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Welcome to the Let's Watch Old PPVs thread! As you may have noticed, the world is kind of hosed up right now. We're all cooped up inside, slowly going crazy because even if your normal lifestyle largely involves sitting at home and shitposting on SA (some refer to this as "working from home") like mine does, it's not nearly as fun when you have to do it. With that in mind, I figured I'd do something to take my mind off the hellscape that is the world in 2020 and start a thread where we can watch old PPVs and chat about them. The WWE Network is currently offering all WWF/E PPVs for free, so there's plenty to choose from even if you don't get a free trial for the full service (or pay for it, but who does that). PPVs and major shows from other companies are fine as well, so it's not WWE only. If you want to watch New Blood Rising or Victory Road 2009, knock yourself out! So how does this work? Well, we've had a bunch of similar threads before (I particularly enjoyed Rarity's 80s WWF thread, that one was great. It's goldmined now, which would be why I couldn't find it at first), in which the OP watches a bunch of shows and posts their commentary. While I'll get things started here in a bit with an overly lengthy (multi-part) look at Survivor Series 2002, I'm not going to hog the entire thread with my ramblings. If you watch a show and want to talk about it, write a review, laugh at terrible Attitude era gimmick matches or whatnot, this is the place to do it! You don't need to go into massive detail if you don't want to either, you don't have to include screenshots or anything like that, just post whatever feels appropriate to you.  Or if you just want to sit back, read my nonsense and talk about the show, that's fine with me too, but I definitely encourage thread participation. I was also considering watchalong-type stuff where we all watch the same show and post our comments about it, and then choose another show for the next week, but we'll see how this thing will turn out. I'm not great at planning things out. The only rule here is that this is supposed to be a chill thread for chill folks (occasional rants about Jerry Lawler's commentary or other dumb poo poo notwithstanding), so please don't get weird if someone dislikes your favorite match or something. Aside from that, go nuts. The normal forum rules still apply, of course. THE SHOWS WWE Survivor Series 2002 by Doc M: Survivor Series 2002, Part 1 Survivor Series 2002, Part 2 Survivor Series 2002, Part 3 WWF In Your House: Canadian Stampede (1997) by Doc M WWE No Mercy 2005 by is pepsi ok ECW December to Dismember 2006 (  ) by Doc M:December to Dismember 2006, Part 1 December to Dismember 2006, Part 56 DMorbid fucked around with this message at 11:47 on Apr 3, 2020 |
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Mar 27, 2020 22:43
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Let's Watch Classic PPVs: WWE Survivor Series 2002 (Nov 17, 2002), Part One Before we plunge into the lowest depths of the Ruthless Aggression era or something like that, let's get things started with a PPV that is actually really good. Survivor Series 2002 is one of my favorite WWE shows of all time, or at least that's what my memory is telling me. I had this show on DVD and watched it over and over when I was a teenager, but I haven't seen it in years so now it's time to find out if Survivor Series 2002 holds up.  We start off with an intro package hyping up the main events. At No Mercy the previous month, Brock Lesnar defeated the Undertaker and retained his WWE Championship in an absolute bloodbath of a Hell in a Cell match, earning Taker's respect and turning face in the process. Brock's first heel challenger is none other than the Big Show, who turned heel earlier in the year by joining the nWo on RAW and then spent several months doing pretty much nothing after the nWo disbanded following Kevin Nash's latest quad explosion. Regardless, Big Show is now on Smackdown and we're supposed to take him seriously as a monster heel again, so he's been brutalizing Brock for several weeks (even press-slamming him off the stage at one point) as Brock's manager Paul Heyman desperately urges his client not to fight Big Show at Survivor Series. "You can't F5 him, he's too big! He's 7 feet tall and weighs 500 pounds!" and so on. However, Brock is not backing down, so the match is on.  The Smackdown main event is not even remotely the focus of the promo video, though, because Survivor Series 2002 also sees the debut of the Elimination Chamber match and the majority of the package is understandably dedicated to building up that match. RAW General Manager Eric Bischoff talks about what a genius he is and how he's once again proven himself superior to the competition, who in this case would be Smackdown GM Stephanie McMahon.  Yes, that's the shot they used for Stephanie in the video. I don't think she'd approve an unflattering shot like that in a promo package these days, because as we all know she's the coolest and most powerful woman in the world. Bischoff puts over the Elimination Chamber and the World Heavyweight Championship, and the video ends.  Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler welcome us to Madison Square Garden and hype up the Elimination Chamber as Saliva's "Always" plays in the background. As far as buttrock themes for early 00s WWE shows go, you could do a lot worse.  Our opening contest sees the Dudley Boyz (Bubba Ray and Spike, as D-Von was drafted to Smackdown and became Reverend D-Von, best known for having some guy called "Deacon Bautista" as his henchman) and Jeff Hardy going up against 3 Minute Warning and Rico in an elimination tables match.  I always liked the glowy paint Jeff wore around this time, it really made him stand out.  I'd probably advise against that, lady. I'm sure it'd be a good time, but there is a good chance you'd get arrested.  Meanwhile, 3 Minute Warning - Jamal and Rosey - have been acting as Bischoff's heavies for a few months, and Rico somehow ended up hanging out with them after the whole fiasco that was the Billy & Chuck wedding. Jamal and Rosey, of course, would later become Umaga and a Super Hero In Training respectively, and sadly both men have since passed away at an early age because wrestling. The faces have the upper hand early on, with some double team moves including the Wazzup headbutt by Spike. Jeff also dives out of the ring and seems to hit his head on one of the tables propped up against the barricade. They also do the whole "Get the tables" shtick and Bubba brings one to the ring, setting it up in the corner. The heels get the advantage and Rosey tries to spear Spike through the table in the corner, but Spike dodges and Rosey goes through it instead. This does not count as an elimination because you have to put your opponent through the table for it to count. Rosey completely nosells going through the table and throws the wreckage at Spike instead. Jeff dives off the top rope and just kind of bumps into Rosey. I'm not sure what they were supposed to do there (looked like Rosey was supposed to catch him), but the commentary tries to cover for the botch by saying Rosey swatted Jeff out of the air as the crowd starts a loud "YOU hosed UP" chant. Spike then goes for the Dudley Dog on Rico, but Jamal and Rosey catch him and just haul him through the table. The faces get back on the attack after crotching both members of 3MW on the top rope (Rosey's sell is great because he basically does a moonsault as he lands), but that doesn't last long. Rosey takes Jeff to one of the arena exits and tries to put him through another table, but Bubba comes in for the save and Rosey ends up on the table instead, as Jeff re-enacts his famous spot from Royal Rumble 2000.  I like his shrug just before he jumps. That's Rosey out of the match, and Jeff has also put himself out of commission for a bit. Unfortunately, his presence is soon required in the ring as Rico goes up to the top rope and Jeff's supposed to push him off, but Jeff misses his cue and Rico has to shout "COME ON JEFF GODDAMMIT" which is cut out from the Network version. Jeff then tries to attack Jamal outside the ring by running on top of the barricade, but smashes face first into a table carried by Jamal. He also slips while running on the barricade, but just about manages to save it so the spot isn't completely ruined. This doesn't eliminate Jeff because he put himself through the table (Jamal clearly pushed the table towards him, but that apparently doesn't count), but Jamal fixes that by putting Jeff on another table on the ringside and hitting a diving splash off the top rope.  Holy poo poo, that looked scary. That's a real big boy landing on you. Jeff is out, and now it's just Bubba against Rico and Jamal. Bubba fights back and takes out Jamal with a top rope powerbomb through another table. Remember when Bubba used to powerbomb women through tables every week and clearly enjoyed it a bit too much? Ah, the Attitude era at its finest. Rosey and Jamal should be out of the match but they both come back to the ring and start beating on Bubba as another table is set up in the middle of the ring. D-Von Dudley runs in, wearing the Dudleyz camo once again, and makes the save, driving off Rosey and Jamal (the latter does the Rikishi-style flipping sell on a clothesline, which looks pretty cool). 3-D to Rico through the table, and Bubba is declared the winner as he and D-Von celebrate together and the crowd goes ballistic.  This, of course, marked the end of the Reverend D-Von gimmick, as D-Von would be back on RAW and once again teaming with his half-brother. This was probably the right call, because nobody cared about either of the two as solo wrestlers and Bubba teaming with Spike just wasn't the same. I wonder what happened to that Deacon Bautista dude. This was a fun opener with a bunch of crazy spots including Jeff's big dive, and it did a great job getting the crowd into the action. It was kind of botchy at times, especially when Jeff was involved (he'd be out of the company the next summer after refusing to go to rehab), but still an enjoyable car wreck of a match. Using my highly scientific rating system that is solely based on how entertaining I found the match, I'll give this one three stars out of five. ***  We go to Stacy Keibler at WWE's The World restaurant, formerly known as WWF New York. She welcomes everyone to the show, and informs us Test (who is not yet dead, and is dating Stacy in storyline... possibly in real life at this time as well, I don't care enough to look up if that was the case) couldn't be there because she sent him on a worldwide PR tour "because there's nothing more than he likes to be surrounded by a throng of Testicles." Somehow, the mention of "Testicles", who were supposedly Test's fans although I doubt any ever actually existed, is the least awkward part of that sentence.  Saliva then performs "Always" live, as we're treated to an excellent video package hyping up the various matches we'll be seeing tonight. The lead singer looks like the Undertaker's goony cousin. I'll say one thing for Saliva here - they're at least a hell of a lot better live than Downstait, although that's not exactly a high bar to clear.  This clip from Summerslam 2002 combined with the line "I see the blood all over your hands/Does it make you feel more like a man?" is approximately 900% cooler than anything involving Triple H or Saliva has any right to be. WWE's video department was just fantastic at the time - hell, at Wrestlemania X-7 they briefly made Limp Bizkit seem cool! After "Always" finishes, Michael Cole and Tazz plug Saliva's album as the band goes into another, much worse song to remind us they're in fact still Saliva and very much not cool. With that brief musical interlude out of the way, let's get back to the wrestling. Our next match is for the Cruiserweight Championship, as champion Jamie Noble takes on Billy Kidman.  At this point, Noble's doing the trailer trash gimmick and is accompanied to the ring by his girlfriend Nidia.  One of many classy crowd signs we'll be seeing tonight. Anyway, Kidman's pinned Noble twice leading up to this match, and now we'll see if he can pull it off when it counts and win the title. Both Kidman and Noble are WCW alumni, but I can't remember if they ever wrestled each other in WCW. Surely they must have had at least one match there.  Kidman enters to his "You Can Run" theme, which is actually debuting here. I always thought it was kind of a bad fit for Kidman, but what do I know? Some nice action to start the match off, but I'm slightly distracted by the sizable patch of blood on the mat.  Tazz eventually takes a break from drooling over Nidia to mention that Rico suffered an injury when he was put through the table by the Dudleys, getting a big cut on his arm, and that's where the blood on the mat came from. This is a WWE cruiserweight match, so it kinda seems to be running at half speed. Noble hits the Falcon Arrow, but Kidman kicks out at two. Nobody kicks out of the Falcon Arrow! Kidman goes up top, but Nidia pulls Noble out of the ring as Tazz sings "What's Love Got To Do With It" and almost hits a correct note once. I love how Cole then mentions Tina Turner and Tazz goes "Who?" Nidia tries to distract Kidman but gets knocked off the apron by Noble when Noble goes to hit Kidman and misses. Noble hits the Tigerbomb for another two count, and goes for a superplex off the top rope but gets countered with a massive sitout facebuster off the top.  That was cool. Noble survives, however, and places Kidman on the top rope again for an enormous DDT.  Somehow, Kidman kicks out of that. Noble's down and Kidman goes up top for the SSP, but Nidia distracts him again. Noble climbs up top but gets knocked down, and Kidman hits the SSP for the win and the championship.  Another good match, albeit a bit on the short side and kinda slow-paced because that's what WWE cruiserweight matches were (are?). Great work from both guys, and some crazy spots I didn't expect to see. That's another three stars, good stuff. Chris Benoit and Kurt Angle have been bickering with each other since they were put together as a tag team, and keep doing so backstage. Eventually, they get on the same page and hug it out at Kurt's insistence. Kurt is great, but I don't really want to talk about Benoit any more than I have to so let's move on. Chris Jericho is preparing for the Elimination Chamber match backstage. We saw RVD doing his own preparations earlier, and we'll be seeing the others as the night goes on.  Secret "F-View" footage shows Victoria talking to a mirror in her dressing room (why did Bischoff install hidden cameras in women's dressing rooms, that's loving creepy), doing the whole "Mirror, mirror on the wall" thing and finding out the mirror thinks Trish Stratus is prettier than her. She proceeds to have an argument with the mirror, smashes it (and the cardboard cutout of Trish in the dressing room, because she's obsessed with Trish) and storms off. JR and King talk about Victoria and the upcoming hardcore match between her and Trish for the Women's Championship. King says "Anything goes, I hope it's the clothes!" Thanks, King. Jerry Lawler's commentary around this time was completely insufferable when it came to women's matches, and this isn't even the worst we'll be hearing from him in the next few minutes. We cut to a video package hyping up the women's title match. Apparently, Victoria is jealous of Trish because they used to be fitness models together years ago and WWE was interested in both of them, but somehow Trish never let her get her chance. Trish won the Women's Championship at Unforgiven 2002 while Victoria "languished", and as of late she's been on a tear against Trish (and anyone who vaguely reminds her of Trish, as poor Terri Runnels got to find out). Victoria promises to take not only the title, but Trish's soul.  Victoria enters to a generic rock theme, no "All The Things She Said" yet. On the plus side, that means we don't need to listen to the terrible Network overdub. Victoria starts the match by attacking Trish during her entrance, choking Trish with her own ring jacket. As this is a hardcore match, we've got all sorts of weapons lying around, and the first foreign object Victoria produces is... a broomstick. Huh. Victoria chokes Trish with the broom and then goes to town with a trashcan lid. The action spills to the outside with Victoria still in control, and JR and King talk about how Victoria is jealous of Trish. King suggests it's because Trish is beautiful and gets all the attention from the guys and "the last time Victoria got whistled at was right before a train hit her." Yes, girls, if you don't look like Trish Stratus, you're a grotesque hag and nobody will ever find you attractive! (Not that you'd want to get wolf-whistled at by randos, but that's obviously not the point they're trying to make here) Thanks a bunch for that, Jerry (or, as I suspect, Vince over the headset). loving hell. Trish gets the advantage and clobbers Victoria with a trash can, then produces... oh, for gently caress's sake... an ironing board. Get it, because they're WOMEN?! Eh?  Trish and Victoria hit each other with some stiff kendo stick and trash can lid shots, and Victoria's nose is bleeding. This is a pretty hard-hitting match, and would be much more enjoyable if Jerry Lawler didn't go on about tearing clothes off. Christ. Victoria finds a mirror under the ring and is briefly distracted by it, so Trish gets the upper hand and hits the Chick Kick for a two count. Trish then hits a very sloppy bulldog in the corner, that looked nasty.  Another two count, as JR covers for the botch by calling it a "modified" bulldog. Victoria grabs a fire extinguisher under the ring and spends approximately six years trying to get it to work as Trish kinda flails at her from the ring and grabs her hair.  Eventually, Victoria manages to spray the extinguisher into Trish's face and hits a snap suplex (no Widow's Peak yet) for the win. Victoria is the new Women's Champion!  That was another solid effort. A women's hardcore match in 2002 was certainly a novelty, and since both women were also pretty capable in the ring it worked quite well from a match quality standpoint. Trish was still rather green at this time, but she was improving rapidly and held her own here, that horrifying bulldog aside. I'm gonna give this two and a half stars, having to dock half a star or so for the terrible commentary by Lawler. **½ I think that's a good stopping point for now. Next time on Let's Watch Survivor Series 2002, we'll be starting with... oh, huh. Apparently, the WWE title match is next. I thought that was later in the show, but I guess not. Anyway, next time we'll find out if Brock Lesnar can F5 the Big Show! DMorbid fucked around with this message at 13:14 on Mar 28, 2020 |
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Mar 27, 2020 22:44
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I'm way too lazy to do the awesome job you did OP but I'll post my Wrestlemania rewatch thoughts here, if I don't get busy and decide to stop rewatching Wrestlemania.
