TNA
Doctor G's Live InsurreXion review
By Nik Johnson
Jun 8, 2003, 22:00

Note from Nik... Okay, I didn't write this, it was writen by Andrew "Doctor G" Rumney, who was unlucky enough to pay to see WWE live in Newcastle. Here's his full report.

--
The card

Jazz vs. Trish
RVD and Kane vs. La Resistance
Christian vs. Booker T
Golddust vs. Rico
Dudley Boys vs. Long/Mack/Nowinski
Jericho/Austin/Bischoff Hi-Lite Reel
HHH vs. Kevin Nash

A revised Lonely Road Of Faith video played (slightly edited to replace the
scratch WWF with the WWE, and new clips of RVD etc) Loads of cheers for
Andre, Hulk, Bret, Owen, British Bulldog etc. Got a big reaction overall, as
the crowd was really hyped. A picture of Freddie Blassie was shown, that got
a big reaction too.

The Fink came out, gave the usual stuff about not taking photos with the
intention of selling them. Then the first dark match started. Someone we've
never seen came out to a flat reaction, some guy from Germany. I booed when
I saw he had the German colours on, and everyone else booed when they
announced where he was from. Out next was... Maven. We were hoping for
Ultimo, but hey, can't win all the time. He got one of the biggest freaking
pops of the night. My mate and I sat on our hands. We booed Maven quite a
lot, the rest of the crowd cheered him. Crap match, at one point I shouted
out "Stop wrestling in slow motion!" which got a laugh from the people sat
around us. Maven won with the dropkick from the top rope, posed for ages,
went back. Next out was Hurricane to a decent pop, then Storm who got a lot
of heat.

Match wasn't anything special, but we saw the neckbreaker, the cross body, a
dive over the rope onto the mat and the shining wizard, so we were happy.
Hurricane won with that last mentioned move, and posed for a bit.

The Fink got back on the mic and said we were about to go live. JESUS that
pyro was loud. The Telewest arena is tiny, and those explosions shook the
place down to it's foundations just about. The last one sent HUGE sparks
flying into the crowd, I saw them hit loads of people. The looks on their
faces were classic.

JR came out to a big pop, Jerry came out to a bigger pop, with a large Jerry
chant. Trish came out, then Jazz. Jazz had a lot of heat, surprisingly. A
small "She's a crackwhore" chant broke out, but despite our efforts, it
didn't catch on.

This was the time we started noticing the funny signs in the crowd.

"The guy behind me has SARS"
"My arms are tired"
"Booker T sold me crack"
"Austin beat my wife"
"I miss Nitro"
"I shagged Trish"
"Marks" (with arrows pointing everywhere)
"I'm with Hogan"
"Randy Orton, your ass is mine"

and a load of others that had us chuckling everytime they popped up. The
people here have had years since the last Newcastle WWE event to think up
some good signs.

The women wrestled for a bit, the crowd was still warming up so there wasn't
a HUGE reaction to the pin falls. Victoria came down and tried to interfere,
but was held back by officials. We chanted "She's a psycho!" but it didn't
catch on.

Long had some heat, especially when he ran in and threw Trish into the ring
post. Jazz picked up the win after that. Oh, and since the arena is so
small, the smoke from the pyros was floating around like a huge fog. A small
"We can't see" chant broke out. We watched through the smoke for the first
few matches.

They aired the Booker/Christian vid from Judgement Day. Booker came out to a
huge pop. The explosion was cool, but the "flames" looked pathetic. More
like small puffs of smoke. Christian came out to a large reaction, mostly
boos but some cheers. He had a lot of heat on him, lots of "Christian
sucks!" chants. Match went on for a while, Booker went for his side kick and
went OVER the top rope to the floor instead of landing on the rope. Looked
pretty good. Later on Christian came off the top rope only for Booker to hit
that kick again and catch him in mid air. Crowd went wild when Booker
motioned for the spin-a-roonie, which he delivered. Christian won by holding
the tights and the rope.

They opened the doors to the arena to try and get the smoke out, which
didn't really help.

