What the World Was Watching: WWF Superstars – 01.20.96

Shawn Michaels tells people that the clock is ticking for him to fulfill his lifelong goal of winning the WWF Championship at WrestleMania XII.

Vince McMahon, Mr. Perfect, and Jim Ross are commentating the last episode of the taping cycle in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. This is the last WWF television broadcast before The Royal Rumble.

Opening Contest: Sid & the 1-2-3 Kid (w/Ted DiBiase) (1-0) beat Avatar & Aldo Montoya when the Kid pins Montoya after a Sid powerbomb at 3:49:

Avatar was Al Snow, who was signed from Smoky Mountain Wrestling in the fall of 1995 after a successful run where he won the Tag Team Championship with Unabom and engaged in an entertaining feud with the Rock N’ Roll Express. Snow was given a martial arts gimmick modeled after Power Rangers and Mortal Kombat where he wore a mask. There was not a lot of effort put into introducing him, which was not a good sign, and the gimmick did not make much sense as Snow carried a mask to the ring and then put it on to wrestle, as if the mask gave him magical powers. The WWF did plan on giving the gimmick a small push but in Snow’s first televised match the night after In Your House 4 he botched several high-flying moves, not realizing how slick the ropes were. That immediately soured McMahon the gimmick, so Avatar was removed from Survivor Series and replaced on Barry Horowitz’s team by Bob Holly. This was his first televised match since that ill-fated debut.

Avatar does not carry the mask to the ring this time, just wearing it during entrances, and he is aligned in colors with Montoya. The Kid gets worked over by the babyfaces until Montoya acts like an idiot and approaches Sid in the corner, getting mowed down with a clothesline. When Sid gets tagged in the match turns into a squash as Sid beats on Montoya near the ropes and kills him with a chokeslam and powerbomb. However, instead of Sid getting the pin he tags in the Kid, who runs around Montoya as if he did something, and pins him. Avatar tries to break up the pin but Sid just mows him down with a clothesline. Putting Avatar and Montoya together as a team would not have been the worst idea since neither of them was doing anything. This would be the swan song for Sid and the Kid as Sid left the promotion after January 6, citing a neck injury. A team of he and the Kid had potential, which would have aimed to draw heat by the Kid taking credit for Sid’s bulldozing abilities. The commentators throughout the match only talk about the Kid being in the Rumble. It is like Sid does not exist. Rating: *

Dok Hendrix’s Slam Jam hypes The Royal Rumble. Goldust quotes Peyton Place to lead into talk about spanking Intercontinental Champion Razor Ramon, a thought that makes him tremble with excitement. Ahmed Johnson screams about how Jeff Jarrett must pay for what he did to him at In Your House 5.

The Ringmaster (w/Ted DiBiase) (1-0) beats Scott Taylor via submission to the Million Dollar Dream at 2:42:

In the split screen, the Ringmaster and DiBiase argue that greed and ability create a monster that can win the Royal Rumble and the WWF Championship. The Ringmaster mocks Taylor as he beats him up, reminding him that the ring belongs to him. Taylor gets no offense in, in contrast to what Matt Hardy was able to do on Monday Night RAW. There is no great setup for the Million Dollar Dream, just the Ringmaster picking Taylor up from the canvas and locking the hold in. This was a better squash for the gimmick than RAW because the Ringmaster showed more personality.

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Hakushi (0-1) pins Matt Hardy after a corner slingshot splash at 1:20:

Barry Horowitz does an insert telling Hakushi that they are friends but it is every man for himself in the Royal Rumble. Hakushi makes short work of the older Hardy, landing a few strikes, slamming him, and then delivering a corner slingshot splash. Not having Hakushi do more high-flying moves negates why he should be a babyface.

The Undertaker and Paul Bearer are in a cemetery, arguing that the sun is setting on Bret Hart’s reign as WWF champion.

