Steve Austin got himself fired, X-Pac got himself the European Title and Vince McMahon debuted a beloved catch phrase in a pretty poor show.
Well, this show sucked, so lets get this over with. The night began with Al Snow getting his turn at making Marc Mero look like an idiot, even with Jacqueline at ringside he was no match for the leader of the JOB Squad.
Next saw LOD 2000, a short lived combination of the ill fated Droz (read my review of the Breakdown PPV for a more detailed explanation) and the formerly great NWA tag Team the Road Warriors Hawk and Animal defeat the Disciples of Apocalypse, who were a bit of a fore runner to the biker Undertaker, though he was way cooler. DOA never achieved much success and were not great wrestlers. This match was not great.
Next match saw a rare PPV match for the Light Heavyweight Title (the most recent one had been at Wrestlemania 14 in March). Defending champion Taka Michinoku putting his belt on the line against Christian, who was having his first PPV match and winning. The Light Heavyweight Title never really took off in the WWE and would be a joke title by the end of the year, just as would happen to the Cruiserweight Title 9 year later. This was probably the best match of the night so far, and it was not all that good.
Next saw Dustin Runnels, back to being Goldust and avenging his loss to Val Venis at the previous PPV. This was a decent match. Terri's explosion at her husband for "ruining her life" was a highlight.
Next up saw the latest match between D Lo Brown and X-Pac in their feud for the European Title. X-pac had won the title from Brown and then lost it back. Here he would win it again in an average match with a nice finish, X-Pac countering a leaping shoulder block with a bronco buster to get the pin.
Next up saw the New Age Outlaws retain the tag team titles by disqualification against the Headbangers. The most memorable part of this was Road Dogg introducing the Outlaws. Not a good match, and haven't you read that a few times in this review? Next came a memorable match as Ken Shamrock defeated Mankind to retain the Intercontinental Championship. The match is well known for the ending where Mankind, caught in the Shamrock ankle lock with no hope of escape, gave himself his own mandible claw move and knocked himself out. Shamrock snapped when the referee announced he'd won by mandible claw and beat up the referee.
The next match advanced the Rock as a singles wrestler in spit of losing to his former Nation of Domination crony Mark Henry. The Nation had just kicked out the Rock and the crowd was firmly on his side, even after the loss, though he had not embraced the fans and officially turned good. Henry wins thanks to interference from D Lo, another former Nation member.
Brings us to the main event in which Kane took on the Undertaker for the vacant WWE Title with former champion Steve Austin as guest referee. Austin had lost the title at the previous PPV when Kane and Undertaker had pinned him simultaneously and had been forced to be the guest ref here. McMahon told Austin that if a new champion wasn't crowned he would be fired. The two have a pretty ordinary match until Paul Bearer, who had been affiliated with Kane walks out and smashes him with a chair. Austin refuses to count the three, much to the Undertaker's annoyance. Austin stuns Taker when the big man complains, counts down both men and declares himself the winner. McMahon appears on the screen and utters the famous line "You're FIRED," for the first time. Austin commends McMahon for his courage, and walks out, apparently unemployed, and still no champ crowned.
What next??? Hopefully a better show than this one.
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