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Mar 28, 2020 07:28
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Great writeup! I'm gonna throw this PPV on tonight.
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Mar 28, 2020 11:55
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drat people were h*n* for Vanna White on WM 4. I know this is one of the most hated shows but I dunno I've always liked it quite a bit. All the layers of long term storylines all over this card are amazing when you contrast it with how things are today. Because it's what I do I came up with a convoluted rating system that rates great, good, funny, nostalgic moments (and heat and entrances) and subtracts bad and terrible and hosed up racist/transphobic/homophobic poo poo and so far these are the ratings: Wrestlemania 1: 7.2 Wrestlemania 2: -3.2 Wrestlemania 3: 8.5 (has better wrestling than any of the other shows so far but so much hosed Up poo poo on it). Wrestlemania 4: 11.2
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Mar 29, 2020 01:25
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Let's Watch Survivor Series 2002, Part Two Alright, let's get back to it. After the women's title match, we cut to Booker T preparing for the Elimination Chamber main event. JR and King put over the fact he's a five-time WCW champion, and now he's got the chance to win the World Heavyweight title (he's definitely not in there just to make up the numbers, no sir). Nothing too exciting about that, so let's move on to Jonathan Coachman interviewing Eric Bischoff. Bischoff talks about how great the Elimination Chamber is gonna be and how great he himself is, but is interrupted by Big Show.  Nice to see the original Xbox controller making a cameo. That's one of the handles. Big Show tells Bischoff he made a mistake trading him to Smackdown, because tonight Big Show will be the new WWE Champion.  Paul Heyman and Brock Lesnar are talking backstage, as Paul tells Brock he's worried about tonight's match (especially since Brock has a broken rib, which I thought was kayfabe but apparently he was legitimately injured) but says he will do everything he can to make sure his client will leave the Madison Square Garden as the WWE Champion.  Brock's face in this graphic is goofy as hell, but don't tell him I said that. We get another video package hyping up the title match, showing Big Show beating up the Undertaker, Brock himself and various other wrestlers. We also see how apprehensive Heyman is about the whole situation, and at one point Brock just tells Paul to shut up before he brutalizes Big Show with a chair on the go-home show. For whatever reason, Big Show wrestled in jeans during this period. Maybe he just wanted a different look for this monster heel run, because I haven't seen him dress like that before or since.  Brock doesn't even have the pyro yet. This was really early in his run, but I forgot his entrance was still this basic. At least he has the theme. The bell rings and the two lock up, and Big Show quickly gains ther advantage but Brock fights back. Big Show regains the advantage on the outside and smashes Brock's back into the ringpost, as Cole and Tazz sell how badly Lesnar's ribs are injured. Lesnar fights back again, and Show goes for the chokeslam but Lesnar suplexes him. Brock then hits a German Suplex on Show, which looks pretty impressive. Brock is now in control and goes for the F5, but Show counters with knees to the ribs. Brock runs into the referee and knocks him out of the ring, then hits Show with a huge belly-to-belly suplex. With the ref dead on the outside, Heyman throws a chair into the ring. Show goes for another chokeslam and gets a dick kick and a chairshot to the head (after blocking one with his fist, which was pretty awesome) for his troubles. Brock lifts Big Show up on his shoulders, and the F5 connects!  I know "there's no way he can slam the Big Show, oh wait he slammed the Big Show easily" has been done to death, but that F5 still looks impressive. Heyman looks completely flabbergasted by this feat of strength, as another referee runs to the ring to count the pin... only for Heyman to pull him out and deck him. Lesnar is less than pleased and glares at Heyman, who looks like he just saw his life flash before his eyes.  Brock chases after Heyman, who gets into the ring as Big Show picks up the chair and clobbers Brock with it. Chokeslam onto the steel chair, Big Show goes for the cover as the ref wakes up, and Brock Lesnar's undefeated streak is over. Big Show is the new WWE Champion.  Show and Heyman celebrate briefly in the ring, and then run off as swiftly as those two physically can before Brock is able to get up and murder them both. They make their way to a limo backstage and get the hell out of Dodge. This wasn't much of a match, to be quite honest. It was only a few minutes long, but that's fine because nobody wants to see Big Show in a lengthy bout and they were able to tell the story they wanted to. Nothing special but not a disaster either, I'll give it two stars out of five. ** Next up, we've got the tag team triple threat elimination match for the Smackdown tag titles. This is gonna be great. Look at this lineup:  The Smackdown Six, gently caress yeah. It's a shame Benoit ruined everything and it's difficult to enjoy his matches these days, but even if we ignore him it'll be a great time. Speaking of Benoit, he and Angle won the initial tournament for the tag titles, but the two fought with each other at the trophy ceremony so hard that they knocked down Stephanie McMahon and got slapped for their troubles. They eventually lost the titles to Edge and Rey Mysterio in a 2/3 falls match on Smackdown, and Los Guerreros have also been a thorn in their side recently. All of this leads to the elimination match we're about to witness. Before the match starts, we cut to... oh god, I forgot this was a thing at this time. Prepare for some absolute nonsense.  You sitting down? Okay. Dawn Marie was feuding with Torrie Wilson, so naturally she decided to seduce Torrie's father Al Wilson (played by Torrie's real father Al Wilson) to... uhh... what was the point of this storyline again? I remember Dawn and Torrie made out in a hotel room at one point because I think Dawn actually wanted Torrie and said she wouldn't marry Al if Torrie slept with her. These were the women's storylines on Smackdown, folks. Dawn then proceeded to marry Al (with both the bride and groom in their underwear at the ceremony), who died in storyline from having too much sex with Dawn on their honeymoon. Al has since passed in real life, presumably not for that reason. It all came to a head at Royal Rumble 2003, where Torrie beat Dawn in the FIRST EVER Stepmother vs. Stepdaughter match. In conclusion, Smackdown circa 2002-03 is a land of contrasts. Let's get back to the parts that aren't poo poo.  You know, back in 2002 I never quite appreciated the Smackdown Six properly. I liked Edge and Mysterio, but I was also a kid who was more into over-the-top storylines (not the one I just described) and flashy gimmicks than quality matches, at least until I saw Angle and Benoit fight each other at Royal Rumble 2003 a couple of months after this. That match utterly blew my mind.  The Guerreros are heels at this point, so the production team has deemed it suitable to display racist crowd signs during their entrance. This is why the producers get paid the big bucks, you know.  Benoit and Angle enter next, and even though they hugged it out earlier they still have separate entrances.  Edge and Mysterio also enter separately. Edge actually has his Rob Zombie theme on the Network, which was replaced by his original theme on the old DVD. "Never Gonna Stop", by the way, is my favorite Edge theme and it's not even close.  Instead of using the regular entranceway, Mysterio comes out via the separate stage that was set up for all the pyro. While we're on the topic of theme songs, can I just say I always hated Rey's first WWE theme? I always found it irritating, especially the goofy lyrics. I'm not a fan of Booyaka 619 either, but at least that's a little better suited for big matches. The teams take some time to agree upon who's going to start the match, and eventually they settle on Benoit and Mysterio. You don't actually have to tag in your own partner here, so Rey or Benoit could tag in one of the Guerreros if they wanted to. Rey keeps adjusting his mask during the match, and it's quite distracting. Edge is tagged in and goes to work on Benoit, but Benoit is able to tag Angle in. Angle then runs into Chavo to tag him in so he doesn't have to fight Edge himself. Some nice action between Edge and Chavo. Rey gets tagged in and hits a springboard splash on Chavo. Chavo tags Eddie into the ring, and Eddie delivers some elbows to Rey's skull before Rey pulls off some good lucha things. Angle gets back in against Rey and tosses Rey up to the top rope, but Rey loses his balance and eats poo poo on the mat. A bit of an unfortunate botch, but poo poo happens. Benoit gets back into the ring and goes for Mysterio's neck, working him over for a bit before tagging Kurt back in. Rey counters the Angle Slam to an arm drag, nicely done. The one botch aside, this has been nice and crisp work from everyone in the match. Eddie taunts Mysterio on the apron, as Rey is held in a front facelock by Angle for quite some time. Mysterio finally fights back, adjusts his mask some more, and takes down Angle with a spinning heel kick. Angle tries to tag in one of the Guerreros, but they get down from the apron so Angle has to tag in Benoit instead. Edge gets in the ring as well and cleans house, even hitting a belly to belly on Kurt. Edge goes for the spear on Angle, but Angle counters into the ankle lock and Benoit slaps on the Crossface as well. Mysterio makes the save with a springboard flying rear end on Angle.  I know that's called a seated senton, but come on. That's a flying rear end and you know it.  Shouldn't he have hit Benoit since Benoit was the legal man and could've still made Edge tap? In any event, Rey hits a diving tornillo on Chavo and Angle on the outside, so all three are down. Edge and Benoit fight in the ring, Benoit goes for a German Suplex and Eddie comes back in with a top rope sunset flip on Benoit and holy poo poo! Eddie gets thrown out again and Benoit plants Edge with three German Suplexes. Benoit goes for the diving headbutt on Edge but Eddie almost steals it with the frog splash, only for Benoit to break up the pin with the headbutt. Angle Slam to Eddie, followed by the ankle lock. I'm not sure why Cole is asking "WHO IS GONNA TAP?" because Benoit and Edge are the legal men here. If anyone's tapping, it's Edge because he's in the Crossface. Chavo clobbers Benoit in the back of the head with one of the belts and tosses the belt to Angle just before Benoit comes to. Benoit thinks Angle hit him, so the two begin pushing each other and Rey knocks them down with a missile dropkick. Rey hits a headscissors on Chavo on the outside, Edge hits the spear on Benoit in the ring and gets the three count, to thunderous boos despite being a face. That's Benoit and Angle out of the match, and now they take out their frustrations by beating up Edge, Rey and Chavo. Benoit and Angle immediately go back to fighting each other, and they argue all the way to the back. Meanwhile in the ring, the match continues between the Guerreros and Edge/Rey. Eddie tries to capitalize on Benoit and Angle's assault by pinning Edge, but Edge kicks out. The Guerreros have the advantage here because Edge and Rey are much worse for wear, so they're in control early in the second half of the match and do their best to lie, cheat and steal their way to victory. Edge eventually fights back by hitting a flapjack on both Guerreros, and manages to get back to Mysterio. Mysterio with some impressive lucha moves, and the Guerreros collide with each other in the corner followed by a spear from Edge. Mysterio gets a boost from Edge and hits Eddie with a big Frankensteiner off the top rope. In case you didn't catch on yet, this match rules. Rey hits the 619 on Eddie and signals for the West Coast Pop, but Chavo hits him in the back with the belt. Excuse me, the championship. Even all the way back in 2002, Michael Cole was very careful not to use the word "belt". Edge goes after Chavo on the outside, but Eddie locks Rey in the Lasso from El Paso and Rey taps out!  Los Guerreros are the new champions, and that is now four straight title matches with belts changing hands. That was a fantastic match. I'll give it four and a half stars, only docking a half star because of that one major botch and the fact watching Benoit makes me slightly uncomfortable. ****½ Kane is preparing for the Elimination Chamber backstage. As JR and King talk about the action and hype up the main event, the Harvard fight song blares from the arena speakers and that can only mean one thing. Yep, Chris Nowinski is here.  Nowinski, of course, is better known and lauded these days for his work in CTE research and raising awareness of the effects of concussions in sports. This is only two months before Nowinski's final PPV appearance at Royal Rumble 2003, where he suffered his career-ending head injury in the Rumble match. Nowinski calls himself the only Harvard graduate in the arena and runs down the crowd in a basic Local Sports Team Heat heel promo. This is obviously the piss break segment before the main event. Nowinski goes on and on about how stupid New Yorkers are, until he is interrupted by Matt Hardy Version 1.0.  Survivor Series 2002 Matt Fact #2: Matt only drinks lowfat chocolate milk God, I love Matt Hardy Version 1.0 and his janky-rear end Windows Media Player 7 entrance with the Matt Facts. Matt has taken exception to Nowinski's insinuation that New Yorkers are stupid, because they're not stupid. They would be classified as losers. There's a huge difference, as he says. Matt and Nowinski keep arguing between themselves whether New Yorkers are stupid or losers, as Matt claims they are sucking the Mattitude out of him. Sucking worse than the Knicks, in fact. Eventually, the two reach a compromise - New Yorkers are both losers AND stupid, or "lupid" for short. This promo is awful, but that's probably intentional because it's soon interrupted by the sound of a siren.  BAH GAWD, IT'S THE BIG BAD BOOTY DADDY. Scott Steiner is the hottest free agent in WWE, and both RAW and Smackdown would absolutely love to sign him. He's clearly not here to talk about his contract situation, though, as he beats the poo poo out of Hardy and Nowinski and tosses them both out of the ring. But he's not done yet! Steiner politely asks for a mic (he screams "GIMME A loving MIC", which is unsurprisingly absent from the Network version of the show). So, what does the biggest and baddest and bootiest and daddiest free agent in sports entertainment have to say? Is he going to tell us which brand he's going to sign with?  "THIS GOES TO ALL MY FREAKS IN NEW YORK CITY: BIG POPPA PUMP IS YOUR HOOKUP, HOLLA IF YOU HEAR ME!" *mic drop* Oh, okay then. That was enlightening. Steiner also yells at the camera to inform us that THAT'S THE LARGEST ARMS IN THE WORLD, JACK! That was a pretty fun way to debut Steiner, too bad his run with WWE would only go downhill from here.  We're getting ready for the main event, as the Chamber gets lowered around the ring. The Chamber-lowering music is the same track they use for cage matches and sounds like something off the Mass Effect 1 soundtrack, which is great because Mass Effect 1 rules (aside from the inventory and reused assets) and now I want to play it again. Err, where was I? The writeup for the Chamber match is pretty long (longer than the entirety of this post, actually), so I'll put that in a separate update a little bit later. DMorbid fucked around with this message at 01:05 on Nov 24, 2020 |
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Mar 29, 2020 02:30
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A month or two before is basically when I started watching wrestling again after various issues forced me to stop after 98. I just was at a point in my life where I could afford a TV and Smackdown being on regular TV meant I could watch it, so I was only following Smackdown and the Heyman turn on Lesnar was a bit of a shock but by this time fans were already cheering him anyway.