The Bodydonnas (w/Sunny) defeat Chaz Warrington & Glen Ruth when Zip pins Ruth after a flying butt splash at 3:13:

As noted before, Zip was the former Dr. Tom Prichard of the Heavenly Bodies, who split 1995 doing work for the WWF and Smoky Mountain Wrestling. Prichard and his tag team partner Jimmy Del Ray lost in the semi-finals of a tournament to crown new WWF Tag Team champions to start the year against eventual winners Bob Holly & the 1-2-3 Kid. Then, after winning a series of squash matches in February and March, they lost to titleholders the Smoking Gunns on Monday Night RAW. A loss to the Allied Powers followed and then the Bodies were not used again in a televised role, eventually let go in July due to budget cuts. They returned to Smoky Mountain, even as the promotion’s fortunes declined. They quickly won the SMW Tag Team Championship again, winning the titles at the Super Bowl of Wrestling from the THUGS (Tracy Smothers & the Dirty White Boy) and they were the promotion’s final champions. During their reign they also won the USWA’s version of those belts from PG-13. While Del Ray was blackballed from the WWF for sexual assault allegations, Prichard was welcomed back to the company, working on Skip’s Survivor Series team and getting eliminated in the early stages of the match. When the WWF decided to put he and Skip together as a permanent team, Prichard shaved his long hair and dyed it blonde, thereby matching Skip’s look.

It is genius for bookers to make Warrington and Ruth wrestle under masks as the Spiders and then later in a taping have them wrestle unmasked under different names. McMahon claims it is hard to tell the Bodydonnas apart, which is ridiculous because even though they sport the same haircut Prichard has a different body type than Chris Candido. The unnamed Headbangers fail to figure out the newly formed heel tag team and Ruth gets powerbombed trying to leapfrog Skip. That leads into the Bodydonnas finish where Skip does a super hurricanrana and Zip comes off the top rope with a flying butt splash.

Yokozuna (w/Mr. Fuji) pins Phil Apollo after the Banzai Drop at 1:38:

Yokozuna’s sheer size, as well as status as a past winner, make him a Royal Rumble contender so McMahon and Ross talk about how difficult it might be to throw him over the top rope. In the split screen, Jim Cornette is with Owen Hart and says that Owen or Yokozuna will win the Rumble. Owen asks Cornette who he will root for if the match comes down to him and Yokozuna and then demands that Cornette better root for him because he is going to win the match. Yokozuna slowly pounds on Apollo before finishing him with the Banzai Drop.

Hendrix’s Slam Jam provides more Royal Rumble news. Hunter Hearst Helmsley, whose name is no longer hyphenated by the WWF, argues that he refuses to wrestle on television this month so he can stay in top physical form for the Rumble. WWF Champion Bret Hart argues that he is not afraid of the Undertaker and is not afraid to find out who is better between them. The champion has a good line about how the Undertaker might be the Dead Man but he “is going to bring him to life.”

Diesel (1-0) defeats Isaac Yankem (w/Jerry Lawler) (1-1) after the Jackknife at 5:37:

McMahon emphasizes that none of The Royal Rumble matches will be aired on television, unlike In Your House 5. The match is slightly better than Yankem’s effort against the Undertaker on Monday Night RAW since Diesel moves faster than the Dead Man. Ross mentions that the SWAT Team (the Headhunters of IWA Japan) will be in the Royal Rumble. Yankem misses a flying leg drop but avoids Diesel’s big boot. However, Diesel counters a body slam with a backbreaker and that leads into a flat finish as each man recovers from the double KO that produces and then Diesel gives Yankem a kick and relatively weak Jackknife. Rating: *

Diesel gets a small fireworks show when he poses in the ring.

A video package recaps all of the matches that will take place at The Royal Rumble.

The Last Word: The WWF is struggling to inject a lot of interest and life into its product. This broadcast did what it could to advertise The Royal Rumble but the event lacks a compelling match and this year the Rumble match itself is not that interesting. The build has been so centered around Shawn Michaels that the outcome is predictable. Bret Hart-Undertaker should be a dream match as they have not tussled since 1991 – and that match happened in Madison Square Garden in front of a local audience – but the WWF is just treating it as filler. It does not help that they did not have any face-to-face interaction going into the pay-per-view. Speaking only for this show, there was nothing fans needed to tune in to see, which is sadly becoming too common on WWF Superstars dating back to last year.

Up Next: Royal Rumble 1996!

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