WCW Monday Nitro 1995

[ElDuderino]

I decided about a week ago to make it my mission to watch every single WCW Monday Nitro as well as the PPV's that ran during that time.

So far I'm 2 months in. I've watched Fall Brawl 1995 and just watched Halloween Havoc as well as all of the Nitro episodes in between and I have to be honest, I'm torn... I'm torn on whether or not this is truly the worst television that I've ever watched or if it's so bad that it's kinda good. As ridiculous as the Dungeon of Doom was, there's a campiness to the whole angle that I'm kind of enjoying. Maybe I'm ironically enjoying it?

One redeeming quality I've noticed is the "B" storyline has so far been really compelling and yielded some pretty awesome matches. Take Fall Brawl 95 for example. Ric Flair vs Arn Anderson was a great storyline and an amazing match that was seemingly overshadowed by the awful War Games match that preceded it. The Flair/Anderson feud eventually evolved into Flair & Sting vs Anderson & Pillman, culminating in a tag match at Halloween Havoc which was vastly superior to the main event and most of the other matches on the card.

WWF on the other hand actually seems like it may have been worse. I'm going mainly on memory and what I've seen in the Wrestling Bios "Reliving The War" YouTube series... But to my knowledge, while the Hogan vs Dungeon of Doom storyline was playing out, the WWF's main storyline was more or less "Diesel and Shawn Michales are cool and they beat up everybody!"

What's even worse is my all time favourite wrestler, Bret Hart, was engaged in the "B" storylines. Those storylines included Bret fighting a pirate who stole his coat, followed by Bret fighting Jerry Lawler's dentist. Now, he had pretty good matches with those guys but they pale in comparison to the angle of the horsemen imploding and reforming to screw over Sting.

I don't know, am I crazy or was WCW better than WWF at this time? Maybe my opinion will change when WWF moves into the Bret/Diesel/Undertaker angles...

What are your thoughts? Keep in mind all of this WCW content is for the most part brand new to me. In Canada in 1995, only the really rich kids had TNT and TBS... So needless to say I didn't see much WCW back then.

 

[TDFG]

It's around this time that WCW stopped showing on ITV in the UK so this is were I kind off stopped watching WCW, trying to get their PPV's on VHS was a nightmare in the UK too. I was getting most of my info from WCW or Powerslam magazine.

You've a bit to go before you hit the NWO era, but looking back, wrestling in general at this stage was in a bad state, WCW was taping at Disney, trying to breath life into Hulkamania with wacky angles which were well past their sell by date.

WWF wasn't any better, to be fair Hogan was obviously gone, Perfect & Dibiase had retired, Savage was gone, LOD, Nasty Boys, Demolition were all gone so they were rebuilding and all over the place.

Keep with it though, it gets better. Although if you try to make sense of WCW's booking you will end up in an asylum.

 

[ElDuderino]

if you try to make sense of WCW's booking you will end up in an asylum.

hahaha, so true!! The infuriating part is how close they were to having a really great product. Like, the cruiserweights, the New Japan guys, the Lex Luger heel/babyface question even the tease of a Hogan / Sting feud were all really compelling. But then there was always something like the Yet-tay or a three ring battle royal or a dumb war games match or just anything at all involving Kevin Sullivan that got in the way.

Also, I don't know why Macho Man gets such a bad rap during this time. I thought his matches and promos leading up to Starrcade 95 were all really good. I'd totally have watched WCW with Macho Man as it's champ.

 

[TDFG]

I don't know why Macho Man gets such a bad rap during this time. I thought his matches and promos leading up to Starrcade 95 were all really good. I'd totally have watched WCW with Macho Man as it's champ.

His 3 title reigns were wasted, harsh on Macho Man as he should have had at least one lengthy reign as Champion.

A bit of brains in creative and things could have been so different.