The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1997)

Starrcade '97, the night WCW effectively handed the WWF the Monday Night War....

Starrcade '97 - MCI Center - 12.28.97

Starrcade '97 was the night WCW killed all their momentum.  They'd been dominating the ratings for well over a year with arguably the hottest angle of all time coupled with a miles-deep roster, and had just taken away yet another top WWF star.  This time it was Vince's franchise player, Bret Hart.  To be fair, Vince helped broker the deal, citing the inability to pay Bret the amount he'd agreed to.  But with all those factors, plus the loooooong-awaited in-ring return of Sting (who'd adopted a Crow-inspired gimmick and hadn't wrestled a match in over a year), Starrcade '97 should've been WCW's WrestleMania III.  It should've been the PPV that launched WCW into the mainstream stratosphere, solidifying them as wrestling's number-one brand, and been the big payoff to the nWo storyline: the returning WCW hero conquers the villainous invaders and restores balance to the besieged company.  But nope, Hulk Hogan and his ego got in the way.  Again.

The two masters Eddy Guerrero and Dean Malenko kicked things off for the Cruiserweight Title.  These guys couldn't possibly have a bad match, so this was a fine opening contest.  While it wasn't at the level of their ECW classic series, it still got 15 minutes and had strong action, plus had the role reversal with Eddie as the heel and Malenko as the no-nonsense babyface.  Good stuff so far.

Eddy vs. Dean was always a fine showing.

Not-so-good stuff followed it, as The Steiners & Ray Traylor faced Randy Savage, Scott Norton & Vincent.  How odd to see Savage and Elizabeth on the heel side and Dibase managing the babyfaces.  This wasn't much of a six-man.  Scott Steiner had some good moves as usual but he was already an over-muscled, bloated oaf by this point.  I'm not sure why he felt the compulsion to get so big.  The action here was mostly clumsy, with everyone well past their prime.  Jeezus Elizabeth looked amazing in the 90s.  Savage's top-rope elbow however did not.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1996)

A surprisingly entertaining Starrcade thanks to a strong undercard....

Starrcade '96 - Nashville Auditorium - 12.29.96

By 1996 WCW was dominating the WWF in the ratings and had become the most popular wrestling promotion in the world, fueled by the ongoing nWo storyline and the influx of international talent most North American fans had never been exposed to.  Starrcade '96 was a pretty perfect cross-section of the overall WCW product.  Most of their in-ring strength was in the undercard, while the main event matches were storyline-driven and featured very little actual wrestling.  Having run roughshod over WCW, Hulk Hogan and the nWo were then challenged by Roddy Piper, returning after a 13-year WWF association.  True to form, WCW was still regurgitating 1980s WWF feuds, but now Hogan was the heel and Piper was the babyface.  It was a very odd hybrid product; the smaller names were doing their damnedest to steal the show, while the big names were lumbering around the ring like it was 1987 WWF and the crowds were eating it up.

The announce team once again consisted of Tony Shiavone, Bobby Heenan (hilarious as always), and Dusty Rhodes (A more long-winded, barely intelligible announcer I cannot recall).  Plus Mike Tenay sat in during the Cruiserweight matches and Lee Marshall during the Women's match.  Four men is way too many for a commentator team.

The opening match, for the Cruiserweight Title (plus 8 other belts) pitted Dean Malenko against  Ultimo Dragon.  This was great for its spot on the card; a very strong opener that amazingly got more time than any other match.  Nice crisp action from both guys, a little slow in the middle, but it ramped up again for the third act, capped off by a cool finishing sequence full of reversals.  Cruiserweight wrestling was one of the few things WCW did way better than the WWF at this point.

The second of three matches involving New Japan stars was next, as Madusa battled Akira Hokuto to crown the first WCW Women's Champion.  This was a good little women's match and I had forgotten how good Madusa could be.  Too bad the company did very little with her after this.  The WCW Women's Title was vacated after Hokuto left the US and WCW never resurrected it.  So in the end this match didn't mean anything, but it was still very watchable.

Probably the best match of the night was third, as Rey Mysterio faced Jushin Thunder Liger in a true Cruiserweight dream match.  Nice high-impact offense from both guys.  Liger had slowed down a little but Mysterio brought the movement and played the usual underdog role.  Pretty weird to see New Japan go 3-0 on a WCW PPV.  A hotter crowd would've elevated this to the next level.  This just needed some drama added to it.

Ka-BOOOM

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1995)

We've arrived at the start of the Monday Night War!

Starrcade '95 - Nashville Auditorium - 12.27.95

Hulk Hogan's shadow was temporarily lifted from WCW in late 1995 due to a kayfabe suspension, so the focus for this show was on in-ring wrestling and several homegrown WCW stars.  WCW once again went back to a standalone tournament-type format for Starrcade - this time it was a WCW vs. New Japan series of matches with the winning team earning a World Cup trophy, which in the long run meant absolutely zero.  Despite WCW putting together a team of both babyfaces and heels, their guys were all greeted as heroes by the Nashville crowd.  Aside from the tourney there would also be a Triangle match to determine a number-one contender to Randy Savage's WCW World Title in the main event.  Two of those contenders and Savage himself were also in the New Japan series, which was just strange.  But unlike say Starrcade '91, this show at least had a handful of memorable bouts, even if the tourney concept was once again pointless in the grand scheme.

Bobby Heenan was great as usual on color commentary but unfortunately had to compete with Dusty Rhodes, who I've always found insufferable as an announcer.  He probably took up about half the talking time of the three-man team and most of his comments were incomprehensible.  So that was quite distracting.

The WCW-NJPW series kicked off with a pretty great on-paper match: Chris Benoit vs. Jushin Thunder Liger.  This did its job as an opener but was frankly a little underwhelming given the talent involved.  I imagine their matches in Japan blew this one out of the water.  Kevin Sullivan ran down to distract Benoit (thus ruining the ending) and Liger executed a really bad hurricanrana and hooked Benoit's legs for the pin.  Not nearly as good as you'd think.

On the flipside though, Alex Wright vs. Koji Kanemoto was a shockingly good followup; better than the opener and with a nice fluid feel to it.  They got almost twelve minutes and did a lot with them.  This match felt almost like a lighter, less stiff version of a New Japan match.

The first throwaway was next as Lex Luger wrestled Masahiro Chono.  Not much to this one but at least it was short.  Chono dominated most of the match, even slapping on his STF finisher, but Luger made it to the ropes and mounted the shortest comeback ever before applying the Torture Rack for the win.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1994)

This Starrcade......this is not my kinda Starrcade.....

Starrcade '94 - Nashville Auditorium - 12/27/94

1994 was the year WCW evolved....into the WWF of the 1980s.  Eric Bischoff had taken the reins the year before and urgently hoped to make the company profitable, and as fate would have it he was able to sign Hulk Hogan in the summer of '94.  This of course immediately brought WCW mainstream attention and lapsed fans from the 80s began watching wrestling again.  The unfortunate side effect of all this was the annihilation of the historic WCW culture.  Gone was the emphasis on athletic, scientific wrestling and simple angles.  In their place were the over-the-top characterizations, convoluted heel turns, and rudimentary brawling of the WWF circa 1988.  Hogan had so much pull he populated (polluted?) the roster with all his old WWF pals, and the in-ring product became a less entertaining version of everything Vince had more adeptly presented a decade earlier.  And you thought Black Saturday was bad.  On the bright side though, at least Bobby Heenan was on color commentary, even if he and Tony Schiavone had zero chemistry together.

