WCW Review: Nitro, April 10th, 2000
WCW NITRO-Ooh Look, a Shark! Let's Jump It!
So far, the WCW Nitros I have reviewed has been god-awful (September 2000), okay (summer 1999) and just plain dull. (late 1999)
So lets go to the point where it looks like things changed from "failing company" to "Oh shitshitshit, no-one knows what the fuck they're doing!"
April 10th, 2000. The WWE Network description promises "A New Era of WCW!". The last era, as it would turn out.
We open with the actual titles for once. Refreshing change. We are in Denver, Colorado. Tony is having a voice-gasm, promising us a LANDMARK occasion! A new dawning in the history of pro-wrestling! Yes, I think he's promising THE GREATEST NIGHT IN SPORTS ENTERTAINMENT HISTORY!
Which is why one of the first people we see is David fucking Flair, staring at the lights and looking like a pod person.
"Mmmm... butter"
We pan a shit-ton of wrestlers in the ring, and I couldn't name half of these guys without help. Okay, Chris Candido and The Cat, know those two. Lash Leroux, Virgil/Vincent, got it. Meng/Haku, wearing a formal shirt, which feels like seeing your local priest in a tutu. Jamie Noble and what appears to be the rear end of Tank Abbot! Hope he left the knife at home today.
No Lanny Poffo, of course.
The bigger names get to arrive late. Well, Scott Steiner does, along with The Wall. I forgot about him. He's kind of Discount Smart-Casual Kane. Booker T, Vampiro... The Cat.
Shit, who was the guy in the ring who looked liked the Cat? Am I face blind or racist?
I'm a Goon. It's face-blindness.
Just people. That's all I can see
Kidman, Van Hammer and Jeff Jarrett arrive. Confession time, I HATED Jarrett's late WCW run. Slapnuts, slapnuts, slapnuts, guitar to the head, yawn. Repeat until your brain turns to pudding.
Someone lets Jarrett get a mic.
I personally hate that person
Sign: "Slap Nuts"-You are the most original person in the room, sir. *slight sarcasm*
Slapnuts count: One.
Jeff loses his flow, for a few seconds, tripping all over his words. I would too if I'd been tasked with introducing Jim Cornette's favourite person in the whole wide world, Vince Russo.
Booooooooooooo!
Sign: "Bischoff+Russo=Ratings" Yeah, you might want to check where the decimal point went, Skippy.
Russo gets to bitchin' and moanin', running down people backstage. He also goes out of his way to mention the departed-to-WWF Benoit, Guerrero, and Saturn. Good point, I should flip to Raw in case they have a match! Russo is crowing that the "over-inflated egos in the back are DONE!". That's some BALLS on future world champ Russo.
Really guys? REALLY?
Bischoff interrupts and heads to ringside. They proceed to hug, which I assume was supposed to be a swerve. Because everything was in WCW by this stage. Bischoff talks, and I'm more interested in the fact that one of the guys in the ring has what looks like a Hardcore title. I'd forgotten they had that. Smashed-looking belt and all. CoughcoughRIPOFF!
Bischoff taunts the old guard, so Sting, Lex, DDP and Vicious show up for a staredown. And more Bischoff taunting. LOTS of taunting. He will NOT shut up.
Until Russo gets the stick again. Fuck me. He calls out Ric Flair, and calls him "a piece of shit on the bottom of my shoe". Behind him, I spot what looks like one of the Harris brothers holding one of the tag-team title belts. Yeah, THERE'S a piece of booking brilliance. The least interesting men in the world holding the gold.
But this is of course a moot point, as Russo states that he's stripping ALL of the title holders of their belts tonight to start afresh. Jarrett gives up the U.S title, the Harris boys the tag-team straps. (Good, now FIRE THEM! FIIIIIRE THEM!) Sid's got the world title, and he's a little.. well, reluctant to give it up.
At least, I think that's the gist of what he said. Add in Bishoff's "scrawny ass" and the phrase "TAKE IT!" and you get the picture. It's one of his better promos. (Seeing as it was one semi-coherent sentence) Bischoff confronts him and threatens to fire him of the belt isn't proffered, stat!
And then he drops the infamous "What's the matter Sid, can't find your scissors?" line. Yeah, there was really no turning back for WCW at this point, was there? Sid finally hands it over. Way to emasculate one of your supposed top draws, dude.
If Sid had stabbed Eric with scissors at this point, the show might have been saved
Nitro brought to you by Castrol GTX and the rampant egos of Bischoff and Russo.
