Welcome to another installment of my PPV Review... it's magical! This PPV is sponsored by ECW Hardcore Revolution: THE VID... er, wait, that's the next PPV.
Seeing as how most of the other matches were totally screwed by the booking, I'll go with this as the best match of the night. The match started off fast, with both exchanging chops and punches. Angle had a nice looking drop toe hold, which dropped Jericho into the bottom rope. Jericho turned the tide and hit his springboard dropkick. They brawled around the outside with the highlight being Jericho being whipped into the stairs, only to jump onto them and execute the springboard moonsault! Back in the ring, Angle took control with a belly to belly and a sleeper. Angle fought out of it and hit a double underhook suplex into a backbreaker. The momentum shifted between the two over the next few minutes, but when Angle tried a hurricanrana, Y2J turned it into a double powerbomb. At some point, Jericho hurt his elbow, and Angle capitalized on it by working it into a nice series of submission moves. Jericho made a brief comeback, but Angle hit his finisher. However, he only got a two count. Angle went for the IC belt, but the ref took it away and Jericho slapped on The Walls of Jericho. Angle fought to the ropes, and Jericho had to break the hold.
Me: Well, both their finishers have been executed and failed, so you know what that means: Screwjob!
Croooooow: Oh Chyna!
They went to the outside, where Angle tried to hit Chyna: Warrior Princess with the Euro belt. She ducked, (and I nearly typed 'She dicked') and Jericho hit Angle who sandwiched Chyna into the ringpost. While the ref checked on her, Angle and Jericho went back to the ring. Jericho went for a springboard moonsault, but Angle raised the IC title into Jericho's face as he came down, and Angle covered Jericho for the win.
Rating: ***
We all wondered why HHH and Cactus were introduced first, and didn't get to hear the nifty Cell music. When the Cell actually came down, we figured out why. The Cell door had padlocks on it so that Cactus wouldn't be able to get out. It started with standard brawling which I won't describe too much. Somewhere during the course of the match, Cactus threw the stairs at HHH. They missed, but made a hole in the Cell. They brawled around to the announcer's position where Mick piledrove HHH onto the English announcing table! Oh my God! They didn't even come close to breaking the English announcing table! You bastards! To get away, HHH climbs the Cell (gotta love that logic). Cactus tells the timekeeper to skee-daddle and grabs a 2x4 wrapped in barbed wire. It had a strap on it so Jack could climb the Cell with it. He does so, but makes the mistake of throwing the 2x4 up as he scales. HHH grabbed it and hit him in the face. Cactus pulled a Shawn Michaels and let go of the Cell! Oh Dios mio! Mataron al vector espaoñol de la anunciación! Tú bastardos! Amazingly, Cactus got up and climbed the Cell again. HHH was waiting and hit him with the 2x4 a few times. HHH suplexed Cactus on the Cell, and Cactus rebounded with his Double Arm DDT. He then lit the barbed wire 2x4 on fire! If only the Hardcore Hamster were a wrestling fan! He hit HHH in the face with it and signaled for a piledriver. However, HHH countered with a back bodydrop, and Mick went through the top of the Cell and made a dent in the mat! HHH climbed down the Cell to see if Cactus was all right, and Mick moved. He crawled over to HHH, who picked him up and gave him The Pedigree for the win. A decent match, but it's hard to enjoy a match when you're hoping one of the wrestlers doesn't kill themselves. A lot more actual wrestling than the previous Mick Cell match and the surprise factor wasn't as high. We knew Mick would do something crazy, but we didn't know what. If this is Mick's last match, I wish him luck in the future and thank him for his efforts over the years.
Rating: **3/4
This match itself could have been the best one of the night, but the ending and the angle around it pretty much killed it. Terri came out on SNH to seek the help of the Acolyte Protection Agency, and Faarooq, Faarooq, Faarooq is on Fire! and Bradshaw came out to watch the match. Too much action to describe (well, actually I'm too lazy to describe it all) but the momentum went back and forth, with the Hardys double teaming Christian for several minutes, and then Edge came in and the momentum reversed, with Edge and Christian working over Jeff Hardy. Classic tag team storytelling. A brawl erupted eventually, and the Hardys tried a Doomsday Device on Edge. Edge countered with a victory roll, and Jeff hit Christian setting up a double pin. Both members kicked out, and the Hardys laid out Christian and hit their Tidal Wave/Rolling Thunder legdrop/splash combo from opposite corners. Edge broke up the count, and the ref concentrated on Christian and Matt. Jeff went up top for his Senton Bomb, but Terri climbed up on the apron and shoved Jeff, who went flying into the guardrail! Matt came over to see what was going on, and Terri slapped him. Christian then hooked the moritano for the pin. Terri tried to raise the hand of E & C but they just walked away confused. When Matt tried to attack Terri, The Acolytes ran in and beat the hell out of the Hardys, which included a botched Dominator that pasted Jeff. In a post-match interview, Christian seemed upset about the way it ended while Edge shrugged it off. Da hell!? Why did Terri turn on the Hardys for no reason? And why did she leave with neither the opponents or the third party? And why were they teasing a E & C split? And why was Christian upset about it when he's the one that took advantage of the interference? Are we not thinking, WWF Booking Committee?
