Retro Mania - Four

It’s 1988, and some more funky graphics and weak 80’s ‘rock’ herald the start of Wrestlemania 4, live (well, 21 years ago) from Trump Plaza, Atlantic City. Yup, old wiggy from The Apprentice was involved with Mania even way back then.

This year, Gene Mean greets us from the middle of the ring, welcomes us to Wrestlemania, and hands over to Gladys Knight to sing us into the show.

America is Beautiful, shining seas, cutaway shots of famous buildings and bald eagle, grace being shined, and we’re out.

The biggest trophy in the world ever is brought out, which is apparently for an Invitational Battle Royal, and we all know the rules about big trophies. If they are presented, they get smashed on someone’s head. It’s the law.

Gorilla (he’s said ‘happening’ twice) is with Jesse, dressed like Crocodile Dundee’s camp brother, and Bob Uecker is back. In fairness, he was pretty good the year previous, so inviting him back and not Susan “Uh-oh” St James is a good call.

Battle Royal participants – Bret Hart, Jim Neidhart (The Hart Foundation), Jim Powers, Paul Roma (The Young Stallions), Sika, Danny Davis, B. Brian Blair, Jim Brunzell (Killer Bees), Bad News Brown, Sam Heuston, Jacques and Ray Rougeau, Ken Patera, Ron Bass, Junkyard Dog, Nikolai Volkoff, Boris Zhukov (The Bolsheviks), Hillbilly Jim, Harley Race and George Steele.

Steele starts on the outside for some reason, and starts by grabbing the Anvil on the leg. Sam Heuston is out first, and Sika follows soon after. The announcers missed the first one because they were talking Baseball, and then Uecker worryingly says “Uh-oh” three times. Steele hasn’t got in the ring yet.

Steele pulls Anvil out while Jesse and Uecker talk about Vanna White, a glamourous TV show........person. I don’t really know. The Rougeaus and Killer Bees start eliminating each other, with only Jacques surviving. JYD slings Bass, and Steele glares at him. The Animal still on the outside, and Gorilla thinks he has been eliminated, while Jesse thinks he has been outside all the time. I agree with The Body, for example.

Hillbilly Jim is next out, and in the ring Davis is getting the most heat. He is thrown out to the crowd’s delight, and then Jim Powers exits stage left. Nikolai is flicked over by Patera, Zhukov comes in to avenge him partner, and he in turn is thrown out. Five left – JYD, Bret, Harley, Paul Roma and Bad News Brown.

Harley disappears and has run his race after a shot from JYD, and then Brown rids the ring of Roma. Bret and Bad News, both out of Stampede and both heels at this point, double up on the Dog as is traditional at the end of a Battle Royal. But usually the face gets rid of one heel after a mix-up –in this case they just throw him out. After the heels celebrate, Bad News hits Bret with a blind inzugiri.

Bret now begins to do what he did best, which is sell like a mad thing, and make the big guy look good. He does this very well, because Bad News throws him out in short order. We get so used to clever and elaborate finishes to Battle Royals these days that this seems really tame.

Bret isn’t happy. So much so that he comes back in the ring and dropkicks Bad News out of there and then (surprise, surprise) kicks the trophy to pieces. The crowd cheer for this – was this the start of the babyface turn?

Ueck is then off to find Vanna, and we’re left with Gorilla (who says happening again) and Jesse, who talk over Howard Finkel. They’d get fired for that now.

Howard is basically explaining the rules of the tournament, and hands over to Robin Leach (I don’t know) to give a proclamation. Howard says Leach is from the Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. I guess that is a TV show. I thought it was a Good Charlotte song. Leach (who I’m pleased to note is English) waffles for a bit and says “whereas” a lot.

Hacksaw Jim Duggan then emerges as the first competitor in the tournament, followed by Ted DiBiase, who has Virgil and Andre with him. The announcers seem surprised to see Andre, I guess because Andre is in the tournament.

