Paid Members LaGoosh Posted March 29 Paid Members Posted March 29 I got into wrestling in early 99 and would buy PPVs from 98 on VHS as often as I could to catch up. When I saw Breakdown in WHSmiths with its Austin vs Kane vs Undertaker main event I immediately assumed it must be one of the best matches ever. 11 year old LaGoosh was pretty upset when I then watched one of the shittest PPV main events of all time. Quote
The Gaffer Posted March 29 Posted March 29 (edited) Rock's reaction is special on that show. It's not the initial pop for the music, it's the fact that it keeps getting louder as he comes out from the curtain and into view. I know the neurons have been firmly laid down now to pop for the music cue so it's not fair to use as a barometer anymore, but when's the last time that happened consistently for somebody? Breakdown's one of those shows I have really fond memories of in a way the very valid critical appraisal of it being shit can't touch. The opening package (MASTER MASTER MASTER PLAN) is peak '98, I always loved Owen and Edge as a no-frills, no-build opener, it has the Christian debut, the triple cage is huge fun and the ending's one of the better goofy twists of the time and an important part of the road to WrestleMania XV. Which made for a better video package than it did a match, but what a road it was. Edited March 29 by The Gaffer Quote
davertfnewman Posted March 29 Posted March 29 Just re-watched the finish of that match, which is a whole lot of limping around waiting to get somewhere. I'd forgotten about Undertaker's pierced eyebrow period. Him, Raven, Perry Saturn, a few others. Raven's had it in so long that if he took it out he'd just have a mound of scar tissue shaped like it was still in. Also, nobody was taking the stooges seriously but they could throw the best punches on the roster on account of being three super workers from the seventies and eighties. Quote
Paid Members wandshogun09 Posted March 29 Paid Members Posted March 29 3 hours ago, Supremo said: Breakdown: In Your House is dog rough. A bad show. Could’ve been worse as well, pretty sure I posted about this somewhere in this thread but they were gonna have a gimpy kneed Triple H against shite 98 Nation version of Mark Henry on that card. Presumably with the focal point of the whole thing being that Mizark wanted Chyna to sample his ‘sexual chocolate’. Breakdown is one of the IYH shows I barely remember. I still bought it of course, because it was 98 and I blindly gobbled up anything the WWF served up. But that particular In Your House never got many replays in my house. Like you say, I remember the three way cage match being the highlight but even then it seemed proper random. Main event was arse. Just recall it being a right slog and was such a deflating way for Austin to lose the title. Obviously I get why they did it now, to transfer the belt onto heel Rock at Survivor Series, ultimately setting up Rock vs Austin at WrestleMania. But at the time it felt way too soon for Austin’s title reign to end to me. Six months? I know he dropped it to Kane at KOTR but I barely count him borrowing Burnt Glen the strap for 24 hours. Austin getting pinned after a shit double chokeslam then Vince flipping the disabled bird just felt like the shittest end to a PPV ever. Owen vs Edge is a very vague memory but it had to have been at least decent, right? Even with Edge being a bit green at the time. Looking up the rest of the card on Wiki now and, Christ, I have zero recollection of any of it and is it any wonder? Mero vs Droz, D’Lo vs Gangrel, last legs Vader vs Bradshaw, Venis vs shite post-Goldust preacher Dustin, DX vs Jarrett and the Godwinns in suits as Southern Justice? Jesus wept. That’s a bad Sunday Night Heat episode. Poster for the event was suitably crap to match the show as well… Quote
BarryOVega Posted March 29 Posted March 29 Owen vs Edge was decent, the double pin in the main was bollocks though, either Taker and Kane somehow thought the other one pinning Austin at the same time wouldn’t count or they somehow didn’t feel their 300 pound brother laying next to them during the pin Quote