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Mar 29, 2020 04:46
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Let's Watch Survivor Series 2002, Part Three Terri Runnels interviews Shawn Michaels backstage and asks Shawn why he believes he will win the World Heavyweight title. Before Shawn can answer, we're interrupted by an RNN Breaking News update.  Orton is still out with a shoulder injury, and recently we've been getting these RNN updates on his condition. Randy was a bland babyface when he got injured, and these segments are being used to turn him heel so he can eventually join up with Triple H and Ric Flair. I'm not a fan of Orton in the slightest, but even I have to admit he's pretty great in these vignettes as this smarmy jackass heel who thinks he's a babyface. Anyway, we never do get to hear why Shawn thinks he's going to win the title tonight, because it's time for the first ever Elimination Chamber match!  Well, maybe not quite yet, because first we have another promo package to sit through as Eric Bischoff tells us some more about how great he is and "Always" plays once more. You know, while this song is in the upper tier of buttrock PPV themes, maybe we don't need to hear the entire thing (well, almost, since they've edited it a little for this package) again, especially since we've already seen most of this video package earlier in the show.  Jonathan Coachman interviews Triple H backstage. Ric Flair is there too, but doesn't say anything. In September, HHH was awarded the World Heavyweight Championship by Eric Bischoff after the cross-brand Undisputed Championship became the Smackdown-exclusive WWE Championship. No tournament or anything, Bischoff just gave it to him. Why? "Because I'm the best," says HHH. He's beat everyone and all that stuff, but now he feels he's put into a lovely position because people are jealous of him. Tonight, inside the Elimination Chamber, he will go up against "five of the very best ever in this business." Wait a second, he didn't call them loser geeks or try to bury them at all! Who is this guy and what has he done to Triple H? HHH says he's going to walk out of the Madison Square Garden as the champion, because he's that drat good. But for right now, he's got a first class ticket to hell and he wants to know who's coming with him. Not gonna lie, that was actually a great promo by HHH. It was short, to the point, he didn't bury his opponents, and he even said something kinda cool at the end.  Eric Bischoff comes out to explain the rules of the Elimination Chamber match and put over how dangerous it is. You know how this works, so I'm not going to go to detail about the rules. Let's get on with the match!  Our first entrant is the living legend, the huge rockstar, the King of the World, one of the World Tag Team Champions (with Christian), and whatever else he was calling himself at this point - Chris Jericho. This is not just your usual Jericho entrance, because he's being played to the ring by Saliva. The band performs "King of My World" live at The World, which is kind of neat even though the song itself is nothing to write home about. Like I said, Jericho was going around calling himself the KING OF THE WORLD, YOU SON OF A BITCH at this time, and I guess WWE decided to lean into that and hired Saliva to record a new theme to replace "Break Down the Walls". This new theme, which was still composed by Jim Johnston, was used maybe twice and Jericho went right back to the old theme. Honestly, this theme isn't that great. It's kind of a boring dirge that doesn't suit Jericho's character as a loud and obnoxious wannabe rock star all that well. I don't like "Break Down the Walls" either because Jericho is an old school rock and metal guy and that song doesn't have that kind of vibe at all. It does at least have more energy than the Saliva song, which is nice. WWE would later try to replace Jericho's theme song again in 2004, when the ill-advised WWE Originals album came out and Jericho's song from that album was briefly used as his entrance music. That song by Jericho's band Fozzy was called "Don't You Wish You Were Me?" and was at least catchier than "King of My World" and better suited to Jericho's character, but it didn't last either. Of course, as we all know, Jericho has since found the perfect entrance theme.  (Personally, in the pre- days I always wished he'd use "Trumpets of Jericho" from Bruce Dickinson's The Chemical Wedding album) That goatee rules, by the way. My social distancing beard isn't quite that impressive yet, but maybe I'll get there one day. Jericho enters his pod and just stands there for the next couple of minutes or so as Saliva keeps playing the song. I don't know, I think they probably should've workshopped this entrance a little bit more. At least Saliva didn't play the full 4-minute version and instead opted to finish the song around the 2:40 mark.  Booker T is next to enter. He's here mostly to make up the numbers and nobody thinks he's actually going to win.  Next up, the Big Red Machine. I quite liked this mask design, although nothing beats the original gear (or the version with the black and red inverted) for me.  Shawn Michaels is next. Earlier in the year, Michaels returned to the ring after a four-year absence caused by the back injury he suffered at Royal Rumble 1998. He was initially brought back as a member of the nWo, but after that didn't work out he transitioned into a storyline with his old buddy Triple H. HHH pretended to reform D-Generation X with Shawn on an episode of RAW but ended up betraying and attacking Shawn, even putting his head through a limo window one week. This led to Shawn's big comeback match against HHH at Summerslam, and what an amazing match that was. Seriously, that match rules. Shawn hadn't lost a step, and the crowd went crazy for everything he did. Anyway, Shawn won that match but got attacked by HHH immediately afterward, as HHH hit him twice in the back with a sledgehammer. In the storyline, this brutal and cowardly attack by HHH put Shawn on the shelf for months and the next time he appeared, he was in a wheelchair. However, this was just a ruse, as the Heartbreak Kid jumped out of his wheelchair during a promo on RAW. The following week, during HHH's casket match with Kane (yes, this was the blowoff to the Katie Vick angle), Shawn jumped out of the casket and superkicked HHH to properly reignite the feud. This was very well timed, by the way, because if Shawn had not come back at that point I would have quit watching wrestling because of the Katie Vick nonsense. As we didn't get RAW in Finland until around September/October 2002 and had no way to order PPVs, I had only seen Shawn in video games by that point, but he'd always been my favorite to play as so I really wanted to see him in action. So, I didn't quit watching wrestling. I also loved Shawn's response to Eric Bischoff about the Katie Vick thing: Bischoff: "Does necrophilia offend your sensibilities as a Christian, Shawn?" Shawn: "No, it offends me as a wrestling fan!" Can't say it much better than that, can you? I should also point out that Michaels is wearing some absolutely hideous gear in this match:  Yeesh. As the story goes, Shawn had meant to wear his old-school HBK gear, but there was a luggage mishap or something to that effect and he didn't have the gear when he arrived at the arena. This lovely little number was the best the costume department could whip up on short notice, and he's also wearing his cowboy boots to the ring. I've spent way too much time staring at Shawn Michaels' rear end during this match to figure out what's going on with the design on the back. It's a white S and a blue M inside a heart shape, but if you look at it from a distance and don't notice the letters or focus on the negative space it kinda looks like an image of two women in front of a blue background!  Then it's time to introduce the guys who will start the match. First off, we've got Rob Van Dam, Mr. Monday Night himself. RVD's high flying skills and innovative offense should be a great asset inside the Elimination Chamber, and suffice to say we'll see some great stuff from him in this match.  Finally, we've got the World Heavyweight Champion. The Cerebral rear end Game Assassin Kicker, or whatever he calls himself this week. While Bischoff is the one who created the Elimination Chamber match in storyline, Triple H is the one who actually came up with it because he wanted to do something like War Games. So, who better to start the first ever Chamber match? Now that we've finally got all the competitors in the ring, let's actually get this match started. RVD has the advantage early on, attacking HHH with his kicks. Educated feet, and all that stuff. HHH fights back and goes for the Pedigree early, but gets backdropped out of the ring and lands hard on the steel floor. That looks and sounds super painful, no padding out there yet. HHH gets whipped face first into the chains that make up the Chamber walls, and he's already busted open. RVD monkeyflips HHH onto the steel and follows up with the Rolling Thunder over the ropes.  HHH is taking a beating here. RVD climbs up the wall and gets on top of Jericho's pod, flipping him off along the way. Jericho takes offense to this and grabs RVD's leg to allow HHH to get to him, but RVD knocks HHH back down to the floor. Rolling senton off the turnbuckle and onto HHH, although RVD whiffs most of that and lands hard on the floor. That looked like it hurt like hell. RVD eventually gets back up and continues beating on HHH, who hasn't gotten any offense in the first five minutes of this match. Five minutes also means the next pod is about to open, and Jericho enters the fray. Jericho runs into a spinning kick by RVD, who follows up with a moonsault. RVD is still in control here. RVD climbs to the top rope and tries to dive on Jericho on the outside, but Jericho dodges and RVD grabs the chamber wall instead, then launches himself at Jericho.  So far, RVD is easily the MVP of this match. HHH finally gets some offense in by clotheslining RVD, but immediately falls on his rear end in a comical fashion. Jericho suplexes RVD and goes for the cocky pin, which I will always mark out for. COME ON BABY! Jericho hits a senton on RVD for a two count, and now HHH and Jericho start to work together as Jericho also decides to do some crotch chops in front of Michaels' pod. Jericho informs us he is the King of the World as he and HHH keep beating on RVD, bouncing him off the chamber wall. More double team offense from the heels, but RVD fights back. This comeback is cut short, however, as HHH hits him with a big DDT.  I love Van Dam's DDT sell, it's always fantastic. Another five minutes have passed, and Booker T enters the ring. Booker cleans house and sends the heels to the outside before turning his attention to RVD. The two respect each other, but this is every man for himself so they fight for a bit until HHH gets back inside. HHH eats a scissors kick from Booker, but Jericho attacks from behind before Booker can capitalize. RVD takes Jericho out, and HHH is dead on the canvas. RVD leaps to the top turnbuckle and then climbs up to the pod, motioning for the Five-Star Frog Splash...  Holy poo poo! RVD's knee lands right on Triple H's throat, causing a legit injury. HHH immediately looks like something's horribly wrong. Referee Earl Hebner checks on him, but HHH is able to continue the match despite the swelling on the inside of his throat. RVD basically took himself out of the match with that dive off the pod, so Booker T hits RVD with a missile dropkick off the top and pins him. RVD is the first man eliminated, and the crowd reacts with enormous boos. Booker then attempts to pin HHH, but Earl Hebner is too busy rolling RVD out of the ring to react and HHH manages to get a foot on the bottom rope anyway. I didn't realize there were rope breaks in the Elimination Chamber, but there you go. Jericho misses the Lionsault, as he so often does, and lands on his feet but eats a spinebuster from Booker. The next pod opens, and Kane makes his way into the ring. Kane clobbers Booker and Jericho for a while, as HHH is still down. Kane tosses Jericho to the floor and rams his face into the wall lawn dart style before throwing him through the plexiglass on one of the pods.  That looked brutal. The plexiglass shatters spectacularly and makes an equally spectacular noise as Jericho hits it. Jericho's now busted open, but somehow he's not completely dead yet and manages to make his way back up to hit a low blow on Booker, which is followed by a chokeslam by Kane. Jericho connects with the Lionsault on Booker, who becomes the second man to be eliminated. Jericho now fights for his life against Kane, with predictable results as he gets tossed around the ring and its general vicinity. Kane misses an elbow drop and Jericho gets back on the offense, as HHH climbs the turnbuckle but gets thrown off by Kane. Honestly, at this point I would not blame Triple H at all if he just stayed down until he was absolutely needed, but there he is. The crowd starts chanting HBK as the countdown begins again, and Michaels enters the match. Shawn comes in and attacks everything that moves, but runs into a clothesline from Kane. Michaels takes Kane down with a forearm smash, and you can clearly hear someone shout "YOU SUCK, SHAWN!" as they're getting up. I think that was someone in the crowd, it didn't sound like any of the wrestlers in the ring. Shawn eats a chokeslam from Kane, and so does Triple H. Chokeslam to Jericho as well, and now Kane is the only man still on his feet. Kane goes for a Tombstone on HHH, but Shawn kicks his face in with Sweet Chin Music. Kane sits up, but HHH gets him with the Pedigree and Jericho follows up with another Lionsault. Jericho pins Kane and gets his second elimination of the night. Jericho goes straight for Michaels and beats him up on the outside, and Michaels is now in a bad way because the heels have joined forces again. Jericho and HHH are trying to make Shawn bleed, and eventually succeed in their attempt. King says this is like a prison. No, it's worse than being in prison, it's worse than Oz! Hey, a timely pop culture reference for 2002. Somewhere in the back, Vince scratches his head and wonders why Lawler would bring up that old movie about the wizard. Jericho continues beating on Shawn and talking trash. Michaels fights back and sends Jericho face-first into the wall, goes for a piledriver on the steel but Jericho backdrops Michaels on the floor. That sound is just gnarly. Shawn and HHH now fight each other and both are knocked down, until Shawn does the kipup to loud cheers, only for Jericho to attack him from behind and land another Lionsault. Shawn kicks out, and Jericho can't believe it. Moonsault press from Shawn gets another two count, and now Shawn has Jericho locked in the Walls until HHH DDTs him. Jericho covers Shawn, but HHH pulls him off, and now the "two egomaniacs" as JR calls them are fighting each other. Flying nothing by Jericho, straight into the Pedigree position but Jericho counters into ther Walls. HHH gets to the ropes but Jericho pulls him back to the middle. HHH looks ready to tap, but Michaels comes out of nowhere with a Sweet Chin Music to Jericho. Shawn eliminates Jericho, and now it's down to Michaels and Triple H. Spinebuster by HHH gets a two count. I'm actually surprised JR is not making a bigger deal about Michaels' back injury in this match, at least until HHH backdrops Shawn onto the steel. Michaels goes for a Pedigree on the outside, but gets countered and slingshotted through one of the pods. That broke in a much cleaner way than the pod Jericho went through, but that hardly matters because Michaels looks completely out of it.  