411’s Mr. McMahon Episode Three Report: ‘Screwjob’

-We left off with Hulk Hogan being pegged by The Government as their star witness against Vince McMahon. My recap of Episode 1 is here and Episode 2 can be found here. Let’s get to it!

Run Time: 53:15

-With a title like ‘Screwjob’ you may think this is only about Bret Hart, but we start with Wendi Richter as WWF Lady’s Champion in 1985. Vince said Wendi was Champion and everything was fine for some time, but then she became a problem. He accuses Wendi of not wanting to do business and pass the Title on to the next person. He says he is a script writer and the Championship is his and not hers. She tells him she won’t give it up. “I’m going to make you give it up then.”

-We get to a show at Madison Square Garden where Wendi is defending the Title against the masked, Spider (Moolah). Vince notes you don’t fire someone when the crowd is expecting a match because you screw the crowd. Vince is always thinking of us fans! His dad told him to give the fans the match in the ring and then figure it out. Vince says it was really easy as he told the ref to count three no matter what.

-Wendi notes she lifted her shoulder at one, but the ref counted anyway. She says it was a painful night and she lost her dream. Vince’s answer to it not being a fair count, “I don’t fight fair. Life’s not fair.” Vince said it was just business and nothing personal. Wendi bowed to him after the match and he never saw her again. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for the business.”

-Opening Title Screen!

-Back to court as Vince is sporting a neck brace as Hulk Hogan is brought in to testify. Hogan notes he and Vince were at each other’s throats at the time, so The Feds thought Hogan was the perfect witness. Hogan testified that Vince never told him to take steroids and it was his choice. Hogan says he told Vince before he left that they came up together and they would go down together. Dave Meltzer says it caught the prosecutors off guard as that wasn’t what they were expecting Hogan to say. Hogan notes he told them what they wanted to hear before court, but knew what he was going to say. He was going to tell the truth and the truth was Vince never sold steroids or pushed for wrestlers to take them. Vince says Hogan was crafty as Hogan gave the government a little of what they wanted, but not exactly what they wanted. Tony Atlas says the Feds called him, but he told them he was taking steroids long before Vince. He notes Vince was okay with them doing steroids, but he didn’t tell them to take them. Bret notes all the guys on Roids were the Main Event guys, but he never saw Vince tell anyone to take them. Dave says Vince would just tell guys they needed to go work out.

-Vince knew his life was going to change when the verdict came down. NOT GUILTY! Shane McMahon says it was relief and Dave notes the case never should have gone to trial as they didn’t have evidence. They needed more than Vince just being a bad guy. Linda said the case proved they didn’t have a steroid problem, but Dave says it proved all their main guys were on steroids. Vince says some people in the Federal Government suck! 



-The trial affected business in a big way as some executives started fleeing. Business was way down and Dave notes they were in big financial trouble. Bret: “Business wasn’t as good as when Hulk Hogan was on top.” They were looking for someone to replace Hulk Hogan as the face of WWE. Enter Lex Luger, and Vince says they put the machine behind Lex. “Lex was okay, but nowhere near Hulk Hogan.” No kidding! Prichard says Lex was another in a long train of guys that was trying to fill the shoes of Hulk Hogan.

-Bret says that guy that pulled the sword out of the stone was Bret Hart. Oh man, I am sure people will have be decisive and have fun with that remark. Bret helps usher in The New Generation with guys like Razor Ramon, Diesel, and Shawn Michaels at the top of the card. Shawn Michaels says once you knew it was no longer The Hogan Era, it put a question on everything as it was all up for grabs. Undertaker: “Hulk is gone, so who is going to step up?” Bret says that guys like him and The Undertaker were some of the best wrestlers ever. He was proud to carry the torch for The New Generation and he was the safest guy. He wouldn’t get busted at a hotel with an underage girl or found with a bag of cocaine. Bret says Vince told him he would be Champion for a long time and hold the fort down while they dealt with all the issues. Vince notes The Hart Family was very interesting. He says Bret didn’t have a lot of charisma, but had enough and it was touch and go at first. Some compliment there!

-Over to WCW as Ted Turner is throwing out massive amounts of money to get whatever stars he could. Hogan made the move and Randy Savage followed a few months later. Eric says those two jumping on board made people look at WCW differently. Eric gives his famous story of telling Ted he needed two hours on Monday Night and Ted gave the green light (it was only an hour the first 6-8 months or so, but it’s Eric’s story). Vince felt they were in trouble when Nitro was announced and was worried it would put them out of business.

