Dark Pegasus Video Review: Monday Night Raw (04.07.97)

by J.D. Dunn April 7, 1997 From Muncie, Ind. Your hosts are Vince McMahon, Jim Ross and The Honky Tonk Man. Owen Hart & The British Bulldog vs. The Godwinns (w/Guest Manager). Before the match, Owen publicly thanks Bret for reuniting the family and warns Shawn Michaels not to say a word against him. Bulldog, btw, has gone full heel after several months of teasing a face turn. Shawn Michaels appears in PIP and says he’ll take Owen’s threats under advisement, but he doesn’t respond well to authority. Owen and Bulldog control most of the way, making this more entertaining than the average Godwinn match. We take a break and come back to the Godwinns getting a false tag. The real tag follows, and the Godwinns clean house. The Legion of Doom gives another interview from backstage. Henry hits the Slop Drop on Bulldog, but Owen comes off the top on him and covers for the win at 7:10. Two interviews squeezed this match off to the side, so you can guess how much they cared. It wasn’t too bad, though. ** After the match, The LOD come down to get them some of the champs. The Godwinns try to slop Owen & Bulldog, but they accidentally slop the LOD. Big mistake. The LOD clean house on the Godwinns as we go to break. After a break, Owen & Bulldog find the accidental slopping so funny that they watch it again… and again. Steve Austin, who happened to be walking by, shouts some epithets at the tag champs. Steve Austin vs. Billy Gunn (w/The Honky Tonk Man). Gunn delivers a promo all the way down the ramp, but the only part the mic catches is “… and don’t you forget it!” What was it?!? That sounded important! Austin is unimpressed and destroys Billy early on. I could actually watch this all night because Billy is in super-seller mode. Austin is just slaughtering him too. Ross stops to hype the original Sunday Night Heat lineup (“Pacific Blue,” “Silk Stalkings” and “The Big Easy”). Meanwhile, Austin stomps a mudhole and flips Billy off. Referee Tim White pulls Austin off and admonishes him, so Austin says, “Okay. All right. I’m cool” and then flips White off behind his back. Billy misses a swing and gets the Stunner at 6:09. This was a fun squash. ** After the match, Honky tells Billy Gunn that he was always the first choice for the Honky Tonk Man’s protégé. The Jesse Jammes thing was just flapdoodle. He offers to remake Billy over in his image. Billy socks Honky in his jaw in response. For whatever reason, Billy would rethink his decision and become Rockabilly Gunn, a gimmick that Honky originally pitched for The Rock. Oddly, they cut out the entire Truth Commission segment that aired here. I don’t remember anything that would have warranted it being pulled other than the fact that it sucked. Shawn Michaels comes out to shoot on Bret. He admits that he and Bret hate each other. Shawn says Bret was *always* a bad guy, even when he was playing a good guy. He left the WWF and cozied up to WCW in 1996 in order to squeeze more money out of Vince. Shawn says Bret was waiting for him to fall flat on his face, but it didn’t happen. In fact, Shawn says, business picked up. He asks Vince to confirm, thus outing Vince as the boss. Not that it wasn’t common knowledge. Shawn claims Bret can’t separate himself from his character, and that’s why he’s so obsessive. Wow, isn’t that prophetic. Even more prophetic: Your obsession with me and the World Wrestling Federation Championship will ultimately be – and I want you to read my lips – it will ultimately be your destruction. Owen Hart and The British Bulldog come out to put a stop to all this, so Shawn bails and grabs a chair to fend them off. Nothing comes of it. The interview was another in a series of shoots that eventually divided the locker room. I should point out that this stuff is wildly entertaining, but it should never, EVER be brought back. As we saw in 1997, the backbiting and bickering was like a cancer on the Fed and, by the end of the year, it had to be cut out because the WWF was dying. Bret left, solving one problem, and Shawn suffered a serious injury, solving another. WCW wasn’t so lucky when Russo tried the same thing in 1999 and 2000. Of course, by the time Russo got there, WCW had the corporate equivalent of AIDS, diabetes, cholera and hemophilia anyway, so something was going to kill them eventually. The Headbangers vs. Barry Horowitz & Freddie Joe Floyd. The Headbangers play heels here. Barry actually seems to have some residual heat from his jobber run. Freddie Joy Floyd is former southern star Tracy Smothers. Horowitz plays face-in-peril but comes back with a jawbreaker. Floyd gets the hot tag and cleans house until Mosh catches him with a sideslam. The Headbangers hit the Stage Dive (powerbomb with a legdrop) at 4:13. Spirited little squash. *1/2 No-Holds-Barred Exhibition: Ken Shamrock vs. Vernon White. Vince hypes UFC. Boy would that come back to haunt him. They trade roundhouse kicks. The fans don’t really know what to make of this, but they don’t seem bored exactly. Shamrock takes him down, but White reverses on him. They wind up in the ropes where Shamrock takes a bit too long jawing with the ref, so White just kicks him right in the face. That pisses Sharmock off and he “snaps,” pummeling White’s face into hamburger for the submission at 2:00. The whole idea was to get over Shamrock as a guy who could snap and hurt someone at any moment. [N/R] Shamrock stops off to explain himself, but Vader interrupts. Vader (w/Paul Bearer) vs. Frank Stiletto. Vader wants to prove that he’s badder than Shamrock, so he cuffs Stiletto around. He German suplexes Stiletto and hits a Vaderbomb. He really wants to squash him, though, so he hits another. The powerbomb finishes at 2:17. 1/4* Gorilla Monsoon explains that Sycho Sid has no-showed, so he will replace him with Stone Cold Steve Austin. Austin interrupts and says he’s not there to save the show because he already wrestled. Austin suddenly has a change of heart and says he’ll wrestle tonight if he can replace Sid at the PPV against Bret Hart. Mankind gives a marvelously unhinged interview explaining his actions. He talks about his daughter and how he has to tell her that he can’t be there for her because he’s on the road 300 nights a year. Undertaker appears on the Titantron for a rebuttal, and I tune out. I have to rewind and learn what I already knew – yadda, yadda, yadda, rest in peace. Steve Austin vs. Mankind (w/Paul Bearer). Austin rushes the ring, and it’s on! The brawl goes around the ring until Austin hops in and tackles Mankind. We take a break and come back to Mankind snapping Austin’s throat on the top rope. Austin misses an elbow, so Mankind goes to the floor and pulls up the mat. Instead, they brawl up the ramp where Mankind goes for a piledriver on the steel. Austin shoves him off the ramp instead, though. Owen Hart and the British Bulldog come out as Austin begins to fire back. The LOD run down to chase the champs off. Vader comes out to attack Austin but inadvertently hits Mankind instead. That’s a DQ at 11:09. Mankind and Vader start brawling to a big pop, but Paul Bearer settles them down as we go off the air. This was a good brawl, but all of the run-ins took attention away from it. **3/4

The 411: Most of the show was boring, and it's no surprise that the ratings went in the tank. Shawn's shoot is the highlight, and it's particularly interesting now, but back then no one knew what in the hell he was talking about unless they were online or read the dirt sheets. What this show does do is set up a lot of threads that would turn around Raw's creative direction and make a huge star out of Steve Austin.

Final Score:  6.0   [ Average ]