#I’m back to make more low effort repo content

[j4zz4lop3]

Graves: are you high?

Amber: am i what?

Graves: high

Amber: hello

[fromtheringapron]

WWF This Tuesday in Texas

Date: December 3, 1991

Location: Freeman Coliseum in San Antonio, Texas

Attendance: 8,000

Commentary: Gorilla Monsoon & Bobby Heenan

Results:

1. WWF Intercontinental Championship Match: Bret Hart (champion) defeated Skinner. 

2. Randy Savage defeated Jake Roberts.

3. British Bulldog defeated The Warlord W/Harvey Wippleman.

4. Repo Man and Ted DiBiase w/Sensational Sherri defeated Virgil and Tito Santana.

5. WWF Championship Match: Hulk Hogan defeated The Undertaker (champion) w/Paul Bearer to win the title. 

Analysis

This Tuesday in Texas is Vince McMahon’s attempt at establishing Tuesday nights as a marquee pay-per-view night. Unfortunately, due to the show’s mixed critical reception and relatively low buyrate, this idea wouldn’t be revisited again until Taboo Tuesday in 2004. That’s not to say This Tuesday in Texas doesn’t mostly deserve its status as a complete footnote. It plays out more like footage from an average house show or hours-long television taping.

There’s also the pervasive feeling the show is the product of a promotion currently on its downswing. By late 1991, public scrutiny over allegations of steroid and sexual abuse are beginning to overwhelm the WWF, and McMahon is looking for anything to reel viewers back in. Hulk Hogan is also starting to see his popularity somewhat lessen. Though he’s still the most popular wrestler in the world, there’s a fraction of fans growing weary of him on top. When he reclaims the WWF title from The Undertaker at the end of the show, it doesn’t even feel like something worth celebrating over.

Fortunately, the show does have quite the upside. The Jake Roberts/Randy Savage blood feud is one of its main draws and it absolutely delivers. Roberts gives one of the greatest heel performances of all time, no hyperbole. His pair of promos disturbing and sinister, his slapping of Miss Elizabeth outrageous and unforgivable⏤Roberts makes it uncool and dangerous to be the bad guy. Kudos to Savage and Elizabeth as well for playing their roles excellently, and Gorilla Monsoon’s “He should be suspended for life!” is a wonderful sound byte. It’s one of the most intense, and at times terrifying, pieces of television ever produced in wrestling history.

Elsewhere, the show isn’t bad, but does little to justify its existence. Despite its commercial failure, it does open up the door for cheaper, shorter monthly pay-per-views a few years down the line. Attitude Era connoisseurs may also take note of how the show trends darker. The WWF is really starting to emulate a dark comic book by the year’s end, and the Roberts/Savage feud is one of the earliest signs of the WWF experimenting with more mature content. For a show that’s become relatively obscure over the years, there are seeds planted here that will grow into things that would change the business forever.

My Random Notes

First and foremost, Jake fucking Roberts. Holy shit. Jake is one of my all-time favorites but, seriously, how good is your heeling that praising it would make me feel rotten to the core? His pre-match promo starts out like he’s reading some poetry he just wrote (beautifully written poetry, I may add), before quickly dovetailing into his sadistic infatuation with Miss Elizabeth. But then his post-match promo, my god his post-match promo, is just so horrifying and disturbing in every conceivable way I won’t even bother quoting it. And, still, amidst all this depravity, he manages to make everything feel so literary. Jake’s promos here have something of value to say about how authority can still fail to protect the most vulnerable members of its community and how our society can wind up protecting predators than actually punishing them. Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but it speaks to Jake’s abilities to make his feuds so thematically rich that I can even reach these conclusions without it seeming like a stretch.

Everyone talks about Jake Roberts’ promos (and rightfully so!) but Savage’s post-match promo is some next-level shit. His voice manages to hit 7,000 different octaves and he falls to the floor as he rants without catching his breath and stays in character the entire time. I mean, when could your faves?

Another Roberts/Savage thing, my god: It took me forever to realize Savage holding up the ring bell to signify he’s going to take it to Roberts’ throat is a callback to his feud with Ricky Steamboat. Like, are you kidding me? Fantastic.

While I agree Roberts/Savage should’ve lasted until WrestleMania VIII (then again, there’s a lot of thing I’d have wanted for WrestleMania VIII), it’s almost unfair to say the feud lost its heat after this. How could it possibly have gotten more heated? The only way it could’ve intensified even more is if Savage legit murdered Roberts in the middle of the ring.

Kinda wish they put more effort into making this show look unique. I would’ve even accepted that hokey cowboy stuff from Survivor Series 1994 because it would’ve at least made it look different from, say, your average episode of WWF Superstars.

I always forget The Warlord had a W shaved on the back of his head. How cute.

I love how Heenan shoehorned that Skinner is undefeated mere seconds before he taps out to the Sharpshooter. So much for that story, eh?

Why didn’t they add Repo Man to Money Inc.? A guy who takes items from people for not paying them off seems like a good fit. Not that I’m seriously complaining. I really do like the idea that Repo Man is just a sociopath who uses his loose repo credentials as an excuse to steal stuff. <3 <3 <3

This show brings me back to Survivor Series 1991, my first review for this blog. That’s a show I’ve always disliked, mainly because they turned it into one long commercial for this show.