May 13, 1995 ECW Arena, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Does it bother anybody else that the DVD cover for ECW Enter The Sandman 1995 makes the event's eponymous star look like a severed head? Probably not, right? Anyway, we came into this event with The Sandman riding high as ECW champion after his manager, Woman, double-crossed former title holder Shane Douglas. Tonight, Douglas would get a rematch against Sandman, who also had to pull double-duty in a second title defense against Cactus Jack.  Elsewhere, we've got the continuing saga of Raven and Tommy Dreamer, the ECW debut of Bi ..read more

Aired October 8, 1990 Reseda Country Club, Reseda, California Recorded at the Universal Wrestling Federation's first set of TV tapings on September 24, 1990, UWF Fury Hour aired a few weeks later as part of SportsChannel's Feet, Fists, and Fury programming.  This week, Herb Abrams continued his cheap jab at Dave Meltzer, B. Brian Blair continued to sell T-shirts like his life depended on it, and Cactus Jack continued to be the best thing on the show.  Elsewhere, we'd see Col. DeBeers taking the show down an unnecessarily racist path in his main event clash with Billy Jack ..read more

   January 4, 1992 Tokyo Dome, Tokyo, Japan Fresh from their first well-received outing to Japan the year prior, World Championship Wrestling returned to the country in January '92 for WCW/NJPW Supershow 2.  The show didn't air in the United States until March of that year, and, when it did, it omitted several matches.  The following bouts were all left out of the PPV show, and thus, out of this review:  Black Cat vs. Hiroyoshi Yamamoto Osamu Kido & Kuniaki Kobayashi vs. Kengo Kimura & Kantaro Hoshino Tony Halme vs. Scott Norton Shinya Hashimoto vs ..read more

Aired October 1, 1990 Reseda Country Club, Reseda, California The Darkside of the Ring episode on Herb Abrams sent me down a major rabbit hole. For reasons I can't explain, I felt compelled to learn as much as I could about his ill-fated Universal Wrestling Federation, starting with its flagship TV show, UWF Fury Hour.  Today, we'll begin with the show's premiere episode, taped on September 24, 1990, and airing one week later on October 1, 1990.  Featuring a - ahem - star-studded main event between B. Brian Blair and Dangerous Dan Spivey, David Sammartino inte ..read more

August 15, 2004, Air Canada Centre, Toronto, Ontario, Canada By the time Summerslam 2004 rolled into Canada, it seemed like WWE had completely stopped caring about their fans.  After all, it had been three years since the company had bought out its competition and, despite attempts by the likes of TNA and the World Wrestling Allstars to fill the WCW-sized gap in the pro wrestling market, World Wrestling Entertainment was pretty much the only game in town.  Watching these 20044 shows back, it seems clear that since there was no need to try and please their hardcore audience, WWE ..read more

July 17, 2002 Municipal Auditorium, Nashville, Tennessee By the time Episode 5 of NWA-TNA's weekly Pay Per View shows rolled around, it was clear that this unique business model wasn't generating the kind of income the company was hoping for.  As a result, this would be the last weekly PPV to emanate live from Nashville's Municipal Auditorium. The following week, the company would move to the smaller -and cheaper- Nashville Fairgrounds, officially kicking off the Asylum Years.  22 years later, this will also be the last TNA weekly PPV review I write for a while. Not because I ..read more

July 11, 2004,  Hartford Civic Center, Hartford, Connecticut Summer was hotting up and Eugene-Mania was running wild as WWE Vengeance 2004 came live from the company's backyard in Hartford, Connecticut.  As they proved many times before and since, the worst thing that could happen to a WWE performer was for something to get over organically.  When it did, Vince McMahon and his creative team would either kill it dead or milk it for all it was worth until it lost all of its appeal.  On tonight's show, the company did both at the same time by having the Eugene characte ..read more

Three months on from the 1998 Royal Rumble, the World Wrestling Federation's publication schedule had them still ranting about Kane setting fire to the Undertaker, the short-lived NWA revival, and the violent history of Cactus Jack and Chainsaw Charlie. Yes, I'm back to doing this again.  Every now and again, as part of a long, drawn-out clear-out, I head up into the loft, pull out an old wrestling magazine, and flick through its battered and crumpled pages for your entertainment.  This time out, we're going through my super-battered, super-crumpled copy of WWF Raw Magazine from ..read more

April 15, 1995 ECW Arena, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania ECW Hostile City Showdown 1995 was the second half of a "Double-Header" attraction, the first half, Three Way Dance, taking place a week prior.  That show had seen the debuts of both Beulah McGullicutty and Eddie Guerrero. The former was revealed as the catalyst for Tommy Dreamer's rivalry with Raven, while the latter captured both the TV title and Match of the Night honors against 2 Cold Scorpio.  Tonight, Guerrero would defend that title against Dean Malenko, while McGuillicutty was set to be in Raven's corner for his mat ..read more

December 28, 1992 The Omni, Atlanta, Georgia. WCW Starrcade 1992 was the tenth installment of the company’s longest-running marquee event. It was also the last World Championship Wrestling Pay Per View with Cowboy Bill Watts in charge.  Watts' 1992 run as Executive Vice President had delivered one ill-received decision after another, whether it was banning moves off the top rope or pushing his underprepared offspring into prominent spots on the card.  Still, if you ask me, the worst thing Bill Watts did while running WCW was to invest so much in trying to present pro wre ..read more