WWF Survivor Series 1991 & This Tuesday In Texas

[Ed Wood Caulfield 0]

There's alot about The Undertaker that they have yet to actually explain when you think about it.

[cabbageboy 0]

It wasn't totally explained but putting it together sums up like this: UT formed an alliance with Jake for the Warrior feud, but was never especially down with some of Jake's more deranged antics. Taker half ass got involved with the SS wedding angle with the snake, but once Roberts flat out tried to attack Macho and Liz with a chair UT had enough and stopped it.

[Darth Pipes 0]

It's also hilarious how Dibiase and Bret are in the corner, and the camera is so close you can clearly hear Dibiase say "reverse, charge". Bret then magically reverses and charges.

 

Yeah, I heard that too.

 

I remember during 1999-2000, HHH had a bad tendancy to call audible spots during his matches. When he regained the WWF Championship from the Big Show on January 3rd, 2000, you could plainly hear him call out "Side slam, Paul!" as he proceeded to run into a Big Show side slam. Classic.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

Seeing the This Tuesday in Texas Roberts/Savage angle unfold in it's entirety (instead of just the match, or the clips of the past match angle they showed on Superstars / SNME build-up / wherever I saw them) with all of the promos surrounding it was amazing. Hell of a job by everyone involved in that one.

 

Thankfully my menu (currently) has the show labelled as "Tuesday in Texas" instead of "WWE This Tuesday in Texas" as it sits above my still messed up GAB listings. I can't wait for that show to expire next week (though sadly, the MSG show I can't access will go with it).

[Enigma 0]

Same. I sat on the couch and watched the whole Roberts/Savage angle from last night in sheer amazement. It's seriously one of the best angles I've ever seen that absolutely holds up 17-18 years later (godDAMN we're getting old). Monsoon and Heenan put it over great too, with Monsoon sounding geniunely disgusted and Heenan so shocked he can't even make jokes. That feud should have stretched out all the way to a huge brawl at WM8. It's a shame they let it fizzle into a nothing match at one of the lame duck SNME's on FOX, which served no purpose other than to immediately segue Roberts into a feud with a turned-face Undertaker.

 

Also, this is the first time I've really been able to sit down and watch Hogan/Taker from this show. Taker looked absolutely horrible in this match. There were three spots he totally blew. The first one is when Hogan went for an inverted atomic drop. Hogan held him up waiting for him to club him in the back, but he waited so long that Hogan had to finish the move. Finally UT brings the hammer down, but Hogan has to no-sell it. The second one is when UT is on the apron and Hogan has him by the neck, about to club him. He waits for UT to drop him down and never does, so he has to club him. As soon as Hogan brings the arm down, UT finally drops down, and both no-sell the shots. The third one is near the end of the match when UT ducks a clothesline and goes to bounce off to do his flying clothesline. UT totally wipes the fuck out in the ring ropes and falls on his ass. Can't imagine Vince felt too bad about tacking him with a 6-day reign after his performance in this match.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

I actually got mad at Jake for slapping Liz (mostly because it looks like a short punch). Getting heat 17 years later! And I knew it was coming too!

[Enigma 0]

Might as well throw out a match listing:

 

WWF Intercontinental Championship

Skinner vs. Bret Hart

 

Jake Roberts vs. Randy Savage

 

British Bulldog vs. Warlord

 

Ted Dibiase & Repo Man vs. Virgil & El Matador

 

WWF Championship

Hulk Hogan vs. The Undertaker

[Darth Pipes 0]

The best part of Roberts interview is his creepy...

 

"Randy, I'm begging you please, bring her back. Let me touch her again!"

[Darth Pipes 0]

The Savage/Roberts match was way too short but it was more than made up for with the post-match stuff, which lasted about twenty minutes. Savage sounded a lot like Roberts (his voice) during the promo and was awesome like Roberts.

[Enigma 0]

Just imagine the heat if Jake had actually DDT'd Elizabeth. I'm not sure how acceptable that would have been for 1991 though.

[RepoMan 0]

Just imagine the heat if Jake had actually DDT'd Elizabeth. I'm not sure how acceptable that would have been for 1991 though.

 

I remember feeling shocked and that WWE had crossed the line the first time I saw a woman get hit in WWE sometime in the early Attitude era.

 

[MillenniumMan831 0]

I love how The Fink introduced The Undertaker on the TiT show.

[Guest]

I haven't done this in a while. Time to put some snowflakes on Tuesday in Texas.

 

Skinner vs. Bret Hart - I liked this quite a bit. Skinner hitting Bret with the alligator claw was quite funny. **1/2.

 

Jake Roberts vs. Randy Savage - Awesome. ***1/2 (EDIT: Knock it down to **1/2. Watched it again, decided I overrated it.). Five stars for the whole thing, if we're taking that into account. They should've faced each other at WM, but that never happened, obv. Maybe that was for the best, cause Jake was pretty broken down at this point and all. Jake punched Elizabeth and I flipped. Just great stuff here.

