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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 15, 2024 8:00:54 GMT -5
...and here are my picks for April '66:
Amazing Spider-Man #36 Avengers #27 Atom #24
Brave and the Bold #65 Daredevil #15 Detective Comics #350
Fantastic Four #50 Green Lantern #44 Hawkman #13
Sgt. Fury #29 Strange Tales #144 Tales of Suspense #77 Tales to Astonish #79 Thor #127 X-Men #19
...all once again for 12 cents each, leaving 8 pennies to forward to next month's shopping spree. Sure wish my allowance was bigger, though, because it bwoke my widdle heart to leave Fantasy Masterpieces #2 and Flash #160 behind, not to mention various other Gold Keys and Charltons.
Cei-U! I summon the hankie!
I know what you mean! There are still plenty of comics I had to pass on. However, I have a suspicion that if I raised the allowance, there'd be people who would say it's too much. Oh well, I guess we all have to make some hard decisions in life.
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 14, 2024 10:25:48 GMT -5
Amazing Spider-Man #36 Avengers #27 Fantastic Four #50 Strange Tales #144 Tales of Suspense #77 Tales to Astonish #79 (Hulk vs. Hercules? I'm there) Thor #127 X-Men #19 Adventure Comics #343 (Legion makes this a must buy) Brave and the Bold #65 (Flash and the Doom Patrol team-up!!) Challengers of the Unknown #49 Detective Comics #350 (The Elongated Man backup has Green Lantern!) Flash #160 (25 cents but I have to have it! Barry Allen Flash, Jay Garrick Flash, Kid Flash, and Johnny Quick stories! Wow!) Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen #92 (some good Silver Age goofiness) Bonanza #19 Star Spangled War Stories #126 (simply for the gorilla cover) Since those Batman Pop-Tart Premium comics have no price listed, can I have them all or do I need to spend my allowance on Pop-Tarts for them? Hmmm...
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 14, 2024 10:08:28 GMT -5
Crap, I've fallen behind in the game. Look for a twofer later today. Cei-U! I summon the lollygagger! Looking forward to it!
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 14, 2024 10:07:53 GMT -5
I believe you’re right about Bret being the second wrestler to win the triple-crown. As you know, Diesel became the first guy to win all three championships in one year (1994). Ah, yes, Tito Santana. It’s a shame he couldn’t make WM X, I think he left the WWF around late 1993, the last televised bout I recall was him against Razor Ramon. Would have been nice to see him at WM X, dark match or otherwise. By the way, I did like the marketing post-WM X, such as the WrestleMania Revenge Tour. It sounds special, and I guess they couldn’t do it all of the time. Incidentally, wasn’t it around WM X - or after - when he WWF began marketing the “New Generation”? Looking back, it made me laugh a tad as Bret Hart was only slightly younger than Hogan, who would soon make his WCW debut. And then at King of the Ring ‘94, they gave us a main event of Roddy Piper vs. Jerry Lawler, with Piper being 40 at the time, and Lawler being 44. So not a great difference in age between them and WCW’s Hogan. WWF logic, eh? I think you're right about the "New Generation". It was either the Raw or Superstars right after WM X where I first heard them market that.
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 14, 2024 8:05:55 GMT -5
This is what I wrote about WM X a few weeks ago: As for your points, dbutler69 , good stuff about the ‘tenth anniversary’ (they did it again, e.g. the so-called ‘25th anniversary’ in 2009). The ladder match you are thinking of was between Bret and Shawn in July 1992, on WWF Wrestling Challenge. Good points about the coin toss. Good logic. Yes, the “loser” would indeed get himself disqualified or something, so as to keep fresh. Were you watching the WWF around the time of this PPV? If so, were you thinking about and expecting Hulk Hogan? Anyway, if you want to see that ten-man tag match, it’s on the videotape WWF Mania The Video. Not sure if it’s on the WWF/WWE Network. It sounds like your views on WM X and mine are very similar. And thanks for mentioning Paul Bearer’s Hits from the Crypt. I see it's available on Peacock, so I'll have to check it out. Thanks for reminding me of when that previous ladder match was! Yeah, in the back of my mind, I think I did sort of expect Hogan to show up. Not that I remember my thoughts from that long ago as well as you do, buit yes, it was odd not seeing him involved. On a lesser note, this was alsao the first WM without Tito Santana, though he was only in a dark match in the previous WM. I also meant to mention that, while I think Bret was the second person ever (after Pedro Morales) to have held the world championship, IC championship, and the tag team belt, I also think he is now the first person to be two-time champ for each of those honors. As far as the ten-man tag match, I just watched the Raw which was filmed live the day after WM, and Vince says that they will have that tag match in two weeks on Raw, so hopefullt that will actually happen. I'll also look for WWF Mania The Video, though.
