The SmarK Rant for WCW Saturday Night – 09.17.94

The SmarK Rant for WCW Saturday Night – 09.17.94

Hmmm so I thought last week was the go-home show for Fall Brawl because there wasn’t any other taping I could see, but apparently there’s still another one sandwiched in there. So NEXT next time it’s Fall Brawl 94.

Taped from Atlanta GA, although I’m not 100% sure when. The tapings from the beginning of August ran out on last week’s episode. Maybe it’s related to all the Timecop talk from the last episode and someone went back in time and taped the show in the past to prevent any paradoxes. Actually Hulk Hogan possessing the time machine tech would certainly explain how he could work 400 dates in a year and cross the International date line twice.

Your hosts are Tony Schiavone & Bobby Heenan

Hacksaw Jim Duggan v. Chris Nelson

Duggan chants “USA” and Nelson clutches his ears in pain, which is weird because I don’t think he’s specifically playing a foreign menace. Isn’t he also from the USA? Why would he have a problem for people chanting his country’s name? Duggan runs him into the turnbuckles and follows with a spinning slam and then finishes with the three point stance at 1:45. Bobby was just riffing on Duggan non-stop here, getting in every one-liner he could think of during the 2 minute squash.

Hacksaw Duggan joins Mean Gene afterwards, discussing his decidedly not-fancy-dan board and working class attitude. And if someone is talking bad about the USA, he’s not gonna stand for it. Bold.

Mean Gene promises that Ric Flair is making a major announcement at Fall Brawl, but if you call his hotline RIGHT NOW, he’ll spoil it for you and tell you what it is right now. Well that’s one way to sell it.

Guardian Angel v. Tex Slazenger

Angel fights off a charging Tex to start and hits him with clotheslines to chase him out of the ring while Tony puts over the matches that Angel had with Hulk Hogan in the WWF years before. Angel stomps Tex down and hits him with a slam, but misses a headbutt and Tex takes over. He slugs away in the corner, but Angel makes the comeback and chokes him out for two. That was weird. Big boot gets two as they are having a particularly stinky match here for whatever reason. Tex fights again, but walks into the WWF Intellectual Property Slam and Angel gets the pin at 4:40. In retrospect they should have just cut their losses and brought him back in as Big Bubba.

FALL BRAWL CONTROL CENTER! WITH MEAN GENE!

Apparently now the major announcement will be from Hulk Hogan instead of Ric Flair, but to be fair Gene would have taped the previous tease weeks before this and WCW never knew what they were doing more than a week in advance at the best of times.

Kevin Sullivan v. Butch Long

Tremendous name on that jobber. Kevin tosses him into the railing right away, with STANK on it, and then runs him into the ringpost while Blacktop Bully yells at Evad from ringside. Security is there to settle him down because they don’t want their fans showing excitement unless they’re paid by WCW to do so. Back in the ring, Kevin puts the boots to Butch in the corner and stomps him down until the ref calls for the DQ at 1:41 for KICKING TOO MUCH ASS. Literally in this case.

The Sullivans join Mean Gene, and Kevin announces that Cacus has awoken an evil inside him while Evad pleads with “Nivek” not to go there. WCW was really quite brave and forward-thinking with their well-researched and nuanced portrayal of dyslexia and the true toll that it takes on people.

Call the Hulk Hogan Hotline, brother! It’s 99 cents a minute but it gets more expensive with every telling.

Meanwhile, Mean Gene recaps the feud between Steve Austin and Ricky Steamboat over the US title. It was actually a really good one but we of course never got the final blowoff.

Stunning Steve Austin v. Terry Taylor

And it’s another random TV appearance for the Rooster! Austin works a headlock, but Taylor takes him down with an armbar while Heenan is strangely supportive of this man who he famously hated with a passion years before. Taylor with a backslide while Bobby accuses Steamboat of bribing Nick Bockwinkel with free luau trips. And then Tony lets him have more rope to work with and Bobby finishes with “He didn’t like when he saw Dusty’s sister all tied up and going round and round, though.” Tony can’t help but laugh at that one, though. Austin goes to a chinlock and blocks a charge before trying a rollup in the corner for two. Taylor comes back with a rollup of his own for two, but then he tries a sunset flip and Austin uses the Bulldog reversal for the pin at 5:52. Well Terry was making a good comeback but then he laid an egg.

