WCW ongoing thread

[Loss]

I'm a big fan of Sherri, but the Flair/Sherri pairing really made Flair seem like a cartoon character. It didn't fit his character at all. Sherri should be paired with someone more eccentric, and Flair should be paired with someone wealthy, well-dressed and cunning. Flair/Woman together I liked. Flair/Sherri didn't click for me.

[Mad Dog]

I agree. Sherri and Flair are a bad pairing to me as she has the wrong personality for Flair.

[El-P]

Well, I'm just entering the era of Flair/Sherri soon, so we'll see if I end up feeling that way. I thought she was just fine with Shane Douglas in ECW, and he certainly wasn't a cartoon character.

[JerryvonKramer]

As weird as it seems, I don't think Flair suits having a valet period. His personality and character are much more geared towards the OTHER guy having a valet, a la the feud with Savage in 92 or the feud with Jimmy Garvin in late 87 / early 88. Flair should be directing his sexual energy at his opponent's woman, not one in his own corner.

 

I much prefer the idea of Flair having a JJ Dillon or Heenan in his corner to look after his business interests with someone like an Arn or Mr. Perfect who has got his back.

[Loss]

I hated Flair with Perfect so much! No one should be a manager who can't bump, or else they never get their comeuppance. Perfect's liberal interference in WM 8 without ever eating a punch from Savage STILL pisses me off. I would have probably liked the two as a sometimes tag team much more.

[El-P]

As much as I don't care for the Worldwide taping, their outside set with the whole New York street decorum was awesome, and they had some pretty great entrance, like DDP in fancy cars with Kim on his side. I'm always a big fan of glamour in wrestling, so I dig this quite a bit.

 

And talking about glamour, I disagree, I think Flair + valet is just a natural pairing. It's visually right and it's in the character to show off having a beautiful woman at his side. The best visuals in Flair's career was the short period in 1996 when he would come out with both Liz and Woman. Made for an awesome entrance.

[JerryvonKramer]

That's a good point actually Loss -- and one of the reasons why DiBiase sucked as a manager so much. Managers need to be able to take bumps -- something that Sherri always did.

 

However, I do like the beat down Perfect and Flair give Savage in Summerslam 92, pretty brutal for the time period. They basically break Savage's leg with that chair. Also,the post-match promos from Rumble 92 and Mania 8 with Heenan, Flair and Perfect are amazing. Any time where it's all three of them on camera is quite cool. I have to say I do like that little triumvirate as an uber-heel faction, despite the fact Perfect couldn't bump.

[El-P]

I hated Flair with Perfect so much! No one should be a manager who can't bump, or else they never get their comeuppance.

I didn't hate it because the characters fit so well together, but what you said is right, it was kinda infuriating to watch at times. Same goes for every no-bump manager (yeah DiBiase comes to mind).

On the other hand, I'm not a fan of Harley Race with Vader because Race was a rather shitty promo and Vader a terrific one, so the purpose was negated, and Harley's only fun moments came from bumping, but at time it seems too much focus on him taking huge bumps actually.

[Loss]

Race did WAY too much in Vader matches. A guy his age had no business taking suplexes on the arena floor and entrance ramp. I do agree with that, even though he worked his ass off.

[JerryvonKramer]

El-P - what do you think of the booking around Starrcade 93? There are some terrific call backs to Starrcade 83 during that feud and Harley's bumps and involvement in general all hark back to this overarching narrative that he's still sore over what happened in 83. All of which is underlined by the fact that Flair slips back into "Minnesota mode", the nice-guy, the family man who always gives his best, even uses exactly the same voice as he does during Starrcade 83. I think the symmetry of those two shows is beautiful.

