WCW Review: The Great American Bash , 1991

The Great American Bash , 1991

Well, I've put it off long enough. Time to hold our noses and dive into a WCW Pay-Per-View. 

I'm taking us back the fateful year of 1991, as the tactical genius known as Jim Herd was running WCW. Two weeks before The Great American Bash, Herd stripped Ric Flair of his WCW title and declared it vacant, Flair's crime that warranted this punishment?

Dropping the belt to Lex Luger. Oh, and refusing the shave his head and start playing a gladiator called "Spartacus". At a reduced pay rate. While being dropped from the main event spot.

Flair was in WWF so fast he must have left a dust trail out of Georgia.

He also left with the WCW title belt, as business genius Herd refused to pay back the $25,000+interest deposit Flair had paid for it.

And so, two weeks later, WCW put on a pay-per-view in front of a... well, let's say, DISPLEASED audience. 

We are LIVE from The Baltimore Arena! And is that a scaffold I see before me? 

Yes, it is. It's The "Skywalkers II" match. Oddly, I started reviewing Starrcade '86 recently, which had the original "Skywalkers" scaffold match. Before realising that thing ran FOUR hours. I'll start with this three-hour show as a warm-up before I get back that Starrcade.

The rules of this match... capture your opponents flag or knock an opponent off the scaffold and hope he doesn't blow out both quads on the landing. Team one arrives and to my eyes it's an out-of-work stuntman and DJ Man-el Toe. Some dudes should NOT wear spandex.


Can we get this man some roomy jeans? A kilt? ANYTHING?

Okay, It's "The Rapmaster" P.N News and "Beautiful" Bobby. So 50% of the Midnight Express is teamed with 100% of everything that was wrong with the 90's. I have a bad feeling with that.

Their opponents... well, there's a familiar face! "Stunning" Steve Austin. His partner... oh, dear lord. "The Computerised Man of the 1990's", Terrance Taylor". Did people just DELIGHT in handing Terry stupid fucking gimmicks? 

Jim Ross and Tony Schivonne stall for time as P.N News climbs the scaffold. It's not the most graceful thing I've ever seen. Terry and Steve stall for time on the floor, presumably trying to extend their careers a few minutes longer. They finally start to ascend and JESUS, that thing is wobbling all over the place. You could not pay me enough to fuck around up there. 

It's also a single piece of wood that's too narrow for the match. Planning!

Bobby heads onto the scaffold to confront Terry, who instantly drops, hugs and crawls back to Steve. Guessing no flying headscissors or dropkicks in this one.


Terry Taylor searches for his lost dignity


Steve and Bobby play hand-tag and trade VERY cautious punches. Rapmaster Hungry Hungry Hippo heads out, making the heels scamper away. In a HORRIFYING moment, he gently lays Terry down and crawls slowly on top of him.


*saxaphone music*

I go pour some Glayva to wash away that particular image.

Slugfests break out at both ends of the scaffold. Steve hits, and I quote "Some kind of takedown". Bobby grabs the flag, and casually wanders back across to win. I think. Steve gets some hairspray off Lady Blossom and sprays both Bobby and News. This causes them to wander around for a few seconds, and then everyone climbs down.

Rating: 0.00 Skywalkers. That was NOT a good start to a show. Terry even hops in the ring to get hiptossed for no reason other than to give the fans SOMETHING.

Tony and Bobby chitchat for a while, giving the ring crew time to tear down the scaffold. Also allowing the crowd to start audibly booing in the background as they mention the Lex Luger/Barry Wyndham main event. Tony verbally buries Ric Flair and throws to your friend and his, Eric Bischoff, who's with Paul E. Dangerously and Arn Anderson.

Coming up, Paul E and Arn get in a cage against Rick Steiner and Missy Elliot. Uhm, Hyatt! Paul E's mullet rates a solid 8 on the John Stamos-o-meter. 


