Dark Pegasus Video Review: Survivor Series ’89

Survivor Series 1989 by J.D. Dunn November 23, 1989 Live from Chicago, Ill. Your hosts are Gorilla Monsoon and Jesse Ventura. Opening Match: Dusty Rhodes, The Red Rooster, Tito Santana & Brutus Beefcake vs. Big Bossman, Bad News Brown, Rick Martel & Honky Tonk Man (w/Slick & Jimmy Hart) Tito kicks Honky’s ass like he ain’t nothin’ but a hound dog, all the while jawing with Martel. Martel waits for Tito to get knocked down and then tags in for his offense. Tito blocks an atomic drop and reverses to his own. Everyone nearly comes to blows before cooler heads prevail. Bossman and Dream trade punches, in a revisitation of their NWA days. Brutus gets caught in the wrong corner for a while. Rooster tags in and suffers the same fate. Tito and Martel finally get hot tags. Tito dominates and goes for the figure-four, but Martel tosses him aside. Martel reverses an O’Connor roll with a handful of tights to eliminate Tito at 9:16. We get a brief shot of an unnamed Sapphire in the crowd. Interestingly enough, Dusty revealed in his shoot that he wanted a prostitute as a sidekick. Thank God good sense prevailed. Rooster gets caught in a bearhug but bites (pecks?) his way out of it. Bad News gets tagged but doesn’t particularly want to get in yet. Rooster yanks him in and pays for it. Bad News destroys Rooster for a while, but a heel doubleteam backfires (just as it did last year). Bad News and Bossman get in an argument, leading to Bad News walking out at 15:30. Amazing how the same thing can happen to the same guy two years in a row. But then, the same stuff happened to John McLane two years in a row, and I can’t complain about how that turned out. Brutus fires away on Bossman but runs right into an overhand right. Honky tags in but runs right into a high knee from Brutus at 17:23. Martel kills time with a chinlock on Brutus. Burtus sunset flips him, but Martel grabs the ropes and squats down. The ref catches him, though, so Brutus is able to complete the move for the pin at 20:13. That leaves Bossman alone in a three-on-one. Rooster hits the Fivearm, but Bossman recovers and hits the Bossman Slam at 20:58. Dream comes in and hits a flying crossbody that squashes the Bossman at 21:59. Bossman cuffs Dream and beats him with a nightstick. Brutus makes the save with the clippers, though. **1/2 In the back, Bossman calls Dream his prisoner and says he now has no rights as a human being. Who knew Bossman was running Gitmo? Jim Duggan, Ronnie Garvin, Hercules & Bret Hart vs. Randy Savage, Dino Bravo, the Canadian Earthquake & Greg Valentine (w/Sherri & Jimmy Hart). The faces clear the ring and do a 2×4 routine. Fuck yeah! Stomp da yard, bitches! Hercules overpowers Savage and Valentine. Valentine plays heel-in-peril. Garvin comes in with some SICK chops to the chest. This was just after Valentine had pushed to get Ronnie reinstated because Garvin was an even bigger thorn in his side when he was inactive. Bravo gets the advantage on Herc and lets Quake squash him at 3:58. Duggan can’t knock Quake down, so Bret gives an assist. Garvin tags in and fires away, but Quake shrugs him off. Valentine tries a figure-four but gets sent into the buckle. Ronnie and Valentine trade STIFF chops until Duggan gets the blind tag. Valentine runs right into Duggan’s clothesline at 7:33. Quake slams Duggan but misses an elbow. Garvin tags in and stomps Bravo. He sets up for the Hammer Jammer (Sharpshooter), but Bravo rakes the eyes. Or was the “hammer jammer” his leg brace? Bret and Savage come in for a brief sequence. Why on earth did these guys never do more together?! Garvin and Bravo tag in, and Bravo finishes Ronnie’s night with the sideslam at 11:19. Bret and Savage go at it again. Bret delivers a backbreaker and gets his boot up on a charge. Bravo puts Bret in a bearhug for a while and then Earthquake chokes him out. Bret gets out of trouble and tags Duggan, but Duggan, master tactician that he is, tags right back out. Bret gets tossed into