–Gene Okerlund and Bobby Heenan handle the studio duties for today’s broadcast. They open the show by hyping the Giant and recapping the Dungeon of Doom shaving WCW Champion Hulk Hogan’s mustache on Monday Nitro.
–As part of the Halloween Havoc Control Center, Kurasawa and Colonel Robert Parker rant about how Road Warrior Hawk is going down. Hawk promises to do some intensive surgery on Kurasawa in Detroit.
–Okerlund and Heenan discuss Ric Flair’s ongoing problems with Arn Anderson and Brian Pillman and how no one wants to be his partner.
–Heenan says that a new Hulk Hogan toy is needed to reflect his neck injury.
–WCW Tag Team Championship Match: The American Males (6-0) defeat Dick Slater & Bunkhouse Buck (w/Colonel Robert Parker) (21-14-1):
This marks a break from the awesome “winner gets to appear on Monday Nitro to face (x)” stipulation that attracted interest to the feature matches on Main Event. Slater and Buck get a title shot despite losing their last three bouts as a team and they fare no better today, jobbing to the newly crowned champions in a match that was taped on September 20 in Atlanta. Sadly, the footage of the match is incomplete, but thehistoryofwwe.com says that the Males prevailed. If I had known this, I would have just put this result into the WCW Saturday Night review that was posted Wednesday.
Backstage News*: Fans who paid to attend the recent Monday Nitro in Denver were upset that matches advertised for the show did not take place. Those included Hulk Hogan defending the WCW title against the Shark and a tag team title defense. Other fans were mad that signs were confiscated before the show. When fans wrote new signs with markers they brought to the arena, security was told to take those new signs away too. However, WCW did give some fans signs that they produced.
*Instead of using Mima Shimoda and Mariko Yoshida for the November 26 pay-per-view, WCW will be getting Cutie Suzuki and Mayumi Ozaki after New Japan became upset that All Japan Women made a deal to send six of its talent to the WWF for the Survivor Series.
*Vader is saying that he needs shoulder surgery after suffering a separated clavicle, torn rotator cuff, and AC joint pain during his match against Hulk Hogan at Bash at the Beach. WCW still has not made a decision about whether it wants to keep him, suspending him without pay until further notice. In the meantime, he is working as a motivation coach for the Colorado football team.
*Although the storyline would seem to indicate the opposite, WCW does not plan to have Ric Flair turn on Sting at Halloween Havoc.
*Backstage news provided courtesy of Dave Meltzer’s Wrestling Observer for October 9 and 16.
Up Next: Monday Nitro for October 9!