#50: Hulk Hogan & Randy Savage vs. Ric Flair, Arn Anderson, Lex Luger, Kevin Sullivan, Meng, The Barbarian, Z-Gangster & The Ultimate Solution, WCW Uncensored (3/24/1996).
This is the Doomsday Cage Match, where the Mega Powers have reunited to take on the Alliance to End Hulkamania. It's an 8 on 2 Handicap Match featuring Hulk Hogan as a babyface. Gee, I wonder where this is going.
Flair's Four Horsemen group and Sullivan's Dungeon of Doom teamed up to form one strong supergroup, in an effort to finally rid the wrestling business of Hulkamania once and for all. This is a triple tier cage, but the catch is that the cage - and the ring for it - are all up by the entrance. Does this make it a tad difficult for the live audience to see the action? Yeah, it really fucking does.
The seeds of the nWo formation are just over two months away still, and by god, it can't get here fast enough.
-Savage and Flair start out, while Hogan and Anderson go at it. The other members of the Alliance are in the other tiers of the cage. Flair with chops to Savage. Hogan is beating on Anderson. The cage floor looks...sketchy. Flair tosses Savage into a steel beam.
Hogan and Flair look like they're doing rest holds against the beam. Savage and Anderson go at it. Kind of hard to keep up with the action already! Almost like a three tier cage match doesn't fucking work, unless it's somehow Ready to Rumble.
Hogan rips his shirt off, and then hulks up against a Flair chop. Flair goes head first into the steel beam. I think Savage was forcing Anderson's face into the cage. I would be pissed if I paid to go to this event. How can they see any of this?
The rest of the Alliance is waiting, like they're fighters in some shitty Mortal Kombat knockoff. Hogan punches Anderson. The action so far is....not? It's just them going through the motions, spot for spot. This feels very choreographed. I don't mind it in spotfest style matches. Here, it's a big negative.
Flair with a sleeper to Savage, while Anderson puts the Figure Four in on Hogan. Flair with one of his own to Savage, but the Macho Man reverses the pressure, as does Hogan to Anderson. Hogan and Savage use powder to escape to the next tier. Flair and Anderson are eliminated from the match.
Hogan uses a chain on Kevin Sullivan. He and Luger double team Hogan. Savage fights off Meng and Barbarian. Hogan locks a door in the middle of the tier to prevent Meng and Barbarian from helping further. Flair and Anderson are trying to rejoin the match. This is an uninspiring clusterfuck. Anyone who discovered All Japan around this time is lucky.
Hogan tries to throw Sullivan from the scaffolding. Hogan and Savage fight Luger and Sullivan outside of the cage. They skipped the last fucking part of the cage? What about the final tier? At ringside, Hogan uses the mic on Sullivan. He doesn't even try to make it look convincing.
Boot to the face of Sullivan in the Ring. The final tier has been busted through! What's the point of the rules, again? Luger and Savage are fighting up by the stage. Hogan sends Sullivan into the cage. Hogan tosses a bucket at Luger, and Sullivan attacks Savage against the barricade.
Hogan and Luger fight in the Ring. Savage is chasing Sullivan with a 2x4. Hogan uninspiringly smashes Luger's head against the mat. This is all so uninspiring and lethargic. Hogan is supposedly fighting for his legacy against a team of villains that came together specifically to end him, and this match just feels like something you'd see on Saturday Morning Slam.
Hogan with a chair to Luger. Savage is choking Sullivan on the mat. Where the fuck are the rest of the people in this match? Oh. There they are. Z-Gangster and Ultimate Solution. Great names! Z-Gangster, being Tiny Lister from the Friday Movies, and that one prisoner from the Dark Knight. Oh, and he was Zeus in Hogan's movie, No Holds Barred.
Solution drags Hogan back to the cage, and Gangster drags Savage with him. Solution and Hogan are in the Ring inside of the cage. Gangster and Savage follow. More lethargic fighting. Gangster makes the cover on Hogan. And the ref doesn't count. What the fuck? Anderson with knees to Hogan, and Flair does a Greco Roman chokehold that would piss Taichi off. Anderson and Gangster send Savage into the cage.
Jimmy Hart is on the outside, and he is laughing hysterically. Flair sends Savage into the cage next. Brutus Beefcake is here, and he gives Hogan and Savage frying pans and they unload on the Alliance. Hogan goes to escape the cage, but Savage remembers that pin or submission ends the match, so he makes the cover on Flair to win.
What the actual fuck was that? It might be because I didn't grow up in the 1980s-early 1990s to actually see Hulk Hogan in his prime, but this shit fucking sucked. Is this what made him a worldwide phenomenon? Because if so, god help us all.
Okay, so maybe that formula works for him. It certainly brought the WWF a ton of money during their Golden Era. The problem I have with this is it feels so uninspired. I've said that a lot so far, but it's the best way to describe it. This is an 8 on 2 Handicap Match. These 8 guys are trying to kill Hulkamania. And Hogan is fighting to save that. So, you'd think there would be, I don't know, a sense of urgency?
There's not. This is plodding. It's a clusterfuck. And it's so blatantly obvious that Hogan is going to be the hero of the day at the end. Was it like that in 1996? I have no idea. But yeah, this sucked. I didn't like anything about this, and it's one of the worst matches I've ever seen.
That might be the problem with me trying to get into Hulk Hogan. On top of the fact that he's just a horrible human being all around, I just don't see the appeal of him as a wrestler. I totally dig the "less is more" factor in wrestlers - the guys who do nothing but make it count. Guys like Ricky Steamboat and Hiroshi Tanahashi excel in that field.
With Hogan, I just think it's pure laziness and selfishness. He's doing nothing because all he cares about is being the winner, and getting paid. Even with the ridiculous triple cage aspect of this, I think this could've been something if it were taken more seriously. Alas, what we get instead is a 25 minute clusterfuck that absolutely sucks in every way possible.
The nWo is coming shortly. And even though that fizzles out in the end, at least it means things in WCW would get better from here.