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Official DVD/Match/Show Discussion Thread

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#1 ·
#11,846 ·
Its pretty fucking spectacular. WAY better than I remembered it being on last watch. Whole Orton/Undertaker series is tremendous, and definitely a series that should be watched in order due to some ongoing stories during the matches, callbacks etc. My review of the HIAC:

The Undertaker Vs Randy Orton – Armageddon 18/12/2005

This feud started on the road to WrestleMania, and gave us 3 tremendous PPV matches and one great TV match. Orton had used his own father to help him win matches. Orton had used the recently deceased Eddie Guerrero’s low rider to crash into The Undertaker and blow him up. Orton and his father had locked The Undertaker inside a casket and set it on fire. And The Undertaker kept coming back. Now, inside the devil’s playground, The Undertaker would get Randy Orton one on one truly for the first time in this long and awesome feud, as Bob Orton would be locked on the outside. So no Bob Orton, no low rider, and no casket to set on fire... how will Randy Orton survive THIS match?

Undertaker had been playing mind games with Orton during the build up to this match, and he had one final mind game to play before the match started; he made sure that it wasn’t a referee who shut the cell door and locking these two men inside... it was The Undertaker. He wanted Orton to know that he WANTED to be here, and there was no way out.

The Dead Man is dominant in the early going. Similar to Shawn Michaels in the first ever Hell in a Cell match, Orton tries to run away from The Undertaker, but ‘Taker doesn’t feel like taking his time like he did back in 1997, so he goes after Orton as quick as possible and proceeds to destroy him. Randy gets some offence in here and there, and reverses a few things, but only really out of desperation because Undertaker is just unstoppable right now.

You can tell just how personal this feud is when Undertaker pulls out a steel chair not too long into the match and brutally smashes it over Orton’s head... TWICE. The first time busts him open, and the second time just makes things worse. I’ve seen more Undertaker matches than I can remember, and it’s not often he is THIS destructive and dominant, and believe me, that’s really saying something.

Orton manages to get hold of a steel chain, but before he can use it The Undertaker takes it from him and begins to choke the life out of the Legend Killer, then long darts him into the cell. Fuck me this is brutal lol, and I must be a sick bastard because I am LOVING every second of it!

At one point, when Undertaker brings the steel steps into the mix, Orton manages to fight back for just a moment, and looks to make a comeback... until the Dead Man boots the steel steps back into the arm of Randy. Comeback... failed.

So what finally puts Orton in control of the match after taking such a beating? And RKO of course! Not a regular one though, instead it’s done with Undertaker’s neck being thrown down into the top rope instead of the mat, which may be worse, I don’t know. What I do know is that it creates enough of an opening for Randy to get his bearings back and make Undertaker pay for everything he has done up to this point.

Just as The Undertaker was a vicious monster while on the offence, Orton is the same. Steel steps, the steel chain, the cell, and a steel chair are all weapons that Orton utilises to payback the Dead Man and bust him open too.

But as vicious as Orton is being, it’s just not enough. After being blown up and set on fire, The Undertaker can not and WILL NOT be stopped it seems. One of my personal favourite HIAC spots comes when Undertaker stands Orton up against the cell wall, goes to the other side of the cell, takes a run up and jumps off the steel steps going knee first into Orton’s head! Spot looked awesome, and I can’t believe I never actually got to see it while watching the PPV live back in the day lol, as the damn satellite feed cut out for a few moments!

The greatness continues with Bob Orton managing to get involved, sticking his arm through the cell, but he ends up getting busted open and knocked down. Undertaker looks to maybe launch himself into Orton while he’s stood against the cell again, but Orton counters with a powerslam into the cell. Oh yeah!

Now the match begins to be a back and forth affair, as both men hit big moves to try and win, but are unable to. The Chokeslam doesn’t work for Undertaker, and a cross body through a table doesn’t work for Orton. Can anything put these men down? Well... the RKO and Tombstone haven’t really come into play yet, but neither man has been in a position to try for their big finishers yet.

The ref gets knocked out and busted open, just as Orton counters a Chokeslam into an RKO just like WM! The cell door is opened for another referee to come in, and who else decides to follow? Bob Orton, who also has The Undertaker’s Urn! After a massive Last Ride, Bob makes his presence felt by taking out the second referee, which results in him taking one hell of a beating from the Dead Man.

Going back to their WM and SS matches, at points in those matches Randy Orton tries to add the ultimate insult to injury by hitting a Tombstone on The Undertaker, but he was always unsuccessful. In the final battle between the two, the Legend Killer FINALLY hits it, believing that it will put an end to the Phenom! It doesn’t, and Undertaker just gets more pissed off, Tombstoning both Bob and Randy to win the match!

