Heroes of Wrestling.
If those three words don’t mean anything to you, then chances are you weren’t around when this special event took place in 1999, during the height of professional wrestling’s most lucrative period. A time when professional wrestling was at its hottest peak and was pretty much all over the place whether you liked it or not. If those words do mean anything to you… bless thy hearts.
Continue reading “The Infamous Heroes Of Wrestling PPV From 1999”
The year is 2001. The World Wrestling Federation had acquired the assets of fledgling rival promotion World Championship Wrestling, Philidelphia outfit Extreme Championship Wrestling went bankrupt, and suddenly there is a tremendous void in the wrestling stratosphere for an alternative to Vince McMahon’s wrestling monopoly, as well as a bunch of name talents not employed by the WWF. As such, there were attempts to gather these talents and build a promotion out of them in an effort to provide that much needed alternative… to mixed results.
One of these promotions was World Wrestling All-Stars, an Australian touring outfit run by concert promoter Andrew McManus. Signing a bunch of well-known names such as Jeff Jarrett, Brian “Road Dogg” James, and Bret Hart among others, the promotion would embark on an international tour of live events. Some of these live events were made into Pay-Per-View shows… with the first of these dubbed “The Inception.”
The Inception took place on October 26th, 2001, but didn’t make North American PPV markets until January 2nd, 2002. The WWA would eventually produce five PPV events in total before being shuttered in 2003. This week, we’ll be looking at all five PPV events.
WCW Halloween Havoc 2000 is the only full show that I have from my original PPV tapings during 2000s… because I used to get all the PPVs and I’d put them on tape and unfortunately, very few of those survived. One of those being Halloween Havoc 2000… Halloween Havoc 2000 was a show taking place during the dying days of WCW. I’m not quite sure if Vince Russo was still writing the shows at this point, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he did.
Anyway, my hopes aren’t high for this show, because my recollections of WCW from this time frame are thankfully few and far between. Because WCW, during its dying days, was hard to watch. It was the classic example of writing that threw shit on the wall and went with what stuck. And it would be a fairly safe bet that my only viewings of WCW around that time were the PPVs that either I or a friend would tape and pass it along to each other to share the torture, as it were. The only time I tuned in to Nitro was when the show was cancelled.
But alas, that’s another story. Onwards to Halloween Havoc.
WARNING: The following post contains mentions of Chris Benoit. Discretion is advised.
WCW Souled Out 2000 opens with the typical WCW signature video that had opened many WCW programs since mid-1999 and from there, instead of an opening video montage detailing the card for the program, we go straight to the arena shot and pyro, where announcer Tony Schiavone welcomes us to the first WCW Pay-Per-View event of the 21st century. And we begin with about five minutes worth of recaps. This is the sign of a program that has been rewritten (almost literally) at the last second, which might be the norm for WCW, but the reasons here are far more grave than the typical excuse of nobody having a clue as to what the show’s about.
The original card for Souled Out was to feature Bret Hart defending the WCW World Heavyweight title against Sid Vicious and Jeff Jarrett defending the US title against Chris Benoit. Of course, with Bret suffering from a concussion that would end his wrestling career and Jarrett also saddled with injuries that forced him out of action for the short term, WCW was forced at the last second to rebook the top of the card. And that’s how we ended up with the main event of Sid vs. Benoit for the vacant World title.
Going into this viewing, I had not seen the PPV in years; more than likely since its original airing back in 2000. However, one thing I remember was that in the weekend of the show, I’d watch the PPV preview channel and I’d distinctly recall a card that would pop up and announce that Bret Hart would not compete and the main event was going to be Sid vs. Benoit for the World title. Whether that was a WCW thing or a Viewer’s Choice thing, I thought that was a cool bit for them to update the card so that fans would not have false expectations. It is generally a rule of thumb to not mention these things until the show is taking place. So, this forward thinking is actually a surprising gesture. Whether it’d helped or hurt the buyrate… I’m probably the wrong guy to ask about that.
Anyway… on with the show… as it were…
Summerslam is hitting the network, so I guess to coincide with the challenge here on the blog, we might as well hit a couple of these up as they play.
