Dark Pegasus Video Review: In Your House 20 – No Way Out (of Texas)

IYH 20: No Way Out (of Texas) by J.D. Dunn February 15, 1998 Live from Houston, Texas. Your hosts are Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler. Opening Match: Marc Mero & TAFKA Goldust (w/Sable & Luna) vs. The Headbangers. Mero sends Sable to the back before the match because they can only have so many beautiful women at ringside. The idea here is that Mero and Goldust are trying to form a team, but it’s not going so well because Luna is jealous of Sable. The Bangers were decent workers before injuries took them down. Then again, you could say that for Mero and Goldust too. Everything goes the Bangers way early. They even work in their suplex into a splash spot. Goldust low-bridges the ropes, sending thrasher to the floor. The oddball team takes over, and things get far less interesting. Thrasher gets cut open on the steps. Even though Mero is a boxer, he opts not to work the cut and instead bores the crowd with a chinlock. A sloppy sitout powerbomb gets two, but Thrasher counters the TKO to a DDT. HOT TAG TO MOSH! Mosh fires away with rights, and the Headbangers hit a flapjack. Mosh goes up but gets crotched by Luna. That brings Sable back out as Mero gets the TKO on Mosh. Mero hops out as the men try to prevent a catfight. That allows the Headbangers to pull the old switcheroo, and Thrasher small packages Mero for the win at 13:52. Mero tries to get in Sable’s face after the match, so she shoves him down to a HUGE pop. This was just formula without much work behind it. Pretty boring. *1/2 Owen Hart promises to work with Steve Austin if he has to and cripple Triple H if he can. Light-Heavyweight Title: Taka Michinoku vs. Pantera. Sunny is your special ring announcer, back during the days when they didn’t know what to do with her. Pantera looks like a low-rent Black Tiger. And yes, I know he has a long history of success, but it looks like he’s wearing sweats and a leotard. Taka, though, was building a cult following. Brian Christopher comes down to ringside because he was the token white guy in the division. Pantera drags Taka to the floor and hits a tope con hilo. They switch rolls as Taka springboards out on top of Pantera to wake up the crowd. Taka misses a charge on the apron, and Pantera takes him off the apron with a headscissors and follows with a somersault. Back in, Pantera works Taka’s back with a chinlock and Mexican Surfboard. Taka fires back but gets backdropped to the floor. Pantera follows him out with another tope con hilo splash to the back. More back work as Pantera drops an elbow to Taka’s back and hits a sloppy tilt-o-whirl backbreaker. He takes him up for a rana and follows up with a moonsault for two. A second one misses, and Taka signals for the Michinoku Driver. Pantera counters to a small package for two. A Majestral Cradle gets two more, but Pantera runs into a Lygerbomb. Taka hits a missile dropkick and a Michinoku Driver for the win at 10:11. The work was fine, but Christopher’s obnoxious announcing (“slant-eyed?!”) ruined this. The crowd only cared about Taka too, meaning most of the match was heatless. Christopher tries to attack after the match, but Taka takes him out and escapes into the crowd. **1/2 The Quebecers vs. The Godwinns. The Quebecers jumped over from WCW and lasted only about a month before getting fired again. This was during the Godwinn period when they were really pissed off but hadn’t quite found the much cooler “Southern Justice” gimmick. The match is pretty boring, so I’ll point out the evolution of the Quebecers instead. Jacques Rougeau used to be in an awesome and underrated team with his brother Raymond. Then, Jacques went solo as the Mountie. When that didn’t work out, they paired him up with newcomer Carl Ouellette as the Quebecers. That went okay for a while, but the WWE wanted to thin out the herd, and the Quebecers got cut. WCW, who would sign anybody with any name value, brought them in as the Amazing French Canadians, which is, admittedly, a much better name. Jacques would retire to Montreal not long after this while Ouellette reappeared with WCW during its dying days. Anyway, nothing happens until the Quebecers hit the Cannonball. Ouellette tries to roll up Henry, but Phineas clotheslines him at 9:14. This makes it out of the gutter only because Lawler had the audacity to call for the assassination of President Clinton. Yeah, don’t you just hate skeevy old men who chase women half their age? 1/4* The New Age Outlaws talk about taking respect. NWA North American Heavyweight Title: Jeff Jarrett (w/Jim Cornette, Barry Windham & the Rock ‘n’ Roll Express) vs. Bradshaw. Jarrett’s music is pretty cool, actually. Very Jan Hammer. To explain why you’re seeing this on WWF TV — Jim Cornette didn’t have much to do after 1997, so Vince decided to have him lead an NWA invasion of the WWF long after it meant anything. Even Ross notes that this contingent is hardly representative of the NWA, turning this into one of those “We know it sucks and that’s why we’re doing it” sort of Fake Razor/Diesel angles. This would be failed singles push #2 (of 4) for Bradshaw. Actually, he’s not such a bad wrestler here, and his hard-hitting match with Vader a few months later is underrated. The ref sends all of the NWA talent but Cornette to the back. Bradshaw DESTROYS Jarrett early but makes the mistake of going after