VQ - Excellent (24/7)

 

1. Dan Spivey vs. Terry Gibbs

This occurred. It really was tedious as hell. They went through the motions for ten minutes. That was it. There was nothing that came across as cool, important, or innovative. I'm someone who feels innovative is overrated but come on do something unique or new. I enjoy arm drags, hammer locks, elbow drops, and bear hugs to an extent but they shouldn't be executed for ten minutes. I mean the best part of the match was Terry Gibbs yelling at the referee, "Hell No!" when he was asked if he wanted to give up while Spivey had him in a hammerlock with his foot. That was cool I guess. Tangent aside, this was just there and didn't do anything for me and probably wouldn't do a lot for anybody else.

 

2. King Tonga vs. Mr. X

Well, this was pretty much the same type of match as the previous one. King Tonga got in a few stiff strikes but there was one spot where he threw a forearm that didn't connect and some kid in the crowd yells, "You Missed! You Missed!" I laughed at that. I actually think that sums up this match pretty well. When I can hear the fans exact cheers and jeers that probably ins't a good thing. Mr. X was so lame on offense too. He just went to the usual reverse chin lock. When King Tonga fought out of that he really changed it up with a REGULAR chin lock. The finish was pretty good thought with Mr. X running full speed into a crescent kick to the chest by King Tonga who followed that up with a jumping headbutt for the win. Really though, King Tonga threw some stiff strikes and the rest of this just happened.

 

3. Jesse Ventura vs. Barry O

We have yet another run of the mill contest here. This was worse than the two previous matches though. Jesse is wrestling in there with his known lung condition (correct me if I'm wrong) and he's not really moving around well. That's not to say he ever was moving around well his whole career but the lack of energy is definitely apparent from him. Barry O was really bad in this match. He did take a good bump after Jesse pushed him off a pin attempt. He went flying threw the first and second rope and vanished to the floor. That was easily the best spot of the match too. So yeah, besides that Barry O was pretty fucking bad. He kept applying a damn reverse chin lock. It became agonizing to watch. Jesse's comeback was so lackadaisical. He basically milled around the ring and casually went to the next move or spot. It was terrible. The finish wasn't bad though as Barry O missed a dropkick as Jesse held onto the ropes to avoid it. Jesse then gave this really nasty jumping knee to Barry O's back to set up his Canadian back breaker. Jesse put in the Canadian back breaker and Barry O gave up. At the end of the day, this didn't do the job.

 

4. Hercules Hernandez vs. Cousin Junior

Man, this sucked too. Hercules threw a really awesome knee into Cousin Junior early on but that was the only good or interesting thing that happened in this match. Hercules resorted to the fucking reverse chin lock. What is it with that hold? Can't anybody think of something else to do in a match that goes TWELVE MINUTES? Junior was really, really bad in this. I did laugh at his entrance because it's always great to see how Vince depicts stereotypes. He really fucking botched the finish badly. Hercules went to give him a back body drop and he was supposed to land on his feet and execute a reverse roll up. Well, that didn't happen. Junior fell on his ass trying to land on his feet from the back body drop attempt and couldn't roll through on the reverse roll up. Then when Freddie Blassie caused a distraction Junior went after him but Hercules tried to roll him up for the win but Junior couldn't fall back. I mean they got it straight after a few seconds and Hercules won the match but my God that was awful. With the terrible finish and boringly bad rest of the match this might have been the worst one so far but I don't know. These last four matches culminating in this one have all been run of the mill and by the numbers WWF 80s boredom.

 

5. The Spider (Fabulous Moolah) vs. Wendi Richter (WWF Women's Title)

This is going to have to be an EXTRA. I'm sure everyone realizes this is "The Original Screwjob." Not much to say here, but that the match wasn't too terrible actually. Wendi did some decent leg work on Moolah early on. The finish was pretty obviously a screwjob and the post-match is great with Wendi viciously attacking Moolah with the Women's Title. I'm guessing we'll start the EXTRA right before the finish and include the post-match as well. This has to go on for historical significance.

 

6. Tito Santana/Pedro Morales vs. The Dream Team (WWF Tag Title)

This was alright. Pedro worked hard in this match. There was the typical WWF 80s tag heel shtick and heel in peril segment. It wasn't as prominent in this as other tags but it was definitely there. Greg worked stiff in this match as he always does. He really laid in some nasty shots on Pedro in this match. Pedro ended up being FIP in this and did a decent job. The Dream Team is actually pretty good at working effective heat segments. It's something I've noticed while watching them. Pedro took a brutal forearm from Greg that led to a big bump from him to the floor. He also took an okay bump to the floor a little later in the match. Beefcake was fairly passable in this and put on the sleeper which was the transition into the hot tag. This was a really well done spot as Pedro fought threw the sleeper to get the hot tag to Tito. Tito was fun here working stiff with Greg as they pretty much had a lighter version of their usually brutality. The finishing run was good here as Tito put Beefcake in the figure four and Johnny V ran into the ring only to have Pedro knock him out of the ring. Beefcake was about to submit but Valentine dropped an elbow on Tito to break the hold. Beefcake and Valentine traded elbow drops on Tito so the referee called for the disqualification and awarded the match to Tito and Pedro for illegal double teaming on Tito. Pedro ran the heels out of the ring after the match. The Dream Team kept the belts though as of course a title can't change hands on a disqualification. All in all, this was an okay match. There wasn't anything that blew me away but there were some effective spots and things that they did to make the match a little interesting.

