The SmarK Rant for the Rise and Fall of ECW
– And so here we are, years after the death of the little promotion that could, with the hardcore alternative ironically chronicled by the mainstream survivors of the wrestling wars. I was never a huge fan, to say the least, but they had their moments and you can’t deny the impact.
– We start with Paul Heyman coming into Eastern Championship Wrestling and helping out booker Eddie Gilbert with a show, because wrestling was becoming hair bands. So Paul invented The Public Enemy and Taz. We are also introduced to Sabu and get some comments from Heyman and Tommy Dreamer about him.
– Paul talks about Terry Funk wanting to come in and make some new stars to ensure the survival of the sport. This leads into the three-way dance 60 minute draw between Shane Douglas, Terry Funk and Sabu, which I always thought was horribly overrated. We also get the “smash your knee to obliticree” promo from Shane afterwards, as he wants to be champion.
– Paul talks about his relationship with WCW. Quote: “I told them to go f*ck themselves when they treated people like shit.” Well, this is certainly an M-rated DVD.
– Next intro, Tommy Dreamer, as he transforms from pretty boy into someone the fans respect. This leads into the Sandman v. Dreamer feud that introduces Singapore canes to the wrestling world and turns Dreamer into hardcore tough guy. That was pretty nasty stuff and RSPW went insane for it back in the day.
– Tommy Dreamer talks about the differences between WWE and WCW and what ECW was doing at the time, and Paul talks about how you have to respect the past, but find something new to present.
– Mick Foley talks about WCW wanting to establish relations with ECW, and getting sent over as a goodwill gesture of sorts. Funny promo with Jack spitting on the WCW tag title and then talking about losing his real title: “World’s ugliest wrestler”.
– Next up, we meet Mikey Whipwreck, the ultimate hardluck underdog. We bypass the TV title reign that went nowhere and get into the tag title reign with Cactus Jack that was much funnier.
– In August ’94, Shane Douglas wins the NWA World title”¦and throws it down to create the ECW World title, thus destroying the lineage of the NWA title pretty much for good. This isn’t as huge today, but it killed the NWA dead back then and it was pretty huge at the time. On the next show, Eastern Championship Wrestling was dead and Extreme Championship Wrestling was born. This was actually a double-cross on Dennis Corralluzzo, who had no clue what was happening around him.
– We skip ahead a year or so, with the Malenko-Guerrero-Benoit invasion, thus showing that ECW was suddenly the cool place to make a name. It also allowed them to expand their audience with a more pure wrestling viewpoint.
– Paul and his producer talk about their production style and hiding the negatives, which was pretty much their philosophy all along. Another philosophy: If we f*ck up, it stays in. This leads into a discussion of the fans, and Hat Guy gets his five seconds of fame with a mention on the DVD.
– Onto Raven, and the feud with Tommy Dreamer. This been covered to death already.
– Tazz talks about the history with Sabu and how they didn’t get along backstage. Sabu no-shows one night and Paul fires him, leading to a short-lived “Fuck Sabu” movement among the fickle ECW fans. Tommy: “Paul never lied to the fans. He lied to the WRESTLERS. But not the fans.” Tazz breaks his neck and takes nine months off, setting up a big showdown when he returns.
– We get a funny three-way argument (via editing) with Heyman, Bischoff and Vince, as Paul accuses Eric of raiding Benoit & Eddie, Eric accuses Vince of raiding the territories years back and Paul of bouncing cheques, and Paul retorting that Eric is full of shit. And then Vince admits that HE raided the ECW roster. That’s awesome.
– So with the roster depleted, Paul brings in the Mexicans. Rey does a rana off a fan’s car. Paul: “If my father wasn’t a lawyer, I could never have pulled off ECW. I got sued more times than Martha Stewart.”
– And then Steve Austin gets fired, which allows Paul to do his Steve Austin impression here, and Steve to do his Hulk Hogan impression back then. Both rule. Not to mention the Monday Nyquil promo. The producer talks about the Austin and Foley promos and how great they were. No shit. I actually have a tape from RF Video from years ago that’s nothing but their ECW promos and it’s awesome.
– OK, so nine months later Tazz returns as the mat-wrestling animal instead of the Tazmaniac. Paul talks about Tazz bringing the “big fight atmosphere” to the arena, which was missing from wrestling.
– On the other end of the spectrum, Raven steals Sandman’s son and wife, which I never really cared for.
– The Blue World Order ends up being the culmination of Steve Richards’ series of parodies, but the people went nuts for it and it ended up sticking. Well, that was pretty random.
– So back to the Raven-Tommy thing, with Beulah announcing her pregnancy, which led to the goofy lesbian angle that paid it off. Tommy’s “I’ll take ’em both!” reaction was the moment that pretty much made him a legend in the ECW arena.
– So back in the WWF, Mabel is King of the Ring and the Philly fans there are busy chanting “ECW” to show their displeasure. So Vince listens and stages an ECW invasion at Mind Games in 1996, with Dreamer and Sandman annoying Savio Vega during a match with future WWE champion Justin Hawk Bradshaw.
– So back in ECW, Raven crucifies Sandman with Kurt Angle in the audience, thus making him stay away from wrestling for another three years. Raven actually apologizes to the audience for doing it. Paul lied to Angle about it. I’m shocked. I’m pretty sure this was never shown anywhere before.
– The PPV era begins, sort of, as Paul can’t break through to In Demand, but the fans petition them until it happens. And then”¦Mass Transit kills it all. Thankfully they don’t show it. So Paul begged and whined and finally they got back on the PPV schedule again.