 

Warlord vs. British Bulldog - Good finish. Rest of the match was pretty bleh, but not the worst thing I've seen. **.

 

Repo Man and Ted DiBiase vs. Tito Santana and Virgil - Meltzer and SK have this at ***1/2. I agree. Crowd loved it. They were pretty down after the post-Savage/Roberts angle, but as a result of this, they became energized for the main event. Worked well all around.

 

Hulk Hogan vs. The Undertaker - DUD. Yuck. Overbooked garbage.

 

Good show.

[Promoter 0]

As mentioned by someone before this was my first live ppv experience that I actually had ordered(seen the other events at bars/arcade for free which was special in retrospect), so it has a place in my heart. I remember the promo on Viewer's Choice that followed a singer from the movie The Five Heartbeats. I agree some of the angles were red hot and a vast improvement from that garbage earlier in 1991. Anyways..............

 

I haven't actually seen Survivor Series/TIT in a really long time(still have the original tapes I recorded the shows with) really felt flat to me(even as a kid) for various reasons already mentioned.

 

The Flair tag title was funny because it was obvious on tv it wasn't the big gold belt. The ending for that was flat.

 

Hogan for some reason I thought would lose. I don't know maybe that nonsense about UT being undefeated foreshadowed it. It came off Hogan v. Warrior redone. The match sucked and I think they did a horrible Tombstone piledriver. Flair interfering out of nowhere didn't make sense either. He came into the wwf to challenge Hogan and his claim as world champion. I didn't buy him doing it out of hate towards Hogan because he originally came in with noise about being the real world champion and the wwf champion was living in a bubble. It would fit his character imo to beat Hogan wearing the belt. The show went on to suck even more after. Rockers breaking up. Then Sid not showing up and Boss Man of all people ending a show. Maybe as someone said too many heels going over here and not much babyface heat to pop for may have made it seem flat.

 

YET........I still got TIT. This show came off better, but sloppy in some parts as stated. Yes, even then it looked off to me such as the bumbling in the Hogan/Taker match(where Hogan looks a A LOT more energetic for some reason ). Bulldog/Warlord put on a better match than their Mania one. It was nice to see Bret defend the title although it was nowhere the heat he had at SummerSlam. Bret was coming in his own then for real. The show set up Royal Rumble nicely and was surprising to me since I was SURE Hogan/Flair champ vs. champ was going to be the main event of Mania. Savage/Jake was stellar and I had always wanted to see them feud since their match on SNME in 1986 from LA Sports Arena.

 

With all that said, I remember it fondly since the shows came off a bit unpredictable(although flat at points) in a time when people were saying the wwf was getting too predictable(the "you know what's going to happen" line they tried to counter in commentary).

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

Retro Observer Survivor Series 91 notes:

 

SURVIVOR SERIES

Thumbs up 35 (09.9 percent)

Thumbs down 312 (87.9 percent)

In the middle 8 (02.3 percent)

 

BEST MATCH POLL

Rockers & Bushwhackers vs. Nasty's & Beverly's 128

Flair's team vs. Piper's team 33

Hulk Hogan vs. Undertaker 13

 

WORST MATCH POLL

Hulk Hogan vs. Undertaker 143

Slaughter's team vs. Mustafa's team 59

Rockers & Bushwhackers vs. Nasty's & Beverly's 12

LOD & Bossman vs. Disasters & IRS 10

 

Team Flair vs. Team Piper: **1/2 ("Action was very good but finish takes it down a full star as it was one of the worst finishes in recent history").

Team Duggan vs. Team Mustafa: 3/4*

Hogan vs. Undertaker: 1/2* ("match itself was negative stars but finish and post-match brought it out of the red")

Beverly Bros/Nasty Boys vs. Rockers/Bushwhackers: ***1/2

LOD/Bossman vs. IRS/Disasters: **

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

More Survivor Series:

 

The fourth match (Beverly Brothers & Nasty Boys vs. Bushwhackers & Rockers) had both good booking and good work rate, although it was marred by perhaps the single worst performance by a television announcer on a big show during the year by Gorilla Monsoon, who first tried to turn Marty Janetty heel (when Shawn Michaels is the one turning), then invented his own angle after he missed Michaels being pinned, which only served to ruin the effect when the angle that he pretended happened and didn't (Michaels walking out without losing), did happen in the next match (when Earthquake did walk out without losing). To make things worse, Monsoon constantly went back to Michaels walking out without having been pinned during the latter part of the show and never corrected himself.

 

I believe things like this are why Meltzer and the old-school Observer readers hated Gorilla so much.

