Over the Edge '99

Legacy Review

Over the Edge '99

May 23, 1999 from the Kemper Arena in Kansas City, MO

Commentary: Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler

I've been debating for a long time whether or not I would even try to do a review for this show. In the end my completionist streak won out, but this will be a very different review, because this is the night Owen Hart was tragically killed. Honestly I'm still surprised that this is even available on the Network/Peacock even though it's been on there since pretty much the start, though it's heavily edited and not readily accessible, you have to go digging around a bit for it (not like finding anything on Peacock's layout is easy). I'll go into all that more when I need to, but until things go south we'll carry on as normal.

The Network copy begins with an Owen memorial graphic before going into the actual show broadcast. The whole opening video is basically Undertaker = evil. We get some footage from Heat of Vince being attacked by the Corporate Ministry after substituting himself in place of Austin in an obvious trap match (don't ask, it's Russo). JR says Vince, who was scheduled to double special guest ref the main event along with Shane, is hurt and we'll have more updates soon.

WWF Tag Team Championship: Kane & X-Pac (c) def D'Lo Brown & "Sexual Chocolate" Mark Henry (w/Ivory) in 14:44- Henry is wrestling in street clothes. Huge "D'Lo sucks" chant from the crowd after the bell. Pac and Brown start with some basics. Brown runs Pac over with a shoulderblock. He does a quick hair pull to keep Pac in a headlock. Pac uses the ref to flip into counters and hit an armdrag. After some more power vs agility stuff Pac hits a back suplex, heel kick and kick combo in the corner. Brown avoids the bronco buster and both sides tag. Kane quickly goes punchy choky on Henry. Henry reverses a corner whip and hits an avalanche. He gorilla presses Kane! That's legit impressive. Kane pops right back up and hits a clothesline. Dropkick from Kane! Man, they're going for it tonight. Legdrop. Henry sees the choke slam being set up, bails and tags a very reluctant Brown. Kane no sells some Brown slaps. Brown flips over a backdrop but runs into a big boot. The champs get Brown stuck in their corner. Pac hits a kick combo and spinning heel kick. Brown goes to the ol' eye poke to turn things around. Henry pulls Pac down from behind and crotches him on the post. Ledgrop from Brown. Pac flies across the ring selling a Henry punch. Some of Henry's very basic offense follows. Pac dodges a splash but Brown cuts the tag off. Pac gets tossed out and Henry drops him on the barricade. Brown covers for 2. Back elbow from Brown. Ligerbomb! Kane breaks the pin up. Brown goes for some springboard flippy thing that I'm not sure what it was supposed to be, but Pac dodges it. Barely. Tags on both sides. Kane knocks Henry around. Tiltawhirl slam on Brown. Henry catches a Pac plancha and posts his back. Kane reverse suplex on Brown. Henry hits Kane from the apron. Brown uses the distraction to hit a spinning heel kick for 2. Kane's kickout sends Brown out to the floor, where he seamlessly joins in double teaming Pac with Henry. Kane goes up top and dives down to the floor onto everyone! Damn! That was holy shit chant worthy if mainstream crowds did that back then. Back in Kane hits Henry with a clothesline off the top rope and we go into proper donnybrooking mode. Pac gets Brown with the bronco buster. Henry clothesline Kane and avalanches post-BB Pac from behind. He turns around into a Kane chokeslam! That gets the pin. Surprisingly spiffy. Everyone had their working boots on and the crowd was hot for it. **3/4

 

In the back Michael Cole has an update on Vince, a possible ankle injury. More to follow.

 

