KB8

I know it's hard to judge this as a regular interview or promo because it's not supposed to actually be that (and as Childs mentions it's impossible to view this out of context), but considering how full of shit he was you could probably say it was a decent promo. I mean, he had a few folk in tears there so he sure worked the hell out of them. Most people seemed to see through his shit from the start, though. It's not a perfect analogy by any stretch, not least because wrestling as a carny business is way more open with fans now, but if you're looking at a modern babyface who's routinely booed by pockets of the audience, there's almost no chance Cena does something like this and is met with "WE WANT [equivalent of Sid]" chants.

Yeah, fascinating look at two guys who'd be in very different positions a year, two years and especially three years from now. I wonder who looked at Rocky and listened to post-match promo and thought, "yep, I can absolutely see that guy being one of the biggest stars in the history of the business some day."

Again, I love crazy rambling Roddy Piper to death so I'll probably like just about anything he does with a mic, but this was fairly on track and I thought it ruled. Hogan accusing him of doctoring the Starrcade footage to look like a Piper win is absurdly awesome and his character right now is near-perfect, right down to the facial expressions and timing of such. The way he shifts from acting like a goofy shithead to being real serious real quick as Piper calls him a bald-headed geek was amazing. Great segment. I have no recollection of the Superbrawl match so for all I know it's a pile of dogshit, but I'll be damned if they haven't got me a little stoked for it.

Bischoff is really something else as detestable asshole right now. "Tell your daddy...he's STILL fired" is the obvious highlight, but Nash and Hall laughing like goobers beside him really add to the feel of Anderson being bullied for no good reason.

They really have done wonders with this Page push over the last three months or so. This was another one of those segments that could've come off as some hokey edgelord bulljive but wound up being great. Page standing up for himself even if he ends up getting stomped only endeared himself more to the fans and pretty much anything involving Sting at this point will be red hot.

I flip flop on this more than probably any match I've ever seen. Loved it first time, didn't really like it second time, thought it was great last time, didn't really care this time. It's not even that I think it's bad because I wouldn't say that at all. I was just wholly apathetic towards it. The standard criticism of juniors matches is that the early part of most matches ends up being perfunctory because it's filled with time-killing matwork or whatever, then they'll flip the switch when they get to that point in the match where TV will pick it up. I don't even like using that as a stick with which to beat these matches now because it's certainly not something you only see the New Japan juniors do. Like, is seven minutes of matwork any less connected from the rest of the match than Ricky Steamboat using armdrags and armbars before the heel takes over? Because how often does the arm actually play into the rest of those Steamboat matches? Do the juniors matches take more of a whipping because a lot of what they're doing feels like they're going through the motions before they hit the TV part? Does it feel directionless, while Steamboat working an arm at least feels like a strategy? Who knows, but it's almost so ingrained as a criticism against 90s New Japan juniors now that I'm wondering if the pendulum hasn't swung too far. So naturally that was one of my biggest issues with this. The first half had lots of gritty matwork and some real niggliness and they use that to further the already-established story going in -- the story of Ohtani finally beating the big dog and proving he's one of the top guys. There was some ropey stuff like Liger trying to work Ohtani's leg and Ohtani just not bothering to acknowledge it, but Ohtani mostly worked on top by going after the arm and I liked the parts where he'd get super belligerent and uncooperative and refuse to let Liger take over. This was his night and he could be as rough as anyone, so of course it was great when he'd just slap Liger in the face as a cut-off. Ohtani's matwork looked mean and the stuff with the arm was mostly quite nasty, like when he'd just dig a knee into Liger's ankle joint before going back to the arm and do the same to the elbow joint. Liger sold it fine as well and I liked the selling where he'd really stretch it out and shake it around whilst applying his own hold to Ohtani. I see the similarities to Misawa/Kobashi from the previous month, especially with Ohtani trying to take out Liger's arm, and by extension the shotei (analogous to Misawa's elbows). And again there's also the story of Ohtani (Kobashi) trying to step level with The Man (Misawa). So the first half was fine and probably even good but...I just wasn't bothered. No real interest, no real investment. Then they went into the second half finishing run, but I either didn't think there was much of a bridge between the two halves or the bridge they did use fell flat. I'm not really sure. I just sort of thought, "okay, I guess we're past the matwork and now it's time for the drama." It was more jarring a shift than usual. Liger pretty much gave up with the arm selling and we got a whole bunch of hokey Ohtani facial expressions. There was one spot as well where Liger powerbombed him on the floor that initially I really liked, almost as a fuck you to Ohtani yanking at his limbs for a while there, but then about ten seconds later Ohtani was hitting his own powerbomb on the floor as if it wasn't even a thing. Like, your random NXT Takeover show will run spots like that and they'll feel way more consequential. Maybe Velveteen Dream is better than Jushin Liger (this is a joke, obviously (is it though?!))? Finishing stretch itself had lots of cool stuff and built drama well, and is probably about as "deep" in terms of playing off previous matches as you'll get with the juniors. Maybe those callbacks and bits of learned psychology add to the All Japan comparisons. They play off the finish to their 3/96 match, play off big spots from Ohtani's past failures against Ultimo Dragon, really drive the point home that Ohtani has grown and learned from those experiences and is better equipped now to survive the same adversities. Liger's palm strikes being his great equaliser is also very cool and I guess some more shades of All Japan/Misawa if you want to look at it like that. Ohtani being belligerent and defiant to the end is a nice finish too. Don't be dick-swinging like a big shot and expect Liger not to cave your face in. I guess objectively this was good and it had lots of cool intricacies and subtleties, but it's whatever. I'll probably love it when I rewatch it in 2024.

