Don Muraco vs Danny Spivey
Not the exciting opener you might
hope for to kick off this episode. Muraco is really happy to stall and waste a
lot of time at the start of the bout, to the point that I’m quite happy when an
impatient Spivey just says “fuck it” and stomps him as he gets in. Muraco takes
control after hurling Spivey through the ringside barriers, then controls him
with some very methodical offence. The best stuff in this bout comes from
Spivey, and I liked his comeback punches which are quite fired up. The end sees
Spivey try to suplex Muraco back in from the apron, but gets cradled for the
win.
Tony Garea vs Mr X
Mr X is a masked Danny Davis. This is
a truly terrible bout, controlled for the vast majority of it by Mr X holding a
headlock. At one point, you can actively hear the crowd groan when X cuts off
an attempted comeback and goes for another headlock. Garea gets the odd
comeback, but X will always cut it off almost straight away, often by hitting
Garea with a knee as he charges in. As a positive, Mr X does hit a nice
legdrop, but this is mostly boring nonsense. Garea eventually gets the win with
an O’Connor roll.
Lanny Poffo vs Psycho Capone
Really odd match. Capone looks like a
scrawny “Double J” era Jeff Jarrett and this is strangely uncooperative in
places. Poffo is mainly in control here, breaking an arm wringer with a big
boot that he nicely holds in Capone’s face. Poffo does some nice 80’s
high-flying hitting a flipping second rope senton and a moonsault. This should
be the end, but Capone awkwardly kicks out. There’s a bit of confusion, before
Poffo hit a slingshot senton to win. Basically a Poffo squash with Capone
getting up quickly after some moves. Very strange.
King Tonga vs Tiger Chung Lee
This is JIP with some nice bits, but
also some dull bits. Both work leg control sections that are pretty dull,
neither guy seems to want to do anything more than hold the opponents foot.
Better are the strikes from both men. Nice leaping enzuigiri from Tonga,
vicious kicks to the face from Chung Lee and both men laying into each other
aggressively. Tonga picks up the win with a big thrust kick.
The British Bulldogs vs The Hart
Foundation
Real prick tease of a match. This
barely goes five minutes and has a shitty ending, which is really annoying as
the match was shaping up to be really good. The familiarity the four men had
with each other means that there’s no holding back on some big shots. Bret hits
some lovely looking European uppercuts in the corner on Dynamite and commits to
missing a massive second rope elbow, and I’m getting pretty excited about this
match…then the Harts hit the Hart Attack mostly behind the refs back, he turns
around and disqualifies them. Just a baffling, bullshit end to a fun match.
Ted Arcidi vs Big John Studd
And of course this ended up being
twice the length. The amount of time they spend stalling, dithering about a
test of strength then working the test of strength is longer than the whole tag
match. At times, there’s not a single bit of motion on screen as they linger in
the same position working the test of strength. Eventually, they do a bit of
fighting, with Arcidi gassing himself out after a series of soft looking
forearms. He grinds down Studd with a series of running ax handles, the logic
of which I quite like, before Studd boots him outside, seemingly to let him
catch his breath. Studd keeps preventing Arcidi from getting in, before Arcidi
drags him out and they “brawl” to a double countout. Yep, not even a clean
finish on this stinker.
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