker on the floor and runs into an Austin clothesline. Austin gets whipped into the rail. Pillman hits a backdrop back in and lays in some chops. Flying headscissors. Austin offers an insincere handshake. Pillman knows better and kicks his face in. The go to the ramp and Pillman backdrops out of a piledriver attempt. He comes off the top to the ramp but Austin gets a boot up. Pillman gets thrown off the ramp into the guardrail! They head back to the ring, and Pillman comes back in with a slingshot crossbody! Austin lifts Pillman up and gives him a sort of hot shot. Cover for 2. Austin works a half crab for a bit with the rope leverage game. Elbow and chop slugfest. Pillman does the fallaway dive from the second rope. Both guys go up top. Austin blocks a superplex and drops Pillman down. He comes off the top, but Pillman cuts him off in midair with a dropkick! That gets a 2 count. Austin lifts Pillman up in a powerbomb like way, but Pillman turns into a sort of hurricanrana for 2. Pillman tries another slingshot over the top. Austin catches him and powerslams him for 2. Pillman with a DDT! Austin kicks out. Pillman tries a crucifix but Austin drops him. Austin goes up top again but misses a kneedrop. Pillman rolling cradle for 2. Austin goes for the stun gun but can't hit it. Pillman tries yet another springboard, but Parker pushes him off, Pillman drops on his head, and Austin covers for 3! Yet again these guys were set up to fail and refused to go along with it. ***1/2

Mean Gene joins us from the Battlebowl "control center". There's no matches to preview since the whole show will be determined by the Lethal Lottery so he goes over the rules instead. After that is a couple of green screen promos, giving this whole segment a very WWF feel.

 

WCW United States Heavyweight Championship: "The Natural" Dustin Rhodes (c) (w/Dusty Rhodes) def "Mr. Wonderful" Paul Orndorff (w/The Assassin) in 11:57- Big Dust is out to keep Assassin from causing trouble. I'm sure the two of them crossed paths in the Florida territory at some point. They immediately jaw at each other. Dusty's jacket it off! Bidness ith picking up! The ring clears out and Dustin and Orndorff have a basic start. Dustin gets a couple of scoop and slams. Orndorff tries to leverage a headlock over to a pin with a handful of tights. The camera focuses on Assassin creeping around the ring to give Dusty the stink eye. Dusty stays focused on the match while Ventura wonder how someone of Assassin's....generousness can sneak anywhere. Things slow burn in the ring as both guys have long periods of arm work. Orndorff transitions a chinlock into a hammerlock. He gives Dustin a knee to the gut coming off the ropes and a faceplant. Orndorff Saito suplex. Dustin blocks a hiptoss into a backslide for 2. Flying lariat for 2. He calls for the bulldog. Orndorff blocks it. Even though it looks like a botch that was the plan. He hits a clothesline and calls for the piledriver. Dustin backdrops out. Orndorff misses a knee off the top rope. Dustin wraps up a Paul Smackage for 3! After the bell Assassin attacks Dustin. Dusty takes him out and hits some bionic elbows in the ring to the delight of the crowd. He starts to take off Assassin's mask. Orndorff makes the save. Dusty takes a belt shot! Dustin saves him from Orndorff's piledriver. I am stunned rigid Dusty didn't blade off that belt shot, retired or not. Match was not great, not awful. **1/4

 

WCW World Tag Team Championship: The Nasty Boys (c) (w/Missy Hyatt) def Sting and "The British Bulldog" Davey Boy Smith in 8:30- Hot start and immediate donnybrooking! Sting and Knobbs are in the ring while Saggs and Bulldog fight on the ramp. Rick Rude sneaks in, attacks Bulldog, and gives him the Rude Awakening on the ramp! Sting goes out to check on him. The bell hadn't actually rung yet, that was a bunch of free wrestling. As Sting carries Bulldog to the ring the bell rings to officially start the match. The Nastys are immediately all over Sting. Sting ducks and hits a double clothesline. Ax handle off the top. Sting keeps the advantage the next few minutes while ducking over to check on Bulldog between moves. He goes up top again but Knobbs pushes him off to turn the tide. Knobbs goes for Bulldog and Saggs chucks Sting over the top to the floor. Knobbs suplexes him back in for 2. Bulldog finally gets to his feet. That must have been the rudest Rude Awakening ever. Sting reverses a bear hug into a belly to belly suplex. Saggs cuts off the tag. Knobbs chokes Sting with his jacket while Hyatt distracts Nick Patrick by offering him the ride everyone backstage has taken. Sting fights out of a chinlock and gets the hot tag to Bulldog. Bulldog slams and dropkicks. Double DDT! He press slams Sting into the Nastys. Powerslam on Knobbs. Patrick is getting Sting out. Saggs comes off the top with an elbow to the back of Bulldog's head and Knobbs covers for the pin. Variation 1A on the usual Nastys finish. Since coming to WCW in May Bulldog has gone after the World title, TV title and now tag titles and is 0 for 3. What makes him think Rude will be any different? **1/2

 

I went over this in more detail on the last PPV review, but to give a quick recap: Sid Vicious was supposed to get a huge face push and be the guy to take Vader down for the world title at Starrcade, but he attacked Arn Anderson with a pair of scissors during the October UK tour and got fired. To fill his spot, WCW turned to old reliable to save them: Ric Flair. Now instead of Vader breaking his back trying to carry Sid in main event matches, peak Vader can get in there with admittedly post-peak Flair, but he's still the greatest of all time and was motivated to prove himself again after a rough first year back in WCW. I'll call that a massive upgrade.

