Derivative Gimmicks

[Matt D]

To me, the Summerslam match is weird. It's got this strange pace and the theatrics are over the top compared to VII, not in the concept but just in how the two guys MOVE. It's not slow motion necessarily but they were wrestling really BIG. It might be for the stadium but no one else in the show was doing that. And the crowd eats it up SO much too.

[S.L.L.]

I remember that I gave that one to SLL when he asked for random matches to review over at Segunda Caida, but I can't find the article itself. Hey guys, you really need to do some work on indexing the links for your work. There's a lot of good writing in there, but nobody wants to scroll through the entire thing in order to find just one post (like I did just now). It's a big catalog of reviews without organization as it is right now, you just have to plow through everything chronologically and hope you find what you're looking for.

Yeah, I wish I knew how to do that better. Best I've got is attaching a relevant label to everything, but that only helps so much.

 

Anyway, here's what I wrote:

 

Hey, it's that other Savage/Warrior match, and I tend to think there's a good reason it's the "other" one. This is a fine example of a match that's very easy to like, but hard to love, a lot of which is down to the angle surrounding it, which I'll get to in a second. The work itself is strong enough to enjoy, and certainly higher-end than your average Warrior match, but not particularly impressive for a Savage match, and overall, not enough to make this really stand out from the pack. If nothing else, Savage deserves credit for eating Warrior's typically shitty offense really well. I've written before about the nature of a good carryjobs, and whether or not a carryjob where you draw all the attention to your own performance while your opponent still looks like shit is really a carryjob. This is a match where Savage actually makes Warrior look like a competent - albeit flawed - wrestler. This is a good carryjob. Still, it is the Warrior. You can polish that turd a lot, but not often, and while this was a game effort from all involved, there was still some classic Warrior suck shining through. Most notably, there was his selling of the neck when Savage was working it over. I guess I should be impressed when Warrior sells a body part at all, but it was mostly him lolling his head around like Stevie Wonder, which just looked goofy. Speaking of musical references and Warrior looking goofy, I hadn't watched a Warrior match in a while, and I had forgotten how silly his no-selling comebacks looked. I had remembered him doing no-selling comebacks. I had forgotten he did them by dancing like Jennifer Beals did to "Maniac". He also blows a top-rope axehandle. I know Warrior didn't come off of the top rope regularly, but I seriously don't get how you blow an axehandle. He released his grip before it hit Savage, and essentially turned it into a tomahawk chop. I don't know how you fuck up in that specific way. On top of all of this, this was the period that Warrior was wrestling in his proto-Giant Gonzalez flesh singlet...ewwwww. Still, the match is pretty solid overall, with Warrior's problems present but minimal. Then the angle kicks in, and this is where they lose me (well, Savage drops Warrior with a sweet piledriver around this point, so it doesn't lose me completely). In case you missed it, Mr. Perfect had been telling everyone that he was going to be in either Savage or Warrior's corner, but wouldn't say who, getting into both guys' heads and making them paranoid (as if either of them needed help with that) over who had sold out to Perfect. So far, so good. Now, as I have heard it, the plan was that Warrior was going to be the one who would sell out, and that he would win the Title as a result, but Warrior nixed it and didn't get the belt as punishment. I can't recall how much of that is fact and how much is bullshit Scott Keith made up, but it seems like a believable story in light of what actually happened: neither man sold out to Perfect, and the match ends with with Savage coming off of the top rope to Flair on the outside with an axehandle, only for Flair to dodge and hit him in the leg with a chair. Well, that's what was supposed to happen - Savage actually appears to be pulling right of Flair, and Ric seems to stay in place as he hits Savage with the chair. Savage gets counted out (Hebner is really awful down the stretch here, too, with his bit where he gets hit and basically regresses to infancy, conscious and crawling around, but unable to stand upright and deliberately crawling as far away from the match as possible...this is not him unable to see what's happening because he's out of it, this is him actively trying to avoid involvement in the match), and Flair and Perfect work over his leg, and that does lead directly to Flair regaining the Title from Savage, but it seems like you don't need to stage this elaborate ruse to achieve that. "Flair playing mind games" was a shitty excuse for the Black Scorpion angle. I'm not sure whether or not the fact that this was a better angle until the payoff and that the blowoff match was better makes "Flair playing mind games" a more or less shitty excuse here. Either way, it's still a shitty excuse.

