Talk about it here.

They put over how frequently Bret is defending the title. They are refocusing on Flair challenging Bret on house shows. Gene has dinner with Flair at a nice restaurant to discuss his future plans. I love simple stuff like this, and Flair is much more comfortable in this setting than he normally felt in WWF-style overproduced segments. He's great at declaring himself better at his opponent while at the same time putting over his opponent's accomplishments.

 

We close out with a montage of the vignettes that are a few years old at this point of Mr. Perfect playing various sports perfectly.

So was it known that Flair was leaving at the time? He seems so calm and collected. Kinda weird.

I thought Flair was tremendous here. He might be the best ever at getting him and his opponent over in interviews, and the ring.

Flair said in his shoot he got the offer from Watts to come back in November and took it immediately and told Vince about it. It's interesting in that he also said Vince wanted him to feud and ultimately job to Razor Ramon, in that Vince saw the potential of Hall as a face rather quickly.

Check out Super WrestleMania, available for the FIRST TIME EVER on Genesis! Don't pay too close attention to the character on the apron! (It's the Warrior).

 

A rundown of Bret's title defenses that's effective at both putting over Bret's hard work as well as how weak the WWF roster was once you get past Flair and Razor. Flair cuts a promo from a restaurant, and for once in a WWF setting Flair gets to be low-key, and he's as great as you'd expect. Flair going for the direct cheap heat on Saskatoon was out of character but I found it amusing.

 

Stuff from Mr. Perfect's introductory vignettes from '88 follows. For a guy who's gimmick is doing things "perfectly," his basketball shooting technique is laughable.

Highlight of Bret defenses vs. Shango, Virgil, Berzerker, HBK to paint him as fighting champion. Flair's unusually quiet in his promo at the restaurant, even though it looks empty. Then we get old clips of Perfect golfing, bowling, playing darts, hoops, etc.

Great Flair promo, probably his best of the year. In complete contrast with the rest of his WWF stuff.

They tried harder with Bret during his first reign than I thought, having him face a wide variety of opponents even if those opponents weren't necessarily top drawer. It was almost like they'd heard the outside criticism from sources like the Weston mags about how soft Hogan's schedule in particular was and decided to compensate for it once someone whom they knew could handle it had the belt. Wise move.

 

This was without question the most Crockett-like interview Flair has done yet, with the exception of running down Saskatoon. Otherwise, Mean Gene could have been David Crockett or Tony Schiavone, and this could have been any random Saturday night at 6:05. It's interesting to me that Vince allowed guys like Dusty and Flair to slip back into their JCP personas once he knew they were leaving. Was it a case of hoping that they'd look ridiculous to the WWF fanbase and thus wouldn't be missed, or did Dusty and Flair simply not care what Vince thought anymore since they were going home?

 

So Hall would have ultimately beaten Flair and sent him out of the WWF? That would have had to have been sometime in the summer of '93, since that was when Hall turned face anyway. Interesting that it was Curt who ended up getting the win instead, and that it helped make his face push work as well as it ultimately did.

 

Couldn't they have done new vignettes for Curt to celebrate his turn? I'm guessing that the one later in December featuring Wade Boggs is an original. since I know Boggs didn't do anything with Curt and Lanny in '88.