The Warrior vs. Hollywood Hogan - WCW Halloween Havoc (1998)
By now you may have heard the shocking news that the Ultimate Warrior has passed away. It's a truly bizarre and tragic event that has taken place only mere days after Warrior's inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame and only about 24 or so removed from his appearance on Raw last Monday night.
Warrior and his character he left to the wrestling world will forever be remembered.
While I did not grow up during the time of Ultimate Warrior's major run in WWF or during the peak of Hulkamania, I did grow up in the time that the Ultimate Warrior was making another return to wrestling, and this time it was in a nWo-heavy World Championship Wrestling. I remember renting WCW's Halloween Havoc '98 at Blockbusters (RIP as well) when I was just beginning to really sink my teeth into all this wrestling business, I didn't really know much about the Warrior at the time, but the cover on the box at the store had Hulk Hogan strangling a man with what looked like cake all over his face and the words "The World's Most Terrifying Wrestling Event" labeled above it. I'm not sure why looking at the cover made me want to watch this PPV immediately, maybe it was the fact that I really needed to find out why Warrior had cake all over his face, but it did.
People may give this Hogan/Warrior match at Halloween Havoc a lot of crap, but for someone who had not seen a lot of wrestling at the time this was a huge spectacle to watch. Also, I did not see the build up to this match which included Warrior appearing in the mirror, a lot of smoke, and, of course, profound Warrior promos, so this was really the first time that I was treated to the likes of the One Warrior Nation (that's nWo backwards).
There will never be another Ultimate Warrior. He is simply unrecreatable. Rest in peace.
Showing posts with label Halloween Havoc. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Halloween Havoc. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 9, 2014
Thursday, October 31, 2013
Match of the Day - The WCW Halloween Havoc phantom!
The WCW Halloween Havoc Phantom vs. "Z-Man" Tom Zenk - Halloween Havoc (1991)
The masked and mustached WCW Halloween Havoc phantom squashes Tom Zenk before relieving his true identity to the WCW audience in 1991.
Enjoy and Happy Halloween!
The masked and mustached WCW Halloween Havoc phantom squashes Tom Zenk before relieving his true identity to the WCW audience in 1991.
Enjoy and Happy Halloween!
Friday, February 1, 2013
Match of the Day - The Stinger fights his past, present, and future selves at Halloween Havoc 2000
Sting vs. Jeff Jarrett - WCW Halloween Havoc (2000)
Jarrett and Sting have had a long running history together not just in TNA but also in WCW. And while Sting was still the cornerstone and backbone of WCW after all the NWO business settled and WCW was running out of steam, Jeff Jarrett, who was always jumping ship sort of just rose to the top in 2000 - now all the sudden was WCW's "Chosen One". Jarrett's main eventing status at this time may have merely been do in part by the lack of talent, talent that WWF and its impending Monday Night War victory was picking up by the truck loads. Don't get me wrong, Jeff Jarrett is one of the greatest heels in professional wrestling, but it took him forever to get over and when he did, he didn't even have to do anything for it. I mean, now that I think about it, did Jeff Jarrett really ever get anything in his career by actually earning it? And yet here he is in 2000; the king of the mountain while Sting is at the bottom of the barrel trying to earn US title shots and doing gimmick matches with Vampiro.
So what better way to honor Sting and his amazing commitment to a company that was once on top of the world and now on its way out the door faster than a Flair blade job? By making him face impostors of himself from better times than 2000. Yep, instead of wrestling Jeff Jarrett in this match which would have been decent at best, Sting really ends up fighting five guys who dressed up like him during different points of his career.
The first Stinger we see is a light green pants-ed late 90's Sting (Tenay says he's the sting from Halloween Havoc 1989 but Sting wore black that year) who gets a Scorpion Death Drop delivered to him on the entrance way. The next Sting is the 1990 World Heavyweight Champion Sting in bright pink who also receives the Scorpion Death Drop on the entrance way. After that we get Wolfpac Sting with red face-paint who, yep, gets Scorpion Death Dropped on the entrance way (I'm guessing to dispose of them faster?), and then when we think that all the Stings are gone, we get Crow Sting, maybe circa '97, who cuts his way through the mat and drags Sting down into the hole to "hell". Luckily our hero, the real Sting, makes short work of this black and white Sting as he throws him out of the ring to get back to Jarrett. But wait! Here comes another black and white Sting - this time it's rafter-repelling Sting who gets his wig taken off to reveal that he is actually "Sting from the year 2525"; 70 year old Sting is then Scorpion Death Dropped on the announce table.