WWF Hardcore Championship: Al Snow (c) (w/Head) def Hardcore Holly in 12:53- These two have done more than anyone to set the standard for Hardcore title matches, which have become a popular and unique attraction. A new twist in the long feud is Snow's new stuffed deer head Pierre, which Holly "killed" recently on weekly TV. Snow brings Pierre with him in a box looking much worse for wear. After a jump start Snow gets a backdrop and 360 clotheslines Holly to the floor. They brawl on the floor a bit with barricade and stair shots on both sides. Holly uses Pierre's corpse as cover and whacks Snow with a cookie sheet. He gets a fire extinguisher but can't get it to go off. Cookie sheet shot from Snow for 2. Snow sets the extinguisher off right in Holly's face. JR: "That can't be healthy". They go into the crowd, up the steps and out to the lobby by some conveniently placed concession stands. JR makes a reference to concession stands in Tupelo, calling out one of WCW's recent disasters. All the stands take shots and get used with food and drink flying. JR: "Not the deadly funnel cakes!". Once everyone's covered in enough powdered sugar they go back into the arena and down the steps. Snow grabs a giant cotton candy holder from an arena worker and whacks Holly with it. Legdrop off the barricade from Snow. Back in the ring Snow hits a Greco Roman nut stomp, the first scientific wrestling move of the whole match so far. He goes out and gets a chair. And a table. He sets the table up in the corner. Holly comes up with a dropkick. Big delayed falcon arrow for a long 2. Holly argues with the ref and Snow hits the Snow Plow for 2. Chair to Holly's gut. Corner whip reversals avoiding the table. Snow goes for Head but Holly holds him back by the hair. Snow gets free and grabs her. Holly ducks the Head shot and DDTs Snow onto the chair for another long 2. He goes to reposition the table. One of the table's legs has come off so he does the best he can. Snow slips out of a slam and powerbombs Holly through the table! Despite the broken leg that went fine. Snow gets the pin. Another fun all arena plunder brawl, but the last part of the match after they got back in the ring really drug. I get they were going for selling the match's damage, but it was a bit overdone. **1/2

 

Back to Cole with Brisco and Patterson. They confirm an ambulance is on the way for Vince, and Patterson says he knows it's a broken ankle.

On the Network copy there's a huge edit here. In the original broadcast it goes into a hype video for the next scheduled match: the Godfather defending the Intercontinental title against the Blue Blazer, who we all know is Owen Hart. Owen was supposed to have a "superhero like" entrance coming down from the rafters in keeping with his Blazer character, which at this point was Owen being delusional that he really was a real superhero. Tragically, as the hype video was playing something went wrong with the harness and Owen fell 70 feet straight down into the ring. The broadcast comes back to nothing but shots of the crowd and JR, who lets everyone know what happened and makes sure to point that this is not part of an angle and is "as real as real gets". Lawler jumped out of the booth as soon as it happened to try to help. After a bit he comes back to the booth and simply says "it doesn't look good". JR says they're not showing any footage of what's happening in the ring on TV because they don't want to sensationalize what's happening and to make sure no one gets the wrong idea about this being a real accident. He narrates Owen being given CPR, then being carried out on a stretcher to subdued crowd cheers and an "Owen" chant. He then says we're going to go ahead and go into our next match, which is the mixed tag match.

 

From here on out this review is going to be simply just the basic facts of what happened. I'm not going to make any critical judgments about performances on the night, give star ratings, or rate the whole show because it's not fair to the wrestlers that were forced to continue working after the accident to try to judge their performances when they were very understandably elsewhere mentally and emotionally. I might make some comments about longer term story arc stuff, but that will be it.

 

Mixed Tag Match: Val Venus & Nicole Bass def Jeff Jarrett & WWF Women's Champion Debra in 6:07- I think we can all agree this likely would have sucked no matter what the circumstances. This is another of those crazy "love quadrangle" angles that Russo loved, most of which involved Venus. I won't get into the details but you can probably guess most of it. Debra's got a t-shirt with two puppies on the front now. The guys work some back and forth for a bit before the women tag in. Debra's trying to wrestle in platform shoes. That's REALLY not going to work. Her bit with Bass is as bad as you'd expect. I know, no judgements considering what's just happened but I feel safe saying it because it'd be awful anyway. After the guys tag back in Bass pulls Jarrett off a pin and poses for the crowd. Debra hits her from behind with the guitar. Bass no sells it and tears Debra's shirt off. Jarrett loads up the guitar but Venus hits him with a back suplex. Money Shot and it's over. After the bell Bass plants one on Venus, who sells it as much as he sold anything in the match, but afterward he looks into it. This would be Bass' last WWF match.

Back to the back and Vince is being loaded onto an ambulance. Shane is SO SHOCKED at what's happened. He promises to be an impartial solo guest ref tonight.

 

"Bad Ass" Billy Gunn def Road Dogg in 11:14- The New Age Outlaws exploding is an inevitable step in Gunn's heel singles push, and it's a shame it had to be on this show after what's happened even if said singles push crashed and burned soon after. Gunn grabs Dogg and drags him to the floor during his entrance, then they get right back in the ring. After some Gunn beating Dogg comes back and 360 clotheslines him to the floor. Brawl up and down the aisle. Back in the ring Gunn begs off, then uses momentum to toss Dogg over the top to trigger a bit more floor brawling. Delayed jackhammer from Gunn in the ring. The next section of the match is largely Gunn hits a couple of power moves to restold to Dogg's comeback is cut off rinse and repeat. After an almost real Dogg comeback flurry Gunn steals the ring bell hammer and nails Dogg with it. Cover for 2. Dogg counters a Stinger splash by punching Gunn out of midair. Gunn clotheslines Dogg with some tape, hits the fameasser, pulls tights for good measure and gets the 3 count.