Before making his entrance Flair is accosted by Col. Parker, who's very intent on telling him Austin plans on challenging the winner of his match. He gets in Flair's personal bubble a bit too much and eats a punch for it.

 

WCW World Heavyweight Championship: "Nature Boy" Ric Flair (w/Fifi) def Big Van Vader (c) (w/Harley Race) by DQ in 9:24- After Buffer's done pontificating they go to commercial, and when they come back Flair is putting old rival Race in the figure four! But that also leaves him vulnerable and Vader makes him pay for it with a big splash. Now the bell rings to start the match. Vader lays in the corner potatoes. Short clothesline. Press slam. Vader bomb! He's in full control and starts playing around with Flair just like Flair used to do. "Where's he at?". Flair blocks more corner punches and starts laying in the chops! He stomps Vader down in the corner. WOOOOOOOO! You can tell Flair's feeling it tonight, really for the first time since getting back to WCW. He hits the ropes but runs right into a Vader tackle. Vader elbow to the gut. Flair's selling it out to the cheap seats. Flair Flip! He falls to the floor. Race gives him a guardrail shot. Vader comes off the apron. Flair dodges and he crashes into the rail! Flair ax handle off the top rope to the floor! As he's recovering Vader takes the mask off. Shit's about to get real. Another chop sends Vader down back in. Vader gets a boot up in the corner. Flair dodges a splash off the second rope. Figure four! Vader grabs a rope while Race eye rakes Flair. Vader suplex and splash for 2. Vader flips off the second rope and Flair tries to make it look like he's powerslamming him. That's a regular Vader spot that was not in Flair's wheelhouse. Another Flair ax handle off the top. Flair Flip 2! He runs to the other side and hits another ax handle. Flair ducks a clothesline and Vader plows right through the ref. Flair tries coming off the top again but Vader catches him. He sets Flair back up top. Vader superplex! I mean SUPERplex, he was standing on the top rope, not the middle. He drags Flair back into the corner and goes up top again. VADERSAULT! FLAIR DODGES! He covers. The ref crawls over and has he does his hands hit the mat 3 times. Everyone thinks it's a pin, including Flair, and the crowd erupts with the biggest pop WCW has heard in years. But the ref waves it off. He says Flair has won, but by DQ due to Vader knockinghim down. No title change. Austin runs in and starts brawling with Flair. Yes please, I'd like that match very much thank you. The heels beat Flair down until Dustin Rhodes and the Shockmaster chase them off. Really good match that was only a warmup for the classic they'd put on at Starrcade. ***1/2

 

Mean Gene hops in the ring for a quick postmatch interview. Flair: "I'M BACK IN THE BALLGAME!". You know he really meant it.

 

OVERALL SHOW THOUGHTS- The Fall of WCW's discontent continues. It started out atrociously, but once you get past that there's a couple of pretty good matches, including what there was of the Hollywood Blondes blowoff.

OVERALL SHOW GRADE: C-

Summerslam '96

Legacy Review

Summerslam '96

August 18, 1996 from the Gund Arena in Cleveland, OH

Commentary: Vince McMahon, Jim Ross and Mr. Perfect

The Slammy Award Winning Owen Hart def Savio Vega in 13:23- Owen's doing the old school heel trick of still wearing a cast on his arm long after any injury should have healed. Jim Cornette is noticeably absent, ostensibly to spend more time prepping Vader. The ref stops Owen from ambushing Vega from behind with the cast at the start. Vega tries to attack the "hurt" arm but Owen keeps squirting away. Owen ducks for a backdrop. Vega leapfrogs over, Owen celebrates like he did something as he was wont to do, and Vega finally gets his arm and runs it into the turnbuckles. Standard and pretty dull arm work follows. A speed run ends with a Vega monkey flip, hiptoss and armdrag. Owen Bret bumps and Vega rolls him up for 2. Owen's kickout sends Vega shoulder first into the post. Now it's Owen's turn to kill time with dull arm work. Just zero intensity here. Vega bites Owen's leg to get out of a hold! Camp Cornette attorney Clarence Mason comes out to cheer Owen on in Cornette's place. Vega hits a crossbody for 2. Owen enzuguri! He did that so good it really should have been his finisher. They have some more near fall tradeoffs and trade spinning heel kicks. Vega slam/legdrop combo and side suplex for 2. Owen gets a neckbreaker and missile dropkick for 2. He goes up top again. Vega crotches him and hits a back superplex, but on the way down the back of his head hit Owen's cast. Owen plays dead to sucker Vega in, then takes his cast off! It's healed! It's a Rusev Day miracle! He whacks Vega with the cast and puts it back on! Vega's out cold. Owen hooks on the Sharpshooter to add insult to injury and the ref calls it. There's a nice bit after when Mason goes to raise Owen's hand and he acts like the arm is hurt again. The match was fine once they stopped hitting the snooze button. **1/4

Justin "Hawk" Bradshaw (future JBL) comes out, bitches to Vince about something we can't make out, then attacks Vega from behind as he's being carried off! After that Todd Pettingill joins us from the boiler room to preview the Boiler Room Brawl. He finds Mankind skulking in the shadows. Mankind says "There's no place like home", has some tender moments with various pipes and ends his promo with the soon to be famous "Have a nice day!".

