Mike Reviews Tapes Considered To Be Stinkers – Sable Unleashed

Happy Stinky Friday, everyone!

Last week I reviewed a WWF Home Video release from the 1990s that is generally well regarded. This week I’m reviewing Sable Unleashed, a tape that was slightly less well regarded.

That being said, there’s no reason a tape about Sable couldn’t be good. After all, Sable was a huge star in the WWF from 1997 to 1999, and when she was motivated she could be a decent fired-up babyface, especially when battling the likes of Marc Mero, Luna Vachon, and Jackie Moore.

However, Sable could never really be accused of having an especially deep character or personality, so dedicating an entire tape to her already sounds like an uphill battle. Still, I’m sure the WWF will compensate for any charisma deficiencies on the part of the future Mrs. Lesnar by falling back on the tried-and-tested tactic of showing her in various states of half-undress.

Nowadays, all you need is a phone and an Instagram account to see most of your favourite celebrities in some form of swimwear. Back in 1998, when fewer people had access to fast internet connections, a VHS tape featuring that sort of content could genuinely be considered a selling point.

So, thanks to the kindness of F&C, let’s take a look at Sable Unleashed and answer the age-old question: is it a stinker or not?

We open up the tape with Sable’s debut back at WrestleMania XII, as she shows up on the arm of Triple H before his ill-fated battle with The Ultimate Warrior. Sable says that the WWF hired her specifically to second Hunter to the ring, but in reality she’d accompanied Marc Mero to a WWF meeting and the company reasoned that she had star potential. This led to the WWF eventually deciding to bring Sable in as part of Mero’s act, so this was the idea they came up with to debut her. Speaking of Marc Mero, he protects Sable when Tri blames her for his loss, leading to her managing Mero from then on.

We get clips of Marc Mero winning the WWF Intercontinental Title and then dedicating the win to Sable. Unfortunately though, Mero then injured his knee in 1997 requiring a lengthy spell on the shelf. However, before we can continue that storyline point we get to see Sable swimming in her pool whilst sultry music plays and a sizeable portion of the tape’s target audience suddenly become very interested in swimming pools. Sable’s big thing about all of this is that she likes swimming in the sea as she grew up near the water, but she prefers swimming in a pool. Good to know!

We move on to Sable modelling T-Shirts and inflatable chairs on WWF television, which keeps her on screen whilst Mero is out injured. This supposedly annoys Mero, as his missus is now getting more attention than he is. To illustrate the point, we’re shown the clip of Mero storming onto the set of one of these T-shirt segments and dragging Sable away. Then, we take another softcore break to see Sable doing a photoshoot on the beach whilst she continues to do a bland voiceover, this time about how much she likes going to the beach. The best bit of this shoot is a brief moment where Sable is laughing at something and actually looks human for 1.8 seconds before the director remembers what kind of tape they’re making and we’re back to treating Sable like a walking mannequin.

We head to the Slammy awards following that, where Sable wins a Slammy for being best dressed and shows up in a very revealing outfit, leading to plenty of slow-motion shots of Sable walking around in said outfit. Sable does thank Marc Mero in her speech, although she thanks the fans and The McMahon Family first though. Speaking of Marc, he returns from injury in the second half of 1997 as a tough guy boxer after previously being an energetic high flyer. However, the fans seem to prefer Sable over Mero, so he punishes her by making her wear a potato sack on Raw, as you do. If Mero really wanted to humiliate Sable he would have made her dress up like the Liverpool squad prior to the 1996 FA Cup Final.

Anyway, Sable stands up to her tyrannical man by ripping off said potato sack and revealing a very skimpy bikini. Despite the foreboding production music trying to make that situation sound far more dramatic than it actually was, this was a good angle that presented Sable as a defiant character who was showing off her body because she wanted to regardless of what her bullying hubby wanted. Having a character, especially a woman, show some skin as an act of empowerment can sometimes be a slippery slope to climb because there’s always the risk of it feeling like titillation for titillation’s sake, but they got the balance right here and it felt like Sable had agency and was sticking it to the man with her actions.