I should explain that the tourney is a King of the Ring like setup to decide the champion, since the belt was vacant after an Andre v Hogan match on Saturday Night Main Event ended in a BS finish. Andre has sort of won, and handed the belt to DiBiase, who had supposedly “bought” it. But the ref was screwy, and this was actually a scripted Hebner double-cross, and not like in Montreal nine years later.

Duggan basically punches and kicks for a bit while Ted overbumps, and in the end DiBiase (who was a terrific wrestler) basically is dragged down to Duggan’s level and does little but the same, with the odd elbow drop and clothesline.

Eventually Duggan takes control and readies himself in his famous three-point stance, but Andre casually trips his ankle. That was genuinely the best piece of outside interference I’ve ever seen, as Andre just tripped Duggan and then looked totally nonchalant. The ending is a bit off, because Andre punches Hacksaw who gets kneed in the back and fistdropped by DiBiase, but the ref saw the Andre punch, so should have simply DQ-ed Ted. Oh well. Duggan is gone, DiBiase progresses, and will later face the winner of the next match.

Brief interview with a rambling Brutus Beefcake, who apparently will be wrestling Honky Tonk Man later. Maybe that’s for the title of “Greg Valentine’s worst ever partner”. Or maybe the IC belt. One of the two.

Dino Bravo – an Italian born Canadian entering to the strains of the French national anthem, with the ridiculous-looking Frenchie Martin as his manager. He will face Don Muraco, accompanied by Superstar Billy Graham.

The match is very 1980s WWF. Two big guys wrestling slowly and hitting power moves. It’s fine for what it is, but you get the feeling that the biggest start involved in Graham, so it’s quite off-putting. Bravo hits his signature Side Slam after a ref bump, and when the ref comes to he disqualifies Dino. It’s hard to see why on first glance, and Gorilla starts to say it is because he pulled the ref in front of him to take the bump from Muraco rather than him. This is indeed the case, as we see after a replay, but shouldn’t it have been made to look more obvious? Never mind.

To Uecker, still talking about Vanna White backstage, and about interview Jimmy Hart and the Honky Tonk Man. It’s standard stuff, with Uecker saying that Hart will lose his hair. Is it a hair match, or is it just because Brutus has a Barber gimmick?

Steamboat against Valentine next. The Dragon has Rey Mysterio with him, I think. Oh wait, no, it’s a very small child. Not sure why, must be his son.

The match is decent, and midway through Jesse says that a friend of his in California thinks that Steamboat will win it all. He then name checks this wrestling expert as Barry Blaustein. This goes no further, but Barry Blaustein is the guy who made Beyond the Mat.

The match ends when Ricky hits his trademark flying cross-body but Hammer rolls it through for the pin. Nice finish. I like seeing stuff like that that is clean, but sneaky, and comes out of nowhere.

Gene Mean has The Bulldogs and Koko B Ware with him. Davey and Dynamite seem to have their dog with them, but Koko is sans Frankie. They all basically say they are going to get Heenan.

Butch Reed is in the ring with his manager Slick, and then Macho Man’s awesome music hits. Savage is babyface at this point, and gets a major cheer.

I like Reed and Slick in this one. They nicely play their schtick over the top to make it like a pantomime, and draw some nice heat to contrast the very over Savage. Reed dominates with power moves early but Savage turns the tables after Reed takes an eternity getting to the top rope. Macho Man throws him off and then quickly hits (well, he missed, but pretended he hit) his big elbow, and that’s it. He progresses by hitting about three moves.

Uecker keeps on talking about Vanna white backstage, when Heenan shows up with The Islanders. I don’t really listen to what Bobby says, because the actions of Haku are interesting me. He simply rubs his hands together and stares at the screen, but does it so unflinchingly it is very odd.

In the ring is One Man Gang, once again with Slick, and his opponent is one of my favourite big guys of all time Bam Bam Bigelow. Bigelow works as a babyface here, which was a rarity for him. He is also the smaller man here, because One Man Gang was huge.

Bigelow’s manager seems to be Moolah with a fake beard. Oh wait, it’s Oliver Humperdinck. Bigelow generally dominates, but loses via a count-out after Slick low bridged him and Gang didn’t let him back in the ring.