 

Four Way Elimination Match for the WWF Tag Team Championship: The Smoking Gunns (c) (w/Sunny) def The Bodydonnas, The Godwinns (w/Hillbilly Jim) and The New Rockers in 12:18- The New Rockers are former Rocker proper Marty Janetty and newcomer Lief Cassidy (soon to be known as jobber extraordinaire Al Snow) and for some reason are heels. The other three teams have been literally the entire tag team division in 1996 and none of them have exactly been setting the world on fire. Just about the opposite. JR even points out all three have had the tag titles in the calendar year. It's anyone can tag anyone else rules. Billy and Henry start with some speed vs power stuff. The crowd chants for the one person involved the match that's actually over. Hint: it's the one wearing the miniskirt and push up bra. Henry wheelbarrow slams Billy, who scrambles over to tag Zip. The Godwinns swap. Criss cross, then both guys run over to tag the Gunns and strut off! The Gunns are furious, refuse to wrestle each other, try to tag the Godwinns who jump off the apron, then Bart tags Zip back in. Janetty trips Zip and Billy pins him. The Bodydonnas are gone. The Rockers work over Henry to complete crowd apathy. The Gunns and Rockers work together a bit, until Cassidy accidentally clotheslines Billy. Both teams argue. The Rockers get discombobulated, Henry hits Janetty with the slop drop, and the Rockers are done. Henry and Bart do some incredibly not interesting stuff. Billy comes in full of fire and screaming. By this point in their run it's become very clear who's the worthwhile Gunn and who's the useless Gunn. Henry catches Billy and powerslams him. Hot tag to Phineas. Donnybrook-ish. Hillbilly Jim goes over and threatens to throw slop on Sunny, which is just plain dumb because he's distracting the ref from Phineas hitting Billy with the slop drop. Bart comes off the top rope, hits Phineas from behind, and Billy covers to retain the titles. For an early 4 way the initial booking and layout was not too bad, but the last half with the Gunns and Godwinns was just plain dreadful. Owen Hart and the Bulldog would soon become a full time tag team with the mission of saving the division. *

 

Sycho Sid def "The British Bulldog" Davey Boy Smith in 6:24- Once again Cornette is still in the locker room with Vader. Sid takes forever on his entrance, soaking up the cheers from the crowd. When they get going we have a shoulderblock standoff. Sid hits a clothesline and slam, and Bulldog powders. After a Sid headlock Bulldog counters a backdrop into a delayed suplex. Clarence Mason comes out again to take Cornette's place. Bulldog clotheslines Sid 360 to the floor, then again off the apron. He lifts Sid up to suplex him back in but drops him off the top rope instead. Sid decides he's sold enough, turns around and goes back on offense out of nowhere with chops and an avalanche. Bulldog dodges a second avalanche. Bulldog powerslam! Now Cornette's out and arguing with Mason, thinking Mason is encroaching on his turf. Bulldog tries to make peace. Sid slips out of a second powerslam and hits a choke slam. Powerbomb and good night. It's a Sid match. 1/2*

 

Goldust (w/Marlena) def Marc Mero (w/Sable) in 11:01- The story here is Goldust and his partner in weirdness Mankind have been going after Sable. After the lockup Goldust slaps Mero and hides behind the ref. Mero hits Japanese and regular armdrags. Golddust stumbles back and hides in the ropes. Mero ducks clotheslines and hits a crossbody for 2. Drop toe hold and arm work. Goldust hits the patented slide down uppercut. He backdrops Mero to the floor! Mero gets knocked off the apron into the rail. Mankind's wandered out of the boiler room to creep Sable out by calling her "mommy" again. Refs chase him off. Mero hits the fallback off the second rope. Inverted atomic drop. Kneelift. Goldust lifts Mero out of mounted punches and they both tumble over the top rope to the floor. Mero gets back in just to dive right back out with a somersault plancha! He hits a slingshot legdrop back in. Mero goes up top and hits a shooting star press! JR calls it the "Wild Thing", a new finisher he'd been teasing. The ref is distracted by Marlena and when he gets over Goldust is able to kick out. Mero hits a powerslam for 2. Goldust reverses a corner whip, hooks Mero up, and hits the Curtain Call for 3. After the bell Goldust stalks Sable until Mero chases him off. There were moments, but also a lot of dead time. Also it's really dumb booking to debut Mero's new finisher and not have him with with it. *3/4

Next we get clips of Ahmed Johnson's injury. He was supposed to defend the IC title against Faarooq Asad (Ron Simmons, now with the WWF) and his very silly hat but suffered a legit ruptured kidney that required emergency surgery. The angle was reworked to say Faarooq caused it. The injury forced President Gorilla Monsoon to vacate the IC title, and he set up a title tournament to start the next night on Raw. In the interview with Johnson we get a glimpse of very, very young Kevin Kelley! Who would have thought from his humble '90s WWF beginnings he would go on to become the best play by play man in the business with New Japan.

Back live Faarooq is out for an in-ring promo with manager Sunny, a strange pairing. Faarooq demands he be given the IC title belt now. Great badass intensity from Simmons here, allowing him to overcome his ridiculous outfit and get a foothold in WWF that would lead to better things soon. He would end up making it to the finals of the tournament for the vacant title, but lost it to Marc Mero.