Steve Austin joins Gene and does a particularly unhinged promo about Steamboat, because it seems that Ricky Jr has been wearing a bag over his head in shame because of his father and Ricky also had to get his wife out of the Betty Ford Clinic because the family is all broken up over “SS Austin” getting ready to cost their patriarch the US title at Fall Brawl. Who knew Steve Austin could show personality?

Meanwhile, Mean Gene heads back to the beach to interview Hulk Hogan again, having to fight through the throngs of totally real non-planted crowd who are there to watch Hulk and Brutus in their matching red and yellow spandex. Hulk apologies for “jumping his bones” in their last interview and now his knee is totally healed and he’s got a way to get Ric back in the ring and put up his fake title belt. But he’s not gonna tell anyone until the PPV.

Pretty Wonderful v. Mark Starr & Frankie Lancaster

The jobbers double-team Roma and chase them out of the ring with a double dropkick. Back in and Lancaster gets a crossbody on Orndorff for two, and it’s back to Starr for an armbar. Starr with a sleeper, but Roma comes off the top to break it up and then tags in for a flying elbow that gets one. Orndorff drops a knee on Starr for two and goes to a chinlock, but the Thumper gets a hot tag and actually runs wild on Orndorff for a bit. But then he falls victim to the BOOGIE WOOGIE ELBOW, as have so many before him, and Roma finishes with a flying splash at 5:34. This is of course the Mortal Kombat II Move of the Week. And yet it’s 30 years later and we’re back to Mortal Kombat 1 again. TIMECOP.

Pretty Wonderful joins Gene, discussing the burden of being better than everyone else and generating haters as a result. Man, don’t I know about that! Unsurprisingly Roma as a smirking douche is a good fit for him.

The Honky Tonk Man v. Jungle Jim Steele

Steele goes after the arm, but Honky pokes him in the eye and beats on him in the corner to take over. Jim makes a comeback but the Shake Rattle and Roll puts him away at 2:00. Count on WCW to name someone after children’s playground equipment and expect him to get over.

Honky Tonk Man joins Mean Gene and he’s going to rent a movie theater in Memphis and watch every match at Fall Brawl, which to be honest would have significantly improved the buyrate for that show.

Sting v. Harvey Solon

We get a posedown to start, which is won by Sting fairly handily, and he takes Harvey down with a headlock and works on that. And then he just kicks Harvey down and finishes with the deathlock at 1:50.

Sting and the Guardian Angel join Gene and tease they might have issues with each other as well as Vader.

The Nasty Boys & Dustin Rhodes v. Rip Rogers, Ron Oakes & Tommy Stevenson

The babyfaces chase the jobbers out of the ring, and then Dusty gets involved and hits them all with elbows in the ring and the referee just lets this travesty of justice continue with not even a warning. The Nasties double-team Stevenson and Dustin hits him with a bulldog, and then the Shitty Elbow finishes at 3:22.

The Nasty Boys & The Rhodeseses join Mean Gene afterwards and they’re all fired up and ready to go to war with the Studd Stable. Dusty notes that all the talking is over and then talks for another couple of minutes.

Today’s movie talk is the commercials for Batman Mask of the Phantasm, a horribly promoted classic that was also somewhat ruined by taking a TV-formatted 4×3 animated property and cropping it horizontally to make it 16×9, thus cutting off big chunks of information on the top and bottom. Still a great movie but man did they screw it up in a lot of ways.

DAS WUNDERKIND Alex Wright v. Bill Payne

Wright takes him down with an armbar while Tony promises that fans will have interactive TV in October, where they get to vote and book the matchups. Man, they should let Twitter do that for AEW these days, because I’m sure that would solve all their issues and have them filling arenas and hitting a million viewers every week! Payne runs Wright into the corner and beats on him, but Wright suplexes him for two. Payne cuts him off with a lariat for two, but Wright backdrops him and then springboards off the top with a bodypress to finish at 2:50. He’s still pretty dull, maybe he should come up with a dance or something to entertain people.

Meanwhile, Mean Gene recaps the WarGames feud, including the awesome Arn Anderson turn on Dustin, and then Dusty’s promo where he wants to be Dustin’s new partner. And of course, Dusty breaking the balsa wood chair on Meng, which does NOTHING.

And we finish with The Studd Stable, as poor Col. Parker is having a blood pressure incident over being forced into the WarGames match, and Meng does angry martial arts to wrap it up as Gene does the hard sell for WarGames.

OK, next time, it’s Fall Brawl 94 redone! For real this time.