To the commentary team of Schivonne, Hudson and Mark Madden, who is expressing shock by imitating Cletus, the Slack-Jawed Yokel.
Out back, Hogan arrives twenty minutes after the start of the show. Real professional, Terry. Sting briefs him, awkwardly shoehorning in "I ain't ribbing you, brother!" Ooh, insider lingo! That won't get annoying quickly.
Twenty-two minutes in and we have a match. DDP vs. Lex Luger as part of a U.S Title "mini-tournament". The only other participants are Sting and Sid. That's pretty mini, all right. DDP has his music cut off and doesn't get pyro. Hope they can get their money back on the fireworks.
Lex enters, his music gets cut as well. I'm already taking bets on how long before someone (probably Bischoff) runs in. Do I hear three minutes? I hear five minutes, very brave of you sir!
Sign: THE HARRIS BOYS LICK JEFF JARRETT'S NUTS-Pretty sure that's an image I NEVER needed in my head.
Lex and DDP are having a typical match in the ring, which Hudson calls "Pay-Per-View" quality. I've WATCHED some of your Pay-Per-Views, that's NOT a compliment. (Rarity has already challenged my to watch NEW BLOID RISING. Because apparently she hates me.)
Suddenly, someone's music starts playing. Okay, who had... TWO MINUTES AND TWENTY-SIX SECONDS? Really? And who should show up but Buff Bagwell. With lights and pyro. I think I see why this idea didn't work?
$3000 for the overnight rate, ladies!
DDP lowblows Lex as Schivonne says "It's only segment two!", making me want to hit HIM in the 'nads. Buff tries to get frisky with Kimberly. (or more probably, offers her a discount for some time with the Buffster) as Luger pretty much no-sells a ball punch. No wonder they call him "Package".
Buff sexually molests Miss Elizabeth, distracting Luger enough to be hit with the Diamond Cutter and pinned after four minutes and twenty seconds of scintillating action. 4:20, huh? Is that a hint?
Rating: 0:00 Buffholes (on a Pole)
Backstage, Curt Henning runs into Russo and doesn't punch him, which I consider a waste of time.
Ringside we go, as everybody's favourite boy-band-loving knife-wielding psycho Tank Abbot is wandering on out. And oh boy, he's there to talk. This is going to be brutal.
Derp.jpg
He spouts a few clichés as if he's reading off an internal teleprompter with bad punctuation. ("Ian't no panstuyassRASSLERI'm a shootfighter. I don't knowa wristwatch fromawrist lock...") He calls out, of all people, Goldberg. He's also blinking like a motherfucker, presumably from the concentration required to keep this speech in his mind. He finishes by threatening to "beat the helly hell" out of people. Not sure what "Helly Hell" is, but okay, do what you feel like, Tank.
Tank proceeds to unleash Helly Hell on Mark Madden, stripping Mark's shirt off in the process. It's like watching a manatee get mugged. Four security guards chase him off. Well, that was unpleasant and unconvincing.
So conflicted right now
Backstage, we get our first taste of Crash TV, cutting between Jeff Jarrett, Billy Kidman and Hulk Hogan in about forty seconds. Hulk does run into Terry Taylor, so that's nice. Commercial break, and we're back to Hogan finding Bischoff. And within seconds, we're out to the ring as Billy Kidman heads out with microphone in hand. Thirty-five minutes of show, 146 seconds of in-ring action so far.
Kidman takes his chance to take a giant verbal dump on Hogan. ("You say Billy Kidman can't draw flies, but who'd know better about drawing flies than a giant pile of shit like you!") Ahh, the things that had to be said in public before Twitter was invented. Billy calls out Hulk, who finds the worlds tiniest and most conveniently-placed hallway monitor in time to hear a few baldspot jokes.
Sign: STEVE AUSTIN IWERKS-I read that as "Twerks" and thought "I hope there's footage of that".
Hogan and Kidman get trade very personal insults until Kidman drops Hogan and puts the boots to him. Hogan puts Kidman into various barriers and ringposts. He takes him back into the ring for some more punishment, and holy crap, we have a run-in by Bischoff and it's not even a match. "The whole think was a work!" screams Hudson. Please stop the carny bullshit, WCW.
Way to put the young guys over, Hulk
Bischoff teases hitting Kidman with a chair, then of course turns on Hogan. (After telegraphing the FUCK out of it by making many fake swings.) Scott and Tony scream like it's Bash at the Beach '94 all over again, because apparently they weren't actually watching the opening twenty minutes.