– So with the WWF roster overseas in February, ECW gets RAW for one night in Manhattan, leading to a mini-invasion angle to promote the PPV. Vince admits he was funding them.
– Barely Legal went off pretty well, although unfortunately due to timing they were entering the PPV arena after the peak of their influence. RVD and Lance Storm talk about Rob’s bad attitude that night and how he created the Mr. Monday Night persona as a result.
– Tazz talks about the big match with Sabu, which unfortunately didn’t live up to the hype at all. Terry Funk won the World title from Raven 10 seconds before the power supply blew up to cap off the evening. My thoughts on the show are that it was good for the time, but doesn’t hold up today and didn’t pay off the promise that the promotion showed.
– So Raven leaves, and Tommy finally gets the win over him. That leads directly to Jerry Lawler showing up to invade ECW, which went on forever and went nowhere.
– We move onto Tod Gordon being a “mole” for WCW and getting fired as a result. Bill Alfonso was almost on the chopping block too for talking with Terry Taylor, but actually saved his job by having a great match with Beulah. Seriously.
– The wrestlers talk about doing other jobs behind the scenes to keep costs down. Very interesting stuff, especially Stevie doing the ECW hotline and making up a pseudonym for kayfabe purposes and Tommy personally doing t-shirt orders.
– The wrestlers talk about Paul Heyman being the David Koresh of wrestling, brainwashing his guys into doing what he needed from them. They also talk about having the creative freedom to do whatever they wanted.
– This naturally leads to Al Snow talking about finding Head and saving his career as a result. Paul spent a fortune buying up Styrofoam heads for the fans, thus creating one of the weirdest pushes in history.
– Bischoff denies that ECW was ever the #2 promotion, and explains exactly why. He also questions trying to create a national promotion out of something with hardcore content, and I have to agree with that too. Vince never considered them a threat and denies taking the Attitude era from ECW. This leads to a series of clips showing all the stuff they obviously stole from ECW. There’s a lot more open editorializing going on here than usual for one of these things.
– Tazz talks about the match with Bam Bam where they went through the ring. This leads him to invent the Fuck The World title to express his annoyance with Shane Douglas ducking him. Eventually Tazz beat Shane to “unify” the titles.
– Moving along to the Dudley Boyz and their fan-friendly activities and abuse of tables. I wouldn’t really call the flaming tables stuff worthy of mention. Sadly, we don’t get a Joel Gertner introduction. We do, however, get Bubba’s “We’ve got a woman who taught her daughter how to suck dick” line from the Heat Wave ’99 PPV.
– Next up, the guys talk about working for little money as the wrestling business starts to plateau. Lance Storm talks about bounced cheques and having to confront Paul about it. Tommy didn’t get paid for SIX MONTHS. That’s why ECW wasn’t the great wrestling promotion it’s often claimed to be — wrestling is about making money, and it never did thanks to Paul’s lack of business acumen. And lack of delegation skills, which led to things falling apart when he couldn’t keep up anymore and no one else knew how to run things.
– So to continue surviving, they needed national TV. So in September of 99, ECW debuted on TNN. By this time, however, the promotion had lived past its expiry date and was running on borrowed time, especially with Paul’s weird ideas about who to push on top. However, with two weeks to go before their debut, WWF stole Tazz and the Dudley Boyz. Tazz felt like he had nothing left to prove and needed a new challenge. The Dudleyz, however, just saw the financial writing on the wall and decided to escape while they could. They wanted to stay, asking only for $1 more to stay, but Paul refused and they left.
– Paul’s list of TNN’s grievances with the show is pretty funny, and it leads to the creation of Cyrus, representing “The Network”. And then they wonder why TNN never promoted them. And in 2000, they got kicked off the network to make way for RAW, leading to Paul doing a crazed rant against TNN on national TV. And that was pretty much it for the promotion, as the PPV buys dried up and the fans stopped watching.
– But we continue, as Rob Van Dam was the only remaining star left, and when he broke his leg there was nothing left.
– More people leave, as ECW champion Mike Awesome jumps to WCW and the cops have to collect the title from him so he can’t throw it in the garbage. So Tazz does a surprise appearance at a spot show in Indiana and wins the title from Awesome, which left a WWF wrestler against a WCW wrestler for the ECW title at an ECW show. Sadly, Tazz brought the title back to the WWF and got to job to HHH. Just because, you know. Vince apologizes here for that one.
– So back in ECW, Tommy Dreamer wins the title from Tazz, his only reign with the title, which was then immediately ended by Justin Credible and his opening-match act. Tommy’s “The only reason I won titles was because guys left” is kind of a sad and profound summing up of his career.
– Bischoff talks about trying to serve the hardcore audience and win over the mainstream at the same time, and how it couldn’t work. So Paul talks about trying to find a new network, but they couldn’t because TNN wouldn’t cancel them. And when they finally did, the ship had already sunk. The really sad thing is the roll call of guys who had no choice but to stay with the dying promotion because they were outcasts who couldn’t get work elsewhere.
– And in January 2001, the promotion quietly folded after a small show in the middle of nowhere, with a scheduled PPV never produced and no alternative thanks to the death of WCW at the same time.
– Everyone talks about what killed the promotion, and it’s the usual reasons: too much violence, not enough business sense. Thankfully they don’t try to blame anyone but Paul Heyman, who keeps beating the drum about surviving if they found another network. I wholeheartedly disagree, as the promotion was dead before it even got onto TNN, and they just didn’t know it.
– The final shovel of dirt on the promotion comes as Paul Heyman replaces Jerry Lawler on commentary for RAW and all those in denial had to finally acknowledge that it was over.