the post by Bravo, and Savage finishes with the Flying Elbowdrop at 19:09. Duggan comes in and clears everyone out of the ring. He clotheslines Savage and Bravo, but Earthquake jumps him from behind. None of the heels can put him away, so Sherri finally trips him up, and Duggan gets counted out at 23:27. Too long for what they were offering. More Macho and more Bret would have helped. *3/4 Genius graces us with a Thanksgiving poem. Hulk Hogan, Jake Roberts & Demolition vs. Ted Dibiase, Zeus & The Powers of Pain (w/Mr. Fuji & Virgil). See, Zeus and Hogan met on the set of No Holds Barred, and Zeus followed him to the WWF because he’s psycho and all. Hulk thought he had disposed of him after Summerslam ’89, but Dibiase started things up with Hogan again and brought in Zeus as some hired muscle. Zeus and Hogan start, and Zeus no-sells everything. I think they wasted a big blowoff with Zeus and Hogan by not doing it at a real PPV. Zeus chokes Hogan out and tosses the referee for the DQ at 3:23. Dibiase takes the shitkicking of a lifetime the babyfaces. Wow, the crowd is almost sympathetic for him. Almost. It finally settles down to the Demos and the Powers of Pain going at it. I’m not sure why the WWE didn’t just give the Powers a run in early 1990, but instead we go Haku and Andre the Giant. Btw, Demolition had just won the titles back from the Brainbusters who were on their way back to the NWA. More on that later in the review. Fuji trips up Ax, who gets pinned after an elbowdrop at 9:54. Smash takes a long beating and gets clotheslined by the Barbarian at 13:45. Barbarian counters Jake’s DDT, and Jake plays face-in-peril. This goes on for a loooooong time. Dibiase gets two off a piledriver. At this point, Jake and Dibiase were feuding over the unsanctioned Million Dollar Title. Barbarian misses a diving headbutt, and Jake tags to Hogan. Hogan cleans house on Barbarian, but the Powers recover and hits Hogan with a spiked piledriver. The ref decides that’s too much double-teaming and disqualifies both of them at 19:50. Jesse rightly points out that none of the heels have been beaten. They’ve all been eliminated by the referee! Dibiase locks in the Million Dollar Dream, but Hogan hulks up and rams him into the buckle. Jake gets the hot tag and drives his knee into the back of Dibiase’s head. Virgil hops up on the apron and takes one for the team as Jake goes after him instead of Dibiase. He hits the DDT, but Dibiase immediately drops a fist between his eyes at 22:54. Hogan is still groggy, so Dibiase slaps on a chinlock. Hogan fights out and they clothesline one another. Dibiase hits a backdrop but stops to gloat, allowing Hogan to hulk up and hit the legdrop at 26:33. Not sure why Hogan went over here when they could have put the heels over in anticipation of the No Holds Barred PPV. Jesse is disgusted. ** Savage puts over the Summerslam rematch at the No Holds Barred PPV. Hogan and Brutus do likewise. Sherri interrupts and tosses powder in their eyes so Savage and Zeus can attack. How subtle. Roddy Piper, Jimmy Snuka & The Bushwhackers vs. Rick Rude, Mr. Perfect & The Rougeau Bros. (w/Jimmy Hart & the Genius). Total comedy match from the get-go. Bobby Heenan is noticeably absent, and there’s been an ongoing storyline all night that he is dealing with “dissension in the Heenan Family.” That dissension would be the Brainbusters splitting up (in storyline terms). Perfect tries to wrestle early, but it bites him – or rather, the babyfaces bite him. Jacques tags in and displays his usual great athleticism. Superfly knocks him out with the Superfly Splash at 4:01, though. The heels nearly get into it as Rude is trying to pull himself up, and Perfect spills over the top rope as a result. Perfect plays heel-in-peril. Lot of that on this show. Raymond slugs it out with Piper but takes a piledriver at 7:39. Piper and Perfects slug it out this time, and Piper catapults Perfect into the buckle. Piper mocks Rude’s pose and knocks Perfect for a 360. Butch tags in, though, and