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Episode 44: WCW Monday Nitro July 29th 1996
47 Plays3 years ago
For the first time, we take a look at an episode of WCW's flagship television show, WCW Monday Nitro. The nWo formed back at Bash at the Beach 1996...but hey, it's just another wrestling faction, right? WCW can just carry on as usual, right? To find out...let's go to the ring!
Music by Michael Gary Brewer at https://www.instantmusicnow.com/
Follow us on Twitter at https://twitter.com/letsgo2thering , or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/LetsGo2theRing/
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Transcript
00:00:01
Speaker
Stinger call, butt player pokes his eyes only for sting to sta- only for ting- ah! Stings to stag, or ting to tag. Geez.
Introduction to 'Let's Go to the Ring'
00:00:37
Speaker
Hello everyone, and welcome to Let's Go to the Ring, where we take a look at the good old days, and not so good old days, of World Championship Wrestling Series by Series. I'm your host, Bob Moore, and joining me from an opaque steel chamber may or may not be Alec Bridget. How's it going tonight, Al? Radioactive material decayed at all yet? No, I'm pretty good. I can't confirm or deny where my existence, but trust me, I'm definitely something. Okay.
WCW Nitro: July 29th, 1996 Overview
00:01:06
Speaker
Tonight, we are taking a look at a Nitro episode for the very first time. Specifically, the July 29th, 1996 episode. Which, interestingly enough, I found out that's labeled episode 29 of Nitro. I noticed that. And it's on the 29th. That is very weird. Interesting coincidence. So, this is rare, but I'm gonna just put an advisement out here. Okay.
00:01:30
Speaker
If you haven't seen this episode and you feel like you might want to watch it, I advise you to pause this podcast here and go and watch it. It's a very unique episode and it's worth watching before hearing us discuss all the individual parts so you get to react to it as it comes. So, go on. We'll be here when you get back.
00:01:54
Speaker
Okay, all good? All right, here we go. This episode of WCW Monday Nitro aired from Disney MGM Studios, now Disney Hollywood Studios, in Orlando, Florida. Now, I've been there quite a few times, but I can't say that I ever caught a WCW show, not on my radar back then. No, it is kind of funny to think that they're doing a show in Orlando as studios, I believe. Is that where the T&A used to record all the time?
00:02:22
Speaker
They would do it at that big area where Disney Quest was. Oh, okay, in Downtown Disney. Different than MGM Studios, but another part of Disney World then. Gotcha, yeah. Okay. Did you ever end up at one that, when I was at MGM, by the way? No, I'm never much of a Disney person. I've been to the parks when I was a kid, but yeah. This would have been when I was 13, so I don't think I was really a park person. Yeah.
00:02:46
Speaker
Well, the episode earned a TV rating of 3.0, which was quite a bit better than the WWF Raw rating of 2.1. We are a few weeks into WCW's famous winning streak in the ratings, which would last over a year and a half. According to wrestlingdata.com, the episode was filmed in front of a crowd of 450 fans, who were in for a bit of a different show than they might have been expecting. Yeah, that's true.
NWO Formation and Its Impact
00:03:15
Speaker
Back at Basheth Beach 1996, a few weeks prior, the NWO formed. But despite the shock of Hulk Hogan's heel turn, WCW is still mostly behaving as though things are business as usual. But are they? To find out, let's go to the ring.
00:03:38
Speaker
Explosions. More explosions. Even more explosions. Excitement? WCW Monday Nitro's opening, featuring video of wrestlers projected on buildings while Pyro goes off basically everywhere, is definitely dynamic and iconic. Even the logo detonates. Yes.
00:03:56
Speaker
By the way, I believe, just for contrast, I believe that footage with the backlot. Yeah. That's a universal, I believe. I think, yeah, you were telling me that. I'm not even sure that's the universal backlot. That is tremendously ironic given where they're filming today. Yeah, right? Yeah. Tony Schiavone welcomes us to the show as yet more pyro goes off.
Unique Aspects of Disney MGM Studios Broadcast
00:04:16
Speaker
He introduces his co-host, the living legend, Larry Zabisco. Both of them are wearing very nice Disney World polo shirts with Mickey Mouse logos.
00:04:25
Speaker
Tony talks up a few of the matches on tonight's card. We've got world champ The Giant versus Arne Anderson, cruiserweight champ Ray Mysterio Jr. versus Eddie Guerrero, and the American males versus the Steiner brothers. Those sound pretty fun. Looking forward to those. Uh-huh, yeah, sure.
Hogan's Heel Turn and Reactions
00:04:43
Speaker
So, what's your take on WSW's Disney World set, Al? We're sitting there right in front of the main entrance, I believe, to MGM Studios.
00:04:51
Speaker
It's a little weird, I'll definitely admit. Yeah, it's a ring with a bunch of bleachers around it. And we'll cover it throughout the show. There's a tree just kind of there in the walkway. I forget who it is that nearly runs smack into it. I think it might be Rick Steiner because he's kind of looking behind him during his. At least, though, yeah.
00:05:11
Speaker
For me, the big WCW letters behind the crowd were nice, but the outdoor atmosphere is a little strange. The entrance ramp, like you said, is weirdly positioned with the palm tree stuck in the middle of it. And the stands just kind of bother me. Yeah. It looks more like a high school football field kind of set up, not a normal arena. Just they've got it glitched up a little bit like for homecoming.
00:05:32
Speaker
Right. It's kind of like if you watch early Ring of Honor shows, they will record in like the nicer high school gyms. Yeah. So it's basically the same setup, except behind them in Ring of Honor shows, you have a wall and you know, you have the flags of the, hopefully your team is good. It has flags from when you won a tournament or something. Hopefully not every school is so lucky. Yeah.
00:05:54
Speaker
Where is this just yet? It just you can see the lovely Orlando air and it is a little weird. They just like big WCB letters on the MGM rather just just above the like not the ticket booth but where they where they check your tickets to come in. I think that's where it is. Yeah, they just got big old WCW on the top of that somebody got to have fun climbing up there and lugging those up and
00:06:16
Speaker
I will say for all the crap that WWF gets for doing WrestleMania 9, they say it's a Caesar's Palace, but it's in the parking lot in front of Caesar's Palace. This isn't exactly like much glitzier. Right, yeah. Admittedly, this is Nitro, not Starrcade. Tony brings up the NWO, saying that WCW is under attack. Larry dubs the NWO the New World Odor.
00:06:43
Speaker
I love Larry Zabisco, but that line is not anywhere near as clever as he repeatedly thinks. Yeah, it's like not quite a dad joke, but it's not much better than that. Yeah. It wouldn't be so bad if he only said it the one time, but he's just all throughout the show, new world odor, new world odor, new world odor. And he emphasizes odor, like just in case you didn't get it. Yeah, you're right.
00:07:07
Speaker
Larry says the NWO are picking their shots, mostly attacking WCW's staff who can't defend themselves. He says they'd better study history or they'll be doomed to repeat it. Tony brings up the NWO's recent assault on Lex Luger when he was alone, and throws to video of the NWO similarly attacking Sting outside an arena in Cincinnati. Apparently it was shot and sent to WCW by the NWO's outsiders, Kevin Nash and Scott Hall.
00:07:38
Speaker
Luger and Sting are leaving the arena together. It's weird seeing Sting in a flannel shirt and white shorts, by the way. Yeah, very weird. No face paint or anything. Nope. Yeah. Luger's called back in for a phone call, which Tony intimates was probably fake. And Nash and Hall sneak up on Sting while he's loading things into his car trunk and beat him up.
00:07:58
Speaker
Now, normally, I would doubt that Kevin Nash, of all people, would be able to sneak up on anyone, but it is the universe's most oblivious and trusting man, Sting. So, fair enough. And he wasn't wearing his pants at the tassels, I'm sure make lots of noise. Right, right, yeah. Tony assures us that Sting is okay, and he only had minor injuries, and calls it a cowardly attack. He says WCW doesn't know what to expect, but they've got some tremendous action planned tonight.
00:08:29
Speaker
So let's get started with that tremendous action with match one, Mike Enos of Rough and Ready versus Hacksaw Jim Duggan. The referee for this one is Jimmy Jett.
00:08:41
Speaker
Duggan has been fighting off and on with Dick Slater, who's the other half of Rough and Ready, which we saw him back at Slamboree 96. That great show. Right. It's part of that elaborate music tournament they had. Yeah. Yeah. I will note for historical purposes, Mike Enos is important to wrestling history. Mike Enos is one of the two people in the ring when Scott Hall first appears.
00:09:06
Speaker
Yes, on May 27th, 1996, Nitro, right? Yes. Yeah, he was in a match against Steve Dahl, a man so notable that I didn't realize he existed until I read that statement. Yes. Enos, at least we have seen before, though he's not generally wowed us as a wrestler. No. But dang, if his entrance music isn't awesome, it's like pure, epic cowboy movie goodness. Yes. They should have used that for Spring Stampede.
00:09:34
Speaker
Yeah, I should have. He has a pretty decent snake-themed vest, too, like the design on that. Tony notes the absence of Colonel Robert Parker, who normally manages Enos, and talks about Parker romancing Sister Sherry, manager of Harlem Heat. That is a long-running angle in 1996. Yeah, we'll definitely have to cover that at some point on at least one show. I'm pretty sure more like three or four shows. Yeah, hell yeah.
00:10:04
Speaker
Duggan's usual flag and two-by-four waving entrance interrupts Larry's train of thought as he's responding to Tony, and he gives a very you reaction now. Oh, not Hacksaw. That's generally my fears, yes. Tony talks up another match for tonight. We'll have Mongo, Benoit, and Flare versus Luger, Savage, and Sting. He says, no one can be trusted right now, and Flare's loyalty to WCW is in question.
00:10:33
Speaker
Larry says, even though he says don't trust anyone, he doesn't think Flair is the one to worry about. Tony disagrees, feeling that Flair is an opportunist and likes to be the center of attention, so he may well join the NWO.
00:10:47
Speaker
Duggan goes after Enos with a 2x4, but the ref holds him back and takes it. Enos attacks Duggan from behind, but Duggan clotheslines him outside, then gets a USA chant going. As far as I can tell, Enos is from Minnesota. Last time I checked, that was part of the United States. I mean, it's close to Canada? Larry wins Al's MVP award by comparing Duggan to a Brontosaurus. Big, but with a brain the size of a peat.
00:11:15
Speaker
Yeah, not wrong. Back in, Enos takes off his vest so you know things are serious. Oh yeah. They trade shoulder blocks and headbutts amidst a USA chant. Minnesota, people. And Duggan wins the slugfest with an atomic drop. But Enos pulls down the ropes on a charge and Duggan spills out. Enos sloppily slams Duggan to the concrete and rakes his eyes. Back in, Enos wins the slugfest and hits quite a nice jumping leg drop. He does.
00:11:46
Speaker
We get another USA chant. Still from Minnesota. Enos wastes time after a knee strike for one. Enos reverse chinlock, but Duggan keeps the arm up on the third check, but Enos cuts off a comeback with a knee strike. Another USA chant. Maybe Canada annexed Minnesota for a bit in 1996? I don't recall. Yeah, I don't remember that being in any history books. Duggan hacksaws up, but they collide on a whip and both go down for five.
00:12:16
Speaker
Duggan's sunset flip for two as he pulls the tights to expose far more of Mike Enos than I wanted to see. Enos neckbreaker for two. And Tony wonders if the four empty seats in the front row are for the NWO. Larry points out there's only three members. And Tony says he's expecting someone else to join. I wonder if that was a slip that he then covered, or if it was just him building the story of suspicion.
00:12:40
Speaker
Yeah, I can go either way in that, honestly, with how much we know they tell him in advance later shows. Enos suplex, but Duggan dodges a top rope splash and hacksaws up again, clubbing away in the corner, but Enos sneaks in a knee strike when Jett warns Duggan. Enos beats Duggan up in the corner and earns a warning too, and while Jett's back is turned, Duggan produces a roll of tape, sloppily wraps up his fist, and slugs Enos for the three count in the win.
00:13:10
Speaker
Jett clearly, clearly sees the roll of tape dangling from Duggan's hand as he raises Duggan's arm in victory, but just kind of gives a quizzical look, like, oh well, I guess rolls of tape just spontaneously appear sometimes. Larry accurately points out that Duggan did just use an illegal object to win, although I will admit I'm not sure how much good a three-second sloppy tape wrap did Duggan really. Thoughts on this one?
00:13:37
Speaker
It's all right. It's pretty nothing, honestly. It's a lot of punching and kicking. There's not a lot of sort of technical flashiness here, which is not even really expect to be fair from a match from all of Duggan. Unless there's like a Duggan-Benoit match, which there probably must be at some point. I would imagine. Potentially speaking, there'd have to be one.
00:13:58
Speaker
Or like a dugout flare match for the flare in his prime. It could be interesting in that respect. You sort of hinted at that, but that body slam on the outside is interesting because it's weird because he's trying to, I think he's trying to be safe. Yeah. He simultaneously looks like he's being safe and like he almost drops him. Yes. Which is not a good combination. Yeah. Cause so if you want a body slam to look as realistic as a body slam can be, obviously, even with that move with some helping.
00:14:25
Speaker
You want to quickly grab the guy, roll him over, and even if you weren't actually doing it, you want the visual of him being thrown down like he's being shoved off a building or something. That's what you're going for.
00:14:38
Speaker
He does the windup part really slowly. I think his goal is to get Doug in like, I don't know, three inches off the ground, maybe, and just let go and drop him. So he's not even slamming him. Like I said, I think he's really going for safety, but he's going so slow that it almost becomes unsafe because of that. Yeah, because he almost loses control at the end, as you when we first saw it.
00:15:01
Speaker
like like the biscoe i really take issue with the fact that doug and just like it's slamper 96 by the way cheats to win yeah he cheats multiple times he cheats by pulling the tights mid-match too yeah yeah it's just so weird i can't get because this is the whole idea that you know there's this whole blurred lines of face and heel thing we think of with like
00:15:22
Speaker
the NWO when they start to get popular with certain fans, and they start to get cheered over WCW wrestlers, or an even trueso where everyone's kind of an a**. Is that how some of the shows get with the writing? But here you have Duggan regularly doing all this sort of cheating, and they're off going, Oh, that's weird. Oh, well, doop-a-doop-a-doop. Don't care.
00:15:42
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's it's strange. It's like, you know, he cheats openly multiple times during the match. So is he a face or isn't he? I expect that kind of ambiguity from 1999 or 2000, but not so much here. Right. I will say, to be fair to Enos, after really tearing apart the body's lamp, he does his I'm dead self and the punch is really good.
00:16:03
Speaker
Yes. He does an excellent job with that. And like I said, that leg drop he did was picture perfect. Just really, really nice. Absolutely. He really throws himself into the top rope body splash to midway through the match. Yeah. He doesn't like hold back on it because he knows he's going to hit the ground or anything. He just goes for it. Exactly. Yeah. I thought this wasn't great, but it wasn't bad. Duggan at least got the crowd going with USA chance, even if those made little sense. And Enos had a much better showing them way back at Russell war.
00:16:32
Speaker
That's the show. I can't remember which show that, yeah. Where he's in the mask as the replacement skyscraper. Oh, right, right, right, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's the one. He controlled much of the matching, got to land some pretty good strikes, a nice leg drop, and quite a nice suplex as well. Still, it's mostly two big guys clubbing each other without much of a plot. It is very weird, by the way, how every time Enos cuts off a dug-in comeback, it's with a knee strike. Huh. Just every single time.
00:16:58
Speaker
No, that's true, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. Vary it up a little bit, folks. Still, I think this did a pretty decent job of getting the crowd into the show, which was his main point. You know, you get duggin' out there, they can have fun chanting, and that's all you really need. Right. I think for me, if I'm gonna see more Mike Enos matches this, which I don't know if he will as much a pay-per-view. He's not a big mainstay of that.
00:17:19
Speaker
I could see him working well with a more intense wrestler, like a Ben Waugh, for instance, or even go for a clash style thing. I have him and Eddie Guerrero. So you get Eddie could do his higher spot or remember, his deer could be good. Yeah. Because he's a solid hand in the ring. There's nothing other than him overdoing the body slam attempt, as we said, trying to make it safe and making it unsafe. He's not bad. He's not he's not exciting in the ring. Just don't put him in a mask and he's pretty good.