After that is yet another video package (what is this, Wrestlemania 38?) recapping the Jake Roberts/Jerry Lawler feud. When Roberts returned to WWF earlier in the year it was as a born again Christian (legit) and recovering alcoholic (not so legit on the recovering part). Lawler played into this by offering to get him back on the wagon. Off the wagon. Whatever the binge drinking one is. Before the match starts Olympian and World's Strongest Man Mark Henry makes his WWF debut, joining commentary and getting a possibly legit lecture from Perfect on backstage handshake etiquette.

 

Jerry "The King" Lawler def Jake "The Snake" Roberts in 4:07- Lawler's got bottles of booze in every pocket and a huge Roberts snake-like bag. He takes his jacket off and he's got a Baltimore Ravens jersey on! Holy shit talk about nuclear heat in Cleveland. For those young'uns not quite up on NFL history, the Ravens were about to start their very first season after leaving Cleveland and temporarily killing off the locally beloved Cleveland Browns. Lawler cuts a long ass promo with a lot of weak comedian one liners before Roberts finally comes out. Lawler's got a surprise for him in his bag- a giant bottle of booze. Roberts gets Revelations out of his bag and sics him on Lawler. Lawler scurries away. The snake goes back in the bag and the bell finally rings. Lawler, shock of shock, stalls and grabs the mic to talk some more. Roberts attacks him on the floor. Slam on the floor. Lawler gets posted. He grabs a soda cup and splashes it in Roberts' face. Roberts gets tied in the ropes and Lawler gets one of the Jim Beam bottles out. Roberts fights loose. Short clothesline. Lawler uses ref Harvey Wippleman to get out of the DDT. He grabs the bottle and whacks Roberts in the throat with it! Cover for 3. After the bell Lawler pours the booze all over Roberts. Henry gets out of commentary and chases him off before he can do the same with the second bottle. Like a lot of Lawler's stuff during this period, this might have worked in Memphis in the '80s but not so much in front of a '90s WWF crowd. 1/4*

 

Boiler Room Brawl: Mankind def The Undertaker in 26:40-The rules are both guys start in the boiler room, then they have to fight out and make their way into the arena. Paul Bearer is waiting in the ring with the urn, and the first one to take the urn from Bearer is the winner. The camera follows Taker from behind as he enters the boiler room. He spends a few minutes slowly searching before Mankind ambushes him from behind with a pipe. The brawl is on. There's really not much to recap here, it's a fight in a boiler room. Commentary stays almost completely silent through the whole thing, only saying the occasional quiet word or short sentence. Not sure if that helps or hurts the overall package. In between all the slow fisticuffs there's trash can lids, trash cans, pipes, and fire extinguishers. What I want to know is, why is there an almost completely full trash can in the boiler room? Hardly anyone goes in there. Are there Burger King wrappers from like 1983 still in there? There's also a couple of "transmission difficulties" with a bunch of static, which was actually WWF making edits to the pretape. Mankind climbs a ladder and Taker pulls it down, making Mankind fall into a small row of boxes for Foley bump #1. The fight continues at the exit door. Mankind gets out first and tries to barricade the door but Taker forces it open. They crawl and brawl through the locker room hallway with lots of other wrestlers looking on. Mankind dumps hot coffee all over Taker! That lets him get into the arena proper first. Taker stops him by breaking a 2x4 over his back. They slow brawl up to the ring. Mankind takes the floor mat off and piledrives Taker on the concrete! But he's not down for long as he stops Mankind getting in the ring. He slingshots Mankind off the apron and Mankind splats on the concrete! Foley bump #2. Taker gets in the ring, gets down on one knee and poses for the urn. Paul Bearer seems oddly uninterested. He turns his back on Taker! What's going on here? Mandible Claw from Mankind! Taker goes down. Bearer is laughing! Mankind does the Taker pose on one knee. Bearer polishes the urn and starts to give it to him! Taker's still got some life left so Mankind puts him down again. Bearer slaps Taker! He hits Taker with the urn! That takes the last bit of HP Taker had left. Bearer happily hands Mankind the urn to win the match and they leave together in triumph. A bunch of druids come out and carry Taker's body out in preparation for his next resurrection. This was an interesting idea not so well executed and way, way too long. Bearer's heel turn is shocking and pretty well done. It would have been better if he'd hit Taker with the urn right away instead of the attempt at a slow burn. In some ways the boiler room portion of this was the embryonic version of the modern cinematic match, which would really be brought into prominence with Matt Hardy's superb Broken Universe mini-movies in Impact and WWE, and then became in vogue with WWE during the pandemic as a way to have epic matches with no crowds (with the Firefly Fun House Match being the best of them at Wrestlemania 36, an absolute masterpiece from Bray Wyatt). *1/2

 