Mero deserves credit for playing the obnoxious petty man jealous of his woman getting more attention than him to the hilt during this storyline, as that really helped with getting Sable over. We get a montage of Sable working out next, which of course mostly focuses on her doing things like lifting weights and cardio rather than showing her in a wrestling ring doing some wrestling. We do at least get a brief shot of Sable kicking a heavy bag so the tape can pretend she’s preparing for an actual fight. I’ve always thought these montages are dumb because it acts like all you need to do to become a top wrestler is lift weights. In reality you need to spend hours upon hours in a wrestling ring honing the basics. That’s a wider wrestling problem though and not something unique to this tape. They at least took some time to show that Sable is actually in really good shape and works very hard, as opposed to just giving us another T&A break.

We move onto Sable’s feud with Luna Vachon next, as Luna forces a kiss on Mero, which leads to Goldust attacking Mero and starting up a couples feud. As is usually the case in wrestling, a well booked Couple Vs Couple feud gets over, and the crowd is immediately into the idea of seeing Vachon and Sable go at it. The “I’m Walking On Sunshine” like production track they play over this section doesn’t really work, but the footage they use of Luna and Sable continuously trying to destroy one another until the lads start going at it as well is strongly executed Pro Wrestling. This takes us to WrestleMania XIV, where Sable and Mero defeat Goldust and Luna in a shockingly good match, with Sable getting super over as the fired up babyface taking it to the villains and eventually pinning Vachon with the TKO.

Sable puts Vachon over for being tough, and we see that the feud continued with an Evening Gown Match at Unforgiven in April 1998. That match was nowhere near as good as the bout at Mania XIV sadly, although the horny fans in the crowd enjoyed seeing the ladies remove clothing from each other. Marco Mero ends up distracting Sable though, leading to Vachon ripping off Sable’s gown for the win. Sable is a sore loser of course, which was a babyface move in the Attitude Era, and she ends up supposedly removing ALL of Luna’s clothes, although it happens under the ring so we don’t actually get to see Luna as nature intended. Lousy as this match was, Sable’s feud with Luna Vachon played a big part in getting her over, so including it here made total sense.

Still, that’s enough recapping the storylines and matches that got Sable over with the WWF fans. Here’s Sable riding a horse on the beach, because why not eh? Sable’s narration focuses on how animals are always honest with you and don’t judge you. I don’t know, I used to be friends with a pretty judgmental duckbilled platypus. He’d get especially unruly if I put too much milk in a cup of tea or opened a packet of Custard Cremes messily. Anyway, Sable rides her horse on the beach and then strokes it whilst staring stoically into the distance. Lovely. It’s got chuff all to do with Sable’s wrestling character, but it’s lovely nonetheless.

We get back to the actual wrestling stuff following that, as Sable gets sick of Mero’s nonsense and challenges him to meet her in the ring. Sable then kicks Mero right in his Johnny B. Badd’s in the eventual match and lays him out with a Sable Bomb. The live crowd of course loves this, but one person didn’t, namely Stone Cold Steve Austin. According to a shoot interview with Jim Cornette, Austin and Mero were going to work some matches on the House Show circuit around this time. However, once Austin saw Sable beating up Mero on television, he supposedly refused to work said matches with him and it ended up costing Mero the chance to wrestle the top man in the promotion.

Mero has always seemed philosophical about it all, noting that he loved his then wife and was doing what he could to help her succeed, which makes him sound like a decent guy in all honesty. That being said, Austin was very protective of his character and I can understand why he wouldn’t want to be seen selling for the guy who kept getting clobbered by his wife on television every week, especially during such an openly misogynistic era of Pro Wrestling. Anyway, Sable wants to break away from Mero’s control following that. Mero says he’ll set Sable free, provided that she can find someone to defeat him in a match at Over The Edge. However, should that man lose then Sable will have to leave the WWF.

