Figured I should probably actually fact-check myself:

I guess somehow I turned "higher" into "he rated it five stars." Oops.

Anyway, silly thing for me to focus on to begin with since we're all in agreement about the overall greatness of it. I'd be happy to smack moorobot around for the fact that he's the one person I know who hates the post-match segment, but unfortunately he seems to not be around anymore.

Going through that thread that I linked, I said that I added Brock vs. Punk to my 5* list. Three days ago in The Imp's drunken stupor, I said I had it at ****3/4 so I could see saying I had Savage/Warrior at 5* at some point. I don't think it's that high though.

After what appears to have been an intermission, Gorilla sends it to Regis Philbin backstage. He's joined by The Undertaker and Paul Bearer. Neither will answer his questions. Undertaker just keeps measuring Regis as if for a bodybag or casket.

Regis kicks it to Alex Trebek, who is with the Smash+Crush version of Demolition, as well as Mr. Fuji. Smash defensively insists that it's "Master Fuji," not Mr. Fuji. These guys make Trebek uncomfortable, so he sends it back to Regis.

Regis is joined by Kitao and Tenryu. He tries to interview them, but they're totally unresponsive until they smile at his mention of the word "Toyota."

Back to Trebek, who gets frightened into running away by Jake the Snake, who teases him with the snake.

Alright, we're finally going to get back to action.

Yeah I'm probably bed-bound soon. Will finish this up tomorrow.

Great moment

Demolition (w/ Mr. Fuji) vs. Genichiro Tenryu & Koji Kitao

This is one of the weirder matches in Mania history in its setup. Demolition were legends, long-time faces, and at the last Mania they won the Tag Team Titles for the third time to a massive pop. Afterward, they added Crush as a third man, sort of organically turned heel in their summer feud against the Hart Foundation (in which they dropped the titles), quietly reunited with Mr. Fuji, and shifted from their legendary theme music to something darker and less memorable. By the time this Mania rolled around, Ax had been phased out, and the team was Smash and Crush.

Kitao and Tenryu had not made one appearance on WWF TV. They were being sent over for this event due to an agreement between WWF and Japanese promotion SWS. The most infamous thing to come out of this agreement occurred when Kitao faced off against Earthquake in a singles match in Japan.

Cliffs, courtesy of thehistoryofwwe.com:

Link to the match

(this incident occurred eight days after this Mania)

...so anyway, the crowd was supposed to accept Kitao and Tenryu as faces against the legendary Demolition here. Let's see how that goes.

Demolition jumps Tenryu and Kitao before the bell. We end up on Crush vs. Kitao. As Kitao wrestles Crush into the ropes, Smash jumps in illegally and attacks, drawing Tenryu in. Gorilla notes that the referee is losing control of the situation early, and amidst a distraction, Fuji gets up on the apron and hits Kitao with his cane. "Mr. Fuji working over his own countryman. I like that!" -Heenan.

Crush hammers Kitao in the lower back, then tags to Smash. Repeated axhandles, a right hand, a tag back to Crush, who enters with an ax off the top rope. Bodyslam, and...the crowd is utterly dead for this. They'll accept Demolition as heels, but they aren't buying Kitao and Tenryu as faces, so basically we have a heat segment where nobody cares at all whether the "hot" tag gets made.

Kitao is able to pull a surprise clothesline out, and he quickly tags Tenryu. Tenryu works both of the Demolition, but ends up missing an elbow off the top rope. Crush with a backbreaker, tag to Smash, Demolition sets up as if to hit their Decapitation finisher, but Kitao is in to run interference. All four men involved before Crush gets cleared out and Smash gets isolated. Tenryu hits an enziguri to the back of Smash's head, follows with a powerbomb, and Tenryu and Kitao score the pin to a barely noticeable pop. This served as a pretty sad little swan song for one of the great WWF tag teams of all time.



Result: Kitao & Tenryu via pinfall
Rating: 1/2*

Mean Gene is backstage with the Boss Man, who throws out a bunch of law-enforcement puns while declaring his intent to take the Intercontinental Title off of Mr. Perfect tonight.

