Dark Pegasus Video Review: In Your House 26 – Rock Bottom

IYH 26: Rock Bottom by J.D. Dunn In the pantheon of second chances, the Rock falls somewhere between David Fincher and Drew Barrymore. Despite the fact that the Rock was hugely over during the summer, this PPV turned in one of the year’s lowest buyrates. It’s understandable, considering the December PPV under any name is usually one of the least interesting. Plus, WCW was countering with their heavily hyped Starrcade, which featured Goldberg taking on Kevin Nash. Thankfully, while the WWF hedged its bets by keeping Mankind on standby, they didn’t give up on the Rock, and he became the biggest wrestling star in recent history. Also thankful for second chances – Michael Cole, who took over for Jim Ross after Ross was sidelined with a severe case of Bell’s Palsy. At this point, Cole had not yet learned the art of irony so he sounds like a five-year-old whining about the heels cheating. Plus, he doesn’t know a lot of the move names, despite having had a year under his belt. December 13, 1998 Live from Vancouver, B.C.. Your hosts are Michael Cole and Jerry Lawler. Opening Match: Val Venis & The Godfather (w/Hos) vs. D-Lo Brown & Mark Henry (w/Jacqueline & Terri Runnels). Jackie and Terri were known as Pretty Mean Sistahs (PMS, get it?!). Boring stuff when D-Lo and Val aren’t in there. D-Lo hits the Sky High, but the Lo Down misses. The hos get into an argument with PMS, distracting Godfather long enough for Jackie to trip up Val. That leads to a Henry bodysplash for the win at 5:57. Not a good start. 1/4* In the back, the Rock is worried because his Corporate ribs are hurting. Vince McMahon tells him not to worry about it. The Headbangers vs. Kurgan & Golga (w/Luna & Giant Silva). The Bangers turned on the Oddities and clipped Luna’s hair. Admit it, you loved the Oddities. I think it was the entrance song, and I’m not even an ICP fan. Golga’s the only decent wrestler of the group, and even that’s stretching it. The Oddities clean house until Kurgan misses a bodysplash. The Bangers start doubleteaming, but Kurgan hits a backdrop and tags out. Golga powerslams Thrasher and goes for the Earthquake Splash, but Mosh blind tags himself in and hits a Thesz Press off the top at 6:54. The best part of the match was the entrance. 1/4* Recap of the problems between Steve Blackman and Owen Hart & the Blue Blazer. Owen Hart vs. Steve Blackman. This was a silly angle in which Owen retired after injuring Dan Severn with the piledriver. Suddenly, the Blue Blazer started showing up as Owen blamed Blackman for making fun of his legacy. The crowd is fervently behind Owen, of course. Owen hits the enzuigiri early. Blackman works in a bow-and-arrow or “what is this?” as Michael Cole calls it. Owen bails out early but gets caught with a running clothesline. He takes a powder again, so Blackman nails him with a baseball slide. Back in, Owen hits an atomic drop and a spinning wheel kick. A flying elbow gets two. Another enzuigiri gets two. Owen takes off the turnbuckle pad but winds up getting whipped into it instead. Blackman locks in the SHARPSHOOTER drawing huge heel heat. Owen makes the ropes, though. Owen simply takes a walk and gets counted out at 10:30. Horrible finish, especially considering Owen was in his home country and a babyface. Not only that, but Blackman tries to soak up the adulation and nearly gets booed out of the building. The match was okay outside of the ending, though. **3/4 In the back, Vince finds Mankind’s office and has a heart-to-heart with his “son.” The J.O.B. Squad vs. The Brood. The J.O.B. Squad is Al Snow, Bob Holly and Scorpio, all three of whom are more talented than half the roster, so of course, they got jobbed out. This came about after the Squad cost Christian the Light-heavyweight Title. Al hits his arm-trap headbutts on Christian and delivers a clothesline. Al Snow plays face-in-peril. Edge gets caught with a ganmengiri. Who would have thought Edge would be a future champion? A pier-six brawl erupts. Scorpio misses a pescado and SPLATS on the floor. Christian misses a splash and gets Head from Al Snow. Everyone gets knocked out, and Scorpio hits a moonsault legdrop. Impressive. Most impressive. Edge makes the save and wipes out Bob Holly with an over-the-top running plancha. That allows Christian to finish Scorpio with the Unprettier at 9:08. It picked up a little bit at the end, which saved it from being totally useless. * Striptease Match: Jeff Jarrett (w/Debra) vs. Goldust. If Jarrett wins, Goldust strips. If Goldust wins, Debra strips. I don’t think I need to tell you who the fans are rooting for here. Not much happens until Goldust rolls through a crossbody for two. Cole says that Debra is looking “mighty fine” three or four times. Sadly, he doesn’t give the wink and the finger guns. Jarrett takes over as the fans start to get worried. They work in the Jarrett sleeper, which is distinguished from the regular sleeper in that it’s immediately reversed once applied. Jarrett reapplies the hold in this case and nearly gets the submission. Jarrett powers up and tosses him aside. Jarrett and Debra try some doubleteaming with the guitar, but it backfires as Goldie is able to hit the Curtain Call. The ref is admonishing Debra, though, and doesn’t see the cover. A bulldog gets two, and Goldust sets up for Shattered Dreams. Jarrett rolls to the floor, allowing Debra to sneak in and nail Goldust with a guitar shot. That allows