Did You Hate the Invasion Angle while it was happening?

[pepentorresHHH]

one of the most criticized angles in history and in this forums was the Invasion angle that the WWE (then WWF) presented us back on 2001 after both ECW and WCW were purchased by Vince.

it went on from like march or june 2001(depending how you look at it) till november 2011, it began with shane "buying" wcw right from under vince till team wwf beat team alliance in a 5 on 5 survivor series elimination match.

now in all this angle we got the arrival of differente wrestlers to the WWF, austin turning on the wwf, booker t vs the rock, austin vs angle, the Undertaker vs DDP, shane and stephanie vs vince etc.

it might feel like a flop because the biggest WCW names werent a part of the angle... personally I loved every single moment of it at the time, it was all about brand loyalty, how these outsiders came in trying to destroy the company trying to take over and destroy the company and the wrestlers we all loved and at the end they were defeated when Angle double crossed austin and allowed the rock to finally put the alliance to rest and out of business.
but my question is.....did you like or hate the invasion angle at the time....and has your opinion changed now after 10 years?
bear in mind i was 11 at the time of the angle so it felt real to me then....

 

[kobrad]

I loved the angle at the time! but the only thing i didnt like during the time was no Sting! He would of made WCW look legit for once! Or what about Goldberg even, i mean seriously think about having Sting, DDP (the real DDP), Goldberg, Booker T, and Steiner vs. WWF!!! That is a pretty good team! The worst part though during the time with the people involved was DDP was made to look like a loser! That sucked!!!!

But i loved the angle when it happened, because it opened new opportunities!

 

[The Dragon Saga]

I didn't hate on the angle until it ended, and I realized how badly in-truth it had been handled.

It was WCW Lite(TNA... Sorry, saw the opening ) versus the WWF at the time, who had all their big guns. Sure during the angle the odd person went over to the WCW/ECW side. Stone Cold Steve Austin, Kurt Angle, Rob Van Dam; big names, but if it had been done with guys like Goldberg, Nash, Hall, Sting and those, the angle would have picked up a lot more, and wouldn't have been as heavily criticized.

It has a lot more criticizms. Like Vince McMahon wanting people on the WWE side to look stronger than the guys on the WCW-ECW side. Also, even though I was for Shane's part in the angle when it began, if Paul Heyman and Eric Bischoff had came in and taken charge it would have been much better storyline wise. And due to their connections, WWE could have gotten a few of the big names who were missing from the angle.

 

[Wolf Pac]

No, I loved it. It's pretty underrated. I hate when people bash it just because Vince never brought in any of the big WCW names. If he had brought in the big WCW names, I doubt we would even have an Invasion angle cause there would sure be a lot of disputes bout who puts who over. Plus how could Vince get the big names like Sting & co. if they are turning down his contracts in fear of how they would be handled by the WWE? No, it still worked out pretty fine in storyline, matches, everything imo but I expect the IWC to still continue picking at the small things that happened in the angle & bash it, just so they can seem clever in the eyes of thousands of internet fans.

 

[MMK]

I didn't like it then and it hasn't gotten any better with age. If anything it looks even worse in retrospect when you consider the fact that all the big name WCW players like Hogan, Goldberg, Hall, Nash, Bischoff, Mysterio, and others all showed up in WWE shortly after the Invasion angle ended. If you were bringing those guys in anyway, why not have them participate in the Invasion?? Or just wait a year and have the invasion in 2002 when all these names arrived.

Why waist what could have been an epic feud on the likes of Jindrak, Ohaire, Kidman, Mike Awesome, and Lance Storm? No disrespect to those guys but thats not what fans wanted when they dreamed up a WCW vs WWF war. If they had just had Storm and other young WCW stars arrive as a new stable like they did with Benoit, Guerrero, Malenko and Saturn, then I would have been fine with it. But don't call it a WCW vs WWF war when team wcw is captained by Stone Cold Steve Austin, the biggest WWF star in the world at that point.

I was more disappointed and insulted by the Invasion angle than anything else. Turning the whole thing into a McMahon family feud was also a poor choice. Vince McMahon was a fine character, but Stephanie and Shane were two McMahons too many.

 

[WWEIsLife2]

I liked the InVasion Angle overall and it led to some Great Matches & Feuds during it as well. WWF/E did what they could with what they had to work with. The reason Sting,Hogan,Hall,Nash,Goldberg,Steiner and others couldn't be involved with it is because they were still under AOL/Time Warner Contracts.

