Hell in a cell match memories

[tiger_rick]

Seems an appropriate topic given the next WWE PPV and (as Herbie reminded me) yesterday was 17 years on from the original HIAC match between Taker & HBK at IYH:Badd Blood 1997.

 

I still think that original HIAC match is the best. I also still think it's the best match Taker & HBK ever had. It's sensational. It's novel, brutal, paced superbly, twists and turns and then delivers one of the best debuts I've ever seen. It's just one of those matches that doesn't let up - enthralling. Pretty sure it would make my favourite five matches ever. I remember watching it time and again afterwards. Michaels was an incredible heel in that period. Him beating up the cameraman was one of those things that's so shocking you believe it.

 

My next favourite would be between the awesome Undertaker/Lesnar blow-off and Trips and Batista which I absolutely loved but haven't seen since.

 

So favourite and least favourite matches? Various spin offs are fair game for discussion too.

 

There's a sporcle quiz where you have to name the participants of every HIAC match here -> http://www.sporcle.com/games/rockgolf/Ultimate_hell

[Callum1993]

My favorite is probably the Lesnar/Undertaker one. Foley and Taker is brilliant for the spots obviously. I think the majority of those held under the 'Hell in the Cell' PPV banner have been pretty poor. It was better when the cell was used to end feuds now it seems like it's just another gimmick match.

[LaGoosh]

I can't think of a particularly good one that has actually been enhanced by the cell since the start of the PPV. Most are just generic hardcore matches that just so happen to take place inside a Hell In A Cell. The Armaggedon 6-man is fucking great except for Rikishi's bump into sawdust. Just mental brawling from start to finish with everyone getting busted open throughout. I love the bit where they all go over to the entrance set of old cars and just starts smashing eachother to bits. And then at the very end Rock and Austin finally come face to face for the first time in over a year or so and everyone goes fucking nuts. Also love that this huge wild match has Kurt stealing a sneaky cheap win at the end. Awesome.

[TheShowOff]

After the Royal Rumble 2000 match I was very excited for Cactus Jack / HHH at No Way Out and I thought it was built brilliantly. 

[HarmonicGenerator]

68/69 on that Sporcle quiz. Had no idea that

 

 

Mark Henry

 

 

had ever been in a Cell match, plus it gave me the realisation that I've only seen a fraction of all the Cell matches there have been. Most of my answers on the quiz from the past five years (not all, but most) were a case of just writing in main eventers' names, whereas if you asked me in 2006 or earlier I could have named every HIAC encounter, its participants, when it happened and probably who won.

 

Anyway, my first exposure to Hell In A Cell wasn't actually watching a match. It was reading about the King of the Ring 1998 match in Mick Foley's first book. I still think that chapter is Mick's best piece of writing, and he really made that match sound so dramatic, so emotional and so must-see that I... well, had to see it. Eventually, I did - I think it was on his Hard Knocks and Cheap Pops DVD (which also featured Kennel From Hell, which surely shouldn't count as a Cell match, but I guess 'spin-off' covers it) - and it didn't really live up to the book, but it was still such an impressive feat. The making, and the almost-killing, of the gimmick at once. It ruined my perception of 'how a Hell In A Cell should be' for a while - that match, plus playing them on SmackDown 2 gave me a perception that if there wasn't a bump off the top of the Cell it wasn't a 'proper' HIAC. Which is stupid, but so was I.

 

The Bad Blood match with Undertaker and Michaels is one of my favourite ever matches too, Rick. Possibly my favourite-favourite, for all the reasons Rick has already described. Action, drama, KANE, both men at their absolute best.

 

I saw Cactus Jack vs. Triple H at a later date (I prefer their Street Fight but it was an ideal use of the gimmick as the ultimate feud-ender, back when that was what the Cell was meant to represent... though that's probably a discussion for another thread. Was HIAC ever really given that perception or is that something I've projected onto it?) so the first Cell I remember really being around and watching properly for was Armageddon 2000. Which I've still never watched all the way through, but I remember the build-up and remember being really, really hyped and desperate that my mate David could record it on his Sky Sports. Which, I think, he said he did but that it got recorded over. And yet No Way Out 2001 survived intact. No justice. Anyway, the Rikishi bump was big news at our school, and just like Foley's book, was possibly made out to be rather more dramatic than it actually was. Fair play to Rikishi for it though, still a mad thing to do.