[El-P]

I enjoyed the build for Starrcade 93, but I admit the whole Race stuff went way over my head since I really haven't watched 83 in context ever. I thought Flair as the family man was still a huge stretch, after years of coming off to the ring with lines of women, talking about basically how he fucked a thousand women in every city, having Fifi at his side clearly identified as *his* woman at the time. The whole kissing the wife and the kids had me rolling my eyes, this was the same guy who 4 years prior was shitting on Steamboat's family values. But Flair has always been a hypocritical sleazebag anyway, as a character and a human being, so...

[Loss]

Oh come on. The story wasn't Family Man Ric Flair, the story was Legend Ric Flair Putting It All On The Line To See If He Could Be The Man One More Time. That his family would support him in such an endeavor makes perfect sense. Also, Flair was an aging playboy bordering on 45 years old and it was an appropriate shift. Yes, it was a left turn from Fifi, and yes, Flair is most likely not the ideal dad or husband, but it was a step in the right direction.

[El-P]

I never said it was the story. I'm just saying that part with the vignettes at home had me grinning. The aging playboy bordering on 45 would soon get Sherri at his side, then get back Woman, fuck Liz again and get batshit crazy. And I can't not point out the irony of Flair turning into Steamboat circa-89, although he didn't had his baby boy wear a Little Naitch outfit. The arc of Ric Flair the character is so much like Ric Flair the human being, because infact they are the same person, so it's always fun to point out to me. I loved the Legend putting his career on the line for one last shot at glory storyline, which was obviously 99% of it.

[JerryvonKramer]

I just think that Flair -- possibly more than any other guy -- has very very distinct face ("Minnesota Flair") and heel ("Carolina Flair") modes -- made more confusing by the fact that the heel mode can also sometimes be booked as a face (see, for example, vs. Nikita in 86, or 97-8 sort of time, although he arguably has a third mode "Crazy Middle-aged Man" that starts to creep in around then).

 

Flair has 2 characters. One is a legend, a family man, a college jock, someone who trains hard, gives everything his all, will work against the odds etc. for all intents and purposes almost identical to Steamboat.

 

The other is Slick Rick, also a legend, who we all know and love. Never the twain shall meet.

 

They are as distinct as Yellow-and-Red Hulk and Hollywood Hogan -- but this is not 100% obvious because there's no image change, he wears the same trunks, robes and suits playing both characters (although face Ric can also wear training tops, as he does in 83 and in some of the 93 stuff).

 

Whatever the story was, there is no doubt that Flair was playing the first character in this feud.

[NintendoLogic]

I hated Flair with Perfect so much! No one should be a manager who can't bump, or else they never get their comeuppance.

This is precisely my problem with Vickie Guerrero today. The only comeuppance she ever gets is of the goofy slapstick pie-in-the-face variety, which would be fine if she were a harmless comedy act like heel Santino. But she's frequently the focal point of the show. She's currently feuding with John Cena, for chrissakes.

[Mad Dog]

Race did WAY too much in Vader matches. A guy his age had no business taking suplexes on the arena floor and entrance ramp. I do agree with that, even though he worked his ass off.

Race drove me nuts in a lot of Vader matches. If you're setting up for your manager to do a diving headbutt off the top rope, you've gotten way too complicated.

[Matt D]

Just wait til Kurt Angle is a manager in 9 years. There was something so legit about Race though. Not because he was a former champ but because he was the only one who could hold Vader in check.

[ohtani's jacket]

When I found that pretty awesome Windham vs Arn match two weeks before I was surprised. When there was a pretty good Windham/Simmons vs Enforcers match the next week, I was glad. But my mind is just boggled by this.

That Arn/Windham match is awesome. I was disappointed when I was the only person who seemed to give a shit about it in the WCW poll. The tag is cool as well.

 

Just curious, what from 91 wcw did you put over it?

 

I don't have a copy of my ballot anymore, but I can't remember voting for too many matches from '91. My ballot was pretty 1989, 1990 and '92 heavy with a few matches from '94. I quite liked the beginning of '91 before Flair jumped.

[Dylan Waco]

You may have had one or two of the Pillman/Barry matches above it.

[ohtani's jacket]

Yeah, I definitely would have.