I loved it when Booker T showed up on RAW in MSG and nailed Vince with a Scissiors Kick, Mike Awesome winning the Hardcore Title from Rhyno, Lance Storm showing up in Calgary and superkicking Saturn, O'Haire /Palumbo interupting the Hardyz/Dudleyz Tables Match on Smackdown,etc. The Best Moment was when ECW was brought in with RVD & Tommy Dreamer returning/debuting then all the other Former ECW guys coming down and turning on Chris Jericho & Kane.

The only bad part to me was the Booker T/Buff Bagwell Match on RAW that was a main event. Not Booker's fault because it was mostly Buff I think who was messing it up. So I liked the Invasion Overall and don't know why it gets flack sometimes.

 

[EastCoastFan]

The Invasion was the most eagerly anticipated feud in wrestling history, and when the smoke cleared, it was the biggest letdown in wrestling history.

The Invasion had the potential to succeed, but I think deep down, Vince didn't want it to succeed - he wanted to bury WCW on his own terms. Case in point: the WCW relaunch. Granted, Booker T and Buff Bagwell had a lousy match, but if the WWF brass had waited just ONE WEEK before trying a relaunch, the match would have taken place in Atlanta, Georgia (WCW's homebase) and would have received a better response.

Even without Hogan, Goldberg, Steiner, Nash, ... the Invasion had potential thanks to bringing in the ECW guys, but there were so many people and so many titles involved plus so many people jumping the fence one way or the other that it just got messy.

 

[Toroc102]

I knew it was over when Booker T and Buff Bagwell were considered WcW's two biggest talents and shat all over the Main-Event of Raw. DDP being a stalker didn't help either. Neither did calling them The Alliance. Neither did WcW getting squashed. Neither did Austin and Angle joining. I really loved WcW man, WWE fucked this up.

I guess if you were younger and didn't really like or know WcW I could see how the Invasion could be just another interesting storyline, but for someone who probably liked WcW(at its peak) more than WWF it was a giant let down.

 

[team extreme]

i think they should have brought ric flair and the nwo out earlier than they did. and incorporated them into the storyline. Also they didn't use ddp, kidman, rhyno, rvd, like they should've.

 

[whoopin' ass]

yes and no. i thought the angle itself was a great idea. while i was watching it, i couldn't wait to see the wcw guys get the upper hand. but that never happened and that is the "no" part - they jobbed everyone out and made them look less than second rate. look at ddp and taker. could have been an interesting angle but they jobbed out ddp all the time and, considering who ddp was married to at the time, they should have used the stalking thing just as a starting point and dropped it quickly. i think i was more excited about what they could do than i was about the actual angle itself.

 

[WWEIsLife2]

How many times must it be said,they COULD NOT bring in guys like Goldberg,Scott Steiner,Ric Flair,Hulk Hogan,Scott Hall,Kevin Nash,and others because they were STILL under Contract to AOL/Time Warner. Vince did the best with what he had to work with. I don't know why that is so hard to understand for some people to get.

Also the cop out of Vince "burying" WCW on his terms is so stupid to me anyway. Also I doubt the Booker T/Buff Bagwell Match would have gotten a better response if it was held here in Atlanta or in Tacoma the week before.

 

[Rockyfolifebo!!!]

It didn't bother me then. At the time, i thought it was the coolest thing ever. I was only six or 7 at the time. I remember i did use to switch back and forth from channel to channel. And one day just see WCW guys on Raw, and was like ? But for a kid my age, it was like Cartoon Network vs Nickelodeon! What if Johnny Bravo was on Nick? To a kid my age that was just as equivalent as seeing DDP or Booker T just appear on Smackdown! Just my opinion.

 

[Lee]

I lvoed it as frankly I didn't have a clue who was on WCW at the time due to minimal coverage of it in the UK. With that the "where's Ric Flair, Hogan Nash, Hall etc etc etc etc" never crossed my mind. It was entertaining from start to finish with swerves left right and centre. What was there to not like?

 

[XgringolocoX]

It wasn't so much that I hated the angle, just how it was done. I felt it was hard to believe in the WCW guys cause there wasn't many big names with them. They didn't make an impact IMO either. Nexus made an impact that first night far better than the WCW invasion.
You also knew that Vince wasn't going to let WCW gain any momentum. The angle was always on shakey ground standing on wobbly legs.

 

[gooseholla]

It was a great idea, and exciting to see at the time. Never knew who would show up. But then it just got lame, as it ended up basically WWF vs WWF. They needed to wait a year, and either run it then or do an Invasion 2.

