Really Surprised!

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

"The Real American" Hulk Hogan and his fighting for American rights against Iraqi sympathisers Sgt Slaughter and General Adnan had gotten very old by this point. But, to flog the dead horse the WWE bought back former Champion the Iron Sheik, renamed as Col Mustafa, to team up against the "Real American" Hulk Hogan and The Ultimate Warrior.Now I haven't picked on any of the other earlier wrestling story lines from 1985- 1990, because they worked. But for a young Australian this storyline was crap. The Iraq war was a non event and well and truly over by August 1991.The night started off with a six man tag match won by Ricky Steamboat (returning to the WWE after a long tour of duty in the NWA) The British Bulldog and Texas Tornado Kerry Von Erich, over The Warlord, and Power and Glory Hercules and Paul Roma.Next up came one of the bets matches ever seen in the WWE as Bret Hart defeated Mr Perfect to win the Intercontinental Championship. Perfect was working with an injured back and put in a sensational performance. Hart was on song as always. These two had tremendous chemistry and this was probably the best of their PPV matches.Next up we see Andre the Giant in a backstage interview with the Bushwackers in his final PPV appearance as he would die later that year. The interview didn't help them though as The Natural Disasters Earthquake and Typhoon picked up a comprehensive victory over the Bushwackers, who were starting to get pretty old.Next up we saw some of the build to the main event with Bobby Heenan standing outside Hulk's dressing room. Following this is an interview with Ted DiBiase as he guarantees all of us he is going to wipe the floor with his former slave Virgil and walk out with his million dollar title belt. He was wrong. Virgil got the win and Million Dollar Belt was his.Next came a jailhouse match won by he Big Bossman over The Mountie. The downside of this was we had to watch some "Comedy" scenes of The Mountie being arrested and thrown in jail. Pretty over the top and quite dated.In our next match the Legion of Doom Hawk and Animal defeated The Nasty Boys to win the Tag Team Championships. If memory serves I think this was the first time they had been tag champs in the WWE.We get another shot of The Mountie in jail and then Irwin R Shyster defeating Greg Valentine, who was cast as a good guy in this match for some reason.Next up is our main event as Hulk Hogan and The Ultimate Warrior defeated Sgt Slaughter, Col Mustafa and General Adnan with Sid Justice as the guest referee. It had been a running story all night that Justice had supposedly been bought out by the Iraqis, but this was not the case and Justice and Hogan posed together at matches end. This was the Warrior's last PPV match in the WWE for some time and it nearly didn't happen after Warrior had threatened to leave the building if he was not given bonuses he was owed from months before. The match sucked. The angle sucked. THank goodness it was finished.The Main Event of the show though was Randy Savage's "wedding" to Miss Elizabeth. Savage, despite not being allowed to wrestle after losing a retirement match to the Ultimate Warrior at Wrestlemania VII had stayed on the show as a commentator and come back to the good side. He'd proposed to Elizabeth in the build up and they are given a proper wedding here with no catches. This would eventually lead to Savage breaking his retirement, which wasn't a bad thing.This PPV had some good stuff on it, DiBiase/ Virgil and Hart/ Perfect, but not much else and it really has aged badly.