At this point, JR and King are starting to think this is just a formality now, with King in particular saying it's over for Shawn, he's done for. HHH rolls Michaels inside the ring and goes for the cover, but Shawn kicks out. HHH isn't done yet and continues the assault, as King tries to convince JR he should just give up all hope of Shawn surviving this. Shawn is still fighting, though, hitting HHH with right hands, but runs into a facebuster and gets thrown to the outside again. Now it's HHH going for the Pedigree on the steel, but Michaels counters and sends HHH into the wall. Both men are half dead at this point, but Shawn finds enough fighting spirit to climb on top of one of the pods...  Jesus! Shawn decides not to go for the cover, choosing instead to tune up the band. Michaels goes for the Sweet Chin Music but HHH counters and hits the Pedigree. HHH is unable to make the cover until several seconds later, and even then he only barely gets one arm on top of Michaels. Because we're not at Wrestlemania XIX and Shawn Michaels is not Booker T, Michaels kicks out and the crowd goes nuts again. Both men stagger up, HHH goes for another Pedigree but gets countered, SWEET CHIN MUSIC and Shawn Michaels wins the World Heavyweight Championship!  As JR is screaming himself hoarse about miracles coming true, a visibly emotional Shawn mouths "thank you" to the ecstatic crowd amid a shower of confetti to close out the show. This would be Shawn's only world title win in the second half of his career, and he'd only hold the belt for a month until dropping it back to Triple H (their feud would go on and on for the next couple of years and they'd face each other again several times, with diminishing returns), but what a moment. What a match. Exciting action and innovative use of the Chamber, great story, satisfying finish, just a great match all around. I originally gave the match five stars, but after some more consideration I'll drop it to four and a half. Booker T served no purpose in the story of the match (aside from eliminating RVD, which could've just as easily been done by Jericho) and might as well not have been in there at all, and the RVD botch was pretty nasty and could've injured HHH much worse than it already did. Still, these guys set the bar extremely high with the first Chamber match, and I don't know if it's ever been topped. I should rewatch some of the later ones to be sure, but the fact is they nailed it with this one. ****½ My overall grade for Survivor Series 2002 is an A-. There's not a single bad match on the show, even the Brock vs. Big Show match served its purpose and didn't outstay its welcome. The Smackdown tag title match and the Chamber match were both an absolute joy to watch, and I'm glad to say this show has held up incredibly well since my last viewing many years ago. Hell, I might have enjoyed it more this time around. The only reason this show doesn't get a full A from me is that we probably didn't need to see two lengthy video packages set to Saliva's "Always", especially when they also performed before the main event. Even if you're a fan of Saliva (those probably exist somewhere, maybe), you'll have to admit that was entirely too much Saliva for one night and that time could've been put to better use elsewhere on the card. But aside from that and Jerry Lawler's cringeworthy commentary on the women's match, this show was as good as it gets. Next time... hm. I'm not actually sure what we should do next time. Anyone got any particular shows they'd like to see tackled next? Any more comments about Survivor Series 2002 you'd like to share?
DMorbid fucked around with this message at 20:50 on Mar 29, 2020 |
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Mar 29, 2020 16:59
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Did they forget to have any Survivor Series matches at Survivor Series?
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Mar 29, 2020 20:50
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Yeah, there's been a couple of Survivor Series shows without Survivor Series matches because they were promoting some other gimmick. 2002 was the Elimination Chamber, and 1998 had the Deadly Game tournament for the vacant world title.
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Mar 29, 2020 20:58
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HBK superkicking Jericho at that moment when HHH is about to tap never made sense to me.
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Mar 30, 2020 01:35
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Let's Watch WWF In Your House: Canadian Stampede (Jul 06, 1997) This show was recommended to me on the Wrestlehut Discord channel. I was told it's got a biased Canadian crowd, it's only two hours long as was the case with all In Your House PPVs, there are no filler matches, and The Great Sasuke is on the show. Sold! I'm pretty sure I've seen Brian Zane's review of this show on YouTube before, but I don't remember any specifics from it so any similarities between that review and this one are purely coincidental. In general, 1997 is a period in WWF/E's history I'm not super familiar with except for the really big stuff like Mania XIII or the Montreal Screwjob. This means that unlike Survivor Series 2002 last time, I won't be able to tell you all the backstory leading up to the matches aside from what they show in hype packages or mention on commentary. With all that out of the way, let's start the show!  We start with a promo package hyping up the Bret Hart/Steve Austin feud and the Hart Foundation, talking about how things are no longer black and white in the World Wrestling Federation. Tonight in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, the villains will be the heroes and vice versa! Indeed, the Hart Foundation are megaheels in the US, but tonight we're on their home turf and Austin and co. are going to get booed out of the building.  Stampeding Canadians can be very dangerous, I'm told, even though they are usually polite about it. Vince McMahon, Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler welcome us to the show, all wearing cowboy hats to fit the whole cowboy theme.  JR puts over how good The Great Sasuke is, and Vince and King hype up the Triple H vs. Mankind match. Oh, and speaking of which, there's Hunter Hearst Helmsley.  HHH and Mankind fought in the King of the Ring final a month before, with Hunter coming out on top and becoming the 1997 King of the Ring after some assistance from Chyna, who I believe had only recently debuted for the company. Mankind has been feuding with the two of them for the last month, and here's the grudge match. Foley and HHH always worked well together, so this should be a good time.  Mankind's still wearing his original brown gear, but judging from the video package before the match his character has already been somewhat humanized and isn't nearly as creepy as he used to be, as they're acknowledging him as Mick Foley instead of the tortured freak that was the original Mankind character. Original Mankind is still creepy as gently caress because Foley sold the hell out of a character that probably should've been ridiculous. Mankind and HHH immediately start beating the everliving poo poo out of each other. Double Arm DDT almost immediately, and Mankind does HHH's blueblood taunt. That was pretty fun. Cactus Elbow to the outside and BANG BANG, as JR brings up Mankind's Cactus Jack days. HHH heads to the ramp in an attempt to get counted out, but Mankind suplexes him on the ramp. Mankind does the whole rocking back and forth thing as he waits for HHH to get back in the ring, as JR describes him as the Prime Minister of Parts Unknown. What is the political structure of Parts Unknown, and how does the Ultimate Warrior fit into it? Mankind has HHH in the Mandible Claw, but Chyna interrupts and saves HHH's rear end. Mankind goes after Chyna as HHH tries to attack from behind, but Mankind is ready for it. HHH whips Mankind towards Chyna and HOLY poo poo   Jesus! Chyna powerslams Mankind onto the steps and he lands calves first on the edge without any way to really protect himself. That looked painful as gently caress, and this is not the first or last time Foley has taken this bump. Chyna distracts the ref as HHH clobbers Mankind with a chair, and now the Connecticut Blueblood is in control. HHH continues working the leg as JR puts over how "cerebral" he is. Heh. HHH keeps pummeling Mankind, who is still selling the leg injury. HHH locks in the Figure Four, but Mankind refuses to give up. HHH holds onto the ropes to gain leverage, so the ref straight-up kicks him away from the ropes and forces him to break the hold. Mankind is back on the attack, but HHH goes for the Pedigree. Mankind counters but HHH kicks him into the corner, and Mankind falls head first onto HHH's groin. Mankind's on the attack once again and now HHH is in trouble as Mankind's hitting him with everything he's got, including the piledriver in the middle of the ring. Mankind clotheslines HHH and himself out of the ring, which JR describes as two cars colliding and people being ejected from the seats. Mankind gets a chair but Chyna stops him and distracts the ref to allow HHH to get another chairshot in. The ref stops HHH from hitting Mankind with the chair again, but now Chyna clotheslines Mankind and Mankind's down again. Mankind's "getting it from both ends", as Vince describes it. HHH gets crotched on the top rope and Mankind applies the Mandible Claw again, but Chyna pulls him groin-first into the ringpost. More brawling on the outside, HHH tosses Mankind over the barricade and the ref counts both of them out. Mankind throws HHH into the penalty box (this is the home of the Calgary Flames, after all), and Chyna's getting in there as well. HHH and Mankind keep brawling in the crowd and referees come to break it up. Tim White gets thrown right to the floor by HHH. Poor guy. The officials eventually break up the fight, and that's the end of the match. I'll give this one three stars out of five. It's got some nice action, and Foley and HHH have good chemistry in the ring, but I didn't care for the countout ending and the match seemed to end just as it was about to get going. Still, both guys look strong in the end, and it was an enjoyable match to start off the PPV. *** We see a video package about a fan event in Calgary leading up to the show, talking about parades and massive lines for Bret Hart's autograph and that sort of thing. After the video, Dok Hendrix interviews Bret and the Foundation backstage but Bret only gets a few words in before Steve Austin interrupts. Austin gets escorted out by Pat Patterson and a couple of other backstage officials, and Bret says there's no reason to beat Austin up now because that'd only mean Austin got beaten 5-on-1. The Foundation wants 5-on-5 and that's how they'll get the job done. TAKA Michinoku's theme plays, and this is going to be good.  Sadly, this version of TAKA's theme song doesn't have the "TAKA IS COMING, MOTHERFUCKER" or even the "gently caress YOU" stinger, but it's still awesome and one of the best themes ever. JR puts over his talent and completely butchers the pronunciation on "Michinoku" as something more akin to "Mitchinoukou". Sadly, Twitter hasn't been invented yet so nobody can put over TAKA's amazing social media skills. Howard Finkel, also wearing a cowboy hat tonight, announces TAKA as hailing "from Japan" because of course he does.  "Also hailing from Japan", it's The Great Sasuke. Nobody in Japan actually has a hometown, you know. Now, I actually thought this was going to be a six-man tag match featuring Kaientai and Dick Togo in an Iron Maiden shirt, but I must be thinking of some other show (ECW Barely Legal? I could've sworn it was a WWF show from around this time, though) because this is just TAKA going up against Sasuke for the Light Heavyweight title. Before the match can start, we cut to Mankind and HHH still beating each other up on the arena floor. Hunter is busted open as the fight continues, and eventually they're out of sight and the actual match in the ring can start. Someone in the crowd has a "THIS IS WORKRATE" sign. It certainly is, buddy. To me, "workrate" was always one of those internet fan buzzwords that seemed to mean different things to everyone who used it, eventually becoming completely meaningless and largely used by WWE fanboys to complain about those terrible smarks who only care about workrate. JR again does his best to put over both competitors, talking about their background and title wins. King brings up the infamous Antonio Inoki vs. Muhammad Ali match, and JR talks fondly about the original Tiger Mask. One of these things is not like the others. The match starts slowly with some holds and the crowd seems a bit restless and quiet, but I'm sure that won't last too long. TAKA runs into a spinning kick and Sasuke goes for an elevated half crab, but TAKA gets to the ropes. TAKA gets the advantage with some strikes, and now Sasuke is down and the crowd starts to get into it. TAKA gets thrown out of the ring, Sasuke up top and lands a "martial arts kick" (if you're anything like me, you are now hearing the "MARTIAL ARTS KICK! MARTIAL ARTS KICK!" voice clip from Smackdown: Just Bring It in your head) on TAKA. Both men back in the ring, Sasuke lands some stiff kicks and TAKA is down. TAKA drops Sasuke with a dragon screw and continues working on the leg, then hits a massive springboard dive that ends with both men on the ramp.  Someone's brought a "WCW - where the GAY boys play" sign that is being displayed prominently on camera as TAKA gets up. I bet that fan was very proud of his veritable wellspring of creativity and razor-sharp wit, and Vince probably found it hilarious. But that's enough about idiots in the crowd and behind the announce desk, because this really cool match continues and both guys make their way back into the ring. German Suplex but TAKA lands on his feet and hits a rana on Sasuke for a two count. La Magistral for another two count. Handspring elbow by Sasuke sends TAKA to the outside and Sasuke follows up with an Asai moonsault. I get the feeling Vince doesn't know what to make of any of this. Both guys back in the ring again, TAKA with a belly to belly suplex, gets another two count. Springboard missile dropkick by TAKA and Sasuke is down again. MICHINOKU DRIVER and that should be it... no, Sasuke kicks out! I genuinely thought that was gonna be it. TAKA goes up top again as we see a replay of the Michinoku Driver. Holy poo poo, TAKA planted him. Look at this.  