The ICP made the crowd give a shit about the Headbangers which is a freaking miracle so I've got nothing bad to say about them this week. This was classic wrestling squash 101 and it worked dammit.

Mick Foley is the best at making the most out of the material he's given because on the surface, Mr. Socko is no better than Rocco. But, hey, Mick makes it work because you can tell he knows its as stupid as you do.

Ken Shamrock worked circles around Kane and actually went over in the end so how the hell can I not like that? Shamrock is just awesome to watch in the ring because he puts his all into everything he does. Kane looked especially bad in comparison. I'm still waiting for them to do something great to push Shamrock over the top.

The Road Dog and Pony show was more entertainment than sports but who doesn't like a good crowd reaction? The wrestling was a blur because the booking took over but Road Dog did a million times better dance number this night than the Rock so please stop liking him. I can't help but like Mark Henry when he's acting like that. Oh yeah, the sexual harrassment thing is so Shawn Michaels.

Al Snow and Jeff Jarrett looked like they were going to make it this week but then Snow fucked up and went after Slaughter and it got all screwy and Snow almost used the head anyway.

I've been critical in the past of people who point fingers at the booker when a guy isn't getting a push rather than at a lazy wrestler. But let me defend Vader agaisnt this charge. Big Van Vader carried WCW through some lean years in 1992 and '93. He and Sting had three great ****+ main event PPV matches. He had an incredible feud with Cactus Jack that was stiff and infused with realism. In what was one of the greatest shoot angles at the time, Cactus Jack took a powerbomb from Vader on the concrete floor and did an ambulance job. The week before, Vader broke Jack's nose. And both these matches took place on WCW Saturday NIGHT! Their feud culminated in a texas death match at Halloween Havoc '93 that won best match of the year in the rspw year end achievement awards. Then Vader went on to put over Ric Flair in maybe Flair's best match since then. Vader also had good to great matches at the time with the Davey Boy Smith and Dustin Rhodes. Vader got lost in the mix after that but his jump to the WWF was filled with promise anyway. And besides a great main event match against Shawn Michaels at Summer Slam, and some semi-main event matches agains the Undertaker, Vader's WWF career has been a big letdown. Vader was booked erratically, jobbing more than winning, even suffering the indignity of putting over the Warrior in under a minute. All his other bright spots in this time period took place in Japan where he had a miracle match to end all miracle matches, going ****+ with Antonio Inoki at the Egg Dome. In 1997 he had a great match in Japan against Ken Shamrock. And as recent as May of this year wrestled a **** tag team match with All Japan at the Dome. And now after spending another year in obscurity he gets fired because he's overweight. Vince McMahon dropped the ball here, not Vader.

Gangrel vs. Val Venis was good while it lasted. There is such a thing as angle overkill.

Steve Austin raped Vince McMahon. What a filthy show. Everyone is loving this angle but I thought it was really dark. I liked the bed pan shot and the use of the defribulator showed that they put some thought into this. I would have been ok with it if it was played for laughs but the way Austin called Vince a piece of trash had just a little too much prison sex in it. Of course, it goes on the permanent tape.

The Rock and the Undertaker wrestled a long time for TV and it was good enough not to make you care too much but bad enough to be relegated here. I feel a little better now that the Undertaker has his pin back but why does he need to cheat to win all of a sudden? Damn face/heel paradigm.

Ollie

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