Paid Members air_raid Posted March 30 Paid Members Posted March 30 (edited) Breakdown was very nearly a one match show. The undercard is mostly dire ; Christian making his debut is at least historically notable during Owen’s last PPV singles win ever, it’s somewhat cool to see Marc Mero bring back the Wild Thing (“Marvelocity”) in his last WWF PPV win, but mostly it’s a shambles. On 3/29/2026 at 9:15 AM, Supremo said: This show marks the last pay per view appearance of Vader’s cursed WWF run, so Jim Ross isn’t even trying to be polite about it anymore. Burying Vader throughout, Jim all but calls him a fat prick who wasn’t worth the contract they gave him. All while Bradshaw stiffs the fuck out of him. See you later, Leon! Having not seen it in forever, I have no memory of undercard comms but this is disheartening when you consider how much Ross rooted for and seemed to like Leon, he always talks about him today with sympathy, especially regarding the bullshit he had to put up with from Warrior. Vince in his ear, no doubt. X-Pac and the Outlaws vs Jarrett & Justice is probably more fun than it deserves to be considering two thirds of it is the Godwinns vs Roadie & a Smoking Gunn although at last there’s resolution to that long simmering hostility between Double J and his former gopher - in fact, looking at who worked who in 95/96 there’s a lot of familiarity all round. It just about worked. Otherwise it’s a load of rubbish, tag titles not defended, Hunter injured and Pac being in the six man on the lone PPV between his hot potato of the Euro belt with D’Lo means that even that title went undefended leaving only the main event with gold defended ; a plodding, meandering mess with a rule change that removed some of the intrigue they could have had about the much-discussed “cahoots” unraveling less than a month after they’d been confirmed. Not that it matters much with Taker being in cahoots with his brother less than seven months after being set alight by him and fewer still since his late mother’s good name was sullied by the DNA test fiasco. Fuck awful finish too, one can only assume Hebner feared for his job to nonsensically count when two men were pinning one, and if that wasn’t enough, a shit non finish serving to set up a match next month with another shit non finish, pure WCW. Rotten end to a fairly rotten show which didn’t even have Sable perking it up. Thankfully the one match in question is a banger. Mankind has a nice gag about Rock’s “sugar coated testes” comment and gets a modest reaction from the crowd but absolutely delivers in another match where he seems hellbent on killing himself for our entertainment. Hamilton reacts very negatively to Ken Shamrock (still booked as a babyface technically despite tensions boiling over between him and Mankind the week before) - one can only assume they have long(ish) memories and as a Hart Foundation nemesis the summer before, his card is marked for life. Well, apart from those three tarts in white tank tops that read “We want to suck off Ken Shamrock” - as best I can remember. The Rock, conversely, the third participant in the midst of a gradual/phantom turn gets a thunderous response out the curtain (a “Redwing” ovation I think JR says in reference to the hockey team across the lake which despite it being more than 180m away is pretty well-supported in Hamilton) and the support only increases during the match, swelling when he nearly takes Kenny Boys head off and positively exploding when he wins the match, ostensibly becoming number one contender but.. well, many bridges to cross. It’s a good match but it speaks volumes that this was a PPV taped off Sky Id tape over in 99 or 2000 when I needed a spare having transferred the cage match to a homemade Rock compilation, and if I have the Silver Vision version I must have got it from a car boot for £1. I say if because I don’t remember. Not a high rewatch value, all round. Cahoots. Edited March 30 by air_raid Is that a new breakfast cereal? Quote
WyattSheepMask Posted March 30 Posted March 30 (edited) I don’t even know how Vince has managed to do that with his hand. I’ve just tried to replicate it and had to really fucking concentrate in order do so. Edited March 30 by WyattSheepMask Quote