 

Elimination Match: The Union def The Corporate Ministry in 14:58- Survivor Series comes to May. The Union was a very short lived Mankind led face stable of former Corporation/Ministry/Corporate Ministry members. In tonight's match it's Mankind, Ken Shamrock, Test and the Big Show against the Big Boss Man, Viscera and the Acolytes for the CM. No one on the Ministry team looks happy to be out there. Viscera squashes Test around at the start with the CM team getting some near falls on him. Test knocks Bradshaw out of the ring, and that only pisses Bradshaw off. Test keeps going on his own, not even trying to tag anyone. He hits an elbow off the top rope. Faarooq distracts, Bradshaw hits the Clothesline from Hell, and Test is gone. Shamrock comes in fists flying. Bradshaw goes for the Clothesline from Hell again. Shamrock ducks and tries to twist into an armbreaker. Faarooq makes the save. Hurricanrana on Bradshaw. The ankle lock is on and Bradshaw taps. Shamrock tries a spinning armbreaker on Viscera that unshockingly goes nowhere. Faarooq comes in and Shamrock strings some moves together on him, then gets the ankle lock on. Boss Man pulls Faarooq to the ropes. Shamrock refuses to break, then dips into the old playbook and belly to belly suplexes ref Mike Chioda. Backup ref Teddy Long runs in and tosses Shamrock out. Show chokeslams Faarooq and that takes care of him. This is in a short period where they were calling Show's chokeslam the "Showstopper". That obviously wouldn't last. Boss Man cautiously gets into it with Show. Show clotheslines him and shoulderblocks him out of the ring. Boss Man tries to walk. Show chases and runs him back in. The beating from Show continues until a Boss Man low blow. A CM double team gets Show down. Show gets a big boot on Boss Man but Viscera breaks up the chokeslam. Everyone's in. Show body slams Viscera, then they fight all the way up the aisle until they go through the stage and are missing presumed counted out. Boss Man beats on Mankind for a bit until Mankind hits the double underhook DDT. Socko, Claw, Long calls it and Mankind is the unofficial sole survivor.

There's another edit here on the Network copy, because this is the point where JR has to make what I'm sure was the most difficult announcement of his career: Owen Hart has died due to the injuries sustained from the earlier accident.

There's been a lot of second guessing over the years of whether or not the show should have been stopped at this point, or even earlier right after the accident occurred. Popular opinion in the aftermath was that it should have been stopped and Vince is a heartless bastard for carrying on. I get that sentiment, but at the same time from a business perspective the best choice was probably for them to get through it as best they could without having to worry about refunds, fallout from the cable companies for cutting the show short, etc. We can debate it all day, but the fact is the show did carry on. I think we can all agree that, given time to prepare, the next night on Raw was handled much better. The show was renamed "Raw is Owen" for one night, the entire broadcast was in tribute to Owen with no long term angle work, and all matches were volunteer only wrestlers.

Back to the show. Next up is a recap of the renewal of the Rock/Triple H rivalry. They had an extended feud over the IC title the previous year that elevated both wrestlers, and almost immediately after Rock was in the main event as WWF Champion. Now they're hoping getting him back with Rock will get Triple H to the same place. Since Backlash Rock has also had his long awaited full face turn, a role he'll stay in until his heel "Hollywood Rock" run in 2003. During the build for this HHH (kayfabe) broke Rock's arm and he's been sporting a cast since. We cut to promo time with the Rock. Chyna and HHH ambush him! HHH starts to cut Rock's cast off. Mankind comes in to try to make the save. HHH and Chyna take him out too, then leave for their entrance.

