by Dr. Tom

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WWE SMACKDOWN! HALLOWE’EN 2K2

Happy Hallowe’en to the children of various ages reading this. If you're a pagan, may the religious zealots pass by your house in their latest witch-burning campaign.

At the arena, Hallowe’en festivities are going on. Eddy Guerrero makes a good Zorro, and Chavo Guerrero is his sidekick . . . uh, Tonto. Stephanie McMahon interrupts the festivities long enough to announce the main event: Brock Lesnarberg vs. Rey Mysterio. I’ll just say that if witches showed that much cleavage in Salem, the Puritans would have found different poles to tie them to.

On tape from Grand Rapids, Michigan, this is WWE Smackdown for Hallowe’en 2K2. Your hosts, a pair of Halloweenies, are Michael Cole and Taz(z).

Opening Match: Edge vs. Chris Benoit. This is pretty dashed easy to take as the opener. They start with a nice mat sequence before Benoit puts the knees to Edge in the corner. Benoit shoulderblocks Edge down, but he walks into a knee off the ropes, and Edge hits a gutbuster. Benoit breaks out the chops, but Edge whips him HARD into the corner and tosses him outside. He comes down from the apron with an axehandle and drops Benoit on the wall. Back in, that gets 2. Edge goes to the chinlock, but Benoit escapes and they brawl. Edge drops Benoit gut-first on the top rope, but misses the baseball slide to follow it. Benoit pounds his shoulder and dropkicks the shoulder into the steps. Back in, Benoit sends Edge shoulder-first into the turnbuckle a few times before slapping on an armbar. Edge armdrags out (with the bad arm), but Benoit goes right back to the shoulder. Benoit nails a back suplex for 2. Edge is bleeding hardway from the mouth. Benoit takes Edge down with a drop toehold, and does a sliding dropkick into the shoulder. Snap suplex gets 2. Edge elbows Benoit on a charge, and they fight over the second rope. Edge wins that exchange, coming down with a leaping facebuster. Of course, it’s time for a commercial break. Back from the break, Edge goes up, but Benoit blocks the missile dropkick and goes right to the Crossface. Edge makes the ropes. Benoit hits the trio of Germans, but misses the Kamikaze headbutt. Both men are down. They exchange chops from their knees, and Edge hits the Edge-O-Matic for 2. Faceplant gets 2. Edge misses the spear, which Benoit turns into the Crossface. Edge rolls thru it, but Benoit maintains the hold. Kurt Angle pulls Benoit out, and they bicker on the floor. Edge nails a baseball slide, slamming Benoit into Angle in the process. Edge goes up, and hits Angle with a flying clothesline after Benoit ducked. Back in, Edge finishes with the spear at 12:21. Of course it was a very good match. They seem to have a lot of them on Smackdown. 7/10
(Winner: Edge, pinfall via Spear @ 12:21)

Meanwhile, at the party, John Cena unleashes the dope rhymes, yo, in his Vanilla Ice getup (and looks an awful lot like him). Tajiri tries to put the moves on Torrie Wilson, but gets snagged by Moolah and Mae Young instead. Dawn Marie impresses Torrie’s dad with her open-chested police outfit. Yipee.

After the break, an angry Benoit interrupts the merry-making to look for Angle, who was hiding behind the "Scream" mask.

Meanwhile, Brock is in costume as the WWE Disputed Champion. Oh. He meets up with Paul E. Dangerously, who compares the Hell In A Cell match to the Thrilla In Manila. That’s a bit of a stretch. Paul wonders how Brock is going to beat The Big Slow if he’s not the same man as he was before HIAC, and if he can’t do his moves to someone so FAT.