Here are the matches...Ricky 'The Dragon' Steamboat, British Bulldog and Texas Tornado v Warlord and Power and Glory: What on earth is Steamboat wearing? Lol. I don't think he is referred to by name, just by his moniker 'The Dragon' and spends most of the time in the ring getting beat up. The weak link is Paul Roma and he gets body-crossed by Steamboat for the pin. An okay starter but there is talent in this match that could have had better separate matches. This is Paul Roma's last PPV and Steamboat leaves the WWF shortly afterwards. 5/10 Bret 'The Hit-man' Hart v Mr Perfect for the Intercontinental title: Mr Perfect, for one PPV only, has 'coach' as his manager who does very little. What makes this match excellent is probably not the wrestling itself but the way Mr Perfect bumps throughout. Mr Perfect spins and gets crotched into ring posts like nobody's business. Perfect smacks Hart off the apron at one point when he tries to get in the ring, flinging him into a camera man and Hart kicks out of the Perfect Plex. The match ends when Hart applies the sharpshooter. Mr Perfect had an injured back and so immediately submitted. Hart is the new Intercontinental champion. This is Hart's debut as a singles wrestler and he does a great job of it. 8/10 Bushwhackers (with Andre the Giant) v Natural Disasters: Bushwhackers oddly enough keep control through most of the match and actually put on a more intelligent fight than usual. It all ended rather predictably when Butch gets squashed in Earthquake's vertical splash. After the match, the Disasters threaten to beat up Andre when the summertime vigilantes Legion of Doom even the odds. That's the second consecutive Summerslam the LOD have come to ringside to help someone out. It would be the last time we see Andre the Giant on PPV as he died in February 1993. 4/10 Virgil v 'Million dollar man' Ted Dibiase for the million dollar belt: Virgil starts off burning and applies the million dollar dream but Dibiase's manager 'Sensational' Sherri hits Virgil with her loaded purse and the bell rings teasing a disqualification. The referee wants Sherri away from the ring and the match continues. Roddy Piper does terrible commentary all night but he sells this match well with nice interplay between him and Dibiase. Dibiase mocks Piper after every move he executes on Virgil. Ted takes advantage of the ref being on the floor by removing a turnbuckle. However, Dibiase is sent head first into it and Virgil gets the pin. Virgil's success proves to be his downfall as the WWF don't know what to do with his character afterwards. 5/10 Bigbossman v Mountie in a jail-house match: I have seen this match a few times now and just can't get into it. As Jacques Rougeau he was okay, as The Mountie he was abysmal. The biggest surprise was Mountie kicking out of The Bossman Slam but gets pinned after the Alabama Jammer. I think I was more interested in the conclusion rather than the match itself. 4/10 Legion of Doom v Nasty Boys in a no disqualification/no count-out match for the tag team titles: Sags actually does most of the rule-breaking at the start spraying something into Hawk's eyes and then hitting him over the back with what appears to be a tray of drinks. It becomes more genteel and settles into a tag match. It ends when Nasty Boys both get hit on the head with Jimmy Hart's helmet and Doomsday Device on Sags to secure the pin to become new tag team champions. This really should have played out like an ECW tornado match. 5/10 Greg 'Hammer' Valentine v IRS: I think this is the only time we hear Greg Valentine's ring music. I like The Hammer but this is really slow even by his standards and IRS's stalling makes it worse. The Hammer gets ensnared in the cradle trying to apply the figure four leg-lock (how many times does Valentine lose this way?). Pretty much the end of the line for Greg Valentine who was ill-used in the WWF after 1988. 3/10 Hulk Hogan and Ultimate Warrior v Sgt Slaughter, Colonel Mustapha and General Adnan in a handicap match (Sid Justice as special referee): Four years after the first Summerslam and we have another 'is the ref biased or not?' subplot. This is hopeless for so many reasons. 1. The Gulf War finished months before. 2. Hogan already pinned Slaughter at Wrestlemania VII. 3. Everybody in the match performed terribly. 4. Despite the handicap rules, did the WWF really think the 'Triangle of Terror' would pose such a challenge to Warrior and Hogan? Warrior and Hogan beat 5 better mid-carders in the previous Survivor Series. 5. Warrior and Hogan were obviously the stronger side yet Hogan still cheated to win the match with powder. This is the third out of four Summerslams to have the tag team main event format and was a clear sign that Hulkamania was running out of steam. 3/10 We now have the 'privilege' of attending 'Machoman' Randy Savage and Elizabeth's wedding (even though they married for real in 1986). It's just an elaborate way of setting up a feud with Jake Roberts. One question though - why does Gene Okerlund refer to the bride and groom as 'Mr and Mrs Macho'? The Intercontinental title match between Hart and Perfect saved this PPV from being a right mess. The undercard wasn't that thrilling (only the blow-off between Dibiase and Virgil was memorable). The WWF can get away with that if the main event is of exceptional quality (Wrestlemania VI comes to mind) but the main event of Summerslam 1991 was premeditively disgusting. The Machoman/Elizabeth wedding would have been better served on a Saturday Night's Main Event than a PPV.

*SPOILERS*Until the last three segments, this one was really good.The opening six-man match was a good way of putting over two guys in one match. I say "two" because all the Texas Tornado did was punch. But it took the British Bulldog a year to go over at least that well again, and The Dragon was gone soon after.The big reason the Bret-Perfect match is so memorable is that it was Bret's first great high-profile match. He has said that most wrestlers had their best match against him, and no one can deny it.\The Bushwhackers put up a great fight against the Disasters, and the spot with the Legion of Doom afterward was almost as big a highlight as what the LOD did later on that afternoon.The Big Bossman always was an underrated performer. He and Jake the Snake are the only wrestlers who I remember could have a good match with the late Hercules. Here, he dominated the Mountie, but the real show went on afterward. Look closely and you'll see the Mountie give a jailer the finger. And the end of his segment is too funny for words. Kudos to Jacques Rougeau in selling this spot so well.While the LOD's match against the Nasty Boys was good, why did they bother making it a "No Disqualification, No Countout" match? The Nasty Boys make sure to do all of their cheating behind the ref's back, and Animal spends most of the match on the apron waiting for Hawk's tag. He would not have been disqualified for running in! That's the whole point!After that, we get a mediocre match between Valentine and IRS, followed by the worst main event in SummerSlam history. That includes the one from '89. Then the ludicrous wedding, which was an elaborate setup for the major feuds of the next few months.So rent it, but just hit "stop" after LOD's match.

BEWARE OF SPOILERS AHEAD!SummerSlam '91 had good points and bad points. First, let me discuss the bad points.There were some pretty unspectacular matches such as Virgil VS Ted DiBiase and Greg Valentine VS IRS. Some of the other matches were just above average. The main event was an average match. Hulk Hogan and the Ultimate Warrior beat Sgt. Slaughter, Col. Mustafa and Gen. Adnan in a short match. It was nothing special but we got to see Hogan beat the evil Sgt. Slaughter to win the match.SummerSlam '91 had it's good points. Bret Hart and Mr Perfect had a fantastic match despite Perfect having a really bad back. Perfect could have forfeited the match but he went out there and had a good match in which he lost the Intecontinental Title.The Bushwhackers had an entertaining match with the large Natural Disasters (Earthquake & Typhoon).The Warlord & Power and Glory had a reasonable match with the late Texas Tornado, Davey Boy Smith and The Dragon.Two other good matches as well;the Big Boss Man met 'fellow law enforcer' The Mountie in a match. The Mountie lost and was forced to spend the night in 'jail.' Also, the Legion of Doom beat the stuffing out of The Nasty Boys to win the tag titles.The Macho Man and Elizabeth got 'married' as well. It was nothing special-until Jake "The Snake" Roberts crashed the party and showed his true colours. That was the highlight of the wedding.SummerSlam '91 is worth a serious look.