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 14, 2024 7:56:23 GMT -5
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 13, 2024 15:13:27 GMT -5
I watched Wrestlemania X! The big setup here is that since Bret Hart and Lex Luger tied at Royal Rumble, they both get a shot at the title. Rather than do the logical thing and have a match between Hart and Luger (could have been on Raw or on the March to Wrestlemania X special that aired a week before this) they decided to have a mini-tournament. How ridiculously convoluted. Whoever “wins” the coin toss faces Yokozuna first, while the “loser” has to wrestle a worthy opponent. Then the “loser” faces the winner of the first championship match. I have winner and loser in quotes because, logically speaking, the “loser” has the better deal, as he only has to wrestle in one championship match. Since the “loser’s” match has no bearing on the championship the smart thing would be for the loser to lost that opening match quickly to stay fresh and healthy for the second championship match. Not that that’s going to happen, of course, but that would be the smart thing, if wrestlers weren’t all apparently dumb as bricks. Both championship matches will have guest referees, whose names haven’t been announced. By the way, Jerry Lawler is back from his “vacation” and is on commentary along with Vince McMahon. And by the way, McMahon and cohorts keep saying this is the tenth anniversary of Wrestlemania. Wrestlemania 1 was in 1985. It’s now 1994. That’s 9 years, Vince, not 10. Oh, and we’re in Madison Square Garden. Among the celebrities are Little Richard and Sy Sperling, president of the Hair Club for Men. Way to be hip, WWF! Conspicuous by his absence in this one is the Undertaker, who is apparently injured. Anyway, since Bret “lost” the coin toss, he faces Owen Hart in what has become the WWF’s hottest rivalry. Luger faces Yokozuna, then Bret faces the winner of that match. No surprise that Bret lost the coin toss – not that the con toss was fixed or anything! For some reason, the first match is the Harts rather than Luger-Yoko, which is even more of an advantage (on paper) for the “loser” as he has more time to rest for the second championship match. I thought they had even mentioned once that the Yoko match would happen before the match involving the “loser” of the coin toss, but I guess not. Again, we open with Bret Hart vs. Owen Hart. Wow, what can I say, great match. Best Wrestlemania opener ever? Too much to recount here, but fantastic back and forth match with Bret injuring his knee, risking his status for that championship match. Owen scores the upset when Bret (after about 20 minutes) goes for a Victory Roll but Owen blocks it and sits on top of Bret for the 1-2-3! Great storytelling, moves, and selling, and a lot of exciting nearfalls. One of the many cool moves was Bret suplexing Owen off the top rope, which wasn’t done much at that time. Unfortunately, there’s probably nowhere to go but down from here. Speaking of going down, the next match is Bam Bam Bigelow and Luna Vachon vs. Doink and Dink. Ugh, I’ve been dreading this match. I had half a mind to just fast forward through this but I decided to tough it out. It was bad enough when Doink turned face, then we lost Matt Borne then Steve Keirn, but bringing Dink on board was the last straw. Dink is insufferable! I have no problem with making things kid friendly, but come on. And I also hate mixed tag matches anyway. They keep talking about what a great technical and mat wrestler that Doink is, but that was Matt Borne (and to a lesser extent Steve Keirn) but not thus guy! I don’t even know who it is at this point. Steve Lombardi, maybe? Ray Apollo? Anyway, this match was actually not as bad as I expected. Not great, but watchable. Bam Bam won it for his team with a flying headbutt off the top onto Doink for the pin. Thank goodness Doink and Dink didn’t win. Next match is a Falls Count Anywhere match: Crush w/ Mr. Fuji Vs Randy Savage. These two have been feuding for a few months as Crush betrayed Savage and hooked up with Fuji. On Monday Night Raw a couple of weeks earlier, Crush cost Savage the championship when he charged in to cause a DQ just as Savage was pinning Yokozuna (in what was probably the best Yokozuna match that didn’t include Bret Hart) to add even more heat to this feud. There are two people waving Canadian flags during this match between two American wrestlers. Uh, okay. I didn’t really understand the rules of this match. They didn’t do a good job of explaining. It seems as though you have to pin your opponent outside the ring and make sure he doesn’t get back in within 60 seconds. Savage wins by pounding down Crush, pinning him, then hogtying him to a scaffolding. This was a pretty good match. Shorter than I expected, but brutal, certainly more so than most WWF matches of this era. Next is for the Women’s Title: Alundra Blayze (champ) vs. Leilani Kai. This match had no buildup. Blayze’s opponent wasn’t even named until a week or two before the match, and at this point I don’t think anybody has heard of Kai, but then again the WWF is just restarting the women’s