[El-P]

July 1994. A historical date on WCW TV. No, not Hulk Hogan winning the belt. No. Bigger than this. The debut of what would become the most over finisher of the 90's this side of teh Stone Cold Stunner : the Diamond Cutter. Of course it didn't get a big reaction, it wasn't even named yet. Still, quite fun to see.

On a side note, the more I watch DDP, the more I appreciate him. Doesn't matter if he was a personnal friend of Bischoff, this guy obviously put a ton of efforts, thoughts and work into everything he did, the way he wrestled, his character, his ring attires, and although it wasn't always very good (the infamous Scum or 2 times promos), at least you could always feel this guy cared a lot. Probably one of the biggest overachiever I can think of. He was already 38 at that point, that's pretty impressive that he had so much drive to improve. Deserved everything he got in my book.

[El-P]

One thing I like about the C-shows like Wolrdwide, is that the announcers were so much laid-back. You can hear Schiavone had much more fun working with Jesse than he did with Heenan too. I didn't realize before that Jesse worked during the beginning of the Hogan era, I thought he was gone by then. I'll sure miss him when he will be.

[El-P]

The whole Dustin Rhodes vs Bunkhouse Buck feud is a complete snoozer for me. Yes, there has been that very fun bloody brawl at the PPV, yes, there has been the fun tag match thanks to Arn & Funk, yes, there has been an awesome promo from Dusty, but as soon as Jimmy Golden enters the ring, they just lose me. Easily one of the most boring worker I've came across. Nothing really good, nothing really bad, nothing engaging at all. Yawn.

[El-P]

Building to Clash at the late of August, the company still looks like WCW of old, Hogan notwhistanding. Not a lot of competitive match on TV, but that has been the case all along since Flair got the book (although it's much better than in the awful 2/3 of 1993), but some pretty good stuff regularly thanks to Austin, Steamboat, Regal, Badd, Pretty Wonderful, Stars & Stripes, Dustin, Arn, Funk, Flair, Taylor... The Rhodes vs Stuff Stable got more fun since Dusty and Funk got involved, as we get real serious heat, but there's still too much Buck on my TV. Meng is a pretty cool body guard character thus far, comes off really bad ass. AUstin vs Steamboat is a good feud on top on the midcard, but Regal doesn't get his weekly TV title defense match, which is disapointing. The tag team division doesn't look that good anymore (really depleted of strong talents) but Pretty Wonderful finally got into a nice groove. I like the fact that Orndorff always kept a way to remain interesting or funny, as he got older he add his goofy maneurisms before dropping his forearm which really doesn't look that far off the people's elbow in spirit. Plus you can notive the fact that he actually cares about his work and tries his best to make it work with Roma, unlike Arn who had a noticeable lack of interest, and as a result, Orndorff/Roma works much better than Arn/Roma. I must admit that Flair/Sherri isn't a very good mixture indeed, although I always love Sherri at ringside fucking up babyfaces. But in promos it doesn't work that well for Flair, I do agree.

 

But, you get some hints that Jimmy Hart & Hogan are getting more power backstage : Nasty Boys work as faces. Hacksaw Duggan debuts. Honky Tonk Man is coming soon. Now Duggan I can understand, after all he wasn't that old and his act was over with the crowd, but the HTM ? A one shot wonder gimmick who hadn't been relevant since 1990 (to be kind) ? WCW is still WCW, but for how long...

[Dylan Waco]

The whole Dustin Rhodes vs Bunkhouse Buck feud is a complete snoozer for me. Yes, there has been that very fun bloody brawl at the PPV, yes, there has been the fun tag match thanks to Arn & Funk, yes, there has been an awesome promo from Dusty, but as soon as Jimmy Golden enters the ring, they just lose me. Easily one of the most boring worker I've came across. Nothing really good, nothing really bad, nothing engaging at all. Yawn.

 

More evidence that when you and I see eye to eye it is a miracle.