Sean Mooney is with Mr. Perfect and Bobby Heenan, who has apparently teleported to the back in record time for this promo. Pretty enjoyable promo from these two, and now we're headed to the ring for this title match.

Intercontinental Title - Mr. Perfect (c) (w/ Bobby Heenan) vs. The Big Boss Man

Lord Alfred Hayes has replaced Bobby Heenan at commentary for purposes of this title match.

Perfect arrogantly flings his towel at Boss Man, who catches it and wipes his ass with it before throwing it back. Perfect spits at Boss Man, who spits back. Perfect slaps Boss Man across the face, Boss Man just smiles at him, and Perfect bails out of the ring. Boss Man follows him out, big right hand, and Perfect gives it the big sell as the punch lifts him off his feet.

Boss Man returns things inside, then flings Perfect around the ring by his hair. More right hands. Perfect reverses a corner whip, Boss Man shows tremendous quickness and agility for his size by taking a baseball slide to the floor, scurrying quickly back inside, and hitting a hard running clothesline.

Boss Man flings Perfect out over the top rope, and Perfect is left to regroup with his manager. Loud "weasel" chant breaks out. Perfect returns and gets more of the same from Boss Man, more right hands, but after a corner whip, Perfect is able to sidestep the big man. That only buys him a quick reprieve however, as Boss Man executes another hard corner whip, causing Perfect to take it as a big bump upon impact with the corner.

Boss Man does his legdrop along the ropes, and then he takes his own leather belt off and starts whipping Perfect with it. Lord Alfred protests this, as the referee just watches it happen and then scoots the belt out of there once Boss Man puts it down. Referee does admonish Boss Man a bit, but I've never understood how that isn't a DQ. In any case, the admonition from the referee bought some time for Pefect, who now goes on offense himself, attacking the Boss Man's ribs with significant effect; Boss Man is now doubled over and selling the ribs hard.

As Perfect slaps on a chinlock, I notice that Boss Man still has a belt on his pants. Was he wearing two belts or something, one as premeditated weapon and one backup belt to keep his pants on? Weird. Perfect transitions into an abdominal stretch, which he's able to get on pretty good despite the size difference. He eventually loses his grip on it, but puts Boss Man down with a nice standing dropkick.

Hard rights from the champion, who executes the signature snapmare --> neck snap combo.

Perfect goes for the Perfectplex. Boss Man blocks, counters into a small package, and he gets the near-fall from the surprise small package. Perfect is quick to get up and jump on Boss Man, slamming him down to the mat. He scales to the top rope, but jumps down into the Boss Man's raised boot.

Boss Man on the comeback now. Corner smash sends Perfect jumping backward in kind of a ridiculous oversell. The challenger flings the champion down toward the corner, then slips out of the ring and pulls the champ crotch-first into the ringpost. As is common, the babyface is doing more underhanded stuff than the heel. Boss Man has some nice momentum going, but allows himself to get distracted into stalking the Brain outside the ring, and it costs him dearly: Perfect runs up from behind sends him into the steel steps for a big bump.

When the referee isn't looking, Heenan gets in some cheap kicks on the fallen Boss Man. Suddenly we hear an upswell from the crowd, and we pan up the aisle to see Andre the Giant plodding toward the ring in an ugly shirt. Heenan scurries away as the action between the competitors has returned to the inside of the ring.

Perfect looks down and sees that Andre has picked up the Intercontinental Title. He's angry about it, and he protests to the referee. What's the referee going to do? When the referee isn't looking, Perfect leans down to try to confront Andre himself, and Andre clocks him with the belt.

Boss Man was still hobbled from prior offense, and he's unable to cover Perfect quickly. By the time he does, Perfect is able to kick out on two.

Immediately after this kickout, Haku and the Barbarian hit the ring and attack Boss Man to trigger the blatant DQ. Lame finish to a good match.