Hogan talks at Gene Mean is probably his best Wrestlemania interview thus far, ranting about Andre and explaining why he’ll win the tournament.

Bobby Heenan leads Rick Rude to the ring next for another Tournament match. Rude grabs the mic and explains that “the odds are in my favourite”. Ok Rick, whatever you say (or said).

Familiar eerie music can only mean the imminent arrival of Jake the Snake, and this oughta be good. Both guys had their character off pat, and it shows right at the start when they lock up, only for Jake to simply stand aside and let the Ravishing one fall on his face. Quality.

The match is full of holds, counters and mat wrestling, which I enjoy but some of the crowd don’t buy into. Eventually Rude settles into a pattern of sitting on a reverse chin lock, but Jake hits the big comeback. He often tries to get to a DDT but can’t lock it in. They haven’t picked up the pace and the match is suffering.

In the end both men hit each other and look exhausted. I’m just thinking that the commentators could make more of the fact that both guys look out of it, and should they go through this would hinder them. However, Rude pops his feet on the ropes for a pin. The ref counts one, then rings for the bell. So Rude wins and the ref can’t count? Or maybe Jake is awarded the match because the ref catches Rude cheating?

Nope, draw. No explanation, no reasoning, just a draw. Both men are out. Even then, Jake doesn’t get the natural post-match revenge, as Rude and Heenan escape Damien’s clutches. That was a let down.

After Gene Mean tries in vain to make Vanna White sound interesting (I’m sure she was terrific on Wheel of Fortune, and she’s very pretty, but isn’t able to sound like she knows anything about wrestling) we go to Ultimate Warrior v Hercules in a “wrestling” match. This ought to be a “HGH on a Pole” match.

This gives new meaning to word ‘boring’, and very slowly these two bumped into each other and pretended they were clotheslines. In the end, Hercules had Warrior in his full nelson, and Warrior flipped backwards off the turnbuckle with the agility of a cat, and looked phenomenal in cradling Herc in a pinning situation.

Of course I’m joking.

Warrior sort of bounces off the corner, falls backwards onto Hercules, and the pair of them lie there as though Herc has Dragon Suplexed Warrior. The ref begins to count and Warrior raises a shoulder at two, with Herc still down. The bell rings, Herc thinks he has won, but Warrior’s arm is raised. That was hardly a squash from Warrior, so it’s interesting to see that he didn’t get a consistent monster push from the off.

Extensive Hogan/Andre video package follows this, which is both good and bad. It is very detailed, going back over a year to when their animosity started, but the clips shown aren’t very clear. You don’t see Hogan winning at Mania 3, the famous Saturday Night Main Event controversial finish which led to tournament isn’t fully explained, and all this would be helped by a clarifying voiceover. Exposition was never Gorilla Monsoon’s strongpoint, so all this build-up is kind of pointless as people either know why things have got to where they are without the video, or are no confused because of it.

Anyway, it’s as you would expect for Hogan v Andre. Hogan has to sell for much of the match, which he of course isn’t totally adept at. Andre was nigh-on immobile by this point, and the mystique of this match must have gone after two previous high-profile encounters in the previous 12 months.

Andre doesn’t seem to have much heat from audience, but Hogan is met with a decent reception. This crowd is one of the quietest Wrestlemania crowd ever. DiBiase and Virgil accompany Andre, and interfere to such an extent that a chair ends up in the ring. Use by both men means that we get a double DQ. Hogan attacks Virgil on the outside and hits the weakest suplex ever, in the aisle. Basically it looks like crap because Virgil put his feet down before he hit the deck and Hogan didn’t fall back and take the necessary bump either.

Hogan slams Andre for the hell of it, and celebrates.......erm....for no good reason but to pop the crowd a little, I guess. This takes like five minutes, with even the commentators getting bored.

Savage promo next, and he bigs up Hogan before stating that he’ll win the tournament. I think he did, anyway, he isn’t always easy to understand.

