Without further ado:
 |
| I give you WCW's Halloween Havoc 1997 |
1997.
Because I hate that I have to say that that was 22 years ago when it feels like I was 22 only yesterday. Ouch. Time is a cruel master.
But we begin with a raucous crowd and a firecracker commentary team of Tony Schiavone, Dusty Rhodes, and Bobby Heenan as announcer Dave Penzer calls out that the first match is starting before we even finish panning over the crowds and taking in that this arena is jam-packed and everyone is freaking out.
 |
| Opening Match: Yuji Nagata (yes that one!) with Sonny Onoo vs Ultimo Dragon, who they have heat with. |
 |
| Despite the crowd being fairly chilly, this match is awesome. |
This match was a real firecracker. Seriously. Ultimo came out to some truly shrill and angry sounding pyro, Yuji & Sonny came out ready for business, and Iron Mike Tenay joined the commentary desk so we didn't have to listen to Bobby Heenan demean both us and himself with overtly racist commentary. Seriously, I love Bobby Heenan, but the man should never have been asked to give commentary on Asian or Hispanic wrestlers. Ouch.
Regardless, it's truly wild to see Yuji Nagata moving like he's Sho or Yoh. Fast, accurate, and heavy-hitting, he's a joy to watch. Even Dusty Rhodes puts him over (which makes sense - they've probably had matches back in the day in Japan when Nagata was a younger man).
Suddenly, though, I was distracted by a gangly man in the crowd running around with a TENAY THE ICON sign. That got me laughing so hard I nearly choked on my popcorn, so good job, random crowd guy with the sign!
Nagata gives UD a piledriver that looked like he was dropping him in a basket of kittens, but he followed it up by literally kicking Ultimo Dragon out of the sky.
Raven & his Flock wandered down to ringside at this point, and the combination of their presence and a random "HOGAN FEARS IDAHO" sign (wtf?!) were pretty distracting, but the amazing match was impossible to look away from for long.
Eventually, however, Nagata put a truly brutal armbar on Ultimo Dragon and held him in place until Sonny Onoo could kick the arm, breaking it and handing Nagata an envelope of cash.
At 9:42, it's one of the longest matches I've seen in WCW involving Japanese wrestlers where there was no reference to rice or Pearl Harbor. It's also one of the best opening matches I've ever seen.
At this point, we cut backstage with Mark Madden & the Disco Inferno (ew). Mid-interview, they are attacked by an irate Jacquelyn, which was pretty cool, but I was eager to get out to the ring again.
 |
| Gedo (yes that one!) and Chris Jericho (yes that one!) |
I can't help it, but I have to say this: I hate that they replace Jericho's "Boys of Summer" ripoff theme with his "Break the Walls Down" theme. That being said, this is another fantastic match. It's amazing to see both of these men so young, though... uh... Gedo kinda looks a bit like Aja Kong here. I guess that means he looked like more of a badass when he was young and wearing a terrible yellow gi than he does now with his hypeman gimmick?
Tenay is still with us on commentary and talks about Gedo's pertner Jado (also still in NJPW!) as Jericho parades around in a leftover Stone Cold vest with the patches missing.
These boys go hard. Jericho looks like he's trying to murder Gedo with his kicks, and Gedo gives him a powerslam answer that made me reflexively curl into a fetal position. It was - b r u t a l - and they follow that up with Jericho giving him the gnarliest Top Rope Hurricanrana (I will not call it a Frankensteiner, even though they did on commentary) I have ever witnessed. It left me wondering who resurrected Gedo, because it did not look like he could've survived.
This was the fastest 7:18 I've ever had in my life. I was not bored in the least. Neither, it seems, was the gentleman in the coolest Papa Shango sweatshirt that the cameras cut to a couple of times.
Regardless, amazing match.
We rolled straight from this brilliant match into possibly the best match on the card:
 |
| Eddie Guerrero & Rey Mysterio Jr |
Rey is a total babyface here, in his fancy purple Phantom outfit, and he's the perfect foil to Eddie's foul-tempered, hateful heel persona. This brilliantly laid-out match is certainly not hurt by the fact that these were two of the best wrestlers on the planet at the time.