TAKA gets kicked by Sasuke in midair as the camera almost completely misses it, and Sasuke follows up with a second rope springboard moonsault press. Another nearfall, and Sasuke hits a stiff Thunder Fire Powerbomb. Tiger Suplex by Sasuke for the three count, as the crowd completely nosells the finish. I'm not sure why because they were hot for everything leading up to it. That was a bit weird. It would've been nice if these two got more time because they really could've brought the house down, but even as it is this was an awesome showcase of that 90s Japanese junior heavyweight action that was so far ahead of its time. You could still put this match on pretty much any card and it'd still be good. Again, it suffers a bit from the lack of time as well as the abrupt finish where the crowd seemed to be totally asleep, but I'll give this match a very respectable four stars out of five. **** If WWF had kept bringing in the Japanese junior heavyweights and just let them do their thing like this, they would've had an excellent answer to WCW's cruiserweight division. Of course, this being WWF, they didn't do anything interesting with the Light Heavyweight division after 1997 and eventually retired the belt for over a year after it had been won by Gillberg. It was brought back in 2000 and won by people such as Dean Malenko and Jerry Lynn, and of course X-Pac who was the last Light Heavyweight champion before the belt was retired for good.Mankind and HHH are now fighting outside in the parking lot as Gerald Brisco and others make futile attempts to separate them. HHH goes to Pedigree Mankind on top of some wooden pallets, but gets backdropped onto them instead and the fight continues until the officials finally manage to break it up. Ahmed Johnson was apparently going to face the Undertaker for the WWF Championship on this show, but got injured and replaced by Vader. Dok Hendrix interviews Paul Bearer and Vader (mostly Bearer, as Vader just makes various grunting noises) backstage, as Bearer accuses Undertaker of murdering his own family. Hmm. I wonder what this might be building up to. He also says looking in the mirror is the best thing he does every morning, "if you know what I mean." No, I don't know what you mean, Paul. Paul Bearer looks weird with his natural hair color and no mustache, by the way.  Bearer says Vader's gonna whip Taker just like he did at the Royal Rumble and leave with the title. We then see how Vader beat Taker at the Royal Rumble after Bearer betrayed Taker and hit him with the urn, and after that it's TIME! IT'S TIME! IT'S VADER TIME! Vader really deserved better in WWF than he got. Rest in peace, big man.  This 1997-98 version of the Undertaker was always my favorite. His gear looked really cool. Meanwhile, Paul Bearer continues to be great:  The match starts and Taker starts throwing those ham hocks at the mastodon. Taker goes for a quick cover and Tim White seems to count to three, but I think the first thud on the mat you hear is just him dropping down and it just sounds like he actually counts to three. Some refs would do that and it always irked me. Vince talks about Undertaker's brother possibly being alive, as Bearer continues to ham it up on the outside. Taker hits the rope walk clothesline for a two count as JR talks about how only someone like Vader who dominated the Japanese wrestling scene could kick out of that. Please don't remind me of NJPW Vader matches during a WWF Vader match, it's depressing. Vader's got Taker in a headlock, but Taker gets free, only to get knocked down by a Vader shoulderblock. Big boot by Taker but Vader stays upright, another big boot sends him to the outside. Vader sends Taker knees-first into the steps, and Paul Bearer gets in Taker's face to loudly taunt him about being a murderer. Taker hits a top rope clothesline on Vader for another two count. JR reminds us how Vader used to be called Baby Bull early in his career. Baby Bull!  Vader displays some less baby bull-like tendencies as he clobbers Taker on the outside. Bearer hits Taker with one of his shoes and again yells "MURDERER!" I think we've established that, Paul.Vader's in control now and goes up to the second rope. Body press on a standing Undertaker for a two count. Bearer yells "THREE THREE THREE DAMMIT THREE, CAN'T YOU COUNT TO THREE?!" and tells one of the fans to shut up. Bearer has been great on this show. Vertical suplex by Vader, nicely done. Standing frog splash for another two count. Vader's slowing things down and has Taker in a hold in the middle of the ring, as the crowd stomps their feet so hard the entire building seems to shake. The camera certainly does. Taker fights out and the crowd goes nuts. Vader's got the advantage once more as the camera shakes again. Taker's got Vader ready for the chokeslam, but Vader kicks him in the balls right in front of the referee. That's gotta be a DQ.  That's as blatant as it gets. However, Tim White does not disqualify Vader. JR wonders why that wasn't a DQ, and I agree with him on that one. Sure, judgement call and all that, but that was as blatant a low blow as you can possibly get and would be a DQ in any other match. Undertaker goes for the Tombstone, Vader tries to reverse to a Tombstone position of his own but falls over and Taker covers him for another two count. That looked a bit botchy. Vader is back on the attack and Taker's down as the building appears to shake again. The ring ropes are actually shaking as well, so it's not just the camera moving up and down. Vader goes up for the Vaderbomb, but Taker sits up behind his back and hits another blatant low blow the ref also allows. I guess now we know why the first one was allowed, because now Taker can get revenge without getting disqualified. Chokeslam from the second rope, and this is over... wait, no? Okay then. Vader kicks out, so Taker hits him with another chokeslam. Surely that'll be... huh. Another kickout. At least they're making Vader look strong here. Vader runs straight into a Tombstone, and that'll be that. Undertaker retains the title.  This was a fun hoss fight. Nothing fancy, but both guys got to do some impressive stuff and Vader looked like a monster despite losing. The lack of punishment for the blatant low blows was a bit weird, because even though I realize the first one was ignored just so Taker could later get his revenge, why would Tim White allow a straight-up dick kick in the first place? Just seems a bit weird to me. In any case, that was a pretty solid three stars out of five. *** More footage of the Harts and the activities leading up to the show, and some of the action we've seen on RAW lately. Exciting! We also get a recap of how the Austin/Hart feud got to this point, and then it's time for Dok Hendrix to interview Austin's team.  Dok Hendrix talks about how the team might actually be going into the match as underdogs, and they're already getting plenty of boos from the Canadian crowd. Holy poo poo, Animal and Hawk, settle down. Stone Cold says nothing. Here to sing the Canadian National Anthem, from Vancouver, British Columbia, Universal recording artists Farmer's Daughter!  No, I've never heard of them either. The crowd goes nuts for them, though.Howard Finkel introduces the Premier of Alberta and Stu & Helen Hart, who are in the front row. Goldust enters (sans Marlena, who is at home taking care of baby Dakota), and receives thunderous boos. Boos for Ken Shamrock as well.  Well, looks like we've got some folks here who don't care for the Harts and aren't afraid to show it. I hope these ladies didn't get yelled at by a bunch of weird wrestling nerds.  The LOD get a cold reception as well, but nothing compared to Stone Cold who is the biggest heel in the building tonight.There are a couple of Austin signs in the crowd, but the reception is almost as if Roman Reigns just wandered in. Brian Pillman is the first Foundation member to enter, and the crowd goes apeshit. Next up is Jim Neidhart, same deal. Davey Boy Smith comes out with Diana Smith, again to a huge ovation. Nothing compared to what we're about to hear, though. First off, it's Slammy winner and IC Champion Owen Hart. The fans love him, of course, but we all know who they came to see. There's that famous guitar wail, and the Hitman is here!  This might be one of the biggest crowd pops I have ever heard. Bret gives the shades to his mother.  JR mentions there is a documentary crew filming this. That'll be awkward a few months later, that's for sure. Bret and Austin start the match by unloading on each other, and Bret gets the advantage. The announcers actually shut up for the opening sequence to let the crowd noise come across, and describe how the building is shaking. The crowd goes ballistic for everything Bret does, and Austin is still the most hated person in the building. Austin with the cobra clutch, Bret's shoulders are down but Bret kicks out and gets the advantage back. Neidhart is tagged in and begins to work on Austin, but gets taken down with the Lou Thesz Press and Shamrock enters. Someone in the crowd is walking back and forth with a "WHAT'S KAYFABE" sign (I think this is what one would call "trying to get yourself over") as Shamrock gets the ankle lock on Neidhart, which is broken up by Pillman. Pillman is tagged in and takes Shamrock down, but eats some punches and a belly to belly suplex. Owen and Goldust now get tagged in, and the crowd goes crazy for Owen. Enzuigiri to the back of Goldust's head for a two count. Loud "AUSTIN SUCKS" chant as Goldust tags Hawk in. Hawk tosses Owen around and goes up top, splash for a two count. Hawk misses a dropkick and Owen locks him in the Sharpshooter, but Animal interrupts. Bulldog comes in and drops Hawk with a stalling vertical suplex and the running powerslam, Goldust breaks the count. Bret and Animal are now the legal men, Animal backs off and tags Goldust back in. Goldust gets put in a tree of woe position in the Hart corner and everyone beats the poo poo out of him, as trash starts flying to the ring. Owen and Goldust are the legal men now, and Owen runs into the ringpost. Animal pummels him for a bit but eats a spinning heel kick, Owen goes up top and hits a front dropkick, followed by a kipup that again sends the fans into a frenzy. Owen goes for a hurricanrana but Animal drops him with a powerbomb. LOD go for the Doomsday Device and hit it, but Neidhart breaks up the count. Everyone's beating each other up again, and Austin gets popcorn and other crap thrown at him. Austin wraps Owen's leg around the ringpost and whacks it with a chair, only to get attacked by Bruce Hart in the front row. Bret's got the chair now, but instead of hitting Austin he checks on his brother. Owen is hurt, so he is taken back to his corner and it seems he's now being taken to the back by referees. The remaining Foundation members beat up Austin in the corner, but Austin fights back and drags Pillman from the tights, and Pillman is now quite literally showing rear end. Austin fights off the Foundation, but gets his bad knee whacked into the ringpost multiple times by Bret, then hits it again with a fire extinguisher. The audio on the Network gets muted for several seconds, so presumably Austin said something naughty. Bret puts Austin in the Figure Four around the ringpost, and now Austin's leg is hosed. Referees show up to take Austin to the back, but I don't think he's gonna go quietly. Meanwhile, the action continues in the ring as Bulldog and Neidhart work on Hawk. Austin is now walking to the back with the referees, earning himself another loud chorus of boos. Anvil and Animal have a test of strength in the middle of the ring, Bret is tagged in, Hart Attack to Animal who kicks out easily because gently caress selling, we're the Road Warriors. Shamrock is tagged in and Bret headbutts him in the "lower abdomen, very low" before Shamrock sends him face first into the turnbuckle. Shamrock allows Bret to get up and assumes a fighting stance, but Bret outwrestles him and Shamrock gets tossed to the floor where Pillman sends him crashing into the Spanish announcers' table. All hell is breaking loose, Vince says as I type the exact same thing. Bret hits Shamrock with the Russian leg sweep but Goldust breaks up the pin, Bulldog and Shamrock are now the legal men and Bulldog beats the poo poo out of Shamrock. Low blow by Shamrock, Goldust comes in and hits, well, a bulldog on Bulldog. Goldust gets crotched on the top rope by Bulldog, followed by a big superplex off the top!  Austin's back, and now his team has the 5-on-4 advantage again. Bret and Austin go at it again, and this time Austin has the advantage until Bret hits a neckbreaker and follows up with the backbreaker. Diving elbow, two count. Bret applies a sleeper hold which is countered into... hm, that looked almost like a Stunner but nobody's calling it that and Bret kicks out easily at two. Sharpshooter! Animal breaks up the submission by clotheslining Bret, and now Austin's got Bret in the Sharpshooter but Owen runs in and saves his brother!  Owen now working over Austin, but gets clotheslined to the floor and beaten up on the outside. Austin now gets into it with the whole Hart Family in the front row, and as he returns to the ring he gets rolled up by Owen. One, two and three, and the match is over, but the chaos has only just begun because now all the Hart brothers are in there and we've got officials, security, referees down, it's absolute mayhem in there. JR even suggests a fan might have gotten in the ring, but I think he was just selling how crazy the situation was. Eventually, the chaos is broken up by a small army of officials. The Harts celebrate in the ring, but Austin slides back in with a chair and attacks them, only to get pummeled by everyone. Austin gets handcuffed by security as he shouts and spits and curses at everything in his general vicinity and is escorted out as he flips off the crowd with his hands still cuffed. Austin gets to look like a badass despite losing, but it's safe to say almost no one in this crowd gives a poo poo about what Austin might look like after that match.  Now that Austin's been removed from the premises the Harts can celebrate again, and even Stu and Helen get brought in to the ring along with their grandkids. That seems to be the entire Hart family in the ring now. I don't think I need to describe the crowd response to all this. That was pretty amazing, not gonna lie. The match itself wasn't really all that special, but the atmosphere was, as was pointed out on commentary quite a few times, electrifying. The entire building was basically shaking the whole match! Looking at this match and seeing the family celebration nearly 23 years later is very bittersweet, because we all know what has happened to the Harts since then and what horrible tragedies they've had to endure over the years, starting with the death of Brian Pillman only a few months after this. But on this night in Calgary, the Harts were the conquering heroes, totally invincible. I give this main event five stars, not for the match itself but everything surrounding it. ***** My overall grade for Canadian Stampede is an A-. Had the light heavyweight match gotten more time and the opener not ended in a double countout finish, this would be very close to full A territory. Quite possibly the best In Your House PPV I've seen. There are IYH shows with better matches for sure, but those also have terrible undercards and this was solid from top to bottom. Maybe next time I'll watch something that doesn't get an A-. 
