The SmarK Rant for WWF Superstars – 03.12.94
WARNING: THIS RANT CONTAINS DESCRIPTIONS OF STROBE LIGHTS THAT MAY CAUSE SENSITIVE READERS TO EXPERIENCE DESCRIPTIONS OF SEIZURES.
I actually have no idea what that warning was referring to. I didn’t notice anything over the course of the show, although they should have put a warning about Johnny Polo and his sound effect gimmick.
Taped from the little town of Bethlehem, PA, on 02.22.94 with a sellout crowd of 3500.
Your hosts are Vince McMahon & Johnny Polo
Tatanka v. The Brooklyn Brawler
Tatanka has recently received his sacred headdress from Chief Jay Strongbow, and he’s now proudly wearing it and I’m sure no one will steal it or damage it in any way. Brawler gets a cheapshot to start but Tatanka hits him with a hiptoss and throws chops in the corner while Johnny makes jokes that are the main reason why we now have the Washington Football Team. Brawler gets a slam and stomps on him while Polo debuts his new sound effect machine and we get an inset promo from IRS. You see, Tatanka received the headdress as a gift, and thus there is a gift tax on it that is owed, which Irwin will be collecting on behalf of the federal government or whatever nebulous tax agency he represents in WWF canon. Is “gift tax” a real thing in the US? That sucks. Where I come from, Canada, giving someone a gift actually shelters it from taxation. And actually wasn’t it a fairly big plot in Shawshank Redemption about using a monetary gift as a tax shelter? Could it be that this 1994 wrestling program is giving us inaccurate legal advice about taxation? Also if he had received that gift on a reservation where he resided, then it would be exempt from both state and federal taxes and IRS would have NOTHING on him. Also another reason why Canada’s tax laws are awesome: Lottery and gaming winnings in general are not taxable, which means that if you win the $50 million lottery jackpot, you take home a cheque for $50 million. However, the Canadian version of IRS would be Clyde Rutherford Adams, otherwise known as CRA, and his shtick would be demanding nearly 50% of your money when you walk in the door for the show. Anyway, I digress. Tatanka somehow survives the onslaught of brawling from Brooklyn and makes the comeback, finishing with the Papoose to Go at 2:40. Vince points out again that the headdress is very “symbolic”. Symbolic of what, we never really learn. 0 for 1.
BUT WAIT! IRS confronts Tatanka in the aisle and gives him tax forms to fill out in order to keep his symbolic headdress, but Tatanka rips them up. Isn’t that destroying federal property?
Men on a Mission v. Todd Mata & Jim Massenger
Mo gets double-teamed by the lumpy jobbers. Massanger appears to be wearing Hack Myers’ gear. Mo fights back with a headbutt to the gut and awful looking somersault kick thing, and Mabel comes in to destroy Mata and finish with the assisted splash at 2:00. 0 for 2.
FACE TO FACE! WITH STAN LANE!
We’re one week away from Wrestlemania and the cable company phone lines are BURNING UP. Stan’s advice: Good things come to those who wait, but better things come to those who act now! Yeah but he didn’t heed his own advice when it came to ring rats and that’s how we ended up with Lauren Boebert.
Shawn Michaels v. Mike Maraldo
Diesel brings a ladder to the ring for visual effect, while Shawn hits Maraldo with a back elbow and follows with a backbreaker. Shawn tosses him and brings him back in with a suplex, then hits him with a superkick for the pin at 1:45. And then Diesel sets up the ladder and Shawn runs up to the top to cut his go-home promo on Razor Ramon, bragging about how fast he ran up the ladder. And then we got people slowly climbing up for dramatic effect for the next 3 decades afterwards. 0 for 3.
Meanwhile, Bastion Booger is sitting in the locker room being gross while Johnny Polo plays gross sounds on his sound machine. This had Vince written it all over it.
WRESTLEMANIA REPORT! WITH TODD PETTENGILL!
Apparently cable companies all over the country have added employees to handle the increased volume of calls for Wrestlemania X. Not to bring facts into things, but the show actually did less buys than Wrestlemania 9, although it made far more money due to selling out MSG as opposed to a parking lot in Vegas. Alundra Blayze now has an opponent in the form of Leilani Kai, for those keeping track.
Bastion Booger v. Earthquake
Earthquake takes him down with a drop toehold and follows with a dropkick while Polo’s sound effect gimmick has jumped the shark three matches ago. Booger chokes him out and hits him with an Avalanche in the corner, but Quake no-sells it and powerslams him to set up the butt splash at 2:30. 0 for 4.
Vince McMahon welcomes Royal Rumble co-winners Lex Luger and Bret Hart for an in-ring interview leading up to Wrestlemania. Lex gets a decent pop here, which is likely because this was the taping where they did the fakeout angle for Wrestlemania to start, with Lex stealing the WWF title from Yokozuna at the beginning of the night and wearing it for the rest of the taping. Anyway, crazy old Bret Hart gives us another conspiracy theory about how the WWF title was “stolen” from him a year ago. Sure, Bret, as if anyone would “steal” the WWF title from you. What next, are you going to blame Vince McMahon for stealing the title from you? Anyway, Lex is unimpressed with Bret’s paranoid rantings and thinks he’ll win if they face off at Wrestlemania. But then they have a handshake and both go to pose on the same turnbuckle, which leads to awkwardness. Of course, this went exactly nowhere.
Meanwhile, Sy Sperling does some Photoshop humor to imagine what Bam Bam Bigelow would like like with hair.
Owen Hart v. Ben Jordan
Owen continues with his bit of finding a kid in the front row and offering the glasses, but then tearing them up so no one gets them. At this point Johnny Polo goes off on a whole thing about family jealousy and how even Wrestlemania guest star Donnie Wahlberg is jealous of his younger brother Marky Mark. At the time that was a ridiculous statement, but of course it was actually quite prescient as Mark quickly eclipsed Donnie as a star by many magnitudes within a couple of years of this show. Jordan gets some armdrags on Owen before Owen dodges a dropkick and beats him up on the mat. Missile dropkick and he mocks the Hitman pose before putting the jobber away with the original Sharpshooter at 2:00. 0 for 5.
FACE TO FACE! WITH STAN LANE!
The hotline is open, which gives Stan the chance to explain the origins of the word: The lines are open, and they’re hot. We can tell where Lauren got her eloquent vocabulary from. Anyway Razor and Shawn blah blah blah.
NEXT WEEK: The show is coming from New York City, supposedly, and it’ll be some kind of Wrestlemania preview show. Goodie. This show is just limping along in 1994 like Bret after he got his leg kicked out of his leg, and it’s no wonder everyone started watching RAW instead. There’s exactly two big angles on Superstars coming up for the rest of the year and that’s it. Whatever, we’ve come this far with it.