Random Network Reviews: WCW Halloween Havoc 1999

WCW Halloween Havoc 1999
October 24th, 1999 | MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada | Attendance: 8,464

It’s the first Pay-Per-View of WCW’s infamous Vince Russo era. Russo was the head writer for the WWE during their turnaround in the Monday night wars and was considered the biggest get for the WCW since the nWo began or Bret Hart. Russo’s tenure in WCW is widely criticized and here’s where it all begins. WCW was already in big trouble by this point, falling far behind in the ratings battle. This is the 11th of 12 Halloween Havoc events.

The opening video package focusing on the confusing WCW World Title scene, including a heel Sting. Tony Schiavone and Bobby Heenan handle commentary. One positive is that the entrance setup looks awesome. Schiavone announces that Rey Mysterio and Konnan have been stripped of the Tag Team Titles due to an injury to Rey, resulting in a three way tag for the vacant titles tonight.

WCW Cruiserweight Championship: Disco Inferno (c) def. Lash LeRoux in 7:35
The quality of this division has fallen hard, but WCW still uses it to open shows. They start things quickly but flub a few spots. Lash mocks Disco’s dancing in the midst of a series of punches. Outside, Lash takes a weak looking bump into the ring post. Disco tries for the stunner but it gets blocked and Lash hits a backbreaker. They trade offense with neither man gaining a true upper hand. Lash hits a blue thunder bomb and Tony shouts, “THAT’S HIS MOVE!” but it only gets two. Disco nails a shitty atomic drop and the Last Dance (stunner) to retain. You could tell LeRoux was green here and Disco wasn’t good enough to help him along. They tried, it just never clicked. *¾

After the match, Lash lays out Disco with Chris Sabin’s move in a few years, the Future Shock. He gets booed, though he’s the babyface.

Earlier today, Chris Benoit and Dean Malenko arrived and were confronted by Revolution stablemate Perry Saturn. They tell him and Shane Douglas to stick it.

WCW World Tag Team Championship Street Fight: Harlem Heat def. Billy Kidman and Konnan and The First Family w/ Jimmy Hart in 5:02
The First Family wear masks to the ring because it’s Halloween I guess. The team is Brian Knobbs and Hugh Morris. Kidman and Konnan wear the titles to the ring, even though they are technically vacant. This is just six guys using as many weapons as possible and fighting all around the ring. Even Jimmy Hart gets involved, but his use of a trash can lid has no effect. Booker chases him to the entrance, where Knobbs tosses a trash can at him. A table gets brought into play inside, where Morris hits No Laughing Matter on Konnan through it. Backstage, Stevie Ray hits Knobbs with a paper mache mummy and somehow that ends it. Wow. Since it happened backstage, nobody knows and the Filthy Animals score a pinfall. Kidman and Booker argue over who the champions are and Harlem Heat get announced to boos since the fans couldn’t see it. A garbage match where guys just used weapons for the sake of it. Add in the terrible idea to have the finish occur backstage and draw confusion and you’ve got a losing combination. DUD

Ric and David Flair enter the arena and that’s all we see.

Diamond Dallas Page and Kimberly come to the ring but this is “not on the format.” Kimberly handles most of the promo to talk about Ric Flair spanking her on a recent show. SPACE MOUNTAIN! DDP disses the people of Las Vegas and makes masturbating jokes before it all leads to him challenging Flair to a strap match.

Backstage, Eddie Guerrero is interviewed and apparently stole Ric Flair’s watch. Flair has quite a few enemies doesn’t he?

Eddie Guerrero def. Perry Saturn via disqualification in 11:12
Before the match, Eddie gives the watch to Heenan because he thinks Tony is a thief. Does he not know how close Flair and Heenan are? They brawl outside for a bit and Saturn slams Eddie on the steps. The crowd is kind of dead for it. Maybe it’s because the storyline calls for Eddie/Flair or Saturn/Benoit or Malenko. This feels like something you’d see on Nitro leading up to a PPV. Saturn works the knee and Eddie goes after the arm. I wouldn’t classify any of it as interesting. Eddie gets crotched up top and Saturn hits the rare super northern lights suplex. Schiavone horribly calls it a back overhead belly suplex. Wow. Eddie counters splash mountain into a superplex and here comes Flair with a crowbar. He attacks Eddie resulting in the DQ. A nothing match that was a huge disappointment considering who was involved. A dead crowd and lots of talking between two guys who seemed to phone it in. **

Billy Kidman runs out to help but gets hit too. Torrie Wilson is here too ad Flair goes to attack her. He decides against it and dances in front of her, which she seems to like. SPACE MOUNTAIN! WOO! He kisses her and retrieves his watch.