Muraco v DiBiase now, officially a quarter final match but since Hogan and Andre are gone it’s basically a semi, because the winner would get a bye in the next round. Winner of this is straight to the final.

In the end, DiBiase wins it reasonably cleanly, catching Muraco from the ropes and hitting him with a move we would now call a Hot Shot, used to call a Stun Gun, and back then they called a clothesline.

One Man Gang is forced t come to the ring to get his hand raised in a forfeit, and then it’s Valentine v Savage for a chance to meet the future Akeem.

Midway through the match Valentine hits a shoulder-breaker, now there is a move you don’t see often anymore.

Savage’s intensity is good in this match, and he looks like he is desperate to win. He does, rolling Valentine up in an inside having blocked the figure 4.

More Vanna nonsense and then out comes Honky Tonk Man, dancing to his famous music and accompanied by “Peggy Sue” and Jimmy Hart. Brutus is out to take him on, and however you want to knock both Ed Leslie and Wayne Ferris these two guys were pretty over.

Monsoon, as ever, calls him Bruti, which I never understood.

The match is satisfactory. It’s hardly a work of art, but it has enough little dips and peaks to make it reasonable. However, it’s yet another BS finish, because Brutus has the sleeper on Honky, having avoided HTM’s dreaded neckbreaker, but Jimmy Hart levels the ref. Some dull post-match activity is highlighted by Brutus cutting Hart’s hair. DQ means Brutus wins but doesn’t get the title.

Backstage to Bob Uecker, who speaks to Andre, who seems happy to have dealt with Hogan. He then throttles Uecker in that now-famous scene.

Generic jungle drums and birds tweeting means it’s a vaguely racist, or at least offensively stereotypical, south pacific gimmick. Heenan leads to the ring Tama and Haku, The Islanders, who along with Heenan with wrestle The British Bulldogs and Koko B Ware with their respective pets. Heenan has some sort straight-jacket-like top on, presumably to defend against the bite of Matilda the Bulldog.

Savage battles One Man Gang next, and, guess what, another DQ. The Gang goes after Savage with a cane soon enough, and although a distraction means the ref misses the first couple of swings, he catches the big guy cheating and this one is over. Savage is in the final.

Backstage to Gene Mean and Vanna, who excuses herself because she has to go to the ring. Cue Uecker to turn up looking for her seconds later. He says that she wrote letters to him, and when questioned by Gene, says “yeah, a guy called Vance White.” What, a guy called Vance White? He thinks a guy was writing to him? My God, if this had been picked up on he caught have been brought back to manage Billy and Chuck. Nice to know the comedy was lame even so long before Gerwitz turned up.

Back to the ring, and shoddy dubbed in music greets Demolition, who will take on the Strike Force team of Rick Martel and Tito Santana. Demolition get the upper hand until Tito hits “the patented flying forearm” according to Gorilla. Where do wrestlers go to patent moves? How do you even get that passed?

Demolition (heels) win after manager Mr Fuji creates a distraction and allows Martel to get clobbered by a cane. New champs, and yet another match which doesn’t have a satisfactory flow to it. Maybe I’m being harsh. What is becoming evident is that a late 80s PPV contained matches very similar to a modern-day TV show. Mania now is so much more fulfilling, and WWE should be given credit for creating compelling PPV TV that both satisfies and intrigues.

Main event time, and here come the celebs. Bringing the belt to the ring is Robin Leach, to irritating piano music. He is either trying to show the belt off either side of the aisle or he’s drunk, because his path to the ring is not a straight one.

Next is Uecker to “Take me out to the Ball game” to be the announcer. He humorously swings at a pretend pitch and then looks behind as if he missed it. That’s pretty funny. Then a drunk guy (not Leach) appears in the aisle and hugs Uecker. Bob doesn’t mind, but security do. Heeeeeeeeeeee’s Outta Here!!

Here comes Vanna to a bigger pop than some of the babyfaces on the roster. Probably because half of the audience are high-rollers at the casino and not wrestling fans. Uecker looks happy, which is strange because Vanna is hot, and very much not a dude.

