Talk about it here.

A woman's car breaks down. She knocks on the door of a house, presumably to ask for assistance, only to see Leatherface sitting inside the house while old school horror music plays. I love how over the top this is, and the mildly grainy VQ adds to the aura of this. Soon, Leatherface is chasing this woman with his chainsaw. She tries in vain to start her car and manages to start it just in time to avoid the chainsaw-wielding Leatherface. I loved this just for how bad it was.

 

Then, Danny Davis cuts an overly pandering babyface interview before the match about how honorable Bill Dundee is. Dundee tells him to take it down a notch and antagonizes him a little for fun. After two minutes or so of this, I want them to stop talking and just wrestle, but things slowly heat up, and both are really good. By the time this is over, Davis is listing all of the things about Dundee that annoy him, which is a funny left turn. The match isn't scheduled, but Eddie Marlin says he likes how they are handling this, and gets a referee out there.

 

They stay on the mat, but everything they do looks really crisp and intense. This is a really great five minute match that ended indecisively, but I REALLY want more matches between them now.

I saw Leatherface live that summer at a spot show in Jasper, Indiana. It was one of those brutal Indiana summers and National Guard Armories were not air-conditioned. So, whoever was Leatherface that night (the one guy that came to the building with a mask on didnt have Tex's build. It might have been Ken Raper) had to wrestle in a 110 degree building, in a latex mask and the rest of the gear. He stuck the chainsaw right near my face. It was a great night.

Somehow the Leatherface vignette doesn't come off as any less effective than Roberts and the Warrior. Slap some Jake narration over that and you'd have something.

 

Davis talks to all the Little Nightmares about doing the right thing and saying no to drugs. Gag me. Dundee agrees and tries to antagonize Davis into a fight. Davis still kisses up to the fans but then finally starts reciting the ways Dundee gets on his nerves--Dundee retorts with how nobody recognizes Davis without his stupid star painted on! They hit the ring and we get the return of REDNECK UWFI. Eddie Marlin likes this and sends Paul Neighbors into make it an official match. This goes from quasi-shoot-style to matwork to a brawl, with a Davis tope in-between. Awesome stuff. They have to take a mid-match commercial break and by the time we return Dundee has walked out. Kind of a lame finish but it does sort of add to the unscheduled, improv feel of the match.

I was expecting when the lady’s car stalled that Leatherface would have issues with his chainsaw too.

 

Danny Davis tells the fans to not drink. No thanks. Dundee thankfully interrupts him. Davis tries to tell him that they are friends. Dundee plays around with Davis who is not in a humorous mood. Both guys decide to settle things now and get into the ring and a match gets underway. Get a pretty nice studio match between the two.

I had read about Leatherface for years in PWI and online without ever actually seeing him. I was sure he was gonna be just a guy in wrestling trunks and a weird Halloween mask given the USWA's record but it's not a bad get-up, all things considered. This video was pretty lame though.

Peg me down as a fan of Leatherface's vignette as it had all the makings of a B-movie horror cinematic classic.

 

The firends going against each other stuff with Davis and Dundee was good and damn if when they got in the ring the matwork didn't look really snug. I was really pissed at the abrupt ending from the break and the quick signoff from Dave Brown.

There have been plenty of wide-release horror films that were far worse than the Leatherface vignette. And the Davis-Dundee angle is pure gold. The Memphis stuff has been a huge revelation for me in the yearbook.

What is wrestling's obsession with making movies at this time? Not that the Leatherface vignette was bad, but it was another of those segments that no one would understand who wasn't already a diehard fan. There was no way to distinguish this from a regular horror film, and a clichéd one at that, It could have used narration of some sort to tie it into wrestling, whether from one of the announcers or possibly from Embry, since Eric's Leatherface's unofficial keeper. By the way, did anyone recognize the woman whose car stalled? She doesn't look like anyone we're supposed to know.

 

I'm not sure what to make of Dundee/Davis. It seems like they didn't want to give the match away, but they also didn't want to do a pull-apart, since that would tease a heel turn, most likely by Dundee. So we get a few minutes of action followed by a convenient commercial break, during which the match just stops for no reason. I've never seen that done before. What we saw was good, but I'm not sure how to rate it, since there was a lot of back-and-forth and neither man held an advantage for long.

 

I thought the verbal stuff before the "bout" was well-done. Davis comes off as slightly sanctimonious, but Dundee comes off as a bit of a jerk, so it's mostly even. Dundee makes a good point about champions having to do whatever it takes to hold on to their belts; even the most upright babyfaces will scratch and claw if they have to to keep their belts out of the hands of their enemies, as we've seen time and again over the years. The description by each man of the other's bad habits is hilarious. I'm not really sure I'd want to go into a Memphis-area restaurant with either of them, at least not while I'm sober!

 

I really don't think there was a tag match signed; if there had been, we would have seen evidence of the other wrestlers somehow, even if they were just jobbers.

Leatherface stuff has impressed me a lot. For some reason I can't figure out, it works. I liked the argument between Davis and Dundee and thought the match was really good while it lasted. I really like the chance to see both of them get a chance to show what they can do on the mat, which doesn't happen often in Memphis.