Jeff to get the pin at 8:03. Pretty good match, and the hot crowd helped. **1/4 Commissioner Shawn Michaels comes out and reverses the decision to give Goldust the DQ win. Oddly enough, there are no “You Screwed Bret” chants. Debra strips, which is supposed to be a big, humiliating ordeal for her, but she appears to enjoy it. See, the whole idea behind a stipulation match is that you’re embarrassing the heel if he/she loses. Funny moment as they cut to the back where Jarrett is watching on the monitor, and in the background you can see mortal enemies Rock and Mankind looking on as well. The Blue Blazer runs out and covers her with his cape. Vince is seen leaving Mankind’s office, but we just saw Mankind elsewhere. That was bad, but not nearly as bad as the time in WCW when Shane Douglas was ejected from the arena and then showed up as one of the pall bearers for a burial angle in a pre-taped segment moments later. WWF Tag Team Titles: The New Age Outlaws vs. The Big Bossman & Ken Shamrock (w/Shawn Michaels). Michaels was one of the more interesting commissioners because he was just motivated by rational self-interest rather than being always against the heels or always against the babyfaces. Cole states that Michaels “used to be an independent thinker” a few times. The WWF was looking in to giving Billy a big push around this time, and you couldn’t really blame them, given his look and overness. It just never panned out for a number of reasons. The heels isolate Roadie for a while. Gunn spends most of the match jawing with Shawn Michaels who threatens to fire him if he comes near him. They work in the front-facelock spot that the Hart Foundation used to do, right down to the false tag. Billy eventually does get the hot tag and cleans house. I’m not sure why, but he sells his own spinebuster. The ref counts, but Shawn pulls the ref out of the ring, allowing Bossman to hit Gunn from behind. Billy goes for a suplex, and Shawn tries the old pull his legs out from under him, but Billy rolls it over and gets the pin anyway at 17:01. Long, boring match. Shamrock and Bossman didn’t have enough interesting offense to keep things going for this long. *1/2 WWF Heavyweight Title: The Rock (w/Vince McMahon & Shane McMahon) vs. Mankind. Before the match, we get a lengthy segment where Mankind demands that Vince acknowledge that he didn’t say “I Quit” at the Survivor Series. That would lead to the silly ending here. Mankind destroys Rock in a big brawl around ringside. Vince demands that the ref tighten the rules. That allows Rock to come back somewhat. Mankind adjusts and tosses the Rock to the floor. He sets up for the elbow off the second rope, but Shane distracts him long enough for Rock to recover and yank him off the second rope to the floor! OUCH! Rock adds some commentary as he kicks Mankind’s monkey ass. Back in, the Corporate Elbow gets two. Mankind roars back and goes low, prompting Vince to call for the ref to disqualify him. Mankind jumps the ref and gives him a piledriver. Well, that takes care of that. He also assaults the timekeeper just to be on the safe side. Rock jumps him from behind and hits the Rock Bottom, but the ref is out. A new ref runs down as Shane and Rock try a doubleteam, but it backfires, and Mankind gets two. Mr. Socko does a run-in. MANDIBLE CLAW! The Rock fades and passes out, giving Mick his first title at 13:34. Oh, but you see, the Rock never said “I Quit,” meaning he didn’t really submit. Rock loses the match but keeps the title in one of the stupidest finishes imaginable. *3/4 Buried Alive Match: Steve Austin vs. The Undertaker (w/Paul Bearer). If Austin wins, he gets a spot in the Royal Rumble. Big brawl to start. Duh. Austin fights him all the way to the ring and hits the Thesz Press. Michael Cole goes way over the top, implying that one of these guys won’t make it out alive. Quite literally nothing to recap here. They brawl around the ring. They brawl up to the grave and back again. Finally, they wind up near the grave where the tombstone gets involved. Taker starts to bury him with a shovel, but Austin pops up, hits Taker with a can of gasoline and Stunners him into the grave. A wheelbarrow full of dirt isn’t going to cover Taker, so Austin leaves the arena. Taker crawls out of the grave and takes cover as a cherry bomb goes off. Suddenly, Kane emerges from the grave and brawls with Taker. Kane gets the better of his brother (for once) and hits a Tombstone. He rolls Taker in as Austin returns with a backhoe. The backhoe operator takes foooooooorrrrrreeeeeeevvvveeer to dump out the dirt. Michael Cole: The Undertaker is being buried alive! Well, wasn’t that the point. Unfortunately, the backhoe operator can’t do much more than that, so Austin has to improvise by shoveling more into the grave. I guess that’s the end because Austin and Hebner share a beer at 21:29. Horrible match, and it was meaningless in the long-run because Taker would be resurrected as the Satanic Taker who would run the Ministry. 1/4*

The 411: How bad was this PPV? Steve Blackman was in the best match. I don't think Debra's all that attractive, so the stips for the Jarrett/Goldust match didn't mean much to me outside of drawing heat. The rest was just god-awful boring. Unfortunately, while their TV would heat up to the point where they were beating the NBA nearly 7-to-1, the PPVs would continue to flounder off and on until into the summer. Thumbs way down here.

Final Score:  3.5   [ Bad ]