October '95

Monday Night Wars October '95

Raw/Nitro Oct 2nd

Monday Night Raw 2/10/95 (2.5 Stars)

The main event on Raw is an IYH rematch seeing Hart go over Peirre. A good match, arguably better than the PPV, but I couldn't care less about this one. I'm surprised we didn't see more of John-Pierre LaFitte at the top of the card. Maybe he had too many names and officials didn't think it was fair to have to wrestle 3 people at once. WWF booked a strong show with good matches, including the great story of The 1-2-3 Kid earning Razor Ramon's respect by repeatedly rolling him up everytime he lost against him.

WCW Nitro 2/10/95 (2.75 Stars)

Luger/Savage kicks off the first Nitro of the month, I assumed this would be the main event and you could argue it should have been. If Luger lost, he would leave WCW and Savage would earn his World Title shot. Luger won in an average effort. After this we see Hogan lose his mustache at the hands of the Dungeon of Doom in a great segment and Ric Flair defeats AA, only to be attacked by Pillman, setting up a cage match for next week. overall a more exciting show won WCW the first point in November

Raw/Nitro October 9th

Monday Night Raw 9/10/95 (1.75 Stars)

The following week on Raw we see a big 6 man tag match open the show (Owen, Bulldog & Yokozuna defeated Diesel, Shawn & Taker). It was made to sound like the main event last week. IT WAS THE MAIN EVENT! It's followed by a 10 minute summerslam recap hyping up a Yankem/Hart cage match for next week, a throwaway Chris Canido match and an admittedly good, but still, just a promo, by JC. There was one "don't change the channel moment" when Diesel and Taker simultaneously big-booted Yokozuna. A cool moment that would have definitely kept me from switching over. Sadly the rest of the show was pointless and WWF got this the wrong way round massively. 2 matches just isn't good enough! WCW Nitro 9/10/95 (2.75 Stars)

Nitro kicks off with a U.S Title match in which Sting successfully defends against Shark, and finished with a decent enough albeit not popular cage match between Flair and Arn. Arn took this one. While I enjoyed it, I will admit time constraints hurt them, a feud this hot in a cage should last a lot longer than 8 minutes. Although seeing Flair lose his shit and challenge Pillman/AA to a follow-up match was very satisfying. I have to add I enjoyed the midcard match that Sabu won against Mr J.L (Jerry Lynn) more than Pillman/Liger from week 1. Hashtag unpopular opinion! Nitro wins the second week for me easily. They also kept panning to Josh Matthews as a young fan in the crowd, which is only funny in retrospect

Raw/Nitro October 16th

Monday Night Raw 16/10/95 (2 Stars)

WWF's go home show was very poor. An interesting note is this would be the last time we would see Doink in a competitive singles match. Maybe if Matt Osbourne was still playing the role and went longer with HHH it could have made the show slightly better. But even the fans in attendance looked visibly bored during Bret's victory over DDS Yankem in the cage so it would have taken much more to save this one. This is a stark contrast to the closing moments on Nitro which literally got every fan in the building "on their feet!" Not quite as bad as the worst show I've seen so far (9/10 edition of Raw) but sadly, not far off either

WCW Nitro 16/10/95 (2.75 Stars)

Eddie Guerrero and Chris Beniot opened Nitro. Stumbling across this match is the equivalent of cleaning your room and finding a £5 note! You can also see moments of a young Beniot throwing himself into Eddie's moves, such as a springboard DDT where he literally drove his own head into the canvas on impact (in retrospect that's sad to see, sacrificing himself for wrestling) Beniot eventually pinned Eddie around the 8 minute mark. Flair Vs Anderson/Pillman in the main event and WCW won this week comfortably. Sting ran in to help Flair gain revenge at the end to a HUGE pop and it's moments like this that make a TV show for me, great drama!

In Your House 4 (Great White North)

Now it's WWF's turn for a PPV (IYH 4) Simply put, IYH 4 was poor. It felt cold and the lack of any decent matches made it truly one of the worst wrestling shows I've ever seen. That’s 3 shows in a row now, maybe WWF were going for a record! The Smoking Gunns retained their tag titles against 1-2-3 Kid and Razor Ramon. Razor would go on to win the IC title later that night when he defeated Dean Douglas. Goldust won his debut match against Marty Jannetty. We also saw Yokozuna and Mabel, which had a legit 1000 pounds worth of weight in the ring, ending via double count-out. Finally The British Bulldog defeated Diesel via DQ in a WWF Title Match with the winner going on to face Bret Hart at Survivor Series. Some semi interesting notes are as follows; HBK was kayfabe assaulted by marines the night before, leading to him not competing and dropping the title. Nash would add that because Shawn was so intoxicated or "bombed" as he described it, that he was likely passed out in his car when the attack took place. He also noted that because Shawn ran his mouth off so often, he essentially needed a bodyguard. You know a PPV is bad when the most interesting thing you can say happened outside the show! (1.75 Stars)

Raw/Nitro Oct 23rd

Monday Night Raw 23/10/95 (2.25 Stars)

The next night, Raw kicked off with Owen winning a decent enough battle royal and a shot at the IC Title next week. We also saw Al Snow " successfully" debut as Avatar. I only say successfully as he went over. He also botched multiple moves and you could hear Vince’s audible disappointment on commentary which is interesting if you're into that kind of thing. Finally, Alundra Blayze successfully defended her Women's Championship against Bertha Faye. I have no idea how highly the women's division was viewed during this period, but as this would be the last time we'd see the title defended on Raw for 3 years and the division would soon be axed completely, my guess is not very! Although we are given reason to tune in next week, due to an excellently advertised match between Owen Hart and Razor Ramon for the IC Title.