He'd pay SO much to have this hair today

More chitchat. The scaffold match was SUCH a great idea, huh? Later tonight, a Russian Chain Match! Yes, we need MORE gimmicks! El Gigante vs. The One Man Gang. Can't WAIT for that one. 

FINALLY we're ready for our second match. So low-budget pyro for Diamond Dallas Page, still in his manager days. He represents The Diamond Studd, who we know SLIGHTLY better as Scott "Razor Ramon" Hall. He appears to have forgotten half his costume, wearing about 3/4 of a pair of sparkly overalls, a black smoking jacket and no shirt. DDP looks like a 4th of July shop window display come to life.


"And the pyyyyyyro's faint glare/Dear God, look at Scott's hair..."

DDP steals Rick Rude's gimmick, bringing a woman in form the crowd to de-pants The Studd. Yes, he DOES call her "toots", great guess! The woman "pulled directly from the audience" is so obviously a paid model I nearly dislocated a cornea with my eye-roll. 

His opponent, "The Z-Man", who I know as Tom Zenk of the WWF's Can-Am Connection. Admittedly, I only know that from his one appearance at Wrestlemania 3. He brings some ladies with him, and jumpstarts the match with a leaping clothesline into the ring. DDP low-bridges him to the outside where The Studd tosses him into the crowd. There's a woman there cradling a TINY baby in the front row. Yep, that's some spectacular parenting right there.


Yes, there WILL be many screencaps of entrances, as the matches themselves offer very little to look at

DDP is somehow managing to steal from Rude, Hogan AND Heenan by this stage some punch-and-kick offense is exchanged. The Studd puts on the abdominal stretch with heel-y rope leverage. There's a dude who I can only assume is a Redneck Freddy Mercury impersonator in the front row having a frank exchange of ideas with DDP by now. 

The Studd hits the world's lowest chokeslam and works over the Z-Man, eventually running into a feather-light karate kick. Zenk hits a top-rope dropkick, so DDP gets in his face. Z-Man grabs him, making Freddy Redneck spring out of his seat like he hit the ejector button. Glad SOMEONE is enjoying this.

Zenk hits DDP with the "Combat Kick", which I can only describe as a "Mediocre Kick", then walks into a back suplex. The Studd gets the pinfall.

Rating: 0.5 Radio Gagas.

Next up, the OTHER half of a future tag team you might remember. Accompanied by "The Great Wizard" (and yes, I'm glad they went with "great" or this would be REALLY awkward), and appearing from out of a painted backdrop the local amateur theatre company would be quite pleased with... OZ!


Hes behiiiiiiind youuuuuu!

Or as he's now know... Kevin Nash. 

What the fuck am I looking at? Big Kev's dressed like an Arabian wizard, has a mask and huge beard, and comes out to wailing guitars and a bass line that is stolen note for note from "Another One Bites the Dust". 


"Just think of the paycheck, Kev..."

He's up against Ron Simmons, who just comes out to generic rock with no pyro. And looks like a complete badass in doing so. 

He's not missing much, as everyone's pyro is frigging pathetic for this show. Not to mention that everyone except Nash has to walk out, wait in full view of the crowd on a raised spot and then start their entrance once the camera is on them. Or more often, after the camera has lingrred on them standing awkwardly for a LONG time.

This is amateur hour.

The lights are now up properly, allowing me to see that Nash.. sorry, Oz... has powder-grey hair, which contrasts beautifully with his lime-green tights. Without the and cloak, Oz has become an overly-flamboyant pirate. I'm just thinking about how nothing of notes has happened in the first three or four minutes when a catcall of "Booooooooorrrrrrriiiing!" comes across the microphones so clearly it almost drowns out Tony. Then another. Simmons clotheslines Oz in the right pec, then backs up and hits him again. "Boring" guy gets in one more heckle before a third clothesline knocks Oz out. 

Oz heads straight back in for a test of strength, which I'm sure one fan fucking loved. He controls the pace (which is slow) for a while, hitting a side suplex that sends Ron out. The Great Wizard runs in an kicks him in the ribs. Magic!