Fuck me, this was fantastic. I wasn’t sure what to expect from the casket match given the fact I had only seen it once when it aired live, but I had a good idea about this match having seen it not too long ago when I bought the Hell in a Cell DVD set. I really liked the match back then, but this time around I loved it. Might even make the top 5 HIAC matches list for me now. It was everything a HIAC match SHOULD be. It was brutal, vicious and violent, and it was the culmination of a near year long feud. Too many times now, the HIAC match isn’t even close to the last match in a feud, which is a shame because done right, the HIAC match can be the perfect way to end big feuds. It’s been proven in the past (hell, that’s pretty much why it was invented), and it was proven here. Epic stuff, and best match of their feud, something I wouldn’t have said before.

Rating: ****1/2
 
#11,848 ·
Five Second Review ; The Triumph and Tragedy of World Class Championship Wrestling

This is a tale of two DVDs. If you were to break this review down into two discs, it would mean reviewing a disc comprised of a documentary, and a disc comprised of nothing but WCCW matches. Now, in principle this is a pretty damn good idea ; it allows WWE to pump out a long documentary with a ton of focus on what made WCCW tick and why it was so successful/what made it go out of business. There's a little problem with this structure that I'm going to address about this format that could have been easily corrected, but first I'm going to talk about the documentary.

This documentary is just... WOW. It's one of those documentaries that focuses a ton on the Von Erich family and the various shit they've been put through over the years, making it seem almost like a modern day A & E documentary at times. Fuck, it feels like I could sit down with my family and watch this documentary, something I can't say about any other one that has been produced by the WWE. Extremely personal to the Von Erichs, it still manages to bring a compelling side when addressing the various feuds , characters, angles, etc of the WCCW product. In this doc I was introduced to a TON of guys that I never even heard of before (because I never knew much about the Dallas wrestling scene, being a fucking Canadian), some interesting and some being WTF.

When it comes to their documentaries on various promotions, WWE always knocks these right out of the park (AWA, ECW directly come to mind), and this documentary is no exception. The interviews in here are fantastic, from the sympathetic look at Kevin Von Erich (who receives a ton of criticism about this, undeserved in my opinion) , to the brutal honesty of Micheal Hayes, Buddy Roberts, and Jimmy Garvin (boy has he gotten FAT) about the product, feuds, and the family in general. I don't like giving too much away here in a short review, but I'd definitely recommend this documentary to any wrestling fans out there. Doesn't rival the likes of "Rise and Fall of ECW" but it ranks up there with the AWA doc in terms of how good it is.

Documentary Rating : 7.75/10

I don't even need to talk about the second disc of matches, let me just show you my own personal ratings for them, and let you decide :

Duke Keomuka vs Ricky Starr (2/3 Falls Match) : ** ¼

King Kong Bundy vs Fritz Von Erich (Retirement Show) : **

Ric Flair vs Kerry Von Eric (Steel Cage ; Christmas 1982) : *** ¾

The Fabulous Freebirds vs Iceman Parsons/Kevin & Kerry Von Erich (1983) : ** ½

Iceman Parsons vs Buddy Roberts (Star Wars 1983) : * ¼

The Fabulous Freebirds vs The Von Erich’s (1984) : *

Jimmy Garvin & Precious vs Chris Adams & Sunshine (1984) : ½ *

Kamala vs Kabuki (1984) : DUD

The Midnight Express vs The Fantastics (1985) : **

Chris Adams vs Kevin Von Erich (1985) : ** ¾

The Missing Link & Bruiser Brody vs One Man Gang & Rick Rude (1986) : * ½

Abdullah the Butcher vs Bruiser Brody (cage ; 1986) : * 1/2

Completely un-fucking acceptable for a match listing in this era. If these were the matches that would best represent what WCCW was all about, I'm GLAD they went out of fucking business (kidding). For all of this talk about how great Bill Dundee is, or how awesome Gino Hernandez was, WHY THE FUCK WOULDN'T YOU FEATURE THEM IN A GOD DAMNED MATCH. Instead we get an almost half an hour long contest between two people that weren't mentioned in the documentary for a single second, and the likes of "The Missing Link". WHAT IS THIS SHIT ? There were TWELVE matches on this one disc, with ONE of them being a great match.