 

The Rock def Triple H (w/Chyna) by DQ in 11:41- HHH wants a forfeit. While he's arguing with Hebner about it Rock's music hits. Rock charges in, cast and all, and pounds away. HHH gets tossed over the top and we have the usual floor brawling with Rock mostly staying in control. HHH gets draped over the Spanish announce table. While he's there Rock takes Savinovitch's headset and provides some Rock-style Spanish commentary. "Kicky your monkey assy". HHH runs Rock's cast into the English table, causing it to come off, then he nails Rock with it. Back in HHH does some stuff. He's still getting comfortable with his heel offense I think. Rock gets a Samoan drop for 2. Speed run and HHH hits the high knee for 2. They go back to the floor and Chyna attacks Rock's bad arm. Double clothesline on the floor. Rock hits a DDT in the ring. HHH gives Rock and arm slam on the bad arm and really starts picking it apart. Rock's comeback ends with him getting tossed over the top and we go knocking around ringside again. After a bit of a rough patch in the ring Rock hooks up for the Rock Bottom, but his bad arm won't let him hit it. HHH counters into a DDT. Chyna hands HHH a chair. Hebner takes it away. HHH doesn't like that and Hebner, as usual, gives it right back to him with lots of chest poking. HHH punches Hebner out! Half conscious Hebner must be thinking "Flair never did that to Tommy Young". Then he calls for the bell, DQing Trips. Rock gets the chair and waffles HHH in the head with it. And now Rock punches Hebner out for good measure. HHH is busted open. They go around ringside again. Chyna tries to get involved and goes down. Rock Bottom! Guess the broken arm is fine now. Rock sets up for a chair assisted People's Elbow. Chyna trips him and HHH gives him a chairshot. Chair to the arm. Mankind runs out and runs the heels off to make the save.

Next up is the recap of another long '98 feud being renewed, Undertaker and Austin. After Taker kidnapped Steph at Backlash (WHERE TO, STEPHANIE?!) it was Austin that saved her despite his loathing for the McMahons in general. After that the Corporate Ministry officially formed, with Shane taking credit as the orchestrator of the plot to kidnap his own sister and have her ritually sacrificed or married off to Taker or whatever the hell it was they were going to do with her. Shane ordered Austin to defend the title at this PPV against Taker with himself as guest ref. Commissioner Shawn Michaels stepped in and made Vince co-guest ref to try to keep things balanced, hence the attack earlier tonight. They're also repeating the same rule as previous Shane reffed matches that if Austin puts his hands on Shane he loses the title.

 

WWF Championship: The Undertaker (w/Paul Bearer) def "Stone Cold" Steve Austin (c) in 22:58- Shane is the first to come out. He's followed by Pat Patterson in a ref shirt! The assumption is Patterson is replacing Vince and Shane is none too pleased about it. Taker makes his entrance, and after a lot of work to get his robe undone he chokeslams Patterson! Well that's that problem taken care off. Glass shatter, vest off, and here we go. Taker gets the early edge until Austin snaps him over the top rope, then goes UP TO THE TOP ROPE and hits a clothesline for 2! Man, Austin off the top. Unheard of. Shane did count that fair. Mudhole stomp with Shane trying to break it up and Austin letting him know he's #1 with both hands. Finally Shane pulls Austin back and Taker attacks from behind. Both guys do some knee work with Austin being generally more effective. Bearer takes a punch in there. Taker uses that distraction and we have our mandatory in crowd brawl. After some more ringside brawling Austin goes for the Thesz press in the ring. Taker blocks it! That's also unheard of. Bearer hits Austin with his shoe! Who uses a shoe, honestly? Now for the mandatory aisle brawl to the stage brawl. Austin dodges and Taker punches out one of the church-like stained glass windows decorating the stage. Austin then puts Taker through another one. They continue brawling around the stage for a while not doing anything terribly interesting. Back in the ring Taker is in control until Austin low blows him and hits an elbow off the second rope. Taker is down but Shane refuses to count 3. What a shock. Austin corners Shane, going as far as you possibly can without putting hands on him. Taker comes in with a chair but Austin cuts it off. He whips Taker into Shane and Shane goes down. Chairshot on Taker! Cover. Brisco comes in to count. Taker kicks out! Big boot from Taker on Austin, then he takes Brisco out. Flying clothesline. Here comes Vince, limping his way to the ring. Taker counters the Stunner and double clothesline. Vince counts them down. Double situp. Slugfest. Stunner! Shane pulls Vince up before he can count 3! Austin gets in Vince's face, understandably thinking Vince has screwed him again. Shane shoves Vince into Austin, Taker rolls Austin up, and Shane fast counts 3! Taker wins the title!

You think this whole angle is silly? Folks, you haven't seen the half of it. It's just after this PPV on Raw when the Ministry's long teased "higher power" is finally revealed.

So again, not going to have any kind of grade or anything on this show. One last thing I will say is, echoing what many have said before me over the years, JR and Lawler did an incredible job holding this whole thing together from commentary. Consummate professionalism.