WCW Halloween Havoc 1998

(Quick note: This was originally going to be posted in July, but then Hulk Hogan passed away and to publish musings on one of his worst outings would have been too soon… so I held it off until now, which is October and thus makes it appropriate for the time. My grace period over the Hulk Hogan Creative Control Card has ended. It’s back to the schlocking, which you can find more of in my weekly WCW Nitro musings posted every Thursday.)

Before anyone asks, yes, the entire show can be viewed on the WWE Vault YouTube Channel… for free, no less. And yes, before anyone else asks, yes, I’m skipping over the Fall Brawl ’98 PPV… one day, we’ll get to that one, but this one is the bigger deal.

So yes, consider this an out-of-season bonus for this final week of July before we start jumping into some recent PPVs that I’ve witnessed or am going to witness next month.

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WCW Fall Brawl 1999

(Breaking the kayfabe here a bit, but this was written before the passing of Hulk Hogan. It’s been left as is, so if you’re not in the mood for anything but positive Hulkster vibes, best skip this one. Also, was planning on having this up much later this month, but… well… anyhoo…)

I wish I could say that the banner had a typo… but it’s WCW circa 1999, so…

Apparently, I still have this on DVD-R… and this is a vintage recording too. One of the few PPVs that I recorded onto VHS and would later transfer to DVD-R once I got my own DVD Recorder. It’s a fun time to be had by all, I’m sure.

To be honest with you, I’m not quite sure why I felt compelled to pull this one out. I realize that I had just watched Road Wild 1999 and… maybe I needed to remind myself of how long this Hulkamania ’99 run was going to continue (spoiler: it lasts until Russo came into play), but I figured since I had a copy of this on-screen, I might as well give it a watch.

Note to self: please do not indulge these needless and oftentimes dangerous diversions for the sake of your own sanity.

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WCW Road Wild 1999

So here we are… the last WCW Road Wild PPV event from Sturgis… the last WCW biker rally PPV before Eric Bischoff was turfed from his role as WCW President and replaced by office accountant Bill Busch, who would bring it a couple blokes from WWF to head creative. And with WWF at an all-time high, it seemed like a good idea at the time… but we all know how that turned out and so I will spare you the bloody details… because they bare no relevance to Eric Bischoff’s last WCW show at a biker rally.

Listen, I’m going to refrain from the one positive about these shows – the outdoor setting, because at this point, it’s a broken record. Yes, it’s a neat visual for a wrestling show, and honestly I wish more shows these took place in these weird outdoor settings just for the visual variety – AEW being more likely to do this stuff, honestly – but after three years of WCW holding these shows at a biker rally before a largely apathetic crowd that didn’t give two fucks about this rasslin’ stuff unless it involved big, burly Americans or something didn’t exactly pan out. But Eric loves his motorbikes and they kept booking the show until he was no longer in power.

And also let’s be honest; this isn’t going to be a fair show.

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WCW/nWo Road Wild 1998

Yes, this is the one that you’re waiting for me to revisit, isn’t it?

The one with Jay “Big Jaw” Leno.

You know, contrary to past claims, I’m not quite as dreading this revisit. It’s been well over a decade since I last touch this thing. On the one hand, I don’t expect this to be a better show. If anything, I’m expect this to be as bad as I remember it.

On the other hand, though, I have seen considerably more WCW material in the past two years alone and certainly enough that I might have something more to add to this show longer after my last viewing. Does the additional exposure to WCW in recent time, thus making some of this stuff as fresh as it was back in the day, does that give me new appreciation for this show and perhaps see in softer eyes? Or is it the same old shit that I perceived it to be ages ago? Or… maybe it’s gotten worse?

Only one way to find out, I suppose.

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WCW Road Wild 1997

Once again, I’m revisiting a show that I already touched on just three years previously… but now I bring added thoughts and context, especially after having seen the prior month’s Bash At The Beach show as well as the 100th episode of Nitro that saw Lex Luger defeat Hollywood Hogan for the WCW World title.

To tell you the truth, there’s not a whole lot to this show that I could really add on a second viewing.

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WCW Hog Wild 1996

So we’re going to do something special this month?

Yes, I’ve already did musings on all these shows. Hell, I did musings for both this and Road Wild ’97 roughly THREE YEARS AGO and honestly, there’s not much that I could add in terms of context. However, I haven’t seen Road Wild 98 (the one with Jay “Big Jaw” Leno) in a decade and Road Wild 99 was last touched on in 2018… so I figured, why not give these things another watch with a fresh set of eyes.

So yes, the first event was called Hog Wild, but licensing concerns with the Harley Davison group prompted the next event to be called Road Wild. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the poster/VHS cover for this show, which prominently featured a red-and-yellow clad Hulkster flexing on his bike – something that would be a stark contrast to how Hogan would appear in this show.

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WCW Bash At The Beach 1997

Who wants to watch another WCW PPV with me?

Yeah, so it’s another Bash At The Beach show… this time, with Hollywood Hogan and Dennis Rodman teaming up against the Giant and Lex Luger. This was successful enough to warrant another Hogan/Rodman team up at the following year’s Bash show, which I do recall watching live. It was largely horrible. So I don’t know. I heard that this one was better, so why not give it a shot? (We’ll keep 98’s Beach Blast on reserve for now and go for another show next week… unless I end up in a foul mood between now and then.)

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WCW Bash At The Beach 1994

Why am I watching a show featuring Hulk Hogan?

Well, we’re looking at old WCW shows. It’s bound to happen anyway… and besides, I never actually SAW this show and it’s one of my DVD recordings from when WWE Network was a channel on TV that I could record stuff off of. And so here we are… so if this pops up on the WCW Youtube channel somewhere along the way, that’s probably the best way to check this show out because otherwise… eh…

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WCW Superbrawl IV

Before anyone asks, I have yet to watch the Double Or Nothing show, though I did get the replay and will probably do so this weekend. If I do, expect a write-up for next week. In the meantime, however, we’ve got another WCW PPV event from 1994 uploaded onto the free WCW YouTube channel… will wonders never cease? Well, they did if you’re watching this show, which is best served as a precursor to WCW’s later (and far better) Spring Stampede ’94 PPV event. Still, this one isn’t all bad, is it?

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