00:17:47
Speaker
As a whole, he's not bad. Same with Duggan. I think Duggan, I'm never going to be a big fan of his. I've seen a lot of his stuff over the years. Nothing's wowed me about him. Other than the fact that he openly teaches the face, he's not bad. Perfectly serviceable big man wrestler. I think that's like both of them fall into that category that I don't think I would ever see them as central to a show, but you put them in the ring, they can do their part.
00:18:13
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Likewise, he'd be interesting with the classic style sort of heel wrestler, like when you have he ultimate dragon. That was it. That might be ultimate dragon match, but I could see that working. It should be a fascinating match. Yeah, I could see that being an interesting thing to watch for sure. Tony tells us that's Pep Boys power pin of the week. Should they not wait until the end of the show to determine which pin gets their award? Way to rush to judgment, Pep Boys.
00:18:41
Speaker
Oh, Duggan slipped number five. Oh, there you go. Yeah. Had to cheat on that too. Exactly, yes. He's consistent. But yeah, it'd be one thing if this were like a pre-taped show and you could say the awards committee watched the unaired version and then voted and then they put it in the version for airing, but Nitro is live. Yes. So whoever was handing out these awards saw Duggan land a punch with a taped fist and was like, yeah, I'm definitely not going to see anything that tops that. That's not an award, that's an indictment. That's true.
00:19:10
Speaker
But, you know, they're probably safe. It's not like someone's gonna hit one of the most terrifying finishers ever later on this very show. No. Can't imagine. Tony throws to Mean Jean Okerlund, who is in the ring with Duggan.
00:19:26
Speaker
And I thank you very much, Tony Schiavone. Ladies and gentlemen, we are live from Orlando. This is Nitro, and there's a lot of things happening. Very heavy security, by the way, I should point out, around this particular facility here at Disney MGM. Hacksaw, Jim Duggan, coming off a victory. Highly questionable, but I think we've got other things to talk about. Namely, the New World Order. What's your take on what's going on right now? Hold on a sec, folks. Hold on a second.
00:19:54
Speaker
You know, everybody's just wondering, Hawk, what have you done? What have you done to us? Not just your friends, not just your family, not just your countrymen, but as fans, Gene, the young kids, they really looked up to you.
00:20:09
Speaker
that really believed in you, Hulkster. I've been with you for almost 20 years. I've gone to the Make-A-Wish Foundation with you. I've been to the Special Olympics. I know what's in your heart. So what's wrong with you, Hulk? Why turn your back on everything that you used to love? Why turn your back on everything that loved you? I don't understand. I had you over to my home.
00:20:33
Speaker
Jeannie's held my two little girls in his arms. The first word my oldest spoke was Hulkster. I've got to look her in the eye and tell her what kind of man you are. Hulkster, you're a great technical wrestler, but I don't want to wrestle you. I want to beat you up. All right, I thank you, Hacksaw, Jim Duggan.
00:20:55
Speaker
I'm not certain we can use the analogy, but it might be appropriate. You take a good apple, you put it into a basket of bad apples, and well, enough said. Stay tuned as WCW Monday Nitro continues here on TNT.
00:21:14
Speaker
Okay. I doubt that anyone's first word was Hulkster. Seems a little tough for a baby. And I'm also not sure that I would describe Hogan as a technical wrestler. No. But oh my gosh, Duggan otherwise knocked it out of the park here.
00:21:32
Speaker
He really got across this sense of confusion and anger at Hogan's betrayal of WCW, and he brought in several personal touches to get across the closeness of their friendship and how big a change this was for Hogan. He really comes across as a man who knows he's just lost a friend, and he's had enough time to think about it, but he hasn't made peace with it. The camera work here, too, I really liked. It zooms in close, which I think enhances the sense of discomfort. Yeah. Let's see that.
00:22:01
Speaker
I really, really liked this promo. Duggan normally gives more fun-loving or silly kind of promos, so hearing him do one like this was really neat. Yeah. We do get a bit of a strange use of the bad apples analogy from Gene at the end, though. A bit, yeah. I think he mixed it up. It's normally one bad apple spoils the bunch, not one good apple falls in with bad ones and gets spoiled. Yeah, it's not quite how it works. The latter's a bit less impactful. Yeah, right.
00:22:29
Speaker
Yeah, it's really good. There's some weird word choices like the kid first word being Hulkster, or they turned his back on his country. Countryman. He does say countryman. Yeah. Okay, that's true. That's still weird to bring that part up. It's a little bit, but I mean, it is dug in the whole USA thing.
00:22:49
Speaker
Yeah, maybe he thinks that WCW is the USA. And that's why he gets the USA chance going against actual American wrestlers from time to time. It's like they're bad in WCW. Therefore, they're not from the USA.
00:23:01
Speaker
Oh, is that why they say the WCW? It's like the USA. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I think we've cracked the code. Wow. Now it's not annoying anymore. Wait, now it still is. But yeah, no, it's good to see someone like him who obviously, if he's not thought of as a big promo guy, obviously he's cut promos of any kind for what? 10, 15 years probably at this point. I think so. Yeah. Yeah. He's had quite a career.
00:23:27
Speaker
Yeah, it's not like they pull some random guy and they hear a kind of promo. He knows how to put emotion in when he actually needs to. Right. Which is nice, yeah. And this one, I think, stacks well with the past few weeks of Nitros, as I recall. They've been having people cutting promos like this, again, reacting to the Hogan turn. Ray Mysterio has a great one where he ends up with he betrayed us. Yeah.
00:23:48
Speaker
There's a lot of nice kind of harder hitting promos than you normally get from a lot of people and some that you're not used to doing a lot of promo work on WCW shows. But then yeah, Duggan I think is a very good choice to then kind of evolve it that he may be, I'm not absolutely sure, but I think he might be the first one that has had such a long running relationship with Hogan.
00:24:08
Speaker
Yeah, it might be. The only other one I can remember is Kevin Sullivan has one, but his is a bit different. His is, you know, I was trying to destroy Hulkamania and he destroyed it himself. Yeah, right. So it's a little bit more super villain promo where Duggan is the first, like, longtime friend, I think that they really have. I mean, the most long term one you can get would be Ed Leslie. And I'm not sure I want to hear Ed Leslie try to do the same kind of promo. Doesn't seem like it'd be as powerful. No. Yeah. He could surprise me. He could. He could. It seems unlikely. Yeah.
00:24:38
Speaker
We cut to our first commercial break on a video from last week's Nitro, featuring the Horseman making an entrance and Arne Anderson checking a white limo, looking for Flair, as Bobby Heenan can be heard assuring Bischoff that if Flair isn't here, he's got a good excuse. Ooh, he's like to keep my favorite snack handy. Need a little excitement? Snap it over to Slim Jim, oh yeah!
00:25:06
Speaker
Back from commercial, we get a commercial. Yes. Randy Savage rips the front off a locker to retrieve some Slim Jims. Then, Tony talks up WSW Saturday Night, which apparently is about experiments in cybernetic arm design according to its footage. It feels like B-roll from Terminator 2. Yeah. Back to the ring for our second match, as Tony tells us, this is the match we were scheduled to have last week, but didn't because of the flare situation.
Six-Man Tag Match and NWO Involvement
00:25:35
Speaker
Correct, yeah.
00:25:36
Speaker
So our second match is The Horseman, that's the nature boy, Rick Flair, Steve Mongo McMichael, and Crispin Waugh, accompanied by Deborah McMichael, Elizabeth, and Woman, versus Sting, Lex Luger, and the macho man, Randy Savage. The referee for this one is Nick Patrick.
00:25:56
Speaker
Kind of funny of a contrast that all three of the Heels have their own manager. Yes. And none of the three faces have manager. It's like the ultimate expression of faces don't have managers, Heels do, right? Exactly, yeah. Laid up pretty well. As far as Dory goes, other than the can of Flair with trusted stuff, obviously you have Sting and Flair. If you know anything about wrestling, you know Sting and Flair have been fighting at this point for about 10 years now. And they've traded their will tile a couple of times between Toa at this point.
00:26:26
Speaker
Sometimes in very ill-fitting mask. Yes. That's, there's also that. I try to forget the black scorpion, which is possible. Much like Mike Eno's flair should not wear a mask. Yes. Really effect his breathing, I'm sure. Yes. But as far as Savage goes, at this point Savage and flair have traded the world title three times between each other on sets of shows. So obviously there's a lot of animosity there.
00:26:50
Speaker
And I believe there's an angle going on where flair is spending savages money as well, right? Yeah, because savage and Elizabeth used to be married and got divorced. And yes, I think the idea is like she got savages money and the divorce and flares spending it all.
00:27:05
Speaker
Yes. It's a little weird because, yeah, because I believe the timeline is they actually divorced in like 93, 94. Yeah. But then he comes in to WCW on the show. We've seen that together, but they definitely eventually come aligned officially because she, she turns on him.
00:27:23
Speaker
Right, yeah. She spends the first month or two, I think, that she's there. She's aligned with Savage. Yes. And then at Super Brawl, I think, is where the turn happens, if I recall correctly. The dangerous high-heeled shoe. Yes. Death. One of many dangerous high-heeled shoe attacks. Yes.
00:27:40
Speaker
Also, as you know, from watching the shows at this point, we're still in kind of a long running story where Lex Luger is a good guy, but really only because he's with Sting. He's kind of becoming nicer and coming up more fan favorite on his, on his own, but he's definitely still, I'm friends with Sting, so he's a face. So I'm, that's why I'm doing this. Not too much. I love the fans.
00:28:01
Speaker
Yeah, he's leaned more towards face recently because I think after Uncensored, they start to turn him more face. Yes. But he still recently has been a heel or recently has been like between face and heel. Yeah, they famously turned the botch, if you believe it is one, and it's such a 96 into part of the story. Yeah.
00:28:20
Speaker
I do have to once again say at this point, the Luger Sting stuff from 1996 is absolute gold. If you have not watched the 96 Nitros, they are worth it for that alone, even if nothing else awesome happened on them and frequently awesome stuff does happen on them. But oh my gosh, the Luger and Sting stuff is just comedy gold, just brilliant stuff.
00:28:39
Speaker
The best bit of course is Sting is walking the ring Luger behind him. Sting is slapping Phantansa in the way. Luger is not. Until Sting looks in his direction, then he's like, he starts high-fighting people. And then he stops once the thing looks away. Love that bit, love that bit. The Horsemen come out to Flair's theme. Mungo has an awesome Four Horsemen shirt on. And Flair has a great sparkly green and gold robe.
00:29:06
Speaker
Deborah is front and center, though, in a gold dress. Arne Anderson, Tony informs us, is not present because of his world title match against the giant later tonight. Sting, Luger, and Savage enter to Sting's theme. Savage has a bright green outfit. And Sting's is a neat sort of sky blue and red. It is, yeah. Luger wears black tights and white boots. Come on, man, get some glitter, bout of peer pressure. Exactly, yeah.
00:29:35
Speaker
I am astonished that they managed to do like a six or seven month angle or more with Sting and Luker, you know, paddling around and teaming up repeatedly. And I think there's precisely one time that Luker wears face paint. Yes. And all of that. It's like that is some solid maintenance of your identity, man.
00:29:53
Speaker
Yeah, they get them in the, like, the military face paint, right? For Fall Brawl, I believe? Oh, okay, then there might be two, because I think there's the one for Fall Brawl, and then I believe for the Bash at the Beach match, they all wear Sting face paint. Oh, you're right, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's true. Yeah. Macho charges flare, and everybody brawls as we cut to commercial. Glacier is coming. During the break, Patrick restored order, so the match proper starts with Sting and Benoit.
00:30:21
Speaker
Sting dominates, so Benoit tags Flair, who stops Sting from tagging Savage, but immediately regrets it, as Sting sends him to the apron to Luger, who sends him to the floor to Savage, who beats him up by a VIP table, and dumps fruit on him.
00:30:33
Speaker
Yeah, I think the VIP table was supposed to be part of that story. I think so. Flair keeps buying a little VIP table with fruits and wines and stuff on it and will often just go over there and sit there during a match just to taunt Savage. Because I believe there's the one show we've actually covered where it's stinging the giant. Slamberea96, yeah, there's the VIP table there and Giant goes over to try and choke Slam, stinging on it, but Luger covers the table with Jimmy Hart, I think. Yes, that's the one.
00:31:00
Speaker
Flair flees inside, and Sting press slams him. Singer call, but Flair pokes his eyes, only for Sting to tag Savage. Flair freezes dead in his tracks, great moment. Less great. Larry says, he shocks Savage hasn't gone out to choke Miss Elizabeth. Tony says, that's a good point. Is it? No, I'm gonna say no on that one, yeah, no. Flair kisses Elizabeth just to tick Savage off.
00:31:30
Speaker
Savage charges, but Mago intercepts, and Flare tries to ram Savage into the ring post, but apparently fails off camera. Macho beats Flare up in the corner, so Flare flees to the ramp, oddly trying to hide momentarily before just giving up and begging for mercy. Macho is fresh out, so Flare's face meets the bleachers. There's a weird bit where he goes to hide, I wonder if he thought something was going to be back there that he could use for a bit of a spotlight he didn't actually know.
00:31:57
Speaker
You could at least try to get behind the tree. That's why it's there. Yeah, yeah. You get in the cartoon where he goes beyond the tree and he fully disappears. Don't make this into a Norman Spiley match, man. I wouldn't have proven it with my match. I can't help it. Tags to Mongo and Luger, and Mongo works headlocks. Larry implies that Tony was making fun of Mongo's face while doing so himself. Yes. Mongo stumbles on a whip and falls through the ropes, but at least lands safely. That was definitely a botch, but he recovered well. Yeah.
00:32:27
Speaker
Tag to Flair, but Luger no-sells chops and punches. Luger roars, and Flair freaks out. Luger press slam, an awkward clothesline to a charging Benoit, and a beautiful stalling suplex on Flair for two and a half. But Flair pokes his eyes and tags Benoit, who stomps Luger to paste in the corner.
00:32:48
Speaker
Savage takes Benoit down, and Patrick has to dodge as they fight around him. As Patrick ushers Savage out, Flair sneaks in to break Luger's eyes, and the horsemen trap him in their corner, but he escapes, clotheslines Flair, and keeps on running to tag Sting. Very smooth. Sting bites Flair, and Larry jokes that Flair still had grapes on his head from earlier. Why not?
00:33:14
Speaker
Sting hip toss, drop kick, and a superplex for two as Benoit saves. Sting sunset flip for zero as Flare gets the ropes, tags Mongo, and slugs Sting. A rather crappy Mongo elbow drop, but he makes up for it with a monstrous clothesline and backbreaker. The Horseman earned two counts off of Benoit back elbow, Benoit back suplex, and Flare's mat wrestling, but Sting bridges out and backslides Flare for two.
00:33:41
Speaker
Benoit saves again, and Flair chop blocks Sting's knee and slaps on the figure four, getting extra leverage from Woman. Flair makes the mistake of slapping Sting, who flexes, roars, and turns the hold over. Will he ever learn to stop doing that? He'll learn to stop doing that about the same time he learns to stop going to the top rope. So, never. Yes. They roll to the ropes for the break.
00:34:04
Speaker
Sting rolls Flair up on a second Figure Four attempt for two, but Benoit is tagged in to work the leg and snap Suplex Sting for two. Larry says he never liked Patrick, but Tony says he's consistently good. That's gonna change in a few weeks, right? Yes.
00:34:21
Speaker
Benoit almost gets the lion tamer, but Luger saves. They save Austin Crabbe, but I swear it's definitely- Oh yeah, yeah. Because the key is you have the one knee down further. Yeah. He's totally going for Jericho's lion tamer. And I don't think Jericho's actually in the company yet. I don't believe he was at ECW at this point. Yeah.
00:34:38
Speaker
Flair's in, but Sting no sells his strikes and tags Luger as Jimmy Hart suddenly appears at ringside, grabs a cameraman, and desperately yells about the outsiders. The cameraman makes his way backstage as Luger runs wild on the horseman. Hart is losing his mind trying to get Luger's attention, but Luger's too busy beating Flair up.