WWF Championship: "The Heartbreak Kid" Shawn Michaels (c) (w/Jose Lothario) def Vader (w/Jim Cornette) in 22:58- Vader tosses the stairs around during his entrance, as if he needed to look more badass. He's Vader. He's also looking to become the first man ever to win the IWGP Heavyweight, WCW World and WWF Titles (yes I know, Hulk Hogan was IWGP Champion, but it was the early version of the title so I'm not counting it). After lockup stalemates Vader starts laying in the potato shots. Huge clothesline. Shawn blocks a big boot, does a leg takedown and hits a low dropkick to a sitting Vader. Vader goes to toss Shawn out. Shawn counters and Vader goes to the floor. Baseball slide. Over the top tope! Double ax handle off the top back in. Hurricanrana! Shawn gets up on Vader's shoulders and ranas Vader down to the floor! Shawn grabs the top rope and skins the cat back in. Plancha! Vader catches him and slams him on the floor! He lifts Shawn up on his shoulder, carries him back up the stairs and drops him in the ring. Corner potatoes. Vader suplex. Shawn flip! A second one and he goes to the floor! Shawn flips out of suplexes and tries to come back but keeps getting cut off by stiff Vader punches. Vader misses an avalanche but kills Shawn with a clothesline. Shawn charges and gets tossed over the top by Vader but skins the cat again. He tries to scissor Vader with his legs but Vader lifts him up and TOSSES him clear across the ring! Cover for 2. Vader hooks on his cobra clutch like sleeper. Shawn fights out, hitting a running knee and clothesline that Vader completely no sells. He tries to slide under but Vader stops him and steps on him! Shawn gets a desperation low blow in and the clothesline after takes Vader down. Shawn goes up top, looks like he's going for the elbow but seems to change his mind midair, lands, and starts kicking and bitching at Vader. Another infamous mid-'90s Shawn in-ring legit tempter tantrum. I couldn't see what Vader might have done wrong there, he was just laying down waiting for the move. A Shawn crossbody sends both guys tumbling to the floor. Vader presses Shawn and drops him on the guardrail! Just as commentary is talking about Vader needing to make sure Shawn doesn't get counted out, Shawn gets counted out. Cornette gets on the mic and demands the match be restarted. After a minute Shawn agrees. Vader attacks him on the aisle. He gets Lothario fired up so Hebner will hold him off and Cornette gets a racket shot in. Avalanche. Vader belly to belly suplex for 2. Shawn fights out of a powerbomb. He ducks multiple clotheslines and hits the flying forearm! Kip up. Elbow off the top. The band tunes up. Cornette grabs his boot. Shawn grabs the racket and whacks Vader with it. The bell rings for a DQ. As the ring fills up with every zebra and official in the building Cornette gets on the mic again, accuses Shawn of getting DQ'd on purpose and wants the match restarted again. Monsoon is in the ring and agrees. Slugfest. Another Shawn forearm. Another elbow off the top. Superkick! VADER KICKS OUT! Hebner gets run over and takes a tumble to the floor. Vader hits the powerbomb! Backup ref Mike Chioda runs in, but the delay was enough for Shawn to kick out. Vader drags Shawn to the corner. He goes to the second rope and starts loading up the Vader Bomb. No. Change of plans. He goes up top. THE VADERSAULT MISSES! Shawn hits a moonsault and that gets the pin! Really good match that was held back from being the classic it absolutely could have been by the overbooking and possibly some personal issues. ***1/2

I will contend until my dying breath that Vader should have won the title here. In fact, he was scheduled to win it until Shawn threw a fit and flat out refused to put him over. In this era whatever Shawn wanted, Shawn got. This might have been the reason for the screwy booking, to try to make everyone happy. That change in plans led to the heel turn and big push for Sid later in the year.

OVERALL SHOW THOUGHTS- Another '96 show with a whole lot of crap leading to a great Shawn Michaels main event. With WCW setting the wrestling world on fire with the early months of the NWO angle this was not the best counterpunch. This will not be remembered in the annals of great Summerslams, though the Boiler Room Brawl is a historical curio that should be checked out once, and Bearer's heel turn would have repercussions for years.

OVERALL SHOW GRADE: D+

Halloween Havoc '93

Legacy Review

Halloween Havoc '93

October 24, 1993 from the Lakefront Arena in New Orleans, LA

Commentary: Tony Schiavone and Jesse Ventura

Another one of WCW's (in)famous long mini-movie skits opens the show, with Tony freaking out the Stranger Things B cast. For the second straight Halloween Havoc the stipulation for the main event will be decided by Spin the Wheel, Make the Deal.

The Shockmaster, Ice Train and Charlie Norris def Harlem Heat and The Equalizer in 9:45- A month after having the whole War Games match booked around him being an unbeatable monster Shockmaster is already in the opening match with, apologies to Harlem Heat, a bunch of nobodies. At this point Harlem Heat was not yet somebody, but they would be. Everyone in this match is green as hell or just plain awful, and in some cases both, so don't expect a hot opener. Train and Kole (Booker T) start with a lot of crowd playing. After getting run over Kole tries to slam Train and fails. Kane (Stevie Ray) takes some buckle shots from Train and Kole walks into an armdrag from Norris. The faces work Kole's arm and he sells to the cheap seats. Train easily kicks out of a Harlem Heat double team. Equalizer kicks a lot. Ventura: "He ain't sure what he's doing in there half the time". Shoot comments that weren't meant to be shoot comments. Norris and Equalizer are in at the same time and are wearing nearly identical gear. Black trunks, brown boot coverings. It's like they coordinated. Equalizer wants Shockmaster and gets run over. Norris gets hit from behind. Equalizer big boot and clothesline. The heels are very visibly giving Norris detailed spot calls. Kole kneedrop for 2. Weak scissors kick. That'd get better with time. Norris dodges a splash and tags. Shockmaster runs wild. Bearhug on Kole. Belated donnybrook while Shockmaster drops Kole down and pins him. 1/2*

Terry Taylor is introduced as the second referee assigned for the Rude/Flair title match.