And the crowd were both too drunk and too racist to get that, it felt like.
Oh, they were hot. They were screaming and hollering and moving around, but they were also... there was a weird undertone. It's the kind of weird undertone we get today with brilliant athletes like Sonny Kiss & Nyla Rose. Not much has changed in wrestling in that regard, I guess...
Regardless.
This is a beautiful match. Every hit looks like a ton of bricks. Every jump reaches the moon. Every leap is well-executed. Everything, in short, works.
I was so hyped going into this match. I love both wrestlers to bits, and the fact that the match devolved quickly from enraged trash-talking from both parties to COMBAT POETRY... it was a real treat to watch. I mean, early on, like, before they even announced the name of the ref (Billy Silverman, btw), Z, who was watching with me, let out a mighty "YEAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!"
Moments into this match, Rey's eyeblack was starting to rub off on Eddie, which really sold, for me, the idea that Eddie was slowly taking Rey to pieces. Well, as far as Rey's mask goes, that was kind of literal. Eddie tore the mask! Rey's answer? Knock Eddie down, dive out of the ring, and yank Eddie into the ring-post crotch-first while Eddie was laying on his stomach.
It's one of the best matches I think I've ever seen, so I strongly recommend watching Rey take Eddie's title in Halloween Havoc 1997.
The most satisfying 13:51 in my PPV watching history.
Ugh. Sorry, guys, but I just hate these awful NWO Hogan promos. He and Bischoff are in the back and Bischoff keeps harping on about how with Sting wandering around, it's just not safe for Hogan to work. Not. Safe. For Hogan. Who claims to be the toughest man on earth. It's garbage. All of it is garbage. I hate it.
 |
| Alex Wright w Debra vs Mongo McMichael |
I don't like Mongo. I just don't. I find him obnoxious and not that good in the ring. I feel the opposite about Alex Wright. He should've had a much longer, more illustrious career and been in the WWE having great matches against all of their best Cruiserweights. This match is one of the longest 6:31 in my life, because it starts with Disco Inferno interrupting the Nitro Girls & making fun of Alex Wright. I wish he'd just stuff it and go away.
And then Mongo comes out and...
look.
This is one of Mongo's best matches.
That should tell you more about how good Alex Wright was than anything else.
At least they gave Wright the win here.
 |
| I'll take "Matches That Shouldn't Exist" for 1000, Alex... |
I neither understand nor care about the origins of this match. All I care about is the fact that Jacquelyn looks like a million bucks here, and her DDT is one of the best in the business.
She takes out the garbage with a rollup in 9:39. Honestly, I feel like if they'd switched up the times for the Wright/Mongo match and this one, everyone would've been happy. It's probably only almost 10 minutes because that's how long it took to get up, go to the bathroom, and get back.
WCW never had faith in women's matches.
 |
| WOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! |
Despite Hennig being offered Arn's spot on the Horsemen when the Enforcer had to retire (and there's about 40 years of footage played before and after this match on that subject), Flair wants Hennig's WCW US Heavyweight Championship, so they have this brilliant match.
Either man could wrestle a broom and make it look good back in the day.
So of course this match is brilliant.
Flair sprinted to the ring, grabbed a cameraman, and mauled Hennig to start with, devolving to kicks before stealing Hennig's robe. The two are fighting, but the announcers are too busy quibbling over nonsense, idiot NWO garbage that no one cares about anymore (except for when Heenan basically shoots on Hogan being a trash human).
There's only one way this incredible match can end, though, without losing heat - it's a DQ finish.
Hennig retains in 13:57
Backstage, Macho man is discussing things with the WCW website, then one of the most boring segments on the show (besides the NWO making fun of Arn's retirement speech. Ugh) happens.
 |
| Why yes, Bischoff, the main event is happening. |
Larry Zbyszko?!