00:35:01
Speaker
power slam, and he signals for the rack, but he finally looks over at Jimmy Hart. Briefly, he considers going after Flair anyway. It is difficult to stop beating up Rick Flair. That's true, yeah. But he decides to listen. Luger exits the ring to follow Hart, and calls for others to come as well, as the match ends in a no contest. Before we go backstage, though, let's talk about the match. So Al, your thoughts on this one?
00:35:28
Speaker
I thought it was a pretty fun match. It was full of action, which is what you always want for this kind of thing. The advantage of this kind of match, kind of like we saw at, I think it was Slambree 97, is that the one I'm thinking of? The six-man match you really like? Yes. With Kevin Green? 97, yeah. Yeah, yeah. What works in matches like that, especially when you have, ironically, in both cases, a football player who's not a regularly trained wrestler, is they can come in, do their big stuff they could do and get out and keep the flow going.
00:35:57
Speaker
You can also sort of have more bumps. They're match because people can just, again, just tag out there for a while. Whereas otherwise you have to, like with the superplex, you have to sell that longer or you can tag out and sell on the floor. Right. Yeah.
00:36:12
Speaker
Like with that match as well, there's a real like how show feel to this, which is I think maybe my interpret I'm saying as a negative way, which in this case, I'm definitely not. I mean, this is just a TV match anyway, so. Correct. Yeah, that is true. That is the difference between if you give me this instead of a world how match involving one of these people, I'd be like, well, I'm getting this instead as fun as it is. But yeah, this is a TV match. None of these guys are the champion. So it's going to use everybody.
00:36:37
Speaker
You get manga some good exposure here. You get Benoit a good chance to show what he can do. Faith is here to come in and now do her own stuff. There's definitely a few miscues here and there like you talked about where I think Flare was trying to hide under the bleachers, but there's nobody out of the bleachers, maybe? That's probably what... Yeah, I hadn't thought of that. He's probably trying to get underneath them. And then, oh crap, there's a wall.
00:37:01
Speaker
There's also, understandable, but there's a bit of miscue covered fairly well. Right before the end with Luger, he's trying to press slam, ban them all, but he doesn't quite get them upright, set them down, and just does it better. Yep. He recognizes he doesn't have his grip right, does the right thing, sets him back down, and then picks him right back up and does it for real. He doesn't do a warrior, just let go and see what happens. Right, yes. I really enjoyed this up until it stops, just because of the storyline.
00:37:30
Speaker
Yeah, I agree. This was a really fun little match here. Good, solid, entertaining six man match with just enough chaos that gave everyone some time to show off. Everyone seemed to really go full tilt from the start, which I was not expecting from a TV match, especially one that was going to end the way this does. It's quite long too, but not so long that it gets repetitive or loses momentum. There's a few minor botches, but they always recover really fast. Sometimes so fast that it's hard to be entirely sure it was a botch. True.
00:37:59
Speaker
You can tell that these are guys that have worked together a lot with only Mongo new to all of this. He's sometimes a tad awkward, but overall gets to look strong as well. I really enjoyed the back and forth feel of this one. While the ending is a no contest, which normally we don't like, I think it's well done and interesting, particularly as we're going to discuss where it's going to lead to.
00:38:20
Speaker
And it's not the kind of no contest that you'll get, but a million and a half of the next six, eight months. This is a no contest that adds to the story. Yeah. Yeah. And adds to the mystery of what's going on. This isn't what the NWO ones were. Here's a good match. And then just to run and start kicking people and it's over.
00:38:36
Speaker
And again, this is a TV match, not a pay-per-view match. This is not where we're expecting it to be a conclusion to something. These guys are fighting to build up the storyline. One, it's more allowable to do a no contest, and two, this is a genuinely interesting way to do one. Yeah. I'm thinking about this. Maybe you might feel differently. I'm torn on whether they should have actually opened the show this way.
00:38:59
Speaker
Because you'd have, hey, here's all the big stars in the ring, here's the big match. Watch this instead of Raw. Obviously they still won the night as you noted pretty well, but I could see this being a strong way to open a show. I could see that, and I think Haxha's promo would work just as well after the NWO attack as well as, so I don't think it would interfere with anything that they did with that.
00:39:20
Speaker
I think maybe the only reason they didn't do it is that they wanted to have, as we'll discuss, the rest of the show be the disrupted matches. Right. So if you have Hacksaw versus Mike Enos afterwards, I mean, they could have maybe done it by implying that Mike Enos wasn't Hacksaw's original opponent either or something like that. But that's the only thing I can see them maybe wanting to do is have enough before the show that like, oh, we had a show planned. And then, oh, gosh. That's what I was going to say. The argument I can make against myself, ironically, would be that
00:39:48
Speaker
Yeah, you want the show to run x number of minutes, say 20-30 minutes normally, and then what we're gonna cover happens, and it feels like the show is stopped because of that. Yeah. I can see that as well. I just have the thought that having the big star power open the show. Absolutely. No question on any other night, I think this would be an excellent opening match. Yeah. I think it's just because of what tonight is that it doesn't go that way. Yeah.
00:40:14
Speaker
Really liked by the way that Luger is the one that heart manages to catch the attention of because heart was formerly his manager Yeah, so that was a nice nice little storyline touch there Yeah, obviously he wouldn't go to Benwa because he at this point he's put a bounty on it. Yes Yeah, don't ask Benwa for help. No, but yeah Luger. I think I think that was just a cool callback Yeah, so yeah quite a fun star studded match. Mm-hmm. Absolutely
00:40:41
Speaker
They already announced in advance that Sting and Luger are going to be teamed up against Hall and Nash at the pay-per-view. Okay. Which is Hogwild. Which, confusingly, they call an unsanctioned match. Yes. I'm still not clear how that works on pay-per-view. The whole show has to be sanctioned, I would think. There's a referee in there that seems to represent some kind of sanctioning to the match. You would think so. In their ring, on their show, on their runtime. Yeah, I'm not quite sure what unsanctioned actually means in the context of one of these shows. Yeah.
00:41:12
Speaker
I think they're going for the idea that they don't work for the company. Yeah. But then you get to know we're going to bring two random guys that don't work here to have a match in our ring and on our show. Yeah. It can make a lot of sense.
00:41:24
Speaker
Oh, also worth noting that Stinger and Lugo were tag champions. They were in a match, which was interrupted by the NWO coming out. At that point, I think it's just Hall and Nash. Yes. Before it bashed the beach. So they come out with bats and they're in a distraction with them and security and must have tried to stop them. There's a random roll-up pin by, I want to say Stevie Ray. I think it might actually be Booker, but I can't remember which one it is, yeah.
00:41:48
Speaker
But one of Harlem Heat pins Luger and wins the tag titles and then sort of leaves quickly, which I want to hit is clever because they're taking a very situation. But same time, this tag team title change is so such an afterthought. Oh boy, they won whatever. Yeah. Luger barely acknowledges it even. He's just like springs back up and glares at the NWO. Yeah. Which on the one hand devalues the tag titles a bit, but on the other hand does actually help to get across the importance of this angle. Yeah. This is the one case where I kind of feel that's a little bit forgivable. Yeah.
00:42:18
Speaker
I would have kind of liked him to be more initially instinct refocusing. Yeah. Yeah. That way. I think that would sell it work. Yeah. The cameraman has reached backstage where Arn Anderson is down and hurt. So too
NWO's Backstage Assault
00:42:37
Speaker
is Marcus Bagwell and standing over him are Kevin Nash and Scott Hall, the outsiders armed with baseball bats.
00:42:46
Speaker
They toss the bats down, looking satisfied. And Scotty Riggs runs out of a trailer to confront them, but notices Marcus down, and is distracted long enough for Hall to grab what looks like a stage light. When Riggs charges, Hall rams it into his face. That makes a good, solid sound.
00:43:07
Speaker
Heroically, Rey Mysterio dives off the trailer steps at Nash, but Nash catches him, hefts him on his shoulder, and flings him face first into the side of the trailer like a dart, quote Larry Zabisco. Yes. Holy crap, that looked brutal. Yeah. I still honestly have no idea how they did that without actually injuring Rey. That's a mostly uncontrolled fall then.
00:43:32
Speaker
Yeah, he's able to get his hands up to mostly blunt the impact against the trailer itself. But there's nothing he can do about how he's falling from that point. Yeah, the way what he really does, you have to really look at it, which is credit to him. You can't see it. And even still, I'm not trying to downplay it like it's Oh, yeah, I could do that. It's really easy. It's obviously no. But
00:43:52
Speaker
He's able to just protect himself. He's going to land on his feet and then kind of roll backward rather than hitting, like falling straight back from that. Yeah, absorb it in a lot of little shots rather than one big hit. Yeah. Yeah, that's good. Kind of the bright heart way of controlling your fall and slowing much of it. Yeah. Laughing, the outsiders make their way to a waiting limo only for Randy Savage to charge into view and jump on top of the limo, reaching in through the sunroof as limo drives away and out of sight.
00:44:22
Speaker
Yes. We turn back to the scene of the carnage as Sting, Luger, and the horsemen and company have arrived alongside a bunch of WCW medical staff. Everyone is shouting, but you can still hear Mongo loud and clear above it all. That's amazing. He proclaims the outsiders can't just come in and do whatever they want. Apparently they can, dude. Yeah. I got a pattern at this point, yeah.
00:44:47
Speaker
Eddie Guerrero has arrived as well, and so too has Alex Wright, just in case they needed someone to stand around reliably being German. The commentators are thrown, and Tony decides to throw to an ad break, but just as he does, Sting yells to Guerrero, who's by Mysterio. Eddie, what happened? What's he saying? He says there's four, Eddie yells back. A pause, and he checks again and seems unsure, saying that there's three.
00:45:14
Speaker
Luger by Riggs calls for help as Riggs is not moving. We cut to break. Thoughts on this first segment here? It's done quite well. It's interesting that I think they're going for realism here, obviously. So that means we don't see the attack on Anderson. So by missing part of it and not the key part, it seems like, oh, he really did just run back there and come and turn on just in time to see this.
00:45:40
Speaker
you get the implication of previous carnage and then you get to see some of it so you get to see the attack but they don't show the entire thing because like you said the implication from heart coming out was this is already going on exactly so so it's important that you don't actually see literally the beginning of it otherwise
00:45:58
Speaker
Yeah, if you get that, you practically see the guy with the little clapper. Right. And go and then they start fighting. Yeah. Yeah. Where this looks like, oh, this already started and now the cameraman has just reached the back to see it in progress. It really is well done that way. Yeah. This is a great, shocking segment. Justifiably one of the most famous in WCW history. In particular, the shot of Nash flinging Mysterio face first into the side of the trailer is legend. Yes.
00:46:28
Speaker
It's brilliant stuff. It feels like an absolutely devastating backstage assault. That's despite the fact that relatively little carnage is actually shown on camera with more just implied what happened beforehand, as you said. It's a smart way to do it. I find the more consecutive stunts that have to be accomplished on camera, the more chance that something goes wrong. True. And this absolutely must go right in order to have the impact that they want. But it did. Yes. Boy, did it ever go right.
00:46:58
Speaker
The immediate aftermath and the overwhelmed reaction of the WSW crew helps to emphasize the enormity of the situation. It feels different, though we're yet to see just how much so. The wrestlers, save for Randy T.J. Hooker Savage, seem completely shell-shocked, stunned and confused by what just happened, which helps to build up that this is something more than your average faction attack that we've seen before.
00:47:24
Speaker
Eddie's sudden call that there were four, though he does backtrack, helps grab interest too, as WCW intelligently placed a new potential clue about the NWO right before the break just to make sure you came back.
00:47:42
Speaker
You got to kind of put yourself in this certain mindset, especially if you're watching this for the first time in, say, 2022, which is that at this point in history, 1996, we had the OJ Simpson white Bronco Chase. Yes. Famously, it's this long segment where their helicopters are following him, car driving the LA freeway, all this was happening. It's kind of like a constant unbroken shot for I don't know how long ago, but it feels like eternity. Yeah.
00:48:09
Speaker
On top of that, we're running out of time that cops has really hit a stride. So with cops, you have, you know, they pull up on the scene, they rush to the top of the fight, or they're taking on a guy. Usually it's some shirtless guy in front of a trailer, because this is what cops is about. Jim Nighthart, is we? Yes. That kind of look, yeah. Exactly. That's a very good, yeah. That's sort of the gritty level of violence that people were expecting.
00:48:33
Speaker
If you're doing an attack that needs to look like a real attack, there's a particular field that you have to get for it. And that's clearly what they're going for here. It's like, like you said, like cops type of stuff where it's like, this needs to not look planned. This needs to look like an organic event that's just happening live. And we've just stumbled upon it, basically.
00:48:55
Speaker
For better or worse, this is a real intentional push to get away from everything looking pre-planned and staged in pro wrestling.
00:49:04
Speaker
Like with face Hulk Hogan, he comes out really strong. Then you, you know, hit him low and you beat him up up until it's snap. And now it's time for the end of the match. Pop up, no seller thing, big move, let it drop. He wins. Yeah. You can definitely put something in the mindset of this is what people were expecting. Both as a fan base audience, you're expecting this kind of thing that happened for it to look real and then less than that. You're like, I don't believe that. They're all just, they're fight fighting. You know, they're just holding a headlock and hitting their own arm and stuff.
00:49:33
Speaker
And on top of that, that's what the people behind the show are really going for. Rodney King, you have the police with batons, you know, surrounding meeting a guy with a stick in bright and broad daylight, everyone sees it. That kind of directly what they're going for with the bat, but definitely that's the factor that why they have the bat. Well, for better or worse, it's a very strong mid 90s, late 90s thing to do.
00:49:57
Speaker
And I like even that the camera guy kind of seems nervous about getting too close to at times and stuff to like, you know, Hall and Nash are saying things, but you don't always catch them very well because the guy's not going right up to them. No, no. Being like, hello, Mr. Hall, can I ask for your thoughts on the brutal attack that you just perpetrated? Yeah. He's like, no, I'm going to hang back a little bit and we'll hear them just vaguely in the distance. Right.
00:50:20
Speaker
This is clearly done in exactly the style they wanted, and they very much thought out exactly how to make it look as realistic as they possibly could. Well, still, obviously, it is a planned thing. These are planned spots, but they minimized the number of them so they didn't have to figure out how to make everything look real for that long. Right. Like with Marcus Bagwell, for instance.
00:50:42
Speaker
he has to sell like he was hit in the knee or the leg or somewhere in the area with a bat. So they can either use a real bat and have to cover it, you know, like not show the swing properly or show a bad angle, or use a non-metal bat, which once you drop it, it's obvious it's not a metal bat. So by applying the attack on arm, which must be like in the arm, I believe, and then the leg attack, the ones that are hard to replicate without actually injuring somebody, that's sort of the way we can get away with that by doing what they did.
00:51:13
Speaker
I do have two questions about this, which will relate to the next parts as well. One, where is Hulk Hogan? Yeah, I would assume in the limo. Yes. Yeah. And the fourth man, I guess, supposedly in the limo as well, which I would assume so. Yeah. Which we know for sure, not flair, because we know where he was the whole time. Right now we know for sure. Yeah.
00:51:32
Speaker
The other is, where is everybody else? I get the idea that the implication is that the outsiders, the limo comes up, they sort of ran out, attacked, aren't attacked, Bagwell and all that stuff. The actual attack is fairly brief, it's not an extended segment. Yeah, you can assume that probably Jimmy Hart ran as soon as he saw the outsiders arriving. So yeah, it's not much time passes between him appearing by ringside and then ending up backstage. Yeah.
00:52:01
Speaker
So I think you can assume that. The main question that I think you pointed out on the show is, wait, Jimmy Hart's there. None of his clients are involved in being attacked. So where are all Jimmy Hart's guys? Why is Jimmy Hart there? And none of his clients are there.