 

Gorilla had a fun interview with Heenan about the six-man main event. Heenan was great talking about how he would outsmart the opposition and calling Andre, Hillbilly Jim, and Captain Lou stupid. Fun stuff.

Gorilla then interviewed Terry Funk and his manager Jimmy Hart. This was funny too. Funk called JYD a jackass a couple of times, said he could beat Hogan, and challenged Gorilla. Great fun.

Gorilla does an interview with Captain Lou. Lou seemed to have just been on a coke binge. He rambled about Heenan and shit. This was what it was.

 

7. Don Muraco vs. Ricky Steamboat

This had a lot of stuff I love but this was boring for the most part. The first half of the match was incredibly underwhelming. Steamer had Muraco in long, boring holds that went nowhere and made me want to take a nap. Then Steamer juiced big time and this finally got interesting. Muraco worked the cut really well with some thumb jabs, biting, and a really gruesome rake to the cut with his fingers. They even did a King of the Mountain spot with Steamboat stumbling around ringside gushing crimson everywhere. Muraco actually had his face covered in Steamboat's blood. It looked like he was a fucking vampire he just got done feeding. It was a pretty disturbing visual. Steamer had this nice hope spot where he just chopped the living shit out of Muraco. Muraco then cut him off and began working the cut again. The finish was good with Muraco and Steamboat fighting over Mr. Fuji's cane. The referee got knocked down in the process. Steamer bloodied Muraco with the cane and got disqualified for it. He then broke the cane over Muraco's back and used one half of the broken cane at the side where it split to grind in Muraco's cut which was awesome and violent as hell. The post-match was fun but it went a little too long as they had this long post-match brawl with Steamboat coming out on top like two or three times. I can't nominate this because the first half was really uninteresting and uninspiring. The second half was good stuff but not enough to turn it around for me to give it a nomination.

 

8. Terry Funk vs. Mr. Wrestling II

This was really disappointing. I was bored pretty much the whole way through. Terry did some fun stuff like chasing Mel Phillips with Jimmy Hart and assaulting a Japanese cameraman. I laughed when he wandered around in the crowd in frustration too. Mr. Wrestling II did some goofy ass dancing which the crowd loved. This was just a lot of stalling and unenthusiastic work. Funk did some nice stuff like a good sleeper while using his loose elbow pad to choke Wrestling II with. I even liked some of Wrestling II's punches and knee lifts but this didn't do it for me. Gorilla stole Jimmy Hart's megaphone and Wrestling II chased Jimmy who hid under the ring. Wrestling II got a couple of near falls from countering a suplex into the ring by falling onto Terry on the first near fall and executing his own suplex for the second near fall. He attempted a charge in the corner but ran into a knee from Terry in the sternum area. Terry made the cover and won the match. Funk tried to brand Wrestling II post-match twice but Wrestling II escaped and then chased off Funk and Jimmy Hart with a steel chair. This had some fun stuff from Funk and even a few likable things from Wrestling II but this did not deliver very well at all and ended up being quite disappointing.

 

9. Andre The Giant/Hillbilly Jim/Captain Lou Albano vs. Big John Studd/King Kong Bundy/Bobby Heenan

This sucked. Heenan took some great bumps and there was a fun torpedo spot with Andre where he was torpedoed into all three heels with the help of both Hillbilly Jim and Captain Lou. The rest of the match was really terrible except the finish where Andre gave Heenan is vicious big boot for the win. I'm not going to review this any further because quite frankly it was pretty fucking bad and really difficult to watch because of the shittiness.

 

Final Analysis

Bad show. This had a few matches with potential but they all pretty much flopped. We did get the one EXTRA which is "The Original Screwjob" with Richter and Moolah. Everything else was pretty fucking underwhelming.

There is going to be some debating because Phil loved the Funkl-II match enough to include it on a new Schneider comp

Put me in the pro Funk/Wrestling 2 making the set. I thought this was Funk's best match in the WWF in the 80's.

Eh, I thought it was very boring. Like I said in my review, Funk did some fun stuff and I liked Wrestling II's punches and knee lifts but this didn't do it for me. I thought the Funk vs. Steve Gatorwolf match was pretty clearly better than this and I didn't nominate that.