Bischoff proceeds to count a cover on Hogan for Billy. Do I have to count that as a match? (No. No, I don't) Hogan has also made a less-than-subtle reach into his pocket, and wouldn't you know it, comes up bleeding.
Flair finally shows up, forty-four minutes into the show. Lazy fucker.
Whoo, I suppose
Back from the break and a slow-mo replay BEAUTIFULLY shows Hogan blading himself just as he turns for the chair shot. Nice angle, crack production team.
Backstage, Hogan bleeds and curses. Meanwhile, Flair watches the opening segment backstage. He heads on out, at least getting his music.
And this confusing sign
He cuts a promo on Russo, who is apparently the top heel in the company right now. He calls us Russo, as calling people out is THE viral trend of April 2000. Big Poppa Roidrage comes out instead. He cuts what I call the "OLBASTARD" promo, as he repeats that phrase like he's getting sponsored to say it. He accuses Ric of looking confused. Dude, you have a live mike in your hands, EVERYONE looks confused when that happens.
Unused concept art from ZARDOZ
Steiner uses some comedy teeth to pretend to be Flair. Well, if you want to hear Scott be even LESS coherent than usual, this is the show for you!
Shane Douglas arrives to backjump Flair. He gets to drop one elbow before WCW security arrives to drag him away.
We're now 52 minutes into the show (plus adverts!) for the same two minutes of wrestling.
Kevin Nash arrives on crutches (an HOUR late, Kev? And I though Hogan and Flair were tardy!) and we go to commercial while showing someone in the crowd that's in so much pyro smoke it could be Jimmy Hoffa.
Canadians in the Mist
Oh, it's Brett Hart. That must have been worth sitting through an ad break to find out.
Shane Douglas gets interviewed by Gene Okerlund, getting to drop some company-sanctioned profanity. Oddly, his promo is one of the worst of the night, fluffing lines all over the place.
Almost as bad as Gene's expression
Hey, a match! That's novel. Sting vs. Sid. I'm not confident this will be a five-star classic. Sid DOES get his pyro, though.
Sign: DIE, SCHAVONE, DIE-Could we get Tank Abbott back out, please? We have a request.
Sting gets in the early offense and dumps Sid to the floor. Where Sid somehow fucks up having his head rammed into a barricade, dropping of his own volition to headbutt (well, HANDbutt) a chair instead. Sid takes over and drops Sting on the barricade. At least ONE of them knew what they were doing. Sid then gets his foot caught in a camera cable.
"Play dead until our contracts expire, Sid!"
I was right about the lack of five stars.
Back inside, and Sid is now playing heel. Guess HE forgot the opening twenty minutes happened, too!
Sid slaps on a chinlock. A resthold in a Russo-booked Nitro? Seems unnecessary.
I'm right, as the Run-In Music plays at 3 minutes and 20 seconds. It's the Wall, with a table. He hits the ring as the ref gets bumped, bopping Sid with a chair like he'd only had the move described to him. He drags Sid outside and hits a chokeslam so low and sloppy that Sid was lucky he didn't end up UNDER the table. He's no Dudley. Not even Sign Guy.
Sid gets counted out.
Rating: 0.01 Uninteresting Walls.
After a quick break, it's time for an in-ring rant by Ric Flair.
Wait, is this show on a loop?
This IS a different rant, though, as he calls out Shane Douglas. Whooo.
Backstage, Hogan goes "RAAAGH" and throws things around. Including a GIANT bucket of candy which come at us like a piñata exploded in 3-D. Another break, more Hogan shouting and swearing. Followed by a recap of the premiere of READY TO FUMBLE. Wait, RUMBLE. I meant that. Next Thursday, David Arquette will appear on WCW Thunder!
I'll pause the review until you former-WCW fans get any screaming done you need to get out of your system.
Look upon the future and despair
Speaking of people WCW fans still hate, here's Jeff Jarrett. Oh wait, he's someone *I* still hate. He's taking on Curt Henning, who gets music so generic that my wife didn't realise he wasn't coming out to Jeff's theme.
They meet in the aisle as I start my stopwatch. Let's see if we get more than five minutes without some shenanigans, shall we?
Crowd Sign: "Only One Hulk"-Well, thank heavens for small mercies, I say.
Then I got a look at the guy holding it, and all was right with the world
It's a chop and punch-fest for two full minutes until an off-key version of Curt's "Mr Perfect" music plays and Shawn Stasiak saunters out. Tony sells this like the return of The Outsiders as Shawn had been in WWE up to till now. (As "Meat", who I VERY vaguely remember) Ref bump as Shawn fucks up the Henning gum-swat, then nearly kills Curt with a HORRIBLE kind-of Samoan Drop. More a Samoan Faceplant, if I'm being generous.