We saw Austin backstage, and he told Teddy he was changing the match later
on. He added Long to the team of Mack and Nowinski to take on all three of
the Dudleys instead of just D'Von and Bubba. Austin got a big reaction, but
it was really hard to hear what they were saying. To be honest, we cared
more about Booker T as he was leaving. Got a big reaction as he went back up
the ramp.

Kane walked past Austin, and they started to talk, again it was hard to hear
what Austin was saying, then the picture went off and the opening image from
La Resistance's titontron video came on for about a minute before going back
to Austin. We could hear him, but all we saw was one half of the French
team. I think Austin was asking if Kane was gonna be a bad ass.

They showed the King and JR at their table as they talked to the people at
home. Obviously, we couldn't hear them, but a huge Jerry chant went out
which I started, and Jerry smiled and saluted us.

La Resistance came out and Rene got on the STICK�! He said they hated the
English as much as the Americans. They didn't get too many boos when they
came out, but there was a lot of heat on them after he finished his promo.
RVD came out to one of the biggest pops of the night. No pyro though. Big
RVD chant and everybody was on their feet, arms in the air for the
announcement that he was Rob Van Dam. Didn't really have enough elbow room
for us all to do it, but we tried. Kane came out to a big pop. They had the
pyro for his entrance, but none for him in the ring.

Match wasn't too bad, RVD was insanely over, with constant RVD chants. He
hit a cool spot where he did a backflip onto one, flipped up, ran off the
rope and hit rolling thunder on the other. Kane hit the double chokeslam and
RVD went up for the frogsplash. Every camera in the arena went off for that.
During the match a huge "We hate Frenchies!" chant started (we really do)
Would be great if that started happening on normal shows, but it's not
likely since this was just a UK PPV. Kane did the explosion thing after the
win and Jesus it's loud. They walked past the ramp and got a huge reaction
as they left.

Air conditioning came on (to get rid of the smoke that was still there from
the very beginning, nevermind the pyro from Kane) and it sounded like a
bloody helicoptor. They shut it off after people booed because they couldn't
hear anything. Most of the smoke was gone.

Al Snow gave an interview with Goldust before the match. Rico's crowd
reaction is what you'd expect for somebody who hasn't been on TV much.
Goldust got a good pop. Match wasn't too bad. Earl Hebner was refeering this
match, two or three "You screwd Bret" chants started, but they were small.
My friend and I were chanting it as loud as we could, heh. Dust got the win
after a powerslam. Rico had gone for a moonsault earlier in the match, got a
LOT of height and distance on it, looked really good.

Y2J came out to possibly the biggest reaction all night. Huge cheers and a
big Y2J chant. He was coming out for the highlight reel, as they'd just set
up the ring. But it wasn't the big set you see on RAW, it was just a small
red carpet and two stools. Y2J finally got in the ring, still getting
cheered like hell. Called us all jackasses, got some boos for that. Touched
on how Newcastle lost the bid for Culture Capital of Europe to Liverpool,
got a lot of boos. Insulted us and said how pathetic the set was for his
show. Also said Bobby Robson was a failure (Newcastle Utd manager) Y2J
certainly did his homework.

His guest was Bischoff to came out to a hail of boos. They insulted us
together, and some "You fat bastard!" chants came out aimed at Bischoff.
Also some "asshole/arsehole" ones. I turned my head to the titontron JUST as
Austin's video played and the glass smashed to THE biggest pop of the night.
He came down, talked some trash, got a load of "What?"s, talked about
drinking.

"One pint! Two pints! Three pints! Four pints!" and so on until he got to
about 20 pints. The crowd was going wild. Had some words with Y2J, and he
said he was trying to hard not to lose his temper. I started a huge "Lose
it!" chant. He said he wouldn't because he wasn't insanely violent... but he
WAS violent. He told them he was making the HHH/Nash match a "good old
fashioned street fight." After making fun of them both, he drank a beer with
them (British sized cans of Miller) then stunnered Y2J. He talked to Eric,
then said something about not wanting to leave him out so he stunnered him
too. Drank some more beer, got some more thrown at him (one landed in the
crowd, heh) and went up the ramp.

Six man tag match with Rodney Mack/Long/Nowinski against the Dudleyz.
Dudleyz got a huge pop. Match wasn't too bad, some good moments and it
didn't drag. Crowd went wild for the wassup and then the "Get the tables!"
The Dudleyz won, Spike pinned Long, but afterwards the heels wanted to put
one of them through a table. Reversed. 3D through the table on Nowinski.
Crowd was going nuts.