00:52:17
Speaker
Right. Some of you can kind of fill in like, okay, so maybe Bagwell and Riggs were in that trailer, like doing their prep for whatever they're doing, like putting their makeup on or whatever they're doing, because they're not in their gear yet. That's warming up to their theme song. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Getting their cardio in for that.
00:52:35
Speaker
Maybe that trailer is like a trainer's room. Ray is stretching and maybe Eddie's back when they're doing the same thing. And maybe Bagwool comes out first gets attacked and that's why Riggs come out behind him and Ray's behind him. But there's not a huge backstage area. This kind of thing would both work and not work in a big arena. Cause on one hand, their exit would be harder in a big arena. Cause they had to go past those big gates to the limo. Unless they let them open, but that would be trickier.
00:53:04
Speaker
But same time, because it's this limited sort of outside area, which trailers, like, where is the giant? Where are the people that aren't on the show at all? Like, where are they? Like, the Harlem Heat's not on the show anywhere. Where are they doing on that?
00:53:19
Speaker
Yeah, I think there's fair questions on that. I don't think it takes away too much, but just something else. It's a question to ask, I think. I think it's good that they restrained themselves on just how much carnage they showed, but I almost do want to see like another two guys that are down before Anderson or something like that. So you have a little bit more of a trail. One of Jimmy Hart's guys, I think, especially as the main thing, like pick one other Dungeons of Doom guys, have them down before Anderson.
00:53:46
Speaker
The one thing that I do like that partially resolves the Jimmy Hart situation is Arne Anderson is the one member of the Horsemen that the Dungeon of Doom has been willing to talk to. Historically, throughout the shows leading to this point, he has conversed with Kevin Sullivan and he's conversed a bit with Jimmy Hart. I can actually see the explanation for why Jimmy Hart's there and his guys aren't, maybe that Jimmy Hart was talking to Arne Anderson.
00:54:10
Speaker
They don't ever say that as the problem, but that makes me pull back a little bit in that slight critique. But like you said, these are minor things and do not in any way spoil the awesomeness of the attacking. There's always questions asked in any segment, but yeah. Don't think I'm taking away from how impactful this is, yeah. When we come back from ad break, medical staff are working on Arne as Woman in tears cradles his head.
Aftermath of NWO Attack: Injuries & Fear
00:54:38
Speaker
Interesting bit of foreshadowing, Arne is cradling his left arm. That's the arm that would suffer numbness and cease functioning later, leading to his surgeries and ultimately to his retirement as a pro wrestler. Obviously, this is not the cause of that. Yeah, yeah. But it's just an interesting coincidence. Yeah, yeah. A fire truck arrives and Doug Dillinger shows the emergency crew over. Could have used your can of mace, Doug. Yeah, right.
00:55:05
Speaker
Over with Mysterio, Eddie still insists that Mysterio said there were four NWO members. Someone, I think it's Alex Wright, is shocked because there's only three outsiders. Technically, only Nash and Hall are the outsiders. Tony notes that they only saw Nash and Hall, and Larry proposes that Mysterio was seeing double. Fair enough, he did get smashed face-first into the trailer, so... Mongo is still hollering up a storm about justice. You gotta love Mongo.
00:55:35
Speaker
woman distraught won't let anyone touch arn mongo tells arn hang in there baby that's very helpful mongo yeah you're an inspirational cat poster yes i kind of want to see that now uh i'll work on that for you yes
00:55:53
Speaker
Medical staff work on Mysterio putting on a neck brace, as Eddie tries to get clarification on the number of attackers. Mysterio insists there's four. Tony says it could be anybody, even someone standing back there right now. The medical crew take Ray's mask off, and he shields his face, as Tony very nicely sells the enormity of Mysterio's unmasking, emphasizing that a masked wrestler in Mexico has never ever seen a mask.
00:56:21
Speaker
Back with Arne, Flair and the medical crew get him onto a spineboard. Benoit does a genuinely great job in the background, looking completely broken up as he watches them work. Eddie wants to go with Ray in an ambulance, but Wright advises him to stay as Eddie has a match coming up. Eddie asks again what Ray means about Four, and Wright says he'll let Eddie know and climbs into the ambulance to accompany Mysterio.
00:56:48
Speaker
Riggs, still unresponsive, is on a spine board with neck brace as well. Manga arrives and gets in Benoit's face. Not now, Benoit bellows at him, and Mongo joins in. Jimmy Hart calms things down.
00:57:02
Speaker
We cut to the commentary team, and Tony apologizes. He says, they aren't sure what they'll do for the show, with wrestlers who are going to compete, now injured, and being taken to the hospital. He notes they only actually saw Hall and Nash, and he wonders about the fourth man. He throws to commercials, saying, we'll be back, I guess. We're coming back. As we see the medical staff putting an oxygen mask on Riggs. Thoughts on this part of it?
00:57:31
Speaker
It's quite good. They definitely get the realism down, even to the point where Meng is still in character as one who is against Benwalk as the whole horseman, dungeon, doom thing. It's kind of weird that he takes Song to show up and everything, but Meng's on his own schedule, maybe. Yeah, yeah. No one tells Meng what time it is. Meng tells you what time it is. I would agree with that. Yeah. Yeah. The ball clocks in Meng's house are set to whatever the heck time he wants. Exactly.
00:58:01
Speaker
The only thing that's getting more nitpicky stuff is that they're only given so much to do in the way things are done. So poor Eddie, for instance, talks about four guys so much in a short period of time.
00:58:16
Speaker
I think it's also that because they're cutting back and forth with commercial breaks and stuff, they're not sure when people might be tuning in. True. They need to make sure whenever you're tuning in, you hear the four guys line. Yeah. So Eddie has to repeat it a lot. Yeah. I will say knowing who the actual fourth person is, it's hard to picture them actually being involved in the backstage assault. But you know, that's not important at this point in the story. Yeah, yeah.
00:58:40
Speaker
I think your point's pretty valid. Yeah, they're not sure when people are turning in. I guess it's going to get into realism maybe. They're not blocking these segments out into exact periods of time. So Alex Wright and Eddie are sort of standing around for a bit, having the same conversation. People do make good use of the time they have, though, as a whole.
00:59:01
Speaker
Yeah, and I like that they do have events like Meng's sudden arrival. They kind of break it up a little bit. True. It's starting to be a lot of nothing happening, but then all of a sudden, oh, Meng's there, and the horsemen nearly get in the fight with them. Yeah. So there's little things that still feel pretty realistic to have happen of your tensions are high, a guy that already doesn't like another guy comes in that can raise the tension in the area a little bit, but also adding those prevents it from becoming monotonous, which I think helps a lot.
00:59:29
Speaker
You know it could maybe help become a big beacon of unity. The giant, perhaps. Yes. I'd be still getting a singlet on. Yeah, I think this segment to me drives home just how different the NWO attack is. It establishes them as something greater than any of the factions that we've seen make war on each other in the past in WSW. You know, we've had the Four Horsemen, we've had the Dangerous Alliance, the Stud Stable, the Dungeon of Doom.
00:59:56
Speaker
None of them, to my knowledge, have inflicted so much damage in the backstage assault that it derailed the show entirely. Yeah. What you usually got in the past is you would get a pre-tape. For instance, you have the forestman attacking Dusty Road to breaking his leg into the car door. Right.
01:00:13
Speaker
One of the shows has an earlier in the day one where someone with Dustin Rogers attacked and then pulled from a match. I forget who it is now. So they show it and say, here's the thing that happened earlier, but it's one guy, it's not a prolonged thing. Right. Yeah. You'll have a faction attacks one dude they don't like. And that's dealt with there. Honestly, generally, they're back that same night. Generally, yes.
01:00:34
Speaker
But even if they're not, it's not like the entire show stops. No. This one, the entire show stops. And W.C.W. is just following the aftermath of the attack through multiple commercial breaks.
01:00:47
Speaker
So, yeah, like we said, there's some parts of this that get a tiny bit repetitive, particularly Eddie and Alex having their four guys conversation. Poor Ray must at some point think Eddie. I've said for like several dozen times, I'm sure despite my traumatic head injury that I'm not, you know, slurring my words or anything. I know you got it. Yeah.
01:01:10
Speaker
But overall, I think this is great. It is, yeah. It's not perfectly real, but there's a wonderful portrayal of a wide variety of reactions from the performers. We've got women just being so worried about Arne, Mango being angry as heck, Eddie's pure disbelief at what happened, Benoit just appearing in total grief in the background in certain shots. And then Meng just thrown in to stir things up and show that enemies aren't all just having a kumbaya moment. Yeah, right.
01:01:37
Speaker
Tony is a particular highlight in all of this, as he builds up the importance of Mysterio's mask and sells confusion about how and whether they're going to continue the show. I don't know how much he was actually told about how this night would go, but if he did know all this stuff, he does an excellent job of acting uncertain and thrown by the events of the night.
01:01:58
Speaker
I could see they say, hey, they're going to be a big attack and we're going to sell it for a bit. But it's one thing to be told that, another thing to see, we're going to do your third into that thing. And to see how it's acted out. I can see him being sort of caught up in the emotion of it as a performer, which he's doing. He really, really, I mean, I think that's it, right? He knows the emotional reaction they want and he just lets it happen. Yeah. He doesn't like try and resist and be the professional announcer or anything. He really lets out how he would be feeling if this actually was happening.
01:02:27
Speaker
I think the only bit of hyperbole, I think it's him that does it. He talks about how the NWBO stole where Mr. Year's wrestling soul. I think that's actually Eric later on. Is that Eric? I'm pretty sure it's Eric. Okay, one of them does that. Yeah, and I'm like, that's a bit much. I'm with the Amascot. I get it's important. But yeah, it's like, it's the whole wrestling soul. It's a little weird. A little Shang Tsung there. Oh, he's out there with Stigot too. So Alex Bright says that Eddie can't go with he has a match.
01:02:57
Speaker
Yes, Eddie's match is against Rey Mysterio. Yeah. Well, you know, Alex is German. He assumes that there will always be a backup plan and maximum efficiency for the show. So he assumes that he will have a match and he is right. Yes. That's his name. Yes. I can't argue with that.
01:03:19
Speaker
We're back from commercial again, and Tony and Larry have been joined by Eric Bischoff and Bobby the Brain Hienan as we continue to watch the medical crew work backstage. Nitro normally traded off to Bischoff and Hienan for the second hour. We cut to the commentary crew, where Hienan has something to say. Bobby, just hang with us. We're back, and this is the point where we're usually sent to the second hour. Eric is out here, and Bobby Hienan, here we are.
01:03:48
Speaker
Tony, I'll tell you what. You saw what you saw. We saw it from back here and it's scary. What's up right now? Let me get something straight here right now, Eric. I'm not going to do a wrestling interview. I'm talking to you man to man, face to face. I have a history of neck injuries, you know that. If you get a shot of this, I have nerve damage in my hand. Eric, this job isn't worth it to me to be out here. They almost broke your back a couple weeks ago. You saw what just happened out back. There's bodies all over the place.
01:04:14
Speaker
I'm not going to do the broadcast tonight unless somebody can guarantee me security. Somebody can guarantee me that I physically won't be hurt. Can you do that? Bobby, I can't guarantee you anything right now. You do what you feel you have to do. Well, I have to walk away from this. My health and my well-being, I'm not going to be crippled and paralyzed for the rest of my life. I'm not going to argue with you here. I'm not going to argue with you, Bobby. You do what you have to do.
01:04:39
Speaker
Guys, I'm going to need a little help here if you don't mind. I tell you what, buddy, these wheels are falling off here. Can we go back and take a look once again, maybe? What's going on back there? I think we need to. I mean, as horrible as these things look, Eric, we need to. Great, powerful moment from Bobby Hainan there, reemphasizing the sense of reality once again.
01:05:03
Speaker
I think Eric does well with that segment as well, trying not to argue with him, but also letting stress and tension about it show. I agree with that. Everything's kind of falling apart and he's trying to keep it together. And I feel like you see later on in the show, he makes comments that are more sympathetic towards him. But at this moment, he's like, I'm trying to keep the show together and you're throwing me another curveball here. It feels like a legit
01:05:27
Speaker
back and forth between the two of them there. No, for sure. Heenan's really good here. Oh my gosh, yeah. He does an exceptional job with that. Because even outside of the initial first show post-Hogan heel turn, you still mostly get the fun-loving, making fun of people like Hax with Jim Duggan and the faces Heenan.
01:05:50
Speaker
Yeah, I think there's like one or two moments on the earlier shows where he's shown more nervousness when the NWO shows up somewhere. Right. But it's not been like, but this is terror. Right. Because yeah, because they they show up in the ringside area a couple of times. So yeah, I thought it's inable for him to be worried about that one. Yeah. But yeah, this is raw terror in his voice, which is really he does an amazing job with that. Oh, yeah, for sure.
01:06:16
Speaker
I liked Tony's line too. I don't know. The wheels are coming off, man. Yeah. We cut backstage again. We can hear the crowd getting restless as they aren't seeing all of this, presumably. Arne is put on a stretcher. Bischoff accidentally mixes up Eddie Guerrero and Ray Mysterio for a moment, sounding like Eddie confused Eddie by saying they're four guys.
01:06:43
Speaker
Tony, again, asks if the four guy might be standing back there right now. And the commentators agree that Macho Man is probably the only one who knows for sure who the fourth guy is now. Yeah. By the way, if you want an explanation of what happened with Brain Savage after the limo pit, I didn't get one. No, I've kind of figured.
01:07:02
Speaker
Maybe it's on WSU Saturday night, which for some reason is not on any version of the network that goes, it goes to 93 and just stops. You have to go through pretty bad quality YouTube stuff to find people that recorded it and uploaded somewhere. They even interview Savage. They don't show like him jumping the limo and then say, what happened to you there? And I expect at least you go, Oh yeah. And they drop them off somewhere or something. It does seem like something that maybe needed a bit of an answer. Yeah. Yeah.
01:07:31
Speaker
It would be funny if the answer was just I fell off after it ran around the curve. Just couldn't hold on. Sorry, guys. Now, obviously, this wouldn't be great for many number of reasons, but it'd be interesting if they tried to use this incident with Savage. I think for him being the fourth person. Yeah, that he actually is the fourth guy and he escapes, but he acts so erratic towards that, like he's overdoing the act. It's not the case, but interesting.
01:07:59
Speaker
They talk about arranging standby matches as we get some more foreshadowing. Kneeling by Bagwell, Sting is holding one of the baseball bats. I'd be shocked if WCW already knew that he was going to make a bat such a big part of his Crow Sting act later, but maybe? Yeah. The crowd can be heard chanting boring, and Eric bemoans them not having monitors to see.
01:08:24
Speaker
Tony sympathizes with Hienan's exit, saying that he's scared to death too, but he says he's not gonna leave. Larry sympathizes as well, but wonders if Hienan saw more than he's saying as he looked terrified. The horsemen watch, as Arne is loaded into an ambulance, and best friend Ric Flair gets in with him, as does Woman. Sting walks alongside Bagwell's stretcher to the ambulance, and Eric goes over Bagwell's friendship with Luger and Sting, with him frequently working out at their gym.
01:08:55
Speaker
Randy Anderson can be seen nearby as well with a medical patch on his eye. I'm not sure if that's separate from this or if it's supposed to actually be part of the attack as well, but I would imagine it's a separate thing. Yeah, I can't find the story of that either. Bagwell is ultimately loaded in the same ambulance as Arne, so Sting climbs in, and the commentators rather nicely highlight that the traditional great foes Sting and Flare are now in the same ambulance. The EMT notes that as well, advising Sting and Flare there will be no fights.
01:09:24
Speaker
as we throw to commercial once more with the commentary team stating that we're going to have backup matches ready soon.
Breaking the Fourth Wall in Wrestling?
01:09:32
Speaker
Thoughts on this last bit of the attack? Overall, I thought it's pretty good. They get close to this line of pulling at the curtain too much, which is definitely a real Bischoff thing early on, and then a much more Veruso thing.