That takes us to Over The Edge 1998, where Sable decides that she’s going to fight Mero herself. Mero feigns remorse and acts like he’s going to let Sable win, but he ends up catching her in a pinning hold for the three count to banish her from the WWF “forever”. We follow that dramatic moment by heading to footage of Sable dancing around a fire at night whilst she does a voiceover about how she wants to give her fans 100% every time out (ignoring WWF No Mercy UK of course where she refused to wrestle due to having a cold, but I digress).

With Sable seemingly gone from the WWF, Marc Mero brings in Jackie Moore to be his new valet, as she’ll seemingly do as she’s told and be willing to play second fiddle to The Marvellous One. However, Sable quickly returns, revealing that WWF owner Vince McMahon brought her back to the WWF so she could be his on-screen assistant. That alliance lasts about as long as a pint of milk that’s been left out in the sun however, as Sable starts rebelling against Vince McMahon and his stooges almost immediately. Meanwhile, Sable starts feuding with Jackie and Mero, leading to the two of them agreeing to have a bikini contest at Fully Loaded 1998.

Speaking of Fully Loaded, Sable initially has a conservative looking bikini top at the behest of Vince McMahon, but she defies the boss once again and removes it to reveal nothing but a pair of handprints as Jerry Lawler has something bordering on an out of body experience. The handprints were supposedly those of Mero, and it’s certainly a very striking image that delivered on the promised titillation during the hype. Indeed, the WWF hyped this bikini contest more than most of the actual matches on this pay per view. I guess they just didn’t trust the epic DOA Vs LOD 2000 feud to really move pay per view sales.

Vince McMahon is not happy about Sable’s actions, giving us the rarely seen Dusty Finish in a bikini contest, as Sable is disqualified because “paint doesn’t constitute a bikini” in the WWF rulebook. Vince heads out to lay the badmouth on Sable following that, leading to her channelling her inner Stone Cold to flip Vince the double bird and bring their alliance to an end. This was another well done angle, as Sable being brave enough to stand up to Vince and tell him where to go helped with getting her over with the fans. Sable was genuinely a good babyface when she was motivated and had someone decent to face off with.

We get to see Sable driving around in a Ferrari next, but even the folks making the tape seem to be getting bored of these non-wrestling diversions as it’s the shortest segment yet as Sable just talks about how she likes driving her Ferrari and we move swiftly on. Where’s the part where Sable talks about her favourite Donkey Kong Country 2 level on the SNES though? Come on guys, give us something interesting we can actually get our teeth into! Sable can wear a nice swimsuit of some kind if necessary, just so long as we can get her speed run tips for Bramble Scramble.

Following the spin in the car, we take a look at Sable hooking up with The Oddities faction of Golga (John Tenta under a mask), Giant Silva, Kurgan and Luna Vachon. The group was initially brought in to the WWF by Don Callis as a violent group of freaks, but the WWF tried turning them into lovable weirdos in the vein of George Steele (and Steele even joined them briefly at one stage). Putting Sable with them was an odd fit, and it felt like the WWF was going for a “There’s Something About Mary” kind of angle where they have a conventionally attractive person hanging around with the outcasts in order to humanise them. It didn’t really work though and Sable wasn’t with them for that long.

We see footage of Sable helping her former rival Luna defeat Jackie Moore on Raw, meaning that The Oddities gain possession of the bikini contest trophy, in something that could only happen in wrestling. It would be like Lando Norris losing his Formula 1 trophy to Charles Leclerc because my boy Lec defeated him in a game of Kerplunk. Anyway, this leads to Sable putting the trophy on the line against Jackie in an arm wrestling contest, because why not at this stage? This gives us the bizarre visual of two people with comically large fake nails attempting an arm wrestling contest. Frankly, I’m amazed neither of them accidentally drew blood. The arm wrestling match ends in a no contest, because of course it does, and Jackie shoves the table onto Sable before smashing the trophy over Sable. That poor trophy, I hear it was just 1 day away from retirement.

