Sam's WWE Network Musings

[Uncle Sam]

It's obviously way too much to ask for me to keep my thoughts on twenty-year-old wrestling shows to myself. This should prove an adequate dumping ground.

First up, King of the Ring 2001 - mostly remembered for Kurt Angle wrestling three matches in one night, the third of which against Shane McMahon is nothing less than brutal. It's less remembered for being the start (or a start) of the Invasion storyline and Diamond Dallas Page being a creepy little stalker.

The main event is Steve Austin against Chris Jericho and Chris Benoit for the WWF championship. This is the first pay-per-view during which Triple H was out with the quad injury and the The Two Man Power Trip being disbanded. "Rumour" has it that Jericho or Benoit would take the belt to WCW if they won it. WCW effectively doesn't exist beyond Shane McMahon's t-shirt at this point, making this an empty threat (and the entire Invasion storyline a damp squib). Chris Benoit, remember, being the man who left WCW the night after he won their world championship. Talk about fickle!

Austin at this point was a heel. The 'logic' being, hey, The Rock's got to take some time off, Mick Foley's been retired for a year, WCW's invading - now would be a great time to make Stone Cold Steve Austin a bad guy.

DDP kicks off the show with what amounts to quite a good promo. People really dislike the "stalker" storyline with DDP but I think he makes it work, at least here. He's carrying a sign with an arrow pointing down that says "MAKE ME FAMOUS." His reasoning is that he's going after the biggest dog in the yard (something that requires "balls") and the whole stalking thing is therefore just a means to an end. Although he does claim to have been wanking to videos of The Undertaker's wife. In a roundabout manner. The real problem, I think, arises from The Undertaker making him seem like a total bitch. Just a thought.

Kurt Angle is all over this pay-per-view, having qualified for the semi-finals of the King of the Ring tournament and having a street fight against Shane McMahon scheduled. The first we see of him - and it's jarring to see a prime Kurt Angle and not a withered robot - is in the opener against Christian. An opener which is as good as you would expect between one of the all-time greats and perhaps the most underrated wrestler in WWE history. The highlight of the match, however, is the ending, wherein Christian hits the Unprettier on Kurt Angle and Shane McMahon breaks up the pin by pulling Christian out of the ring. Kurt then hits an Olympic Slam from the apron into the inside of the ring (it looks great) and picks up the win.

Here's psychology for you: Shane has to wrestle Kurt Angle later on in the night, so ensures that Kurt wins his semi-final and thus has to wrestle an extra match. Neither commentator - JR nor Heyman - acknowledges this. In fact, they act quite puzzled. They're still a great announce team though.

 

[Mighty NorCal]

That match(Shane Vs Angle), in all seriousness, is one the most brutal American matches ever. I recall KOR being one of my first shows I cued up on the Network as well.

The window-pane spot is exhausting to even watch, let alone imagine how it felt doing it.

 

[Uncle Sam]

What's remarkable to me is that Kurt had already wrestled two lengthy (and really good) matches before that. More like Kurt of the Ring, am I right? It's the high point of what turned out to be a really, really great event.

Just making a note here to mention later on about how fucking awful X-Pac's theme is at this time. Just bloody abysmal.

In the meantime, there's the other semi-final to talk about: Rhino versus Edge. Or is it Rhyno? Fuck nows. Anyway, the semi-finals all feature members (or, as it were, former members) of Team RECK. Edge and Rhyno, Christian's TNA documentary taught me, had been friends for a long while at this point and it translates to really good chemistry in the ring. The best spot is probably Rhyno going for the gore just as Edge spins around to hit a spear, ending in a clash of heads. Edge picks up the win with a nasty looking Impaler DDT (if it's called the Edgecutor at this point, nobody told the commentators).

It's becoming hard to type and watch at the same time, particularly with Jeff Hardy's fan girls not only existing in 2001 but being very vocal. Goth chicks like multi-coloured hair and shit promos, I guess.

But more on that later. Maybe.

(Jeff just took his shirt off and the pitch of the ensuing scream shattered my television - and it's 2015, so my television isn't even made of glass).

 

[Uncle Sam]

So as to not leave you all in suspense, I'll quickly summarise the rest of the show. The street fight was so good as to leave me dispassionate to everything else, but let's go for it:

• DDP sat in the front row and, so as to undermine his credibility, starts freaking out when footage of him eating lunch and walking to his car is shown. It's meant to be some sort of great "turn the tables" moment, particularly when it's revealed that Undertaker's wife Sarah (Sara?) was the one with the camera, i.e. the woman DDP's been stalking. The crowd don't react at all. The Undertaker comes out, and the crowd do pop, and he punches DDP in the face until DDP runs away. Gee, I wonder why DDP didn't get taken seriously.
• Billy Gunn was at WWF New York. WWF New York! He cuts a promo about how he was King of the Ring and yet wasn't even in this tournament. Yes, Billy, we know your push didn't work. The smart thing to do would be to keep quiet about it, mate. But you're not on the card, you're in a restaurant instead, so I think your place was already pretty clear.
• Spike Dudley reveals his mystery partner (to take on Bubba and D-Von for the tag titles) to be... Kane! Kane uses Spike as a projectile for most of the (short) match. Spike gets in some plucky offense and nearly wins the match with the Bo-Dog before getting hit by the 3-D ("three-deeeee!") and taking the pin. Those damn Dudleys try to 3-D Spike through a table after the match but Kane ends up chokeslamming D-Von through it before carrying Spike to the back.
• Edge defeats Kurt Angle following a spear. Not an Edge spear; a Shane McMahon spear. No, seriously. One of the most surprising things here is how legitimate a threat Shane is made out to be. Good match. There's a big deal made out of thrones and such in the opening promo. Wherever the throne is, it's not somewhere where cameras are - Edge just sort of wanders off after the win.
• Jeff Hardy and X-Pac have a good match for the light heavyweight title. I forget who won. This was X-Pac's shit theme that I was talking about: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sDMt19MkRk
• Remember Austin and Jericho and Benoit? Remember how hot some of their matches around this period was? This one features a lot of innovative punches. And some breathtaking stomps. And some never-before-seen rest holds. Booker T comes out and gets what could well be the only pop of the match as he puts Austin through a table. Austin wins anyway. The match takes what seems like forever. Seriously disappointing.

Maybe I was being over cynical because I'd just seen Kurt Angle versus Shane McMahon, which had me going like this:

You'd think what with everything else, they'd lay off during the brawling. Nope - stiff as fuck. They kick the shit out of each other. An Olympic gold medalist and the owner's son. Ridiculous.

Let's see, it's been nearly fourteen years since King of the Ring 2001 - Angle's probably due out of prison for Shane McMahon's murder soon.

You can hear his skull hit the concrete. You can hear it. For fuck's sake!

The decent human being in me says the match should have been stopped. The wrestling fan in me says SHANE KICKED OUT! HOW DID HE EVEN DO THAT!?

Another note: Shane can actually wrestle. Not "for a non-wrestler" wrestle; wrestle wrestle. Spinning DDTs. Arm drags into the barricade. A shooting star press!

God, that match is still astonishing. I forgot. I thought I'd never forget but I did.

Good first pick, I think.