[Dylan Waco]

Watching the Montreal footage which has been extremely fun and has had plenty of pleasant surprises. One of my favorites is "Pretty Boy" Chuck Simms who is there in 87 and is working an obvious Doug Somers rip off gimmick. I fucking love Doug Somers but it is absolutely absurd that someone was doing a poor mans Doug Somers, and yet I defy anyone to watch Chuck Simms from this era and come to a different conclusion.

 

Possibly even stranger than Candido being a Johnny Stewart clone

[Victator]

You know as a kid I thought it was obvious Flair and Perfect were lying to fuck with Macho Man and Warrior. So I was happy that neither man sold out.

[S.L.L.]

You know as a kid I thought it was obvious Flair and Perfect were lying to fuck with Macho Man and Warrior. So I was happy that neither man sold out.

I was, too. Warrior was my first favorite wrestler, and I don't know what kind of joyless bastard you would have to be to hate Randy Savage, so I was happy neither of them sold out at the time.

 

As an adult....Flair and Perfect went a very long way to accomplish something that they could have gotten from jumping Savage in the parking lot before his title defense against Flair. If the in-universe goal was to injure Savage's knee going into that match, this was kind of a needlessly elaborate plan that could've easily backfired on them. If the real life goal was to create added tension for the Savage/Warrior match, it's not like either of those guys need help being paranoid and insane. I was actually watching their tag against the Nasty Boys from the SummerSlam Spectacular just the other day. You totally buy that these guys would have dissension even without an outside heel party getting involved. So the storyline comes across as kinda pointless to me.

[Johnny Guitar]

You know as a kid I thought it was obvious Flair and Perfect were lying to fuck with Macho Man and Warrior. So I was happy that neither man sold out.

I was, too. Warrior was my first favorite wrestler, and I don't know what kind of joyless bastard you would have to be to hate Randy Savage, so I was happy neither of them sold out at the time.

 

As an adult....Flair and Perfect went a very long way to accomplish something that they could have gotten from jumping Savage in the parking lot before his title defense against Flair. If the in-universe goal was to injure Savage's knee going into that match, this was kind of a needlessly elaborate plan that could've easily backfired on them. If the real life goal was to create added tension for the Savage/Warrior match, it's not like either of those guys need help being paranoid and insane. I was actually watching their tag against the Nasty Boys from the SummerSlam Spectacular just the other day. You totally buy that these guys would have dissension even without an outside heel party getting involved. So the storyline comes across as kinda pointless to me.

 

I love that Flair was paired up with Hennig and Heenan in the WWF. It seems so right.

 

Anyway. I knew that Flair & Perfect would get involved in the WWF title match even before they started the storyline on TV.

 

I got a flyer from SilverVision for SummerSlam months beforehand. Which had just had Bret/Davey, Savage/Warrior, Taker/Kamala & Warriors/Money Inc (which was billed as a title match) listed. As that took care of all the major babyfaces and left Flair without a marquee match. I kinda guessed he & Perfect would stick there nose's in somewhere.

 

Sidenote for SummerSlam 92. I met Animal & Wayne Bloom in the Hard Rock Cafe before the card. They were very cool.

 

Me and my cousins almost got lynched for cheering Bret in Wembley. Good times!

[flyonthewall2983]

Wasn't there a big number of Bret fans in the crowd that night? Maybe not equal to Davey but still a presence in the audience.

[Johnny Guitar]

Wasn't there a big number of Bret fans in the crowd that night? Maybe not equal to Davey but still a presence in the audience.

There was. But never underestimate British patriotism and alcohol!

[Victator]

You know as a kid I thought it was obvious Flair and Perfect were lying to fuck with Macho Man and Warrior. So I was happy that neither man sold out.