Fat Guy Match: The Big Slow vs. Rikishi. This is for the last piece of cheesecake at the party. Rikishi slugs it out and superkicks Slow to the floor. Slow runs him into the post (“runs” being a relative term here, of course) and tosses him back in. He drops a big fat elbow and headbutts Rikishi. YOU CAN’T HEADBUTT A SAMOAN! What’s next, Kidman takes a powerbomb? Slow clotheslines Rikishi, and the match escapes a negative rating with Rikishi’s whirly-bird sell job. Rikishi gets splashed and powerslammed, and the chokeslam mercifully ends this at 2:28. At least they had the sense to keep it brief. DUD.
(Winner: The Big Slow, pinfall via chokeslam @ 2:28)

After the match, Slow gets on the stick and calls out Brock. He sounds GASSED, after a whole 150 seconds of "action." Backstage, Brock is rarin’ to go, but Paul desperately tries to talk him out of it. Since the tension could be cut with a knife, WWE spares the audience a collective heart attack by going to commercial.

Back from the break, Slow is still in the ring, and promises to hold the show up until Brock comes out. Here’s some footage of Slow tossing The Undertaker off the stage four feet onto a big foam pad. Slow blathers on for an awfully long time, until Brock finally comes out. Brock agrees that Slow is a giant, but adds “piece of shit” to the description. Brock is now my hero. Slow promises to do something to Brock that’s never been done before. BO-RING!

Meanwhile, Torrie stretches, and I nearly drop my soda.

Trick or Treat Match: Dawn Marie vs. Torrie Wilson. This one is being held in a big bowl of chocolate, with an assortment of pies and sweets on a table. The chocolate seems more like chocolate milk, and Torrie has to struggle to stay in her outfit a few times. She needn't make such an effort on my behalf, really. Torrie wins by chopping Dawn’s chest until an implant threatens to rupture. Don’t tell me you want a rating.
(“Winner:” Torrie Wilson, pinfall via tittie-chopping.)

Meanwhile, Moolah and Mae regale Tajiri with tales of the singles scene during the War of 1812. Mattitude v1.0 livens up the party, and points out that Tajiri is flirting with Mae and Moolah (versions BC) instead of getting ready for their match.

After the break, The Guerreros ask the bewitching Stephanie for a shot at the tag titles. Cena tells Steph that Daddy is waiting to see her.

Mattitude v1.0 vs. Tajiri. Fun fact, courtesy of Mattitude.com: Matt always got more candy than his brother. There’s a very easy joke there, but I’m feeling charitable enough not to make it. Matt takes Tajiri over with an armdrag, and promptly poses to show off his MATTITUDE~! They fight over a top wristlock, with Tajiri bridging out and hitting a pair of armdrags. Matt grabs a rollup for 2. He points out to Tajiri just how close he came to a pinfall, so Tajiri retorts by KICKING him square in the head. Matt ends up on the floor, so Tajiri greets him with a baseball slide and follows with a nice Asai moonsault. Tajiri flips back into the ring, but walks into a Side Effect for 2. Matt pouds Tajiri and stunguns him. He does a side slam with an elbow for 2. Matt locks in a neck vise, but Tajiri fights out, only to take an elbow off the ropes. Matt slams him and goes up, but misses the second-rope legdrop. They slug it out on their knees until Tajiri explodes up into a vicious dropkick. A back kick gets 2. Matt blocks the Tarantula with a German suplex for 2. Tajiri gets the Tarantula on his next try. Matt ducks the Buzzsaw kick and tries the Twist of Fate. Tajiri backslides out of it, but Matt goes low, and hits the Twist of Fate for the win at 7:38. Pretty fun match, with Matt getting more into the “Mattitude” aspects of his character. 5/10
(Winner: Matt Hardy, pinfall via Twist of Fate @ 7:38)

Meanwhile, “Vince” turns out to be Easy Eric Bischoff, who promptly gets his freak on with Steph. Hey, you heard it on Stern: she’s into that stuff.