"Where's the Black Scorpion, we need him now!" - Mark Madden
Taking out what Sting thought was the last of his mirror-image impostors was not the end of the match, however. Sting tries to go back in to finish Double J off with the Scorpion Deathlock, but the Sting from under the ring reappears and smashes a guitar over real Sting's real head. Luckily though, Sting no-sells the guitar shot and Scorpion Death Drops the fourth Sting, who now has blood all over his face. Sting putting away bloody Stinger gives Jeff Jarrett time to find another guitar to use on Sting. Jarrett succeeds in smashing the guitar over Sting's head, all the while, the ref (Slick Johnson, of course) is off somewhere looking for more Stings and doesn't notice the shards of wood in the ring as he returns to give Jarrett the three count.
So yeah, this was a clusterfuck. A big heaping pile of Vince Russo shit clusterfuck.
The best - I say best because it's funny to me - part of this whole bad idea gimmick is that Jeff Jarrett, whose grudge with Sting was a combination of Sting losing his heart (a classic feud saying which means nothing at all except to bring in heat), refusing to retire, and not being as good as he was in his hey-day, is the fact that Jeff Jarrett would do this again in TNA (when Sting was returning to action in 2006) with Eric Young as 90's Sting (he also portrayed The Great Muta against Mr. Anderson Sting 5 years after), knock-knock who's there? Braden Walker (Chris Harris) as the black and white Sting with James Storm (a man who would eventually be champion of the company 6 years later) in a chicken suit as The Crow, Sting's mascot, and last but definitely not least, Monty Brown as the black daddy Sting with a little Stinger baby. Boy oh boy, do I love when history repeats itself...
A bonus to the 2006 TNA Sting impersonation gag was that Chris Harris, who portrayed a very spot-on black and white Sting, was also one of the impostor Stings in the match above. I'm not sure exactly which Sting he played but I'm almost positive it was bloody black and white Sting.
That's all I got.
Jarrett and Sting have had a long running history together not just in TNA but also in WCW. And while Sting was still the cornerstone and backbone of WCW after all the NWO business settled and WCW was running out of steam, Jeff Jarrett, who was always jumping ship sort of just rose to the top in 2000 - now all the sudden was WCW's "Chosen One". Jarrett's main eventing status at this time may have merely been do in part by the lack of talent, talent that WWF and its impending Monday Night War victory was picking up by the truck loads. Don't get me wrong, Jeff Jarrett is one of the greatest heels in professional wrestling, but it took him forever to get over and when he did, he didn't even have to do anything for it. I mean, now that I think about it, did Jeff Jarrett really ever get anything in his career by actually earning it? And yet here he is in 2000; the king of the mountain while Sting is at the bottom of the barrel trying to earn US title shots and doing gimmick matches with Vampiro.
So what better way to honor Sting and his amazing commitment to a company that was once on top of the world and now on its way out the door faster than a Flair blade job? By making him face impostors of himself from better times than 2000. Yep, instead of wrestling Jeff Jarrett in this match which would have been decent at best, Sting really ends up fighting five guys who dressed up like him during different points of his career.
The first Stinger we see is a light green pants-ed late 90's Sting (Tenay says he's the sting from Halloween Havoc 1989 but Sting wore black that year) who gets a Scorpion Death Drop delivered to him on the entrance way. The next Sting is the 1990 World Heavyweight Champion Sting in bright pink who also receives the Scorpion Death Drop on the entrance way. After that we get Wolfpac Sting with red face-paint who, yep, gets Scorpion Death Dropped on the entrance way (I'm guessing to dispose of them faster?), and then when we think that all the Stings are gone, we get Crow Sting, maybe circa '97, who cuts his way through the mat and drags Sting down into the hole to "hell". Luckily our hero, the real Sting, makes short work of this black and white Sting as he throws him out of the ring to get back to Jarrett. But wait! Here comes another black and white Sting - this time it's rafter-repelling Sting who gets his wig taken off to reveal that he is actually "Sting from the year 2525"; 70 year old Sting is then Scorpion Death Dropped on the announce table.
