Hello faithful readers (all six of you)! It’s good to be back in the locker room. Smell that fresh air, look at those rug burns! You should maybe use some lotion. If I felt any remorse for taking a short break in writing about the 1999 season of the WWF I would say that I’m sorry but I’m not so suck it. During the break I recorded an EP for some guyz, and also did some podcasting with my friend John. You should go listen! And as always I’ve been watching a lot of wrestling but not writing about it as if I were some common non blogger. But now I’m back, I feel refreshed and I’m ready to inject a sense of irony into my wrestling blog like it’s never been done before. What could be a better episode to start back up with than WRESTLEMANIA!?
To answer the question that I just posed to myself: Any episode other than Wrestlemania. First of all there’s none of the goofy storytelling that you love and they actually just have some pretty run of the mill matches. Although Vince McMahon did shell out to have Boyz 2 Men sing the national anthem. Time to bask in the R&B goodness.
Stand up you spandexed dummies!
The first match at Wrestlemania is a three way hard core match where pinfalls count where ever and on whomever. So whatever you think that means is probably right. Somehow Hardcore Holly manipulated the rules to make sure that he would win not only the Hardcore Title (SO WHAT!) but also a whole pile of boos from the stadium tonight in Philadelphia. More like City of Brotherly Hate, am I right you guys?
The Tag Team Championship match is really only worth mentioning because Owen Hart and Jeff Jarrett came down to the ring accompanied by a transvestite. That’s pretty forward thinking for 1999. 
What exactly is the Brawl For All? It sounds like anyone can run down and have have some sort of royal rumble but it’s actually a boxing match? And it lasts almost no time so that’s nice. I’ve never paid very much attention to boxing but after watching Butterbean knock out whoever Bart Gunn is in like no seconds I think we should all go to a Snake Eyes esque boxing match/dinner theater mystery. But don’t bring Nicholas Cage. Or maybe do bring Nicholas Cage.
Is there a medical name for Man Kind exhaustion? I am already so tired of having to hear his back story of being a down and out schlub who traversed the world wrestling in all the countries much like every other down and out schlub. The schlub. He’s so down and out and no one likes him except for everyone in the audience. What a schlub.
Schlub Kind happens to be wrestling “The Big Show” Paul Wight at WM15 to win the honor of being a referee later in the evening. It seems like kind of a bum rap if you ask me.
“So uuuuh if you win this match you have to go do more work but if you lose you get to hang out next to catering and munch on queso for the rest of the evening.” – the guy who books the matches. Maybe I’m projecting.
I know that Vince wants The Big Show to win the match so he can sway the championship match later in the evening to his favor but Man Kind *is* already dressed for the part.
As luck would have it, The Big Show choke slammed Man Kind through two folding chairs thus he was disqualified. I incorrectly assumed that this was a no qualification match but I suppose that it makes sense that the match would serve as fast class for the two wrestlers to learn the rules of the match that they would be officiating. Or whatever. And then Paul Wight punched Vince McMahon in his face for acting really McManny and then had the cops called on him for assault. Surely this will have no repercussions in the weeks to come.
Why did I think that The Road Dogg (ugh) was so cool in my youth? He looks like a meth head at a Slayer concert and talks like a thirteen year old. Maybe that’s why I was so into Road Dogg (blech). I mean because of my tremendous meth addiction of course. The match for the Intercontinental Championship (the coolest of championships) is a four way match between the previously mentioned Road Dogg (yeeeeeuck), Val Venis, Goldust (my personal favorite), and perpetual vanilla ice cream Ken Shamrock. Next to the other three wrestlers Goldust looks like a time traveller from Mars. Sadly neither his space powers nor this amazing shirt could do nothing to quell the speed freak braids of The Road Dogg (ugh) and he was sent back to the Moon with his “mommy”.*
We're gonna need a bigger yikes
Time for Kane to fight Triple H for the honor of Chyna (or something?) and also for revenge against Triple H for setting him on fire with a flame thrower. NBD. Kane can’t seem to catch a break, during his intro music the San Diego Chicken (which actually turned out to be Pete Rose in disguise) ran out to the ring to punch Kane in the ribs but just ended up getting a tombstone pile driver. That’s right folks, Kane pile drove Pete Rose into a kiddie pool filled with shitty pizza.
In an almost hilarious predictable turn of events Chyna showed up at the end of the match to help …wait for it. Triple H. Once I figure out how to embed the audio of this match (never) I’ll play you Jerry Lawler referring to Chyna as a “witch” and “she devil”.
Oh my goodness gracious Sable is so terrible and boring and she’s fighting a cast member from CATS . Does Andrew Lloyd Weber know about this?
grossest family ever
I think that this match between X-Pac and Shane McMahon is the pinnacle of my distaste for X-Pac (or at least his story line). In the late 90s the WWF story had become a failed novelists dream of class warfare stories. Schlubby Man Kind against future movie star The Rock, every day working man Stone Cold against his devilish boss Montgomery Burns Vince McMahon, and of course, high flying kung fu master X-Pac against his boss’ diskish ivy league son Shane. Compared to modern WWE stories (everyone except for Marc Henry and the luchadores are from the Jersey Shore GO!) 1999 is Shakespeare verbatim. Every 14 year old must have wanted to be loud mouthed, bronco bustin, X-Pac. How terrible for mothers everywhere. How many times can one man be hit in the head with a European Championship belt? Five I guess. Just when you think that everything is a-ok in X-ville (a classic saying) Triple H and Chyna show up to help Shane retain his European title. Wrestlemania 15: The night of four twists!
To the writers of Jerry Lawler’s dialogue in 1999, you’re really pushing all of this satanic stuff into the ground. I suppose you could say that you’re beating a dead, ghoulish horse. Or maybe a dead goulash horse. It’s kind of like a turducken but it’s a horse full of goulash. Get on it Adam Richman.
Why wasn’t Paul Barer invited to play The Penguin in Batman Returns?
I’m not saying that he should have played him but he should have at least been invited.
After The Undertaker/Big Bossman Hell In A Cell match The Brood <insert goofy brood picture> descend from the ceiling and take foreeeeeeeeeeeeever to lower noose through the top of steel cage where The Undertaker proceeds to hang the Bossman. It was pretty great.
Is there a video of the Wrestlemania Rage Party and all of the goofy ways that Brisco and Patterson tried to sneak in? There’s got to be a torrent somewhere.
Time for the Main Event:
I can’t tell you how happy I am that JR has been brought out to officiate the title match without any mention of his palsy. That story line felt forced and it was unfortunate that the WWF assumed that they could make a character into a villain because half his face is frozen (even if most Bond villains begin that way).
To keep things brief Shawn Michaels showed up wearing one of his favorite Don Johnson costumes to dereferee Vince McMahon and replace him with someone far less interesting or controversial. <get pic around 2:15:00> I respect HBK’s quest for a fair fight but shouldn’t he be more concerned with a really fun match? Maybe people were tired of Austin chasing MchMahon through time and space instead of actually wrestling. Actually that doesn’t sound like a half bad canceled SYFY show.
Stone Cold is King and Vince has lost his hair gel. I give it a 5.3
*By the way I don’t know if this has been covered but The Blue Meanie refers to himself as Goldust’s “mommy”. How is this not a central story line?