division, so it’s going to take time. Consequently the crowd, who has been great so far, didn’t really care too much about this. Blayze wins with a bridging German suplex. This was a decent, and short match, but certainly nothing special. Blayze looked pretty good here but Kai is 44 years old and obviously past her prime, so they kept things basic. Kai wrestled in the first Wreslemania. So there you go. I can’t believe that they still haven’t gotten to the Yokozuna-Luger match. They really don’t want the winner of that one to get much rest before the final match, do they? Really weird. Next match is for the WWF Tag Team Championship: The Quebecers [champs] w. Johnny Polo vs. Men on a Mission. This was a decent match (one cool spot was when Jacques backdropped Pierre over the top rope onto Oscar on the floor), though the ending was awful and awkward, as the Quebecers got counted out. I’m not even sure which Quebecer was legal, but it didn’t really matter. Then, MoM were celebrating in the ring with the belts (refusing to give them up) like they were the new champs, which of course they weren’t. I hate when wrestlers act like they’ve won a championship when the clearly haven’t due to having won by DQ or countout. It just makes them look dumb. MoM did get a pretty good crowd reaction, though. The next match, finally, is for the WWE World Heavyweight Title: Yokozuna w/Mr. Fuji & Jim Cornette vs. Lex Luger.
I saw a “Lex Loser” sign in the crowd. Wow! Mr. Perfect (who was a babyface who hadn’t wrestled in a while due to injury) was the guest referee. This match was incredibly slow, mostly consisting of long rest holds. Yokozuna’s cardio is so bad. All the more reason this match should have happened much sooner. After a long 14 minutes or so of not much happening, Luger, who has tossed both Cornette and Fuji into the ring, knocks Yoko out with his bionic forearm, then goes to cover, but Mr Perfect isn’t counting. He’s trying to help Fuji and Cornette out instead. So Luger touches Perfect – barely – and Perfect disqualifies Luger. Obviously Luger is furious afterwards and confronts Perfect and this will obviously set up a feud between the two of them (meaning Perfect must be about to start wrestling again) so I guess this accomplished that. There was a loud “BS” chant after this match as the crowd obviously wasn’t too happy. Next match is Adam Bomb (w. Harvey Whippleman) vs. Earthquake. Earthquake recently returned to WWF and is still a babyface. Whippleman gets into a tussle with ring announcer Howard Finkel and Adam Bomb comes out and is about to rough up a terrified Finkel when Earthquaek runs out to the rescue, attacking Bomb from behind. The bell rings, and Earthquake, already with the advantage, finishes off Bomb in 32 seconds. Not much to discuss here, just a nearly record setting squash. Rather shocking, actually. Next is the Ladder Match for the Intercontinental Title: Shawn Michaels vs. Razor Ramon. I like how they set this up. Shawn Michaels was stripped of the Intercontinental title by Jack Tunney for not fulfilling his commitments, then Ramon won a battle royal and subsequent match vs. Rick Martel to become the new Intercontinental champ. When Michaels got reinstated, he insisted that he was still IC champ and carried around his own IC belt. Now, both his belt and Ramon’s belt are at stake in this ladder match, to decide the undisputed IC champ. The winner will have to take both belts from above the ring using the 8 ft ladder. As with the Savage-Crush match, there are no DQ’s here. Anyway, this is an all-time great match. Again, too many cool spots to mention. Razor gets the win when Shawn gets his foot, then his arm, stuck in the ropes and Razor is able to climb up and get the belts. Diesel had been ejected so he wasn’t there to help out. This was another brutal match, with the ladder of course being used as a weapon. I’ve read online reviews that claim that this was the first televised WWF ladder match, but I don’t think that’s true. I seem to recall one before this. My memory sucks, but I think it might have been Bret Hart vs. Razor Ramon and it might have been on Superstars of Wrestling, or something like that? Anyway, this was a fantastic match. Next we were supposed to have a 10 man tag team match but I guess they were running short on time and decided to skip it. They showed the heel team arguing about who should be the captain. That’s too bad, as I was looking forward to this. They’ve been showing one highlight from each of the previous 9 Wrestlemanias. For Wrestlemania 7, they showed that stupid, terrible blindfold match between Jake Roberts and Rick Martel.What? Are you effing kidding me? They showed that garbage instead of the Randy Savage-Ultmate Warrior retirement match followed by the reunion of Savage and Miss Elizabeth? Seriously? Okay, I know they’re divorced by this point, but still, they showed the worst moment from Wrestlemania 7. They could have done better. While I’m griping, Vince & co. have referred to this as the 10th anniversary of Wrestlemania, because it’s the 10th Wrestlemania, I guess. However, the first Wrestlemania was in 1985. It’s now 1994. That’s 