The SmarK Rant for TNT – 06.07.85
“TNT travels to Vegas for a special episode”
Eh, January is kind of a dumpster fire for blog revenue every year anyway, so I’m just gonna do what makes me happy for a while until it picks up again.
As a note, I’m skipping the 05.31.85 episode because it’s a “Best of TNT’s first year” episode and we’ve already gone over all the stuff anyway.
Your host is Vince McMahon with a legit studio audience this time around, doing an actual live show from a cable convention in the Vegas Hilton Hotel. The crowd is JACKED and Vince must have been loving it.
Jesse Ventura joins us to start, and he’s burying the “military” in the audience and he offers to let Vince try on his shades. Vince defers to Lord Alfred, who decides they’re not his style. Moving on, Jesse talks about the wimpy “rock stars” who weigh 150 pounds and think they’re bad, unlike himself. So we get a music video of Jesse beating up jobbers and uh…singing a song. Oh my. OH MY. I think it’s called “The Body Rules” and it’s some amazing 80s cock rock cheese. HOW IS THIS NOT ALL OVER TWITTER?!?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XL9WMUpLOqk
They don’t even cut out the song on this show! So that means WWE OWNS THE RIGHTS to this monstrosity and they’re choosing NOT TO RELEASE IT for some reason. So Vince keeps cutting off the video and Jesse gets all pissed off and demands that they show more, so Vince plays literally 2 seconds of the clip and then cuts it off again. Jesse’s reactions here are amazing. Vince tries to wrap up the segment, but Jesse wants to cut one more promo before he leaves and puts himself over as the only broadcaster with no bias, unlike Mean Gene. Vince wants to see the body of the Body, but Jesse quips “No no, you pay to see the body!” and then storms off. Tremendous on every level.
Lisa Sliwa (now known as Lisa Evers) joins us next, as she trains to be a pro wrestler after spending time as a part of the Guardian Angels and modeling. Mean Gene interviews her at a training session with Mario Mancini, and she demonstrates a judo throw on Gene and we get a photo session with her. Then we cut to Gene and Lisa on the subway in New York as they talk about the Guardian Angel program. Lisa promises to be the best professional woman wrestler in the world, but this was her only appearance for the WWF and nothing ever came of it. Would have been kind of an interesting gimmick for 1985, decades before Ronda Rousey.
Bruno Sammartino joins us next, and he’s here to talk about his son David, who has apparently wanted to be a wrestler since he was 8 years old. Vince throws it to a clip of the Sammartinos against Johnny V & Brutus Beefcake at MSG, as Bruno destroys the heels on his own and then we head back to the studio. Bruno: “The old man can still move!” Bruno humbly talks about how he still runs 8 miles every morning even in retirement and lifts weights in his basement, coming off like a big star even in retirement. Johnny V interrupts, in advance of his own segment later on, and they cut promos on each other before Johnny takes a swing and Bruno knocks him over the chair and into the back of the set.
Bobby Heenan and John Studd join us next and the crowd is immediately all over him, so Bobby is in his glory. “It’s like a Paul Orndorff family reunion out there”. Bobby clarifies that had Orndorff not fired him on TNT, Bobby would have fired HIM. Huge if true. So Vince throws to the clip of Orndorff firing Bobby and then Bobby throwing a tantrum on Piper’s Pit, and then we another clip of Paul firing Bobby on Championship Wrestling this time. Then Bobby offers up a $25,000 bounty on Paul’s head, with John Studd and Ken Patera vying for it. Back at the studio, John Studd claims that the Heenan Family put Paul in the main event spot at Wrestlemania because they wanted to make him look good, but in fact he should have been there instead. Bobby takes credit for all of Orndorff’s success and takes credit for any ratings success of TNT as well. Also he’s not a weasel, he just wants it known.
We take a break and return with Bobby, Johnny V and Jesse taking questions from the audience members. So Johnny and Jesse interview audience members and Bobby has a gong ready if the questions are stupid. Unfortunately they don’t have any planted fans and this goes off the rails in a HURRY. Jesse asks a guy who his favorite wrestler is and the guy says “Richard Belzer”. Oh man they shut that one down in a HURRY. Jesse and Johnny do their best (“Did you have fish for dinner, honey?”) but this went off a cliff and never recovered. Man, they had three ringers running the show and everything, this should have been LEGENDARY trainwreck TV. Oh well, swing and a miss. Shit happens.
This was an AMAZING episode and I wish they would have done more with this kind of crowd atmosphere instead the fake “studio audience” playing along on the normal USA studio version. It was night and day and Vince even seemed to having more fun and was looser than usual. Definitely check this one out, it’s super fun.