Must have over-oiled himself
Stroke finishes it for Jeff, who face the winner of Sting/DDP for the U.S title.
Rating: 0.0025 Meats.
Upstairs, Hulk Hoagan bleeds, swears and traumatises entire families in the Skyboxes, but can't find Bischoff. Break now!
Apart from that girl, who's loving a blood-soaked Hogan run-in
Back to Nash backstage. He does nothing interesting.
Sting interview. He's still trying to sound invested in this dreck, so points for effort.
"Impromptu" match-Flair vs. Douglas. Not sure it's that "impromptu", as you announced it two ad breaks back, Tony.
More punchy-kicky stuff both in and out of the ring. Whoo Chops in the corner. Shane reverses and punches.
Sign: "I'm on TV!"-No, your sign is, you're holding it too high, dickhead.
Tony and Scott still won't shut up about Bischoff and Russo, and just like Candyman, one of them appears. It's Russo, who hits Flair with a baseball bat to end this gruelling 3-minute match.
Rating: Fuck you, Russo.
Russo steals Flairs Rolex. Flair surprises me by NOT blading.
Back from the break, a pointless replay, sponsored by... ooh, the Wendy's Monterey Ranch Chicken Burger! I worked at Wendy's around this time, and I LOVED that fucking thing. So did my girlfriend. I married her. Probably something to do with the chicken.
Either that or no woman can resist a man drunkenly crooning Bon Jovi songs at her.
Nash limps out on crutches. Admittedly, I've seen him move more sluggishly in a WWF championship match.
He launches a spray at Bisch & Russo. "Jagoffs" is his new catchphrase, it seems. He wonders what happened to their "sweet little 'rasslin' show" that used to have. Well, at least you still have a show.
For about another year, anyway.
Nash is in street clothes, making him look like a well-paid shampoo model.
Shiny
Mike Awesome jumps him, taking him down with Nash's own crutch.
Outside, Angry Hogan is on the phone in his limeo. He's going to "eat Bischoff's ass alive". Not sure that's going to make it past Standards and Practices, really.
The fabled White Hummer arrives to demolish Hogan's limo. Because what a failing wrestling show needs to do is destroy an expensive automobile. Bischoff is driving it, of course. Well, at least we don't have to hear "WHO WAS DRIVING THE HUMMER?" for the next six months.
I was thinking it's more a train-wreck at this point, but whatever
Main(?) Event time. DDP vs. Sting! Thirteen whole minutes left on the show.
So of course, let's waste some time by having Jeff Jarrett show up as well. He's headed for the commentary table, so it's not a one-second run-in, at least.
Sting pushes DDP off an early Diamond Cutter attempt, DDP flings himself out of the ring with such velocity I suspect Sting is chugging Super-Soldier Serum. DDP escapes a Scorpion Deathlock attempt and is selling like he just ran the Boston Marathon. He hits a belly-to-belly for two as Jarrett leaves the table. They get into it on the floor as Vampiro runs-in the attack Sting.
We're three minutes and 54 seconds into the match.
Could we get Russo some Ritalin? A joint? ANYTHING?
Diamond Cutter and it's over.
Rating: Bollocks to that.
Kimberly takes a guitar shot and we fade out.
Way to duck, Page
GODDAMMIT! It was a commercial. WHY YOU NO END, SHOW?
The Goofball Twins send Jeff back out to ringside. Great, we're ending with Jarrett finding ways to say "Slapnuts" and "Stroke" and bore me to tears. Can we get a run-in please?
Well, of course we do. DDP runs in, Scott Steiner runs-in on him, Lex Luger runs-in on HIM. STOP IT!
Then Buff Bagwell runs in and gets killed. Well, I enjoyed that. NOW stop it!
Nope, Vampiro AND the Wall run-in. Is there anyone left in the backstage? I'm expecting a run-on by two cameramen and the catering staff at this point.
'You! In the third row! GO! Tony, Scott, get in there!"
Sting runs-in as my kid goes mental at the endless run-ins. Is showing 2000 WCW to a nine-year-old considering child abuse? If so, lock me up.
Booker T and The Cat turn up as well. I give up.
We get one more look at Russo and Bischoff and we're finally done.
I take it back, Brett Hart shows up behind them with six seconds of the show to go.
Eric and Vince seem quite surprised to see him, considering he walked out three seconds after tem. Very observant, you morons.
And we're done.