Cool look at two of the WWE's longest-serving talents having what I'd imagine was one of their very earliest matches together. It's more of a segment than an actual match, but the whole setting, Helmsley with the limousine and Undertaker having to walk through the crowd to get to him was pretty neat. The tombstone on the escalator indeed ruled and I'm also a bit surprised they haven't made a bigger deal of this in WWE lore over the years.

I have no clue who the Spellbinder is but he's absolutely juiced to the moon with a thick, high-pitched New York accent. Good luck to anybody other than Lance trying to narrate this whole segment. The man really was a treasure. Even when the candles are lit the flames are flimsy wee things and both Spellbinder and Brian are coated in so much baby oil that a flamethrower would struggle to permeate it. Actually, maybe it's the opposite and the baby oil makes the tiny flame dangerous. Any sort of contact and those guys are going up like a furnace! That fireball shot looked pretty great and Lance shouting "YOU THREW A FIREBALL AT HIM, YA IDIOT!" was amazing. You know somebody fucked up when Lance is calling someone a hoodlum or an idiot or some such. This was total Memphis stupidity so I guess I loved it?

Pillman is an amazing nutjob and naturally when you add that to Lance being Lance you get something hugely fun. I got sort of giddy at the possibility of a Pillman/Lawler interaction, but we didn't really get one.

No idea who Bolton is, so I'm inclined to agree with Samples that he has no business shooting commercials for Memphis restaurants. This was like two minutes and wild as fuck. "WE'RE SHOOTIN' A COMMERCIAL HERE!" Many plates are smashed, tables and chairs broken, patrons hurriedly exiting as they leave dinners uneaten. We all had the Concession Stand Brawl top 15 on the Memphis set so I think it's only fair that this gets six and a quarter stars.

This felt a bit like a fun ten minute greatest hits version of Negro Casas v El Hijo del Santo. They hit the mat a little, brawled a bit, Casas tore at Santo's mask, Santo hit a Santo tope, they communicate the hatred, etc. More of a neat addendum to their eternal rivalry, but it's these two so you can't really go wrong.

Man, this might be the most detestable Hogan has been since the turn, and that covers a fair bit of ground. Bischoff as his obnoxious little sidekick really was perfect here as well, and Piper referring to Hogan as Terry is one of those goofy pro-wrestling things that can easily come off corny, yet by pro-wrestling's standards Piper is a good enough actor to pull it off. Gene as the straight man in the middle was also really good and Piper blowing a gasket felt like a nuclear moment. Heenan shouting "WHIP HIM WITH THE BELT!" was awesome. How much of a prick must you be to force Bobby Heenan to back Roddy Piper? By 1997 this match-up is pretty much washed, and I guess in hindsight you question how smart it is when the WWF are on the other channel setting up a pretty hot long-term group of main eventers, but in the moment this felt like the biggest match in wrestling. I love Piper anyway so I'm cool seeing him show up some more. Maybe a top 5 nWo segment so far.

I could see this being a touch confusing or overly cute if you try to make too much sense of it. Hall and Nash have been so confident that Sting is nWo, so walking away when he shows up sort of contradicts that. Or maybe that's the point? Their confidence is more hubris than anything and all that talk about him being nWo is them keeping up appearances. Maybe they're not nearly as sure as they'd have us think. And then you throw in the ultimate wildcard in Savage and yeah I guess I talked himself into thinking this was actually pretty good. I mean, it's five guys shooting looks at each other and the crowd were eating it all up. If you didn't know already, WCW were on a hell of a hot streak.

