It's
Summer-time! And the living is easy. Pity you
won't feel the same way after this
fucking show is done.
We are
LIVE from Phoenix, Arizona.... the only state
stupid enough to give Ultimate Warrior citizenship. So
there you go. Shattering the myth of "Parts Unknown" for
good. And rightfully so. I always wondered when I was a
kid why every strange monster in wrestling seemingly
lived in the same town. That's
right.
Onto
the show~!
Dudley
Boyz vs. (C) La Résistance: World Tag team
Titles.
Holy
shit, speaking of "parts unknown", The Dudleys have
apparently relocated to "New York City" by way of
Dudleyville. Can't say I blame them. Living in a town
only occupied by dozens of brothers and sisters has
got to be quite awkward financially around
Christmas time. And on a side note, God bless Bubba
for sticking with that same first name despite now
residing in fucking Hell's Kitchen. Ya, you'll last
pretty long there, Bubba. Why don't you just throw a
pillowcase on your head and drag a burning crucifix down
110th street while you're at
it?
There are only 7 matches
tonight, so they give everyone more time to work. La
Résistance's timing has picked up somewhat, but I guess
when Bubba all but threatens to fucking kill you at
house shows, that tends to tighten up your game. The
Dudley's end up hitting a 3D on Dupree, but Grenier
pulls the ref out before the count. This allows a
"camera man" to slide in and cork D-Von, allowing Dupree
to cover and La Rez to retain. After the match
the camera man is revealed as "Rob Conway"... only they
don't call him by a name yet, bar that "Damn
French sympathizer". Holy shit, his Mom must've really
hated him to give him a name like that! Oh, ya. Spike
Dudley runs in and gets his ass kicked too. But hey,
when you need back up, is whistling for a 150 pound dude
really the best recourse? That'd be like heading into a
gang fight, and calling in your paper boy to have your
back. Just saying.
Winners and STILL Champions du
monde: La Résistance. You know, I think this might be
the first time a camera man has ever stepped out of the
nexus of the universe and been acknowledged as actually
existing in the WWE. But hey, don't get your
hopes up there, bucko. Next time someone's getting
ran over, shot, stabbed or set on fire on WWE TV,
they'll be right back in their unknown plain of
existence, just standing there filming the whole
thing, doing nothing.
/5
-Coach
is backstage with the Dudleys. They put over La Rez and
their willingness to do whatever it takes to win. No
doubt. Clearly, this version of La Résistance is one
that gets results, unlike their 1940's counterparts. And
why not? If Patterson clung to their backs like a
spider monkey couldn't break their spirits, I doubt
the Germans would get the job
done either.
-Backstage, Christian confronts
Bischoff about being the Intercontinental champ and
STILL not being booked in a pay-per-view match
tonight. Bischoff blames Austin; saying Stone
Cold booked Eric's match with Shane tonight in
lieu of a Title match. Wait. I thought Austin was
supposed to be the BABYFACE here? What did we ever
do to deserve THAT?
Undertaker vs.
A-Train w/ Sable
Hey,
remind me to never take NYC's famous
A-Train if they in fact in any way resemble WWE's
version. And if they do, my god, they might want to
think about maybe shaving that subway, because
I guarantee you you'll probably add another 50
miles per hour to its top speed. It's just Science.
You can't fight it.
Anyway, A-Train will be assuming the role of
Kamala/Giant Gonzalez/Kama here; that being a big
useless load who bounces Taker around for about ten
minutes then teeters over, never to be heard from
again. Undertaker sells the ribs and the referee
actually gets bumped TWICE. Yes TWICE. IN THIS
MATCH. Holy shit, I've heard of jumping the shark, but
this is not only jumping it, but pulling it out of
the ocean, and putting the boots to it until it dies.
Anyway, while the ref is out, Train gets the Derailer,
but Taker kicks out. Train then tries to use a chair on
Undertaker, but he just kicks it back in Albert's face.
Taker then attempts a tombstone, but when
Train floats out and
over, Taker transitions that into a
choke slam and gets the pin. And now that this
business is done, Sable can hopefully take Albert
to the dude who does her Brazilians. The trick will be
evenly spreading the wax on that 36" inch piece of
Bristol board.
After the match, Sable breaks up Taker's attempt
of a last ride on A-Train, then tries to seduce the
Deadman; but he has nothing of it, and instead of
umm, "burying a stiff" in her so to speak, he
grabs a hold of her throat. But then, all of a
sudden, Steph's music hits and BY GOD it's a
FESTIVUS MIRACLE, because she's all healed
up from her "internal injuries" as
she runs in to take Sable down. Ya, those
"internal injuries" just come and go ALL THE TIME.