"Mr. Wonderful" Paul Orndorff (w/The Assassin) def Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat by countout in 18:35- Orndorff is subbing for an injured Yoshi Kwan, turning it into a bit of a revenge match as Steamboat beat Orndorff for the TV title on a recent Clash. Orndorff gets a jump from behind. Backdrop. Steamboat rolls out to think and Orndorff ambushes him again on the floor. Steamboat gets slammed on the ramp. Long pause with little happening....until Steamboat dives over the top rope! Orndorff dodges it! Saito suplex for 2. Steamboat takes Orndorff down by the arm while both are running and arm work will be the theme of the next 5 minutes or so of the match. After a crossbody for a 2 count Steamboat posts Orndorff's arm several times. Ref Nick Patrick physically pulls Steamboat down from the top rope to allow Orndorff to get back in. Steamboat does some very Pete Dunne/Marty Scurll like joint manipulation on Orndorff's fingers, sadly without the big snap. Steamboat's going pretty heelish here. If they wanted to really make things interesting and do a double turn (way too high level thinking for '93 WCW) they're doing the groundwork right here. Orndorff hides in the corner. They go out again and Orndorff takes a stair shot. Patrick holds Steamboat back again and Orndorff pulls him down face first into the apron. He throws Steamboat over the guardrail! Orndorff elbow off the top in the ring and arrogant cover for 2. Crossbody collision. Orndorff tries an illegal leverage pin. Patrick kicks his hands off the ropes. Steamboat hits a couple of chops off the top rope. Orndorff counters a backdrop with a faceplant and goes for a piledriver. Steamboat reverses and they do the bridge spot. Steamboat slingshots Orndorff into the top buckle and stacks him up for a long 2. Crossbody off the top! Assassin distracts Patrick, and by the time he gets over to count Orndorff kicks out. Patrick gets involved again. Steamboat pulls him away, giving Orndorff an opening to throw him over the top to the floor. Assassin loads up his mask old school style and headbutts Steamboat. Steamboat can't get back in and is counted out. Not a horrible match from two old pros, but that was a long way to go for that weak ass finish. **1/2

 

WCW World Television Championship: Lord Steven Regal (c) (w/Sir William) and "The British Bulldog" Davey Boy Smith go to a 15:00 time limit draw- Regal hesitates to lock up because Bulldog is a dead common Mancunian. The first 5 minutes of the match is several really good mat wrestling sequences, with Bulldog playing Regal's game perfectly rather than trying to take over with power right out of the gate. Regal missells a monkey flip and Bulldog hooks him in a surfboard. William provides a distraction for Regal to get a shot in. Bulldog crossbody for 2. Regal with a knee to the gut and senton for 2. Bulldog does a Bret bump. Regal European uppercuts. Bulldog sunset flip for 2. Five minutes left. Regal starts working half nelson/crossface style submission holds to play defense for the time limit. Four minutes left. Bulldog powers out and hits a clothesline. Regal gets a knee up in the corner and wraps Bulldog back up, tying his legs up this time too. Three minutes. Bulldog lifts Regal up but Regal gets a punch to the ribs and falls on Bulldog for 2. Another hold wrap up. Two minutes. Bulldog lifts again. This time Regal falls on the apron, gets another gut shot and cover for 2. One minute. Bulldog clothesline. Suplex. Powerslam! I think they mistimed that, there's still time left so Regal has to kick out of Bulldog's finisher. Bulldog hits a piledriver, and while the ref is counting that cover time expires. Solid time limit match, but they couldn't keep up the momentum of the great mat wrestling in the opening part of the match. **3/4

Vader and Harley Race come out to spin the wheel for the main event. Fortunately this year they remembered to rig the wheel to make sure they get what they want this time instead of some naff option like Coal Miner's Glove. The wheel stops on Texas Death Match and all is well.

 

WCW United States Heavyweight Championship: "The Natural" Dustin Rhodes (c) def "Stunning" Steve Austin in 14:23- These guys had some good matches over the TV title in '91, you'd think with two more years of seasoning they should be able to cook up a classic here. Austin's still repping the Hollywood Blondes while Pillman's out hurt. During intros Austin clearly wants Buffer to get a move on. So do we all. Cautious start. Austin slaps and grins. Rough lock up. Another Austin slap and he bails to the floor, all the while making it clear he knows exactly what he's doing trying to rile up Rhodes. He was on top of his character game at this point for sure. Dustin fights a Boston Crab attempt and flips Austin over. Speed run. Austin hits a back elbow. Snap mare and cover for 2. Dustin snap mare followed by ground and pound. Another long speed run ends with a Dustin dropkick. Dustin dodges in the corner, causing Austin to knee the top turnbuckle and fall to the floor. As he limps around on the floor gentleman Dustin gives him plenty of time to try to shake it off. After Austin gets back in he tries to dodge Dustin's attempts to go for the knee, but eventually gets too close and Dustin hits a kneebreaker. Knee work follows. Austin kicks Dustin south of Del Rio behind the ref's back. He pulls the pad off his good knee and kneedrops Dustin for 2. Dustin tries a slingshot, but Austin blocks it and falls on Dustin again with his good knee. Slugfest. Dustin backdrop and flying clothesline for 2. Austin blocks the bulldog and Dustin ends up in the tree of woe. Dustin roll up and small package for 2. He blocks a stun gun attempt and they trade cradles for 2. Austin gets a leverage cover with his feet on the ropes. The ref counts 3, but waves it off before the bell rings as he saw the feet on the rope after. Austin thinks he won and tries to get the belt. Dustin rolls him up, and the ref counts 3 even though I'm pretty sure Austin kicked out. Austin gets the belt and whacks Dustin with it, and takes it with him when he leaves. Another unnecessarily overcomplicated finish, and the match itself barely got into second gear. Not nearly what you'd expect from these two. *3/4

 

Footage of Bagwell and Scorpio beating the Nastys for the tag titles "last night" (it was really pretaped weeks before).