Simmons dropkicks Oz and hits three football tackles in a row for the pin. Well, that came out of nowhere.

Rating: 0.05 Ruby Red BORRRRINGs. This is sucking my will to live, and there's two full hours to go.

Next up, the Rock 'n' Roll Express EXPLODE as Morton takes on Gibson! If we're lucky. 

We're never that lucky, are we.

Time for Robert Gibson vs. Richard Morton. Richard? Fucking RICHARD? Why the fuck would you change Ricky Morton's name? (Because WCW, or course)

Anyway, he's got Alexandra York with him, who went on to be Terri Runnels. Here she looks like a power-dressed Yeardley Smith. The Rock 'n' Rollers meet in the aisle and kick things off a high pace. Then stop and stall for ages. Ricky is playing heel, which seems arse-backwards to me. He bails, stalls again, then finally gets the upper hand by raking the eyes and posting Robert dick-first into the post. Surprised that didn't break the post if Jim Cornette's stories about the Rock 'n' Roll are accurate.

Ricky works the knee until Robert rolls him up for a two-count from referee Bill Alphonso. Morton goes back to the knee, which was supposedly injured by Butch Reed and Ron Simmons the previous year. Morton has said it was actually a result of Roberts wife hitting him with a car. 

Wikipedia doesn't mention if that was an accident. With these guys reputations, I suspect not.

The match has slowed to walking pace, with a LONG figure-four/reversed figure four spot. Way to break up a classic tag team and then fuck up the blow-off match, WCW. Jim Ross mentions he thought it'd be a 'catch-as-catch-can" match. I'm taking that to mean he thought it'd be interesting. FINALLY a DDT from Gibson stops the ten-minutes of knee-based offense. Ricky steps away from a dropkck and starts working the leg again. Where's Boring Guy when I need him.


Four days later....

Ricky goes up and gets slammed, then helps out a little by letting Robert hit an enziguri. Alexandra York distracts the ref, allowing Ricky to grab a tiny 90's computer. Ricky jumps off the top rope and boops Robert on the shoulder with it. Somehow this wafer-thin international object is able to knock Robert out cold for the win after SEVENTEEN FUCKING MINUTES OF BULLSHIT.

Rating: I'll let you know when I wake up from the boredom-induced coma.

We're already at a point where it seems there's two types of wrestlers on this card. Veterans who are half-assing it in protest of Herd's BS and new guys either green as grass or struggling with horrible gimmicks. 

Next up, it's a six-may Elimination tag. Dustin Rhodes and the Young Pistols (Steve Armstrong & Tracey Smothers) make up the faces. The Young Pistols are the first, and probably last team of cowboys I've seen wearing sparkly gold jackets. Dustin cuts a promo, doing a scarily accurate impression of his old man. I don't ever think I've heard him aping Dusty so closely. 


He's also fascinated with something on the ceiling

Their opponents come out first, and it's 2/3rds of The Fabulous Freebirds (Michael "P.S" Hayes and Jimmy Garvin) along with "Badstreet", who's gimmick is "Brad Armstrong in a mask". Much strutting ensues from Hayes and Garvin, Dustin bodyslams the Freebirds and delivers Atomic Elbows all round. Wow, they wwere REALLY trying to make him Dusty 2.0 at this point. 


Jimmy Garvin, happiest man in Baltimore that day.

Garvin , as usual, cheats like a mofo with a knee in Dustin's back, Dustin shrugs it off and continues elbowing everyone. The Pistols clear the ring with flying shoulderblocks off the top. More stalling. The Freebirds start a mid-match posedown. Tracey whiffs on a dropkick and tags in Armstrong, who waits on the top rope for an ETERNITY until Badstreet gets in the right position to be taken out. Stallfest '91 continues. 