WCW Nitro 23/10/95 (2.5 Stars) Over on Nitro "The Master" made his first appearance and Kevin Sullivan, soon to be the Taskmaster, says they (DoD) have an insurance policy for Halloween Havoc. Hogan comes out and says he's keeping the edgy look as we all know "what a man in black gloves is capable of" Is Hogan really channeling OJ Simpson in order to retain a world title? Anyway, a tag match with Eddie Guerrero & Jerry Lynn going over Chris Beniot & Dean Malenko follows. They have a four way post-match brawl that opens possibilities for singles contests including all four men going forward. Oh, and Pillman attacked Eddie afterwards for seemingly no reason whatsoever, whilst holding up 4 fingers signifying he was a horseman. The show ended with a frantic run-in following Sting and Lex Luger's match with Harlem Heat. It was typical WCW stuff at the time. The Giant came down chokeslaming people, Hogan with the save before the Dungeon of Doom got involved etc. All you need to know is this. Sting pinned Booker T. But perhaps more importantly...the Yeti made his debut as he burst out of his glacier looking gimmick set up on the stage. The wrestling matches weren't all perfect but I was still highly entertained going into Havoc

Halloween Havoc '95

After an average PPV opener with Johnny B. Badd (Marc Mero) taking the TV Title from DDP, we have the confusing affair of Savage having to beat Zodiac and Luger having to beat Meng in order to face each other later in the night. These two matches didn't need to happen. Savage would go on to defeat Luger in an underwhelming match anyway. We also witnessed Flair double cross Sting after an excellent tag match against AA & Brian Pillman. This match made sense, the psychology was brilliant and the ref actually made an effort to keep things under control and fair. One of my all time favourite tag matches. Onto one of my all time least favourite matches, the monster truck match! Hogan "wins" the most boring segment I've ever seen and when he proceeded to "murder" The Giant. Although to be fair it was in self defense and he even tried to apologise afterwards. The Giant shows up fine and well and Hogan loses in the main event via DQ, even though he was the one attacked by Jimmy Hart, the Yeti (or YE-TAY) as Schiavone excitedly pronounced it aswell as Lex Luger (Savage was right, Hogan never should have trusted him) The Giant runs off with Hogan's title. The fact The Giant defeated Hogan one on one says a lot about the faith put into him by WCW at the time, but overall, all foolishness aside involving potential death and monster trucks. There weren't enough quality matches on this card to warrant a high rating (2.25 stars)

Raw/Nitro Oct 30th

Monday Night Raw 30/10/95 (2.25 Stars)

Raw's Halloween edition see's Jim Cornette cut a promo making a valid point. He was with his legal counsel and full time Johnny Cochran impersonator, who pointed out as The British Bulldog won his match at IYH 4. He should be facing Bret Hart, and not Diesel. Razor Ramon defeated Owen Hart in the main event via DQ, run-ins ensue and Ahmed Johnson made his debut, bodyslamming Yokozuna to a huge pop! Apparently he's only the second man to do this after none other than...Lex Luger. Is there anything this man can't do? The main-event almost made up for a lacklustre show which also included a bad Goldust match (He pinned Savio Vega) and two squash matches. Vince was also wearing a prisoners outift halloween costume, as a middle finger to Gov. Officials in the wake of the lengthy steroid scandal.

WCW Nitro 30/10/95 (2.25 Stars)

The fallout to Halloween Havoc saw Eddie defeat a legit amateur wrestler and power plant product, Sgt. Pittman, while Flair, AA & Pillman cut a heel horseman promo. In the main event, Lex Luger, now aligned with the DoD, teamed with Meng, and they defeated the American Males. This was followed by a quick interview involving The Giant sporting the stolen World Title, Lex Luger, Jimmy Hart and Kevin Sullivan to close out the month. Neither show was great but Raw's main event earn's them a draw in the final week. Both shows have their own issues, but overall WCW is simply more exciting and has some real bright spots, whereas the WWF was just dull at this point. As a modern fan, it's also nice to watch a Sting match outside of TNA

Summary and scores

Nitro is really starting to heat up whereas Raw and the WWF are stuttering along, struggling to get out of first gear. The main draw for me at the time was Nitro's "introduction" of the younger stars such as Eddie and Beniot. The DoD stuff as hokey as it seems now, was the hottest angle between either promotion at the time. The scores see WCW lead the way with a score of 5-1 with 2 draws

Match of the Month: Sting/Ric Flair Vs Arn Anderson/Brian Pillman (Halloween Havoc)