I did the math, and that's a fucking NINETY TWO percent FAIL rate. The only match on this disc that's worth owning is the awesome Von Erich-Flair Cage match, which you can own on the "Greatest Cage Matches" set. This disc was more than likely a disgrace to all those who were ever involved in the company that was World Class Championship Wrestling, and to say that this was one of the hardest discs I've ever had to sit through would be a HUGE understatement, as I had more fun with some discs on the "you know what" DVD than on this one.

Where the hell is the variety ? It seems like every single match takes place at a "Star Wars" or a "David Von Erich Memorial" show, most of them being really shitty matches. Kamala vs The Great Kabuki? Did we REALLY need to see that horrible, horrible match ? How about Bruiser Brody vs Abdullah the Butcher (WHICH WAS ACTUALLY RELEASED AGAIN WTF) ? DID WE REALLY NEED TO SEE THAT ? My blood pressure is rising just thinking about it actually. Seems like over half of these matches feature an overaged , out of shape Fritz Von Erich in them, BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT WE WANNA SEE AS WRESTLING FANS, RIGHT ?

Again, if you need to ask me ANYTHING about an individual match and why I rated it what I did, just ask me and I'll give a pretty good response, but this DVDs second disc FAILS and FAILS hard. This second disc was PUTRID, it was fucking NWO STANDARDS ! Ugh I felt dirty just saying that. Anyways, download the documentary, and pick up the DVD if you can buy it for really cheap like I did. Stay the fuck away from the second disc besides the awesome Flair-Von Erich cage match, and............You know what ? Download the entire first disc (w/extras) if you can find it out there, and but the "Cage Matches" set. You'll get the only match worth owning on this set that way without having to see the rest of this filth. Fantastic documentary keeps this away from "Epic fail" territory, but the second disc would literally be a 1.5/10 in my books.

4.75/10
 
#11,849 ·
Love the doc, hate the matches. I was honestly never a fan of the Von Erics of the Freebirds UNTIL I got the DVDVR Texas set. Only watched the first disc and I'm practically in love with them :p. With the great shit available to them, how the fuck did WWE fuck this shit up? FUCK.

You should totally get the Heroes of World Class DVD. Independent made documentary done BEFORE WWE bought the library, so we get footage and shit still. Its really good, and goes hand in hand with the WWE one. You get stuff in the WWE one that isn't in the Heroes one and vice versa. Can probably pick it up cheap too, I got it for like £3 on Amazon last year.
 
#11,850 ·
HHH shows up for the first time in months. WWE Universe's reaction:

WE WANT TAKER!

:lmao
lol, thought the same thing. Place would've went ape shit if Taker had shown up like on Raw 1000. Such a shame he wasn't there. :(

Raw last night was awful. Between the show itself, the fact Punk/Bryan OTL wasn't even a fucking nomination and Rock/Cena and Sheamus/Show were, and then the fact Cena won WOTY over Punk were all just fucking retarded. Thank god Flair returned, we had a great Punk rant promo and we got The New Age Outlaws or else this show would've been all around disastrous.
 
#11,853 ·
Yeah, I'm completely cool with HHH/Taker being remembered as the MOTY amongst the casuals TBH. As long as it means Rock-Cena not being slobbed all over by the WWE brass, anything can be MOTY in their eyes honestly.

Just wait until they do their top 25 list and Rock/Cena is top five :lol
 
#11,856 ·
Am I the only one who didn't hate that match? Sure, it's not top 5 or even top 10, but it wasn't dreadful. It was basically this generation's Rock/Hogan.
Was absolutely dreadful. Only this generations Rock/Hogan in that it was a big star from the past facing current big star. Quality wise they don't even compare.
 
#11,857 ·
Am I the only one who didn't hate that match? Sure, it's not top 5 or even top 10, but it wasn't dreadful. It was basically this generation's Rock/Hogan.
Was absolutely dreadful. Only this generations Rock/Hogan in that it was a big star from the past facing current big star. Quality wise they don't even compare.
 
#11,858 ·
I thought Rock/Cena was good, but nowhere near enough to be a MOTYC. Sheamus/Show was great, and I can understand that more, but I still think there were several matches that should've been above it.

I don't mind Taker/HHH winning as if casuals love to see dramatic storytelling in a match more than anything else, it was the best match in that category and as such I can understand it being voted for as MOTY. I could've understood Lesnar/Cena winning for the brutality it had. Keep in mind I don't have either match in my top 5, but I can understand the elements that made those matches great being the best in those elements of the year. I just can't believe that Punk/Bryan wasn't at least nominated. And yes, I'm :mad:.

Then again, as said, it's WWE, so I shouldn't be too surprised.
 
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