Result: Big Boss Man via DQ
Rating: ***

After the match, Boss Man goes and chases Andre up the aisle and forcibly turns him around as if he's going to take issue with Andre running interference in his match. Instead he raises Andre's arm, the two shake hands, and we have what looks like an attempt at a bit of a passing-the-torch moment between a legend and an up-and-comer.



Unfortunately for Boss Man, he never really got any further up the card than this going forward. He engaged in feuds with the likes of the Mountie and Nailz, and basically got lost in the midcard shuffle. In any case, I do think this was a fun match and post-match moment.

Mean Gene grabs an interview with Donald Trump. They agree that they hope to have another WrestleMania back in Trump Plaza very soon. That didn't happen. And now, speaking of passing the torch, here's a very special handshake between Donald Trump and Chuck Norris! And with the one and only Fonz watching on. I think we have ourselves a WrestleMania moment.



Moving along.

Earthquake (w/ Jimmy Hart) vs. Greg "The Babyface" Valentine

Valentine was the most unnatural face ever, and was obvious cannon fodder here. The two men lock up, Quake powers Valentine into the corner, picks him up and hits a big powerslam for an early two-count. Monsoon trots out his weird meme about Valentine taking 12-15 minutes to really get going in a match, which is exceptionally weird in an era where most matches were less than 10 minutes long.

Valentine dodges a corner charge and throws a few chops and elbows. Earthquake reverses a corner whip, Hammer tries to charge out at him, Earthquake whips him into the ropes, but a game Valentine does hit him on the way back. He throws a series of punches, a clothesline that staggers the big man, and an elbow off the second rope that finally takes Earthquake off his feet. Drops an elbow, feigns an attempt at a figure-four before dropping a headbutt, then actually goes for a figure-four before dropping it due to distraction by Jimmy Hart.

As Valentine turns his attention to Hart, Quake puts him down from behind, drops an elbow, hops around him, and we see the big Earthquake Splash (or whatever he called it) to put this thing away.



Honestly, a bit surprised they gave Valentine as much offense as they did, and turned this thing into a bit of a cheap win for Earthquake.

Result: Earthquake via pinfall
Rating: *

Legion of Doom is with Sean Mooney in the back. They rage for a bit at Power and Glory, who apparently cost them a title shot at the Hart Foundation. The back story is that the Nasty Boys won their title shot for this event in a battle royal on Superstars, and I guess Power and Glory dicked them around in some way. This is a revenge match for that.

Legion of Doom vs. Power and Glory (w/ Slick)

Hercules and Paul Roma jump the LOD before the bell, knocking Animal from the ring and double-teaming Hawk for a moment until Hawk takes them both down with a double clothesline. Animal returns inside, and we're doing four-way chaos from the beginning here as Animal hits a powerslam on Roma. He lifts Roma upon his shoulders, Hawk climbs the ropes, Doomsday Device, and this is a very quick squash match.



Result: Legion of Doom via pinfall
Rating: N/A

Next is a video package of Ted DiBiase treating Virgil demeaningly on multiple occasions, culminating in Virgil finally turning face at the Royal Rumble when he clobbered DiBiase with his own million-dollar belt. Rowdy Roddy Piper had begun serving as a mentor for Virgil during this period, and he's going to be in Virgil's corner during this WrestleMania match.

Ted DiBiase vs. Virgil (w/ Rowdy Roddy Piper)

Piper gets his own separate entrance, and he's out on crutches. Monsoon references a motorcycle accident as being the reason. Virgil has no entrance music as of yet, but he comes out to a big pop, and the crowd quickly breaks into a "Virgil" chant. Heenan says he looks like "George Foreman on Nutri-system."

Virgil fashions himself as a boxer, and he puts Ted down with a series of punches. DiBiase a bit out of sorts early, as he can't keep up with Virgil in this hand-to-hand combat. DiBiase eventually just bails out of the ring, realizing he needs to try a new strategy. As he re-enters, he lets himself get distracted by Piper, and Virgil slingshots him into the ring before clotheslining him back out over the top to the floor.