-WCW Monday Nitro debuts in Sept 1995 and Eric needs a surprise. Lex Luger shows up one night after working a WWF Live Show. That was the first shot in the Monday Night War. Eric says Lex was tired of WWF, so he gave him a deal and told him not to let anyone know. Eric: “It was a beautiful deal.” Vince says all he had with guys was a handshake agreement and that always worked. Now the big, bad Turner organization was throwing money at everyone. We all know the irony involved as what Ted was doing was the same thing Vince was doing to the territories back in the 80s. Smart business and they need to compete when Vince does it, but evil empire and backstabbers when it goes the other way.

-Prichard says WCW one upped them and they looked like the cool show. He says Eric was ruthless. Eric wanted to be different from WWF, so he went live every week while RAW was on a taping cycle. He wanted his stories to be more reality based and have more adult characters. He wanted Nitro to be the show where fans never knew what would happen. Hogan knew it would get dirty because Vince wants to destroy his competition and eat it.

-We get to Eric giving away the results of taped episodes of RAW at the star of Nitro. “Shawn Michaels beat the big guy with a super kick.” Vince since it hurt them for some time and annoyed him. When Vince is angered he is going to focus all the more. Eric says that Hogan and Randy told him that no matter what he did, Vince would never sell the affect. HHH, Taker, Heyman all note that Vince never sold. “Don’t sell it. Never acknowledge the competition.”

-Eric kept pushing it and had Madusa show up on Nitro and dump the WWF Woman’s Title in the garbage. Vince finally reacted with the stupid Billionaire Ted skits. Eric says he showed them to Ted Turner and he laughed his ass off. We see Ted watching and sure enough, he is dying seeing The Huckster. Vince says it was all in fun, but Kay Koplovitz (Founder USA Network) shut them down. Kay says it was distasteful, and she didn’t like it even if they were competitors with Turner. Vince says Kay and Ted were friends. Prichard says USA Network was receiving heat from their friends in Turner. He also says they should have been above taking those shots, but those skits were how he pieced together that Razor and Diesel were leaving. He asked them to get involved in the skits and they said no. That seems weird as I don’t recall any of the actual in ring talent being used in the skits. Maybe I am remembering wrong.

-Vince had long conversations with Scott Hall (Razor) and Kevin Nash (Diesel). He realized they were being offered more money for less dates. They were doing what was best for their family. Shawn says professionally he was happy for his friends, but it sucked as he wouldn’t see his buddies anymore. HHH talks about the friendship he and Shawn had with Hall and Nash. That leads to a fateful night at Madison Square Garden.

-The Curtain Call: May 1996: This was a live event where Hall and Nash were having their last match in the promotion. Shawn wanted to do something to honor Hall and Nash and cleared it with Vince. They were given their blessing as it was important to Shawn, so Vince said it was important to him. After Shawn and Diesel had a cage match, Hall and HHH (who faced earlier) came down and all four men embraced in the ring. Old school people were losing their minds as they were breaking kayfabe and exposing the business. Stephanie McMahon says she was in the crowd and part of her thought it was cool, but she figured he dad would be pissed. Cody Rhodes says people his age thought it was cool, but the generation above saw it as breaking the cardinal sin.

-The Undertaker didn’t like it and Bret says “they killed wresting that day. It’s not wrestling anymore. It’s entertainment.” We get a lesson about Kayfabe as it was a carnival term and is the fiction that is produced by the con artist. HHH says it is keeping the illusion that it is real. Good guys stay with good guys and never mingle with bad guys. Taker says he came up where he lived and believed that mindset. He always wanted to cast the doubt with the audience and protected the business and his character all the time.

-HHH says it was becoming antiquated and brings up the newsletters and dirt sheets. It was about 1997 when I got online and started getting into the IWC. Vince admits he let it happen, but he can’t let it happen again. Kevin and Scott were gone, so they can’t be punished. Shawn is WWF Champion, so HHH had to take all the punishment. He says he was supposed to win King of The Ring that year and that all went away. HHH told Vince the biggest reaction of the night was the moment and told him the world was changing and they needed to change. Vince told him he understood, but that time wasn’t now. HHH had to learn to eat shit and like it for awhile.