The heels manage to get Smothers on the floor for a spot of physical abuse, then continually kick him off the apron. Garvin plays to the camera between moves. His dickish heel act was a LOT better at Starrcade '86 for me. Chinlock helps the match grind to a halt as the crowd noise fades slowly to near-silence. Hayes gets backdropped, allowing Steve to make the tag to ZERO reaction from the fans. Everyone pairs off until Badstreet and Hayes hit Steve with a double-DDT and eliminate him. THAT gets a pop. Too bad it was for the heels! 

Hayes back body drops Smothers out, and because this is 1991 WCW, gets disqualified. The fans boo. I'm not sure this is going the way the booker intended. The ref misses a tag from Dustin and has to shoo him out, allowing Badstreet and Garvin to hit another double-DDT to get rid of Smothers. Dustin INSTANTLY hits a lariat on Garvin and it's down to one-on-one.

Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but shouldn't the heels have had a FEW seconds to use their weight of numbers? Badstreet slams Dustin but gets caught off the top rope. Lariat and of course Randy Anderson is tied up with the heel manager. Dustin gets the win ten seconds later with a bulldog. The fans at least cheer for that.

Rating: 1.5 Dusty Rhodes Imitators.

Half-way there. Hoping for a match that surprises the FUCK out of me.

Next: The Yellow Dog (w/adorable doggo) vs. Johnny B. Badd.

Seriously, what the fuck is this shit? A yellow-masked luchadore, announced from "The Kennel Club", along with a dog simply called "Man's Best Friend". Was this written by a bunch of five-year-olds?


DOGGO!

The match is for the mask, and the announcers are thinking that's Flyin' Brian Pillman under the hood. Oh good, so it's an angle, not yet another stupid-ass gimmick.I fucking hope it's Pillman, becuase at least I might get a half-decent attempt at at match.

Oh right, I forgot he's wrestling Johnny B. Badd, who has one Theodore Long with him. It's pretty early in his career, but he's gone Hurricane Force Five on his outfit at least. 


It's Count Campula!

And then the feed cuts out and we're left with just the commentary for a few seconds. When it comes back, it's now horribly overexposed. God bless live TV in the 90's. 

A few basic moves into the match, Johnny shows just how green he is, literally standing still with his arms out waiting for Yellow Dog to hit a crucifix. Then kind of slumps into the move, which looks AWFUL. Johhny blindsides Dog on the floor and goes to work with sad punches and backrakes. Back inside, Yellow Dog lays in HARD chops, Badd respondes with limp-wristed slaps. He's also calling spots REALLY loud. This is uglier than Vader in a tanning bed.

He finally gets a nice-looking top-rope sunset flip and tries to take Dog's mask off. Umm, if you pin him, he HAS to take it off, dimwit! The Dog hits a back suplex and spinning karate kick on Johnny B. Broomstick. He covers, then has to rapidly reposition himself so that Teddy can come in to cause the DQ. Air Pillman on Long pops the crowd for the first time in the match, Badd taps Pilm.. uh, The Dog, who flings himself to the floor. This is the very definition of wrestling yourself.

Rating: 0.5 Cute Doggos. This match needed to be put to sleep.

Backstage, Eric Bischoff sleazes around Missy Hyatt's locker room, and decides to interview her while she's in the shower. He gets pelted with shampoo bottles instead. Fuck me, now even the comedy bits are verging on negative stars.


Komedy

Okay, is there ANY chance this next match will be good.

Lumberjack Match: Black Blood vs. Big Josh

Well, that answered that question real fucking quick, didn't it?

Time to broach the Redbreast 12-year-old and take a quick review break.

Josh (from "The North Woods", because no-one on WCW had a real hometown in 1991) gets brought to the ring by a bevy of ring girls. Sadly, they're not the lumberjacks. 


He's in here somewhere, if you care

Black Blood (from "A Little Town in France", because fucked if we're taking the time to look up an actual French town) is... a medieval executioner. Who wears a wrestling mask UNDER his executioners hood.


Somewhere, a Ren Faire is missing one of the crew

I'm really fucking confused right now. 