Kurt Angle vs. Eddy Guerrero. Angle starts with the phat matwork, so Eddy gets to the ropes. The fans remind Eddy that he sucks, and will indeed be the heel in this match. Angle shoulderblocks Eddy, then hiptosses and armdrags him. Angle picks Eddy up on his shoulder and tosses him across the ring, s Eddy wisely bails. Back in, Eddy uses the ref as a screen to pound on Angle, and he stomps away in the corner. Angle gets 2 off a flying jalapeno. Eddy drop toeholds him right into a turnbuckle and kills Angle with a FILTHY back suplex. Eddy chokes Angle and slaps on a facelock. Angle fights out, but Eddy shoulderblocks him and goes back to the resthold, with a chinlock. Angle fights out and powerslams Eddy. Eddy dropkicks Angle and chokes him in the corner. Angle ends up on the apron, so Eddy helpfully brings him back in with a vertical suplex. Back to the chinlock, which Angle escapes, only to wind up in a triangle choke. Like a good heel, Eddy uses the ropes for some extra leverage. Angle finally fights out of that to the Anglelock, but Eddy quickly rolls thru. Eddy snapmares Angle and dropkicks him in the back of the head. He pounds away in the corner. Angle escapes a suplex, and flips Eddy over with a German. Angle clotheslines Eddy and backdrops him. Eddy blocks a German, so Angle settles for a belly-to-belly for 2. Angle slips out of a vertical suplex and nails the trio of Germans for 2. He goes for the Olympic Slam, but Eddy turns it into a nifty rollup for 2. Eddy pulls out a super-cool tornado DDT for 2. He locks in the El Paso Lasso (without using anything to set it up), but Angle grabs the Anglelock out of it. Eddy makes the ropes, and lowblows Angle without the ref spying him. He hits the watered-down North American brainbuster and goes up. Angle shoves the ref into the ropes to crotch Eddy. Chavo runs out, but Angle swats him off the apron. He doesn’t see Benoit, though, who pastes him with a title belt. Eddy adds the Frog Splash for the pin at 13:20. Another very good match that I liked better than the Benoit-Edge match: it was stiffer and had a better overall flow, though there were about two too many restholds. Still first-rate work, though. 8/10
(Winner: Eddy Guerrero, pinfall via Benoit-assisted Frog Splash @ 13:20)

After the break, Angle plays party pooper in his quest for Chris Benoit. Angle finds Benoit, after unmasking Brother Love in the "Scream" getup, and they throw it down, wrecking half the room in the process.

Main Event: Rey Mysterio vs. Brock Lesnarberg (with Paul E. Dangerously). Rey eludes a manhandling and guillotines Brock. Brock is all “NO POBO~!!” and tosses Rey around. He posts himself, then gets led on a chase outside the ring. The shifty Mysterio sneaks in a Bombs Away leap. He goes for another one, but Brock catches him and just whips him into the ringpost. Ouch. Back in, Brock carries Rey around for a while before powerslamming him onto his face. Brock picks Rey up by the throat and suplexes him across the ring. Brock posts himself on a charge, allowing Rey to hit the 619 to his ribs. Rey dropkicks Brock’s legs out from under him and goes for the 619 again. This time, Big Slow catches him and tosses him about five rows into the crowd. That draws the DQ at 4:00. Brock attacks Slow, but gets posted and clotheslined. Slow chokeslams Brock thru the announce table, after botching the spot and almost dropping him. Slow heads up the ramp, saying, “It’s all mine!” He must be thinking about the buffet already. This was a slow squash, and not worthy of being in the main event consdering the match it followed. 1/10
(Winner: Rey Mysterio, DQ (Interference) @ 4:00)

The breakdown:

The Good: Edge, Benoit, Angle, and Eddy Guerrero proved yet again that they’re money in the ring. The thing is, after a great opening match, Smackdown still had plenty of gas in the tank. That wouldn’t have been the case with Raw, corpse-violating segments aside. Matt Hardy and Tajiri put on a good little match, and it’s obvious that Matt is having a lot of fun with the Version One character.

The Bad: I don’t mind if storylines are advanced thru the main event, but when the match becomes a plodding squash to advance an angle, it irritates me.

The Ugly: WHY did they have to bring The Big Slow to SD? WHY WHY WHY!? I was happy putting nothing under this heading every week, but as long as he’s around, he’s going to be making “The Ugly” his home.

Overall: Trick or treat? I’ll have to go with treat. There were some very good matches, and most of the party skits were entertaining. However, the Big Slow tainted Smackdown with every segment he was in. To go with a candy metaphor, call this one dark chocolate: it’s still good, and there’s a sweet taste there, but you have to get past a little bitterness to find it. 7/10

Dr. Tom
(Remove the leading X from each field to holler at me.)
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