9 years, Vince, not 10. Anyway, the final match is for the WWE World Heavyweight Title: Yokozuna (champ) vs. Bret Hart. The special guest referee is Rowdy Roddy Piper! Someone in the crowd had a “Hot Rod #1” sign. Hard to believe that in that pre-internet time someone knew who the guest referee would be, but that’s what it looked like to me. Bret Hart wins the championship when Yoko drags him over for the banzai drop, gloats a bit while standing on the middle turnbuckles, then slips and falls. Bret just gets out of the way then rolls up Yoko for the pin. Personally I thought it was a lame ending. The match was okay, but I wasn’t too crazy about it. After Yokozuna stormed off, a bunch of babyface wrestlers, starting with Lex Luger (and Bert Reynolds) came out to celebrate with Bret Hart, in a pretty cool moment. Overall, two spectacular matches and nothing that was really terrible, though nothing particularly memorable wither other than maybe the Savage-Crush match, so a pretty good Wrestlemania.
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 8, 2024 18:32:53 GMT -5
Fatty Arbuckle used the gag in Back Stage. Buster Keaton used it in One Week and Steamboat Bill Jr. Pretty sure it’s One Week that you saw. The plot revolves around the house kit as described. Yes, I believe it's One Week. Thanks!
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 8, 2024 12:59:04 GMT -5
I don't know if anybody here can help me with this, but I was watching part of a silent movie on YouTube maybe almost a year ago which I never got around to finishing (though I think it was under half an hour if I remember correctly), and I can't remember the name of it to try and find it again and finish it' and it's no longer in my view history. Again, it was a silent movie, I think it was Buster Keaton (though maybe it was Charlie Chaplin) and it's got a newlywed couple (Buster/Charlie/whoever is the husband) trying to build their own how from some kind of house building kit, and there's a scene (probably semi-famous) where he's standing there, and the front wall of the house falls over, and he's only saved from being crushed by the fact that he happens to be standing right where the cutout for the window falls. It's a really cool scene. I checked out both guys' credits on imdb.com and none of those titles rang a bell.
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 5, 2024 8:26:39 GMT -5
Thirty years ago today, Adam Bomb and Earthquake had a rematch that aired on Raw (although the event was taped in late March). It lasted under five minutes, but was better than the 35-second waste of airtime bout that they had at WM X. On that same Raw, the five-man tag match which was cut from WM X aired: Rick Martel, IRS, Jeff Jarrett and The Headshrinkers vs. Thurman "Sparky" Plugg, Tatanka, The 1-2-3 Kid and The Smoking Gunns. I'm up to February 1994 in my WWF viewing, so I'll be getting to this soon!
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 4, 2024 8:01:11 GMT -5
Amazing Spider-Man #35 Avengers #26 Fantastic Four #49 (Galactus!) Daredevil #14 Tales to Astonish #78 Thor #126 (Thor vs. Hercules!) X-Men #18 (Magnet, plus a floating head cover!) 3-D Batman #1 (50 cents is killing my budget, but I've got to have this) Adventure Comics #342 Justice League of America #43 Teen Titans #2 Green Lantern #43 (I'm picking this up because it guest stars the Flash, and I love superhero team-ups) Detective Comics #349 My cover of the month:
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 4, 2024 7:53:25 GMT -5
Yeah, it's also mind blowing that Demolition isn't in. Must be a political thing. I mean, come on, Koko B. Ware is in!
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 2, 2024 16:09:11 GMT -5
On this day 35 years ago, WrestleMania V aired on PPV, taking place at the the Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, New Jersey: Hulk Hogan won his second WWF World Heavyweight Championship, by defeating the Macho Man. It was a great match, although I believe the two had better matches than this one. The rest of the card was pretty good, too, including Intercontinental Champion Ultimate Warrior vs. Rick Rude, WWF Tag Team Champions Demolition vs. Mr. Fuji and The Powers of Pain, Mr. Perfect vs. The Blue Blazer, Jake Roberts vs. Andre the Giant (with Big John Studd as the guest referee), and The Rockers vs. The Twin Towers. I don’t believe every match needs a storyline behind it, certainly not on an undercard, whatever Vince Russo has to say. Sometimes, competition is enough, so other bouts here, like Brutus Beefcake vs, Ted DiBiase, were what they were. Roddy Piper returned to the WWF here, hosting a “Piper’s Pit”. His guest was Morton Downey Jr. (Brother Love gatecrashed proceedings). My match of the night was the tag team championship match. For over 8 minutes, Demolition and The Powers of Pain held nothing back, beating on each other in the most brutal and believable way. This is one of the best WMs. Speaking of matches on the undercard not needing a storyline behind it, Mr. Perfect vs. the Blue Blazer might have been my favorite match on the card! My only complaint is that it was too short.