Black Blood tosses Josh a few times, so Josh forearms him and hits a dropkick, which is one dropkick more than I though I'd see in this match, "You can really hear the impact!" Ross says of some chops. Yes, because the crowd is DEAD! They go in an out a few more times, and time now seems to be going backwards. The lumberjacks start a brawl, and for about five seconds the crowd gets animated. Meanwhile, Josh and Blood are having what could be charitably called "deliberately-paced" match in the ring.

The fight breaks out on the floor again, Blood goes for his axe, so Dustin nails him with an ACTUAL axe-handle. Josh rolls him up for the pin after exactly four minutes and forty seconds of sweet fuck all.


So if this wasn't a lumberjack match, Josh would have been beheaded? Best. Ref. Ever.

Ratings: I barely care enough to type the word "rating", let alone actually rate this shit. 

Oh, and next up, El Gigante vs. The One Man Gang. Joy, two immobile monsters to follow two immobile monsters. Fuck you, Jim Herd.

The One Man Gang is first out, giving me chance to see his WCW look. It's half post-apocalyptic Biker, part exploded-hairdo Ian MacShane. Kevin Sullivan is his manager, who has gone for "Stoned off my tits bondage fan" tonight. He cuts an insane promo while Gang giggles and screams. 


So, this happened

El Gigante turns up, and it's hard to recognise him without the air-brushed fursuit WWF gave him,

He's also carrying a dwarf on one shoulder, and has three others coming out to ringside with him. One is dressed like Kevin Sullivan. Hoping that this will be the stupidest thing I witness tonight, but I'm not confident about that.


Yes, you're tall. We get it.

After some dwarven comedy, El Gigante starts his usual offense of roundhouse slaps to the back. He manages to KIND of hit a hiptoss and Jim Ross pretty much apologises for him being as green as Shrek's testicles. Gang hits a top-rope clothesline, and El Gigante sells like Boris Karloff in Frankenstein. Except Karloff could act.

Gang uses a wrench to work over El Gigante, and it sounds like they're wrestling in a library. The small child in the front row is getting REALLY restless now, and I don't blame her. Gang hits the "747"(a splash) and only gets two. El G. hits a suplex, nearly breaking Gangs hip in the process. Sullivan hands Gang powder, El G. kicks in his face and nails him with a clothesline to the back of the head for the win. Thank god that's over.

Rating: 0.00 Rusty Wrenches. Only because I don't use negative items. if I did, WCW owes me at LEAST three rusty wrenches.

Since we haven't had enough gimmick matches, it looks like the Russian Chain Match is next. Koloff vs. Sting.

Yep, take a nice mobile wrestler like Sting and chain him the human anchor that is Nikita Koloff. Amazing planning.

Not a lot to recap at the start of this, as both guys wander around the ring, ramming each other into the barricades. Until something interesting happens, I'll just type some of my favourite words.

Truculent. Xylophone. Subatomic.

Oh, there we go, Stinger drags Koloff into the ringpost.

Hmmm... Tuxedo. Cocktail. 

Snore. Boredom.

Wait, they're not favourite words, that's what my wife is saying about this match. 

Even Redneck Freddy Mercury is now sitting down looking glum. You have ruined this mans night, Herd!

My wife is now making unkind remarks about the size of Stings manhood. Should I rewind back to show her Ricky Morton?

They have a race to the buckles, touching three each. Randy Anderson gets in Koloffs way for no reason, Sting tries to vault him, and Koloff gets pushed into the corner to touch the buckle and win. 

Rating: 0:25 Former Russian Republics.

Post-match, Sting beats up Koloff and there's more action in this one minute period than in the entire match.

Two matches to go, both in Steel Cages. So we'll need Jim and Tony to chat a bit as they construct it. To offer a TINY bit of praise, Jim and Tony have been pretty solid on commentary. Even when they've had nothing to talk about.

By which I mean "All fucking night".