DMorbid fucked around with this message at 00:16 on Apr 1, 2020 |
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Mar 31, 2020 23:14
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Glad you enjoyed my recommendation Mod Edit: Don't quote the entire post! Somebody fucked around with this message at 00:41 on Apr 1, 2020 |
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Mar 31, 2020 23:33
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El Gallinero Gros posted:Glad you enjoyed my recommendation ...Just, uh, maybe don't quote the entire huge post?
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Mar 31, 2020 23:46
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Canadian Stampede is loving incredible, that main event remains one of the hottest I've ever seen and it's the perfect happy ending.
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Apr 1, 2020 00:41
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Alright I generated a random number from 1990-2020 and got 2005, then generated one between 1-12 and got 10, so I guess I'm watching No Mercy 2005. Which is good because I wasn't watching at that time. Apparently there's a Juventud Guerrera match? I seriously had no idea he ever wrestled for WWE.
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Apr 1, 2020 00:55
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is pepsi ok posted:Apparently there's a Juventud Guerrera match? I seriously had no idea he ever wrestled for WWE. I'm not gonna spoil the gimmick they gave him, though.
DMorbid fucked around with this message at 01:35 on Apr 1, 2020 |
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Apr 1, 2020 01:28
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is pepsi ok posted:Alright I generated a random number from 1990-2020 and got 2005, then generated one between 1-12 and got 10, so I guess I'm watching No Mercy 2005. Which is good because I wasn't watching at that time. Apparently there's a Juventud Guerrera match? I seriously had no idea he ever wrestled for WWE. Good idea! I looked between 1984-2020 and got 1985, then 1-2 to pick one of the two big wrestling shows that WWF put on that year and got 2. So I'll be doing the Wrestling Classic from November 7, 1985.
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Apr 1, 2020 01:42
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The PPVs don't have to be WWE, by the way. WCW, ECW and, hell, TNA are fine as well if you've got some way to watch them! I won't say no to major Japanese shows either so if you want to do something like early Wrestle Kingdom shows, go right ahead. Hell, technically Heroes of Wrestling is eligible, although that is really stretching the definition of "classic". The thread should probably have been named "Let's Watch Old PPVs" because again, they don't necessarily have to be good shows.
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Apr 1, 2020 01:47
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Doc M posted:The thread should probably have been named "Let's Watch Old PPVs" Now it is! I'll do Wrestling Classic then use RNG to choose whether I do a WWF/E, ECW, WCW, New Japan, All Japan etc show next 
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Apr 1, 2020 01:52
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Doc M posted:The PPVs don't have to be WWE, by the way. WCW, ECW and, hell, TNA are fine as well if you've got some way to watch them! I won't say no to major Japanese shows either so if you want to do something like early Wrestle Kingdom shows, go right ahead. I put it a new challenge in discord. You will not enjoy this as much, but it is infamous. Not HOW, though.
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Apr 1, 2020 01:53
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El Gallinero Gros posted:I put it a new challenge in discord.  So, as it turns out, my next review will be ECW December to Dismember 2006. This show will not receive an A-.
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Apr 1, 2020 02:05
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Doc M posted:
Oh no no no
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Apr 1, 2020 02:07
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Doc M posted:Right, let's check the Discord to see what... oh no. Oh no. Mother of God....
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Apr 1, 2020 02:51
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Let's Watch ECW December to Dismember 2006 (Dec 03, 2006), Part One of Roughly Fifty-SixMax Coveri posted:This show, which took place in the James Brown Arena, was so bad it killed its namesake a few weeks later. Well, I brought this on myself by asking goons to nominate shows and saying they didn't have to be good shows. In the latest installment of Let's Watch Old PPVs, we'll be looking at one of the most infamous PPVs of all time, one widely considered to be among the very worst wrestling shows ever put on. December to loving Dismember 2006. Oh boy.  This is not my first time going through DtD 06. In some ways, that is a blessing because at least, at least I know what's coming and can prepare accordingly. On the other hand, this means I am going to have to watch this utter dreck, this travesty, this wretched excuse for a wrestling show for the second time. Not only that, but I'll also get to recap it for the second time, because back when this garbage aired I actually wrote a recap that has since been lost to the ether. Before we start, let's talk a little bit about the background so I can put this off for slightly longer. Following the successful ECW One Night Stand PPV in 2005, WWE decided to go ahead with a full-on revival of the ECW brand the following year. And hey, if WWE's actual ECW shows had even remotely resembled the One Night Stand shows, even the weaker 2006 edition that kind of served as a pilot for the revival, that would've been fine. Hell, even if it hadn't really felt like classic Extreme Championship Wrestling but were its own thing like NXT is now (more or less), that would ALSO have been fine! However, Vince McMahon couldn't leave the new third brand well enough alone, so he had to put his grubby mitts on the product. Paul Heyman was ostensibly the booker, but Vince had final say on everything. This was a problem from the start and everyone knew it. So, when ECW debuted on the Sci-Fi Channel of all places two days after One Night Stand 2006, we were treated to what would often be derisively called "Extreme Velocity" or "Extreme Heat" in reference to WWE's minor shows nobody cared about (although Velocity at least had good wrestling matches pretty regularly, so it was a decent show). It was very much a traditional WWE show of that era in terms of in-ring action and production, except you had Joey Styles on commentary and there was a hardcore match - or "extreme rules match" as they were called - every so often. All that said, ECW on Sci-Fi wasn't a totally terrible show early in its run. It had a bevy of dumb poo poo like Sandman caning zombies and other weird gimmick characters, yes, but it also usually focused on matches and since ECW's top stars at the time included the likes of Kurt Angle, Rob Van Dam and CM Punk, plus guys like Tommy Dreamer and Sabu falling through tables each week, it was a nice little show. Rob Van Dam was the ECW and WWE Champion, having defeated John Cena at One Night Stand 2006. Then RVD got busted for drug possession and dropped the titles. The ECW belt ended up on the Big Show, the most extreme of wrestlers (to his credit, he did his best to make it work, and Show actually had some fun matches during his run), while RVD got suspended and Angle left the company. It kinda went downhill from there, and that is where December to Dismember 2006 picks up. I guess I'm gonna have to talk about the PPV now, aren't I? I should've gone to bed hours ago but my sleep patterns are all hosed up again, so I'll write this instead. What have I done with my life?  The big main event of December to Dismember is the EXTREME ELIMINATION CHAMBER. It's extreme because the pods have weapons in them. The participants are Big Show, RVD, CM Punk, Sabu, Test (sure, why not) and Bobby Lashley. The fans have gotten behind Punk in the months following his debut at the Hammerstein Ballroom in front of the original ECW faithful, but Lashley has big muscles so you know who Vince wants to push. Joey Styles and Tazz open the show and welcome us to Augusta, Georgia. "Tonight, a new ECW champion will be crowned," says Styles. Thanks for the spoiler, I guess! Off to a great start, and it'll only be downhill from here. Well, not quite, because the opening match is actually not a complete disaster.  MNM are former three-time Smackdown tag champions but have been separated for a while. Joey Mercury aka Joey Matthews is actually an ECW original although that fact is never mentioned anywhere on the show because nobody gives a gently caress, and Johnny Nitro is the future John Morrison/Johnny Mundo/Johnny Impact/etc. I still wish he'd gone to AEW because I was always a fan and wanted to see Johnny Dynamite in action, but at least he's earning that retirement cash in WWE. They're accompanied by Melina, Nitro's real life girlfriend at the time who would eventually become a relatively decent wrestler in the women's division. At this point, she's largely known for screaming a lot and doing the splits on the apron during MNM's entrance.  The Hardys issued an open challenge for December to Dismember, and MNM accepted by attacking them on ECW on Sci-Fi. A couple of things to remember about this match: 1) Neither team are actually on the ECW brand 2) This is the ONLY advertised match for this show, aside from the Extreme Elimination Chamber. The crowd is reasonably excited because they know they're about to see a good match. That will not last. Meanwhile, Tazz is ogling Melina who's in front of the announce table. Mercury and Matt start the match, and Matt has the advantage early on as Mercury's fake tan gets all over the canvas. Standoff between the two, and Jeff and Nitro enter the ring but nothing exciting happens and Matt and Mercury continue exchanging holds. Jeff gets tagged in and works Mercury's arm, Matt does the same as my Network feed freezes. It keeps freezing at the same spots, so apparently this is not my computer trying to protect me from having to watch this show but the encode is just hosed on the Network, and no one's bothered to fix it because nobody in the right mind would watch this show anyway. The Hardys with some nice double team moves on Nitro and Mercury, including a double wheelbarrow suplex. MNM get the advantage with some double team moves of their own on Jeff, as the crowd chants... erm, "SHE'S A CRACKWHORE" at Melina.  That's something you'd hear on original ECW shows basically every time a woman was onscreen, but as much as the Augusta crowd wants to pretend they're at an original ECW show they maybe could've left that particular chant in the past.Nitro misses a standing SSP on Jeff, so Jeff manages to tag Matt in and now Matt is on the offense. Sitout crucifix powerbomb by Matt, that was pretty cool. Melina grabs Matt's foot from the outside and Matt goes after her, but runs into a clothesline. Meanwhile, the crowd's chanting "SHE'S GOT HERPES," another original ECW favorite. Melina chokes Matt with her legs, Xenia Onatopp-style. MNM double-teams Matt with a facebuster as the ref is getting Jeff out of the ring, and Melina keeps screaming. MNM still with the double team moves, even hitting the Poetry in Motion, and excuse me but my ears are bleeding. Probably shouldn't have worn headphones for this. Nitro gets dropped on his "yambag" on the turnbuckle as Matt pushes Mercury into him, and Matt finally gets the task. Jeff takes out Nitro with an elevated sitout facebuster, in comes Matt and dives onto Mercury on the outside. Nitro's looking to dive now, and there he comes. Jeff climbs up top and dives into the pile, because he doesn't want to be left out.  Now we've got the Hardys hitting a bunch of double team moves, but Jeff misses the Swanton and Nitro takes him down with a springboard missile dropkick. I'm not sure who in this match has the worse white guy dreads, Jeff or Mercury. What do you think?  Personally, I'm going with Jeff. Nitro and Jeff continue fighting while the crowd amuses themselves again with classy chants towards Melina. Melina flips them off, good for her. More double team moves by MNM, but Jeff kicks out of the cover attempt. Nitro with a slingshot elbow drop on Jeff over the ropes, but Matt breaks up the pin. Jeff kicks out of a rollup attempt and sends Mercury to the floor, but can't make the tag as Mercury takes Matt down from the apron. Jeff is pulled to MNM's corner, and Nitro is back in. Jeff hits a desperation Whisper in the Wind on Nitro and Mercury, and Matt is finally tagged in. Matt's kicking rear end, hitting the Side Effect on both opponents but Nitro kicks out. Matt goes up to the second rope for the leg drop and it connects. Another two count. Nitro counters Jeff's top rope powerbomb attempt into a frankensteiner!  