This was another fun segment and I thought Shawn's promo was totally fine. Bret might be the best there is, the best there was and the best there ever will be, but he's not the WWF champion. We're sure getting some edginess to the two top babyfaces as Bret calls him a punk, jackass and degenerate. Neither one of them comes across as being terribly easy to root for or, you know...LIKE. Austin is probably more likeable than both of them and he's a sociopath. Maybe it's because he's an unapologetic one and so you get exactly what you see with him, whereas Bret is pretty sanctimonious and torn-faced about everything and Michaels is sort of obnoxious and not very endearing. Actually Undertaker might be more likeable than all of them and he's a Satan worshipper or something. Bret standing on the belt and flipping off Michaels was kinda awesome, though. Really cool segment. WWF are definitely onto something with what they're doing at the top of the card and things are sure feeling very Attitude-y.

I've always dug this a bunch. Rich is a total scuzzball, spitting at folk, telling some guy in the crowd to come shine his shoes, and he generally looks crazy enough that you buy him following through with his threats of hitting a fan with a chair. Old man Funk being old man Funk will always be fun to me and the stuff build around smacking each other in the leg with a chair was cool. Not a MOTYC or anything, but mighty enjoyable.

I liked how the heels and babyfaces were separated here, and of course the fans live and die with Heyman's sell of the PPV. He might've been a total bullshit merchant, but when he turned it on he was a hell of a hype man.

I don't really know what's going on here with the who's-side-is-she-on Lori and the bWo t-shirt, but either way I agree that this feels like a feud that could be doing with a conclusion already. Richards standing up for himself again was good stuff, but I thought the finish was a little too cute.

I generally don't give a single shit about Raven but this was totally fine, and I'm much more likely to find him tolerable when he's cutting short promos like this than those longer ones about whatever the hell.

Is this the best promo Taz has ever cut? Everyone got torn through the coals here and I've never bought him as a badass more than I did here. No idea if the match with Sabu will be any good, but Taz has made of it a thing I'm actually interested in watching and I can't say I've ever really been bothered about watching him before (although I like Sabu).

Phenomenal promo. I saw this a few years ago and was blown away by it without actually knowing when it was from, so as soon as this popped up I hoped it I hoped it was the same one. How can you watch this and not want Funk to win the belt? Man that guy is the fucking best.

Well this sure was a thing. Pettengill's reaction is shared by many, I'd imagine.

Luger hitting the ring at the end was definitely a refreshing - and probably needed - twist on the norm, as the norm had been played past the point of it truly resonating by now. I mean, I'll usually get a kick out of Hogan hamming it up to ridiculous degrees, but you can only really go so far with the B-teamers getting slapped about the ring before Giant ends up inevitably going down under the nWo's weight. Was it '97 or '98 when Luger got red hot for a minute there?

Hogan's bullshit and constant lying through his teeth around this point is fucking awesome. Bischoff is egging him on every step of the way and Hogan talking about how he beat Giant with a reverse fireman's carry was amazing. Bischoff's fawning over Hogan is almost comical. If Dillinger wasn't clearly telling people in the crowd to stop flinging shit I imagine the ring would've been full of garbage in pretty short order.

This ruled. Bischoff's reasoning is clearly nonsense, but it's steeped in enough corporate bullshit that you know he can justify it. Hall throwing the toothpick in Anderson's face after Randy talked about his battle with cancer somehow made him come across as more of a prick than the guy firing Randy in the first place, which is quite a feat. Tell me there's a payoff to this. Hall continuing to shit talk the Steiners as they hand the belts back was great as well. Hall and Nash were usually playing everything cool around this point, but there was really nothing about how they acted here that made you want to cheer them. Great stuff.

Not nearly as hot as last week, but another fun segment with the main event players that builds the Final Four. This was one of Undertaker's better promos to this point because he got to say some of his goofy shit about the dark side and taking Shawn's soul while sounding genuinely menacing rather than cartoony. Austin smelling an ambush and getting Ross to interview him in the aisle was a very cool touch, as was him calling someone front row a punk and telling them to shut it. He isn't red hot yet from a fan connection perspective, but everything he does when you stick a mic in his face right now is absolute money. I also quite liked Shawn's promo. Wasn't anything particularly memorable, but he got his point across fine and didn't strike me as being disingenuous with what he was saying. I haven't watched the four way from In Your House in about ten years so if nothing else they got me hyped to check it out again.