01:09:46
Speaker
It's like it's done pretty well, though, like the idea that he explains that Bagwell and Sting have been friends for a long time, like behind the scenes. Right. Yeah, he said he explicitly says you don't see that often on TV. He said, right. Yeah. So at least in this case, I don't believe the American males are heels. No, no, there are still good guys. Right. So he's not doing the curtain pullback so much in that face and heels thing out together. But no, I think you can take every single thing that he says
01:10:15
Speaker
In the context of a real competition, it still works. Yeah. We've actually seen matches occasionally, very occasionally where staying in Bagwell are facing each other and they're very respectful towards each other. Clearly pals. So it's more of a, these guys may fight each other to see who's better, but they're still buddies. Right.
01:10:34
Speaker
I think it's the same thing with them saying, oh, what are we going to do? We need backup matches. Well, you can take that still in the context of a real competition. That still works. Right. Because, yeah, you would need another competitor to come out. They're not saying it like Russo's problem later on, as he'll say it in context of, oh, my gosh, we accidentally threw out the script for the match. What will happen? Yeah. Right. Where this one, this isn't that. No, no. Sure. Yeah.
01:10:58
Speaker
This is we had a guy lined up to face this guy in a legitimate sporting event. He was injured. We got to scramble and get someone else to face the guy so that the crowd can see a fight that they paid to see. Right. It's the same thing as, you know, if there was a boxing thing and someone got bonked into it by a truck backstage as they were walking to the arena. Oh, my gosh. Get another boxer. Well, if you want to a more recent for the show comparison, you have Tonya Harding, right?
01:11:28
Speaker
And that whole incident at the time of Harding and, you know, her rival attack backstage. Yeah. So things like that can happen in legitimate sports as well. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Obviously, in that case, they weren't skating against each other or skating at the same time. They're just in the same competition. But yeah, they have that as a as a reference as well. Yep. And again, it's a bat and it's a knee, which I don't think is an intentional reference, but it could it could be in the in their minds. Exactly. Yeah. In their minds. Because that's it. That was that was that was ninety five, maybe four.
01:11:57
Speaker
Yeah, I don't remember exactly, but it might be. It's around this period for sure. Yeah. Yeah, I thought, again, an unusual but really, really good segment. Smartly, WSW chose to develop events further rather than just showing more disaster movie footage. Yeah. It's surprising how well all of this works. Despite it being a long time without wrestling on a wrestling show, collectively, the Attack and Aftermath cover about a third of the episode.
01:12:22
Speaker
It's so unique that it really held my attention. Hennan's easily the highlight of this segment with a powerful and genuine performance. And Tony again does a great job bringing out the emotion and confusion of what's happening to the point of sympathizing and agreeing with usual nemesis Hennan.
01:12:38
Speaker
Yeah. And of course we get the excellent ending of traditional rivals Sting and Flair riding off in the same ambulance to care for their respective friends. A great emphasis of how different this is and yet another foreshadowing of how WCW is going to have to come together and work across the lines of usual rivalries to oppose the new threat. So yeah, make no mistake, taken together these segments are quite long, but they're good.
01:13:05
Speaker
This is the sort of trick that you can only pull once. The first time you do it, done well, it works. It feels different, it feels real, it feels raw. It's so surprising that the viewer is glued to it despite the lack of action. The storyline is interesting, the reactions are interesting, the little clues and hints are interesting. Despite some minor flaws here and there, it just comes together.
01:13:28
Speaker
But yes, it is something you can only pull once. If they ever did this again or something like it, like the NWO takes over a nitro bit later on, it doesn't work as well. You need the shock.
01:13:39
Speaker
Right, right. Yeah, the most recent thing I think that compares to this in modern wrestling is probably the Nexus attack at the end of Raw. Because what that one did is you have a match going on and you have an attack happen middle of it like you had with, I think it's Luger and Big Bubba a couple of shows back. They have that few attacking during the match.
01:14:03
Speaker
But it goes beyond that, because the group attacks both the face and heel, which is CM Punk and John Cena. But they also attack their people with them. They attack, I think it's Luke Gallows that's with CM Punk as the straight society thing going on at this point. Yeah, don't they even like go to the commentator and stuff? That's it, yeah. Then they also attack the cameraman and the commentator, see? Right. They attack everyone in the ringside area. They go above even this one,
01:14:30
Speaker
Probably because of the need to escalate from this kind of incident. Right. Yeah. You can't just be the end up. You'll again, though, to, to that point, even not on this show, but on other shows, the NWO has been shown attacking backstage crew and yes, that sort of thing. So they just with the nexus, they just let's pile it all in one moment.
01:14:47
Speaker
But yeah, I think that's probably the closest I can think of as well for just the raw chaos and feeling of derailment of the show that this engineers. And it really is just impressive how well this actually works and how fascinating you are and stuck to it you are, despite the fact that really objectively there's not a ton going on for probably a good half hour to 45 minutes, I think. But it's still, it's genuinely interesting.
01:15:14
Speaker
So that's the other thing about this that I have two minds on, and I'm wondering if they were doing this as well. So doing this at the MDM, I want to say studio, I don't know what you want to refer to this other at. On one hand, the contrast of this sort of brutal, sudden, proper violence and the aftermath of it feels really intentionally out of place at MDM. True, at Disney World. Exactly, yeah, this big, violent assault Disneyland, the ambulance coming.
01:15:44
Speaker
Makes you wonder where people in the area if they heard Amos's fire trucks blowing up. Probably. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You also have the fact that right when they're doing this would be the transition between commentary teams. But the fireworks sapping the back when they're talking, which I believe is like a timed thing. MGM. I don't think it's I don't think it's natural doing it. But yeah, I mean, they did traditionally have fireworks for their second hour transitions, but
01:16:08
Speaker
I could see in storyline Bischoff going, don't do this. I'm going out there. Don't do this. Yeah. Cause he's in charge of the show. Same time. Maybe you could say, maybe I want the interns back. They go, Oh, it's what says this type of this button, you know? Yeah. Yeah. But so outside of just the contrast of the look, you have at a place where there's no, like they're in an arena. There's big monitors showing and it's happened. Right. Yeah. So the crowd doesn't see this.
01:16:35
Speaker
On one hand, I think it's more effective because the crowd doesn't react alongside the hits backstage. Right. Right. Yeah. Cheer boo when someone appears. It's like when you take commentary out. Yeah, I think for the they definitely have to have the crowd not able to see the attack. You can't have the crowd react into the attack because because you need the realism.
01:16:57
Speaker
What's the thing? So you lose some reacts, but not having the crowd aware of this because they don't, you know, they could boo during replays when they replay the attacks. You see it to emphasize a bunch more against anyone, how shocking this is.
01:17:10
Speaker
But you would have what seemed like 450 people sitting in bleachers around a ring with presumably nothing happening in it. Other than Tony and Larry sitting there at a table looking at a screen on a desk. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, so it's more gritty and realistic because they do it at a place where there are no screens to show the video for them.
01:17:31
Speaker
But at the same time, I'm worried that they're short-term hurting this audience to get that effect. I think that segment of the show definitely sucked for this audience in general.
01:17:43
Speaker
But I agree with their choice to do it that way. I mixed on, honestly. I really feel like if you had the audience cheering or reacting to it, it makes it more of a standard wrestling show. Yeah. The fact that you don't have audience reactions going on to it helps with the feel that they're going for. One of the questions I have as well is, did they choose to do this at this arena or what you would call this place they're at?
01:18:09
Speaker
purely based on a timetable, you know, week three, we do this week for we do this. And we just happened to be because they're at MGM for a bunch of shows in a row. Yeah, there's a way to save money. So they just go, Oh, we're at MGM, I guess we'll just do it here anyways. Were they just sort of locked in at the location they're at? Or did they go let's do it here because they won't have monitors? And I'm actually not sure. Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if that was a factor in the decision. Right. Yeah.
01:18:36
Speaker
I think for any small critiques that we can make of this overall segment, I don't think those end up really mattering. Not really long-term, no. The uniqueness of the episode overwhelms everything else. I have to say, big kudos to WCW for trying something like this.
Steiner Brothers vs. High Voltage
01:18:52
Speaker
It's a really gutsy move to do, but I think they pulled it off well, which is not something I'm used to saying about WCW.
01:18:59
Speaker
Honestly. Praising and production. Yeah, yeah. It's amazingly done. Just a really unique moment that had to go exactly right to succeed and I think it does. Finally, we come back from break and it is time for our next match.
01:19:18
Speaker
So our third batch is High Voltage, that's Robbie Rage and Kenny Chaos. Yes, seriously. And Chaos with a K. Yes, it is. As you're wondering. Versus the Steiner Brothers, Rick and Scott. The referee for this one is Randy Eller. So as we noted, Harlem Heat won the titles a few weeks back during the chaotic bit with the Envioa surrounding ringside, back when it was just two of them.
01:19:45
Speaker
Five days before the show at a house show, they had a title change, where the Steiner brothers actually won the titles from Harlem Heat. Okay. Three days after that, a different house show, they then lost them back to Harlem Heat. Okay, so it's one of those phantom title changes again. Yes, and as you know, watch the show, it is not mentioned. Yeah. Because they didn't talk about this at some point in commentary. The Steiner brothers' goal coming here has become tag team champions, which they just recently did. But you know. Oh, well.
01:20:16
Speaker
High voltage, enter to an alarm sound, and announcement of danger. High voltage. Sadly, it's not that one song. Yes. They're energized, no pun intended. They wear hot pink. Only Bret Hart can really make that work. True. Eric builds up the opportunity that the two are getting and notes that they can't be unmoved by the attack, but they don't have long-running friendships backstage like others.
01:20:42
Speaker
Speaking of, the Steiner's enter to Steinerized with a much more subdued entrance than usual. Both look downhearted, and Rick in particular keeps looking towards backstage as Scott repeatedly tells him to focus. We cut backstage briefly to see Scotty Riggs loaded into an ambulance. Back at the ring, the bell rings to start the match. Scott and Chaos start. Tony points out that Rick is not even on the apron, he's too busy watching the entrance ring.
01:21:11
Speaker
Eric agrees that this is not the usual Steiner's. They're shaken and distracted. Scott, nevertheless, flings Chaos around and outwrestles him, as what I'm pretty sure is one of Disney World's fireworks shows starts up. Yes. Yeah, this is where I dissected. Did you say there was some during the announcers? No, I think my time is up. This definitely happens, yeah. It might be some earlier as well, but yeah, there's definitely some here. Scott tries to get Rick focused in between beating up Chaos and finally talks him to the apron for the tag.
01:21:41
Speaker
Rick, though, wanders towards the ref, asking him something and pointing backstage, and Chaos repeatedly land strikes as Rick just cannot get himself focused on the match. Eric talks about hating to commercialize what WCW just went through, then commercializes it, telling the NWO that they'll see them at Hogwild.
01:22:02
Speaker
Rage and Chaos trade off beating Rick up with several double teams. A double elbow drop goes a little bit awkwardly, but a double drop kick and double suplex go quite well. Interestingly, I noticed that the two of them always seem to slap the back of their partner's hand, not the palm when they're tagging in and out. I'm sure other people do that too, but I just really noticed it with them.
01:22:24
Speaker
A rage top rope flying shoulder block earns one, but Rick, kind of, counters a chaos top rope dive into a power slam. More accurately, chaos does a jumping flip past Rick who barely touches it. Yes. It gets two anyway. Tag to Scott, and he decimates rage and chaos with Steiner lines, and continues the destruction on rage with a tilt to whirl slam and double underhook powerbomb.
01:22:52
Speaker
Tag to Rick, who smashes rage into the turnbuckle and Steiner lines him, and he tags Scott for the Steiner f***ing screwdriver. Yes. That's his full name, yes.
01:23:03
Speaker
on rage for the three count and the win as Rick blocks chaos For those who haven't seen it. Yes, the Steiner screwdriver is when Scott Steiner's picks you up overhead for kind of like a suplex Then while you're aimed headfirst at the ground drops you it's let go Yeah, then hopefully he catches you as you fall and hits a pile driver It is one of the most terrifying moves I have ever seen. Yes
01:23:31
Speaker
It's a terrible move the Steiner brothers do. And these are the same guys that put one guy in their shoulder and do a DT off the top rope. Right. Yeah. Yeah. This is actually more terrifying than that. Yes. Hilariously, Eric is in the middle of making a point about how this match had been going, but it cuts off as that move happens with a surprise. Oh, Larry also sounds amazed by it.
01:23:55
Speaker
The Steiner's hug and make their exit, with Eric suggesting that they're probably going to visit the injured wrestlers now. Rage is, unfortunately, already crawling out of the ring as they exit. I appreciate that he at least bothers to look dazed, but he really should have been selling that thing like Savage sold the diamond cutter back at Spring Stampede 1997. That is a move that demands unconsciousness. Agreed, yes.
01:24:20
Speaker
As we go to break with some excellent replays of Rick Steinerlein and Scott Steiner's screwdriver, and one more shot of an ambulance leaving backstage, Eric lets us know that the role of Ray Mysterio Jr. in the upcoming match with Eddie Guerrero will now be played by Big Bubba. That's going to be a bit of a different match. Uh, yeah. And see now, if you really wanted to get the screwdriver over, you could have just had the EMTs come out and cart rage off.
01:24:44
Speaker
Yeah, we're already here anyways. Yeah, stick him in the same ambulance as Riggs. Yeah, right. I think that would have made it a bit comedic though, so yeah. Thoughts on this match? I thought it was a good to strong match. They really play up that this is the first match after this big sort of shaking event.
01:25:05
Speaker
Rick really sells him being distracted, worrying about them coming back and attacking again. Scott does this good thing where he's trying to kind of wrestle the match normally and get Rick to do that. It nicely works in that High Voltage can get control of the match, keep it for a little while, because they're working against Scott by himself. Yeah, it's a good excuse to let them get to show off some more stuff than they otherwise might have been able to against the team. Exactly. I thought that was a good use of this moment.
01:25:34
Speaker
The two big moments, of course, Rick Steiner's quote unquote power slam. That one terrifies me almost as much as a screwdriver, because, yep, poor guy, he jumps, he's doing like a front, sort of summer assault. Rick is supposed to catch him at some point and sort of complete the rotation, so it's much more of like a back and butt bump, lack of better words.
01:26:00
Speaker
But because there's nothing really affecting his fall, he basically sometimes felt the top rope land high in his shoulders and not quite his neck, thankfully, but really, thankfully, he was rotated enough that he still lands safely ish. But yeah, that looked kind of got his one arm under his neck, which might be the difference, but it didn't make as much difference as it's supposed to. Yes, it's not quite the Samoa Joe moves as you jump out of the corner and let you fall spot.
01:26:29
Speaker
But it's definitely like, Oh man, you could really do that better. Yes. Yeah. That's like miss Q admittedly not easy thing to do, but still.
01:26:38
Speaker
And as you said, the Steiner screwdriver. Finally, for the first time, actually getting it properly on the show. Yes. I believe we almost got it on collision in Korea, but they cut away. Yes. I'm pretty sure that's what he was hitting at the end of that match. But we have started definitely picking up for the screwdriver and then whoever's opponent was at that point laying in the ring after the move happened. Yes. And definitely he sells the death of that quite well. Yeah.
01:27:05
Speaker
If you look at it as what should be a squash match, but becomes a more competitive match with story, it works quite well. Rage and KS aren't terrible. They can do their double teams up pretty well. They just don't have much in the way of characterization. They're guys that are brought out to basically be jobbers, but slightly above average jobbers at this point. I imagine they win matches on WCB Saturday night, but not much more than that.
01:27:30
Speaker
Yeah, I think this is one of those matches where you're like, OK, this is your chance to prove what you can do because we're giving you an excuse in storyline to do it. So go out there and give your best. They do. And I think they do actually quite well at it. Yeah, no, they're not the one elbow drop spot. Their timing just seems a bit off where I think they're supposed to do it in quicker succession. But yeah, I think one of them lands where the other one was going to land. So he has to stop and wait for him to get back up and then he can do his.
01:27:57
Speaker
But really, they do quite a good job with this moment. Yeah, I think this was a surprisingly fun match. And I agree they made a really good use of Steiner distraction to give high voltage and excuse to be able to just do more than you would have expected them to do, which is really nice. I thought they had some good high impact moves and some good double teams and they kept things moving at a high pace with quick tags as well. Yeah. So while there's a few awkward bits, I think that's just experience. It'll get more polished in time. Sure.