Andre grabs the ankle of Savage early in the match to the annoyance of the audience, who start to cheer for Hogan. That would actually make sense, although it’s quite annoying for Savage that he is the new guy trying to be put over as top dog but people still want Hulk.

To be fair, the match is very slow. It’s understandable since the guys have already worked, especially Savage, and would be legitimately tired and would have to sell it anyway. Savage goes to jump onto DiBiase on the outside but Andre stands in the way. Randy goes over to Liz and tells her something. The crowd understand what is happening as while she is disappearing up the aisle they start cheering for Hogan.

Sure enough, she re-emerges with the Hulkster to be in Randy’s corner. I know it was years too early and would have made no business sense, but wouldn’t it have been cool for Hogan to join DiBiase at this time?

Decent psychology here by wrestlers and commentators as they position Savage as trying to end things quickly and DiBiase trying to wear Savage down even more. To this end, DiBiase avoids a top rope elbow and slaps on his Million Dollar Dream. The ref is bizarrely distracted by Andre, though, and this allows Hogan to come in and slam DiBiase with a chair. What the f.....? Damn that was a heelish manoeuvre, and hardly makes Savage look like a worthy champ does it?

Elizabeth is either genuinely overcome with emotion or does a great job acting like she is crying. Gorilla is also emotive, as he says he has “Goosebumples”, whatever they are.

They celebrate, and we’re out for Mania number four. A poor show, it has to be said. Star power at a premium in the tournament, and way too many dodgy finishes. Would it have killed One Man Gang or DiBiase, or many other folks for that matter, to simply lose cleanly? Really?

Bizarrely, with such a dead crowd, we’d head to Trump Plaza again the following year, where once again Savage and Hogan featured heavily in the main event.......

Retro Mania - Wrestlemania III

Wrestlemania III is often talked up as being the best of the early Wrestlemanias, and this is likely due to two things. One a quality wrestling match, the other an iconic moment. We will get to them in due course.

We start this event, which took place in March 1987, with some delightful cheesy 80s graphics and music, and in the ring is Vince, with his famous “Welcome to Wrestlemania III”. He hands over to Aretha Franklin to sing America the Beautiful. She would show up for Wrestlemania twenty years later looking like Rikishi, but even as a non-American I have to admit this version is pretty stirring stuff.

Over to Gorillia, who has Jesse dressed like Jake the snake’s gay friend, and two celebs. They are “Entertainment Tonight’s Mary Hart” as Gorilla says with a petrified look on his face, as if he didn’t know who she was and was desperately making sure he didn’t forget. Also with them is Bob Uecker, who my research tells me is a baseball player-turned-actor-turned-broadcaster, who starred in a series of adverts. Ok.

Can-Am connection (Rick Martel and Tom Zenk) are up first in the daylight of the Pontiac Silverdome, in Michigan, to face Don Muraco and Bob Orton, with Fuji in their corner.

Before the first bell rings, Gorilla has called Wrestlemania “This happening” four times.

The babyfaces (Zenk and Martel) are in control early on, and Monsoon says that Zenk has “the excellence of execution”. Wrong Canadian, Gino.

This match doesn’t last long, and considering the prestige of the individuals in the heel corner, they get very little offence in. Can-Am wins in short order, with the old playground trick of one guy bending over behind someone who is reversing. In this case, it’s not a push but a cross-body that topples Muraco.

Off to Gene Mean for a chat with Bobby Heenan, who brings in his charge, Hercules Hernandez. Herc says that he brought Samson and Atlas down, which is mixing all kinds of things up, because Hercules was a Roman mythological figure, Atlas from Greek mythology and Samson biblical.

He faces Billy Jack Haynes, he of the big tall black hat and the only man I’ve heard of from Oregon, or at least that talks about Oregon.

The combatants come to the ring in those little carts shaped like a wrestling ring, which I’d completely forgotten about. I’d love to see those return for one time only.

This is allegedly the battle of the full nelsons, since each man had the move in his repertoire. That doesn’t fill you with confidence since that tends to be a move used by lumbering (allegedly) roided up monsters – Warlord, Chris Masters etc.