Backstage, Goldberg beats up a bloody Sid.

Time for another promo, like this is Nitro or something. Buff Bagwell says something about having issues with two writers from up North, which confuses the crowd. He demands to face Jeff Jarrett, who recently returned to WCW after collecting a nice payday to drop the IC Title on his way out of the WWF. Jarrett shows up and they brawl until Lex Luger tries to make the save. He misses the guitar shot and cracks Buff instead.

More backstage stuff as doctors are checking on Sid. He shoves the doctor away and flips over a table while yelling “LET HIM BLEED!”

Elsewhere, a hurt Eddie calls Rey Mysterio to return to the arena. So many backstage cuts.

Brad Armstrong def. Berlyn w/ The Wall in 4:23
Remember when WCW ruined the fun that was Alex Wright and made him Berlyn? He’s playing the generic evil foreigner role. Armstrong is billed as a hard working American, so the match makes some sense. Berlyn controls with some of the most basic offense possible. Outside of a few “USA” chants, the crowd again doesn’t seem interested. Berlyn tries for a neckbreaker but Brad blocks it and gets the three. So they had Berlyn do all his lame offense only to lose? Horrible. ¼*

After the match, the Wall enters and helps Berlyn kick Armstrong’s ass.

Backstage, Ric Flair is interviewed about drops about twenty “woos” in a three minute span. He also talks about Kimberly liking the spanking he gave her and what he plans on doing to DDP later tonight. WOO!

WCW Television Championship: Rick Steiner def. Chris Benoit (c) in 12:50
At their best, these two could put on a great match. At this time though, Rick wasn’t interested in producing anything good. Right off the bat, Rick delivers some terrible looking strikes. Benoit hits a superplex and Rick TOTALLY no sells it. Not in a “I powered up” way either. He’s blown up and takes a rest outside, so Benoit follows with a tope suicida. Rick starts going after Benoit’s right knee and Benoit does an alright job of selling. Once again, the crowd sits on their hands. Benoit tries a comeback but Rick carelessly drops him on his head. Rick finally does something interesting with a release German. Benoit rallies with the trio of Germans but Rick takes out the referee. He the uses a steel chair to block the diving headbutt. Dean Malenko runs out and, SWERVE BRO, whacks Benoit with the chair. A three count later and Rick wins the title. That was horrible and the worst match I recall Benoit having. Rick was terrible throughout and technically, he should have been disqualified for shoving the ref in the first place. Benoit saved this from going into the negative stars. DUD

Saturn comes out and hugs Dean Malenko.

Bret Hart gets interviewed before the next match to say he’s going to give it his all despite an injury.

Lex Luger w/ Elizabeth def. Bret Hart in 7:46
They brawl outside almost instantly. It’s a damn shame how bad most of Bret’s WCW work is. Liz gets involved a bit but nothing really happens throughout this match. The crowd starts hot, which is a contrast to the earlier matches. Luger looks winded like his name is Rick Steiner. Dumbass Luger doesn’t work the leg, which is obviously the way to go with the story. It’s grating to hear Schiavone call Luger “the package”. He finally attacks the leg and Schiavone says, “he goes after the obvious body part.” See Luger? I told you. Luger applies a weak half crab and, for the first time ever, Bret taps. Wow. Why not do a match that makes a big deal of Bret tapping out for the first time in his career? Instead, it was just Luger doing a lot of nothing and winning from out of nowhere. Bret saved this from being as bad as the other matches, but it wasn’t anywhere near being a good match. ¾*

Goldberg gets interviewed and plans on decapitating Sid later.

Madusa and her giant fake tits are out in a bikini to shill a WCW perfume. She gets to the commentary table and Heenan says it smells bad. Not a good way to promote the product Bobby. Madusa gets on the microphone and says to tell the higher powers from up North that this is bullshit and she dumps the perfume on Bobby.

WCW World Heavyweight Championship: Sting (c) def. Hulk Hogan in 0:03
Hogan’s theme plays as commentary notes that the challenger always comes out first. Mind you, Benoit and Disco entered first earlier tonight. Hogan no shows and Sting’s theme plays. Heel Sting is such a bad idea. Hogan finally comes out, but is in jeans and a shirt instead of ring gear. He gets in the ring, says something to Sting and lays down for him. “Pin me, pay me.” The crowd is rightfully confused. I hate this stuff. It’s classic Vince Russo and it never works. He just wanted people talking about WCW the next day but no PPV after this ever had more buys. It was all downhill from here.