Thank the lord.
Final Thoughts: I need a drink.
So far, the WCW Nitros I have reviewed has been god-awful (September 2000), okay (summer 1999) and just plain dull. (late 1999)
So lets go to the point where it looks like things changed from "failing company" to "Oh shitshitshit, no-one knows what the fuck they're doing!"
April 10th, 2000. The WWE Network description promises "A New Era of WCW!". The last era, as it would turn out.
We open with the actual titles for once. Refreshing change. We are in Denver, Colorado. Tony is having a voice-gasm, promising us a LANDMARK occasion! A new dawning in the history of pro-wrestling! Yes, I think he's promising THE GREATEST NIGHT IN SPORTS ENTERTAINMENT HISTORY!
Which is why one of the first people we see is David fucking Flair, staring at the lights and looking like a pod person.
"Mmmm... butter"
We pan a shit-ton of wrestlers in the ring, and I couldn't name half of these guys without help. Okay, Chris Candido and The Cat, know those two. Lash Leroux, Virgil/Vincent, got it. Meng/Haku, wearing a formal shirt, which feels like seeing your local priest in a tutu. Jamie Noble and what appears to be the rear end of Tank Abbot! Hope he left the knife at home today.
No Lanny Poffo, of course.
The bigger names get to arrive late. Well, Scott Steiner does, along with The Wall. I forgot about him. He's kind of Discount Smart-Casual Kane. Booker T, Vampiro... The Cat.
Shit, who was the guy in the ring who looked liked the Cat? Am I face blind or racist?
I'm a Goon. It's face-blindness.
Just people. That's all I can see
Kidman, Van Hammer and Jeff Jarrett arrive. Confession time, I HATED Jarrett's late WCW run. Slapnuts, slapnuts, slapnuts, guitar to the head, yawn. Repeat until your brain turns to pudding.
Someone lets Jarrett get a mic.
I personally hate that person
Sign: "Slap Nuts"-You are the most original person in the room, sir. *slight sarcasm*
Slapnuts count: One.
Jeff loses his flow, for a few seconds, tripping all over his words. I would too if I'd been tasked with introducing Jim Cornette's favourite person in the whole wide world, Vince Russo.
Booooooooooooo!
Sign: "Bischoff+Russo=Ratings" Yeah, you might want to check where the decimal point went, Skippy.
Russo gets to bitchin' and moanin', running down people backstage. He also goes out of his way to mention the departed-to-WWF Benoit, Guerrero, and Saturn. Good point, I should flip to Raw in case they have a match! Russo is crowing that the "over-inflated egos in the back are DONE!". That's some BALLS on future world champ Russo.
Really guys? REALLY?
Bischoff interrupts and heads to ringside. They proceed to hug, which I assume was supposed to be a swerve. Because everything was in WCW by this stage. Bischoff talks, and I'm more interested in the fact that one of the guys in the ring has what looks like a Hardcore title. I'd forgotten they had that. Smashed-looking belt and all. CoughcoughRIPOFF!
Bischoff taunts the old guard, so Sting, Lex, DDP and Vicious show up for a staredown. And more Bischoff taunting. LOTS of taunting. He will NOT shut up.
Until Russo gets the stick again. Fuck me. He calls out Ric Flair, and calls him "a piece of shit on the bottom of my shoe". Behind him, I spot what looks like one of the Harris brothers holding one of the tag-team title belts. Yeah, THERE'S a piece of booking brilliance. The least interesting men in the world holding the gold.
But this is of course a moot point, as Russo states that he's stripping ALL of the title holders of their belts tonight to start afresh. Jarrett gives up the U.S title, the Harris boys the tag-team straps. (Good, now FIRE THEM! FIIIIIRE THEM!) Sid's got the world title, and he's a little.. well, reluctant to give it up.
At least, I think that's the gist of what he said. Add in Bishoff's "scrawny ass" and the phrase "TAKE IT!" and you get the picture. It's one of his better promos. (Seeing as it was one semi-coherent sentence) Bischoff confronts him and threatens to fire him of the belt isn't proffered, stat!
And then he drops the infamous "What's the matter Sid, can't find your scissors?" line. Yeah, there was really no turning back for WCW at this point, was there? Sid finally hands it over. Way to emasculate one of your supposed top draws, dude.
If Sid had stabbed Eric with scissors at this point, the show might have been saved
Nitro brought to you by Castrol GTX and the rampant egos of Bischoff and Russo.
To the commentary team of Schivonne, Hudson and Mark Madden, who is expressing shock by imitating Cletus, the Slack-Jawed Yokel.