The opening match for the US Title pitted Jim Duggan (who infamously defeated Steve Austin for the belt in under a minute - good call on that one Eric) against the man who by all rights should have main evented this show, Vader.  The match was actually better than I expected.  Probably the best Duggan match I've ever seen, which isn't saying much for him.  The first half or so was pretty hard-hitting, then it settled into a plodding second act before ramping back up toward the end.  They recycled the Starrcade '92 finish where Vader came off the top and got powerslammed to the mat, but this time Harley Race interfered to distract the official.  Vader then won with a wheelbarrow slam which Duggan took pretty poorly.

The unexpected standout of the night was Alex Wright vs. a young blueblood character named Jean-Paul Leveque.  From a mat wrestling standpoint this was quite good.  Sadly it went about five minutes longer than it needed to, and there wasn't really anything at stake.  It's so weird to see Triple H in a WCW ring.  This was technically a good match but little more than a showcase for two young dudes.

It's Triple H vs. Berlyn!!

The TV Title was on next, as Johnny B. Badd defended against Arn Anderson.  This wasn't too shabby; both guys could work and they gelled fairly well.  It's criminal that the only reason Arn got on this show was due to the original challenger, the Honky Tonk Man, being injured.  Hogan's spray-tanned fingerprints were all over the WCW product at this point and it was ugly.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1993)

Ric Flair's big homecoming resulted in a very good main event atop a mediocre Starrcade....

Starrcade '93 - Independence Arena - 12/27/93

The Bill Watts experiment ended in early 1993 and a young, ambitious fella named Eric Bischoff soon took the reigns of WCW.  Initially the product didn't change a whole lot except in cosmetic ways.  But a host of new and returning talent found themselves on WCW TV, such as Davey Boy Smith, Sid Vicious, and of course the company's former cornerstone, Ric Flair.  The "Nature Boy" was brought in as a babyface and immediately reformed the Horsemen with Arn and Ole, and a mystery partner, who was revealed as Paul Roma.......ummmmmm.....okay....

The WCW Title was kept in a stranglehold by the monstrous Vader, who was set to feud with Sid Vicous leading into Starrcade.  Then during an overseas trip Sid and Arn Anderson got into an absolutely insane real-life slugfest which escalated into a scissor stabbing contest.  Both men were hospitalized, and Sid was fired.  The company scrambled, but found a much more suitable challenger for Vader, taking Starrcade back to its roots.  Ric Flair would now vie for the WCW Title in his hometown, with his career on the line.  The top of the show included a vignette shot live at Flair's home as he kissed his family goodbye to leave for the arena.  The cameras followed Flair into his limo, where he discussed with Gene Okerlund the grave situation he was about to face.  This came off as quite melodramatic, but it made for a nice little bit of window-dressing.  Before we get into the Flair-Vader showdown, let's look at the rest of the card.

The show kicked off with a tag match, as Pretty Wonderful (Paul Orndorff and failed Horseman Paul Roma) faced Marcus Bagwell & 2 Cold Scorpio.  This was a fun little opening match, and I liked both combinations.  Bagwell was actually a decent wrestler before he got Buff, and Roma & Orndorff made a fine heel team.  Solid work by everyone involved.

Speaking of failures, The Shockmaster made his Starrcade debut next against Awesome Kong.  Everyone of course remembers The Shockmaster as "Tugboat" Fred Ottman, who was supposed to be Sting's big equalizer at that year's WarGames, against Vader and Sid's team.  Ole Anderson provided the easily-identifiable voice for this character, and the fools in charge stuck a glitter-bedecked Stormtrooper helmet on Ottman as a disguise.  Ottman was supposed to break through the wall of Ric Flair's talk show set and make a grand entrance, but unfortunately he tripped on the way through and fell on his face, losing the helmet in the process.  This was all broadcast on live television, so the gimmick was D.O.A., and Ottman became more of a comedy wrestler instead.  Anyway, this match went 94 seconds.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1992)

Now this felt like a Starrcade show....

Starrcade '92 - The Omni - 12/28/92

Well this was a whole lot better.  The previous Starrcade featured ten forgettable, awkward tag matches and a convoluted battle royal main event.  Yes, the Norfolk Scope was dressed up nicely, adding to the splendor of the event, but not one match from that show stood out or warranted a second viewing.  SC'92 on the other hand featured a handful of big matches (two of which were truly inspired) and even though half the card was still taken up by Battlebowl proceedings, the four mongrel tag bouts were concise, fast-paced, and moved along with a purpose.  I still had no interest in the tournament format but Starrcade '92 was a rare show with nary a bad match.  This PPV took place during the Bill Watts era, thus The Omni had a stripped-down, barebones look with gloomier lighting and minimal Starrcade decor.  The focus in 1992 WCW was almost entirely on the action in the ring, and the play-by-play was called by the dream commentary team of Jim Ross and Jesse Ventura.  While their chemistry wasn't as strong as say Jesse & Gorilla or JR & Lawler, I loved hearing these two work together; my favorite play-by-play announcer with my favorite color man.

Side note: I know Rick Rude was injured but where the hell were Steve Austin, Arn Anderson & Bobby Eaton??

The first four matches were all Lethal Lottery tag bouts, none of which overstayed their welcome, fortunately, and all of which were at least a little fun on some level.  Cactus Jack teamed with Johnny B. Badd vs. Van Hammer & Dan Spivey in a decent opener with some good wrestling from Team Cactus.  I'm not sure what they were thinking giving Hammer & Spivey the win though; what's the point of two obvious non-winners being in Battlebowl?  Next was Vader & Dustin Rhodes vs. The Barbarian & Kensuke Sasaki in a very entertaining slugfest reminiscent of a Japanese Strong Style match.  This didn't go long but felt urgent.  Vader beat the piss out of Rhodes after getting the win.  The standout of these tag matches was next - The Great Muta & Barry Windham vs. Brian Pillman & 2 Cold Scorpio.  I liked the Muta-Scorpio/Muta-Pillman exchanges a lot; Muta vs. Pillman should've been a major feud at some point.  Another brief match where they crammed in a lot of good action.  Finally we had Sting & Steve Williams vs. Jushin Liger & Erik Watts, which had good wrestling all around except for Watts, who was clearly not ready for prime time but was being pushed due to his father's position as head booker.  Still this was a fine match, particularly when it was Sting vs. Liger.

Lotta talent in that ring.

With the Lottery bouts out of the way the show settled into a more traditional format with four title matches.  First was The Great Muta challenging Masahiro Chono for the NWA World Title (now separated from the WCW version).  I liked this quite well actually.  Nothing about it was mindblowing, and at 12 minutes it couldn't be epic, but it was well-worked by both guys.  Muta unexpectedly submitted to Chono's STF.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1991)

Another Starrcade experiment thrown at the wall that didn't stick....

Starrcade '91 - Norfolk Scope - 12/29/91

I'm really not sure what the higher-ups at WCW were smoking when they invented the Battlebowl concept.  I'd like to think there was some variety of substance abuse going on, but who the hell knows?  Evidently having learned nothing from the box office disaster that was Starrcade '89, WCW went with another "tournament" format for the 1991 edition.  Only this time the card would consist entirely of mongrel tag teams decided at random, competing so both members could enter a main event two-ring battle royal.  The winner of that would get a future WCW Title shot.  What a convoluted way to establish a number-one contenter.  And what if Lex Luger had won this?  Ugh.  So of the eleven matches on this show, ten involved pairs of partners with no chemistry and in some cases little or no tag team expertise facing other such pairs.  Few of these matches had any kind of story to them either, except in rare cases when two enemies were forced to team together.  Wow, did this get monotonous fast.