Virgil follows MDM outside and returns him inside, but this creates an opening for DiBiase to attack him on the way back in. Virgil does manage a back elbow and a two-count shortly thereafter though, and DiBiase remains rattled by what's warming up to be a serious upset bid. Virgil takes his old boss down from behind, basically getting 100% of the offense so far.

DiBiase finally slips in with a drop toe-hold, and he's at the advantage as he slams Virgil's face into the mat repeatedly. Chops in the corner, a back elbow, and a big clothesline off an Irish whip. DiBiase is very preoccupied with Piper outside the ring, even though Piper is apparently crippled and sitting in a chair. DiBiase hits a piledriver. And a suplex. Two-count.

DiBiase dumps Virgil to the floor, chops him against the guardrail in front of Donald Trump, and then pushes a crippled Hot Rod to the ground.



Back inside the ring, DiBiase powerslams Virgil off an Irish whip as Piper is trying to struggle his way to his feet on the outside. Piper does end up making his way up, and uses his crutch to pull down the top rope and cause DiBiase to tumble to the outside. DiBiase again attacks Piper, but he loses track of the count, and this fighting on the outside leads him to lose the match by countout.



Result: Virgil via countout
Rating: **

DiBiase attacks Virgil from behind after the match, slapping on the Million Dollar Dream. Piper struggles his way into the ring and finds his feet for long enough to crack his crutch over DiBiase's back, causing the hold to be broken. As Piper is going to attack further, we see Sensational Sherri run in from the back. She comes to DiBiase's aid, grabbing the crutch out of Piper's hand and allowing DiBiase to beat Piper back down.


He repeatedly slams the crutch down on Piper's injured knee until Virgil finally recovers enough to clear DiBiase and Sherri out. Those two leave together, looking triumphant over the damage they just did.

Piper's knee is completely gone, but he refuses help back to his feet. Virgil gets on the house mic and implores Piper to get up. Without physically helping, he encourages Piper, who summons all the strength he can find and does regain his feet, leaning on Virgil once he gets there.



This is a cool, well-executed moment that I had forgotten about. I wasn't always a big Piper fan, but his work on this night was tremendous.

We get some video footage building our forthcoming main event, as Sgt. Slaughter burned a Hulk Hogan shirt (in lieu of an American flag, apparently) on an episode of Superstars. Slaughter and General Adnan are backstage with Sean Mooney for a promo. Adnan says something or other in another language. Slaughter explicitly threatens to get disqualified or counted out in order to save his title tonight, which I can't say I remember any other heel threatening in the past.

But before we get to the main event, we have one more midcard match.

The Mountie (w/ Jimmy Hart) vs. Tito Santana

These two get right into it, running the ropes and colliding in the middle of the ring. Mountie goes to regroup with Jimmy Hart, leading Santana to go out and knock Mountie's and Hart's heads together. He returns Mountie to the middle, hits a big atomic drop, and connects on a right hand.

Jimmy Hart runs distraction, Mountie stuns Tito with his shock stick, and he records the pin in a very abbreviated match (total runtime of 1:21, only 22 seconds longer than LOD vs. Power and Glory). Mania was already running long, and they were probably lucky to not get knocked off the card entirely.



Result: The Mountie via pinfall
Rating: N/A

Mean Gene is with Hulk Hogan for the pre-match promo. Hogan says that he has lots of secret plans in place to take on Sgt. Slaughter. But are any of them truly a match for "getting counted out on purpose"?

They show footage of a beatdown Hogan took on TV just last week. Gene asks if he's still the same man after that. Hogan says no, and says he's done "a full 360." Somebody get that man a protractor.

It's time for our main event.

The three aforementioned celebs (Regis, Trebek, Marla) come out for the main event. Trebek is the ring announcer. Champ out first obviously, as Sgt. Slaughter makes his way out to the ring with General Adnan, who waves the Iraqi flag.