Jeff is down, but kicks out of the pin at two. Nitro heads up top again but Jeff fights back, Matt and Mercury in the same situation on the opposite end. Stereo superplexes! Jeff goes for the cover but Melina distracts the ref. Melina tries to slap Jeff but Jeff catches it and gets right in her face (I thought at first he was planting a kiss on her, but I'm not sure) Nitro tries to hit Jeff with a dropkick but Jeff dodges it and Melina gets knocked on the floor instead. MNM with the Snapshot on Jeff in the middle of the ring, but Matt breaks up the pin. Melina's still down. MNM attemps the Snapshot off the second rope, but both eat a Twist of Fate instead. Swanton Bomb on Mercury and Nitro, Jeff covers Nitro, 1-2-3 and that's the match!  That... was okay, I guess. There wasn't really any heat to this match and it didn't flow particularly well either, and while it is easily the best match on this show that is not saying much. I give this match two and a half stars, these teams can do much better. **½ Rob Van Dam talks about how he's going to win the ECW title inside the Extreme Elimination Chamber, because when you think ECW Champion you think Rob Van Dam. Yeah, good luck with that, Rob.  Next, we've got... oh no, it's Matt Striker. Not just any Matt Striker, but Matt Striker, your teacher. Striker gained some notoriety when he got fired from his teaching job after using his sick days to wrestle. WWE wants to be drat sure we know he's a former teacher, as you can probably tell from his getup and general presentation. Striker grabs a mic, and someone in the crowd lifts up a sign that reads "CUE THE CRICKETS". Striker's opponent tonight will be Balls Mahoney, but this is not gonna be just any match. No, this is an Extreme Rules match, that is, an Extreme Enforcement of Rules match. That means: - No gouging of the eyes - No pulling of the hair - No maneuvers off the top rope - And in light of his opponent's name, no foul language Striker says we're about to see if Balls can wrestle under Striker's Rules. Sure, let's get this guy whose main skillset revolves around whacking people in the head with a steel chair, and put him in a match where all of his weaknesses are exposed. On PPV. I can't see this going wrong at all.  Balls enters to an instrumental ripoff of "Big Balls". As Styles and Tazz go over Striker's Rules, I can't help but notice he didn't prohibit the use of foreign objects. Don't get too excited, though, because that just means weapon use is prohibited under standard WWECW rules.  Oh god, he's got his own face on the back of his trunks. I've often thought Matt Striker has his head up his rear end, but this isn't quite what I meant. Anyway, the match gets underway and the two lock up. Balls was actually an amateur wrestler in his high school days (and then got banned for punching a referee, according to Styles) so he could potentially hang with Striker in this stupid match. Balls with a hiptoss and a cross armbreaker, but Striker gets to the ropes. Why is this match on this show? Balls talks trash to Striker, but fortunately doesn't use any foul language. Striker punches Balls right in the face and the announcers think they saw a tooth fly out, which would leave Balls with three. Styles and Tazz have some funny banter on this show, which I guess is something to distract you from the horrors unfolding in the ring. Striker pulls Mahoney's hair because as you'd expect, his rules don't apply to him. Striker works Balls' arm, and this match feels like it's been going on for 47 hours. Also, I can't help noticing that Striker's trunks leave very little to the imagination and if I didn't know what is coming later, I'd assume he's the reason this show has a TV-14 rating for sexual content on the Network.  END! END!! ENNNNNNNDDDDD!! To their credit, the crowd still bothers to chant "BALLS" every time Balls punches Striker. Mercifully, the match finally ends when Balls plants Striker with a sitout spinebuster. I think that has a fancy name, but I don't care. I'm just glad it's over. I guess it was a wrestling match and there were no horrible botches or anything, so I'll give it an extremely generous one star out of five. I'd give it only half a star but ½* takes more effort to type than *. I reserve zero stars and negative stars for very special occasions, this is just a lovely match on a lovely show so one star it is. *  CM Punk is shown backstage, preparing for the Extreme Elimination Chamber. For some reason, presumably because of the growing popularity of MMA, Punk was billed as a Muay Thai expert early on so he's doing all these strikes and none of it looks even remotely convincing. Elsewhere, we stumble upon a grisly scene as Sabu's been attacked backstage.  Paul Heyman shows up and demands to know what's going on because Sabu's supposed to be in the main event. Sabu is in fact not going to be in the main event, because he is "unresponsive" and about to get carted off by the EMTs. This gets a very loud "BULLSHIT" chant from the crowd, because Sabu has been advertised for the Extreme Elimination Chamber for weeks and now he's being removed from the match when the show is already in progress! Vince already got his money, so what does it matter? gently caress the fans, what do they know about putting on entertaining shows? Besides, he surely has a great replacement lined up, just you wait! Why would they do this, you ask? Well, apparently WWE higherups thought he was "useless" in normal matches and could only perform in matches with "stunts and tables". I... this... you hired Sabu for your ECW show! What in God's name did you expect? Technical wrestling? The man of 1,000 holds? No, wait, you hosed him up too! And even if Sabu is useless in a normal match, you could... I don't know, put him in a gimmick match like the Extreme Elimination Chamber so you can actually hide his weaknesses and focus on the stuff he does well, which is crashing through tables and falling off things, sometimes with a chair in there somewhere! Jesus Christ! gently caress this show. I'm not even halfway through yet, but I'm cutting it here because I can't take any more of this in one sitting. Next time, we'll wade through some more crap. Look forward to it! DMorbid fucked around with this message at 01:06 on Nov 24, 2020 |
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Apr 1, 2020 05:32
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If I remember right, Vince was absolutely 100% convinced the EC was selling point enough and Heyman had to beg him to get anything else on the show advertised, including the Hardyz/MNM match. Vince insisted over and over that this would work, and when it didn't it was Paul Heyman who got the blame.
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Apr 1, 2020 06:16
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Jerusalem posted:If I remember right, Vince was absolutely 100% convinced the EC was selling point enough and Heyman had to beg him to get anything else on the show advertised, including the Hardyz/MNM match. Vince insisted over and over that this would work, and when it didn't it was Paul Heyman who got the blame. He also had a huge argument with Paul where Paul was fine with Lashley winning but he wanted Show to job early on, thus guaranteeing a new champ (a Heyman booking trope during multiman title matches), the idea being that it'd get Punk over as Punk would tap out Show and Bob Holly before getting ganged up on, putting him over despite losing. Vince's alleged response? quote:Get this through your thick loving skull. I need Lashley to be the superhero for this brand!
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Apr 1, 2020 14:59
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Alright, here we go with No Mercy 2005. Some quick stats: Date: October 9, 2005 Venue: Toyota Center in Houston, TX Attendance: 7k PPV Buys: 219k Cage Match average score: 5.43/10 Meltzer average star rating: 2/5 - The main story coming in seems to be that Eddie has been trying to convince Batista that he's reformed himself after his drug addictions. Big Dave has cautiously accepted his friendship. Seems like an interesting story but incorporating his drug problems into it seemed like typical dumb WWE poo poo.  - First match was Christy Hemme and the Heidenreich LoD vs. MNM. This was a really ordinary match and Animal looked old as hell. Also Taz was doing his best Jerry Lawler impression over Christy and Melina. LoD won with Christy hitting the Doomsday Device.  - Simon Dean vs. Bobby Lashley. Holy gently caress it's this match!  I always wondered where that came from. The match itself was nothing. Lashley won and made Dean eat all 20 burgs, which he did in segments throughout the night. Bobby was just as much of a charisma vacuum as he is now. - Chris Benoit vs. Booker T vs. Christian vs. Orlando Jordan. Watching a Benoit match was more uncomfortable than usual after recently watching the Dark Side of the Ring doc. It was an unsurprisingly good match though. Probably the best of the show. I'm gaining more of an appreciation for Christian's ring work when I watch his old matches now. Benoit won with a Sharpshooter and the crowd went nuts for it. - Mr. Kennedy vs. Hardcore Holly. I never liked Kennedy. I guess this was his first PPV match so he went over. Holly was balding real bad at this point and it made him look like an old man.  - JBL vs. Rey Mysterio. JBL loving sucks and he said "speak english, boy" to Mysterio before the match. Of course he went over.  - Randy and Bob Orton vs. The Undertaker in a Casket Match. This was just godawful. I can't stand casket matches to begin with, and this one was even more convoluted because Taker had to get both Ortons in this stupid oversized casket. It went 20 loving minutes and Bob was worthless throughout most of it. After a bunch of dumb false finishes they finally got Taker in the casket and then locked him in it. After that they......murdered him by filling the casket with gasoline and lighting it on fire. Okay. I guess it fits the name of the show?  - Next up was Juventud vs. Nunzio for the Cruiserweight championship. Doc M posted:I'm not gonna spoil the gimmick they gave him, though.   (Ok, Juan Deere is a little funny) This was obviously the piss break match and the crowd treated it like that. Both https://thumbs.gfycat.com/OrnatePastCrocodile-mobile.mp4 - Finally time for the main event. Eddie vs. Batista for the World Heavyweight Championship. This was a very slow and plodding match until we get to a ref bump about 2/3 of the way in. Eddie grabs a chair but decides against using it. Batista is selling his back and it prevents him from hitting a Batista Bomb, so he goes for a spinebuster instead and gets the pin. Kinda weird finish. They shake hands after the match and the show closes with Cole and Taz wondering if Eddie has really changed.  Final thoughts: maybe this review came off as overly negative but it really was a bad show. The whole thing was focused on (mostly bad) storylines with the ring work being a complete afterthought. None of the matches felt special in any way and probably were no different from what was being put on Smackdown around that time. gently caress JBL.
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Apr 1, 2020 20:08
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E: Lol I say as one of the worst ones ever is posted above me. Ah sorry nostalgia covers over things. Any smackdown exclusive PPV over the next few years after that Survivor Series is good .
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Apr 1, 2020 20:24
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I remember Fully Loaded in 2004 being better than you'd expect as well.
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Apr 1, 2020 22:22
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I should do one of these
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Apr 2, 2020 03:33
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And that would be Eddie's next to last match, he was dead the following month
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Apr 2, 2020 04:00
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DeathChicken posted:And that would be Eddie's next to last match, he was dead the following month Yeah I was about to ask if it was that show because I was pretty sure it was. Basically the end of the heel turn the fans absolutely refused to accept except in the most racist parts of the country.
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Apr 2, 2020 05:14
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Did you know the plan for Eddie at WM22 was to pit him against Shawn Michaels?
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Apr 2, 2020 05:17
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Max Coveri posted:Did you know the plan for Eddie at WM22 was to pit him against Shawn Michaels? gently caress
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Apr 2, 2020 06:35
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God that would have been so good.
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Apr 2, 2020 06:38
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True dream match.