Out back, Hogan arrives twenty minutes after the start of the show. Real professional, Terry. Sting briefs him, awkwardly shoehorning in "I ain't ribbing you, brother!" Ooh, insider lingo! That won't get annoying quickly.
Twenty-two minutes in and we have a match. DDP vs. Lex Luger as part of a U.S Title "mini-tournament". The only other participants are Sting and Sid. That's pretty mini, all right. DDP has his music cut off and doesn't get pyro. Hope they can get their money back on the fireworks.
Lex enters, his music gets cut as well. I'm already taking bets on how long before someone (probably Bischoff) runs in. Do I hear three minutes? I hear five minutes, very brave of you sir!
Sign: THE HARRIS BOYS LICK JEFF JARRETT'S NUTS-Pretty sure that's an image I NEVER needed in my head.
Lex and DDP are having a typical match in the ring, which Hudson calls "Pay-Per-View" quality. I've WATCHED some of your Pay-Per-Views, that's NOT a compliment. (Rarity has already challenged my to watch NEW BLOID RISING. Because apparently she hates me.)
Suddenly, someone's music starts playing. Okay, who had... TWO MINUTES AND TWENTY-SIX SECONDS? Really? And who should show up but Buff Bagwell. With lights and pyro. I think I see why this idea didn't work?
$3000 for the overnight rate, ladies!
DDP lowblows Lex as Schivonne says "It's only segment two!", making me want to hit HIM in the 'nads. Buff tries to get frisky with Kimberly. (or more probably, offers her a discount for some time with the Buffster) as Luger pretty much no-sells a ball punch. No wonder they call him "Package".
Buff sexually molests Miss Elizabeth, distracting Luger enough to be hit with the Diamond Cutter and pinned after four minutes and twenty seconds of scintillating action. 4:20, huh? Is that a hint?
Rating: 0:00 Buffholes (on a Pole)
Backstage, Curt Henning runs into Russo and doesn't punch him, which I consider a waste of time.
Ringside we go, as everybody's favourite boy-band-loving knife-wielding psycho Tank Abbot is wandering on out. And oh boy, he's there to talk. This is going to be brutal.
Derp.jpg
He spouts a few clichés as if he's reading off an internal teleprompter with bad punctuation. ("Ian't no panstuyassRASSLERI'm a shootfighter. I don't knowa wristwatch fromawrist lock...") He calls out, of all people, Goldberg. He's also blinking like a motherfucker, presumably from the concentration required to keep this speech in his mind. He finishes by threatening to "beat the helly hell" out of people. Not sure what "Helly Hell" is, but okay, do what you feel like, Tank.
Tank proceeds to unleash Helly Hell on Mark Madden, stripping Mark's shirt off in the process. It's like watching a manatee get mugged. Four security guards chase him off. Well, that was unpleasant and unconvincing.
So conflicted right now
Backstage, we get our first taste of Crash TV, cutting between Jeff Jarrett, Billy Kidman and Hulk Hogan in about forty seconds. Hulk does run into Terry Taylor, so that's nice. Commercial break, and we're back to Hogan finding Bischoff. And within seconds, we're out to the ring as Billy Kidman heads out with microphone in hand. Thirty-five minutes of show, 146 seconds of in-ring action so far.
Kidman takes his chance to take a giant verbal dump on Hogan. ("You say Billy Kidman can't draw flies, but who'd know better about drawing flies than a giant pile of shit like you!") Ahh, the things that had to be said in public before Twitter was invented. Billy calls out Hulk, who finds the worlds tiniest and most conveniently-placed hallway monitor in time to hear a few baldspot jokes.
Sign: STEVE AUSTIN IWERKS-I read that as "Twerks" and thought "I hope there's footage of that".
Hogan and Kidman get trade very personal insults until Kidman drops Hogan and puts the boots to him. Hogan puts Kidman into various barriers and ringposts. He takes him back into the ring for some more punishment, and holy crap, we have a run-in by Bischoff and it's not even a match. "The whole think was a work!" screams Hudson. Please stop the carny bullshit, WCW.
Way to put the young guys over, Hulk
Bischoff teases hitting Kidman with a chair, then of course turns on Hogan. (After telegraphing the FUCK out of it by making many fake swings.) Scott and Tony scream like it's Bash at the Beach '94 all over again, because apparently they weren't actually watching the opening twenty minutes.
Bischoff proceeds to count a cover on Hogan for Billy. Do I have to count that as a match? (No. No, I don't) Hogan has also made a less-than-subtle reach into his pocket, and wouldn't you know it, comes up bleeding.