gets rolled up by Perfect at 10:46. Rude sends Luke packing via Rude Awakening at 12:15. Snuka gets caught in the wrong corner, and that goes on for much longer than it probably should. Piper gets the hot tag and drags Rude to the floor for a brawl. That leads to a double countout at 18:39. That leaves Perfect and Snuka. Perfect gets a very close count off an O’Connor roll, but Snuka slips out and gets two of his own. Snuka hits a big chop and the crossbody, but Perfect rolls through with a handful of tights for two. Snuka goes for a backdrop but lowers his head, and Perfect is able to finish with the Perfectplex at 21:27. Long, boring match that nearly redeemed itself at the end with the segment between Snuka and Perfect. *3/4 Andre the Giant, Haku, Arn Anderson & Bobby Heenan vs. The Ultimate Warrior, Jim Neidhart & The Rockers. Weird how they split up the Harts here. Bobby is subbing for Tully Blanchard who was fired for failing a drug test (she don’t lie, she don’t lie, she don’t lie…). Neidhart and the Rockers pick a fight early. CONSTRUCTICONS! MERGE FOR THE KILL! Andre tears through the faces until the Ultimate Warrior finally comes down and clotheslines him to the floor. Andre gets counted out at 0:30. Things settle down with Anvil getting caught in the heel corner. He nails Anderson but gets caught with Haku’s thrust kick at 3:32. Shawn and Haku do a decent little sequence, and the Rockers work over Haku’s arm. Warrior seems legitimately pissed because they’re tagging each other and not him, and he actually shoves Michaels off the top rope. Haku catches Janetty, but Shawn adds a dropkick to knock them over. Arn tags in and drops the hammer on Marty. Shawn saves Marty from a double suplex, and the Rockers hit double thrust kicks. You gotta give credit to Arn because he brought his A-game even though it’s his last night, and it’s not like they’re going to let him go out on top or anything. Heenan tags in, takes one shot from Marty, and tags right back out. Even Jesse is cracking up at that one. Arn nails Janetty from behind, and Brain gets the pin at 8:52. Warrior goes ballistic on Haku and Arn. Shawn gets knocked to the floor, and Warrior roughly tosses him back in. I think I’d rather have Bad News Brown as a partner. Arn gets pinballed back and forth. Warrior and Shawn team up for the Rocket Launcher on Arn for two. Haku tags in but misses a crossbody. Shawn goes up and hits one to eliminate him at 12:53. Shawn gets knocked to the floor by Arn, and Heenan teases a Cactus Elbow. Arn reaches out for a tag, but Heenan gets the short arms and justifies it by saying Arn wasn’t close enough. Arn and Shawn collide for a double KO spot. They go through a few more moves before Arn hits the spinebuster at 15:40. Arn desperately tosses Warrior to the floor, and Heenan again teases coming off the top before the refs bringing him down. Hey, there’s Shane McMahon playing the part of outside official. Back in, Warrior sends Arn into Heenan and finishes him with the big splash at 18:20. And that would be the last we’d see of Arn in the WWF until 2001. Heenan, who was knocked off the apron, doesn’t know Arn has been eliminated and thinks he’s walking out on him. Warrior sneaks up behind him and DESTROYS him in retaliation for months of torment. If I haven’t mentioned it before, Heenan was an AWESOME bumper. The flying tackle and splash finish at 20:30. He even adds one more clothesline on the way out. This match was booked much smarter than the others. With a barely mobile Andre getting eliminated early and Warrior standing on the apron throughout, that left all the actual talent to carry the match. Fun match. **1/2

The 411: Hogan does the usual. Warrior does the usual. You've seen it all a hundred times before. There are a few decent matches but nothing I can really recommend paying for. There's not even anything really notable about the card other than it being Arn's last match in the WWF before going home. Thumbs down.
Final Score:  5.0   [ Not So Good ]