I ruptured my kidneys yesterday, popped some Advil's and
WAS GOOD TO GO. It's as simple as
that. Anyway, Steph and Sable go Huge Tit for Tat
and the two roll around for a bit while Jerry
Lawler no doubt masturbates under his desk.
(probably the real reason the WWE tables are fully
enclosed now).
Winner: The Undertaker, who
celebrates with Stephanie. Ha. Apparently, her
hatred for the woman sleeping with Daddy supersedes any
sort of long term resentment for a dude who
once kidnapped her, strapped her to a crucifix err,
I mean SYMBOL, and tried to marry her in a dark Satanic
ceremony. BYGONES ARE BYGONES! What a
touching message of forgiveness and redemption this
is! Across the land, stalkers and their terrified
victims are likely joining hands in friendship,
toasting their mutual hate for various family
members significant others. We've seen something special
here tonight. Clearly.
/5
-Coach
interviews some random dudes at ringside. YOUR WWE PPV
DOLLARS AT WORK, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN.
Extra Matches? Who needs those? Jesus, WWE is like
that Taxi driver who purposely takes a bunch of fucking
side streets to bilk you, rather than just taking you
straight home.
Shane McMahon vs. Eric
Bischoff: NO DQ, Falls Count
Anywhere.
Ah,
yes, the battle of the pudgy former WCW owners. Eric is
of course wearing his maternity pajamas here, so
you know he means business. Of all the
slightly overweight martial artists out there, he's
clearly my favorite. In fact, I often picture him
having a pre-match warm up with nunchucks made
entirely out of link sausages.
Anyway, the animosity in this
whole umm, rivalry, stems from the fact that just last
week on RAW, Eric apparently entered the McMahon home
and VIOLATED Linda. Man. I can only imagine how
much money it'd cost to have the Linda McMahon robot
thoroughly cleaned after an event like that. Not to
mention how many circuits were likely
damaged. Maintenance like that can't be too
cheap.
With
that said, the shit is on, and I mean that almost
literally. Shane takes it to Bischoff, almost entirely
shattering the mythos of Karate once and for all. All we
need now is for someone to just grab and kill
Jean-Claude Van Damme in mid slow motion
wheel-kick and the circle will indeed be complete.
Anyway, when Bischoff looks just about done, JONATHAN
COACHMAN runs in and turns on Shane! OH MY GOD. It's
like Hulk Hogan in 1996 all over again! If you
discount the fact that was incredibly significant, made
money, and people actually fucking cared about it.
Other than that though, it's clearly identical. This by
gawd CHICANERY of course brings out Stone Cold who
whips Coach's ass. But he can't touch Bischoff without
provocation, so Shane pushes Bischoff into
Austin so he can take him out with a stunner.
I wonder if this happens with his girlfriends in real
life? You know, he has a buddy come over when he's
arguing with his old lady, who
then purposely shoves the woman into
him , so he can LEGALLY take her out?
THIS SHIT HAS TO BE APPLICABLE IN REAL LIFE, DAMN
IT.
Oh ya,
after the stunner, Shane decides he isn't going to pin
Eric in the ring, and instead drags him outside, and
smashes him through the announce table with a big elbow,
and pins him on the floor for the
win.
Winner: Shane McMahon, who gets
revenge for Mom's alleged rape by NEARLY KILLING
HIMSELF. Hey, to me, that's like insisting on
leaping from the roof of your house onto a would be
attacker, as opposed to just shooting the fucker as they
come through front door. But hey, whatever floats
your boat, Shane.
/5
-
Backstage, Flair is with fellow Evolution
member Randy Orton, and reminds him who
is supposed to go over in tonight's Elimination Chamber.
Hey, speaking of "Evolution", am I the only one who
wants to see HBK form his own group called "Creation"?
Then the two can feud extensively, until former wrestler
The Missing Link is finally found to conclusively end
their rivalry! It'll be AWESOME, and not at all lame and
stupid. I'm telling you.
(C)
Eddie Guerrero vs. Tajiri vs. Rhyno vs. Chris Benoit
: Fatal Four-way for the U.S.
Title.
You
know, I think I hate this U.S. Title belt. It's damn
ugly. Normally, you get a magic whip and a fucking
Invisible plane when you wear something that
looks like this, don't you? Eddie must be feeling
gypped.
