[1990-04-07-WWF-Superstars] Rick Rude vignette

[Loss]

Talk about it here.

[Loss]

The beginning of Rude being repackaged as a serious, threatening top guy. He has started a new training regimen and does a very serious promo that works really well. I remember really enjoying these. I'll take this as the top feud over Hogan/Warrior.

[PeteF3]

Rude points out that he's already beaten Warrior for one title, and he aims to do it again. The vignettes and interviews were good but Rude never seemed to get a quality win that really established him as a main event threat in the WWF. It would have been nice to see one of the WWF's myriad top babyfaces do a job for the greater good. I saw Rude pin Roddy Piper at a house show in February (albeit with a ref bump and a Bad News Brown distraction and a ring bell to the head). Such a match on SNME would have accomplished wonders.

[Matt D]

I think Dusty would have worked in that role. Or Duggan.

[soup23]

Short effective promo by Rude and man was he sweating in the workout.

[Kevin Ridge]

Rude is calling out new champion Warrior already. Rude is as sweaty as Jim Cornette was in the previous segment.

[Cox]

Good segment, the first of what I seem to recall were a lot of these. I'm with Pete, Rude needed one quality program pre-Wrestlemania to really make him a threat for Warrior. The Piper program had mostly fizzled out by the start of 1990, and lord knows Piper wasn't going to put over Rude at Wrestlemania (which is why I assume they didn't have a match). Nobody except Young 10 Year Old Cox expected Jimmy Snuka to beat Rick Rude at Wrestlemania VI. He needed a big win on somebody higher on the totem pole, and while the natural program of Rude beating for the IC title made sense, I don't think he was seen on Warrior's level, which was the first step towards Warrior's title reign dying on the vine.

[Cox]

Oh, and one other thing; I always liked how people treated Parts Unknown like it was a real place. I was reminded of that during Rude's promo talking about traveling to Parts Unknown. They take this boilerplate phrase used to explain not giving a hometown for strange or mythical-type characters, and to his credit, Warrior owned it as if it was where he lived when he wasn't wrestling in the WWF. This is literally the only positive thing I will say for Warrior.

[garretta]

Rude sounds like he's been drinking a bit of Warrior's leftover silly juice when he talks about "going beyond Parts Unknown" and such early in the segment, but recovers to deliver an excellent serious promo. Heenan's right there with him, sounding truly menacing for the first time since Andre turned on Hogan three years before. This is a bit of a quick makeover, but it works, mostly because we know how tough Rude was in real life. It'll be interesting to see how this buildup continues.

[drew wardlaw]

Rude cuts an awesome promo here. Really serious and I like the close up with his hair wet. Looks dangerous.

[GSR]

Rick Rude is in the gym drenched in sweat while the Brain is also in workout gear. Rude bets that the Ultimate Warrior is happy, and as the new WWF champion he has every right to be, but he’s happy too. Only one man has ever beaten the Ultimate Warrior for a title, and that’s him. He’s now issuing a public challenge to him, one that he must accept. Heenan says that he’s not going to be smart or cute, they’re 100% dead serious and if the Warrior doesn’t understand that he’s in some serious trouble. Rude says that he’s embarked on the most rigorous training schedule the human body can endure, and when they step into the ring and stare eye to eye, there will be no doubt who the ‘ultimate athlete’ is. Once more he will cross over into parts unknown, and once more he will take what the Ultimate Warrior thinks is his forever.

 

Strong, ultra serious promo from Rude and Heenan here. Problem is that I don’t take Rude as a legitimate threat. Sure he already beat Warrior for the Intercontinental title, but it wasn’t clean in the slightest. Pete touches on it, but a clean win over a fairly top level face would have really helped here and Jimmy Snuka (who he is coming off defeating at Wrestlemania) isn’t that top face.

[dawho5]

I think Rude could have been something bigger than he was if he'd have been given this kind of gimmick earlier. He can pull off serious just as well as sleazy.

[Bigelow34]

Like it was said above, Rude beating Piper at Mania to end their feud was never going to happen but would have been a key win for Rude to give him some legitimacy. They give it a good effort starting here but he hadn't done much of anything since losing to Warrior at SS89.