This is one of the more “interesting” shows in that it features two big matches. In one main event, reigning WWF Champion Bret “Hitman” Hart defending his title against his young brother and newly crowned King Of The Ring winner Owen Hart. In the other main event, both Ted Dibiase and Paul Bearer have Undertakers and the two fight it out to see who’s the genuine article… except it should be plain as day who’s the real deal given that the other one is played by some other due.
Should be fun, I guess… then again, maybe not.
So here’s the other WCW PPV show that I still have from the “old” days of VHS to DVD conversions; the 1999 iteration of the Bash At The Beach. My memory of the event is a bit fuzzy; the only thing I recall is that one of the matches took place in a junkyard… well, sounds like a good place for a WCW event in 1999, amirite?
Why am I writing “amirite” now?
Bash At The Beach was known for many things in its short history; it’s the event where Hulk Hogan would beat Ric Flair for the WCW World Title in his first WCW match. It’s the event where Hogan would turn heel and planted the seeds for the birth of the nWo. It’s the event where Vince Russo would cut his scathing promo on Hogan that planted the seeds for a lawsuit. It’s the event where… where a bunch of guy would fight in a junkyard in a hardcore invitation match for a crappy trophy.
Because, sure… why not?
San Francisco, CA – Feb. 22, 1998
I’ve got this on VHS, so I’m fairly certain this is the most complete version I’ll be watching unless there’s one floating around online that I’m unaware of. In any case, this is two months after Starrcade where Sting and Hogan locked horns in a clusterfuck of a match and Sting won the big one in dubious fashion… except he didn’t because shortly after, the World title was held up and so this show is where the rematch is taking place… everyone got that?
Yeah, me neither.
On tap for the Network, it’s a WCW Pay-Per-View from 1995. Superbrawl V… wait a minute. A WCW Pay-Per-View from 1995? That could only mean… oh no.
For those with no context to what I’m talking about, Hulk Hogan signed with WCW in 1994 and in his very first WCW match, beat Ric Flair for the WCW World Title. He’d continue to feud with Flair for a couple months before the Nature Boy was “retired” for a couple months. By the time we got to Starrcade, Hulk Hogan was defending the World Title against his BFF, Ed Leslie… it went over about as well as you’d expect.
Superbrawl V sounds promising, though. Hogan’s going up against Big Van Vader, the big guy who tore off Cactus Jack’s ear, the guy who dominated WCW for the better part of 1993, the guy who had been involved with an awesome feud. Surely, WCW couldn’t possibly fuck this up, could they?
Well, WCW isn’t around anymore… are they?
NOTE: I figured since it’s August and Summerslam is the big PPV, I might as well toss in a couple Summerslam musings along the way. Consider these “bonus” additions, for lack of a better term.
Summerslam 2011 should have been a sign that things weren’t going to be rosy.
Get this; you have a super hot commodity whose contract is known to be expiring and fresh off an intense promo that should have been the catalyst of a new era of relevancy for a promotion that has been lacking it for years. He main events a PPV event in front of his hometown homies, beats the franchise player, and then rides off into the sunset with WWE championship in tow. What should have followed was a massive push of this new main event who has been attracting outside press and would hopefully lead to a new star being made and less of a load on a top guy who has been getting stale and boring.
But as most know by now, that wasn’t the case. The hot commodity known as CM Punk was subsequently curtailed due to petty egos and moronic creative teams and instead of ushering a new era of relevancy in WWE, he’s currently bringing attention to his eventual debut fight in the Ultimate Fighting Championship.
There are many things to point to and many people to blame as to why this run didn’t pan out the way it should have… well, aside from the fact that it’s WWE and they have a tendency to screw up the surest things. But, for me, the wheels were off the wagon at this show… and this is the first time I’m watching this show, so here we go.
Quick Note: The following musing was written prior to the whole Hulk Hogan racial controversy, so don’t expect anything touching that particular subject. Believe me, there are a lot of other ugly aspects to Hogan as a human being that we can spotlight instead.
From December 1994, the 11th edition of WCW’s “Granddaddy of Them All” features Hulk Hogan defending his WCW World Heavyweight Championship against the Butcher! The Butcher is perhaps best known as Brutus Beefcake in WWF and also for being Hogan’s BFF. Thanks to the WWE Network, I am getting to watch this show in its entirely for the first time. I’ve heard of this show, I’ve read about this show, and now I get to watch this show…
And instantly regret it.
dtm666 