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 2, 2024 16:05:06 GMT -5
I recently saw Superbrawl IV from 1994. Which apparently was for some reason never released on home video. I can hear driver1980 groaning right now. This WCW PPV is coming from Georgia (of course) and with Tony Schiavone, making his WCW PPV debut, is Bobby the Brain Heenan! Apparently this is Flair’s first job as a booker. The main event here is Flair vs. Vader for the WCW championship in a Thundercage match! The first match was supposed to be Johnny B. Badd vs. Michael Hayes, as they’ve recently started a rivalry (they were partners until Hayes attacked Badd). They introduce Badd with his music and his glitter gun and all that….Then Hayes comes out in a wheelchair pushed by his old teammate Jimmy Garvin, and Hayes and Garvin tell conflicting stories of how Hayes really wanted to wrestle Badd but he got hurt in the way in (reminiscent of what Lawler Pulled at Summerslam 1993 except that in this case apparently Hayes really is hurt) so the match is off. However, new Commish Nick Bockwinkle comes out and says that he’s looked through the old Freebirds contracts (which are still in force) and is Hayes can’t wrestle Badd, then Garvin (who hasn’t wrestled in 2 years and is now a commercial pilot – for real!) must wrestle him, or they will both be heavily fined. So, they have 45 minutes for Garvin to get ready. Apparently, they had to do this because Hayes had a legit injury and since WCW films things months in advance, they got railroaded into having a retired guy wrestle at a PPV. Okay, fine, but why bother wasting 5 minutes on the Badd entrance if you know the match isn’t going to happen and we’ll just have to do it again. Good ol’ WCW. So, now the first match is Harlem Heat (Kole & Kane) vs. Thunder & Lightning. Thunder & Lightning are a green, generic babyface team who haven’t been in WCW very long. Harlem Heat now sport their new, cool looking leather (or vinyl?) outfits. Harlem Heat win when Kane stomps Lightning in the head (unseen by the ref of course), allowing Kole to cover him for the win. The was a decent match. Kole, AKA Booker T, was the best part of it. It would be pretty weak otherwise. But anyway, this match was fine, if nothing special. Next match is Jungle Jim Steele vs. The Equalizer. Ugh. This match has NO business on a PPV! Jungle Jim is supposed to be a Tarzan gimmick (he sort of looks like a cross between Jimmy Snuka and the Ultimate Warrior) and he’s supposed to be from the jungle and his intro has animal sounds – including monkey – and they say he’s from…the Florida Everglades?! Oh, WCW! Jungle Jim hasn’t impressed yet in WCW but he’s still worlds better than the Equalizer. Jungle Jim wins with his closer, which I think is a Lou Thesz Press. Terrible match. Next match is Diamond Dallas Page (w. a Diamond Doll) vs. Terry Taylor. Both guys are back in WCW after a lengthy absence. I guess DDP had recently come back and was challenging wrestlers by pulling names out of a fishbowl, but every name he pulled was a retired guy. Finally Taylor called his bluff when his name was called, and accepted Page’s challenge. Taylor wins with a rollup, which surprised me. This was a decent match, though the crowd didn’t seem to care much. Perhaps because, like I said, these guys have been away from WCW for a while. Besides, whatever momentum Taylor had is long gone. Oh, and on his way out, Taylor shoves the Diamond Doll for no particular reason. Real nice, babyface. Next, we finally get that Johnny B. Badd vs. Jimmy Garvin (w. Michael Hayes on the entrance platform in a wheelchair) match. Badd wins the match with a nice looking sunset flip off the top rope. After the match, Badd goes over to the platform and threatens Hayes (the guy in a wheelchair) then Garvin jumps him from behind then throws him into the ring. Then Hayes tosses Garvin his boot and he clobbers Badd with it, and the heels go off, crowing. This was an okay match. Considering that Garvin hadn’t wrestled in 2 years, it cold have been worse. They worked the crowd but that doesn’t do much for the people watching on TV. Not a terrible match but not really PPV quality. This match was too long at 12 minutes and really dragged at times. Next is for the TV Championship with Lord Steven Regal (champ) w. Sir William vs. Arn Anderson. Regal wins when Arn goes for the sunset flip, but Regal sits on his chest, then holds onto Sir William’s umbrella for additional leverage, and the win with something like 6 seconds remaining in the match. Normally I enjoy Regal’s matches, but I thought this one was just plain boring. TV title matches are normally 15 minutes (and sometimes even 10 minutes) but for some reason they made this one 30 minutes, and it would have been a much, much better match if they’d kept it at 15 minutes (or at most, 20 minutes). It seemed like they were just stalling and going for the time limit draw. I’ll at least give them credit for going against the grain and tricking us by actually giving us a decision right at the end. I just wish I didn’t have to wait so long to get it. By the way, someone in the crowd was