-May 27, 1996: Memorial Day and my 15th Birthday: SCOTT HALL SHOW UP ON NITRO AND WRESTLING IS NEVER THE SAME! Eric says he had the idea for the invasion for some time, but could never figure out how to make it work until Scott and Kevin came along. KEVIN NASH POWERBOMB TO BISCHOFF OFF A STAGE. Eric says it was a hell of an idea and Vince sued them over it. WWF’s claim was that Eric was stealing their intellectual property as Hall was being as close to Razor Ramon without actually calling him that. Vince says it was stealing and not the right way to do business. Eric laughs and says stealing is in the eye of the beholder. Vince went into sympathetic babyface mode and was “whining like a little school girl.” Damn!

-Vince whined that Ted was using his resources in a predatory fashion to put a family business out of business. Oh man, that is classic con man right there! Eric is is all his glory mocking Vince’s claims. He then points out what I said earlier about Vince raiding the territories and Dave Meltzer backs that up by noting that is what Vince in 84 and 85. There you go, we have Eric and Dave agreeing on something. Amazing! Dave says Vince had free enterprise to do it, but Turner had the same right.

-The producer brings this point up to Vince, but he says it wasn’t the same. “Ted’s philosophy was to hurt his competitor, and that’s not mine. I wanted to compete.” The producer pushes back and Vince says it may sound hypocritical but he was looking out for himself. He rambles about how what he says may be different than what he thinks. Vince seemed really lost here and credit to the producer for pushing back.

-Prichard says the real turning point was Bash at The Beach 96. HERE WE GO! If you weren’t around I feel sorry for you! My review of that show is here. The Third Man mystery is one of the greatest angles in the history of everything ever. The reveal was the greatest heel turn of all time as HULK HOGAN DROPPED A LEG ON RANDY SAVAGE. Cody Rhodes was there and says it was surreal to see the biggest babyface of all time turning to the dark side. I cheered and ran around my house like crazy. I still get goosebumps watching it now. Prichard calls it a truly Holy Shit moment. Cody says he learned about too much heat for the first time that night. Fans pelted the ring with garbage and they cover a fan rushing the ring and getting decked by Nash and then stomped by Hall. I love this era so much! Eric says it was the most amazing moment in his career. Cody says it was a strong punch to the gut to wrestling fans. Again, not me as I cheered like crazy.

-The producer asks Vince if they ever considered turning Hogan heel. Vince says he and Terry wanted to keep Hogan as a good guy. Shoemaker says every piece of trash thrown in the ring was like a good brick for WCW and Vince missed out on a chance to make a ton of money. Hogan says most fans forgot he broke into the business as a bad guy and could handle the role. He then cuts THE GREATEST PROMO OF HIS LIFE! Hogan wanted to prove a point to Vince and show that he could do this without him. Vince is very much business is business, but with Hogan it was personal. Prichard: “that was the moment in time that shit changed.”

-The nWo is born and what I would do to be able to go back and relive this entire run all over again. WCW had the cool factor and people started seeing the WWF as less than. Taker says the nWo was cool and WCW started kicking their ass every week. Eric: “How many weeks?” He then says 83 about a half a dozen times and says they were blowing them out so badly it wasn’t funny. Booker T says they felt there was no way they could lose. Vince says it was a war and he wasn’t sure if they could even stay in business. Hogan says once they committed to going after Vince he was all in.

-The idea was thrown out for Eric to be part of the nWo as an on air character and it was a stroke of genius. Eric took to that role perfectly and it made all the sense in the world for the story of the nWo taking over the company. Prichard says it was always a war against Turner and not Bischoff. Eric took note of that as well and understood why Vince wouldn’t say that Eric Bischoff was kicking his ass every week. The story had to be the evil billionaire trying to take down Vince’s family business.

-The producer asks Vince when he first heard about Eric Bischoff. Vince says he didn’t realize this but Eric auditioned to be a stick man like Gene Okerlund. We see Eric’s audition tape from June 19, 1990 and he is asked who he is hero is, and he says Hulk Hogan. Way to suck up Eric and boy did that prove prophetic. Eric was disappointed he didn’t get the job. Vince didn’t regret not hiring Eric and says he doesn’t regret anything in his life. I believe that!

-Vince goes back to Eric just using former WWF talents to win the battles. Vince decided he needed to keep his talent and offered Bret the infamous 20 year deal. Vince says it was a bad business deal the moment he signed off on it. His ego told him he needed to keep Bret, but inside he was telling himself he could just create new stars. Shane says Vince was telling Bret where the loopholes were so he could get out and get a better deal from WCW. Bret takes a deal with WCW, but is the WWF Champion at the time. Vince starts how he can’t let Bret go to WCW with the WWF Title. Shane: “Bret had different ideas.” Shawn says that Bret didn’t care about losing the Title, but it couldn’t be to him.