 

WCW World Tag Team Championship: The Nasty Boys (w/Missy Hyatt) def 2 Cold Scorpio and Marcus Alexander Bagwell (c) (w/Teddy Long) in 14:38- Funny bit at the start where Tony and Ventura try to justify how Hyatt's hair got about 3 feet shorter overnight. The perils of so much pretaping. The Nastys pose with the belts and get ambushed from behind. Double belt shot from the faces, but the ref lets it go because the bell hasn't rung yet. Bagwell kisses Hyatt! Talk about taking your life in your own hands. The bell rings and we reset with Saggs and Bagwell. It's all angry Nastys early. Bagwell (barely) slides under and dropkicks them both. Scorpio crossbody off the top onto both heels! Both Nastys are sent to the floor. Scorpio with a plancha! Face double teams on Knobbs back in. Scorpio out-agiles Knobbs all over the place. Not hard. It's about the same level of difficulty as outhinking the Bushwhackers. Face double tackle for 2. Bagwell Thesz press for 2. More high octane double teams before Scorpio slows things down with arm work. Bagwell gets in and immediately gets caught in the heel corner. It's clear who the weak link of the team is. The Nastys do a double team hot shot, but Bagwell overshoots and falls almost straight to the floor. Hyatt slaps Bagwell in return for the stolen kiss earlier. I think the kiss was more hazardous to his health than the slap. Saggs back suplex on the floor. Knobbs suplexes him back in and the Nastys work some surprisingly zesty quick tags instead of bogging the match down with rest holds like usual. They work the ref to get some double teams in. It almost backfires but Knobbs cuts the tag off and hooks in a bear hug. Huge Saggs clothesline. He's slow to cover and Bagwell kicks out. They do the usual "ref didn't see the tag" spot. Bagwell dodges a splash in the corner and gets the real tag. Scorpio cleans house, even though he completely whiffs one of his spinning heel kicks. Moonsault on Knobbs. Everyone in the pool! I mean everyone, Long and Hyatt are fighting on the apron! Scorpio hits Knobbs with the 450 splash. The ref is distracted so Saggs nails Scorpio with his boot, Knobbs covers, and the Nastys get the titles back! It's the same finish you've seen the Nasty Boys do 100 times before. That aside though, I didn't completely hate this. The faces (well, Scorpio) hit all their big spots in the beginning, and the usually useless Nastys were going a little harder than usual. **

 

Sting def Sid Vicious (w/Col Robert Parker) in 10:41- Since there's no titles involved this match is to determine the "franchise of WCW". Parker distracts and Sid jumps. Sting hits a slam and clothesline. He clotheslines Sid on the apron and suplexes him back in. Sid powders and Sting follows. Brawl through the crowd! What is this, 1998 WWF? Back in Sting hits a clothesline off the top for 2. Parker grabs Sting's boot. Sid goozles and choke slams him. There's been way too much action, Sid needs to slow this shit down and does so in usual Sid fashion. Side suplex. Parker gets a couple of chokes in. Sting rolls out and chases Parker. Sid nails Sting with a chair shot. Well, I say "nails", really nudged him with the thick padded part of the chair. The Spanish Inquisition's soft cushions probably do more damage (Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition). Sting gets dropped on the rail. Sid reverse chinlock. Sting's comeback gets cut off with a powerslam for 2. Sid bear hug. Sting fights out but runs into a Sid boot. More bear hug. Sting fights out again and this time blocks the boot. Faceplant. Stinger Splash! A second one! They fumble around over by where Parker is, a clear setup. Parker grabs both boots, then pulls down on Sid's and holds him down. Sid just kicks out of a pin, then looks at Parker with a "WTF" face. Parker swears he didn't realize it was Sid's boot. That's the way it's supposed to be, but watching it in reality there was no way in hell Parker couldn't tell which boot was which. While they're arguing Sting rolls Sid up for 3. Another overconvoluted finish. Seeing a pattern tonight? Afterward Parker pleads his case some more but Sid walks out on him. This would be the catalyst for Sid's face turn. All in all, as much as Sting tried in the first part, it's a Sid match. 3/4*

Sid's face turn was finalized the next week on TV and was supposed to lead to a massive push, culminating in being the man to take Vader down at Starrcade to end his year long title reign. In fact they already had footage in the can of Sid with the WCW globe and stars belt from their massive pretaping blitz. But all that had to be thrown away when soon after this show, during WCW's UK tour, Sid tried to murder Arn Anderson with a pair of scissors and was promptly fired. Sid would go down to the USWA for the next year and a half before WWF took him back in '95.