However, it was some of the happiest times I remember from wrestling, and way better than anything 2003 onwards had/has to offer!

 

[Toroc102]

How many times must it be said,they COULD NOT bring in guys like Goldberg,Scott Steiner,Ric Flair,Hulk Hogan,Scott Hall,Kevin Nash,and others because they were STILL under Contract to AOL/Time Warner. Vince did the best with what he had to work with. I don't know why that is so hard to understand for some people to get.
QUOTE]

He didn't need to get all of them and WWE was rolling at the time. He could've afforded one or two of those guys, if he was really thinking long term he would've signed Sting and Flair and treated them like stars.

Consider this, Ric Flair debuted, the night after the angle ended. After that they went through all of these guys within two years. I'm pretty sure Sting and Flair could've been had and made all the difference.

 

[WWEIsLife2]

He didn't need to get all of them and WWE was rolling at the time. He could've afforded one or two of those guys, if he was really thinking long term he would've signed Sting and Flair and treated them like stars.

Consider this, Ric Flair debuted, the night after the angle ended. After that they went through all of these guys within two years. I'm pretty sure Sting and Flair could've been had and made all the difference.

Well those guys not being there didn't bother me as much as it does some people. Yeah it would have been cool to have them there but I still liked the WCW/ECW Invasion overall. It provided different Matchups and Feuds plus Stone Cold was very entertaining with the whole paranoid Leader of WCW/ECW as well which to me is another highlight of it.

We won't know the reason why the Big Names didn't come in right away and I really don't give it much thought.

 

[waylon p]

I loved it for about six days, until the second raw featuring the storyline. I figured it wasn't going to work by then. But When Austin took over the alliance, that killed my last lingering hope that Vince was going to take the angle at all seriously.

But that first night was great.

 

[silrock316]

No I didn't and it was because it enabled Angle to portray a for real face run. He was SO over during and after the invasion. He was already over but this made him a top face. With that being said I think they went about it all wrong. They should have ran nitro a couple weeks with the WCW guys. Vince could have made that part work. Then each week have another wcw guy or two invade WWE while keeping the buy by Vince as quiet as possible with few leaks. It would have an nWo feel to it. Woulda been neat.

 

[avb6100]

TO ME IT WAS A GOOD ANGLE WITH THE WRESTLERS THEY HAD THEY MADE IT LOOK GOOD AND STONE COLD AS A HEEL WAS AWESOME . THE ONLY THING IS IT COULD HAVE BEEN BETTER HAD HOGAN AND ALL SIGNED AFTER THE INVASION ANGLE . STING SHOULD HAVE ALSO BEEN THEIR WHICH WOULD HAVE BEEN A TYPICAL WCW-WWE RIVALRY .

 

[Da Truth]

I thought the angle was pretty good. It gave us alot of memorable moments, and some great matches. I think people diss this angle because the big players in WCW weren't involved. WCW really killed themselves with top heavy contracts, so in a way, I don't blame Vince for not trying to buy them out. It was a success for what they had to work with. The only thing I didn't like was that they really took some great wrestlers and made them look really bad such as DDP( totally go punked out), constantly poking fun at Kris Kanyon, making Lance Storm an after thought of sorts, etc. I also felt Vince could've at least afforded two of the contracts; I would've brought in Sting and Flair(Flair much sooner). But all in all it made for pretty good television.

 

[brighamosity]

I know we all have our opinions in retrospect on the Invasion angle, but I remember very distinctly how I actually felt about it first-hand, without the bias of being active in the IWC at the time.

Having given up on WCW in mid-1999, I only knew who a few of the wrestlers were. Booker T, DDP, Buff Bagwell, Crush... and I think that's it. Having never watched ECW, I didn't even know who Rob Van Dam or any of the ECW guys were. So I remember thinking, "This is all that's left of WCW? No wonder they went out of business." Again, I hadn't watched WCW in about two years and was completely unfamiliar with the Vince Russo era or anything else that happened in their last two years. I just knew that the big wrestlers like Sting and Scott Steiner weren't there.

Another thing that disappointed me was that WCW was turned into a bunch of jobbers. I watched the very last Nitro (the one where Shane McMahon was on it) and I saw that Booker T was now their main guy. So I was disappointed when he was just jobbing to The Rock. Not that I felt he was on the same level as The Rock, but I felt like WWE didn't even try to make it appear that he was a viable threat. Same thing with DDP. He came in as a comedy character and anticlimactically lost to The Undertaker. WCW just came off as so weak. When they brought Stone Cold and Kurt Angle into the mix, I was excited because I felt like it gave them credibility. But I still thought it was lame.