 

Believe it or not (I'd rather not since I don't think it's held up particularly well), Triple H vs. Jericho at Judgment Day 2002 was one of my favourite matches for quite a few years. There hadn't been a Cell match in nearly a year and a half, so when Vince announced "HEEEEEEELLLLLL.... INACEEEEEEEELLLLL" on SmackDown, I could not wait. I had Sky Sports by this time and I could watch it! I loved it - the career-ending injury to Tim White was shocking, the blood, the Pedigree on top of the Cell (it didn't matter if nobody went over the side or through the mesh because they were fighting ON TOP OF THE CELL) and, most vividly, a barbed-wire-bat shot to Jericho's head which got caught in his hair and stuck there for several seconds afterwards. Brutal. It is still one of my favourite Jericho matches, at least.

 

I saw No Mercy 2002's Cell match, too, and that's had the opposite change of heart for me. Hated it at the time (no big bumps, blah blah fapper nonsense, like I say, I was stupid) but like it a lot more now. Lesnar looked like a beast and, though I didn't realise it at the time, this was the moment I bought him as a top guy. The cast angle worked really well, and the blood, Christ, the blood... the closing visual of Lesnar and Heyman atop the Cell is strange foreshadowing of his dominance this year, in a sense.

 

I still had Sky Sports in June 2003, so I sat through that year's Bad Blood (the Redneck Triathlon... I shudder at thinking the time I lost forever watching that) for Nash vs. HHH. And I actually quite enjoyed it, I was quite sad when I became a forum-goer and discovered it wasn't well-liked at all. Maybe it was the rose-tined 'Hell In A Cell matches are always good' idea that was still floating around in my head, but it wasn't half-bad. No big bumps though, and I was starting to go off the Cell matches. But I've not seen many more since, and at least after this one I got the idiotic idea out of my head that someone was supposed to dive off the thing to make it worth doing.

 

Michaels vs. HHH I would have happily watched because I tried to keep myself under the misguided impression that every match they had would be the equal or superior of Summerslam 2002, and because I missed Three Stages Of Hell so this would make up for it. I can't remember anything that happened, though, or who won, so either it didn't turn out well or I never actually saw it. Batista vs. HHH in 2005 was a good'un, as was Undertaker vs. Edge in 2008.

 

I'd got sick of Orton fighting Undertaker and Batista fighting Undertaker in 2005 and 2007 respectively, so I don't think I ever saw those matches, and the DX vs. McMahons & Big Show one was probably the first Cell match I really wasn't bothered about. And here comes the point where my Cell knowledge gets really sketchy. Looking at Sporcle, a few matches I can recall happening (DX vs. Legacy, Undertaker vs. Punk, Punk vs. Ryback), and one I definitely remember seeing - Undertaker vs. Triple H at WrestleMania XXVIII, which I liked but not as much at XXVII's classic. It had great drama - the SCM-Pedigree near-fall combo - and a wonderful ending, and while it didn't necessarily need to be in the Cell, it was as a good a 2010s use of the gimmick as anything else. It felt appropriate.

 

The rest, I can barely remember at all. Orton and Cena had a Cell match? Orton and Sheamus? Orton and Henry? Del Rio and Cena? Even Undertaker and Kane... Not an inkling.

 

So, to answer Rick's question:

 

Favourite: Bad Blood 97

Least favourite: hard to say. Probably DX and the McMahons. I really wasn't keen on DX06.

[Sphinx]

Good post, HarmonicGenerator (Harms for short?)

 

It's not moronic for you to think every Hell In A Cell match should have bumps off the side and through the cell when the first one you saw had that. That Hell In A Cell will never be topped for how mental it was and they had to be careful to make people not expect it all the time. Of course, HIACs shouldn't need massive bumps like that, but you weren't alone in feeling that. As you said, the games let you do all that too so it felt natural.

 

My first exposure was Taker and Michaels, but quite a few years after it took place. Loved it then and haven't watched it back in years. Like Harms (testing the waters), I read about the Foley HIAC in his book before watching it a couple of years later. I was about 10 or 11 when I read the book and it completely engrossed me. I got the Greatest Hits and Misses DVD when I was 13 and it probably exceeded my expectations if anything.

 

After Batista vs. Triple H, it all becomes pretty meaningless. It's very hard to keep the match fresh and thus a selling point when it's used all the time. I argued with a mate that Punk and Ryback never faced off a second time in the cell, so that shows how memorable that was. What kind of numbers has the PPV historically done? Is it one of the better performers?

 

Loved Taker vs. Lesnar at the time. Might need to watch that back soon. Latter half of 2002 was lush (other than Armageddon).

[Supremo]

All this talk about Hell In A Cell bumps, and considering some of the bumps Seth Rollins has taken this past year, jumping of balconies all over the place, does anyone think he might do something off the cell?