Flair finally shows up, forty-four minutes into the show. Lazy fucker.
Whoo, I suppose
Back from the break and a slow-mo replay BEAUTIFULLY shows Hogan blading himself just as he turns for the chair shot. Nice angle, crack production team.
Backstage, Hogan bleeds and curses. Meanwhile, Flair watches the opening segment backstage. He heads on out, at least getting his music.
And this confusing sign
He cuts a promo on Russo, who is apparently the top heel in the company right now. He calls us Russo, as calling people out is THE viral trend of April 2000. Big Poppa Roidrage comes out instead. He cuts what I call the "OLBASTARD" promo, as he repeats that phrase like he's getting sponsored to say it. He accuses Ric of looking confused. Dude, you have a live mike in your hands, EVERYONE looks confused when that happens.
Unused concept art from ZARDOZ
Steiner uses some comedy teeth to pretend to be Flair. Well, if you want to hear Scott be even LESS coherent than usual, this is the show for you!
Shane Douglas arrives to backjump Flair. He gets to drop one elbow before WCW security arrives to drag him away.
We're now 52 minutes into the show (plus adverts!) for the same two minutes of wrestling.
Kevin Nash arrives on crutches (an HOUR late, Kev? And I though Hogan and Flair were tardy!) and we go to commercial while showing someone in the crowd that's in so much pyro smoke it could be Jimmy Hoffa.
Canadians in the Mist
Oh, it's Brett Hart. That must have been worth sitting through an ad break to find out.
Shane Douglas gets interviewed by Gene Okerlund, getting to drop some company-sanctioned profanity. Oddly, his promo is one of the worst of the night, fluffing lines all over the place.
Almost as bad as Gene's expression
Hey, a match! That's novel. Sting vs. Sid. I'm not confident this will be a five-star classic. Sid DOES get his pyro, though.
Sign: DIE, SCHAVONE, DIE-Could we get Tank Abbott back out, please? We have a request.
Sting gets in the early offense and dumps Sid to the floor. Where Sid somehow fucks up having his head rammed into a barricade, dropping of his own volition to headbutt (well, HANDbutt) a chair instead. Sid takes over and drops Sting on the barricade. At least ONE of them knew what they were doing. Sid then gets his foot caught in a camera cable.
"Play dead until our contracts expire, Sid!"
I was right about the lack of five stars.
Back inside, and Sid is now playing heel. Guess HE forgot the opening twenty minutes happened, too!
Sid slaps on a chinlock. A resthold in a Russo-booked Nitro? Seems unnecessary.
I'm right, as the Run-In Music plays at 3 minutes and 20 seconds. It's the Wall, with a table. He hits the ring as the ref gets bumped, bopping Sid with a chair like he'd only had the move described to him. He drags Sid outside and hits a chokeslam so low and sloppy that Sid was lucky he didn't end up UNDER the table. He's no Dudley. Not even Sign Guy.
Sid gets counted out.
Rating: 0.01 Uninteresting Walls.
After a quick break, it's time for an in-ring rant by Ric Flair.
Wait, is this show on a loop?
This IS a different rant, though, as he calls out Shane Douglas. Whooo.
Backstage, Hogan goes "RAAAGH" and throws things around. Including a GIANT bucket of candy which come at us like a piñata exploded in 3-D. Another break, more Hogan shouting and swearing. Followed by a recap of the premiere of READY TO FUMBLE. Wait, RUMBLE. I meant that. Next Thursday, David Arquette will appear on WCW Thunder!
I'll pause the review until you former-WCW fans get any screaming done you need to get out of your system.
Look upon the future and despair
Speaking of people WCW fans still hate, here's Jeff Jarrett. Oh wait, he's someone *I* still hate. He's taking on Curt Henning, who gets music so generic that my wife didn't realise he wasn't coming out to Jeff's theme.
They meet in the aisle as I start my stopwatch. Let's see if we get more than five minutes without some shenanigans, shall we?
Crowd Sign: "Only One Hulk"-Well, thank heavens for small mercies, I say.
Then I got a look at the guy holding it, and all was right with the world
It's a chop and punch-fest for two full minutes until an off-key version of Curt's "Mr Perfect" music plays and Shawn Stasiak saunters out. Tony sells this like the return of The Outsiders as Shawn had been in WWE up to till now. (As "Meat", who I VERY vaguely remember) Ref bump as Shawn fucks up the Henning gum-swat, then nearly kills Curt with a HORRIBLE kind-of Samoan Drop. More a Samoan Faceplant, if I'm being generous.