"Where's the Black Scorpion, we need him now!" - Mark Madden
Taking out what Sting thought was the last of his mirror-image impostors was not the end of the match, however. Sting tries to go back in to finish Double J off with the Scorpion Deathlock, but the Sting from under the ring reappears and smashes a guitar over real Sting's real head. Luckily though, Sting no-sells the guitar shot and Scorpion Death Drops the fourth Sting, who now has blood all over his face. Sting putting away bloody Stinger gives Jeff Jarrett time to find another guitar to use on Sting. Jarrett succeeds in smashing the guitar over Sting's head, all the while, the ref (Slick Johnson, of course) is off somewhere looking for more Stings and doesn't notice the shards of wood in the ring as he returns to give Jarrett the three count.
So yeah, this was a clusterfuck. A big heaping pile of Vince Russo shit clusterfuck.
The best - I say best because it's funny to me - part of this whole bad idea gimmick is that Jeff Jarrett, whose grudge with Sting was a combination of Sting losing his heart (a classic feud saying which means nothing at all except to bring in heat), refusing to retire, and not being as good as he was in his hey-day, is the fact that Jeff Jarrett would do this again in TNA (when Sting was returning to action in 2006) with Eric Young as 90's Sting (he also portrayed The Great Muta against Mr. Anderson Sting 5 years after), knock-knock who's there? Braden Walker (Chris Harris) as the black and white Sting with James Storm (a man who would eventually be champion of the company 6 years later) in a chicken suit as The Crow, Sting's mascot, and last but definitely not least, Monty Brown as the black daddy Sting with a little Stinger baby. Boy oh boy, do I love when history repeats itself...
A bonus to the 2006 TNA Sting impersonation gag was that Chris Harris, who portrayed a very spot-on black and white Sting, was also one of the impostor Stings in the match above. I'm not sure exactly which Sting he played but I'm almost positive it was bloody black and white Sting.
That's all I got.
Friday, December 28, 2012
Match of the Day - Jerry Lynn gets burned in WCW!
Sabu vs. Mr. JL - WCW Halloween Havoc (1995)
During his short-lived World Championship Wrestling career in 1995, Sabu faced a few cruiserweghts here and there, one of which being Jerry Lynn who was masked for some reason and only wrestled under his initials. I'm not sure why Jerry Lynn had to keep his identity so secret while in WCW but it was a damn good thing he was wearing a mask for this match!
Reason being that Sabu was accompanied by his Uncle, The (original) Sheik for this match at Halloween Havoc and The Sheik had a little trick up his sleeve. That trick being a fireball shot right in JL's face, an effect that no one except The Sheik himself (if that) knew was going to be performed!
Along with the fireball incident, this match is also known for the fact that The Sheik breaks his leg after being on the receiving end of Sabu's asai moonsault. Sabu also hit Lynn but for some reason The Sheik , Aladdin sword and all, happened to walk right behind Lynn as Sabu was coming off the ropes.That's why you see The Sheik wobbling around the ringside area as he sets for the fireball immediately following Sabu's unbotched win.
This match is surely a gem.
During his short-lived World Championship Wrestling career in 1995, Sabu faced a few cruiserweghts here and there, one of which being Jerry Lynn who was masked for some reason and only wrestled under his initials. I'm not sure why Jerry Lynn had to keep his identity so secret while in WCW but it was a damn good thing he was wearing a mask for this match!
Reason being that Sabu was accompanied by his Uncle, The (original) Sheik for this match at Halloween Havoc and The Sheik had a little trick up his sleeve. That trick being a fireball shot right in JL's face, an effect that no one except The Sheik himself (if that) knew was going to be performed!
Along with the fireball incident, this match is also known for the fact that The Sheik breaks his leg after being on the receiving end of Sabu's asai moonsault. Sabu also hit Lynn but for some reason The Sheik , Aladdin sword and all, happened to walk right behind Lynn as Sabu was coming off the ropes.That's why you see The Sheik wobbling around the ringside area as he sets for the fireball immediately following Sabu's unbotched win.
This match is surely a gem.
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