The Freddie Blassie tribute came on and it got a massive, massive reaction,
with constant Freddie chants breaking out. First time most of us had seen it
since SmackDown would be on that night for us here in the UK. Really big
reaction, everybody was on their feet cheering or chanting. I read that JR
thanked the crowd for the reaction, but I'll have to check that when I see
the taped PPV.

They aired the video for Steiner/Test. Val came out as the special guest
referee to a big pop from the ladies. He introduced Stacy, who got a big pop
from the guys. My mate and I had the perfect view of her arse as she went
into the ring. Damn... She introduced Test (went through how she was
contracted to him and how he was her former boyfriend) He got booed, but
again we sat quietly, since we don't care about him. I shouted "You're a
hoss!" which got a laugh. Stacy introduced Steiner. We booed him, everyone
else cheered.

Match wasn't as God awful as you'd think, but then again, we were watching
Stacy. Test made her put on Val's towel. Got a big "Take it off" chant to
which she smiled. Later on she ripped it off. Steiner did all of 4 moves...
and that's including a punch. Won with that DDT style move. We were
constantly booing him, but the crowd seemed thoroughly behind him. I shouted
"Play it in fast forward!" which got a laugh. Spent the rest of the match
chanting "Boring." Only a few people joined in though.

Next was HHH/Nash. HBK came out first to a HUGE reaction. No pryo on the
stage. No pyro in the ring. Out came Nash, the crowd cheered, but again we
were booing. I was shouting "Where's your wheelchair?" The HHH fans sat in
front of us loved those. Nash got pyro, DAMN it was loud. Flair came out
with HHH, which was a shame, we wanted to see his entrance. Constant woos
from everybody. Even I had to clap at HHH's entrance. As much as I hate him,
it is pretty cool. As somebody once said, he can spit water better than
anyone else.

Constant boos and cries of "Boring!" from me and a few people around us.
Also shouted "Tear your quads!" a number of times. Flair was bleeding thirty
seconds into the match... and he wasn't even in it! He and HBK chased around
the ring. Flair was sent backstage, don't even know where HBK went. Flair
came back later, then HBK came back out and attacked him. I know all this
happened, since I wasn't even watching the snore fest in the ring. HHH got
the pedigree reversed on the ramp, and then they ended up next to the
announcing table. Can't even remember what happened, but nobody went through
it. So far, so crap. Some spots with a steel chair and some others with the
steel steps. HHH was soon bleeding.

Um... wasn't really paying attention to the rest but I know Nash had HHH
pinned after the powerbomb, but there'd been a ref bump, which we cheered
for, since Earl was refereeing again and there was about five or six large
"You screwed Bret!" chants throughout the match. They really seemed to
affect him. The small kid next to me obviously had no idea why we were
chanting that. He also seemed confused that we would boo Steiner and Nash.

Match ended with Nash about to powerbomb Flair but HHH hit him with the
sledgehammer and pinned him when the ref got up (one or two refs had come
down but either took a ref bump or were attacked by Flair)

HHH and Flair crawled up the ramp. Flair raised his hand. Nash was down for
ages, when he got up he got a big reaction. Obviously not from us, we were
still booing and chanting "Where's your wheelchair?" He did his arm raise
thing and looked to the crowd. HBK and an official helped him up the ramp.
JR and Jerry left (after much cheering) and the Fink thanked us.

Nothing special, no GOOD matches, but nothing too bad. Only two and a half
hours long, but there was only three backstage things, the one with
Austin/Long/Kane, one with Snow interviewing Goldust before the match and
one with Flair and HHH saying how unfair it was that it was a streetfight.
Each match was given enough time, but it's a shame Y2J didn't wrestle.

Top 5 pops:
Austin
RVD
Chris Jericho
Maven
Jerry Lawler

Top 5 heat:
Christian
Lance Storm
Test
La Resistance
HHH

---

Andrew
[email protected]

--
Drop him a line, and let him know what you think, and I'll be back this weekend. Nik.

© Copyright by TheSmartMarks.com