WWF’s Greatest Hits
by Scrooge McSuck
From the depths of hell, also known as the Coliseum Video vault of terror, comes another magical tape that highlights some of the best action the WWF had to offer… that wasn’t good enough for PrimeTime television. Oh wait, I forgot. This tape is nothing BUT recycled stuff from their television shows, so it IS the best the WWF had to offer at the time. Judging by what’s featured on this tape, the good people at Coliseum Video hunted through countless hours of WWF tapes… from October-November 1990. Some of the selections aren’t too bad, considering this stuff was already put on television, but it gets pretty bizarre in other cases. With that introduction out of the way, lets get right into the action…
- Your host is Sean Mooney, who’s standing by in the Event Center for this production. Yeah, a good sign this is a “quickie” video. It’s basically Mooney’s weekend job, except with about 5 minutes of extra work. He tells us we’ll be seeing the best action and greatest hits from the WWF. With a title like this, how can this tape not be awesome? (On a side note, Sean Mooney was pretty tolerable in his role of “hype guy”, it’s just he had no business actually calling the action.)
- WWF Intercontinental Championship Match:
“Texas Tornado” Kerry Von Erich © vs. Mr. Perfect (w/ Bobby Heenan):
Pulled from an episode of SuperStars of Wrestling (PBP team of Vince, Piper, and HONKYTONK MAN), around the first week or so in December. Ted Dibiase comes to the ring and pays off ring announcer Howard Finkel to do the ring intros himself. As much as I enjoy watching Curt Hennig wrestle, history proves even he couldn’t get a good match out of Von Erich at this point of his career, and it’s not like they didn’t wrestle a hundred thousand matches together. They did, and they all sucked wet ass. Lockup, and Von Erich shoves Hennig off. Lockup again, and this time Perfect takes Von Erich down with an arm drag. Scoop slam by Perfect. Lockup into the corner… whip across the ring is reversed, and Tornado takes him over with a slam, then sends Hennig flying out of the ring with a clothesline. Tornado “double noggin knockers” Hennig and Heenan for good measure. Lockup, and Von Erich works the arm over. Tornado maintains control until ramming himself into the ring post, and Dibiase adds a cheap shot for good measure. This trend continues, I might add. We get a ref’ bump as Tornado makes a superman comeback. DISCUSS PUNCH! Dibiase runs in and nails Tornado across the back of the head with the championship belt. Hennig recovers first, and a Perfect-Plex later makes him a Two-Time Intercontinental Champion. This set up a Von Erich/Dibiase feud that went nowhere, and Perfect was already transitioning into a program with the Boss Man. Oh, and the match was pretty boring, but not as bad as some of the other stinkers I’ve seen between the two.
- Now, random highlights and clips of the WWF Superstars in action! It’s basically everyone hitting their big moves on jobbers. If I sound as if I don’t really care, then I’m doing a pretty good job, because I don’t.
- Marty Jannetty vs. “The Model” Rick Martel:
Pulled from the Survivor Series Showdown special the week before the PPV of the obvious name, but the commentary of Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby Heenan (featuring some great blind jokes by Heenan) is replaced by the wonder team of Sean Mooney and Lord Alfred Hayes. Lord, help me now… and I don’t mean Alfred. Jannetty has a pretty funky pair of tights fort this match. It’s definitely not a traditional Rockers look. Even Lord Alfred takes a shot at his gear… now that’s cold, Alfie. I won’t bother to go into PBP detail for this match. As much as I love Jannetty, much like his partner at the time, he could dog a match like no one else could, and this match is nothing special. Jannetty does little else than lame rest-holds and punching. His opponent? Martel doesn’t do much either, because he’s worried more about playing his character rather than attempting to put on a good match. Blah blah blah, both men go through the motions for a good ten minutes before we go to a pretty abrupt finish. Jannetty attempts to slingshot himself back into the ring for whatever, but Martel moves out of the way, and Jannetty crashes on his head… and that’s all, as Martel makes the cover for the easy three count. Damn, he couldn’t at least put him in the Boston Crab or something? Talk about a lazy finish. The sad thing is this was easily the best night from the Showdown special, if you can believe it.