The first four matches sorta blurred into each other and were varying degrees of lackluster.  Marcus Bagwell & Jimmy Garvin vs. Tracey Smothers & Michael Hayes was noteworthy only for the anticipation of seeing the Freebirds fight each other, which barely even happened.  Rick Rude & Steve Austin vs. Van Hammer & Big Josh was a case of two big stars on one side and two gimmick-saddled utility guys on the other.  Also, in what wrestling universe did the 5'10" 220-pound Matt Osborne qualify as "big?"  More like About Average Josh.  Dustin Rhodes & Richard Morton vs. Larry Zbyszko & El Gigante was pretty awful; anything involving the future Giant Gonzales is by definition a turd.  The story here was Gigante not being able to understand Zbyzsko's instructions and eventually getting fed up and attacking Larry.  Pretty bad stuff.  Things picked up a little in Match 4 as Jushin "Thunder" Liger & Bill Kazmaier faced Mike Graham & Diamond Dallas Page.  The Graham-Liger exchanges were intriguing but with no heat between them there wasn't anything to get invested in.

Ka-BLAMMO!

Finally in the middle of the show we got a few memorable bouts.  For starters, WCW Champ Lex Luger & Arn Anderson faced Terrence Taylor & Tom Zenk.  This is more like it.  The match was entertaining from start to finish and had some nice conflict with Taylor slowly turning babyface.  Ricky Steamboat & Todd Champion vs. Cactus Jack & Sgt. Buddy Lee Parker was fun just for the Steamboat-Cactus interactions (Did they ever have a singles match together?), but not much going on besides that.  Abdullah the Butcher attacked Parker during his entrance, which meant Cactus wrestled almost the entire match by himself.  The most unexpectedly good match was Sting & Abdullah vs. Bobby Eaton & Brian Pillman, a wild battle where Sting and Pillman worked together despite being on opposite teams, and Abdullah was just trying to kill Sting the whole time.  Chaotic but enjoyable.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1990)

Right here the Starrcade series drove temporarily off a cliff.....

Starrcade '90 - Kiel Auditorium - 12/16/90

I'm not sure what happened in 1990 that ruined the world, but both the WWF and especially the NWA spent that particular calendar year serving up a menu of dog crap a la mode.  Case in point, Starrcade 1990.  Man, what a difference a year makes.  While Starrcade '89 was no all-time classic, the NWA as a whole was at its apex in 1989, and suddenly with the new year they reset just about everything, crowned Sting their new top babyface (which made sense, he was super over), and had him feud with one of the stupidest mystery characters ever created in any medium, The Black Scorpion.  This nonsensical six-month angle climaxed at Starrcade '90 with a payoff in the same ballpark of stupid as the WWF's "Who Ran Over Steve Austin?" angle ten years later.

Look, the WCW logo is sinking.  Rather symbolic, don't you think?

On top of their flagship PPV being headlined by a World Title match involving an unknown challenger, the company decided to cram an entire seven-match tag team tournament onto this show as well, bringing the total number of matches to fourteen.  Fourteen matches on a three-hour PPV.  What was the object of said tournament?  A trophy.  Which teams would be competing?  The Steiners.....and seven other teams, mostly comprised of dudes no one's ever heard of.  Super.  I wonder who's gonna win.....

The show started out promisingly enough, with Bobby Eaton vs. Z-Man.  Pretty good little opening match with two guys who could work and had faced each other in tag matches numerous times.  Nothing mindblowing but this match did its job as the kickoff.

We then plunged into the tag tournament, with four mostly pointless, abbreviated matches that just cluttered up the card.  Konan & Rey Misterio Sr. vs. Chris Adams & Norman Smiley was the only standout of the opening round, but even that was too short and a little sloppy in spots.  The Russian team of Victor Zangiev and Salman Hashimikov had interesting amateur-style grappling moves but Zangiev's back hair was so long it was parted in the middle!  So all I could think of during his matches was "Jeezus, someone actually has to touch that furry creep??"  That match had an awkward ending, like the ref forgot he was supposed to count to three, so he hesitated and then counted anyway.  The other two first-round matches were either done in the blink of an eye or totally forgettable.  All of these teams were wrestling like they knew they only had 3-5 minutes.

Next up was a battle of former stablemates, as Michael Wallstreet faced Terry Taylor.  This felt like a free TV match on a WCW Saturday Night undercard.

For some reason, and despite Sid Vicious now being a Horseman, The Skyscrapers faced The Big Cat & Motor City Madman in a sloppy one-minute squash.  On the biggest PPV of the year which had thirteen other matches.

Moving right along, the Freebirds were next against Ricky Morton & Tommy Rich (subbing for an injured Robert Gibson).  Jeezus, this Freebirds-RNR feud lasted like eight months.  This match could've been decent had it gotten five more minutes.  I wonder if the wrestlers on this show were pissed that they had no time to do anything.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1989)

This show was a cool idea in theory but in practice it wasn't totally successful....

Starrcade '89 - The Omni - 12/13/89

For Starrcade '89 the NWA inexplicably (for the first of four consecutive Starrcades) went with a non-traditional card format, in this case two round-robin tournaments, one singles and the other featuring tag teams.  I can only assume they got this idea from New Japan's G1 tournament and wanted to try their hand at such a gimmick.  I've already published my own revised version of the show HERE, but in short, there were three major things wrong with using the Iron Man/Team tournament concept at the company's flagship PPV.  1. They'd already given away the blowoff to the year's biggest feud (Ric Flair vs. Terry Funk) on free television a month earlier, so the singles tournament featured no hot rivalries at all.  2. They never made it clear what was at stake in these tournaments other than bragging rights, so the audience had no real reason to invest in the outcome.  3. Twelve matches is a lot for a three-hour PPV.  Oh, and 4. In both tournaments they totally buried someone unnecessarily.

Still this show had a lot to like about it.  Of the twelve matches about eight or nine were watchable or better, and this show marks one of only two times (I think) we ever got to see The Steiners vs. The Road Warriors.  In general the concept of a round-robin tournament is fun and presents some intriguing pairings you wouldn't normally see (just watch some of the recent NJPW G1 tournaments for evidence of that), but Starrcade was just the wrong show for this experiment.  The attendance numbers certainly reflect this; the 17000-seat Omni was only about a third filled, to the point that the house lights had to be dimmed midway through the show to cover up the vast areas of empty seats. 

The singles tourney featured the NWA's top four stars - World Champion Ric Flair, US Champion Lex Luger, and two former TV Champions, Sting and The Great Muta.  On paper every one of the six singles matches should've been gold.  Unfortunately the time contraints (fifteen-minute time limits for all twelve bouts), somewhat hindered the wrestlers' ability to deliver standout matches.  In some cases, mostly those involving Muta, the matches were criminally shortchanged; Flair vs. Muta theoretically could've been the main event of Starrcade had they built it up properly.  In actuality that match was given under two minutes and Muta looked like a chump after it was over.  The innovative, tremendously exciting young Japanese import was jobbed out three times and ended up leaving the company right after Starrcade.  Not the best way to treat one of your top heels of the year.  Flair's other two matches, against Luger and Sting respectively, were both headliner-worthy but not up to their 1988 efforts.  Luger was the only man to go undefeated, beating Sting and Muta and going to a draw with Flair.  But Sting scored a major upset in the final match, defeating his former rival and current mentor Flair with only thirty seconds left in the time limit.  This gave Sting enough points to win the whole tournament, and he was soon named the #1 Contender.  Flair and the Andersons made Sting an honorary Horsemen but soon turned heel on him once the reality of Sting's impending challenge set in.  Had the company made it clear beforehand that the winner of this tourney would receive an automatic title shot, that probably would've gotten people much more interested.  Sadly this wasn't the case, and all Sting officially won that night was a trophy.

It's Champion vs. Champion!

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1988)

Arguably the greatest of all Starrcades, and ironically the first one not produced by Jim Crockett Promotions....

