WWF Summer Flashback (July 14, 1997)

 

Original Airdate: July 14, 1997

Your Host is Vince McMahon via voiceover 

We start with a look back at 1988, and the formation of the Mega Bucks - complete with clips of the movie Wall Street to highlight Ted DiBiase’s state of mind

Clips of the Hulk Hogan/Randy Savage v Andre the Giant/Ted DiBiase main event at SummerSlam 1988

WWF Intercontinental Title Match: Honky Tonk Man v Ultimate Warrior: From SummerSlam in New York City on August 29 1988. This is supposed to be Brutus Beefcake challenging for the title again, but he's been injured by Ron Bass on Superstars of Wrestling two days prior (kayfabe), so Honky makes an open challenge to anyone who wants a shot. And, boy does he get an answer: the Ultimate Warrior charging down the aisle, and totally obliterating him in 0:27 to win his first Intercontinental Title! As a match, it's nothing, but as a blow off to the long Honky Tonk Man title run, it's terrific - the entire thing from Warrior's entrance to exit just one sustained pop. Plus, it saved us from having to watch Honky and Beefcake stink up the ring on another pay per view, so there's that. Vince notes that winning the title here was the start of Warrior’s rise to the top, which culminated at WrestleMania XII. So, beating Hunter Hearst Helmsley was suddenly the pinnacle of his career? And they say that Vince didn’t see anything in HHH early on. DUD 

Footage of the fall of the Berlin Wall highlights the breakup of the Mega Powers in early 1989, and we get clips of No Holds Barred to explain Zeus

Clips of Hogan/Brutus Beefcake v Savage/Zeus in the SummerSlam 1989 main event

SummerSlam ‘97 ad

We use clips of Buster Douglas knocking out Mike Tyson to set up the Demolition/Hart Foundation story from 1990. Now we’re really stretching with these pop culture tie-ins

Clips of Demolition losing the WWF Tag Team title to the Hart Foundation at SummerSlam 1990

Clips of Pretty Woman, with Vince comparing Julia Roberts’ rise to stardom with Rick Rude’s ascent to top contender in 1990. See, because he’s pretty, too

Clips of Ultimate Warrior/Rude for the WWF Title in a cage at SummerSlam 1990. I still get a kick out of Roddy Piper screaming “what does that mean?!?!” every time Warrior does his arm raise/lower taunt

Clips of the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill scandal, as well as the Donald and Ivana Trump divorce tie-in to Macho Man proposing to Miss Elizabeth in the summer of 1991

Clips of Bret Hart winning the WWF Intercontinental title from Mr. Perfect at SummerSlam 1991. What, no tie-in with the race riots in Los Angeles, or something?

Time for some 1992 tie-ins: George Bush throwing up in Japan, Charles Barkley being a dick at the Olympics, and Paris Disney. But, in a non-international embarrassment: SummerSlam ‘92. We get clips from throughout the show, which I’m surprised they didn’t just do for all of them. But then, this is one of the first ones where they can mostly highlight guys who were still in the promotion

Clips of Davey Boy Smith winning the Intercontinental title from Bret at SummerSlam 1992. The match is better in clip form, with all of the resting cut out 

Andre the Giant tribute video. Man, they shoehorned that video into everything for years

A look at Yokozuna bulldozing through the WWF in 1993, complete with clips of him pinning Hulk Hogan to win the WWF Title at King of the Ring

Clips of Lex Luger coming to America’s rescue on the deck of the USS Intrepid to win the Bodyslam Challenge, and then going on a bus tour

Clips of the Yokozuna/Luger main event from SummerSlam 1993. Sadly, no insane cultural tie-in for this one

We take a look back at the summer of 1994, when baseball went on strike, but Randy Savage promised WWF Superstars never quit. Shortly before quitting

Meanwhile, Undertaker had gone missing, until Ted DiBiase brought him back. And that was the end of that story. Oh no… sadly, we’re not leaving it there, and get clips of the Undertaker/Undertaker match from SummerSlam 1994. That’s one of the rare instances of them actually referencing that whole thing, even in the days after the event they largely ignored it

And that’s it for 1994, as they segue right into clips of Shawn Michaels v Razor Ramon for the Intercontinental title in a Ladder match at SummerSlam 1995. I guess they didn’t want to highlight Bret v Owen, since they were in the middle of the whole Hart Foundation angle when this aired

We look back at Steve Austin’s rise in the summer of 1996. But, no actual match, since he’s never worked a SummerSlam

Clips of the Undertaker/Mankind Boiler Room Brawl from SummerSlam 1996. Another one that’s definitely better in clipped form

Undertaker/Bret Hart hype video, ahead of their meeting at SummerSlam ‘97

One last montage of highlights from the first nine SummerSlam events. As well as some stuff not from SummerSlam, so we can see Steve Austin actually do something 

BUExperience: As an actual show, this was nothing special, but man, I loved the batshit pop culture tie-ins, and I appreciated that they didn’t just focus on the guys they had under contract, and actually did highlights from the history of the show.