Such as now as they talk about Lex Lugers past, ignoring the steadily-growing chant of "WE WANT FLAIR!" that's suddenly started behind them. The now talk about Windham as this padding reaches epic length. It HAS to be longer than several of our matches.

FINALLY Barry Windham is introduced. Should point out this means the WCW title match is going to be followed by a match with Paul E. Dangerously in it. No-one in this joint knew what they were doing. Lex heads out to the same sub-par fireworks everyone else got. The "WE WANT FLAIR!" chants start again. The director decides to pan the crowd, so we also get that chant in Pissed-Off Fan-Vision.

Luger appears to have stolen a pair of Hogan's gold underwear for the occasion, so that's nice for him. It's a slow start s they pause for a staredown after every move. Shoulderblock. Stare-down. Dropkick. Stare-down. Small package. In a cage match. Staredown. *sigh*

Backdrop. Staredown.

"WE WANT FLAIR!"

Luger reverses a suplex.

Staredown.

Luger kicks out of an attempted figure-four and I just BET you can guess what happens next. Even Jim Ross is starting to repeat facts about Luger's football career. The match has been going about five minutes and neither guy has got out of first gear. Luger slaps on a sleeper hold. Barry powers out and puts one of his own on.

The steel cage has been completely pointless so far. It's also tiny, the top of it being about three inches higher than the top of Windhams head. He goes up top and misses and elbowdrop. Dude, you could literally have stepped over the thing. (Despite all the talking before this match, I'm not even sure if escaping the cage gets you the title, of course.)

Luger hits a powerslam, and the director manages to find the two guys in the arena who are actually enjoying themselves. Torture Rack from Luger, Windham escapes about nine seconds. Windham hits a top-rope lariat and bodydrops him as the Network starts freezing up for me repeatedly. STOP MAKING THIS LAST LONGER!

Top-rope dropkick (only just) connects and gets 2 for Windham as Harley Race and Mr Hughes wander down the aisle. Harley gives Luger a one-second pep-talk, Lex acts like he's been shot full of adrenaline, instantly hitting a piledriver for the win and the title.

[Future Kiwi] That's not how you sell a heel turn, WCW. I didn't even KNOW it was supposed to be one until I looked this match up online afterwards.

Rating: Not a fucking thing. That was slow, painful and DIDN'T USE THE CAGE ONCE! It was also less than seven minutes long. 

Lex immediately vacates the scene with his title, barely even celebrating. Can't blame him.


"Anyone want see me wear this tiny belt until Flair gives back the real one? No? Cool."

And now, our purported Main Event, Arn Anderson & Paul E. Dangerously vs Missy Hyatt & Rick Steiner. 

A pair of Dicks (Murdoch and Slater) head to ringside before the bell has even rung. That's got to be a record of some sort. They proceed to kidnap Missy Hyatt and strat dragging her back to the locker room. (Briefly stopping so that some dickhead fan can try to help out. Points for being a white-knight, although he came within INCHES of getting knocked the fuck out by the Dicks)

[FUTURE KIWI] Amazingly, this was because WCW forgot to check if Baltimore allowed mixed-gender matchers. They didn't at the time. PLANNING!

So it's now a handicap match, as Paul cowers in a corner and screams. Some dude is now holding up an actual "We Want Flair" speech bubble sign. 


You and me both, buddy

Steiner KO's Arn ninety seconds in. (Oh, get the fuck out of here)

He then clotheslines Paul and pins him in around two minutes and eight seconds by my watch. 

Rating: What, are you fucking kidding me?

And in a great summation of the night, Rick simply walks out of the cage and is half-way down the aisle by the time we go back to Jim to try to sum up this abomination of a night. They set off some fireworks and fade out, presumably as the line of people demanding refunds forms at the box office.

Final Thoughts: I'd read reviews of this shemozzle over the last ten years or so, and yet nothing prepared me for how half-assed, yet awful this was. Come back, Wrestlemania 9, all is forgiven.