As expected, this is a slow on, full of slow, ponderous power moves, and not even one with a satisfactory ending. Haynes eventually slapped on his full nelson, but both men fell to the outside, and Haynes turned out to be from that stupid brand of babyfaces that can’t count, because he didn’t release the hold and they both got counted-out. Swell.

Heenan interjects after the bell, causing Haynes to be distracted and for Herc to nail his adversary with a chain. Bizarrely, Haynes – remember this is a relatively low-interest second match with a draw ending – blades heavily. Hercules puts the full nelson on, and then leaves. Very dull, and very puzzling.

And to make matters worse, a replay of the first chain shot is shown, and you can see Haynes blading if you look closely.

Uecker is with Gorilla and Jesse for this next match, and for one competitor it’s quite the fall from grace. King Kong Bundy was in the main event with Hogan last year, and now he’s accompanied by two midgets (Little Toyko and Lord Littlebrook) to face Hillbilly Jim and his two partners of restricted size, Haiti Kid and Little Beaver.

Imagine if Lawler got to call a match involving a little Beaver. Carnage.

This ‘contest’ is basically midgets running around and bumping into each other quite a lot, then Bundy tagging in and them running around him. Jesse is constantly calling for Bundy to squash the little guys, with Monsoon typically sounding shocked.

I was expecting to see Bundy chase them to no avail and see Hillbilly Jim stop him, but instead Bundy gets fed up of Little Beaver tormenting him, so slams him and drops an elbow. That was hilarious. Bundy gets DQ-ed and all the midget show their scorn for him. How dare he. So that’s three matches, and only own clean finish so far.

Next is Harley Race v Junkyard Dog. Heenan is back along with Harley, who is King of Wrestling at this point, and has the music we now associate with Jerry Lawler. Moolah is with Race and Heenan, proclaimed as the queen of pro wrestling, and Uecker excuses himself from the announce position because he wants to get with Moolah. Ohhhhh-kayyyyy.

The stipulation, says Gorilla, is that the loser must bow down to the other man. Now, people far more learned than I wax lyrical about these two, both hall of famers. All I’ll say is that I’ve seen little of both guys, but in what I have they don’t seem to be up to much in my eyes. It looks like two sixty year olds fighting, and it ends after Harley hits a very soft belly to belly and the ref does an unconvincing count.

JYD is supposed to bow down post match, and although he does, he then grabs a chair and blasts Race. I hate that, I never think a babyface should do this unless majorly provoked. Otherwise what distinquishes between good guys and bad?

Back to Vince backstage with Hogan, who yammers on about riding a bike and having people say he’ll lose, but it’s generally nonsense with “brother”, “man” and “Dude” liberally sprinkled within the dialogue. Even Vince looks at Hulk as if to say “what the hell are you on about?” The message is essentially that he’ll beat Andre, I think.

Back in the ring are Jacques and Raymond Rougeau, who are talked about in positive terms by Gorilla and vaguely cheered, so they must be face at this point. I liked them when they did the All-American Boys heel gimmick. They are against Greg Valentine and Brutus Beefcake, the Dream Team, accompanied by manager Johnny Valiant and, for some reason, Dino Bravo. Better to have Bravo doing this than wrestling. TNA love him, though, they are always talking up Bravo when I speak to them.

Ray Rougeau is the guy with the moustache who was on the French broadcast table when it still existed, and Jacques was later The Mountie. I’m not listing all the characters Brutus Beefcake has been because this site only has so much bandwidth and I’m going away in five weeks.

Midway through the match, just as the heels get the upper hand, Bobby Heenan appears alongside Gorilla and Jesse. The Brain claims two victories out of two, and Gorilla explains it is one from three.

In the ring, Rougeaus hit a double team move on Valentine, but with the ref distracted Dino Bravo nails Raymond and rolls the Hammer on top for the win. For some, not really explained reason, Brutus isn’t happy with this. Valiant, Bravo and Valentine celebrate outside, and Beefcake looked pissed off. The other three leave Brutus behind for no good reason. Was this a babyface turn?

