Raw 147
We kick things off tonight with the ongoing, one sided sexual tension between Goldust and Razor Ramon as Razor challenges Goldust for the Intercontinental title. After getting worked over pretty well, Goldust sees defeat is inevitable and leaves the ring to be counted out rather than give up the belt. Razor wins, but it’s a hollow victory. Grabbing a mic, he addresses Goldust saying “I don’t want your belt; I want your ass!” I’m getting some mixed signals from Razor.
Next, Barry Horowitz and Aldo Montoya are in the ring waiting to face the Bodydonnas in a tag team match, but before the Bodydonnas even leave the locker room, Vader storms the ring and beats up Horowitz and Montoya. He told us he’s declared war on WWF and it looks like he’s following through with his threat. There are only so many jobbers in the company, so Rowdy Roddy Piper better figure something out quickly.
After that, Marty Jannetty faces the Ringmaster, who’s now sporting a clean shaven head, a goatee, and black trunks. He’s starting to look like someone, but I just can’t place it… As he makes his way down the aisle, Vince on commentary says, “talk about a stone cold man!” God, it is just on the tip of my tongue…
Goldberg? No, that's not it...
We then get our first fleshed out Mankind promo. He’s got a similarly creepy vibe to Waylon Mercy, who unfortunately retired the previous year. It’s too bad we won’t get to see both of those lunatics in the company at the same time.
The final match of the night is Tatanka VS the Undertaker. During the match, Diesel comes down to the ring with an axe held high, grabs a camera man, and takes him backstage where he has the guy film him while he chops Taker’s coffin into pieces. There’s no way this ends well for Diesel.
Nitro 25
The first match up on Nitro is Arn Anderson (a bad guy) VS Hulk Hogan (a good guy). I’m going to list some things now that one of these men did during this match. Try to figure out whether it was the bad guy or the good guy:
Attacked their opponent before the bell
Raked their opponent’s back
Raked their opponent’s eyes
Choked their opponent with their jacket
Blatantly choked their opponent with their hand
Bit their opponent’s face
Took a scarf from a fan and used it to choke their opponent
If you said “the bad guy”, you’d be wrong. Nope, good old American hero Hulk Hogan did all those things. I’d love to hear a defense of these tactics. None of that seems like something a role model for young kids should be doing. “See kids, good DOES triumph over evil, assuming of course that the good guys stoop to the bad guys’ level!”
"It's not torture, it's enhanced interrogation."
After that, Alex Wright, “Das Wunderkind”, gets squashed by a big fat oaf named Loch Ness. I don’t know why he’s even in the company and I have no idea why they’re pushing him. And how are you going to have a guy you call “Das Wunderkind” get squashed by him?!
The final match of the night is Ric Flair accompanied by Woman and Miss Elizabeth VS Randy Savage. When Woman tries to throw her heel into the ring for Flair to use as a weapon, Macho Man intercepts it, but is taken out with a DDT by Arn Anderson when the ref is distracted by a fight between the Taskmaster and Hulk Hogan. Flair gets the win but the ring immediately bursts into chaos as all the faces fight all the heels. Suddenly a new wrestler runs in and turns the tide in the favor of the good guys. When the smoke clears, we can see it’s the wrestler formerly known as Brutus “the Barber” Beefcake, or as he was known more recently, Zodiac. Hulk runs down to interrupt the commentary team to inform us that this guy’s name is “Booty Man”. Booty Man. Let that sink in.
...Booty Man.
Verdict: For once, it’s not even close and Raw comes out on top. It seems like Raw’s getting their act together and developing multiple storylines while also keeping the audience on their toes by never knowing when Vader may go on a rampage. They’re also introducing characters like Stone Cold Steve Austin and Mankind while Nitro is giving us Loch Ness and Booty Man. I’m starting to maybe see why WWF won the war after all.
Winner this week: Raw
Score to date: Nitro 18, Raw 4
(Television Ratings: Raw - 3.1; Nitro - 2.9)