PWPNation.com Presents
FROM THE VAULT
This week’s RAW is the fallout for In Your House 3, where they reverse almost every decision made at the PPV and so it was all pretty much pointless. Let’s roll, I suppose.
We start off with a video package for Undertaker vs. Bulldog, which is probably the first decent opponent the Undertaker has had in months. We also recap Owen Hart interfering only to immediately be pinned at In Your House, and since Owen wasn’t actually in the match when he was pinned, the decision was reversed. I don’t know why they didn’t do this on the actual PPV or at the very least on RAW, but okay.
We immediately jump to Skip vs. Marty Jannetty, who’s making his fifth return in 3 years. Why Vince keeps trying with this guy is beyond me. It’s like trying to pan for gold in California in 2015, it’s just not gonna work.
SKIP vs. MARTY JANNETTY
Marty blows a kiss to Sunny (just to be obnoxious, I guess) which pisses Skip off enough to throw some generic filler offense at him. We get a BAAAACK BODY DROP, which leads to a hug outside the ring. There’s a weird spot where Marty tricks Sunny into hugging him and then ducks a slap. Again, this all kind of makes Jannetty look like an ass, but I suppose it’s better than what it could be. Sunny grabs Marty’s leg, he yells at her for a bit and then gets gutwrench powerbombed. Dean Douglas shows up on the ramp for some reason and starts taking notes.
Man, this match is really disjointed. It almost feels like a Nitro match instead of a RAW match, if that makes any sense. We get a replay of the hug steal spot earlier while Lawler makes fat jokes. Ahh, vintage WWF. Marty hits a German Suplex after a reversal chain, which actually looked pretty nasty. We get an awkwardly edited out plug for the WWF Hotline, another failed interference spot and yet more stalling. Marty hits a fist drop from the top rope, which gets him the win. Wow, way to make Skip look like a complete idiot. So much for building him as a viable singles threat, eh?
We get a recap of Clarence Mason and Jim Cornette bitching at Gorilla Monsoon, a few clips from the In Your House main event, and all of this makes Gorilla Monsoon look stupid and incompetent. I don’t get why they’re doing this.
WWF TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP
YOKOZUNA & OWEN HART (c) vs. THE SMOKING GUNNS
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that Gorilla Monsoon, being kind of a heel to the heels at this point, made this match after Jim Cornette ruined his argument and got the straps put back on Yoko and Owen. They plug an ugly as sin Triple Header t-shirt and the main event between Taker and Bulldog, and the match starts off with some armdrags. I don’t know why this was so common back then, but it happened with both Jack Tunney and Gorilla Monsoon – the face authority figures would just be obnoxious to the heels, so they would be ridiculously unlikable to everyone but tiny children.
How this is a problem that continues to this day is beyond me, because it has a pretty easy fix – just have someone completely neutral. Has there ever been a completely neutral authority figure before? Stephanie McMahon as GM of SmackDown got close, but then she started having a pissfight with Bischoff and that went out the window. Huh? Oh yeah, there’s a match going on. For some reason, Billy tries to hit a backslide on Yoko, which gets him dropped straight on his ass. Owen gets tagged in and we have some face-in-peril because every tag match ever booked is pretty much the same exact match.
Owen hits a crossbody from the top rope, but Billy counters it and almost gets the cover. Yoko and Owen do that weird wishbone spot and Bart distracts the ref so they can beat up Billy in the corner. Ahh, the idiocy of this spot. Good thing it happens in every tag match, huh? Yoko locks in the nerve hold (ugh…Lex Luger flashbacks) and puts Billy, and the crowd for that matter, to sleep. Billy hits some elbows right to the balls of Yoko, which starts the fake comeback followed by real comeback spot that happens in every tag match ever booked. I’m not getting at anything here, I swear.
We get some “USA” chants, Yoko misses the elbow that everyone always misses and we get the good ol’ double tag spot. Bart beats everyone up for a while, hits a BAAAAAAACK body drop, and gets the two count off a gorilla press slam. Owen gets thrown into Yoko, which leads to the Gunns hitting the weird elbow drop side slam thing and dodging a Yoko splash for the win. For some reason, Shawn and Diesel come out to celebrate with them and try to steal their heat. Well…alright. We get a stupid video package for Bret Hart vs. Jean-Pierre LaFitte and Razor vs. Kid on next week’s played-out rematch edition of RAW.
Doc Hendrix talks to Gorilla Monsoon and asks him about Undertaker vs. Mabel at the next In Your House, “which you might consider a train wreck”. Wow, they’re making my jokes for me. We get a bunch of news for the next PPV, including Dean Douglas vs. Shawn and Bret Hart getting an automatic title shot against whoever the champion is at Survivor Series.
THE UNDERTAKER vs. THE BRITISH BULLDOG
We start out with some good old Undertaker no-selling and an obvious chokehold in the corner. Wouldn’t it be hilarious if a ref ended up disqualifying Taker for doing a chokeslam? I could just imagine the IWC exploding. Taker goes for Old School, which Jim Cornette derails by shaking the ropes like a maniac. Taker no-sells a clothesline to the outside, tries to chokeslam Cornette and gets thrown into the ring steps for his troubles. Mabel and Mo show up on the entrance ramp, which reminds me of the Dean Douglas thing earlier that didn’t amount to anything. For some reason, Waylon Mercy also shows up. Uh…okay.
Bulldog locks in a single leg crab, which leads to a failed powerslam. For some reason, Jim Cornette leads a chant against Bulldog, which is pretty interesting. Yeah, this is a weird RAW. Taker goes for Old School again, and Paul Bearer prevents Cornette from screwing it up this time. Bulldog reverses a running nothing into a casual piledriver, which Undertaker no-sells. Man, I sure am glad the stupid Undertaker no-selling everything era is almost over. It just makes British Bulldog look stupid and destroys my suspension of disbelief. Seriously, he just no-sold a piledriver. This is getting a little ridiculous now.
Out of nowhere, Mabel gets in the ring, which kickstarts a beatdown. So yeah, this match was pretty much a tool to try to sell Undertaker vs. Mabel, a match that couldn’t possibly be anything more than garbage. Or maybe it’s not, because almost everyone even remotely involved in the main event scene proceeds to run out to the ring and clear out the heels to end the show. What a weird show this was.
The Dean Douglas and Waylon Mercy interferences didn’t amount to anything and just felt out of place and it just ended with HBK and Diesel dancing for 5 minutes. I feel like I just watched a house show, and that’s not a very good thing.