The follow up to this is a tag team match at SummerSlam 1998, where Sable tags with Edge in his WWF pay per view debut against Mero and Moore, with the babyface duo picking up the victory when Edge presses Sable on top of Mero. This is another decent match, although not quite as good as the tag team match at WrestleMania XIV. I don’t think they ever really explained why Edge of all people agreed to this when his gimmick at the time was that he would silently stand in the crowd looking moody most of the time, but everyone played their allotted role well in this one and Sable hadn’t lost her fire yet, so it’s a solid outing.

We move on from that to see Sable eating the world’s smallest breakfast before heading to a business meeting. I’m sure Rena Mero has had plenty of business meetings in her real life. She ended up posing in Play Boy and making millions of dollars across her different careers, but this looks incredibly staged and inauthentic even for a WWF Home Video release. If Sable is someone who takes business meetings and is looking to grow a property portfolio, then let’s actually see her doing it. That is impressive and shows that she’s an actual businessperson who can be taken seriously and not just a lass getting her kit off for a bunch of ogling hounds every Monday night. Staging a scene where she takes a fake meeting with acting so wooden you could use it to make a new set of teeth for George Washington just makes her look like a phony, which is absolute death for a personality piece like this.

We move on from that to seeing Sable acting in Pacific Blue, a show I’ve never personally seen. Sable looks like she’s doing a good job, especially in the physical scenes, which is likely why they hired her in the first place for the gig. We follow up a scene of Sable getting an acting gig and doing it competently though with clips of her showering in her garden in a see through white top with no bra on, as the tonal dissonance of this tape rears its ugly head once again. We then close the tape off with the same montage that opened it and that’s us done.

Is It Really A Stinker?

Sable Unleashed never really felt like it knew what it wanted to be. At points it felt like a genuine recap of Sable’s career up to that point that actually did a good job of highlighting why she was enjoying such popularity at the time. However, at other points the tape just felt like an excuse to stick Sable in revealing outfits so that horny viewers could be aroused. This led to a constant feeling of tonal whiplash throughout the tape.

They’d show some footage from Raw and pay per view events of Sable doing a genuinely decent job of playing a fiery babyface who wasn’t going to take guff from anyone, but then they’d cut to her riding a horse on the beach and it would all of a sudden feel like a totally different tape. It didn’t help that the tape seemingly made no effort to let us get to know the person behind the character in any way. Any time they tried to show Sable outside of the ring it just felt phony.

On rare occasions you’d get to see Sable smile or actually look like she was enjoying herself, and you could see that she did have some semblance of genuine likability about her. But those glimpses were fleeting. It was surprising how a tape that was meant to showcase Sable often made her feel so vapid and uninteresting as a person. The stuff detailing her wrestling career was generally quite good because Sable was an effective character on WWF television at the time that was popular with the fans.

Sable isn’t a character that tends to be thought of too fondly by fans today, but watching her get into it both physically and verbally with the likes of Luna, Mero, Jackie and Vince, whilst getting loud cheers for doing so, shows that Sable was a star and a big part of the 1997-98 era. Yes her wrestling ability wasn’t especially good, but in the right setting she could play her part in an entertaining match.

When Sable Unleashed focused on her exploits in the wrestling arena, it wasn’t a bad tape and a strong argument for her importance to the overall WWF product at the time. However, much of what worked in those sections was undone by the vapid segments showing her outside of the ring. The biggest surprise was that the parts of the tape designed to showcase Sable often made her less interesting than simply watching her on Raw. It takes a certain twisted skill to make looking at a beautiful woman in various states of near nudity boring, but this tape managed it somehow.

Final Score – Stinky
(Scores done on a scale of Stinker/Stinky/Odourless/Pleasant/Fragrant)