Rating: **3/4
Seemed like an off-night for Benoit & co. which is surprising considering their good matches with Too Cool over the past few weeks. Once again, too much action that I'm too lazy to describe. You wanna make something of it? Go here. He should have his detailed review up soon. Anyway, standard tag match, with the homeboys taking the early advantage, which was followed by a Worm attempt by Scotty. Malenko cut him off at the pass, as he did several times during the match, giving him the dickish role of the night. The Radicals went to work on Scotty for the next few minutes, but eventually Scotty and Benoit hit simultaneous clotheslines. Rikishi was tagged in, and cleaned house. He hit the Rikishi Driver on Saturn, and then Scotty did The Worm. Benoit took out Rikishi's ankle, but Rikishi fought through and lifted Benoit for a suplex. Malenko took out his ankle again. Grand Master Sexay went up top and he and Scotty executed the Hip Hop Drop on Satrurn, but the ref was elsewhere. Benoit broke it up with his swandive headbutt. Everyone except Rikishi and Malenko went outside, and Rikishi was able to execute his butt drop from the second rope for the pin.
Rating: **1/2
Here's where match quality drops off. It was no holds barred, so I'm sure everyone had a pretty good idea of how it went. X-pac eventually hit the X-Factor, but Paul "I'm a human waterbed" Bearer distracted the ref. When X-pac nailed Bearer, he ate a clothesline from Kane. Tori tried to distract Kane, but Kane didn't notice, and chokeslammed X-pac. Tori tried to interfere, but Kane Tombstoned her again. Kane picked up the ring steps (because Lord knows we haven't seen those used enough tonight) and X-pac dropkicked them back into his face. X-pac laid the steps so that they trapped Kane's shoulders underneath and leaned on the steps for the pin. However, the steps didn't get the chance to celebrate its victory, since its only means of movement left the ring.
Rating: **
In the greatest thing I've ever seen, the Road Dogg tried to do his dancing jab, but Buh Buh countered with a full nelson slam! I've been yelling at the other wrestlers ever since the Dogg started doing that. "Just hit him, dammit!" Billy Gunn seemed to favor his shoulder during the match. He hit the FameAsser on D-von, but Buh Buh pulled him outside the ring. He smashed Gunn's arm with a pipe (billy club!). It's a pun! Laugh! Buh Buh got back in the ring, where he and D-von hit 3D and got the pin. Not a spectacular match, but it got the belts off the Outlaws. Billy club! Laugh!
Rating: *3/4
This one went so long that I wasn't even paying attention until the weird ending. The Rock was thrown into Earl Hebner, and Tim White came down to officiate. However, Earl didn't like this, and pulled Tim out of the ring. (High pitched voice) Ref fight! Ref fight! Suddenly, No Chance in Hell played and Shane McMannequin was back! Wait... there's more. Shane threw a chair at the Rock as he was doing the People's Elbow. One of the refs made it back in just as BS covered Rock for the three count. Yet more confusion!
Rating: *1/4
This match was made on Heat, after an interview with Mark Henry. Henry sighted Mabel in the distance (how could one miss him?) and charged. They exchanged blows.
Me: (as Mabel) Hey, I'm just getting a cup of coffee!
Croooooow: Mommy, the bears are fighting!
Anyway, on to the match. (English accent) Here we observe the endangered Rhinoceros in its natural habitat. When two male rhinos are in heat, they will fight to the death. Mabel hit his spinning heel kick that must have gotten him three centimeters off the ground, which was followed by more controlled falling. Outside they went, where Mabel tossed Henry into the steps. I guess it's true that rhinos can't corner well. The match ended somehow, but we didn't see it because the WWF cameras decided to take a coffee break and therefore earned my gratitude! The black screen was a hell of a lot more entertaining than this!
Rating: *
Match? What match? This lasted all of ten seconds before The Bossman and The Earl of Albert engaged in a five minute beatdown of Tazz. The gist of it seems to be that Tazz cannot be kept down. Or something.
Rating: *
Overall PPV Rating: **1/4
Definite sub par effort. Too many "The hell!?"s and not enough decent action to deliver a good PPV. This one fell just below average just when the momentum from the last two PPVs seemed to promise that this would be one of the WWF's better PPVs.