- Hulk Hogan & Tugboat vs. Rhythm & Blues (w/ Jimmy Hart):
Dear God in heaven, why art thou forsaken me?! From the October (1990) episode of Saturday Night’s Main Event. No backstory to the match participants, but Hart is manager of Dino Bravo and Earthquake, so draw your own conclusion from there. Let’s see… Hogan half-asses, Tugboat sucks, Honky sucks, and Valentine isn’t good enough anymore to carry people, especially since he, like Martel, is too worried about getting over his lame gimmick rather than attempting to put on a good match. The whole purpose of the match is to set up interference from Bravo and ‘Quake, who come to ringside about half-way through. Tugboat takes a beating for a while, but Hogan manages to clean house until the interference finally happens, giving the Hulk Hogan and Friend team the victory by Disqualification. The numbers are too great, as the whole Hart Family Gang puts Hogan down for some butt-squashing, but Tugboat makes the save, with the use of Honkytonk Man’s guitar. Strangely, the guitar doesn’t break despite taking a few shots against the canvas and on the wrestlers. I guess they didn’t bother to gimmick it. I’m sure Jake Roberts remembers how well that worked out the last time the guitar didn’t break on impact. The match totally sucked, by the way.
- More OUTRAGEOUS HITS from the WWF SuperStars. Same shit, different pile… hey, didn’t I see this montage on SuperTape Vol. 3?! RECYCLED CRAP ON A COLISEUM VIDEO? SAY IT ISN’T SO!
- Big Boss Man vs. The Barbarian:
... What the HELL!? How many fucking times do I have to watch this match? I swear to God, this turd has seen the light of three coliseum videos, several episodes of Primetime Wrestling, and my own personal nightmares. It might be from the Maple Leaf Gardens, but at this point they ditched the awesome ramp, so I can’t say I’m 100% sure about it. The only thing I do know for sure is this match is balls, but thankfully we’re JOINED IN PROGRESS. I absolutely refuse to watch this match without it being in fast-forward. Incase you missed one of my other recaps of this match, it features a lot of rest-holds and chinlocking by the Barbarian. The finish is the usual, too. The Barbarian sits on his opponents face, poses as if he won the match, then the opponent finishes the attempted sunset flip and gets the three count. Even joined in progress, this match seems to go on forever. After the match, the Barbarian and stable-mate Haku put a beating on the Boss Man for whatever reason, until someone makes the save. I don’t care enough to stop the tape to double check. It was probably Tugboat or Duggan. Back to the finish, I swear, EVERY FUCKING MATCH with the Barbarian from 1990-1991 ended the same way, and I just explained it. Seriously. Find me a match where he doesn’t do that. You’ll be looking for a long time.
- WWF World Championship Match:
The Ultimate Warrior © vs. “Million $ Man” Ted Dibiase (w/ Virgil):
Final match of the tape, and at least it has some promise to it. Pulled from the Main Event special following the Survivor Series. I’m sure this was taped as a SNME episode, but for whatever reason, didn’t get the Saturday spot. I’m also sure the taping included the phantom title switch between the Rockers and Hart Foundation, so maybe that could explain the move to a Friday night 1-hour slot, as well. Anyway, back to the match. No clue on how Dibiase got a title shot. He wasn’t doing anything other than poking fun at Dusty Rhodes, and the Warrior was in serious limbo. I don’t think he did ANYTHING of significance with the title once his program ended with Rude until randomly dropping the title to Slaughter 5 MONTHS later. Anyway, onto the match. Not a classic or anything, but Dibiase does the best he can to walk Warrior through the match, making Warrior look like a competent wrestler at times. We all know how hard it is for someone to do that. Of course, all that goes to hell because it’s a cheap ending, as Warrior runs wild on everything walking until Macho KING, Randy Savage runs in to draw a Disqualification, and beats the living hell out of Warrior. Oh yeah, Warrior/Savage had a thing going… too bad they never actually DID anything until AFTER Warrior lost the title. I know that was the point going into WrestleMania VII, but it gave both men nothing to do for almost the last half of 1990, despite being two of the top stars in the company. As for the match, it’s the best on the tape, but I wouldn’t say it’s much higher than **, if I had to slap a star rating on it. Outstanding performance by Dibiase, decent by Warrior, and a total suck-ass finish that was in vogue at the time.
Final Thoughts: Totally lame. A bunch of recytcled television matches, most of them not being that good to begin with, and a lazy production makes this tape an easy “Thumbs Down” recommendation. It’s not worth the time to find a copy, and it’s not worth an hour to sit through the whole thing. It’s basically a blue-print of what not to include on Coliseum Video, recycling junk like crazy and expecting customers to slap down their hard earned money for it. For shame WWF, and for shame even more Coliseum Video for thinking this tape was a good idea.
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