I was, too. Warrior was my first favorite wrestler, and I don't know what kind of joyless bastard you would have to be to hate Randy Savage, so I was happy neither of them sold out at the time.

 

As an adult....Flair and Perfect went a very long way to accomplish something that they could have gotten from jumping Savage in the parking lot before his title defense against Flair. If the in-universe goal was to injure Savage's knee going into that match, this was kind of a needlessly elaborate plan that could've easily backfired on them. If the real life goal was to create added tension for the Savage/Warrior match, it's not like either of those guys need help being paranoid and insane. I was actually watching their tag against the Nasty Boys from the SummerSlam Spectacular just the other day. You totally buy that these guys would have dissension even without an outside heel party getting involved. So the storyline comes across as kinda pointless to me.

 

I would guess they were hoping to make one of them snap and burn out at the PPV then pick up the scraps. When it became apparent that was not going to happen, they just fucked up Savage's knee. I would assume the main thing was for Warrior not to get the title.

 

I hated Warrior for awhile after Wrestlemania 6. I did not hate Warrior, but I did not think he could stand up to the bad guys like Hulk. I felt vindicated when Warrior lost the belt to Sgt.Slaughter at the Rumble.

[artDDP]

You know as a kid I thought it was obvious Flair and Perfect were lying to fuck with Macho Man and Warrior. So I was happy that neither man sold out.

I was, too. Warrior was my first favorite wrestler, and I don't know what kind of joyless bastard you would have to be to hate Randy Savage, so I was happy neither of them sold out at the time.

 

As an adult....Flair and Perfect went a very long way to accomplish something that they could have gotten from jumping Savage in the parking lot before his title defense against Flair. If the in-universe goal was to injure Savage's knee going into that match, this was kind of a needlessly elaborate plan that could've easily backfired on them. If the real life goal was to create added tension for the Savage/Warrior match, it's not like either of those guys need help being paranoid and insane. I was actually watching their tag against the Nasty Boys from the SummerSlam Spectacular just the other day. You totally buy that these guys would have dissension even without an outside heel party getting involved. So the storyline comes across as kinda pointless to me.

 

They could have easily just shot a pre-tape of Flair and Hennig attacking Savage in the parking lot but a big part of me wants to believe Flair wanted to get loaded in London so he got the WWF to book him to play a larger role in the main event.

[rainmakerrtv]

You know as a kid I thought it was obvious Flair and Perfect were lying to fuck with Macho Man and Warrior. So I was happy that neither man sold out.

I was, too. Warrior was my first favorite wrestler, and I don't know what kind of joyless bastard you would have to be to hate Randy Savage, so I was happy neither of them sold out at the time.

 

As an adult....Flair and Perfect went a very long way to accomplish something that they could have gotten from jumping Savage in the parking lot before his title defense against Flair. If the in-universe goal was to injure Savage's knee going into that match, this was kind of a needlessly elaborate plan that could've easily backfired on them. If the real life goal was to create added tension for the Savage/Warrior match, it's not like either of those guys need help being paranoid and insane. I was actually watching their tag against the Nasty Boys from the SummerSlam Spectacular just the other day. You totally buy that these guys would have dissension even without an outside heel party getting involved. So the storyline comes across as kinda pointless to me.

 

I would guess they were hoping to make one of them snap and burn out at the PPV then pick up the scraps. When it became apparent that was not going to happen, they just fucked up Savage's knee. I would assume the main thing was for Warrior not to get the title.

 

 

Divide and conquer. Attacking Savage in a parking lot just damages Savage and could mean Warrior gets the title. Using mind games to get them angry at each other means that they have a violent, mutually damaging match instead of a clean-cut, scientific match (I know, I know) between respectful athletes, and thus the match takes its toll on both men, hopefully leaving Savage injured for when Flair gets a shot at him and comprimises Warrior for any future challenges.

 

Besides, villains love overly elaborate plans, it's one of the great traditions of villainy. Flair was probably operating under the rules of the Guild of Calamitous Intent.