Paid Members BomberPat Posted March 30 Paid Members Posted March 30 On 3/29/2026 at 9:15 AM, Supremo said: I remember me and my mates thinking Vince’s middle finger was hilarious. It was how we’d do it for months afterwards, flipping each other off at every opportunity. Something to think about any time I’m annoyed at my kids shouting, “SIX SEVEN.” I guess it could be much worse. Completely off-topic, but one of the best things I've seen at an indie show in ages was RJ Singh working heel at a student show, doing the ten punches in the corner, getting to "six, seven", and pausing to mockingly go "ahhh, SIX SEVEN!" at the kids in the audience, leaving himself open for the babyface to cut him off and start his comeback. Lovely stuff. Back on the dregs of 1998 WWF, that triple threat finish is rotten. The kind of thing I associate with Vince Russo at least as much as swerves and crash TV bollocks. When it comes to booking actual wrestling finishes - and I can only assume this was one of his - it's always the worst kind of "what if?" shit that completely pisses on any idea of wrestling as a sport, or the promotion and referee as having any meaningful authority. "Okay, so it's a three-way match, what would happen if two blokes get the win at the same time?" - well, for one, it would be fucking stupid, for two, you'd think that if this were a real sport that eventuality would actually be covered in the rules or the contract before the match started, not left to figure out after the fact. It's the same school of thought that gives you tag partners pinning each other in a multi-team match, or the perennial favourite of every school playground fantasy booker, "what if number 28 and 29 in the Royal Rumble eliminated each other, so number 30 just walked out to an empty ring and won the match by default?". I'll tell you "what if", it would be fucking shit, and a miserable way to end a show that people have paid money to watch. The scourge of the Attitude Era was booking shit because people wouldn't expect it, rather than making what the audience wouldn't expect make sense. Bollocks, all of it. Quote
Paid Members Lorne Malvo Posted March 30 Paid Members Posted March 30 1 minute ago, BomberPat said: Completely off-topic, but one of the best things I've seen at an indie show in ages was RJ Singh working heel at a student show, doing the ten punches in the corner, getting to "six, seven", and pausing to mockingly go "ahhh, SIX SEVEN!" at the kids in the audience, leaving himself open for the babyface to cut him off and start his comeback. Lovely stuff. Mansoor did this bit a few times last summer, iirc. It popped me everytime. Quote
Ironic Indie Lad Posted March 30 Posted March 30 I have waited for the day there was some Break Down IYH discussion. Very special show for me. I was into WWF in the early 90s during the sort of initial UK boom. Like many, I dropped off for several years. I started High School in August of 1998 and quickly made friends with a guy who was a big wrestling fan. He taped Break Down off of Sky and lent it to me and I was totally hooked. My older brother had no interest in wrestling whatsoever at the time but somehow this got him hooked as well and we were both diehard fans from then on. The video packages to that show are totally burned into my brain. I could be sitting working or something and "SEPTEMBER 27th AUSTIN!!!!!!!" or "I'm damn sick and...I'm damn sick and tired I'm DAMN SICK AND TIRED" will pop into my head for no good reason. Quote
Paid Members gmoney Posted March 30 Paid Members Posted March 30 Yeah it gets said a lot, but the intro to the PPVs from 98 - 99 are masterpieces. I'd love to see a supercut. Get on it, Vault. Quote
Members SuperBacon Posted March 30 Author Members Posted March 30 This in the intro or video package would always get me going. Quote
Ironic Indie Lad Posted March 30 Posted March 30 The Vault uploaded a compilation of WrestleMania video packages recently. It starts with the one everyone always goes on about. The Iconic X7 My Way video. Jarringly it follows this up with a crap video hyping The Miz v John Cena from ten years later. Terrible feud, match and WrestleMania. Quote
Paid Members gmoney Posted March 30 Paid Members Posted March 30 I remember thinking the Cena/Miz video package was pretty good, despite everything going into the build being shite. Not arsed enough to want to watch it again though. Fucking hell, Miz once headlined a Wrestlemania... Quote
Paid Members Supremo Posted March 30 Paid Members Posted March 30 No greater example of how effective those WWF 97/98 PPV Intros were. You can even use them to pretend AEW’s Devil storyline was a success! Quote
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