[Jon-Carr_92]

I wonder if Mick Foley wishes he had a penny for every time WWE used a certain clip of a certain fall through a certain announcer's table?

[Fanny Pack]

Ive just read the post on Mania 28 in the HHH match thread and it has to be HHH v Taker with HBK ref. If I could get away with copying and pasting that post I would because it was a crackin post and match.

 

Goin thru all the cell matches its interesting that Austin and Rock never had a 1 on 1 cell match with anyone.

[Professor Paul's Bin]

I'm a massive fan of the Edge Vs Undertaker HIAC from Summerslam 2008 and this could possible be my favourite. I didn't even watch it live. I ended up watching it a few years back on dvd, after not watching much of 2008 I had no idea what happened and who the winner was. Plus the Edge/Taker PPV matches throughout 2008 were all quality.

 

I hope to see some more love for this match. I always look at is as a conclusion/ending to the TV-14/Ruthless Aggression Era where there was one last war.

 

One of my favourite matches of all time really.

[HarmonicGenerator]

Ive just read the post on Mania 28 in the HHH match thread and it has to be HHH v Taker with HBK ref. If I could get away with copying and pasting that post I would because it was a crackin post and match.

 

Goin thru all the cell matches its interesting that Austin and Rock never had a 1 on 1 cell match with anyone.

I can't figure out how to link to individual posts on my phone but this page of the Triple H thread has the review in question: http://ukff.com/topic/132408-triple-h-reviews/page-5

[King Pitcos]

One I loved that seems fairly forgotten is the DX vs McMahons and Big Show one from 2006. I think it was the debut of the big tall cell, to stop people expecting falls off it (which didn't work). But a cracking match, that had a bit of everything. And ended with Vince's head being shoved up Big Show's arse.

[CleetusVanDamme]

The first, Triple H vs Batista and Triple H vs Undertaker are the elite tier.

 

It shows how great a gimmick it's been when you still have loads of great matches below them, Triple H vs Cactus, the 6 man (aside from Kish's bump into the cornflakes), DX vs Legacy, Edge vs Undertaker and the massively underrated Nash vs Triple H war.

 

I can barely remember anything about any of the ones since 2009. Just the awful finish of Undertaker vs Kane and the death of Ryback. Brock vs Cena should have put an end to that but isn't happening for whatever reason.

 

The cast angle worked really well

The World's Worst Cast stuff knocked it down a few pegs. From "Owie, it hurts when you touch the cast!" to "Oh no now my bare hands exp... Wait, that's helped!" *punch, punch, punch, chokeslam with the magically healed hand*. Between that, the build (false labour!), the aftermath (RESPECT!), and the fact that they had a guy they were trying to portray as an unstoppable beast try to run away. All make it one of the most confused matches ever. Definitely a Heyman production.

[Onyx2]

It's not the cool answer but I really do like the Foley / Taker match from King of the Ring 98. I know you're supposed to prefer the Michaels one but each time Foley goes off the top my heart jumps into my mouth again.

 

It's at once the best and worst Cell moment. Worst because it has set a practically untoppable feat, that fires expectation that maybe, just maybe, this time something even more death-defying will happen. And somehow best because like the Montreal screwjob the more you learn about it, the more incredible it becomes. The whole thing seems over after about two minutes, but carries on for twenty more.

 

And the less impressive but more physically destructive slam through the roof. Two epic "bumps" (that word is too soft for what happened) in one match.

 

So much of it is stuck in my brain on instant replay whenever I want it, but I can still watch it over and over. JR screaming that Foley is broken in half. Funk being slammed out of his shoes to buy time. The cell going up. Mankind getting off the stretcher. Each time I get goosebumps, I'm exhilarated, I'm in awe of Mick's resilience, admire Undertaker's aloofness, and I still care so much about what happens next. It's not a perfect match, but it's an astonishing spectacle and exactly the sort of thing wrestling gives me that nothing else can.

[Trout Stain]

Mankind v Undertaker for me too. The commentary makes it even more spectacular than it already was with all the ridiculous shenanigans going on. "As God is my witness he is broken in half". "He's dead." "Will somebody stop the damn match". Phrases that just beautifully transcend into everyday life and told the story perfectly. He genuinely could have been dead.

 

Angle winning the six man remains one of the highlights of my teenage days watching any form of wrestling. All these huge names beating the utter bejesus out of each other, blood everywhere, Rikishi lying in a gigantic packet of Shredded Wheat that has spilt everywhere and Kurt goes and gets the win. Brilliant