Must have over-oiled himself
Stroke finishes it for Jeff, who face the winner of Sting/DDP for the U.S title.
Rating: 0.0025 Meats.
Upstairs, Hulk Hoagan bleeds, swears and traumatises entire families in the Skyboxes, but can't find Bischoff. Break now!
Apart from that girl, who's loving a blood-soaked Hogan run-in
Back to Nash backstage. He does nothing interesting.
Sting interview. He's still trying to sound invested in this dreck, so points for effort.
"Impromptu" match-Flair vs. Douglas. Not sure it's that "impromptu", as you announced it two ad breaks back, Tony.
More punchy-kicky stuff both in and out of the ring. Whoo Chops in the corner. Shane reverses and punches.
Sign: "I'm on TV!"-No, your sign is, you're holding it too high, dickhead.
Tony and Scott still won't shut up about Bischoff and Russo, and just like Candyman, one of them appears. It's Russo, who hits Flair with a baseball bat to end this gruelling 3-minute match.
Rating: Fuck you, Russo.
Russo steals Flairs Rolex. Flair surprises me by NOT blading.
Back from the break, a pointless replay, sponsored by... ooh, the Wendy's Monterey Ranch Chicken Burger! I worked at Wendy's around this time, and I LOVED that fucking thing. So did my girlfriend. I married her. Probably something to do with the chicken.
Either that or no woman can resist a man drunkenly crooning Bon Jovi songs at her.
Nash limps out on crutches. Admittedly, I've seen him move more sluggishly in a WWF championship match.
He launches a spray at Bisch & Russo. "Jagoffs" is his new catchphrase, it seems. He wonders what happened to their "sweet little 'rasslin' show" that used to have. Well, at least you still have a show.
For about another year, anyway.
Nash is in street clothes, making him look like a well-paid shampoo model.
Shiny
Mike Awesome jumps him, taking him down with Nash's own crutch.
Outside, Angry Hogan is on the phone in his limeo. He's going to "eat Bischoff's ass alive". Not sure that's going to make it past Standards and Practices, really.
The fabled White Hummer arrives to demolish Hogan's limo. Because what a failing wrestling show needs to do is destroy an expensive automobile. Bischoff is driving it, of course. Well, at least we don't have to hear "WHO WAS DRIVING THE HUMMER?" for the next six months.
I was thinking it's more a train-wreck at this point, but whatever
Main(?) Event time. DDP vs. Sting! Thirteen whole minutes left on the show.
So of course, let's waste some time by having Jeff Jarrett show up as well. He's headed for the commentary table, so it's not a one-second run-in, at least.
Sting pushes DDP off an early Diamond Cutter attempt, DDP flings himself out of the ring with such velocity I suspect Sting is chugging Super-Soldier Serum. DDP escapes a Scorpion Deathlock attempt and is selling like he just ran the Boston Marathon. He hits a belly-to-belly for two as Jarrett leaves the table. They get into it on the floor as Vampiro runs-in the attack Sting.
We're three minutes and 54 seconds into the match.
Could we get Russo some Ritalin? A joint? ANYTHING?
Diamond Cutter and it's over.
Rating: Bollocks to that.
Kimberly takes a guitar shot and we fade out.
Way to duck, Page
GODDAMMIT! It was a commercial. WHY YOU NO END, SHOW?
The Goofball Twins send Jeff back out to ringside. Great, we're ending with Jarrett finding ways to say "Slapnuts" and "Stroke" and bore me to tears. Can we get a run-in please?
Well, of course we do. DDP runs in, Scott Steiner runs-in on him, Lex Luger runs-in on HIM. STOP IT!
Then Buff Bagwell runs in and gets killed. Well, I enjoyed that. NOW stop it!
Nope, Vampiro AND the Wall run-in. Is there anyone left in the backstage? I'm expecting a run-on by two cameramen and the catering staff at this point.
'You! In the third row! GO! Tony, Scott, get in there!"
Sting runs-in as my kid goes mental at the endless run-ins. Is showing 2000 WCW to a nine-year-old considering child abuse? If so, lock me up.
Booker T and The Cat turn up as well. I give up.
We get one more look at Russo and Bischoff and we're finally done.
I take it back, Brett Hart shows up behind them with six seconds of the show to go.
Eric and Vince seem quite surprised to see him, considering he walked out three seconds after tem. Very observant, you morons.
And we're done.
Thank the lord.
Final Thoughts: I need a drink.
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