 

Thumbs down for the work, but only because of Hogan-Undertaker was so bad for a title match, but huge thumbs down for the booking and a pretty substantial thumbs down overall on the show. I don't think it was quite as bad as the Bash in July, but in my book, if it wasn't for that Bash show, it would be the worst major show of the year.

 

When watching the show, I thought the best work in the entire show was Hogan's selling the tombstone after the match was over, as it took him several minutes to get to his feet and he looked really groggy and his selling was completely realistic. As it turns out, he really was injured, apparently by the tombstone on the chair. After viewing it back several times, it does appear that Hogan's head never came near the chair, however Undertaker may have jammed Hogan's neck with his knee, since Hogan was hospitalized legit all night long with a jammed neck (which is why Sean Mooney had to do Hogan's interview for him later in the card).

 

A big thumbs down. I think it was the worst Survivor Series ever. It seemed like I paid $24.95 just to watch hype for the 12/3 show. The disqualification of just about everyone in the first match was a joke. Hogan vs. Undertaker was boring. It was interesting how Shawn Michaels was pinned but Gorilla Monsoon missed it completely and tried to create his own angle.

 

 

[PILLS! PILLS! PILLS! 0]

Christ almighty, yes- Monsoon talking about Michaels walking out without being pinned, when it wasn't the case, irked the holy hell out of me. I love Monsoon but, really, what the fuck? This is the kind of mistake that I would have expected from Russo-era WCW when the announcers were in the dark about what was going to happen. But he had to have had a copy of the booking sheet directly in front of him. WWF/E doesn't mess around when it comes to that kind of stuff.

 

Cannot remember if I mentioned this before, but WWF Magazine, in their Survivor Series coverage, erroneously reported that Ted DiBiase was pinned with Piper's quick rollup.

[Enigma 0]

I never could figure out why someone didn't yell at Monsoon in his headset about fucking up the Michaels angle. Heenan didn't even correct him, so he must have not been paying attention either. It doesn't matter though. Everything after Hogan/UT was nothing but a hard sell for Tuesday in Texas. So much that the announcers didn't even give a shit about the last two matches.

 

And I never knew Hogan was legit hurt from that Tombstone.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

Yeah the Hogan injury part interested me the most. It obviously wasn't bad since he was at Tuesday in Texas, but there was a big fear there.

[garfieldsnose 0]

The dude that always dressed up like Hogan in the audience looked like someone killed his mother after UT beat Hogan.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

Roddy Hogan is the man.

 

[Boner Kawanger 0]

Didn't Hogan talk about the Undertaker dropping him on his neck "in '74" to Nick on an episode of Hogan Knows Best?

[MillenniumMan831 0]

I can imagine just reading one of these Observers when I was nine and thinking "what a crabapple this Meltzer is" before throwing it away.

[PILLS! PILLS! PILLS! 0]

Didn't Hogan talk about the Undertaker dropping him on his neck "in '74" to Nick on an episode of Hogan Knows Best?

 

That would have been a sight to see, since Taker would have been nine years old at the time.

[Boner Kawanger 0]

Yeah, I'm sure it was said with part sarcasm/part "two thousand pound Andre the Giant" retcon

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

And with another Retro Observer, the 'dirt sheet' news on the Survivor Series 91 / Tuesday in Texas comes to an end.

 

SURVIVOR SERIES FINAL POLL RESULTS

Thumbs up 56 (12.4 percent)

Thumbs down 386 (85.8 percent)

In the middle 8 (01.8 percent)

 

TUESDAY IN TEXAS

Thumbs up 96 (57.5 percent)

Thumbs down 67 (40.1 percent)

In the middle 4 (02.4 percent)

 

BEST MATCH POLL

Santana & Virgil vs. DiBiase & Repo Man 42

Randy Savage vs. Jake Roberts 33

Hulk Hogan vs. Undertaker 8

 

WORST MATCH POLL

Warlord vs. British Bulldog 50

Hulk Hogan vs. Undertaker 46

 

Noted by Dave, "Response to Tuesday in Texas was the smallest of any poll in recent memory, which makes me believe that a lot of readers who never miss a PPV show decided to skip this one".

 

Match Ratings:

Skinner vs. Bret Hart: **1/4

Jake Roberts vs. Randy Savage: *** ("two stars for the match but add another star for the angle")

Bulldog vs. Warlord: **1/4

El Matador/Virgil vs. Ted DiBiase/Repo Man: ***1/2

Hulk Hogan vs. Undertaker: *1/2

 

Selected Notes & Quotes:

 

WWF's experimental "Tuesday in Texas" PPV show took place on 12/3 in San Antonio before a sellout crowd of 8,000 fans (announced as 20,000+ by Gorilla Monsoon several times during the show) at the Freeman Coliseum. The card had sold out a day or two in advance and it was well known locally for some time it would be a PPV show. The 90-minute long show (which ended at 90 minutes on the dot because satellite time is charged by 30 minute interval and this was, by WWF standards, a show run on a shoe-string budget with no advertising other than on the weekend television, five matches, and no production frills like grand ring entrances or pyrotechnics.