holding up an “Arn rules the world” sign so I’m guessing that that person her about the Sid Vicious stabbing incident somehow, way back in the pre-internet days. Next up is the Tag Team title match with the Nasty Boys vs. Cactus Jack and Maxx Payne. These two teams have had several battles recently, and they’ve been pretty good. No Missy Hyatt as she has left the company at this point and I think had sued WCW for sexual harassment. The match ends when Payne gets Knobbs in his finishing submission move, the Payne Killer (and armbar), then Sags hits him over the head (twice) with the guitar that the Nasty Boys had brought with them to the ring to mock Payne (who was a guitar player) so the Nasties lose by DQ but retain their belt. This will set up a no DQ match between these two teams at the next PPV, I think. This match was fun and brutal. Jack took a nasty bump off the apron onto the cement floor (the Nasties had pulled up the padding) but then doesn’t he in every match? How could that guy even remember his own name? Payne was very impressive here, too, suplexing guys and tossing them around like a Stainer at the beginning of the match, and to this point, Payne hadn’t really impressed me, but he showed me something here. These two guys make a good tag team. Too bad the Hollywood Blonds broke up, I love to see the tackle Jack & Maxx! Next is Thundercage match #1, a 6 man tag team match with Paul Orndorff, Rick Rude, and Steve Austin vs. Sting, Brian Pillman, and Dustin Rhodes. These guys have all sorts of feuds going on between the 6 of them. So here we go! Oh, the cage is a few feet away from the ring, so it doesn’t come into play as often as in a regular cage match, but don’t worry, guys definitely still got smashed into it! The good guys get the win when Sting picks up Pillman and throws him onto Austin for the pin. After the match, Rude slams the cage door on Sting’s face then gives him the Rude Awakening on the floor. Orndorff and Pillman both got opened up in this match. This was a very good match, with some ood heat segments, and the crowd was into it. At just under 15 minutes, maybe they should have made it longer (and shortened some of the other matches that were way too long) but overall an enjoyable match. The final match is the Thundercage between Flair (champ) and Vader (w. Harley Race) for the WCW championship match (no DQ’s, and Vader brought a chair with him!) and the Boss (AKA Big Bossman) is the special guest referee to bring “law and order” to WCW! The match was pretty good until the last couple of minutes, where it got pretty silly. Vader & Race manage to get the Boss handcuffed to the cage, then Race gets the key to the cage (the cage door had been locked at the beginning of the match so Race, and everybody else, couldn’t get in) then Race goes inside the cage and locks the door. And Vader and Race gang up on Flair. Arn Anderson and Ricky Steamboat frantically try to get inside the cage to help their buddy, to no avail. The Boss eventually breaks the cuffs, then he clips Vader I the knee with his nightstick, then Flair slaps on the Figure Four and Boss calls for the bell less than a second after the Figure Four was applied. Heenan kept saying over and over that Vader never quit, and he’s right. Boss ran the bell so quickly that Vader literally didn’t even have time to say I quit, plus I don’t think Boss even looked at Vader. It honestly looked more like he was calling for the bell due to a DQ, except that this was a no DQ match. Pretty good match but messy finish. Vader is furious after the match, terrifying the announcers, and I can’t say I blame him. Well, I guess this sets up a feud with him and the Boss now. Overall, I thought this a decent PPV. Well, average at best, really. I’m glad you’ve got to see this. Sorry you didn’t enjoy Arn/Regal that much. I did find it absorbing, and was engrossed, but I do remember some negative letters about it in one magazine published here, so I appreciate that its not for everyone. I was never 100% sure what was supposed to be special about “Thunderdome”. Ever. Or perhaps it was that WCW didn’t effectively hype it in the way the WWF did with Hell in a Cell. It just felt like Thunderdome was an afterthought. I thought the good bouts on here were good, others were solid, and the bad bouts didn’t ruin things. I had to get an imperfect copy of this in the late 90s because of WCW’s utter inconsistency with its home video releases. I’m pleased that the Boss/Vader shenanigans led to a heated feud between the two. In 1994, Sting seemed lost in the shuffle a tad. Or is it me? This PPV also shows how relentless and ever-changing wrestling was. When people watched Flair/Vader, did they ever suspect that five months later, Flair would be a heel, challenging Hulk Hogan, who had been synonymous with the WWF for so long? What's special about "Thunderdome" is...the name, I guess. I was thinking the same thing about Sting myself. He was the most popular wrestler at WCW, yet they seemed to move him down the card, which didn't make sense to me. That's WCW, though. Yeah, the Flair/Hogan stuff is a pretty amazing turnaround.