Starrcade '88 - Norfolk Scope - 12/26/88

The first Starrcade of the Turner Era was an unabashed classic.  Held the day after Christmas to avoid having to compete with Survivor Series, this show was the culmination of the year-long Ric Flair-Lex Luger feud, as well as the first Starrcade to not feature a single gimmick match (I was super pissed about this at the time; as a thirteen-year-old I thought gimmick matches ruled).

1988 saw a disturbing number of heel and face turns in the NWA.  It's pretty staggering when you think about it.  Lex Luger turned face, Barry Windham turned heel, Ronnie Garvin turned heel, The Midnight Express turned face, The Road Warriors turned heel, Ivan Koloff turned face, Rick Steiner turned face, Steve Williams turned heel.  That's gettin' to be a lot.  Anyway, the first match saw Williams team with his new manager Kevin Sullivan to challenge The Fantastics for the US Tag belts.  Tommy Rogers and Bobby Fulton had won a tournament for the vacant Titles due to The Midnight Express having given them up after winning the World Tag belts.  Sadly their World Tag Title reign was over well before new US Tag Champs were crowned.  What a gyp.  This opening contest was quite good, and the New Varsity Club captured the belts clean.

The second bout was one of my favorites, as The Midnight Express, Bobby Eaton and Stan Lane, faced The Original Midnight Express, Dennis Condrey and Randy Rose, managed by Paul E. Dangerously.  Prior to this feud I wasn't familiar with Dangerously, but I liked his heel manager antics right away.  These two teams gelled superbly and put on a tag team clinic, which Cornette's Midnight Express won with a Double Goozle after nearly 18 minutes.

The only throwaway match of the night was next, as Ivan Koloff teamed with NWA newcomer The Junkyard Dog, against former allies The Russian Assassins.  Not much going on in this one, and mercifully it was over in less than seven minutes, when one of the masked Assassins stuffed an object into his mask and headbutted Koloff.

The rest of this show was smooth sailin'.

Movie Review: Men (2022)

Cerebral British writer-director Alex Garland's latest opus Men is almost a cross between two recent psychological horror films, Darren Aronofsky's mother! and Ari Aster's Midsommar.  Like the former it is largely a parable meant to convey an easily relatable but perhaps too simplistically on-the-nose message, via nightmarishly disturbing imagery.  Like the latter it concerns a damaged woman on vacation, working through an unhealthy relationship (or in this case its aftermath). 

Men stars Jessie Buckley as Harper Marlowe, a widow who has rented a sprawling old house in the English countryside, and Rory Kinnear as the house's owner Geoffrey (among other characters).  Harper's backstory is doled out to us in dribs and drabs, and we learn that she and her husband (Paapa Essiedu) were headed for a contentious divorce when suddenly he fell from a balcony to a grisly death (Was it intentional or accidental?).  Throughout the film Harper experiences flashbacks to these horrific moments, providing some of the film's best-acted scenes.  

But quickly her vacation takes an unsettling turn as a naked, homeless man begins stalking her and at one point tries to break into the house.  Harper calls the police and the man is taken away, but her psychological trauma is far from over.  Of the plot I won't reveal any more, but this film certainly delivers the creeps in spades.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1987)

I know most people don't think this show has aged well, but I still love Starrcade '87....

Starrcade '87 - UIC Pavilion - 11.26.87

The 1987 edition was the first-ever PPV broadcast by Jim Crockett Promotions.  Crockett was expanding rapidly with designs on competing with the WWF, and moved into the non-traditional locale of Chicago for his flagship show.  Unfortunately Vince McMahon had designs on squashing the NWA's PPV hopes and ran the inaugural Survivor Series against it.  Not only that but he issued an ultimatum to the cable companies: Run Starrcade and you can't have WrestleMania IV.  The ploy worked, and only a handful of cable providers kept Starrcade, which meant it got destroyed by Survivor Series (which to be fair was an awesome PPV).

Starrcade '87 holds a special place for me, as it was the first one I ever watched all the way through.  I mail-ordered the VHS tape in 1988 after reading glowing reviews in Wrestling's Main Event magazine, and upon viewing it for the first time I was blown away.  The action was athletic, physical and intense, and at the time I loved that the NWA did so many gimmick matches (When you're 12 years old nothing is as cool as a Steel Cage match, except maybe a Scaffold Match).  Amazingly this show ran under 2.5 hours but it doesn't at all feel incomplete.

SC'87 was built around Ric Flair's quest to regain the NWA Title.  The Board of Directors wanted Flair to drop the belt to someone a few months earlier and win it back at Starrcade, I guess hoping to recreate the magic of SC'83.  The problem was, no one wanted to be a two-month lame duck Champion, and the only babyface who agreed to it was perennial midcarder Ronnie Garvin (who was a fine worker but no credible World Champion).  Garvin won the Title in a cage match that September and then announced he wouldn't be defending it until Starrcade.  Not much of a story for a PPV main event, but the match itself was pretty goddamn good.  Flair and Garvin beat the bejeezus out of each other, engaging in a war of chops and Figure Fours, and frequently using the cage as a weapon.  After 17 minutes Flair caught Garvin off the ropes and hotshotted him into the cage (in one of the least painful looking spots ever), and cradled him for the win and his fifth NWA Title.  Lame ending aside this was a pretty great match.

Garvin slaps on the Figure Four

The rest of the show was nothing to sneeze at either.

Three of the undercard bouts involved recently-acquired UWF talent, as Crockett had bought the former Mid-South territory from Bill Watts and staged a UWF Invasion.  Unfortunately he botched it completely by presenting most of the UWF wrestlers as far beneath his homegrown stars (a mistake Vince would repeat 14 years later after buying out WCW).

Still the invasion yielded some decent stuff on this show, starting with a pretty fun six-man opener pitting Larry Zbyzsko, Eddie Gilbert and Rick Steiner against Michael Hayes, Jimmy Garvin, and a young facepainted powerhouse named Sting.  This was nothing amazing but it was a nice way to warm up the crowd, and Sting was already hugely over.  The match inexplicably ended in a draw; Sting really should've pinned one of the heels given how quickly they pushed him.

Second was the only bad match on the show, as UWF Champion Steve Williams defended against Barry Windham.  On paper this sounds fantastic, but when they're only given six minutes and the match ends with a cradle out of nowhere, you can't expect much.  Since the show ran so short this should've gotten at least five more minutes.

The show got a huge boost in the third spot, as the Skywalkers gimmick match was brought out again.  This time though The Midnight Express would face their greatest rivals, The Rock n' Roll Express.  The scaffold match is one of those gimmicks that sounds cool but is very difficult to execute well, given how dangerous it is.  Fortunately the Midnights and RnR delivered an entertaining little fight twenty feet above the ring.  As a kid I thought this match was all kinds of awesome, and it was actually much better than the previous Skywalkers Match.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1986)

Starrcade took to the sky in 1986.....

Starrcade '86 - Greensboro Coliseum/The Omni -
11.27.86

Starrcade '86 was the first one I was aware of as a wrestling fan.  On Saturday mornings I'd watch World Wide Wrestling and see ads for the VHS release.  I must say those commercials were GOLD.  Whoever put those together had me at "hello."  When I used to watch those Turner Home Entertainment tapes I looked forward to the previews as much as the event itself.

The 1986 edition suffered greatly from its main event plans being derailed only a month out.  Jim Crockett Promotions had intended a major World Title push for Magnum TA, which would've kicked off at Starrcade with a huge win over Ric Flair.  Who knows what would've happened, had that come to fruition.  Magnum was enormously popular, built like a brick shithouse, and had rugged good looks that appealed to a crossover audience.  The NWA could've had another Hulk Hogan on their hands, and may very well have been able to compete with Vince.  But unfortunately it was not to be, as Magnum suffered a career-ending car crash in October, and the promotion had to scramble to put together a new main event for its biggest show of the year.  The bookers cleverly turned Nikita Koloff babyface by having him show compassion and remorse over his longtime enemy's injury.  I like that choice a lot actually.  Thus Nikita took Magnum's place in the main event and became one of the NWA's top faces for the next two years.