I think the Invasion angle would have been better if they had brought in guys like Flair, Steiner, nWo, and Mysterio in initially. But in the end, it wouldn't have mattered and we'd still have the same rosters we have now.

 

[silrock316]

I know we all have our opinions in retrospect on the Invasion angle, but I remember very distinctly how I actually felt about it first-hand, without the bias of being active in the IWC at the time.

Having given up on WCW in mid-1999, I only knew who a few of the wrestlers were. Booker T, DDP, Buff Bagwell, Crush... and I think that's it. Having never watched ECW, I didn't even know who Rob Van Dam or any of the ECW guys were. So I remember thinking, "This is all that's left of WCW? No wonder they went out of business." Again, I hadn't watched WCW in about two years and was completely unfamiliar with the Vince Russo era or anything else that happened in their last two years. I just knew that the big wrestlers like Sting and Scott Steiner weren't there.

Another thing that disappointed me was that WCW was turned into a bunch of jobbers. I watched the very last Nitro (the one where Shane McMahon was on it) and I saw that Booker T was now their main guy. So I was disappointed when he was just jobbing to The Rock. Not that I felt he was on the same level as The Rock, but I felt like WWE didn't even try to make it appear that he was a viable threat. Same thing with DDP. He came in as a comedy character and anticlimactically lost to The Undertaker. WCW just came off as so weak. When they brought Stone Cold and Kurt Angle into the mix, I was excited because I felt like it gave them credibility. But I still thought it was lame.

I think the Invasion angle would have been better if they had brought in guys like Flair, Steiner, nWo, and Mysterio in initially. But in the end, it wouldn't have mattered and we'd still have the same rosters we have now.

I am pretty sure Steiner was around for the latter stages of WCW. Thats when he really was coming into his "genetic freak" gimmick. He may have even wrestled on the last nitro, or was there in some capacity.

Also, they didnt make Booker T job, even if he was losing fueds, his early fueds were against guys like the Rock and Stone Cold. Austin beat him down in a super market. Any program with those two shouldn't be considered jobbing. You get massive rubs against guys like that.

As I stated earlier, the best way to have made that angle effective was to keep the monoply of wrestling under wraps and have the WCW guys defect a couple at a time without the 90% of fans that arent "IWC" knowing WCW was bought by Vince.

Could you have imagined the reaction of RVD, Booker T, Steiner or even Goldberg showed up without any clue? Definitely woulda been shock factor at least.

 

[willross]

If vince had bought out the contracts of all the Top guys like Hogan, Nash, etc. he would of been broke and he would of ended up losing money by being a mark rather than making money by being a good businessman.

Do any of you realize how much money was in just Hogan's AOL contract? Now add in Hall, Nash, Goldberg, and Sting, NO ONE HAS THAT MONEY, except Ted Turner. If Vince had that money he would of bought them out for sure. But he didn't have the funds to buy out those huge contracts.

But again, even if he did, the angle wouldn't have sprung a profit. The internet wasn't that big for spoilers back then, and they could get away with surprises. Most of the audience watched expecting to see the "top" guys show up at some point. They did.

WWE is doing very well for itself now and the invasion of 2001 does not effect 2011 AT ALL. Yea you're smarky hearts are broken that Vince didn't blow his funds on 4 or 5 overpaid guys. But that's why Vince runs the most successful wrestling/entertainment company ever, and you all sit around and shit over it.

Bischoff was right by the way, 10%ers. Instead of watching a show and being like "oh well he fucked that up" JUST ENJOY THE FUCKING PRODUCT AND STOP LIVING IN THE PAST!!!! If you want the past to come back then DO NOT COME ON THIS WEBSITE AND BOYCOTT SPOILER SITES.

 

[Toroc102]

WWE could've afforded to get 1 or two of the Main-Event guys, lets not be foolish McMahon was making mad money around this time.

To put it in perspective lets think about how much the WWE is willing to pay guys like Mike Tyson and Floyd Meyweather, or someone like Snooki of all people to bullshit at Wrestlemania. This is not a recent trend on WWE's part, I'm sure they had Kid Rock or Limp Biscuit or someone performing that year that cost them a million dollars for like an hours worth of work. They could've bought some contracts.