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Apr 2, 2020 06:51
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Let's Watch December to Dismember 2006, Part 56 Ah poo poo, here we go again. This took a while because I was watching wrestling shows that weren't crimes against humanity. Our next in-ring masterclass sees Elijah Burke (future D'Angelo Dinero aka The Pope in TNA) and Sylvester Terkay facing off against... err... I don't remember, actually.  Burke grabs a mic and cuts a rather bland promo where he talks about the Elijah Experience and... hold on a second.  Yes, something definitely went wrong here. Elijah puts over Terkay's MMA credentials, and informs us that like animals in heat, tonight they are going to leave their mark. Eww.  Oh, right, the Full Blooded Italians were on this show. Little Guido and Tony Mamaluke are of course ECW originals, and Trinity worked for TNA before joining WWE. Trinity's outfit seems to be missing half its fabric, and I am missing 640x20 pixels off the top of the rest of the images because I didn't notice I had scrolled down on the Network player page when I started grabbing these shots. The FBI hit some double team moves on Burke and work him over with quick tags. Terkay lumbers into the ring and starts hossing it up, and nobody in the crowd gives a solitary gently caress about what's happening. Tazz calls Terkay "Manbear", which reminds me how people would refer to him as "Manbearpig" in the rare occasion someone remembered he existed. The Network encode of the show is having some freezing issues again, which I welcome at this point. This match isn't completely terrible because Burke and both members of the FBI can work, but there's absolutely no reason to care about any of this. Elijah hits the Elijah Experience (aka The Stroke) on Mamaluke after a forearm from Terkay, and that'll be that. Terkay gets back in the ring to inflict more pain on the FBI and the audience, murdering Guido with a Muscle Buster as the crowd chants "TNA".  Well, that's what you get when you use Jeff Jarrett and Samoa Joe's finishers in quick succession like that, I guess. That was certainly a match that just happened. One star out of five. * We return backstage as Sabu is loaded into an ambulance and taken to the Local Medical Facility. Not much to say about that at this point.  Oh, good, the Great Khali is here too. He's been paired with Daivari because of course he has, they're both foreign after all.  This match is apparently between Daivari and Tommy Dreamer. Okay, let's get this over with. I wish this show was bad in a ridiculous way like WCW 2000, instead of just boring and sad. Khali gets ejected from ringside by the ref after interfering in the match, and if he leaves now he might get backstage before the show ends. The crowd chants "We want hardcore" as Daivari has Dreamer in a rear chinlock and transitions into a side headlock. The action is off the chain, I can barely follow this! The video is now freezing more and more frequently, and every time it does I hope it dies again but no such luck yet. Daivari now has a rear naked choke locked in, but Dreamer fights back and Daivari gets slammed on the mat. Dreamer now gets on the offense with some right hands, a back body drop and inverted DDT. Two count, and the match continues to everyone's neverending delight. Dreamer gets pushed off the middle rope and Daivari dives but nobody home. Dreamer's got Daivari in the tree of woe and hits a dropkick to the face. Dreamer goes for the DDT but Daivari counters into a rollup, grabs a handful of tights and wins.  Dreamer chases Daivari up the ramp but runs straight into Khali, who had just about made it to the Gorilla position.  That chokebomb on the steel looked pretty painful. Joey and Tazz switch to the Owen voice as they talk about how Dreamer might have suffered severe injuries. Dreamer tries to stand up on his own and refuses any help from the officials as he crawls backstage, because HE'S HARDCORE! gently caress this match. Half a star. ½* Paul Heyman bursts into the locker room, where he encounters Hardcore Holly who's just standing there in his ring gear.  Heyman tells Holly that he'll be replacing Sabu in the Extreme Elimination Chamber, and the crowd does not particularly care for this development. Holly was apparently originally meant to be in the Chamber match but Sabu took his spot, but now Holly's back in the match because Vince McMahon insisted he be in the match. To be fair to Holly, he was a mainstay of the hardcore title scene in the Attitude era and also bolstered his hardcore credentials by finishing an extreme rules match on an episode of ECW on Sci-Fi after receiving a horrifying gash to his back in a table bump gone wrong, but... it's Bob Holly. Nobody has ever wanted to see Bob Holly, especially in a PPV main event, and ESPECIALLY if he's replacing someone the fans actually give a gently caress about and has been advertised for the match! For our next trainwreck, we've got Mike Knox and Kelly Kelly going up against Kevin Thorn and Ariel. I think this is the last match before the Extreme Elimination Chamber, so maybe I can actually get to the end of this show.  This is Kelly Kelly's in-ring debut. She first showed up on the first episode of ECW on Sci-Fi, introducing herself as an exhibitionist and doing a TV-14 striptease because I guess someone wanted to recreate THE NIGHT KIMONA WANALAYA DANCED ATOP THE ECW ARENA! Kelly kept doing her thing in the following weeks, but would get interrupted by Mike Knox each time. Knox is supposed to be Kelly's boyfriend in the storyline, and naturally he's an rear end in a top hat heel for not wanting his girlfriend to strip naked on TV. Kelly's also infatuated with CM Punk, which does not exactly please Knox either. Kelly grabs a mic and wishes CM Punk good luck in the Chamber match, to Knox's chagrin. Knox gets in her face as their opponents make their entrance.  Kevin Thorn is the former Mordecai (Remember him? No? I do, he sucked), repackaged with a vampire gimmick. He's accompanied by his valet and fellow bite club enthusiast/tarot card reader Ariel, aka Shelly Martinez. Unlike Kelly, she's at least a trained wrestler even though she was never particularly good in the ring. I'll be honest - I actually really liked this pairing at the time. They had a great look and an awesome entrance, Thorn was decent enough in the ring and Ariel was absolutely gorgeous. Definitely one of the highlights of early WWECW for me. For this match, Ariel's wearing highly appropriate ring gear that includes a frilly skirt and a thong that shows off her entire rear end. That'll be the other part of that TV-14 rating for sexual content, then. Thorn and Knox start the match, and I'm just realizing that this is heel vs. heel and Kelly is the only face in the match. Well, Ariel's outfit probably gets the biggest reaction from the crowd, but you know what I mean. Ariel tags herself in and demands Kelly get in the ring. No, you don't want Kelly to get in the ring, certainly not at this point when she's not even properly trained. She'd eventually get vaguely competent and even held the Divas championship, although she never did learn to run the ropes properly. Ariel chokes Kelly with her boot in the corner, and Tazz momentarily loses his train of thought.  Ariel does a little dance and hits a terrible elbow drop. Kelly tries to tag Knox in, but Knox just walks off and abandons her. Ariel drops Kelly with... was that an STK? That kind of looked like an STK, albeit not very crisp. Ariel covers Kelly by sitting on her face, and the followers of vampirism pick up the win. Ariel beats up Kelly some more, but all of a sudden we hear a generic guitar riff and that can only mean one thing!  You wanna get hardcore? You wanna get extreme? Sandman's not having any of this bloodsucker bullshit on his show, and proceeds to cane the everliving poo poo out of Thorn. Sandman poses for the crowd, and that's that. Half a star. ½* Backstage, Rebecca DiPietro interviews Bobby Lashley who appears to a chorus of boos from the crowd. We see a video package showing off what happened on ECW the week before, with Lashley getting destroyed by Big Show, Test and Heyman's riot squad (not to be confused with Riott Squad). Rebecca asks how Bobby's going to overcome the odds, and Bobby replies with some bland poo poo I can't be bothered to transcribe. Extreme Elimination Chamber hype video. No man will leave unscathed, indeed. Everyone who saw this show was permanently scarred. Oh, and the hype video still has Sabu in it, just to rub it in a little bit more. Joey and Tazz talk about the upcoming match as Heyman shows up with his riot squad goons. Apparently, those guys were actually Doug and Danny Basham.  Heyman cuts a promo, saying ECW will live on long after his death, and that is all thanks to Paul Heyman. This would be the last time we see him on WWE TV for a very long while. God, he must be so loving pissed right now. Heyman talks about how Sabu was removed from the match and says he personally would have loved to see the suicidal, genocidal, etc. maniac in the Extreme Elimination Chamber, but let's face it - the age of Sabu, Sandman and RVD has come to an end. This is the age of the global phenomenon of ECW, led by Big Show ("WHO'S GONNA RETIRE NEXT YEAR!" a very loud and vocal fan yells, and Show would indeed take a lengthy hiatus shortly after this show). But now, it's time to finish this shitshow. Lower the chamber and let's get this over with so we can all move on with our lives. That same fan is still yelling poo poo throughout all this.  Big Show enters first. Again, he's done a commendable job as the ECW champion and did his best to make it work (the match he had against Ric Flair in particular was insane), but everyone knows he was never supposed to win the belt and no one wanted him to.  Here's the man everyone except Vince McMahon wants to win the belt. Punk only debuted recently, but is super over with the crowd. I remember some people saying he wasn't ready to win the ECW title yet, but come on. The weapon in Punk's pod is a chair.  Holy loving poo poo, Test has taken all the steroids in the world. He looks like he's about to explode. Test's pod has a crowbar in it. A dangerous weapon for sure, but not very spectacular in a wrestling match.  Here's the guy everyone knows is winning the match. I seem to remember some folks including myself hoping that Punk would pull off the win, but realistically we all knew how this was going to go down and were just deluding ourselves. Lashley's weapon is a table. Hardcore Holly enters next. Nobody gives a gently caress. Finally, here's RVD.  RVD and Holly will be starting the match. At least they can both work even though Holly is bland as gently caress, so this shouldn't be a complete disaster. Holly starts things off with some clotheslines and various strikes, and RVD gets tossed to the steel floor. RVD repeats his Spider-Man dive off the chamber wall from 2002, but misses and lands hard on the ropes. Holly's in control and climbs up to the top rope, flying nothing and boot to Holly's face. Rolling Thunder over the ropes to the steel, just like he did to Triple H four years earlier. Holly suplexes RVD into the ring and goes for the pin, RVD kicks out at two. Nice dropkick by Holly and another cover, two count as the first pod is about to open. CM Punk enters the match and the crowd wakes up. Punk throws the chair in Holly's face and hits a springboard clothesline on RVD. Punk tosses the chair to RVD, who throws it right back and clobbers Punk on the head. Monkeyflip by RVD on the chair, Punk lands rear end first. Punk dodges a kick and legdrops RVD's head onto the chair, that looked sick. Punk springboard dropkicks Holly to the outside and goes to work on RVD some more. RVD's busted open above his right eye and gets whipped into the chair in the corner. That also looked nasty,  Holly tosses Punk into the chamber wall and goes for a cover on the floor, Punk kicks out. Holly pummels Punk some more as the crowd chants something that sounds a bit like... hmm. That definitely sounds like something that ends in the six-letter F-word (Apparently, they were chanting "TEST'S A F*****", which I couldn't quite make out with my slightly crappy hearing and didn't realize they were chanting at Test who wasn't even in the ring). Holly superplexes Punk off the top and gets a two count. Punk with the knee to Holly in the corner and goes for the bulldog, but runs into a kick from Van Dam. Test enters with his crowbar and goes straight for RVD's wound, that's pretty gross. Punk manages to take Test down on the outside, and Van Dam kicks Holly in the face in the ring. RVD's got the chair and whacks both Test and Holly with it. Corner dropkick with the steel chair on Punk, and RVD hits the Five Star Frog Splash! 1-2-3 and Punk is the first man eliminated. The crowd hates this and has now officially turned on the match. Test hits a big boot on Holly, eliminating him from the match. Good riddance. I actually completely missed this elimination at first and had to go back to see what happened to Holly, as I suddenly realized he was no longer in the match (he also kicked out at two but got eliminated anyway). That's how memorable his turn in the Extreme Elimination Chamber was. Test gets kicked by RVD, who climbs on top of Big Show's pod. Show grabs the leg and Test hits RVD with the chair. Test places the chair on RVD's face and... climbs on top of the pod?  MOTHER OF GOD! Test covers RVD after that huge elbow drop and eliminates him from the match, so that's both guys the crowd cared about taken out of the match in about a minute. Props to Test for that spot, though, because holy poo poo. How did his skeleton not launch itself out of his body on impact? Meanwhile, the crowd is chanting for refunds. When I first watched this in 2006, I didn't even pay for it but still wanted my money back. Lashley's pod opens, but Officer Basham and Officer Basham lock him inside with a chain. Test taunts Lashley, who proceeds to use the table to smash his way through the steel chains. Lashley climbs on top of the pod and to the top rope, hitting a diving clothesline on Test. Lashley shoves Test into not one but two of the pods, smashing the plexiglass. The fight continues with both men now in the ring. The crowd chants "YOU BOTH SUCK!" BORING chants ring out in the James Brown Arena as Lashley spears Test and eliminates him. THIS IS BULLSHIT chants now. Lashley waits for Big Show to enter as Heyman tries to psyche up Big Show. CHANGE THE CHANNEL chants from the crowd. Lashley is trying to smash up the pod, but there's only a few seconds left so might as well just wait for Big Show to get in. Big Show's got the barbwire bat and swings it at Lashley, who uses the chair to block. Lashley loses the chair but the bat gets stuck between the chains, so Lashley grabs the chair again and hits Show with it. Lashley poses for the crowd and receives massive boos like the all-conquering babyface he is. Lashley throws Show through the nearest pod and continues the beatdown inside. Show busts out the remaining wall of the pod as Heyman's losing his poo poo on the outside. Show motions for the chokeslam, but Lashley counters into a DDT. LET'S GO BIG SHOW chants. Lashley and Show continue swinging at each other, Big Show runs into the corner, Show goes for Lashley's own Dominator finisher (not to be confused with Faarooq's Dominator, which is what Lashley initially used but switched to the running powerslam), but Bobby breaks his way free and spears Big Show. One, two, three, and it's finally over. Thank God. This match was not that terrible in a vacuum as most guys in the ring at least put in the effort and Heyman tried to salvage what he could with his booking. Ignoring everything surrounding it, the match would be a **½ affair at the very least, but but sadly this match did not take place in a vacuum and was in fact so bad it basically killed the ECW brand. That means I'm giving the Extreme Elimination Chamber a rating of zero stars, and even that's being generous because everything surrounding this match makes me want to tear my hair out.  drat straight, Paul. I couldn't agree more. After the show, Heyman and Vince McMahon would get into a huge argument as Vince blamed Heyman for the trainwreck we just witnessed, and Heyman was escorted from the arena and sent home. He then met with Vince and Stephanie McMahon and left the company. WWE.com cited "slumping television ratings and a disgruntled talent roster as causes for Mr. Heyman's dismissal" because of course they did, and Tommy Dreamer and Stevie Richards asked for their releases but were refused by Vince and John Laurinaitis because gently caress you. Heyman and Big Show both wanted Show to get eliminated first by CM Punk, who was supposed to go on and win the entire thing. Then when Vince opposed the idea and demanded Lashley win the match, Heyman and Show still wanted Punk to eliminate Show first because that would've gotten him over as a bonafide star, but Vince wouldn't have any of it because God forbid anyone get over if he personally didn't engineer it. Instead, Punk was made to look like a loser geek, because Vince thought Punk was a loser geek and anyone who thought otherwise could kiss his rear end. You can boo all you want, it's not gonna change anything. We know better than you marks. You're gonna love Bobby and that's that. If you don't love Bobby, we'll poo poo on all your favorite guys and make them look like worthless assholes so you have no choice but to cheer for Lashley! Deal with it! Hmm... why does that sound so familiar? Oh yeah, because they'd repeat the same sort of deal with Roman Reigns in 2015!  The show ends after only 2 hours and 14 minutes, but instead of being mad about not getting a full three-hour PPV I welcome the end at this point. Jesus Christ, what a goddamn garbage fire. The opening match wasn't a disaster and the Extreme Elimination Chamber had a couple of fun moments, but overall this is a strong contender for the worst PPV of all time, especially for what it represents. This whole show is nothing but a demonstration of Vince McMahon being Vince McMahon and making GBS threads over everything he did not personally create, and the sheer contempt towards the audience here is just mindblowing. My overall grade for December to Dismember 2006 is an F+, and even that's pushing it.
DMorbid fucked around with this message at 23:00 on Jun 4, 2020 |
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Apr 2, 2020 13:34
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as someone who came back to watch wwe exclusively because they were putting punk on tv, thanks for the nostalgia trip. sometimes nostalgia is really lovely
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Apr 2, 2020 14:58
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Thanks for the write up. It’s almost as if that PPV was some sort of horrible premonition of what’s to come.
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Apr 2, 2020 17:23
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