01:28:27
Speaker
I thought that was a really cool way to get them to a chance to show off without being decimated by the Steiners. And it didn't devalue the Steiners because obviously they have a very good excuse for being a little more vulnerable than usual. Rick is, aside from the one powerslam, the star of this one. He does an excellent job showing his head just not being in the match. From wandering around ringside early on to glancing away at inopportune moments while he's in the ring. In contrast to Scott's late 90s ringside wandering, this is actually good.
01:28:57
Speaker
I'm curious how they decided who would play which role. I'm not surprised they went with Rick because he's he's traditionally the guy that Scott kind of needs to encourage and get focused and things. And when they do the first like big tag to Rick in the match, Scott will do the whole like weird rub your head thing and kind of direct him at his opponent. And so I think it makes sense for it to be Rick in that light.
01:29:20
Speaker
Because I could see it the other way, given that Rick is the older brother. I could see that too. It's just not traditionally his role. No, I got you. But I like to picture them like flipping a coin. I'm going to work the match and you're going to be nervous. Yeah. Yeah. Go. Yep. And then all that and Scott hits the scariest finisher in recent memory. So this was fun. Yeah. Unless you're Robbie Rage. Yes.
01:29:46
Speaker
The Stiners, having recently been tag champions but not mentioned, will be challenging for the tag tiles against Harlem Heat at Hogwild. A little bit of historical irony to close this out as well.
01:29:58
Speaker
But two years from now, a little over two years from now, the Stylers Brothers has broken up because Scott turns heel, it becomes Big Papa Pump and Big O. There's a whole convolute thing we'll cover when we cover Holly and Havoc 1998. But basically, Rick Steiner wins the tag titles by himself because his tag partner betrays him. And I guess they count him leaving the match as not being his partner anymore. Yeah. Didn't that other rules work?
01:30:22
Speaker
So now Rick Steiner is a single tag champion. He's trying to find someone to be as, presumably long-term tag partner, but just being short-term. He finds Kenny Chaos, who at this point is working, I think Robbie Rage is, I don't think he's been released, but he's just injured, I believe. I think so, yeah, I think. So Kenny Chaos becomes his temporary tag partner, Rick Steiner. That is hilarious. And they never actually dropped the tag tiles, by the way, that Rick Steiner gets injured and they vacate them.
01:30:52
Speaker
So good for kitty cats and to lose the tag titles. We cut to the table where Eric welcomes us back again after a commercial break as Tony looks oddly pouty. Eric talks up the upcoming Eddie Guerrero Big Bubba match and Tony notes that the NWO's attack on Rey Mysterio robbed Guerrero of the chance to go to hog wild as Cruiserweight champ.
01:31:15
Speaker
Larry says everyone in WCW is a fighter and he's a fighter. He's tired of sitting around. Eric suggests that he followed the outsiders as they're attacking where WCW doesn't have security. So I guess that's a comment in favor of Larry's strength, like if he's there, he can prevent an attack. Yeah. It's interesting, by the way, that Eric and Larry themselves are going to end up in a match against each other in a little over a year.
01:31:38
Speaker
That's true, yeah. That's the other thing, too. So we know they sort of retconned and that Bishaw eventually by before the end of the year becomes a heel and they say he was somehow helping them the whole time. But you have to excuse so much in that to be true. Yeah, I feel like it's more natural for it to be that they eventually turn him. Yeah. Rather than that he was actually a part of her from the beginning.
01:32:02
Speaker
Yeah, either way, they act like it's been a long time that he's been secretly a member. It's not until the build to Stark and I believe 96. They do that. Yeah, I buy it if it's, you know, a couple months into the end of your storyline, they've turned Eric like once Ted DiBiase comes in. Yeah, that you can say, Okay, he flashed Eric, you know, a billion dollar check or whatever. Yeah. And Eric's like, Oh, yes, I will sell out my principles for that. Thank you very much. Yeah, sure.
01:32:27
Speaker
But the storyline works best if Eric is at this point loyal to WCW. I want to think that this is going, but I don't know what they actually decided that or not. Yeah. Yeah. Retroactively decided that. Because at this point, they hadn't decided that turn yet. Our fourth match is Big Bubba, accompanied by Jimmy Hart versus Eddie Guerrero. The referee for this one is Jimmy Jett.
01:32:51
Speaker
Bubba comes out to the ring alongside Jimmy Hart, who still looks downhearted after the events backstage, just shaking his head as he walks down. I like that people are letting this influence their entrances and stuff, not just doing their usual thing. As Guerrero enters, Eric again briefly confuses Rey Mysterio and Eddie Guerrero as he talks about the dart throw incident, but he corrects himself.
Guerrero vs. Big Bubba: Underdog Story
01:33:15
Speaker
Larry sneaks in another new world odor as we cut to another commercial break. That was fast. Yeah, right. I kind of wonder if they'd actually like got an agreement to shift around the ad locations so that they could do the attack with longer stretches between the ads and that they're making up for it here a bit. We're back as the match starts up.
01:33:35
Speaker
Guerrero grabs the headlock, but Bubba whips free and hits a massive shoulder block, then slaps Guerrero and flings him outside. Only for Guerrero to spring right back in, wait for him to finish posing on the turnbuckle, and give him a mighty slap in return. Nice.
01:33:52
Speaker
Guerrero dropkicks Bubba out through the ropes, and Bubba sells his jaw. As does Guerrero, which is a nice touch. Bubba gets some encouragement from Hart and gets back in. Eric says that Guerrero seems determined in contrast to the shaken Steiners, and Tony says everyone reacts to that attack in their own way. Bubba nails Guerrero with a kick and hurls him skyward to hit the mat hard, and Guerrero is stunned so Bubba takes him apart and drops him throat first on the ropes.
01:34:22
Speaker
An elbow drop with a very relaxed pin earns two, and two again with a more solid pin, as Bubba death glares at Jet. Guerrero manages a back suplex in a brief escape, but Bubba uppercuts him down. I really love Bubba's uppercuts. He has this great rotation on him. He's like a snap to them, yeah. Yeah. It's kind of like, who does them? Like Kane? Yeah, Kane. A simpler one, for sure.
01:34:47
Speaker
Bubba repeatedly claws at Guerrero's face for lectures from the ref, and Larry nicely points out how different Guerrero's current matchup is from who he was planning to face. Bubba is just a tad larger than Rey Mysterio. That's a bit, yeah. Bubba cuts off another Guerrero comeback with a monster clothesline for two.
01:35:08
Speaker
Bubba is displeased at the pace of the counts, but continues with a camel clutch and a body scissors and earns two counts with a corner splash and a shockingly nice elevated bear hug into a spine buster, but Guerrero rolls him up for two. Guerrero fires up, but Bubba smacks him right back down and brags to the camera, then wrenches Guerrero's neck and slaps on the chin lock, but Guerrero keeps his arm up on the ref checks.
01:35:37
Speaker
Guerrero crossbody countered into a slam, but Guerrero kicks Bubba away in the corner and hits a tornado DDT, then counters a powerbomb with rapid punches, but Bubba flings him overhead into the turnbuckle as Hart argues with Jet on the apron, grabbing him. Bubba flings Guerrero outside and Hart flings the megaphone to Bubba behind Jet's back, but it goes through Bubba's legs.
01:36:03
Speaker
Bubba scrambles for it, ending up near the ropes where Guerrero sunset flips in just as Bubba gets his hands on the megaphone so the megaphone sails overhead as Jet escapes heart and counts three to give Guerrero the win. As the crowd cheers, Guerrero and Jet both rapidly escape and exit before an angry Bubba can pound their faces to mush.
01:36:25
Speaker
Hart and Bubba argue in the ring, tossing the megaphone back and forth as they're clearly debating who was at fault for the mis-throw. It's a great bit. Larry accurately points out that Bubba probably didn't need the megaphone as he was doing fine without it. Yeah. I'm genuinely curious for your thoughts on this, too. Was that mis-catch of the megaphone? Do you think that was a botch that they just worked really well with, or that that was intentional? I think that was intentional. Yeah. Because it had to get him close to them. But he does such a good job with looking like an accident.
01:36:55
Speaker
Yeah, I could see it being a slip up that they worked with really, really well because they're both very experienced though. I could also see that being an explanation for how they're able to fake that something went wrong when it didn't. Right. Yeah. Calling the replay of the tornado DTT. Larry notes that it sent Bubba's quote semi-circular canals into a tither. Yeah. Which may be my new favorite wrestling call. That's pretty good. Yeah. It's right up there with a butt over tea kettle. I think thoughts on this one.
01:37:25
Speaker
I kind of do mind about this match, I will say. I didn't actually time this. I don't know how many minutes this is. This feels like there's a really good five minute TV match with the story. They have, you know, Eddie constantly finding underneath. But we're using his power and the advantages. And then, of course, the finish all working really well. The problem is the match is eight to 10 minutes.
01:37:49
Speaker
So they draw it out a little too much for me. At no point is it bad. It's not like they have miscues or they get necessarily repetitive. It's just, somewhere in the crowd is ready for them to go to the finish and they go, that's a couple more minutes to see how this goes. I don't know who's calling it. I don't know if they were told you have this much time for the match or if Big Bubba, so let's go longer or Eddie goes, let's work a little longer. One of the cases, it's a bit long for me.
01:38:14
Speaker
There's a lot of good spots throughout though. Exit Eddie's a really good underneath babyface at this point in time. Big Bubba as unnuanced as his offense is. And this, he's a realistic guy to be in that position because he throws like he's got an uppercut so you can throw his body at the guy like that.
01:38:33
Speaker
He actually did the better version I think I've seen of the, lift the guy up and then slam him back down on like on the stomach bit. Cause so many times I see him do that move, they start to throw up and walk away or step away. And then, why don't you just put your feet down and land? But actually you would be like, delve zigzag goes up like eight feet in the air to put your feet down. You're fine. But I thought because he elevates him down, they cover that pretty well.
01:38:58
Speaker
The trainer GT you thought was really done. And to his credit, Eddie Guerrero gets a really good crowd reaction. He really gets them behind him finish. Oh, yeah, yeah. They champed for him multiple times during this match. Yeah. That's what makes me wonder if maybe at some point when they start chatting for him when he's down, they go, let's do this a little longer. Maybe one or both of them makes that call. I could see that. I could also just see it being a bit difficult to get the match timings right on this show because of the unusual. Like, OK, we've done this big segment here.
01:39:26
Speaker
How do we finagle the last part of the show to around that right? Yeah, it's definitely not a bad match It's just I've always been a little bit shorter a bit and tighter. I think it would work really really well Yeah, I thought this came off as one of those classic fast wrestler versus huge wrestler kinds of matches Like I was pitching the end of the show. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah exactly enough
01:39:46
Speaker
It's a bit formulaic, but the formula really works. Bubba pounds the ever-loving crap out of Eddie Guerrero and quickly cuts off every single comeback, but Guerrero stays just alive enough to keep the crowd into it and earns their sympathy and repeated chance.
01:40:02
Speaker
I do feel like I think getting at what you were saying, I feel like it's maybe a little bit too one sided, right? Like if they added one longer mid match hope spot for Guerrero before we went back to the beat down and they got a few moves in sequence in the middle of the match, it might've been a little better, but I really appreciate the Bubba tremendously varied up his offense. He didn't just stick with one move or stick with punching or something like that. He does a lot of different things, including some pretty decent Matt wrestling. Yeah.
01:40:31
Speaker
And Guerrero's short comeback attempts were all different as well. So this never got dull to me. No.
01:40:37
Speaker
I like the general story, too. Bubba is clearly dominating, but he's too arrogant to get the pinfall that he needs. He basically at various points has Eddie beat, but just does a relaxed pin or poses for a little bit beforehand. The message is clearly, yeah, this guy probably is pretty much decimating Guerrero and could win at any time. It's just he has the wrong attitude. Yeah, exactly.
01:41:02
Speaker
Yeah, ultimately he and Hart get frustrated when they could have won in other ways, go to their old standby, and that's their undoing. This was a good way of building up everybody. Bubba comes off as really tough and powerful. Guerrero is a fighter, and this ends up a solid and very fun match. I agree it gets maybe a tad repetitive at points, but they're fighting that well with the varied offense.
01:41:26
Speaker
I think it's kind of funny, there's a little bit of historical irony as well that Big Bubba does the Camel Clutch on Eddie Guerrero, which as I've noted was invented by Gory Guerrero. Oh, okay. I can't remember which show I noted that on. I forget, yeah, yeah. I think it was probably the show we had the dragon Eddie Guerrero met him in. Might have been, yeah.
01:41:44
Speaker
I'm happy to hear you compliment a match that has a bear hug spot in as well. Even if it's short. One, it's short. Yeah. Two, he keeps it elevated. Yes. And three, he transitions it into something looks awesome. Yeah. So like if every bear hug spot was like that. Yeah. Hugs spots. I would love bear hugs. Yeah. Yeah. That's one of the best bear hug spots I've ever seen. I forget. I think there's one spot with Nikita Koloff on some other show that we saw where he does like a cool bear hug. The ragdoll bear hug like that. Yeah.
01:42:12
Speaker
I think Sting one time does one where he does a bear hug but then lowers him to the ground and then raises him back up. I think so, yeah. So people that do things with bear hugs, I don't mind bear hugs. I know. But it's when people just sit there kind of leaning against the guy. And they're both standing on the ground. Making no effort whatsoever. That's when I hate bear hugs. Oh, yeah, I get it. Unfortunately, that's 99.9% of bear hugs. That's true. Yes.
01:42:38
Speaker
So the match that was already scheduled is Eddie Guerrero versus Rick Flair with this point, either the title is the US champion. So he's scheduled at hog wild to fight for the title. Right. Which is interesting, kind of what they mentioned in that context. They have Eddie Mrs. Chance to become Cruiserweight Champion.
01:42:57
Speaker
And in some alternate world where this doesn't happen, the NWA title doesn't happen, he could be Cruiserweight Champion fighting for the US title like two weeks later. Yeah, yeah. I think it's Tony actually does mention the US title thing shortly after they talk about the Cruiserweight one, but they don't fully tie the two together. Yeah, I'm in a sense that you never see Flair with the belt. Yeah. Weird. Yeah.
01:43:18
Speaker
Also, for contrast, so the previous show is where Flair won the US title. He beat Conan. Right. Flair is defending his title on Hogwild against Eddie Guerrero. In contrast, Conan is wrestling a match for WWE Saturday Night taped before Hogwild. That's unfortunately a pretty quick demotion for Conan. Yeah, that's too bad. Yeah.
NWO's Bold Promo and Its Impact
01:43:42
Speaker
The following announcement has been paid for by the New World Order.
01:43:48
Speaker
Yo, it's a tough job, but somebody's gotta do it. People are wondering who's gonna be next. Don't call us, we'll call you. Yeah, it's invitation only, they're chikos. Well, you talk about the money, you talk about beating people up. Well, it's a new world order, and I hope it's okay, because there's nothing you can do about it. That's right, power, fame, money, and now our own corporation.
01:44:18
Speaker
You know, think about it. In W.O. We're new. We're taking over World Championship Wrestling and we've given all the orders. It's the new way. Is that okay, billionaire Ted? You don't like it? Come and fight. Is WCW even gonna fight or are we just gonna take it? We make the choices. Wait for the call.
01:44:41
Speaker
You know, billionaire Ted, with all of Ted's horses and all of Ted's men, you're not gonna be able to put the WCW back together again.
01:44:56
Speaker
I see it like this. Everybody wants to know who is next. Look at the third man we deliver. Everybody wants to know who's going to be fourth, who's going to be fifth. Is it another outsider? Or is it somebody right in the CNN center? We don't need you. We don't want you. We'll take you when we want you.
01:45:19
Speaker
These WCW guys, just Sting and Lex, they got soft. They living in Billionaire Ted's Country Club. Take a look at us. We have to fight, scratch, and claw for everything we've got. And boys, we want you.
01:45:41
Speaker
I think the whole world wants to know one thing about Lex Luthor. Hey Lex, what are ya bitch? What are ya bitch Lex? You guys know something? I almost forgot something that's really important.