Next up is Adrian Adonis v Roddy Piper, and nice to see Adorable Adrian get a match with Piper rather than Uncle Elmer like last year. Piper admonishes Adonis for wearing a dress, but seems to miss the irony that he wears a skirt.

Adonis has big shears and Jimmy Hart a mirror, with the premise being that the loser of this match has a haircut. Piper is now a babyface, as you can probably tell. The commentators talk up the fact this is Piper’s last hurrah, and that he is leaving wrestling after this match. Ironic given that this is twenty two years ago, and we was on Raw three weeks ago.

Adonis and Piper start the match trading shots with a leather belt before Piper gets the upper hand, frequently using Jimmy Hart as a weapon and sending the crowd into raptures. Man, Piper just has always had a connection with the fans. Two years prior to this he was a staggeringly good heel against Hogan, and now he is being cheered hugely.

Adonis gets the upper hand, and the commentators keep talking about him getting “Goodnight Irene” on Piper, which is a sleeperhold. Another match where both men have the same finisher. Hart sprays some perfume in Roddy’s face, and Adonis puts on his sleeper.

Adonis and Hart celebrate when they think they have won, but Piper didn’t drop his arm. That actually makes far more sense that the usual miraculous comeback which makes no real sense. If the move is applied and puts a guy mostly to sleep, how would he comeback while the hold is still on?

Anyway, while Hart and Adonis celebrate, Brutus Beefacke appears to massage Piper’s shoulders, and Roddy slaps on the sleeper and gets the win. Brutus begins to shave the Adorable One’s hair, while Piper stands on Jimmy Hart. I guess this is the start of the “barber” gimmick, and explains why Brutus meekly turned face in the previous match.

Beefcake does a terrible job, since Adonis loses very little hair, but the crowd go nuts for Piper, who would then depart to go and make a few average to poor films.

A fan runs in to celebrate with Roddy, and Piper seems delighted to shake his hand. Then two security guys come in and kick the shit out of the intruder. Oh well.

Next, Ventura heads to ringside to be introduced to the crowd, and to wish the heel team in this next six-man tag match. They are The Hart Foundations, tag champs at the time, along with Danny Davis. This was Davis’s debut, after he had been an evil referee for some time. He had been allegedly suspended forever at this point, as an official, but he’d be back soon after his brief wrestling tenure. The story was that he’d cost The British Bulldogs the tag titles, with the Hart Foundation profiting.

The Bulldogs are two-thirds of the opposing team, along with Tito Santana. The trio in the commentary booth are Gorilla with the two celeb guests, Mary Hart and Bob Uecker. They have to be given credit, actually because they are a million miles from Susan “uh-oh” St James, and actually add a little to proceedings. They let Gorilla do the talking and chip in where necessary.

It turns out Davis is quite the heel , because the crowd, although entertained by the fun tag team exchanges with the other five, go nuts when Tito starts hammering him. Davey Boy takes over, even hitting a early Tombstone (Taker was in World Class at the time) and having the former ref beaten before Anvil breaks it up.

Typically, though, the dastardly heel gets the decision, as while the other four are fighting, Davis procures Jimmy’s megaphone and cracks Davey Boy in the head. Strangely, the commentators don’t actually see this, and it takes a replay for them to realise.

Backstage, Gene Mean has Andre and Heenan with him, and Bobby is superb here. This is where great managers came to the fore, because he talks his man up something terrific here, and Andre’s frame says the rest.

Slick is in the ring with Butch Reed, and he’ll face Koko B Ware. Creature number two at ringside, after we’ve already seen the Bulldogs with, erm, a Bulldog. Why isn’t Koko the Macaw Man, and not the Birdman?

This, unfortunately, is another match of big guys doing basically the same punch, kick, slam, backdrop match. Reed wins after Koko’s cross body is rolled through. Slick lays into Koko post match, but Tito makes the save and for some reason tries to take Slick’s clothes off. The Doctor of Style runs away, and the two babyfaces dropkick Reed out of the ring.