The company also put the spotlight on one of the secondary main events, even naming the show after it.  Starrcade '86 was the television debut of the Scaffold Match - a horribly dangerous gimmick bout where the combatants are forced to fight twenty feet above the ring on a three-foot-wide platform.  They renamed it The Skywalkers Match (I wonder if George Lucas ever considered suing) and it took on a pretty mythic quality.  But before we get to the top-billed matches, let's take a look at the rest of the show.  For the second consecutive year Starrcade emanated from both The Omni and the Greensboro Coliseum.

Starrcade '86 opened with Tim Horner & Nelson Royal vs. Don & Rocky Kernodle, which sounds pretty nondescript on paper but featured surprisingly good action and a fast pace.

Next was Jimmy Garvin vs. Brad Armstrong in a very strong undercard bout.  These two had good chemistry and worked hard.  Brad Armstrong was a pretty underrated talent, always good for a solid opening match to rev up the crowd.  This went to a time limit draw which was probably a mistake given its spot on the card.  A blazing ten minute match with a decisive finish would've been more appropriate.  Still, this was good stuff.

The next two matches were throwaway tag bouts - Hector Guerrero & Baron von Raschke vs. Barbarian & Shaska Watley; and Ivan Koloff & Krusher Kruschev vs. The Kansas Jayhawks.  Both were quite forgettable and about the only intrigue came later during the evil Russians' promo on their former friend Nikita.  One thing that I found disturbing was the sound of the live crowd cheering when von Raschke did his goosestep bit.  That's not something a sane person would cheer.

The first of many gimmick matches was next, as Wahoo McDaniel faced Rick Rude in an Indian Strap Match.  While the concept of two enemies bound together is always intriguing, I hate the "touch all four corners" rule.  I find it silly and cumbersome and it really disrupts the flow of the match.  As expected this was mediocre, and I found it strange that both guys were bleeding from a piece of leather.  This would be the first of many blood-soaked bouts on this card.

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1985)

Starrcade bounced back in 1985 with a now pretty legendary lineup....

Starrcade '85 - Greensboro Coliseum/The Omni - 11.28.85

Now this was more like it.  Starrcade '85 was broadcast from two venues again, but this time there were really only ten matches, thus the important bouts all felt long enough.  While not at the level of Starrcade '83, this edition had a handful of memorable bouts, one of which is still considered an all-time classic battle.

For this show Tony Schiavone replaced Gordon Solie on commentary, and right away I noticed two things: #1 Schiavone and Bob Caudle didn't talk much during the matches; there were long stretches of action with no commentary at all.  #2 Schiavone was asked to plug the upcoming Bunkhouse Stampede event (and others) way too many times, during actual matches.  This distractive shilling should've happened in between bouts.

The show opener was Krusher Kruschev vs. Sam Houston.  This was a decent little match, with a good speed vs. power dynamic.  Houston looked good and reminded me of early Shawn Michaels.  Kruschev won after escaping Houston's bulldog with a foot on the ropes and then hitting Houston with the Russian Sickle, after which the referee missed Houston's foot on the rope.

Next was Manny Fernandez vs. Abdullah the Butcher in a Sombrero on a Pole match.  What a ridiculous gimmick; what'd Vince Russo book this?  This was just ok - both guys bled within the first couple minutes, which became a pattern on this show.  That struck me as diffusing the tension very quickly.  After missing a top-rope headbutt Manny then just leapfrogged over Abdullah and climbed the ropes to get the hat, which was a strange ending.

What followed were two 2-part matches in a row.  The first was Black Bart vs. Ron Bass in a Bullrope match where if Bass won he got five minutes with JJ Dillon.  Storyline-wise this was awfully similar to the previous year's Bass vs. Dick Slater match, with two former partners fighting.  Again the blood flowed right at the beginning, and by the end both guys were covered in it.  The finish came out of nowhere (in a bad way) when Bass hit Bart with the cowbell off the second rope and abruptly covered him.  This match could've used more cowbell!  Sorry, had to do it.  Dillon then attacked Bass, starting their followup match.  Short and forgettable, Dillon won after a ref bump when Bart knocked Bass unconscious.

My god this was sadistic.

The other two-part event was an arm wrestling match, followed by a wrestling-wrestling match.  Billy Graham vs. Barbarian was the third match in a row with blood, again right at the beginning.  Graham won the arm wrestling match and Barbarian attacked him, leading to a five-minute throwaway.

Refreshingly we got a gimmick-free bout next: Buddy Landell vs. Terry Taylor.  This was a well-worked wrestling match, though it was like watching Ric Flair's stunt double wrestle his son.  It's so odd that JJ Dillon managed the fake Ric Flair only months before he traded up for the real one.  The ending was clever - Taylor went for a superplex but Dillon quickly swept his leg out from under him and both wrestlers fell to the mat hard with Landell on top for the pin.  Definitely the highlight of the show so far.

The second half picked up pretty well, with multiple Championship matches, starting with Ole & Arn Anderson vs. Wahoo McDaniel & Billy Jack Haynes.  Decent enough little match that started out fast-paced before the Andersons took over on offense.  Sadly this had a pretty silly ending with Arn pinning Billy after a simple forearm strike with Ole holding his leg down.

The most memorable bout on the show was unquestionably Tully Blanchard vs. Magnum TA for the US Title.  A classic I Quit Steel Cage match that was gritty, realistic and brutal.  This was just a slugfest with lots of vicious ground & pound, great selling, and buckets of blood.  The closing moments with the two fighting over a piece of broken chair are iconic.  Nothing fancy, but a helluva fight.

The I Quit match was tough to follow, and this next match didn't really bother.  The Midnight Express faced Jimmy Valiant & Miss Atlanta Lively in what was a very wild brawl, but the babyface team was impossible to take seriously, particularly with Ronnie Garvin dressed in drag.  Also, three of the participants were bleeding within the first minute, which was unnecessary coming after such a great gorefest.  Not much of a match.

The semi-main slot went to Ivan & Nikita Koloff vs. The Rock n' Roll Express for the Tag Team Titles.  This was a very enjoyable Steel Cage tag match.  Morton & Gibson were expert underdog babyfaces and at the time probably the most consistently good team in the company.  This fine bout built to a cleverly executed finish, as Morton blind-tagged Gibson, bounced off the opposite ropes, and rolled up Ivan for the pin.  Then all hell broke loose as the Russians beat the piss out of the good guys.  One of the best matches on the show.

Flair's hair looks dented; no wonder he's upset.

In a rematch from Starrcade '84, the main event was Ric Flair vs. Dusty Rhodes for the World Title.  This was light years better than its predecessor, but rather unremarkable overall.  The action was a little slow, and I always thought Flair and Dusty had better chemistry as characters than in the ring.  Flair bladed pretty unnecessarily, bringing the total number of matches with blood to eight (if you include the tacked-on Bass vs. Dillon match).  That's pretty excessive; when the majority of matches on a given show feature blood it becomes numbing and it takes away some impact from matches that need it, like the brutal Tully-Magnum bout.  Since Flair's bleeding didn't play into this match at all, it was just gratuitous.  The end came after a ref bump.  Arn and Ole interfered unsuccessfully and then Dusty rolled Flair up into a small package (which Flair visibly assisted with) while the secondary ref counted the pin.  Dusty appeared to win the Title but a week later it was overturned when Tommy Young retroactively disqualified Flair for outside interference.  Rather questionable if you ask me - why reward Flair after the fact for the Andersons' illegal conduct?  Anyway, this match was decent but not great.