 

The combined revenue grossed by Titan Sports (in excess of $4 million) from these two shows is greater than any single Thanksgiving show had in the past. There were some complaints among cable viewers as if they felt they paid for the first show which was simply hype to get them to buy a second, but they were minimal. Anyway, I enjoyed the second show because nothing was that bad, and some things were pretty good. It was far from the best show of the year (or even of the past few weeks), but it was entertaining to watch (but not necessarily to listen to since the Gorilla was almost as bad as he'd been the week before, between claims of Skinner being unbeaten since coming to the WWF, 20,000 fans in attendance and truckloads of misused medical terminology).

 

It started out kind of slow since Skinner is pretty well past washed-up

 

The match itself was only average but the post-match was pretty memorable. Roberts gave Savage three DDT's and Elizabeth came down and kept begging him to stop. Roberts pulled a bag out and they pretended there was a snake in the bag and teased it for about 100 years (at least it seemed that long), climaxing with Jake slapping Elizabeth before Jack Tunney, Dr. Pat Patterson, Dr. Rene Goulet and the like all made the save. This was just about the most dramatic angle I've ever seen. Most angles in wrestling are usually rushed through (a major problem with WCW for some reason) so the needed drama isn't there. If anything, this went on for too long.

 

Both guys' bodies had made major changes in just the previous six days, for whatever that's worth and probably very little. I think a lot of people looked at this match, with one guy who usually does nothing against another guy who almost always is terrible as a stinker before it started. And aside from a three-minute fullnelson spot which Monsoon ruined by emphasizing the hold wasn't properly applied (which ruined all the intensity of a possible near submission, which they certainly needed if they were going to use a hold for three minutes), this was a good match. These guys are best friends in real life and Bulldog did a lot of good stuff here.

 

DiBiase may be the best worker in the WWF right now and he seems to have kicked the effort up a good 50 percent in the past few weeks and everyone knows he's got as much ability as anyone. He was the one-man match pretty much. The second best worker was Sherri.

 

The first time I saw this match I thought it was so much better than last week and the finish was very exciting. But after watching it again, while it may have been better than last week, it was still a 1/2* match with a star added on because of a hot finish.

[PILLS! PILLS! PILLS! 0]

Both guys' bodies had made major changes in just the previous six days, for whatever that's worth and probably very little. I think a lot of people looked at this match, with one guy who usually does nothing against another guy who almost always is terrible as a stinker before it started. And aside from a three-minute fullnelson spot which Monsoon ruined by emphasizing the hold wasn't properly applied (which ruined all the intensity of a possible near submission, which they certainly needed if they were going to use a hold for three minutes), this was a good match. These guys are best friends in real life and Bulldog did a lot of good stuff here.

 

 

So which one is Bulldog- the one who does nothing or the one who almost always is terrible? Because I would strongly disagree with either of those.

 

Does anybody else find it funny that Bulldog and Warlord faced off against each other at every PPV that year?

[Guest]

Bulldog was the one who does nothing. He had no good matches between the time he came back and Tuesday in Texas, matter of fact, almost all of them were terrible. The shoe fits.

[MillenniumMan831 0]

Both guys' bodies had made major changes in just the previous six days, for whatever that's worth and probably very little. I think a lot of people looked at this match, with one guy who usually does nothing against another guy who almost always is terrible as a stinker before it started. And aside from a three-minute fullnelson spot which Monsoon ruined by emphasizing the hold wasn't properly applied (which ruined all the intensity of a possible near submission, which they certainly needed if they were going to use a hold for three minutes), this was a good match. These guys are best friends in real life and Bulldog did a lot of good stuff here.

 

Hey, if someone can not execute a full nelson properly, Monsoon should point out that it's all fucked up.

[Kahran Ramsus 0]

Both guys' bodies had made major changes in just the previous six days, for whatever that's worth and probably very little. I think a lot of people looked at this match, with one guy who usually does nothing against another guy who almost always is terrible as a stinker before it started. And aside from a three-minute fullnelson spot which Monsoon ruined by emphasizing the hold wasn't properly applied (which ruined all the intensity of a possible near submission, which they certainly needed if they were going to use a hold for three minutes), this was a good match. These guys are best friends in real life and Bulldog did a lot of good stuff here.

 

Hey, if someone can not execute a full nelson properly, Monsoon should point out that it's all fucked up.

 

I find it surprising that he gets criticism for this too. This is one of the reasons why I liked Monsoon. He would treat it like a legitimate sport, and if a move wasn't executed properly or somebody didn't hook a leg on a pinfall attempt or tried to win a match with a chinlock, he would call them out on it.