 

WCW International World Heavyweight Championship: "Ravishing" Rick Rude (c) def "Nature Boy" Ric Flair (w/Fifi) by DQ in 19:22- This is a rematch from Fall Brawl, where Rude won the Big Gold Belt for the first time. Rude's got great Halloween themed tights tonight. Flair comes in hot. Delayed suplex. Corner clothesline. Rude gets a knee up in the opposite corner. He misses a kneedrop off the top rope. Flair with a kneebreaker. Figure four! Right in the middle of the ring! Rude fights it for a while and finally just reaches out enough to grab a rope. Flair posts the knee and hits a chop block. Rude pulls Flair's tights to send him to the floor. Flair sunset flips back in. Chops. Flair crossbody and both guys tumble over the top to the floor. Flair ax handle off the top to the floor. That's cool and all, but they did the exact same stuff in their last match. He goes up top again and this time Rude catches him with a punch to the gut coming down. Taylor takes a chair away from Rude. Flair takes a rail shot. Flair Flop! Rude backbreaker and double chinlock back in. He gives Fifi a hip swivel. Ax handle off the top from Rude, but he tweaked his knee again coming down. Flair Flip! He took a cameraman out on the way down! Rude suplexes him back in. Another ax handle off the top for 2. Slug/chopfest. Rude gets a corner whip and clothesline for 2, then locks in a bear hug. Flair ducks a clothesline and hooks on a sleeper. Rude back him into the corner. Flair with a Rude Awakening! He's slow to cover and Rude kicks out. Flair backslide for 2. He tries coming off the top again, Rude gets his boots up. After some whip reversals the ref gets squashed in the corner. Taylor comes in....and immediately gets run over by Rude. Oy vey. Rude gets knucks out of his tights, which is what he used to win the title. Flair ducks and hits a back suplex. Flair gets the knucks and pops Rude with them! Taylor counts....but stops just before 3. The main ref stopped him and says he saw Flair use the knucks, and DQ's him. Rude tries to carry Fifi away after the bell. Flair stops him. Both guys were on autopilot and we have yet another stupid finish. **

The rules for the main event: falls count anywhere, after a fall there's a 30 second rest period, and after that a wrestler has a 10 count to get to his feet or the match is over. Yes, it's overly convoluted, and no, there's no chance at all that WCW will mess up their own overly convoluted gimmick match rules. Never happened before. This is also a non-title match, which was standard for WCW in a gimmick match.

 

Texas Death Match: WCW World Heavyweight Champion Big Van Vader (w/Harley Race) def Cactus Jack in 15:59- Jack charges Vader on the ramp and it's on! Vader pulls his mask off barely a minute in. Shit's gonna get real. Jack dodges and Vader punches the post. Stiff slugfest. Vader takes a chairshot to the head. Bang bang! They get in the ring. Vader gets a boot up and absolutely MURDERS Jack with a stiff clothesline. Corner beatdown. Jack blocks an apron suplex and suplexes Vader onto the ramp! Jack is bleeding from the punches, one cut just above the eye and the other on his cheek. He back suplexes Vader on the ramp. Race tries to sneak up with a chair but Jack cuts him off and gives Vader more chairshots. They brawl in the graveyard set and fall through the stage! Right into the grave marked "RIP Vader". The ref refuses to go down in the hole to count. Vader emerges from his own grave and is now also bleeding. Jack clotheslines him and gets the first fall. After the rest period Vader is up before 10. Jack hits him with a cactus prop from the stage! There's a conveniently placed table right by the ramp. Cactus Elbow off the ramp to the floor! Jack gets another fall. Vader beats the count again. Jack puts the table in the ring. He sets it up wrong and the ref has to fix it. Vader lays in some more potatoes and goes for a corner whip. Jack reverses it and Vader goes face first into the upright table! Jack drops the table onto him! Vader rolls to the floor. Jack sunset flip to the floor! He drops Vader on the rail, charges and dives, but Vader blocks it and Jack splats on the floor. Vader with a chairshot, and he caught Jack in the back with the legs too. We can see Race has a taser. They get back in the ring. Vader goes to the second rope. No, up top! VADERSAULT! That gets a fall. Jack is up in time. More potatoes. They go out to the ramp again. Chairshot to Jack's head. Vader gives him a DDT on the chair! Medics come out to check on Jack and Vader chases them all off. He covers and gets a fall. Jack gets up and DDTs Vader on the chair. But, we're still in the 30 second rest period. Even Capetta sounds confused counting it down. The ref starts counting both guys after the 30 seconds are up even though Jack hit Vader with a move during the "rest period". Jack is almost up at 8 but Race tasers him in the leg! Vader is up and the ref counts Jack down at 10, giving Vader the win. WCW messed up the overconvoluted rules for a gimmick match. I'm sure you're as shocked as I am. Yet another terrible finish regardless, this was stiff, brutal, and way outside Turner's family friendly comfort zone. Clean up the rules and give it a better finish and this would be an all time classic. ****

OVERALL SHOW THOUGHTS- WCW had a dreadful time in the fall of '93 thanks to the pretaping of so many shows sucking wrestler motivation away, and this is another example of it. The problem of too clever by half finishes is also all over this show, something that unfortunately becomes a hallmark of Bishoff era WCW, especially in main events. That said, the main event is pretty must see despite its flaws. It's the kind of hardcore match you never saw from a major American company in the early-mid '90s, hearkening back to some of the NWA's bloody '80s brawls and forward to what ECW would be bringing into the mainstream in the near future.

OVERALL SHOW GRADE: C-