As for
the match, well, there's four dudes here, so I guess
that at least means we won't have to suffer through one
guy pretending to be out-cold on the floor for ten
minutes after one fucking move. It's funny how as soon
as you add one extra guy to a match, their BLOWS BECOME
LETHAL.
With
that said, this was a very good match. Very fast paced,
with all four men getting in their spots
flawlessly.The end comes when first Eddie blocked a gore
by Rhyno with the U.S. Title; Benoit then hits a diving
headbutt onto Rhyno while Tajiri was tied to the
tree of woe; but Tajiri escaped and broke the
cover up. From there, Tajiri and
Benoit went over the top simultaneously, allowing
Eddie to hit a frog splash to the back of a
prone Rhyno to retain.
Winner
and STILL Champion: Eddie Guerrero! He Lies. He Cheats!
He Steals! Steals? Huh. Maybe he should
"steal" some Clearasil sometime. That shit on his back
is getting nasty. Still though, great match. And
you can't go wrong with any of these guys. They're all
awesome.
/5
-Video
package for Lesnar/Angle. Included within is Lesnar
destroying Zach Gowen, and breaking his umm,
"leg", in essence crippling him. Heh. Turns out
people actually frown on you abusing crippled
people. I wish I knew this before. Could have saved
me A LOT of grief with those Make a Wish Foundation
people. Live and learn, I guess.
(C)Kurt Angle vs.
Brock Lesnar; WWE Title.
Michael Cole announces that tonight
we'll be seeing THE REAL Brock Lesnar. Apparently the
one we've been seeing is a ROBOT CLONE. Turns out WWE
has been doing this for a while. In
fact, WWE allegedly has a facility
where they churn out completely identical robotic clones
on a monthly basis. I believe they call it "OVW".
We should be seeing some of these prototypes soon. But
be CAREFUL. I've heard they have a tendency to
SPINEBUSTER AND DROPKICK at random. They should
have the bugs worked out soon,
hopefully.
Anyway, I was surprised that they
put this one on this early. However, I can't say enough
good things about this match. Both men worked their
asses off, and for my money (which is clearly
worthless since I'm Canadian) this one
actually surpassed their Wrestlemania effort. Wait.
That explains why we haven't been seeing "the real Brock
Lesnar" until tonight! Clearly, he was killed at
Wrestlemania after that botched SSP. IT ALL MAKES SENSE
NOW. Good thing they reanimated Brock in time for
tonight's show! But I've seen enough movies to know
that's not always a good thing. They'll know it's a
mistake if Brock adds biting through skulls to his
already stacked repertoire.
Pretty
even match for the most part, but the tide turns when
the Ref gets bumped. Angle then gets the Anklelock,
and Brock taps, but there is no referee to see it.
Vince ('cause let's face it, we haven't seen enough
McMahon's tonight!) then saunters in and nails Kurt
in the back with a chair. Lesnar follows that assist up
by hitting an amazing F-5 on one leg (DO THE
TRIBUTES TO ZACH GOWEN TRULY NEVER END!) but Kurt gets
out at two... because, as his comeback from a broken
neck in TWO FUCKING MONTHS proved, clearly he's the
fasted healer alive. And if we ever see a dude
in a kilt with a broadsword attack him, followed up
by a nonsensical indoor thunderstorm a few minutes
later, I think we'll know why. THERE CAN BE ONLY
ONE~!
Anyway, McMahon tells Brock to
hit another F-5, but Angle counters into the
anklelock out of it, and after nearly a minute in
the hold, Brock taps out for the clean Angle
win!
After
the match, Angle attacks Vince, and gives him an
Angle-slam, Or "Slam" as it's known in the Angle
household, on a CHAIR that was set upright in the ring!
Awesome. If only we could all attempt to murder our
bosses. I know I would. But unfortunately, I work
for myself and it doesn't exactly work out as
well. But man do I have it coming. One of these
days, I'll teach me for not giving myself a raise
when clearly I deserved it. You'll
see.
Winner
and STILL WWE Champion: Kurt Angle; a man, who in
certain light resembles a six foot penis. I blame this
on the fact that his head and neck seem to
have no differential in size. And with that said, I
believe this to be the REAL catalyst for the
Lesnar/Angle rivalry. You see, ever since I saw
that photo of Brock and Kurt making out with
each other, I have suspected that the two were possibly
gay... you know, despite that being the exact
definition of homosexuality. These emotions then
confused both men; and rather than embrace their love
for one another, and the various go-behinds and tight
waists they could be exchanging in a
secret mountain retreat somewhere, they instead
opted to suppress these feelings and tried to destroy
each other. But we know the truth. You're not fooling
anyone. How tragic.