Starrcade '85 holds up thirty-plus years later as a pretty good show featuring one bona fide classic, four or five decent bouts, and nothing I'd call truly bad.  The NWA definitely relied much too heavily on blading to ramp up the drama, when less of that would've made it much more meaningful and dramatic.  But this show had a lot to like, so it gets an easy passing grade.

Best Match: Tully Blanchard vs. Magnum TA
Worst Match: Billy Graham vs. The Barbarian
What I'd Change: Tone down the blood so it means something when it's needed.  The I Quit match was brutal but would've come off much more strongly had it not followed four other bloodbaths.  Sometimes less is more.  Also I generally hate the Dusty Finish.
Most Disappointing Match: The Andersons vs. Wahoo & Haynes
Most Pleasant Surprise: Terry Taylor vs. Buddy Landell
Overall Rating: 7/10


Thanks for reading - subscribe to our mailing list, and follow us on Twitter, MeWe, Facebook and YouTube!

1984

1986

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1984)

The classic inaugural Starrcade was followed in 1984 by a.....not so classic one....

Starrcade '84 - Greensboro Coliseum - 11.22.84

The NWA's sophomore Starrcade effort was rather a far cry from the original, with eleven matches crammed into a three-hour format, and precious few of them memorable.  On paper the top-billed bouts looked solid but unfortunately nothing was given enough time, and some of the booking was questionable at best.

I'm just gonna get this out there: I know Gordon Solie is right up there with Jim Ross as the most respected wrestling announcer ever, but I've always found his style pretty bland.  He never seemed emotionally invested in the matches, and he drastically overused the phrase "There's no question about it."  Legit, on this PPV he says that phrase 3-5 times per match.  If there's no question about anything, why even bring it up?

The opening match, Mike Davis vs. Denny Brown had decent enough wrestling but it was too short, and the finish with Mike Brown pinning himself after a back suplex was so confusing even the ring announcer and Gordon Solie called it wrong.  Next up was Brian Adidas vs. Mr. Ito (Mystery Toe?), which had promising action but only went four minutes.

The first standout of the show was Jesse Barr vs. Mike Graham.  This was easily the best thing so far, and possibly the best match on the card.  Really strong mat wrestling and reversals, and Barr had some great heel moments like quick hair pulls and stepping on the ropes momentarily to gain leverage.  Barr won with a schoolboy while hooking the tights.

How was this not a four-star classic?

The History of NWA/WCW Starrcade (1983)

Hey there everyone.  Welcome to Enuffa.com, your home for pro wrestling, movies, music, and other life-altering forms of pop culture.  I know what you're thinking.  You're thinking, "Hey Justin, it's been a while since you posted the complete history of a beloved wrestling supercard.  Can ya help us out?"  You my friends are in luck, because without further ado, I'd like to present.....

The Enuffa.com Complete History of NWA/WCW Starrcade!!!

That's right, it's time to hop into the ol' DeLorean and travel back to 1983, when Jim Crockett Promotions envisioned a wrestling event so magnanimous it couldn't be just for the live crowd in attendance.  It had to be broadcast on closed-circuit television throughout the South!  Big wrestling events on Thanksgiving night had long been a tradition in the region, and Crockett correctly surmised that a supercard held on that date would draw big business.  Starrcade '83 is the real Granddaddy of Them All - the first wrestling event broadcast on closed-circuit, and the prototype for the modern PPV event.  The show was a tremendous success, famously causing massive traffic jams in downtown Greensboro, and JCP made Starrcade an annual tradition.  Quickly it became the promotion's flagship event, and by 1987 it was also carried on pay-per-view.  When Ted Turner bought out Jim Crockett in 1988 he kept the Starrcade brand but moved it to December to avoid having to compete with the WWF's Survivor Series, and that's where it stayed until WCW folded in 2001.

So let's look at the highs, lows and everything in between, of Starrcade!

Starrcade '83 - Greensboro Coliseum - 11.24.83

The inaugural Starrcade was by today's standards a very barebones production which featured quite a few obscure names from the early part of the decade.  It was a very uneven show with a pretty forgettable first half.  But it's the final three matches that make Starrcade '83, and they're all first-rate classics of the era. 

The NWA event lineups back then were different from the WWF approach, in that they stuck all the undercard bouts early on the card and saved the important ones for the second half - quite often the last four matches would all be for championships.  By contrast Vince would spread the big matches around to give each show peaks and valleys, often inserting "buffer matches" between some of the headliners.  There are pros and cons to both philosopies of course.

After three matches that could be considered throwaways (The Assassins vs. Rufus Jones & Bugsy McGraw; Kevin Sullivan & Mark Lewin vs. Scott McGhee & Johnny Weaver; and a brief Abdullah the Butcher-Carlos Colon showdown), the show began for real with a solid tag match: Bob Orton (Randy's dad) teamed with Dick Slater against Mark Youngblood and Wahoo McDaniel.  This was no five-star classic, but it was easily the best match thus far.

Next was a TV Title vs. Mask match between The Great Kabuki and Charlie Brown (actually the "suspended" Jimmy Valiant under a mask).  I've never been much of a Valiant fan, so for me there wasn't much to this, but it does stand as the first-ever championship match on a Starrcade show.
From here on out the show was pure gold.

I'd have tapped out right here.

The History of WWE Survivor Series (2021)

The final RAW vs. Smackdown installment of WWE Survivor Series was....a show.  Watchable.  Not much more.

This was yet another example of a WWE PPV where one experiences neither highs nor lows, and that went for the live audience too.  Comparing AEW's Full Gear 2021 crowd to this one a week later was jarring.  The former was molten for most of the show, so beyond excited to be there, while this crowd was like "Eh, we paid for the tickets already, we may as well watch it."  Nothing on this show beyond the opening match really stood out, it was just competently presented, homogenized pro wrestling.  

I was pretty pissed to see Shinsuke Nakamura vs. Damien Priest get bumped to the pre-show, particularly considering just how much time was wasted on video packages, commercials, entrances, etc.  There is no excuse whatsoever for a match of any importance being relegated to the Kickoff while the company pisses away airtime on a video package for Drew McIntyre or Bobby Lashley.  Or how about Vince McMahon and the stupid gold egg?  Yes, as a movie tie-in, this company seriously built an entire episode of RAW around "Rich Old Guy's Expensive Trinket Missing?"  Imagine thinking your wrestling audience wants to see your obscenely wealthy 76-year-old ass whining about how someone stole your new toy.  Anyway, Nak vs. Priest was pretty good while it lasted, with lots of nearfalls and counterwrestling.  Until Priest let go of a submission hold because Nakamura's guitar player friend distracted him with his guitar playing.  Welcome to WWE, where a legit badass with MMA experience gets turned into a comedy character.  Priest went after Rick Boogs, took his guitar away, broke it over his knee, and bludgeoned both Boogs and Nakamura with it, drawing a disqualification.  So Damien Priest, who had been undefeated for months since debuting on RAW, loses by DQ on a Kickoff show.  Makes sense....  Like I said, this was good until the finish.

The proper PPV opener easily stole the show, as Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair had a very intense, aggressive fight.  To WWE's credit they resisted the temptation to make it look like a shoot or have some wacky Montreal-esque ending, considering the real-life animosity between them.  There were a ton of nearfalls, both women used each other's finishers (Becky didn't quite lock in the Figure Four properly and had to kinda turn it into a heel hook), and it built to Flair attempting to steal a win with a rope-assisted roll-up, only for Lynch to reverse it and use the ropes more surreptitiously so the ref didn't see it.  Lynch got the pin and gloated over her archenemy.  This was a very good match with a few sloppy moments, like Charlotte's top rope moonsault that more or less missed Becky.  Still this was unquestionably the best thing on the show. 

