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Montreal - 20 years


garynysmon

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15 minutes ago, air_raid said:

Eh? There wasn't much time left in the ppv. The finish as planned was Hebner goes down (as happened), Shawn puts Bret in the Sharpshooter, Bret grabs his leg and reverses it with Earl still down. Hunter runs in, the Foundation runs in, Earl comes around and throws it out. Thats how he tells it in his book.

Well that's what he said recently in an interview. Who do we believe? Bret or Bret?

 

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20 hours ago, Liam O'Rourke said:

As for it being a work, I think that's perhaps the dumbest point anybody could ever make in wrestling. It makes no sense for it to be a work in any avenue, and the argument falls apart with 10 seconds of rational thinking.

Depends which way you look at the work, no way was it a work to further business. Vince could never have projected he was to become one of the greatest heels of all time by doing it.

However, creating the work so it meant Bret lost the title at the PPV but didn't in theory lose to Shawn, but lost to Vince. Where everyone in the world gets hooked into thinking Bret never really lost (which is something you can just see Bret going for) is entirely possible.

Never happened though.

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It was one incident that really did change the landscape of wrestling and one we will never see again.

I remember watching the event the following morning as I had taped it during the night. I was looking forward to the event for a number of reasons and this was the first event that was held on my Birthday (that I can remember at least). Despite being fairly clued up on wrestling at the time, thanks to Powerslam, I thought the incident was a work. The WWF was starting to do a lot of swerves and I genuinely believed that this was exactly that - In fact, it was only when I saw the epsiode of Monday Nitro when the NWO came out with Candian flags and made several references to the incident did I start to think that this was real and for a time I became absolutely fascinated with the incident and would consume any information on the subject I could find.

No one knew that Shawn would be a seriously injured just two months later and I believed at the time of the incident the WWF wanted to turn Shawn Michales into the biggest arsehole walking the face of the Earth and wanted him to create a simialr reaction that Hulk Hogan got when he turned heel on a nightly basis. Little did anyone know that it was actually Vince McMahon himself, who turned into the bigesst arsehole walking the face of the Earth.

With regards to Bret, I thought he was in the wrong and should have dropped the title as requested. However, it appears to be some unwritten rule or tradition in Canda, that Candians do not do the jobs (Jacques Rougeau and Carl Ouellet are just two  incidents of this at around the same time ) Regardless of if you agree with this stance or not, Bret seems to be (or was at the time) a man of principals and tradition so despite not agreeing with his decision, I respect it. 

As for the match itself and how long it was suppose to go for, I would be inclined to go with the version Bret tells in his book rather than a recent Podcast. The Screwjob has now been talked about so much by all parties involved and many more who were not, the reality or truth is bound to become a little hazy at best, in fact, it is bordering on the "How heavy was Andre, when I bodyslammed him". 

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It was good in the sense that it created the Mr McMahon character. Bad in the sense that it was probably what started the stupid fucking "it's a work, hey look at me everyone, I can see it's a work, I'm not a mark" bullshit that continues today whenever anything happens in wrestling.

Team Vince all the way. Partly because a big PPV is the best time for a big title change, and partly because Bret is like JR - takes himself so seriously that anything that embarrasses him or humiliates him on screen is a good move.

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I don't think I've ever thought it was a work - I've discussed it quite a lot with a friend who's a bit of a casual fan, but quite obsessed with this match, and he's always been of the mindset that it may have started as a work, but relations between the WWF and Bret soured to the extent it became 100% a shoot. I don't buy that, but it's at least a more nuanced approach than "it was definitely a work", which I've never heard a strong argument for.

You don't run an angle that involves your top guy moving to the competition, certainly not while fairly explicitly painting your own promotion as the bad guy. There are a million and one ways that could backfire - if WCW had been legally able to capitalise on it sooner, and had Bret appear on Nitro only a week or two after Montreal, people would be tuning in to Nitro to see what Bret had to say, and what he would do next, not tuning into RAW on the off-chance that Vince McMahon might explain himself.