[Sean's note from 2007: Kurt & Brock
hiding a secret gay relationship, and desperately
wanting to hold each other in the MOUNTAINS? Where have
we heard THAT before? What am I, a Genius? A
Wizard?]
/5
-Goldberg is seen preparing
backstage with phantom kicks and punches. Man, those
invisible people are taking a real BEATING! Have
some mercy, Bill!
Kane vs. RVD: NO HOLDS
BARRED... minus the all important Tiny Lister
jr. seeking
his revenge months after the filming wrapped
up.
The
story of this match is the fact that Kane and Rob were
once the bestest of friends, but Kane turned on him
because, umm, actually, I have no idea why he turned on
him. Maybe it's because Rob didn't want to grow a
bowl-cut to be "Moe" to
Kane's "Larry", after Kane unmasked
revealing that exact
haircut? I don't know. All I do know
is I'm surprised WWE didn't write some completely
ridiculous retcon to explain this feud; like Rob almost
accidentally set the house on fire when he left his bong
lit, and this brought back a flood of emotions for the
Big Red Machine. Not that it wouldn't serve Kane right.
For a dude traumatized by open flames, he's sure hung
with enough potheads in this
company...
Anyway, this match is of course "no
holds barred", with even fewer used. Very
sloppy match here. At one point, Kane tries to go up to
the top for something ,then slips and violently
tumbles out, getting his head caught in the ropes, and
almost hanging himself. Got to laugh at the irony
of "fire" not killing this dude, but a random
clumsy tumble off the top rope getting the job
done. And most ironic of all is he apparently had
better balance while having his vision obstructed in a
fucking mask for 6 years!
RVD
comes back soon after, taking JR's advice to "destroy
Kane's verticality". Wait, Is Verticality even a
real fucking word? Holy shit! It is! Damn. I was hoping
I could add further advice of Rob needing to
grab some weaponality and try to knock Kane
into unconsciousality, and get him into a state of
horizontality where he could get the pin. *The following
was brought to you by the precedent of fake words ending
in "ality" as seen in the Mortal Kombat
games.
Rob
then hits some stiff kicks, and uses my earlier
advice, bar the fake English, using a slew
of chair-assisted offense on Kane, including a
rolling thunder and skateboard. RVD
then dusts off the old Van Terminator, but Kane
avoids the contact by moving clear. Kane
then drags RVD to the floor where he proceeds to
tombstone him on the ring steps, before rolling him
back in for the anticlimactic pin.
Winner: Kane. Poor Rob. It looks
like he'll have to go out and buy a Zippo to light
his joints from now on. Kane's days of lighting four of
them at once by just raising his arms are sadly
over.
/5
Bischoff is shown backstage being
treated for cuts when Linda comes in. And she's not
even wearing her neck collar anymore, after, you know,
having it BROKE AFTER BEING TOMBSTONED ON THE
RAW STAGE. Man, if only Edge was a McMahon! He'd
have been back before Wrestlemania! Anyway, Linda
looks on, angry with Eric, as rape will usually do, and
SLAPS Bischoff for umm, putting himself,
umm, inside her? Dear God. Only in
wrestling could raping someone only merit you a light
slap on the face, and ZERO jail time. Clearly, Mike
Tyson missed the boat by not signing a full time
contract with WWF in 1998 when he had the
chance....
-Ric
Flair gets Triple H mentally prepared for his title
match. A simple "you're fucking the boss's daughter,
you'll go over" might have been a little more realistic.
Ah, I kid. KAYFABE 4 life, baby.
(C) HHH vs. Goldberg vs. Y2J vs.
Kevin Nash vs. Randy Orton vs. HBK:
Elimination Chamber, World Heavyweight
Title;
Having
Nash, Y2J, HBK & Orton in here is the equivalent of
having a bikini contest with four obese women,
and Pamela Anderson and Yasmeen Bleeth. We all
KNOW who it's coming down to here. But apparently, the
reasoning for the chamber is because both HHH and
Goldberg are injured and can't realistically carry a
match.