Cornette. Jarrett jumps Bradshaw from behind and works him over while getting heat from the crowd. Bradshaw overpowers him, but Cornette hits his knee with a racket shot. Jarrett works the knee and goes for the figure-four. Bradshaw shoves him away and hits a powerbomb. Cornette gets involved but gets whipped into Jarrett. Jarrett grabs the errant racket and slams Bradshaw with it for the DQ at 13:06. The old-school NWA guys go after Bradshaw, but The Legion of Doom makes the save. This actually did have kind of an NWA feel with Jarrett playing the poor man’s Ric Flair while Bradshaw stood in for Barry Windham in his prime. Of course, neither of these guys measure up to those guys, so call it **1/2 Great promo as the Rock completely upstages Faarooq who is trying to get a point across. Faarooq, D-Lo Brown, Kama Mustafa, Mark Henry & Rocky Maivia vs. Ken Shamrock, Ahmed Johnson, Skull, 8-Ball & Chainz. D-Lo gets caught in the wrong corner early. Everyone trades moves for a while before Henry calls out Ahmed Johnson. They slug it out to a BIG pop from the crowd. Henry wins the slugfest but gets slammed. D-Lo jumps Ahmed from behind and hits the (unnamed) Lo Down. Rocky saves Faarooq from a powerbomb, and Faarooq goes low on Shamrock. Skull (current TNA Security dude Don Harris) gets caught in the bad-guy corner and takes a whoopin’. D-Lo misses a moonsault, allowing Skull to get the hot tag to Shamrock. Shamrock gets the hot tag, triggering a HUGE BRAWL! The fans explode as the faces clear the ring. That leaves Shamrock and Chainz in with Faarooq and Rocky. The Nation tries to whip them into one another, but Shamrock catches Rock in a belly-to-belly and finishes with the Anklelock at 13:46. Rocky blames Faarooq for not saving him, and the two come to blows. The other Nation members hop in and separate them. Everything is eventually smoothed over, and the Nation goes out for Dairy Queen. There were just enough guys in there to make up for the fact that 7 of them sucked. **1/2 Steve Austin doesn’t care who his opponent is tonight. He just wants to kick some ass. Well, we knew that, didn’t we? Kane (w/Paul Bearer) vs. Vader. With the Undertaker buried and set on fire at the Royal Rumble, that just left one more monster that could take out Kane. Big slugfest to start, and it spills to the floor. Vader is hugely over with the crowd. They slug it out up the ramp and back again before Vader dumps Kane. Kane snaps Vader’s neck off the rope and hits the flying clothesline. Kane goes to work with a lot of smothering. Vader avalanches Kane against the ropes and clotheslines him over, but Kane lands on his feet and comes back in with a DDT. Vader hits another avalanche in the corner and goes low to counter a chokeslam. MOONSAULT! Kane no-sells that. Vader hits an avalanche and another clothesline to send Kane to the floor. Paul Bearer has the ref distracted, so Vader grabs the fire extinguisher and sprays him in the face. Back in, POWERBOMB! Vader goes after Bearer instead of covering, so Kane sits up and finishes Vader with the Tombstone at 11:00. I’ve seen a lot of people (most notably Scott Keith) criticize this match for Kane’s lack of selling, but the whole point was to put Kane over as an unbeatable monster when Undertaker came back. Seriously, looking at this match, wouldn’t the average fan ask “How can you beat him?” Good power match. After the match, Kane smashes Vader’s face in with a wrench. Ross says he doesn’t want to alarm Vader’s friends and family, but it looked like the entire side of his face was caved in. Gee, why would that be alarming? **3/4 Non-Sanctioned, Anything Goes: Steve Austin, Owen Hart, Cactus Jack & Chainsaw Charlie (Terry Funk) vs. Triple H, Road Dogg, Billy Gunn & a Mystery Partner (w/Chyna). Shawn Michaels is injured, so he’s going to pick his successor — Savio Vega. The fans are as underwhelmed as you are. Cactus brings a big bin full of weapons to the ring, so Austin clears the ring with it. Hunter bumps around a lot for everyone as they match starts with a big brawl. Owen puts Billy in the Sharpshooter early, but Hunter breaks it up. Owen grabs the Testicular Claw on Hunter. It finally settles down into a real tag match as Hunter stomps a mudhole on Chainsaw Charlie. Austin gets sick of watching Charlie get beat down, so he launches a trashcan at Billy’s face. Owen gets the false tag. Gunn lets Charlie fall right on his head on the outside. Back in, Cactus gets the hot tag and destroys the Outlaws. He gets a double Mandible Claw, but Hunter goes low. Jack takes it to the floor against Road Dogg, but Billy sneaks up on him and DDTs him on the floor. Cactus plays face-in-peril as Savio wraps barbed-wire around him. A heel doubleteam backfires as Billy whacks Roadie with a chair. HOT TAG TO AUSTIN! Austin unloads a can of whoop-ass and hits Road Dog with the Stunner for the win at 17:33. Austin would use this momentum to catapult himself to the title at WrestleMania. Hard to imagine a time before he won the world title. Chyna gets in Austin’s face, so it’s “Wham, kick the bitch in the ovaries and knock her out with the Stunner.” ***

The 411: The wrestling was about par for 1998. There wasn't any angle advancement, and the PPV didn't do anything to set up WrestleMania that wasn't already done on Raw. I can't honestly think of a reason to recommend it, but it's not actively bad. Thumbs down.
Final Score:  5.5   [ Not So Good ]