WIRTB Review: King of the Ring 1995

Guess who's back, back again? SOTB!!!'s back, tell a friend.

After some EOTR Role Reversal Roulette, I've returned with a somewhat easy WIRTB Review (don't worry, I'm going to get back to the Souled Out series...maybe. I mean, even I can only take but so much punishment). In 1995, WWE sucked more than Sunny in an ECW locker room. 1995 WWE sucked more than a fifty-nine year-old former porn star usually does at trying to portray herself as a squirter...or halfway attractive from the asshole up at this point (and even then, we're completely pushing it). 1995 WWE sucked more than the hookers on St. Paul Street in Baltimore around 5:30 in the morning. Hell, I'd even put the International Incident and 1996 WWE higher than 1995 WWE. At least by 1996, we knew that WWE blew loads and lowered our expectations accordingly. Plus, 1996 WWE at least had the first "Austin 3:16" promo.

Yes, it does, Stone Cold. Yes, it does.

Anyway, let's get into it. Live from Philadelphia, PA, it's King of the Ring 1995 aka The Fat Ass That Gravity Forgot.

Our first match of the evening is Savio Vega and Yokozuna with Razor Ramon and Mr. Fuji and Jim Cornette in their respective corners. This match is for the KOTR quarterfinal. There's nothing to this match really. Savio gets the win subbing for an injured Razor. Yay, I guess. My give-a-fuck-ometer is already reaching empty. Savio was never a bad or good talent. He just...existed in WWF/E.

Next up? The Roadie Dogg--err, I mean, The Roadie and Bob Holly. This match was solid, until the finish. The finish was just...no. Just no. Did Vic Venom have a hand in this one? Nope. Russo didn't become part of creative until 1996. This is all...well, who-the-fuck-ever was in charge at this point.

Afterwards, Shawn Michaels and Kama end up fighting to a draw. Now, let me get this straight: one of your hottest talents in the company, he draws. But, he draws to a man who, at this point, is still relatively low-card. He fights to a draw with the Proto-Boogeyman. He fights to a draw with the Ho-less Ho-Train-engineering Godfather. He...y'know what, it can't get worse, right? Michaels lost, but at least Kama is a fucking menacing force, somewhat. He's a big black guy, and we all know big black guys in WWF are usually fucking menacing savages who kill everything in sight...and whatnot.

But, it can't get worse, right?

I think that the Wrestling Gods hate me because I forgot that this was the PPV where Mabel defeated The Undertaker. The fucking Undertaker, a legend, a wrestling god, was defeated by a man who was essentially a jobber that got a bigger chance because he was a bargain bin Kamala (in other words, big black guy who you could portray as an angry big black guy with savage tendencies). Seriously, Nelson Frazier, later in his career, may he RIP, was able to do his own thing. But here? He's Kamala mixed with PN News. 

Plus, his matches at this point were more botch-prone than a Survivor Series 5-on-5 match with 10 Bella Twins clones and Summer Rae officiating. I mean, for fuck's sake, he (maybe, per Kevin Nash) injured Rikishi! If you're out there injuring the Samoans, you know you're fucking up. They're supposed to be impenetrable. He even broke Taker's orbital bone, which led to Phantom of the Opera Taker, but still. Nevertheless, Mabel defeated Taker to move on to the KOTR Final.

After that bit of infinite sadness, we're treated to, essentially, a nothing match between Savio and Roadie--even though it determines who goes to the KOTR Final. It wasn't bad, it wasn't good. It just existed. Even though Savio was booked to be the underdog, I couldn't get behind him--at all. Maybe it was the "Batista/Roman Reigns winning the Royal Rumble over Daniel Bryan" vibe that the Mabel/Taker match had, but I could've given zero shits about this match--and that still would've been too many.

After the previous PPV (IYH 1, which I WIRTB'ed a few months ago), we get yet another Lawler/Hart match because everyone in the land brayed with glee at the idea being tossed in our faces again. This time, we get a Kiss My Feet match. What is it with Vince and having one grown man kiss another grown man's body part? I mean, yeesh. There have been countless "Kiss My Ass" matches over the years for no damn reason other than "hurr-durr, sophomoric humor. Derppp Vince like this, so let's keep at it." Hell, Lawler's been involved in a good portion of these clusterfucks.

Now, I wouldn't be as mad at this match if it were kind of a quick squash. But, it goes on for almost ten minutes. That's not even counting the fact that the feud itself had gone on for years before this! At least from this match and feud, we got Isaac Yankem, D.D.S., who evolved into Kane (but not before some sort of match involving a shark cage?!) and still trolls the upper-midcard to this day. Seriously. People talk about Big Show being involved too much. Have you jackholes met Kane?! Even when he's used up his last bit of usefulness, WWE pumps life back into him, injects him into an upper-midcard-to-main-event-level feud/storyline, and lets him linger up there for months (sometimes years) on end. Why? Because they don't have shit else to do with him and they feel bad letting him ease off into the sunset because he's KANE! But, it can't get worse...right?!

We still have close to twenty-five minutes left in this fuckery. However, for the PPV to be called King of the Ring, the KOTR match isn't the main event. That's like having WrestleMania and having the main event be Machine Gun Kelly perform some shit-tastic "rap" music. Or like having Machine Gun Kelly, a skinny white guy who Kevin Owens could probably pick up and murderize with one hand in real life should it ever come to that, pretty much no-sell a pop-up powerbomb (the move which has knocked out quite a few Superstars thus far, including Jesus Juan Cena) like the piece of shit asshat that he is.

KO: "Lace up?" How about "lay down?"

Our last two matches feature 6 talents and maybe one of which can actually move in the ring in a way that doesn't look clunky, clumsy, or tears quads (there! Speed on the Beat finally made a quad joke. Now, I must be part of the IWC, right?!). 

First up, the KOTR Final which sees Mabel defeat Savio Vega to a sea of "ECW!" chants. Now, just last month, Savio was being pushed as a new breed of superstar. He saved Razor Ramon for fuck's sake. Now, four matches into the night (ugh), he's cannon fodder for Mabel? Ok, WWF. I'll bite. Where can I get the crack that you were smoking on twenty years ago? On top of giving Mabel the KOTR title, he ends up getting his top heel billing stripped because he wasn't ready and was dangerous in-ring? Sounds like someone from the past couple years, right? You'd think that WWE would learn from their mistakes once in a fucking while. But, noooooooo. We still get Ryback challenging for the WWE Championship a couple months into his main roster career, failing, getting repackaged ten times, then potentially finding his niche as an upper-midcarder who could still be a competent champion if booked correctly. We still get FAT ASSES pushed to the moon because they're big and tall and look larger than life, even though they move like shit. 

Newsflash, Vince and others. André the Giant, even in his later career, could wrestle circles around Big Show. Why? Many of the super big men of today aren't as agile or as good. It's like they, meaning the Wrestling Gods, stopped making 6'6"+ men who could still go in their mid 30s into their forties since they hit perfection with The Undertaker. He has the bigness of an André. He had the agility of an oversized Shawn Michaels. He can walk the fucking top rope. Sure, his matches against Brock and Bray have been meh. But, wouldn't your matches be meh too if you only went at it once a year? 

You know what? Fuck the last match. Just...no. Fuck it. The field in which I grow my fucks for Tatanka has been barren since I first saw his Indigenous American Ultimate Warrior ass as a kid. And, I don't think we need to ask the question I always pose. Fuck yes, it was that bad. From top to bottom, it was horrid. It was putrid. It was just shit. I'm about to break my WIRTB sobriety after this fuckery.