With
that said, Triple H is wearing elongated versions of his
tights, because of a groin pull (I used to pull my groin
all the time, but my Mom told me I'd get hair on my
palms so I stopped). I'd be lying if I said they
weren't completely fucking comical. In fact,
with the iron cross and all, he kind of looks
like a Nazi bike courier. And speaking of Nazi's,
Goldberg just might be the only Jew alive, not only
willing, but happy to enter something called an
"Elimination Chamber". Good grief,
man.
HBK & Y2J start things off with some
fantastic exchanges. I could watch these two wrestle
forever. Next out of the gate is Randy Orton, who is
also surprisingly "on" given his relative
big-match inexperience. Nash comes in next and goes
to work...and by "work", I mean the same literal
definition of someone on Welfare. He does as little as
possible to earn an undeserved check. However, just
as fast as he and his seemingly radioactive blond beacon
of a head enter (I think this new hairdo
could land planes and guide fucking ships safely into
harbor), he's eliminated after HBK hits him
with a superkick, and Jericho jackknife (SWEET IRONY)
bridges him for the elimination. Nash, then
furiously gets up and jack knife's Jericho,
Michaels and Orton, then calls it a WWE career so
he can put over The Punisher. Well, that was clearly
worth the money. I think Nash may have worked like
maybe 4 PPVs since resigning with the company in
2002, and 3 of those pay-per-views were fucking
World Title matches! I think Big Kev just might be
the bizarro world version of Milton from Office Space.
He doesn't do ANY fucking work, and still gets paid for
doing NOTHING. Sweet deal. God speed, Big
Sexy.
Next
up is HHH, and his orthopedic clam diggers, but HBK
superkicks him back into his pod so he can buy some
time. Goldberg finally makes his way in soon
after, and destroys every one. Orton gets speared
and pinned first negating the whole "protect Trips"
storyline. Silly, Orton. Goldberg's people invented
Creationism. Take this Evolution business
elsewhere, mister. From there, Jericho also gets
speared, but through one of the Plexiglas
chambers. Ouch. HBK & Goldberg
then exchange some offense before Goldberg spears
and jack-hammers him. Y2J suffers much the same fate
immediately after, and this leaves only H's and
Goldberg remaining. HHH won't leave his pod, so Goldberg
breaks it, slicing his leg in the process (Glass- 2
Goldberg- 0!). From there, Goldberg who is WAY over
tonight, finally gets his hands on Trip's and manhandles
him. It looks like Goldberg is about to finish H's with
a spear when Trips pulls out a sledgehammer fed to him
by Flair through the cage and nails him in mid
charge, collecting the easy pin. Well, Trips really
clocked in a barnburner here. Good thing the
motherfucker's not getting paid by the hour. Steph'd go
hungry. Wait. Maybe that's not that bad of a thing after
all....
Winner
and STILL World Champion: HHH. Loser: The IWC, clearly.
Even a bandaged cock and the complete lack of
mobility won't make this douche bag do a
job.
/5
After the match, Evolution hand-cuffed Goldberg
to the chamber and bloodied him to close the show.
A BLOND GUY WITH AN IRON CROSS ON HIS OUTFIT IS
DESTROYING A JEW INSIDE A CHAMBER. What could possibly
be misconstrued as offensive about this.
MOST.DEPRESSING.PPV.FINISH. EVER. [/Comic Book
guy].
FINAL
THOUGHTS: Well, outside of the Brock/Angle match
which was AWESOME, and a decent four-way U.S. Title
match, this PPV was about memorable as a night of
passion with an ugly woman. Something that you
aesthetically enjoyed at times, but at the end were
sickened and wanted to forget completely. The Main Event
was plugging along great, but then it ended in a whimper
with some of the silliest booking ever. I guess we'll
have to wait until Unforgiven to see Trips, who by that
time will be encased in a giant black diaper, put
Goldberg over. To be honest, I kind of wished
they had thought outside the box and put Jericho or
Michaels over, seeing how Trips and Goldberg seem to go
down easier lately than a Hemophiliac playing Dodgeball.
Oh well.
Still,
two match rule permitting, I'll give it a thumbs up. But
that thumb, well, he's going up under
duress.
I'm
Sean.
Send Feedback to Sean
Carless
Sean Carless is a man of many
hats. And he wears those hats to cover an
ever-increasing bald spot. Sean's various scribblings
have been read at Live Audio Wrestling, 411 Mania, Honky
Tonk Man.com, The Toronto Star.com, and Lethal
Wrestling. He has also cured AIDS.
