Invincinator continues to do cool stuff in the second update of the new weekly schedule, in this case a Daniel Bryan Danielson-style front missile dropkick. I’m not entirely sure why, but I find top rope moves infinitely less difficult to draw than the preceding panels where the guy is standing on the top rope about to leap.
Next Saturday: Invincinator punches everything that moves until his lungs start to hurt.
So anyway, the schedule for HEAT. It’s kind of a good news/bad news thing. The good news? I’ve had a comic project greenlighted by a publisher, which is awesome and very exciting. The bad news? I have to, y’know, draw it, so I’m going to have to take some of that drawing time away from HEAT pages. So what this means for you guys is that I’ll unfortunately have to reduce the schedule to once a week. So until further notice, HEAT will be updating once weekly on Saturdays, starting this Saturday, January 14th.
Remember in the last update how I was looking for a cool Stampede Wrestling clip? Found one. It’s a compilation of three Owen Hart matches. One thing that’s interesting to note is that in Stampede the tombstone piledriver was considered a transitional move – and this is in the late ’80s, before the Undertaker debuted it as his finisher. In looking for a good Stampede clip, I’ve noticed that it’s a staple in the arsenal of high-flyers as a set-up move to dives off the ropes (I believe Dynamite Kid was the first one to use it for that purpose).
I imagine most of you will recognize Bad News Allen, known in the WWF as Bad News Brown, but how many of you spotted Makhan Singh? Okay, most of you, because he’s huge and hard to miss, but what other name did he go by? Why, that’s good ol’ Bastion Booger! Johnny Smith is a much less famous name, but he did some pretty good stuff in Stampede and internationally.
During my Christmas break I’ve already posted a WWF Championship match and the RCW Gladiator Cup finals, but today’s match isn’t for a title, it’s a war for pride from ECW November To Remember 1995. I was looking for some old Stampede Wrestling stuff on YouTube to post, but I couldn’t find anything that really grabbed my attention. Most of the matches were only five or six minute clips from much longer bouts, and the video quality was pretty poor on most of them, so my search continued until I stumbled upon this gem from ECW, featuring lucha libre that I actually enjoy (that’s a whole other post). I forgot just how small Misterio was pre-WWE until I watched this clip and realized just how ‘roided out he got.
This video comes from the RCW Gladiator Cup tournament (November 19th, 2011), which I was going to write a review of then got busy with student teaching. At this point it just seems irrelevant to write a review for a two-and-a-half month-old show that I can no longer remember the details of, but I did find this video that I forgot I took on my phone a little while ago and popped it up on YouTube for you guys.
The Gladiator Cup is an annual tournament held by RCW in honour of Matt “Gladiator” Verishine, a former member of the RCW roster who passed away. This match is the finals of that tournament, featuring Mid-Heavyweight Champion Kato taking on Pistol Pete Wilson in a match that involves a bunch of crazy high-flying shit.
And because I just found my notes from the show, here’s a brief, no-frills review of the show.
Gladiator Cup Quarter-Final Match: Heavy Metal vs. Pimp Daddy Rick Matthews
Metal and the Pimp Daddy start off frenetically with chop exchanges, holds/counter-holds and rope running. Tommy Lee Curtis offers Metal his loaded fanny pack, which Metal refuses to use, then walks straight into a spine buster from Matthews. Matthews scales the turnbuckles and takes flight with a Money Shot shades of Val Venis… and eats shit as Metal rolls out of the way. Metal hits the Pimp Daddy with a tiger bomb and it’s all over but arguing with TLC all the way to the back. Winner: Heavy Metal via Tiger Bomb.
Gladiator Cup Quarter-Final Match: Keishi vs. “Pistol” Pete Wilson
The first move of the match is La Mistica. Seriously. First move. It’s followed up by a tiger head-spin and a plancha to the floor. Keishi starts a heat segment after reversing Pistol Pete into a British Bulldog powerslam and a cool swinging side-Rock Bottom. After the heat segment, Pete hit a really unique ace crusher from an implant DDT set-up, then reversed a Razor’s Edge into a facebuster, hit a 450 splash, and that was all she wrote. Was it a spot-fest? Yes. Was it REALLY fucking fun? Yes. Winner: Pete Wilson via 450 Splash.
Gladiator Cup Quarter-Final Match: Tommy Lee Curtis vs. Raam Dante
Raam Dante had really cool gear, but this match kind of sucked. There was a little bit of brawling then Raam went for a powerslam but TLC’s legs hit the ref in the face, giving TLC enough time to lay out the fightin’ pharaoh with his loaded fanny pack for the 1-2-3. Winner: Tommy Lee Curtis via Loaded Fanny Pack.
Gladiator Cup Quarter-Final Match: Barricade vs. Kato Barri-Kato collides in the first meeting of tag team partners of the tournament. This was a pretty classic “big guy vs. small guy” match, and the two worked it well. After an exchange of holds, Kato ended up with a waistlock and went for a German suplex… nope. Barricade wouldn’t have any of that. Barricade takes control with avalanches and powerslams while Kato tries to catch him with arm submissions. Eventually Kato sinks an arm triangle and forces Barricade to tap. Winner: Kato via Arm Triangle.