01:45:56
Speaker
On August 10th, I wrestled the Giants. I perked. It slipped my mind. I mean, the WCW heavyweight title is on the line. That means, gentlemen, in one given night, we get to beat up the best that the WCW has, gentlemen.
01:46:24
Speaker
I find it quite ironic that the WCW could be so weak to beg, to plead, to cry out to the giant that he's their last hope, that he's their only chance of surviving the wrath of the NWO.
01:46:47
Speaker
On August the 10th, hog wild brother on that night, the outsiders become the insiders. And with 500,000 Harley Davison's by their side, the NWO will establish itself as the greatest wrestling organization on the Earth, brother.
01:47:13
Speaker
You know, in Sturgis, me and the big man, we're gonna take care of a little crutch man. You know Sting, you painted face punk, you've been whining and crying about how much you want us. You get your partner, you get Luger, you two punks, you get all pumped up and Chikos, you want us, don't sing it.
01:47:36
Speaker
We call it Armageddon. The Genesis has begun. It's a new beginning, the beginning of the new world order. And on one given night, as you two amigos destroy the top towns in the WCW, the giant shall crumble and fall at Hawke Hogan's feet. The preceding announcement has been paid for by the new world order.
01:48:05
Speaker
I love that the commentary team, by the way, just throws to this, like they're throwing to a regular commercial break. Yeah. The show even fades out in exactly the same way. So it looks like it's legitimately going to commercial. Okay. Which is a nice touch. Yeah. That does a lot to make it look like the NWO legitimately bought an ad spot on TNT rather than it just being a part of nitro. Right. Right. As for the promo, this is so, so different. Yeah.
01:48:33
Speaker
pre-taped, heavily produced, jumping between different cuts and disorienting camera angles, all in black and white, with video effects phased in occasionally. I know they've got one point where Hogan's making forward circle motions with his arms. They start overlaying the same footage, so it gets like an echo effect going on. It's kind of neat.
01:48:54
Speaker
It's unfocused, constantly shifting topics, interspersed with random comments and jokes, mixed in with posing like it's a photo shoot. It's great.
01:49:04
Speaker
It is dripping with disdain for WCW, for all of their stars, for everything they stand for. And yes, there are parts, mostly Hogan's, where it feels more like a traditional wrestling promo again. He kind of like makes some longer statements that they can't chop up as easily as the other guys. But I actually kind of think that's fine with me because jumping back and forth in style also adds to the confusion. And confusion here is good.
01:49:33
Speaker
Right. So, yeah, I think it would have been a little bit neat to see Hogan just kind of talk in a more normal voice, more casually, too, like the other guys. But this works. Yeah. And yes, there are some weird lines, Nash's linking of Armageddon and Genesis being a real head scratcher. Uh huh.
01:49:48
Speaker
Maybe he's a proponent of the theory that there was a previous universe and it ended and then the new universe started from that. Yeah, I guess. But man, this is just totally unique and filled with character. Right. You know, I'd really love to see with all this time that WWE has owned this footage. And I don't think they've ever released in this. I really want to like, I'm one of the DVDs that could have done this.
01:50:14
Speaker
Put out the raw version of them promos. I want to see that. How many hours do you think it is? Yeah, right. To do this one promo. Yeah, yeah. Because they have all these massive amount of different shots that they're taking that are clearly like different things, like between take things. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And stuff. I would imagine it's a situation where you kind of just like point a whole bunch of cameras at this, just leave it rolling. Right. And like, OK, we'll cut together. But still, I mean, this.
01:50:39
Speaker
My prediction, probably a good at least two hours of footage. Very possibly. That they probably had to pull together for this. Right, right. Like you stop and cut and you do this thing here. You've got to assume they've took multiple takes of a few of that stuff too, right? Just amazing, amazing work at this to make something completely different than anything you saw before.
01:51:00
Speaker
Yeah, I think the only problem they were going to do with this long-term is that they create this cool unique style that makes them stand out, which is absolutely a good thing to do, but they never quite make a counterbalance to it with the WCW wrestlers doing their promos.
01:51:18
Speaker
which on a certain level, I agree with you on a certain level. And I, and I, but I'm going to just as a counterpoint to that. Okay. I think WSW is wrestlers maintaining the more traditional wrestling style actually kind of is the point. It's like it is tradition versus chaos, you know?
01:51:35
Speaker
And I'm not saying they have to create the same kind of promo. I just mean, they never up their game, I think, is what I'm saying. Oh, OK. I'm not saying literally do this kind of promo. No, no. Just one of it would be kind of funny, actually, after a show where, say, the enemy loses a lot of control, have, like, Sting, Luger, and someone do a counter version, like a parody version. That would be hilarious. I would see that. Especially given that the enemy got to do parody versions of other people's promos, like the Forest Men with Arne. It would be nice to get their own puppets that way.
01:52:03
Speaker
And what I'm saying is they never really gave other than sting. And obviously they bought the ending with sting on that.
01:52:10
Speaker
They never had the other people up their game, like production wise or intensity wise. So what happens is you have the NWO doing this crazy, weird style that all these people that aren't in the wrestling gravitate towards. I think, wow, this is what wrestling should be like and is like now, this is really cool. And then there's Saxton and Duggan, but he's cutting regular promos and all this stuff happening. And they, it really created this mindset of,
01:52:36
Speaker
This is the old style. It's not good anymore. I can kind of see that. Yeah. They created their own problem.
01:52:43
Speaker
And then the other thing that you run into with it a little bit is they set such a high bar here. Yes. This is clearly a time consuming and very expensive way to do promos. Yes. And ultimately they start going to, uh, we're just going to have the theme music bit and the black and white bit. We're not going to do all the camera cuts and all that kind of stuff. It starts falling a little flat later on, but all that's in the future. Oh yeah. Yeah. This segment is brilliant. Oh yeah. Yeah.
01:53:11
Speaker
We talk about WSW, you have to look at the short term, like this show and go, wow, this is really good. And then you can't help but think about long term. It's like, it's clearly in a bubble. But yeah, I agree with you.
01:53:25
Speaker
on the storyline itself. I think a promo like this helps too because it makes the NWO look wealthy and powerful. They clearly have the time and money to produce something like this and then purchase the ad spot on WCW's own home TV station right where you can just stick a thumb in their eye basically with that. Emphasizes that they've got the time, the cash, and the huge egos necessary to put this on and take the fight to WCW in their home.
01:53:52
Speaker
Combined with the backstage assault earlier, this establishes the NWO as a force to be reckoned with and a threat above and beyond anything WCW has ever faced. So it's an excellent promo concept that really emphasizes the storyline and really well made.
01:54:06
Speaker
I think, I don't think they realized how effective it is early on because the very next week on Nitro, which I watched for comparison, they do a similar thing where they cut to a Nivio promo, but then it abruptly stops because staying in Lugram in the production room and telling them to stop playing the tape. Right. Right. Yeah. Which is good as it breaks the look of a wrestling show. I think, wow, this is real because they're literally stopping the show for this and everything.
01:54:33
Speaker
But at the same time, you now establish they could just do this. That's true. Maybe Hogan, once he has the championship in the future, he has his powers that you can't do that. But yeah, the fact that and that's well, that is where like the Bischoff explanation comes into things as well. Probably. Yeah, that could help. Yeah. But it's funny that he didn't really go, hey, stop playing the tape now. It's like the threatened great leathers and was few on screen appearances. Yes.
01:54:58
Speaker
We're back from our apparent ad break, and Tony informs us that Eric has left, checking on the conditions of the wrestlers.
Giant's Unexpected Match and Booking Surprises
01:55:05
Speaker
Tony and Larry go over the events of the attack from Heart's arrival, as Larry says that he thought for sure the dungeon was going to attack.
01:55:13
Speaker
Then going back to the NW assault, Tony throws the footage of the earlier attack. We get a great line from Larry during that, by the way, that I missed talking about before when Tony talks about the outsiders being in the back. Larry says, the who is where this exasperated tone. It's great. Back from that footage. It's time for our next match. Tony mentions that this one was supposed to feature Arne Anderson challenging the giant for the world championship, but obviously that's not happening. No.
01:55:44
Speaker
So our final match is a mystery opponent versus the Giant for the Giants WCW World Heavyweight Championship. Referee for this one is Nick Patrick. So going back a bit on the July 15th night show, shortly after the infamous turn, Hogan cut the promo, I believe it's a videotape promo, I don't think it's a live promo, where he challenges for the WCW title. Now, I still question why they give him a title shot.
01:56:14
Speaker
I don't like how in that show that he does work there, but I would think what he does might be grand determination, but it gets not.
01:56:21
Speaker
Also, I think he does. Eh, we'll let you slide this one time, buddy. And then the next 10 times and 11 times and 12. You know what it is? In this feud, you've got the NWR, the heel organization. WCW is the face organization, which means WCW is cripplingly stupid. That's true. Faces are always agreeing to title matches they should not agree to. Yeah. It's just in this case, it's the entire company. Yeah.
01:56:48
Speaker
Two weeks ago, on Nitro, we actually had a world title match between Arne Anderson and the Giant. Oh, okay. So, it's interesting that they, as part of a storyline, they switched that match, but they just had this match. So, no Arne Anderson. But, W.C.W. still has a strong roster. They could give us a cool surprise, right? Uh-huh. Who could it be? Well, Steve Austin's old W.C.W. music hits.
01:57:18
Speaker
Could this be an amazing return? It's been about a month since Austin claimed superstardom with this famous Austin-316 promo. So that would be one heck of a get. That would be, yeah. Or perhaps it's Blitzkrieg appearing several years early via Time Machine. He did use the same music. If anyone could. But it's neither of those things. It is, in fact, Greg the Hammer Valentine. Yeah.
01:57:44
Speaker
Tony just matter-of-factly says, Greg the Hammer of Valentine will take Arn Anderson's place. Like, that needs no explanation. Yeah, yeah. In fairness, Valentine did apparently have a match with Savage on Nitro a few weeks prior. Also, in fairness, that's kind of strange too. Yes. I don't know if this is accurate, but according to thecagematch.net, the match with Savage is Valentine's first WCW match in 1996. This is his third for the world title. Yeah. Crazy.
01:58:15
Speaker
Yeah. Seriously, though, nothing against Valentine. I still have fond memories of a Starrcade 83 classic against Piper, but he was definitely not who I would have called coming out.
01:58:26
Speaker
I will say, and this is really more of a knock on booking as a whole. The Giant has been a regular defender of his world title on Nitro other than Aron a couple weeks ago. He had not been facing top talent. Going back and forth, there's this whole mindset people have of Nitro shows up, changes all the rules of wrestling. It's completely different than Raw and Raw takes like two years to catch up and change everything.
01:58:53
Speaker
I don't know, 40% true. Yeah. So much of nitro at this point, 96 and even 95 and it starts is still big time guy versus jobber. They tend to be named jobbers like rage and chaos and I've old. Right. So, so much of giants booking as world champion is fending off people like Cobra. And in fact, next week he fends against Craig Pittman. So as silly as a sound looks at a bubble that Greg Valentine really appearing in a world title match.
01:59:23
Speaker
It's surprisingly par for the course of the way they're booking the giant. Fair. It's kind of like the Goldberg thing when he wins the title and the big guys don't want to face him because they don't want to, you know, have to lose. Right, right, exactly. Do you have to say also, Greg Valentine has a great robe, black and silver. We had a nice exchange by Tony and Larry as they discussed Bobby Heenan's exit.
01:59:46
Speaker
Larry notes that Hina never was the bravest. He's not a blood-and-guts kind of guy. But Tony sympathizes, saying he's scared too, to which Larry notes that Tony's not a blood-and-guts kind of guy either. Yeah. Tony says he's there, though, right next to Larry, to which Larry says he's lucky, to which Tony agrees, saying he's glad that Larry's there. Aw, how sweet. BFFs.
02:00:08
Speaker
I do like though the slight indications that because Tony and Larry always are a bit at odds like Tony and Hienan often are. So it's kind of neat to see in the midst of the NWO attack them saying like we actually do like working together and are happy to be together during this and Tony recognizing Larry is a fighter. Yeah. That makes me wonder something and obviously I didn't really have the answer to it.
02:00:31
Speaker
There's a thing so much in modern TV now with football and baseball and basketball, especially retired players, coming commentators and they cause it makes sense. You can talk about always what I did. Here's what this guy could do. Yeah, there's a lot to get that. Yeah. I'm kind of curious. I think I don't have the answer to this where that starts.
02:00:51
Speaker
Does that go back 30, 40 years? I'm just not aware of it because wrestling makes good use of that. Going back to Bruce M. Martino was a commentator with Vince McMahon, like 85, 86. Right. Right. Yeah. I don't think wrestling beat them to this, but I'm curious to see who's the first, who's the first former competitor in a sport to become a commentator in the sport. Is wrestling doing it because say basketball or baseball did it or did basketball, baseball, they're doing it so much because wrestling did it. That's an interesting thought. Yeah. At the research at some point.
02:01:22
Speaker
Giant makes his entrance looking intense alongside Jimmy Hart, who is now wearing a giant face jacket in contrast to the Jimmy Hart face jacket he was wearing earlier in the night. And to clarify, it is a giant face, but it is also a giant face. Yes, that is true. He also has a tie that bears Giant's face and his own. Nice. Larry starts to make a point about how serious he looks, but kind of trails off losing his train of thought. Tony throws to commercial.
02:01:50
Speaker
We're back and we get a very nice shot of the full moon. Is Valentine now a werewolf or something? That'd be the only way he could have a chance, I'd say. Right? Yeah. Giant shows Valentine end-over-end. Valentine pokes him in the eyes and bounces off him with several clotheslines, but can't take him down. Larry describes Giant as so tall that if he falls down, he's home. I've missed Larry's commentary. I like that line, yeah.
02:02:16
Speaker
Giant gets annoyed and smacks Valentine flat, but Valentine dodges a corner charge and stuns Giant with a top rope double axe handle. But as Valentine goes to the second rope, Giant roars and chokeslams him down. Another chokeslam just for fun, and Giant gets the three count in the win.
02:02:35
Speaker
Giant earns cheers from the crowd as Jimmy Hart races wildly around with the title belt. Giant gets up to the camera and sends a message to Hogan, telling him he wants him to listen real close. To what? Well, first, let's discuss this match. Thoughts on this one? I mean, it's a pretty nothing match, obviously. The point is to have Giant come out, not completely dominate, but basically all but completely dominate the match. Yeah.
02:03:03
Speaker
Regardless of who was going to be there wondering how long this would have gone. I don't think they would have treated aren't quite this badly, obviously, but still. It was not designed to be competitive match design. So show the giant throwing guy around and then leading with the promo, like you say. Yeah. Greg Valentine is a recognizable name to be decimated. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.
02:03:24
Speaker
To his part, he screwed nothing up. As simple as the match is, it flows really well, having a veteran of probably this point 20 plus years in the ring. Oh, yeah, absolutely. All my joking aside, Greg Valentine does a perfectly good job. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Given the point of this match, which is again dying to demolish somebody, it works fine. Yeah.
02:03:44
Speaker
Yeah, it's pretty much the mauling that you would expect. Giant is nice enough to sell a little bit for Hammer, respectful of Hammer's long history, I think. But it doesn't even remotely feel like Hammer has a chance here. Nor should it. No. He doesn't even get Giant off his feet. No.
02:04:01
Speaker
Giant just lets Valentine bounce off him for a while until he gets annoyed and obliterates him. Right. Short but sweet. And it made Giant look strong, which is exactly what was needed. So not much of a main event, but the match is not the focus here. No.
WCW's Storytelling and NWO's Influence
02:04:16
Speaker
Mean Jean is in the ring with Giant and Heart. As Jean speaks, Giant does some oddly familiar flexing poses.
02:04:28
Speaker
All right, guys, I thank you very much. We are concluding this evening one of the, I guess, most different two hours that I've ever been part of. Of course, what happened at the beginning of this program, a little different tenor here at the conclusion. As I talk to the man who's the WCW Heavyweight Champion of the World, he is the Giant and in short order on Saturday, August the 10th,
02:04:49
Speaker
At Hogwild, this man is going to be facing Hollywood Hulk Hogan and his new world order. Will you know something mean, Gene? I've been to the top of the mountain, brother. I've walked through the valley of the shadow of death. Wait a minute. Have you lost your marbles, Giant? That's a knockoff on Hogan.