The History of WWE Survivor Series (2020)

Survivor Series 2020, or as I like to call it, The COVID One, was yet another mixed affair, with a couple of standout matches and a bunch of badly booked fluff from a company that can't seem to avoid bad booking.  Of the six bouts on the show, three were worth a look, three were really not, and the whole card took a backseat to yet another Undertaker nostalgia-wank.

Orlando, FL - 11.22.20

The show opened with the men's elimination match, not really ever a good sign.  Team RAW included AJ Styles, Braun Strowman, Keith Lee, Sheamus and Matt Riddle, while Smackdown's squad was comprised of Seth Rollins, Kevin Owens, Jey Uso, Baron Corbin and Otis.  Gee, which of these teams looks stronger?  Seth was doing his stupid cult leader gimmick at the time and sacrificed himself to a Sheamus Brogue Kick to be the first one out.  Lovely.  The idea was that his elimination was for "the greater good," but I'm still trying to figure out what good came out of it.  Kevin Owens ran wild with a series of Stunners on people but of course got taken out by AJ's forearm - why is the whole "run wild and then get pinned" deal the only way WWE knows how to eliminate someone?  By this point it was very obvious who was winning this, as Smackdown was left with Jey Uso and a couple dorks.  Baron Corbin got eliminated by Riddle, while Strowman powerslammed Otis to take him out.  This left Jey in a five-on-one, and after a flurry of superkicks he was pinned with a Keith Lee spirit bomb.  A clean sweep for RAW.  Anyone who's read this series knows how much I hate clean sweeps.  This match felt pointless.

Next up was a mild improvement, as The New Day faced Street Profits in a battle of tag team champions.  The match was pretty fast-paced, with New Day controlling the early minutes and taunting their would-be successors.  Dawkins and Ford rallied though, and after some exciting, crowdpleasing nearfalls the Profits took the duke with a Doomsday Blockbuster finish, upsetting the vaunted New Day.  This was fine.

The History of WWE Survivor Series (2019)

The 2019 addition featured NXT being added to the brand vs. brand format, and Triple H's upstart brand shone bright....

Welp, you could say many things about the 2019 Survivor Series, but one thing you can't say is that they didn't do their damndest to get NXT over.  Triple H's upstart crew took four of the seven head-to-head-to-head matchups and it was clear from the crowd reactions that NXT is the show WWE fans were into at that point.  Going into this show I wasn't sure what to expect as far as mixing Triple H's booking philosophy with Vince's usual approach.  There were things that didn't make sense to be sure, and choices that were baffling and annoying, but for the most part this show worked really well for me.  For the fourth year in a row the Survivor Series mostly delivered, at times in spite of itself.  Say what you will about the idiocy of brand vs. brand, but this annual tradition has brought us some very good Survivor Series PPVs in recent years.  Yes, the triple threat approach was unwieldy and got old by the end, particularly in the main event, but I'll take a show like this over just about anything the main roster churns out right now.  So let's take the deep dive....

The show opened with the women's elimination match, with Charlotte Flair leading the RAW team against Sasha Banks's Smackdown squad and Rhea Ripley's NXT faction.  First off, let me applaud WWE for bringing the elimination match teams out all at once instead of giving all fifteen participants their own entrances.  I actually read a review complaining about this, and to that I say "Would you rather they spent 20 minutes on entrances for these two matches?"  Anyway, I think these matches would've been better if only two people were allowed in the ring at a time, but for some reason it was triple threat rules.  Still, most of the participants got a bit of time to shine.  Io Shirai and Kairi Sane had some good early exchanges, Carmella had an amusing moment where she kept trying to cover two downed opponents and screamed every time they kicked out, Charlotte and Bianca Belair got a nice battle of the super-athletic women, and Rhea Ripley came off like a fucking superstar.  The first two eliminations came, bafflingly, after a series of outside the ring dives, which apparently left Io and Candace LaRae "injured."  They were helped to the back, leaving NXT at a two-woman disadvantage.  No idea why they did this, as both of them showed up again at the end and were fine.  This was handled badly, but it's my only real complaint about this match.  NXT eventually evened the odds and more, not losing another member until RAW and Smackdown were down to one woman each.  Charlotte and Asuka got into a shoving match, after which Asuka sprayed mist at Charlotte and walked out, Bad News Brown-style.  Sasha and Natalya eliminated Toni Storm with a double-submission and then hit a Hart Attack on Belair to get it down to one-on-one-on-one.  Sasha then turned on Nattie and pinned her, and we were down to Sasha vs. Ripley, who had some nice exchanges.  Suddenly Io and Candace showed up to interfere and help Ripley put away Sasha.  Io hit a springboard dropkick and Ripley nailed the Riptide for the win.  I assume Ripley was the sole survivor but they didn't make it clear if Io and Candace were actually eliminated or not.  Regardless, I enjoyed this match a lot and the right team won.  Ripley went on to dethrone Shayna for the NXT Title and then her big push was all but derailed for a while at WrestleMania with a nonsensical, infuriating loss to Charlotte.

The History of WWE Survivor Series (2018)

Amazingly the 2018 edition was a neo-classic Survivor Series PPV, and ended up the best main roster show of the year...

Well I'll be goddammned.  In 2018 WWE actually pulled off a really great Survivor Series PPV that for me even exceeded the miraculously good show from 2016.  Including the pre-show match (which has to be one of the two or three best pre-show matches of all time), this had three very good elimination matches, four excellent singles bouts and only one throwaway tag match.  In 2018 this was about as good a main roster WWE show as you could ever hope for.  Let's get into it.

I pretty much always skip the pre-shows for these PPVs but since this particular pre-show included my beloved 10-team elimination match I made it a point to watch, and I was glad I did.  While this was obviously no Powers of Pain-Demolition epic from 1988, these ten teams worked their asses off to do something memorable.  The first half felt a bit rushed as teams were getting eliminated pretty quickly, but once it boiled down to New Day & Usos vs. Revival & Gable/Roode, this kicked into high gear.  Loads of crazy offense and dives over/off the top rope (including an absolutely nuts spot where Jimmy Uso German suplexed Gable off the top, onto the pile of guys on the floor).  It boiled down to The Usos vs. The Revival - nice to see Dash & Dawson make it to the end - and Jimmy & Jey hit their superkicks followed by a top-rope splash to win the whole thing.  Just a damn fun opener that won the crowd over (WWE should hold every PPV at the Staples Center, by the way; this crowd was awesome).

The proper PPV opened with the women's elimination match, and this was roughly on par with the 2016 edition.  Some last minute changes improved the match, as Nattie and Ruby Riott were subbed out after a locker room fight in favor of Sasha and Bayley (nothing against Nattie and Ruby, but you can't omit Sasha and Bayley in one of these things).  Mandy Rose disappointingly ended up being the mystery partner for Smackdown, but she at least earned her keep in this match.  Of course the match started with two "shocking" quick eliminations.  WWE has to stop doing this - both main card elimination matches had them and they never get the desired reaction.  They seemingly set up dissension between Rose and Sonya Deville, as Rose stole a pin on Mickie James after Deville leveled her with a sliding knee.  Sasha tapped out Mandy with a Bank Statement and Bayley and Sonya got double counted out.  This paved the way for a super engaging exchange between Sasha and Asuka that lasted a good four minutes.  Sasha gained the upper hand and climbed to the top rope only for Nia Jax to push her off into a waiting Asuka, who slapped on the Asuka Lock for the tap out.  Nia then pounced on Asuka with three legdrops, followed by a Samoan Drop for the win.  Nia had nuclear heel heat coming off her injury of Becky Lynch and came off like a total asshole here.  Very enjoyable match to open the main card.