-Bret: “SHAWN WAS A REAL DICK AT THAT TIME AND IT’S JUST THE TRUTH.” I had to pause because I choked on my spit while laughing. We get into the Shawn/Bret rivalry and how they were poking each other. Shawn admits he was a prick and we hear “The Sunny Days,” promo. Bret says he came close to punching Shawn in the face as he told National TV he was “banging” Sunny when he is a married man. Vince’s thoughts were that it was good for television. That’s our Vince.

-Survivor Series 97: Bret doesn’t want to lose the WWF Title to Shawn. HHH had a phone call with Shawn and Vince and HHH is the one that said, “fuck that, if he won’t do it, do it for him.” I believe there was a Dark Side episode where Cornette and Russo both took credit for coming up with the idea as well.

-Shawn says he met Vince when he was 23 years old and has spent more time with him than his own father. He gets emotional as Vince put up with him when he was in a bad place. His loyalty is to Vince and he was going to do whatever he wanted. Prichard says he was told day of the show it would be a clusterfuck finish with nobody winning. That worked for Bret, but he also knew what happened to Wendi. He never took his eye off Shawn as he was ready to truly fight him if needed. He says the match was a great match. My review here! Shawn puts the Sharpshooter on wrong and Bret helps him get in correct, and then Vince screams “RING THE FUCKING BELL.” Prichard is screaming on the head set wondering why the bell rung. Vince wanted to be at ringside so he could know what happened. “I took back what was mine.” BRET THEN HITS THE MOTHER OF ALL SPIT SHOTS RIGHT IN VINCE’S EYE. We aren’t done yet as Bret is smashing monitors and writing WCW in the air with his finger. Bret breaks down as he talks about how consoling Owen was to him at that time.

-Bret bled and worked holidays, and kids’ birthdays for 14 years for Vince. He gave Vince everything he could and none of that meant anything to him. We get some Wrestling with Shadows footage (The Hitman documentary that stumbled into the Montreal Screwjob) as Bret asks Shawn if he was in on it and Shawn denies with God as his witness. HHH and Shawn both say that Vince told them both to deny, deny, deny as he wanted all the heat to come to him. We see Julie Hart (Bret’s then and now ex wife) run down HHH and tell him God was going to strike him down for lying. Now 27 years later, HHH is running the show. She tells Hunter that what comes around goes around. Undertaker says its was chaos and many of the boys were pissed.

-Vince says he felt he owed Bret something and was okay if Bret wanted to hit him. HHH says he left the room because he didn’t want to see Vince get punched. Vince says he walked up to Bret with his hands down and Bret says Vince didn’t get him a free shot. He calls that story bullshit! They tied up like a wrestling match and everyone was ready to separate them, so Bret realized he could only get off an uppercut. Undertaker has no idea how the punch got through. Bret: “probably the best thing I ever did and he deserved it.” Vince says he got a concussion, was limping around, and had a pretty good shiner. Taker felt bad for everyone, but Vince had to do what was best for business. Vince says that was The Montreal Screwjob and he doesn’t regret any of it. HHH says it was a shift and created a seismic change in the business.

-The controversy after led to the Mr. McMahon character. HHH says in the middle of chaos, genius comes out of it. Archive footage of Vince claiming this isn’t the final nail in the WWF as they are just getting started.

-Credits!

-This episode went away from the criminal and despicable scandals and instead focused on Vince’s war with Turner and his dealings with wrestlers that didn’t want to do what he wanted. In that sense these are low on the Vince “scumbag moves” list. There are people out there that have had their fill on Montreal and never want to heat it again. Even with what they covered they left a ton out and just made it seem like Bret didn’t want to lose and that was it. They didn’t touch on him offering to lose to someone else or giving up the title or Bret having reasonable creative control. With that said, the case can be made that this is Vince’s sandbox and Bret should have done what his boss had asked. I always like to point out that Hogan lost to Yokozuna on his way out of the company and got beat by his own move. I get that Bret’s issues were with Shawn and his telling Bret he would never do a job for him. I have a feeling Montreal is going to be talked about for another 30 years. The rest was just a solid look at Vince’s WWF failing to keep up with the times and having a real challenger for the first and only time. I loved them pointing out the hypocrisy of Vince whining about what Eric was doing to him and that seemed to fluster Vince. Eric seemed to be having a blast recounting the golden days when he was on top of the wrestling worlds. Next time we get The Attitude Era. Thanks for reading!