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Post by dbutler69 on Apr 1, 2024 16:05:38 GMT -5
I recently saw Superbrawl IV from 1994. Which apparently was for some reason never released on home video. I can hear driver1980 groaning right now.
This WCW PPV is coming from Georgia (of course) and with Tony Schiavone, making his WCW PPV debut, is Bobby the Brain Heenan!
Apparently this is Flair’s first job as a booker.
The main event here is Flair vs. Vader for the WCW championship in a Thundercage match!
The first match was supposed to be Johnny B. Badd vs. Michael Hayes, as they’ve recently started a rivalry (they were partners until Hayes attacked Badd). They introduce Badd with his music and his glitter gun and all that….Then Hayes comes out in a wheelchair pushed by his old teammate Jimmy Garvin, and Hayes and Garvin tell conflicting stories of how Hayes really wanted to wrestle Badd but he got hurt in the way in (reminiscent of what Lawler Pulled at Summerslam 1993 except that in this case apparently Hayes really is hurt) so the match is off. However, new Commish Nick Bockwinkle comes out and says that he’s looked through the old Freebirds contracts (which are still in force) and is Hayes can’t wrestle Badd, then Garvin (who hasn’t wrestled in 2 years and is now a commercial pilot – for real!) must wrestle him, or they will both be heavily fined. So, they have 45 minutes for Garvin to get ready. Apparently, they had to do this because Hayes had a legit injury and since WCW films things months in advance, they got railroaded into having a retired guy wrestle at a PPV. Okay, fine, but why bother wasting 5 minutes on the Badd entrance if you know the match isn’t going to happen and we’ll just have to do it again. Good ol’ WCW.
So, now the first match is Harlem Heat (Kole & Kane) vs. Thunder & Lightning. Thunder & Lightning are a green, generic babyface team who haven’t been in WCW very long. Harlem Heat now sport their new, cool looking leather (or vinyl?) outfits. Harlem Heat win when Kane stomps Lightning in the head (unseen by the ref of course), allowing Kole to cover him for the win. The was a decent match. Kole, AKA Booker T, was the best part of it. It would be pretty weak otherwise. But anyway, this match was fine, if nothing special.
Next match is Jungle Jim Steele vs. The Equalizer. Ugh. This match has NO business on a PPV! Jungle Jim is supposed to be a Tarzan gimmick (he sort of looks like a cross between Jimmy Snuka and the Ultimate Warrior) and he’s supposed to be from the jungle and his intro has animal sounds – including monkey – and they say he’s from…the Florida Everglades?! Oh, WCW!
Jungle Jim hasn’t impressed yet in WCW but he’s still worlds better than the Equalizer. Jungle Jim wins with his closer, which I think is a Lou Thesz Press. Terrible match.
Next match is Diamond Dallas Page (w. a Diamond Doll) vs. Terry Taylor. Both guys are back in WCW after a lengthy absence. I guess DDP had recently come back and was challenging wrestlers by pulling names out of a fishbowl, but every name he pulled was a retired guy. Finally Taylor called his bluff when his name was called, and accepted Page’s challenge. Taylor wins with a rollup, which surprised me. This was a decent match, though the crowd didn’t seem to care much. Perhaps because, like I said, these guys have been away from WCW for a while. Besides, whatever momentum Taylor had is long gone. Oh, and on his way out, Taylor shoves the Diamond Doll for no particular reason. Real nice, babyface.