WCW United States Championship: Goldberg def. Sid (c) in 7:11
The Outsiders run out and jump Goldberg during his entrance, which kind of evens things out after Sid got attacked earlier. Sid felt like the babyface after the attack earlier, but now he’s more like the heel. Sid attacks in the aisle and they fight to the ring. He gets busted open again and is gushing badly. The crowd chants for Goldberg, but it’s Sid who looks like a badass here. He works a chinlock so close to the ropes that Goldberg’s legs are under them. Bad ring awareness by the big veteran. Goldberg pummels and chokes Sid, who continues to bleed all over the place. Sid powers up often and again looks like the resilient babyface. Eventually though, Sid doesn’t respond enough to give up, but the referee calls the match. That was one of the better things on the show, though the booking was odd. I’d have had Goldberg, the face, be the one to overcome the blood and win. A good fight though. **¼

Sid gets up and wants more, but Rick Steiner comes out to help him to the back due to the blood loss.

Footage airs from some hotel room where Kimberly Page strips into lingerie. She’s ready for a special night but Ric Flair pops out from the bathroom and is ready to take her to space mountain. I guess that was from Nitro.

WCW World Champion Sting is back out because promos on Pay-Per-View is classic Vince Russo. He says he didn’t come here for a night off and challenges anyone to a fight later tonight. Could this not have been done in a backstage segment?

Strap Match: Diamond Dallas Page w/ Kimberly Page def. Ric Flair in 12:49
This isn’t a traditional strap match with the four corners gimmick, instead ending via pinfall or submission. DDP refuses to enter the ring, so Flair goes out and they brawl everywhere. From ringside to the aisle and into the stands. Flair whips him several times. They make it back to ringside and Flair kisses Kimberly, leading to DDP taking him out. Flair kissed Torrie and Kimberly in one night. SPACE MOUNTAIN! Not to be outdone by Sid’s bladejob earlier, Flair does his own. Kimberly’s expressions throughout the match are horrible. DDP whips Flair on the announce table and back inside. Flair goes low and fires up with short punches. The crowd is again apathetic towards most of this. DDP survives the Figure Four and hits some low blows. He chokes Flair with the strap and hits the Diamond Cutter. Charles Robinson doesn’t count three but calls for the bell anyway. Flair missed the rope with his foot, leading to the weird finish. Lots of punching and kicking, which made it feel like a fight but it just wasn’t all that interesting. The dead crowd and botched finish didn’t help. *½

DDP hits Robinson with a Diamond Cutter and attacks Ric more. David Flair runs out with a crowbar for the save but Kimberly kicks him low. DDP uses the crowbar on Flair’s nuts and plants David with two Diamond Cutters. Ric does a stretcher job. Before he gets in the ambulance, the Filthy Animals jump him and add to his woes. Heel Rey Mysterio is a weird sight. They steal the ambulance and drive off with Flair.

WCW World Heavyweight Championship: Goldberg def. Sting (c) in 3:08
Goldberg answers the open challenge The announcers tease this isn’t a title match because things weren’t agreed upon beforehand, which is odd since that seemed to be what Sting offered earlier. Charles Robinson, fresh off taking a Diamond Cutter, runs out like it’s WrestleMania XXIV to start the match. The work they do is sluggish outside before Sting gets two on a splash. He gets a big pop by spearing Goldberg, but Goldberg no sells and hits a spin kick. After missing a spear, Goldberg hits his next attempt and uses the Jackhammer to win the title. Nothing match really, but it was one of the few to feature a rather hot crowd. It all felt super rushed as if they didn’t plan this out until halfway through the show. ½*

Goldberg gets announced as the World Heavyweight Champion, confusing the commentators. Goldberg looks to be back to the position he was in a year ago as double champion. However, the confusion led to the booking of a large tournament which culminated at the next PPV, Mayhem.

1.5

The final score: review Extremely Horrendous

The 411

There is almost nothing redeemable about this event. It truly sucks. Russo’s crash TV style was all over this, but even without those strange moments, the wrestling wasn’t any good. Sid/Goldberg was the match of the night, so you know there’s a problem. There were things like the stupid Sting/Hogan trash and the confusing main event. Guys like Eddie Guerrero phoned it in, while someone like Chris Benoit was dragged down by the horrible Rick Steiner. Tons of nonsense throughout a show filled with lame matches.