Oh heck yeah.
 |
| There are enough drugs in this ring to kill a small nation. |
Despite the fact that every person in the ring was probably riding about 8 lines of coke each (rumor, partially substantiated by participants through various shoot interviews), this is a really solid match.
It's an angry match, but it's a solid one.
And everyone here is alive. Which is incredible when you consider the hardships all four of these guys have faced. I mean, Syxx reportedly had his heart stop in a Denny's in Maine once...
But seriously, this is a great match. Syxx is a perfect heel, belittling the counts, while Zbyszko does an excellent job as a ref, taking no garbage from any of the men involved. Larry even threatens to eject Syxx at one point. It's great.
Someone keeps dancing their Wrestlebuddy (a stuffed wrestler doll) on the stairs off and on. It's hilarious.
At first, the match ends with Hall winning, but it's such an obvious troll finish that Larry watches the replay and tells them they have to get back in the ring and finish it for real. They do, but even though Luger technically wins, the NWO wreak havoc (hah!) on both him & Larry Zbyszko.
Honestly, it was the shortest 13:02 Luger match I've ever seen.
 |
| I don't like most weird gimmick matches and the origins for this one are icky. |
8) Mach Man Randy Savage with Miss Elizabeth vs DDP with Kimberly in a Las Vegas Sudden Death Match
Okay, so the origins of this match involve implied rape. Seriously. Macho implies that he assaulted Kimberly and claims she enjoyed it. I don't forget garbage storylines like this.
NWO 4 Life in Prison...
Anywho.
Basically, the only way to win this match is via countout. Your opponent cannot get up before the ten count.
Mickey Jay is the referee for this match, and boy does he have his hands full. Both Macho & DDP battered each other down for a while before the camera got bored and panned over to the Flock, still watching from the crowd.
At one point either Macho or DDP took a move that sent Dusty over the moon screaming "HE WOBBLE-LEGGED HIM! HE WOBBLE-LEGGED HIM!" and you cannot miss that. It's one of the best Dusty-calls of all time!
At one point, Miss Elizabeth & Kimberly got into a catfight on the outside! It was pretty bad, since neither one was really a wrestler, but it got Heenan interested again, so there you go.
This is a pretty decent match, and Macho Man sells really well. Unfortunately, there are Fake Stings in attendance, so they beat DDP down and Macho wins in, perhaps, one of the longer 18:07 of my life.
Main Event time, folks.
It's Age in the Cage.
 |
| Yikes. |
9) Rowdy Roddy Piper vs Hollywood Hogan in a Steel Cage Match
This is one of the worst cages I've ever seen in wrestling that didn't involve the word "Punjab".
I will say this, it's pretty hilarious watching Piper biting Hogan on the buttock first and then on the head. Eventually they both left the cage, which... ugh. Eventually, however, like all NWO matches at this point, they were interrupted by a slowly growing horde of Stings of dubious reality. I really thought the top-of-the-cage fighting was great, though. This is probably Piper & Hogan's best match together.
Eventually, there were too many Stings, so both Hogan & Piper returned to the Cage proper where Piper choked Hogan out with a Sleeper before being attacked by Macho with a baseball bat. Huge multi-Sting brawl ensued with Piper shackled to the cage. What really freaked both Z & I out was that a fan had snuck into the fracas wearing Sting makeup. If there's one thing I know about fan interference in wrestling, it's that it never ends well for the fan in question. RIP Sting-makeup guy. Yikes.
At 13:37, this was a little longer than either man was ready for, but it was as long as it had to be, I feel.
And that, my friends, was WCW Halloween Havoc 1997, presented by Slim Jims.
I would 100% recommend you watch this whole PPV - it's a really fun time, and even though I hate the NWO's promo packages and their treatment of Arn's retirement (I love Arn), it's an easy enough watch. So, thank you, Commissioner, for requesting this Havoc!
Go Enjoy Something!
FC
No comments:
Post a Comment
Comments are now moderated, so if your comment doesn't appear right off, it's just bc I haven't seen the email yet sorry!