02:05:10
Speaker
No, I just wanted to explain to you people at home how easy it is to fall into that con trap. Because you know that's exactly what Hulk Hogan did. He conned America. He told America what they wanted to hear.
02:05:26
Speaker
He made them believe in what they needed to believe in. The problem was, is he didn't believe in it himself. He comes along now in WCW with his two piranhas. He started the NWO because he knew he could never be the big fish in WCW.
02:05:48
Speaker
Right here at WCW, I have beaten the finest athletes in the world. While you're making movies, I'm defending this title with every bit of honor in my body. You want your new world order? Your two piranhas? This is WCW. I guarantee you WCW, if we don't hang together, we all will hang separately. Hogan?
02:06:16
Speaker
I've got a Chokeslam noose that's gonna fit just alright around your neck.
02:06:24
Speaker
All right, perhaps a little bonding on the part of the superstars in world championship wrestling. Quickly, Jimmy Hart, before we leave the air. Me and Gene, you've known me for most of my professional wrestling career. I eat and sleep professional wrestling 24 hours a day. Sometimes I lie so much, I believe what I'm lying about myself. And one day I'll have to pay for the things I've done. But I promise you this at hog wild hogan, we'll take you out. Thank you, and good night from Orlando, everybody.
02:06:55
Speaker
I thought this was a brilliant bit. Giant's an impressive fighter, but he needed something extra to be taken as a face in the upcoming match after a year as a heel. Right. So reframing his year-long feud with Hogan in a different light, portraying Hogan as a career con man who never believed all the stuff he was saying, does the trick.
02:07:17
Speaker
Giant may not quite be the good guy yet, but he's given a good enough explanation for why he was trying to destroy Hogan when Hogan was still apparently a face, that he can serve the role, converting Hogwild from a heal versus heal match to a more traditional alignment. He also provides a great call to action for WCW, providing a little hint of the eventual tradition versus anarchy kind of conflict that's going to be felt over the next year.
02:07:42
Speaker
It's honestly a shame that they had Giant join the NWO later on. Yeah, twice. Yeah, because he could have made one heck of an inspirational face character. For instance, how we eventually see him at Spring Stampede 97. Yeah. Imagine that, but without him having been in the NWO before that point. Yeah, exactly. Man. Hart, for his part, does a really interesting promo as well, surprisingly introspective, and serving as a good way to make him a little bit more of a face as well.
02:08:08
Speaker
It also helps sell the severity of the NWO threat. Hart explains himself in the context of loving wrestling. And thus, we get the impression that the NWO isn't just a threat to individual competitors, to factions, or even to WCW, but a threat to the sport of professional wrestling itself.
02:08:25
Speaker
It's a really, really strong close to the show from these guys. It's again, particularly amazing to note Giant is a little over a year into his career. Yeah. And knocking out of the park with promos like these. Holy crap, what a talent.
02:08:40
Speaker
Right, yeah. Yeah, it's definitely really good. It's definitely a case of them putting the right people around him, give him the proper coaching, training, and to really emphasize what his ability is. Right. Because I know him from when I started watching wrestling in 2000.
02:08:57
Speaker
his old thing, he starts impersonating wrestlers up again. And he gets an SNL and shows comedy. And you're like, wow, this guy's really interesting. And they really played that in his gimmick for a long time before they turn him face and heel 167 times. All the time between I'm this evil guy who will destroy you and I'm this funny guy who'll make you laugh.
02:09:17
Speaker
So yeah, it's interesting seeing sort of middle ground on that because he does his Hogan bit there, which is really nice, but then turns it on itself by being about how easy it is to be like this guy, but not really believe any of this. Yeah. Yeah. He highlights the fact that he's doing it as a fake. Yeah.
02:09:35
Speaker
And yeah, he does a great impersonation. I can see why they eventually, I would, I would bet that someone in the WWF when he does the later impersonation saw that he'd done this was like, Hey, do you think he could do that again? And more extended gimmick. Yeah. He's definitely having fun doing that. Like this promo and the later stuff.
02:09:54
Speaker
Yeah, I like your point about how they had to reframe him because it's true. Do you have to forget if you're a long-term fan watching the show that the Giant originally wins the title from Hogan because Jimmy Hart gets Hogan disqualified in the match. Yes. Even though he's artificially aligned with the Dungeon of Doom and Kevin Sullivan and the Giant. And somehow wrote into the contract that the DEQ loss makes the title change hands. Yes. Mind it, that doesn't stick.
02:10:20
Speaker
But yes, seeing these two as the faces defending the integrity and safety and longevity of pro wrestling, they definitely need this extra bit to get around that whole storyline. Right? Yeah, you you have to at the very least, make them people that
02:10:35
Speaker
saw Hogan as so evil that it was worth anything to beat him. Yes. So, like I said, you haven't quite gotten them to actual full face roles, but you've at least given them an explanation for why they had such a vendetta against Hogan. Basically, you look at a giant, much like Hienan in his commentary at times, has seen Hogan for what he is all along, is the portrayal. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's really good. It's nice to see him, like I said, a necessary transition they have to go through for this to work in.
02:11:05
Speaker
Jean signs off and we see the Mysterio dart spot from the attack once more as they clearly know that they've got a special moment there. Yes. And Nitro is done. So overall thoughts on this episode of Monday Nitro.
02:11:19
Speaker
It's a really strong one. It's a great example of how they can do it. Their traditional wrestling show, which obviously they haven't necessarily done that long. They've been doing since what, October 95, I think they've been listening to you. But obviously you have the JCP shows, uh, which is definitely model night to raptor a lot and raw to compare it to. So they have this pretty solid.
02:11:42
Speaker
framework of here's a wrestling show goes, and then they have this big incident happen, which derails the whole thing makes it feel much more real and different. And then you sort of see there were a band effect to a certain extent, they have to try to then make the show back in a wrestling show again, that you see the strain of it, they don't go, here's this thing anyways, next segment, it feels like the company has been disrupted. Exactly. Yeah.
02:12:08
Speaker
It's a step above having some big crazy thing of like Braunstrom and flipping over a truck or something and then going to the next match and not even talking about it. Right. Because we've complained about that on earlier shows like the Terry Funk Attack on Ric Flair on One of the Wrestle Wars. I remember saying like, yeah, a couple people mentioned things after it, but it feels like the show just kind of goes on. Uh-huh. Yeah. Where this, the show does not go on. The show stops. Exactly. You know?
02:12:34
Speaker
Yeah, so many issues you can point to as the big, shocking things, like the Nexus attack, or you have times they've had the ring de-destroy, but Superplex or Powerbomb and whatnot. Those are always at the end of the show, because it's so much easier to do that. Oh, right, yeah, yeah.
02:12:52
Speaker
Like if you did a Nexus attack at the end of like hour one of raw, and then you have to have like someone reset the ring and bring in their place in commentators and all stuff. It's a very different thing that just here's a shocking end of the show. See you next week and things back to normal. But we talked about how we were last week.
02:13:10
Speaker
Right, yeah. As I said earlier, this was a gutsy move, and it's a trick that's a great trick, but that I think you can only pull once as your company because people will not tolerate this happening too often, but man, the one time that you do it, if you do it right and they did, then it causes such an impact. Absolutely. It's funny that for episodes of Nitro to review, we ended up doing this one first. Right, yeah.
02:13:37
Speaker
because it's one of the most strange and most unusual episodes, but that's just how our schedule worked out, I guess. For what it is, it's kind of brilliant.
02:13:47
Speaker
The NWO angle was good already. It was always, I think, going to be a big thing, no question. But this episode, I think, is the one that takes it from a good faction storyline to a company-changing massive story that's about the fate of WCW itself. This is the point where the NWO becomes more than just another wrestling faction. It becomes capable of demolishing the company's primary show and completely derailing WCW's plans.
02:14:12
Speaker
It's enormously gutsy for WCW to try an episode like this. It could have lost them viewers having so much effectively dead air with a bunch of wrestlers just milling about as EMTs worked. But it worked. It really, really worked. And it cemented the NWO as the angle that would take WCW to the top and keep them there for a year and a half.
02:14:33
Speaker
What about the show outside the attack? That's interesting too. The matches are sometimes strange after the NWO attack, but most are actually quite good. Yeah. Only the early shows Duggan versus Enos is a little bit underwhelming, and even that serves its purpose to pump up the crowd with USA Chance against a guy from Minnesota and oh, I haven't forgotten that. Yes.
02:14:53
Speaker
But really, everything was at least an acceptable TV match, and everyone was clearly trying their best to put on a good show tonight, aware that this had to be great and that the crowd might need to be one back after what would be to them a mid-show lull. And yeah, credit to the performers for winning the crowd back quite well. I credit the Steiner screwdriver. Yeah, right. That'll wake anybody up except Robbie Rage. He got knocked out pretty good. Yes.
02:15:22
Speaker
promos were amazing. This was one heck of a night for promo work, and for acting in general for that matter. From Duggan's heartfelt talk of Hogan's betrayal, to the varied reactions to the NWO attack, to the supremely different NWO ad, and finally to some character redefining work by Giant and Heart in the final moments, it was all great, one of the strongest shows we've ever watched from that standpoint.
02:15:46
Speaker
Aside from some minor repetitiveness with the four men fact during the attack aftermath, all the promos went off without a hitch and really brought the emotion.
02:15:56
Speaker
as did the commentary team. Tony, Larry, Bobby, and Eric all did a great job emphasizing the impact of the show with Tony and Bobby particular standouts. Tony for nicely portraying the disorientation of having the show matchless pulled out from under him and trying to figure out what was going to happen. And Bobby for a short but very good portrayal of the raw fear that someone who wasn't a fighter, and particularly someone who had a history of injuries, could have in the dangerous situation the crew now found itself in.
02:16:25
Speaker
They do have a few minor flubs here and there, in particular Eric's repeated mix-up of Ray and Eddie. One wears a mask, Eric, it's not that hard. No, I have not. But largely, they nail the feel of the night. Production is strong too. On a night where there's more chaos than ever, and so much has to go right, it pretty much does. Yeah.
02:16:46
Speaker
Seriously, this is WCW's crew. I'm used to them missing critical moments. But instead, tonight, they gave us some of the most famous shots in WCW history, including the immortal Rey Mysterio dark throw, some excellent coverage of the aftermath that looks very news footage, some great camera work to emphasize mood during promos, and one of the most artistic promos WCW has ever done with the NWO ad buy. They get so much right here. Are we sure this is the same crew?
02:17:15
Speaker
Yeah, this is a nitro like no other, taking place at a critical moment where the NWO storyline was just getting going and needed to get bigger, more unpredictable, and more exciting. And that this nitro 100% provides. If you have not seen this nitro, please do take the time. It is so, so different from anything else WCW does that is well worth the experience. Okay, yeah.
02:17:42
Speaker
All right, our match of the night and MVP. So Al, your match of the night.
02:17:48
Speaker
For me, I think it's the six man match. It's the most enjoyable in terms of, has so much varied action, has varied people. Like I said, they're able to do big spots, take the bumps, and then just tag out to keep the flow going. That's the advantage you have in these multi-man matches with so many veterans like Benoit and Luger and Sting and Flare, especially in there. They keep the thing moving really nicely. They want to highlight people like Bongo, get in their moments.
02:18:17
Speaker
Even if it doesn't have an actual ending, it's not a DQ ending, it's the story taking over, which ends the match. So I don't really fault the match for that.
02:18:27
Speaker
I'm going to agree with you. I'll go with the six man tag. Yes, it does get interrupted, but it gets interrupted for one of WCW's greatest ever angles. So I can't hold that against them. No. And before that, it's great action with tremendous intensity, building on angles that have been running for months and performed a couple of Mongo spots aside with precision and reliable excellence. So it was a lot of fun. Agreed. MVP.
02:18:54
Speaker
It's a tricky one because there's a lot of good people in the show, which is good. I could definitely see doing with Tony because he has to stick through the whole show, same as Larry does. But Larry, for his part, gets to be the reaction guy to Tony. Tony's got to be the, for all intents and purposes, the straight man, the normal commentary guy in the show. Larry can pop in and say a thing, but then Tony's got to keep them going straight.
02:19:21
Speaker
Penan is a really strong, quick appearance in the show. He really nails the accept the realism they're going for this. You feel for him here. He wants to do the show. He likes talking with me. He loves wrestling. He's worried about his long term health and his life. Yeah, he's he can't stick around for the show. I could almost see giving it to Robbie Ray for being willing to take the standard screwdriver. You poor man, better you than me. Oh, God, yeah.
02:19:52
Speaker
Likewise, Ray taking the bump of arguably the year. Yes. Oh my God. With that laundard spot. I mean, that could have gone wrong in so many ways. Credit firm for doing that and selling the aftermath properly, just being down for that.
02:20:09
Speaker
And to your point at the end, Giant, for really taking the first big steps in turning from, yes, he's a heel aligned with this confusing, but not really creatures anymore, Dungeon of Doom.
Heenan's Performance and Dungeon of Doom's Struggles
02:20:24
Speaker
It's a weird point for them because they're trying to get more serious, but they're still called the Dungeon of Doom. I think for me, in terms of impactfulness, I gotta go with Heenan. Okay.
02:20:37
Speaker
It's a hard choice. I could definitely see him to Giant. For me with Giant, I think if he had appeared even just a little bit in part of the aftermath, the attack, I think I could have been extra thing there. Take nothing away from what he does. I think he's not quite enough. And it's early in this transition that he's not quite there, but it's a really strong show. Yeah.
02:20:57
Speaker
I kind of was expecting that you might go for Heenan because that is such an impressive moment. For a guy that's on the show for, I don't know, maybe a grand total of 30 to 45 seconds, he is a part that I will remember strongly, which is a good argument for being an MVP.
02:21:13
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, man. There are so many good performances on this show, particularly in terms of promos or reactions to the attack. Jim Duggan's early promo is great. Giant and Heart's show closer that you mentioned. Excellent. Bobby Heenan, of course. I agree. That's a strong one. I'm going to go to another person that you mentioned, though. Okay. I'm going to give it to the one guy that highlighted the themes all night long. That's Tony Schiavone.
02:21:38
Speaker
On a night that could have gotten confusing or even boring without someone keeping things moving and highlighting the right points, Tony did an amazing job keeping everything together while bringing out theme's intention in the storyline.
Show Wrap-Up and Teaser for Next Episode
02:21:50
Speaker
He kept everything moving and kept everything together while looking like he was having trouble keeping it together, which is a hard balance to strike. For sure, yeah. It's an amazing commentary job. This night does not work without a good commentary performance, and Tony was at the heart of that. Agreed, yeah.
02:22:09
Speaker
And that wraps up our review of WCW Monday Nitro from July 29th, 1996. If you've enjoyed listening to us tonight, you can find us on Twitter or Facebook as Let's Go to the Ring. Links will be available in the episode description. Follow us for episode announcements and other show details, and share your own thoughts about each show as we go through. You can subscribe to our show on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, High Heart Radio, Spotify, Stitcher Radio, TuneIn, Verbal, or Audible.
02:22:37
Speaker
And please, if you've enjoyed this show, give us a rating or review and share the show through your favorite social media platforms to help others discover us. Many thanks to OSW review for TV ratings, wrestlingdata.com for attendance figures, and Gina Trujillo for our logo. Next up. Hog Wild 1996. Ain't no easy writers here. And I was really looking forward to Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper versus Kevin Nash and Scott Hall.
02:23:07
Speaker
I could see I'm riding out wearing the Captain America helmet. Yeah, there you go. This is Bob Moore for Alec Prigen, signing off. Good night, everybody. Happy wrestling. Back to the ring for our second match. As Tony tells us, this is the match we were scheduled to have last week.
02:23:37
Speaker
which I think is when, um, yeah, sorry, did I not? I don't think I actually mentioned the, Oh, cause I forgot to mention that part of it. Let me cut this in and I'll put it back to where it was supposed to go. Okay.