Next up was a top contender for Match of the Night, as Seth Rollins faced Shinsuke Nakamura.  I daresay this was Nak's best main roster match to date.  He looked a lot like his old NJPW self here, pulling out every move in his arsenal and played the antagonist to the hilt.  The first half of the match was a little slow in spots and they struggled to keep the crowd into it, but in the second half everything picked up tremendously.  They built to a furious pace by the end, trading finisher attempts and counters, and finally Nak went for a Kinshasa but missed, allowing Seth to hit the Curb Stomp for the win after 22 minutes.  I was very happy to see this get the time it deserved and even happier to see Nakamura look really motivated again.  This was pretty excellent.

The History of WWE Survivor Series (2017)

Here was a very good Survivor Series show with an absolutely wretched main event....

Toyota Center - 11.19.17

Well, just like the 2016 Survivor Series, this was a very good PPV that had a mindnumbingly stupid main event.  The problem is, unlike 2016's main event which only took up 90 seconds of my time, this one took 33 minutes.  Brock Lesnar went from the worst match of the night in 2016 to the best match in 2017, while the men's elimination match took the opposite path.

The show opened, smartly, with the six-man tag between two very over squads, The Shield and The New Day.  The crowd was into this and loved both teams (except Roman who got a smattering of "you still suck" chants).  Both trios worked hard and aside from a couple miscues (which seemed oddly prevalent on this show), threw together a very enjoyable 21-minute match which loads of false finishes and an actual ending that was a callback to an earlier spot - after being thwarted earlier in the match, The Shield put it away with their signature triple powerbomb, but delivered it from the second rope.  If anything this match could've been maybe three minutes shorter, and it wasn't at the same level of the Shield's amazing 2014 matches with The Wyatts and Evolution.  But it was a hot opener with a big-fight feel and established The New Day as very worthy opponents for the dominant Shield.

If you didn't pick these guys to win, I dunno what to tell ya.

The women's elimination match was next, after a baffling backstage pep talk from Stephanie McMahon to her RAW team that once again made the actual women wrestlers look subservient to the boss's daughter.  I don't want to see McMahons on my TV screen anymore.  I'm sick to goddamn death of this family.  Anyway, the match itself got over 18 minutes and didn't feel like a sprint, but still felt a bit rushed.  Too many eliminations were too sudden, like Becky Lynch's unceremonious exit two minutes in (This was of course before they knew what they had with Becky).  From there we got a battle of the bulls, as Nia Jax and Tamina faced off.  Tamina won this round by repeatedly attacking Nia outside the ring and hitting her dad's Superfly splash on the floor, getting Nia counted out.  Bayley also fell to Tamina's splash, while Alicia Fox was the victim of a horrendous fast count by the ref.  Naomi had rolled her up and she was clearly supposed to kick out before being locked in a submission hold, but the referee counted 1...2-3 and basically pushed her out of the ring.  Not sure who screwed up, but someone did.  It all boiled down to Nattie and Tamina vs. Asuka, allowing the Empress of Tomorrow to fully demonstrate her dominance by eliminating both opponents clean.  Not a great match but a good one that accomplished what it needed to.  Asuka was set up for a several-month run of dominance that included winning the first-ever Women's Royal Rumble.  Sadly Vince ruined her starting with her WrestleMania 34 loss to Charlotte, and she's become just one of the girls.

Asuka's main roster push looked so promising until Creative started doing what they do.

The History of WWE Survivor Series (2016)

Minus a bafflingly abbreviated main event, WWE gave me a birthday present in 2016 by bringing back the real Survivor Series concept....

Survivor Series 2016 - Air Canada Centre - 11.20.16

For the 2016 edition WWE finally took the Survivor Series concept back to its roots (mostly), assembling three huge traditional elimination matches - one for the men, one for the women, and one for the tag team division.  All three delivered on some level, laying the foundation for what turned out the best main roster PPV of the year.  Additionally there were three singles matches, two of which also delivered, and one which just may be the most baffling thing of any kind, in any medium, in any universe, ever.  Advanced trigonometry makes more sense to me than did this main event.  But before I start complaining about a show that I frankly quite enjoyed overall, let's talk about the good stuff.

Brock's afraid of Grampa.

The show opened with the Women's elimination match pitting RAW Champ Charlotte, Sasha Banks, Bayley, Nia Jax, and Alicia Fox against Smackdown Champion Becky Lynch, Naomi, Alexa Bliss, Carmella, and Natalya, subbing for Nikki Bella who was attacked by a mystery person backstage (later revealed to be Nattie herself to get into this match).  This match was a lot of fun despite a slightly rushed pace.  The women got a solid 17 minutes to work with and multiple feuds played out a bit.  The RAW vs. Smackdown rivalry has never, and will never work as a believable feud, but at least in a few cases the babyfaces and heels were booked as very reluctant partners.  After Bayley won the match for her team, her co-survivor Charlotte beat the holy hell out of her, hammering home that the pleasantries were over.  Pretty much everyone in this match got time to make an impression, particularly Nia Jax who was booked like a monster, eliminating Naomi by countout after beeling her off the apron onto the floor.  This match easily ranked high on the list of best women's Survivor Series bouts, right up there with the Team Moolah vs. Team Sherri match from 1987.  A great way to open the PPV.

Next up was the Intercontinental Championship, as The Miz, fresh off regaining the strap the previous Tuesday defended against Dolph Ziggler's scheduled opponent, Sami Zayn.  I'm still not sure why Miz was booked to win back the Title at the last minute, as Zayn vs. Ziggler surely would've been the superior contest.  But this was quite alright too.  As I've said before, Zayn is nigh incapable of having a bad match, and The Miz was looking better than ever.  So this gelled nicely.  Miz eventually won in classic heel fashion.  Zayn had slapped on a figure four and Maryse rang the bell to distract both Zayn and the referee, allowing Miz to roll Zayn up for a cheap pinfall.  This was a cheap finish, but an appropriate one for Miz's character.

ROH Final Battle 2022 Preview & Predictions

Get ready, Ring of Honor fans, it's time for the Final Battle.....of 2022.

This Saturday afternoon marks the second ROH PPV under the Tony Khan regime, and once it's over we should finally at long last get some answers about the promotion's future programming.  Even as a longtime ROH fan I must say it's getting to be a lot, having essentially two promotions featured on AEW television.  Between having too many belts and having to find room for a whole other talent roster, it's made AEW programming very overcrowded.  I anticipate and welcome crossovers and talent exchanges between the two groups, but it needs to be done sparingly or it just gets overwhelming.  My hope is that ROH and its vast library find their new home on HBO Max.  The library alone will be so much fun to explore; I have dozens of their old DVDs but jumping around from disc to disc gets cumbersome.  Anyway, it will be interesting to see which AEW talent gets assigned to ROH full-time, if any.  It should also make Dynamite and Rampage into much more focused shows, which should help ratings.  But enough speculation, let's look at this PPV.

Swerve In Our Glory vs. Shane Taylor Promotions

I don't think I've ever seen Shane Taylor's team so I can't speak intelligently about them.  But SIOG is oddly teaming together after Keith Lee walked out on Swerve Strickland at Full Gear.  I guess they made up during that private conversation they referenced a few weeks ago.  It would be an odd move for their actual breakup to occur during this show as opposed to on Dynamite, but I suppose if you put a major AEW angle on an ROH PPV it conditions fans to not want to miss future ones.  Not really sure who to pick here - I guess Swerve?

Pick: SIOG