One thing I'm unsure of is Triple H's role in the whole affair. In recent years he's been painted as far more heavily involved in the thing than I think seems plausible - the idea that someone only recently starting to make a name for himself in the midcard would have enough sway with Vince McMahon to affect the booking of a fraught main event between his two biggest stars, under extremely delicate circumstances, just seems so unlikely. I think WWE have retroactively shifted some of the blame to Triple H either to bolster his reputation as some kind of Machiavellian mastermind or, more likely, to try and rehabilitate the image of Shawn Michaels.

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On 9 November 1997 the Montreal Screwjob took place. However, some people insist that the World Wrestling Federation faked the Screwjob in film studios at Titan Towers. They argue that photos of the Screwjob aren't real, heat from the Canadian fans would have killed the business and WCW didn't have the ability to return Bret Hart safely from his WWF contract.

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Photo: Bret Hart in the Sharpshooter during the Montreal Screwjob. Conspiracy theorists say the shadows in this photo, and others like it, are all wrong. 

Is it possible to fake Earl Hebner ringing the bell in Montreal in a Connecticut TV studio?

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In 1998 Bret Hart was so concerned about Montreal Screwjob conspiracy theories that he proposed releasing a film to refute them point by point.

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Marcus Allen believes that the Montreal Screwjob never happened and was a reconstruction done to fool wrestling fans here on Earth.

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Fin Martin of Powerslam magazine was one of thousands of journalists who followed the 1997 Survivor Series. He believes the sheer numbers of witnesses and people working on the WWF Championship programme means a hoax was impossible. Others say photographic evidence exists which shows the Montreal Screwjob was faked. 

vince-mcmahon-spit-300x200.jpg

Wrestling imaging expert Douglas Arnold joined Sir Patrick Moore to dispel conspiracy claims that a lob of spit from Bret Hart never landed on Vince McMahon. The large quantity of gob-on brought back to the locker room on McMahon's face is strong proof, as Sir Patrick and Arnold explained.

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"Did Bret screw Bret? Would he have dropped the title elsewhere? Was Vince protecting his title or himself? What role did Triple H and Shawn Michaels play? We just don't know. But it wasn't a bloody work!"

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On 25/11/2017 at 10:25 PM, King Pitcos said:

Team Vince all the way.

Yep, he is the one paying you to play fight so you do as he says.  "Was the Purple wedding a work?  Joffrey didn't want to drop the crown at his own wedding but the writers and producers and Emma Peel totally screwed him over.  He was willing to drop the crown the next week in a hunting accident"

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45 minutes ago, ColinBollocks said:

Indeed. "See your mate what just died?" "Aye." "Well, call him a cunt next week.""Erm..."

Vince's judgement is never to be questioned. Particularly when he lies to you.

This.

Not to mention that, if it really is Vince's job to tell you what to do, then he shouldn't be telling you one thing and arranging another behind your back - he should just say "No, you're doing it, that's final". And if he couldn't because Bret indeed had the creative control clause as he claimed, then he 1. shouldn't have given him that clause and then 2. got his company into a position whereby he had to negotiate or screw Bret over to get his way.

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1 hour ago, Carbomb said:

This.

Not to mention that, if it really is Vince's job to tell you what to do, then he shouldn't be telling you one thing and arranging another behind your back - he should just say "No, you're doing it, that's final". And if he couldn't because Bret indeed had the creative control clause as he claimed, then he 1. shouldn't have given him that clause and then 2. got his company into a position whereby he had to negotiate or screw Bret over to get his way.

This is the key thing for me. Forget all the moral arguments. Legally Bret had(reasonable)control over what he wanted his character to do, and obviously saw losing in Canada as detrimental to his future career prospects(rightly or wrongly). Legally Vince should have made an agreement that Bret was happy with(which he did, as per Wrestling With Shadows) and stick to it(which we know he didn't). The only chance Vince would have had if things would have ended up in court was the terminology "Reasonable".

It's also the reason I don't think it was a work. I don't see what positives could be gained rom working the other wrestlers under Vince's employment. Trust in wrestling is a huge thing, as we all know. I can't see Vince risking losing the trust and cooperation of his locker room over a daft work...

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