WWF Championship - Sgt. Slaughter (c) (w/ General Adnan) vs. Hulk Hogan

As Marla Maples rings the opening bell, Hulk Hogan chases Slaughter outside the ring and ultimately chases him into it. Slaughter only now removes his title belt and outer shirt, and we're ready to go.

The combatants circle each other, each slow to engage the first lock-up. They do finally engage, grappling into the corner. Referee Earl Hebner tries to step into the middle, and Hogan shoves him aside hard. Hebner gets up and jumps back in, and Hogan shoves him down again, of course with no consequence. The refs on this show are just letting themselves get shown up at every turn. Hogan finally powers Slaughter to the mat.

After a reset, Hogan slaps on a side headlock. He shoves Slaughter into the ropes, the collide in mid-ring to a stalemate, but on a follow-up collision, Hogan knocks Slaughter to the mat. Slaughter rolls outside, Hogan goes out and fights him on the floor, but then he gets baited into attacking General Adnan. Slaughter picks up a steel chair wrapped in something or other, he gently blesses Hogan with it from behind, and again Earl Hebner just watches this without issue. Hogan no-sells in any case, turning around and backing Slaughter down.

Hogan rolls Slaughter back inside. Sarge begs from his knees, seems to slow Hulk down, and he gouges the eyes to regain the advantage. The champ beats on the Hulkster, slamming him face-first into the turnbuckle. Back elbow off an Irish whip. He drives multiple knees into Hogan's head, but misses on an ensuing elbow, and Hogan is back up and back on offense.

Big clothesline by the challenger. He knocks an interfering General Adnan off the apron, then returns to work on Slaughter. Corner whip and a follow-up elbow. Atomic drop and a two-count. He rakes the back (that was always such a weird spot, particularly on someone wearing a shirt). Another clothesline gets another two-count. Hulk smashes his man into one turnbuckle, then takes him to the adjacent one and slams him further into the ringpost instead. He follows that with a slow-motion backdrop. Corner whip again sends Slaughter hurtling forward hard enough that he purportedly hits the ringpost (he doesn't really hit it, but that was the intent). Catapult, again into the post. WTF, is the psychology of this match that he's working the face to wear down Slaughter's ability to handle hard physical impact against unforgiving steel?

Hogan straddles Slaughter and rains down a series of punches. Corner whip and a clothesline. Corner mount and a ten-punch. This feels like an unusually long period of babyface offense, particularly from someone with a limited move set. Hogan gets another two-count after a turnbuckle smash. Hogan climbs up to the second rope, and an awkward sequence ensues. Adnan grabs at his boot, Hogan seems to just sort of talk him into letting up (it's as if he says, "brother, that isn't the spot," and Adnan relents), then Hogan comes off with an axhandle while Slaughter hits him in the gut. Hogan just continues forward, no-selling the blow from Slaughter and raking the eyes. Seems like people were on different pages there.

Scoop slam by Hogan. Drops an elbow. Twice. Hogan climbs the ropes again, this time to the top. Oh, and here's Adnan to grab his boot and create an advantage for Slaughter. Yep, they just totally went back and redid the same spot that Adnan thought they were supposed to do last time, and for some reason Hogan didn't go with it. Anyway, Slaughter uses this as an opportunity to fling Hogan off the top, and then he clotheslines him out over the top to the floor.

Slaughter posts Hogan, and again hits Hogan with a steel chair, this one not wrapped in any sort of padding. Earl Hebner again just watches this happen without issue. A second chair shot connects. Hebner resets his count for some reason, but the weapons are fine. Now Slaughter grabs a television cord and strangles Hogan with it for a while before returning him into the ring.

The champion hammers down with axhandles to the Hulkster's lower back. Bodyslam and then a backbreaker. Two-count. Slaughter gets in Hebner's face about the count, then hopefully whispers a thank you for looking the other way on the "no weapons" rule. Slaughter puts Hogan in a Boston crab about three inches from the ropes, and for some reason Hogan struggles and writhes in pain instead of just reaching out very slightly. He eventually does grab for the rope.