Next is Randy Savage v Rick Steamboat. Footage of Savage attacking The Dragon is shown, and then a doctor, apparently Dr. R Jeremy, says that Steamboat’s recuperative powers are amazing.

Savage was IC champ at this point, so these two will be tangling in a title match. He hits the ring first, and I don’t care how many times I hear it, I will always love Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1, otherwise known as Land of Hope and Glory. It is one of the finest pieces of music I know, and I believe contributed majorly to one of Savage’s babyface turns, which we will witness in about four Manias time.

This was, as it is always said to be, is a classic. Savage is perfect as the arrogant misogynistic heel, the Dragon the virtuous, athletic babyface. The match is based on a storyline with feeling, and is performed with such precision timing one cannot help but marvel. It goes to and fro so many times, I cannot possibly explain it in linear fashion.

Basically, if you have never seen this match, find it, watch it then rewind it and watch it again. It’s terrific. Steamboat wins with a small package.

Jake Roberts, with Alice Cooper, takes on Honky Tonk Man next. No sign of his brilliant theme song we’d come to know and love.

This is quite a fun one. It’s not a classic wrestling match like the one before, but Honky’s infectious personality gives the bout a flow, and the roll up victory by HTM with the aid of the ropes is redeemed when Alice Cooper and Jake pour the python over Hart.

Gene Mean announces the dubious indoor attendance record, and then it’s time for....Gorilla to call it a happening again.

Tag team action next, and it’s flag waving nasty foreign bad guys Iron Sheik and Nikolai Volkoff. The big Lithuanian starts to do the Soviet anthem as usual, but Hacksaw Jim Duggan heads out to give Americans a bad name like he normally does. He isn’t wrestling, though, he’s just interrupting. The Killer Bees those charged with taking on the Sheik and Volkoff.

It’s typical tag action for several minutes before Duggan decides to go chasing Volkoff. Sheik has one of the Bees in a Camel Clutch when Volkoff runs through the ring, Duggan in pursuit. Hacksaw smacks Sheik with the wooden plank, and this one is over, with the Killer Bees disqualified. More idiocy to have good guys cheating and acting like morons. Never understand this.

Back to Bobby and Andre, who predict victory, and then some background on the feud. More ‘wise’ words from Hogan, and then Bob Uecker is brought out as special guest ring announcer. Mary Hart is timekeeper, and then Heenan, resplendent in white, seconds Andre to the ring for the biggest match of The Boss’ life.

Jesse calls it the biggest match in the history of professional wrestling. You are used to hearing that kind of hyperbole from Tony Schiovane, or Michael Cole, or Jerry Lawler, but in this case Jesse Ventura is probably right. At this point, this may well have been the biggest match ever.

Hogan hits a right hand, goes for a slam and Andre falls on him. The Frenchman then dominates for the next five minutes or so. Hogan briefly rallies with a few right hands which elicit the biggest response of the night, only for Andre to boot the champ and then clamp on a bearhug.

Hogan makes a vague comeback and the action spills to the outside. He removes padding to expose concrete, and laughably tries to piledrive Andre on the concrete. Andre of course counters, and Hogan takes one of the weakest backdrops of all time. Back in the ring Hogan basically runs into Andre who bumbles backwards. On their feet Hogan slams Andre, and a legdrop later it’s over.

Frankly, it wasn’t good to watch, but it is completely wrong to judge this by aesthetics. Just one look (and a listen) at the crowd and you can hear what they think. Hogan was just so over at this point that he was almost the sole attraction. As long as Hogan was winning it was all that mattered to people, so if Steamboat and Savage entertained on the undercard then cool, but as long as the people went home happy with a Hogan victory, as was becoming Wrestlemania tradition, that was what mattered.

Overall, this was not a great PPV. It had one great match, an entertaining six man and a half decent Jake v Honky match, but most other matches were slow and ponderous.

Not it’s cracked up to be, frankly, but the Macho Man v Steamboat match is everything people say it is and more.