Next, we finally get that Johnny B. Badd vs. Jimmy Garvin (w. Michael Hayes on the entrance platform in a wheelchair) match. Badd wins the match with a nice looking sunset flip off the top rope. After the match, Badd goes over to the platform and threatens Hayes (the guy in a wheelchair) then Garvin jumps him from behind then throws him into the ring. Then Hayes tosses Garvin his boot and he clobbers Badd with it, and the heels go off, crowing. This was an okay match. Considering that Garvin hadn’t wrestled in 2 years, it cold have been worse. They worked the crowd but that doesn’t do much for the people watching on TV. Not a terrible match but not really PPV quality. This match was too long at 12 minutes and really dragged at times.
Next is for the TV Championship with Lord Steven Regal (champ) w. Sir William vs. Arn Anderson. Regal wins when Arn goes for the sunset flip, but Regal sits on his chest, then holds onto Sir William’s umbrella for additional leverage, and the win with something like 6 seconds remaining in the match.
Normally I enjoy Regal’s matches, but I thought this one was just plain boring. TV title matches are normally 15 minutes (and sometimes even 10 minutes) but for some reason they made this one 30 minutes, and it would have been a much, much better match if they’d kept it at 15 minutes (or at most, 20 minutes). It seemed like they were just stalling and going for the time limit draw. I’ll at least give them credit for going against the grain and tricking us by actually giving us a decision right at the end. I just wish I didn’t have to wait so long to get it.
By the way, someone in the crowd was holding up an “Arn rules the world” sign so I’m guessing that that person her about the Sid Vicious stabbing incident somehow, way back in the pre-internet days.
Next up is the Tag Team title match with the Nasty Boys vs. Cactus Jack and Maxx Payne. These two teams have had several battles recently, and they’ve been pretty good. No Missy Hyatt as she has left the company at this point and I think had sued WCW for sexual harassment.
The match ends when Payne gets Knobbs in his finishing submission move, the Payne Killer (and armbar), then Sags hits him over the head (twice) with the guitar that the Nasty Boys had brought with them to the ring to mock Payne (who was a guitar player) so the Nasties lose by DQ but retain their belt. This will set up a no DQ match between these two teams at the next PPV, I think.
This match was fun and brutal. Jack took a nasty bump off the apron onto the cement floor (the Nasties had pulled up the padding) but then doesn’t he in every match? How could that guy even remember his own name? Payne was very impressive here, too, suplexing guys and tossing them around like a Stainer at the beginning of the match, and to this point, Payne hadn’t really impressed me, but he showed me something here. These two guys make a good tag team. Too bad the Hollywood Blonds broke up, I love to see the tackle Jack & Maxx!
Next is Thundercage match #1, a 6 man tag team match with Paul Orndorff, Rick Rude, and Steve Austin vs. Sting, Brian Pillman, and Dustin Rhodes. These guys have all sorts of feuds going on between the 6 of them. So here we go!
Oh, the cage is a few feet away from the ring, so it doesn’t come into play as often as in a regular cage match, but don’t worry, guys definitely still got smashed into it!
The good guys get the win when Sting picks up Pillman and throws him onto Austin for the pin. After the match, Rude slams the cage door on Sting’s face then gives him the Rude Awakening on the floor.
Orndorff and Pillman both got opened up in this match. This was a very good match, with some ood heat segments, and the crowd was into it. At just under 15 minutes, maybe they should have made it longer (and shortened some of the other matches that were way too long) but overall an enjoyable match.
The final match is the Thundercage between Flair (champ) and Vader (w. Harley Race) for the WCW championship match (no DQ’s, and Vader brought a chair with him!) and the Boss (AKA Big Bossman) is the special guest referee to bring “law and order” to WCW!
The match was pretty good until the last couple of minutes, where it got pretty silly. Vader & Race manage to get the Boss handcuffed to the cage, then Race gets the key to the cage (the cage door had been locked at the beginning of the match so Race, and everybody else, couldn’t get in) then Race goes inside the cage and locks the door. And Vader and Race gang up on Flair. Arn Anderson and Ricky Steamboat frantically try to get inside the cage to help their buddy, to no avail. The Boss eventually breaks the cuffs, then he clips Vader I the knee with his nightstick, then Flair slaps on the Figure Four and Boss calls for the bell less than a second after the Figure Four was applied. Heenan kept saying over and over that Vader never quit, and he’s right. Boss ran the bell so quickly that Vader literally didn’t even have time to say I quit, plus I don’t think Boss even looked at Vader. It honestly looked more like he was calling for the bell due to a DQ, except that this was a no DQ match. Pretty good match but messy finish. Vader is furious after the match, terrifying the announcers, and I can’t say I blame him. Well, I guess this sets up a feud with him and the Boss now.
Overall, I thought this a decent PPV. Well, average at best, really.
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