Andre Williams vs. AJ Sanchez
The bout begins with AJ Sanchez cutting a long comedy promo that, while completely unnecessary, was pretty funny and set up the comedy opening of the match, which featured Sanchez giving Williams advice during a classic big-man “irresistible force/immovable object” shoulder tackle spot. AJ hits a springboard hurricanrana much to my surprise, because he’s a big dude that shouldn’t be able to move that fast. He hits a few huge chops, then a springboard moonsault! He lets out a funny “oof, he’s heavy!” while trying to pick up Williams in a fireman’s carry. Williams kicked out of a frog splash which I felt should have been the finish, then hit an ugly flatliner-esque thing out of a fallaway slam position for the victory. He then cut a promo, resulting in AJ kicking him in the back a few times much to the pleasure of the crowd. Winner: Andre Williams via Fallaway Flatliner.
Gladiator Cup Semi-Final Match: Heavy Metal vs. Tommy Lee Curtis
The Supreme-Adonnas shake hands, then TLC sucker punches Metal. Hold exchange, TLC bails, chase around the ring, sucker punch. Metal comes back after TLC gets up in his face verbally, leading to a three-stooges eye poke sequence and a Metal offence sequence. TLC comes back with a low blow, then Metal retaliates with a low blow of his own and a low DDT. They then punch the referee for no reason and are apparently friends again. This was really confusing as the entire show thus far had built towards a Heavy Metal face turn, then all of a sudden Metal and TLC are buddies again and have apparently swerved the crowd for no gain. Very strange. Winner: Double Disqualification.
Intermission
Tag Team Championship No Disqualification Match Complete Impact (Steven Styles & Bucky Briggs) (C) vs. C-Block (Ugg & Slammer) w/ Officer Gordon
This one is a wild brawl that I wish I could have gotten any sort of useable video out of. They were too all over the place to capture all the cool stuff. Bucky gets the worst of it, being thrown through a table, through several rows of chairs, and splattered on the floor a bunch of times. Slammer eats a fan’s boot (that fan being wrestler Andrew Hawks, who wasn’t a plant, but was nonetheless very enthusiastic about kicking somebody in the face). Chairs get thrown around and it’s just generally chaos. Styles and Briggs win with a Hart Attack/Superkick thing after mostly getting curb-stomped for the entire bout.
Afterward, the Supreme-Adonnas attack, hitting a spike piledriver on Bucky Briggs who really bumped his ass off tonight. I think he hit MAYBE one move. Teddy Hart chases them away, then a promo segment results in TLC being suspended for shoving the commissioner and Metal being pitted against Teddy Hart and Steven Styles in a tag team match with a partner of his choosing at the next show. Winner: Complete Impact via Hart Attack/Superkick
Gladiator Cup Finals: Kato vs. Pistol Pete Wilson
With TLC and Metal both being eliminated due to their double disqualification, the other semi-final becomes the finals. You just watched the video of it. If you didn’t, why not? Go watch it.
“All American” Steve Rivers & Evan Inferno vs. Big Jess Youngblood and Hotshot Danny Duggan
Inferno is isolated right away, then a funny double suplex spot occurs as Rivers tries to save Inferno, only to be fended off by Duggan and Youngblood kicking at him while holding Inferno up in the vertical suplex position. Heat segment on Duggan, hot tag to Big Jess, heat segment on him, and then a weird low blow spot where everyone gets dinged in the dingleberries, including the referee (I don’t know how that didn’t result in a DQ either, just go with it). Duggan and Big Jess hit a series of double teams, including a clothesline into a German suplex, then Jess hits his sit-out powerbomb finisher to set up for Danny Duggan’s STIFF double knees from the top rope. Duggan schoolboy’s Inferno for the pin. Winner: Duggan and Youngblood via roll-up.
Rivers and Inferno mug Duggan and Youngblood, including dumping garbage all over the place and putting a garbage bag on Jess’ head. Rivers lays out a challenge for Jess’ RCW Heavyweight Championship on the December show to close things out.
As much as I roll my eyes when internet wrestling fans clamour for the WWE to return it’s product to the curse-laden, blood-soaked, TV 14 days of the Attitude Era, it will always hold a special place in my heart, as I was at the perfect age for it when it began in the late ’90s. The Attitude Era began in 1997, around the time I became a teenager. I had largely stopped watching the WWF regularly after WrestleMania 12 in favour of WCW’s edgy, dynamic product headlined by the heyday of the nWo, and in 1997 the only WWF pay-per-view event I ordered was the Royal Rumble (I could write a whole other article on why I think the 1997 Royal Rumble is the dawn of the Attitude Era.
In 1998 the WWF hooked me again. Having spent 1997 gathering momentum, the Attitude Era began in earnest with Stone Cold Steve Austin’s WWF Championship victory over Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania 14. I watched the episode of RAW that followed WrestleMania 14 essentially by accident; I was home from school sick and caught the replay on the Tuesday afternoon after it aired. I was enthralled. Cactus Jack and Terry Funk battled the New Age Outlaws in a steel cage match, highlighted by DeGeneration X interfering and debuting a new member, the returning (but renamed) X-Pac. I started watching more regularly, and two short months later I was ordering my first WWF pay-per-view since the ’97 Rumble.
Over the Edge ’98 saw Stone Cold Steve Austin defending his WWF Title against Mr. McMahon’s hand-picked corporate crony, Dude Love, in what remains one of my favourite matches of the Attitude Era (and also one of my favourite entrance stages in wrestling period). So while I’m working away on rebuilding my buffer of HEAT strips to start again (I’m going to be drawing HEAT 190 a little bit later tonight), here’s one of my favourite Attitude Era matches courtesy the technological miracle that is YouTube. Enjoy!
