It was the night before the night before XMas and even after last Nitro,
no one was watching Thunder! not even the Power that is Vince Russo.
All the kids were huddled in front of the TV with the channel turned to UPN
as visions of the original brand of sports entertainment begin...

1999's RSPW*'s Worst Show winner, Thunder! Delivering the proof...

Open with some recap material.

Tenay in the intro mentions they'll be 'proving that Thunder! is special again.' Sure Tenay. Whatever you say.

But I tell you what is special: Scott Hudson moves back up a rung in the announcing chain as he's part of the announcing team of Tenay, Hudson, and (ugh) Schiavone. But for my money, this is the best announcer lineup going today. If we can get Juvy back in Tony's place....

nWo ver. 2k out to talk a while.

Hart: 'Don't you like all the gold. Isn't is sweet.' Hall: 'No, it's too sweet. Remember that one?'

Hart: 'We've been planning for a month. You wrestling fans are such stupid idiots (boooo) you feel for the oldest trick in the book.' Hart cues the highlight reel of Nitro's masterpiece swerve. Lots of stuff from the last month of Hart and the Outsiders against Goldberg. I guess it's all rather coherent. HBK's name gets dropped by Bret after a clip of the Starrcade doublecross on Goldberg. I'm sure many will go on about that.

Nash does a real lame attempt at being a heel by saying the fans cheered just to be hip and they can't be hip because they are stupid and feel for the swerve. Well, I suppose after a few months 3H finally got it down so maybe Nash will figure it out as well.

Hall's survey of nWo vs. WCW gets bizarrely edited out.

Jarrett proclaims it 'the First Annual Slapnuts Convention. And he is the Choosen One. And this nWo will be different. No watering down, no ham n eggers, only the elite. Once you've had the black you never go back.'

Goldberg's music plays. nWo brandishes silver baseballbats. Goldberg: 'I've thought of Monday night 1000 times. Compassion is dead and so are you. One by one I'm going to rip your hearts out and shove them down your damn throats. It won't be who's next, but who's left.'

Shots of Leia Meow (Kimona Wanalaya) warming up. I don't know who thought "Leia Meow" was anything but a stupid name, but let me just say this about that body in that outfit: HOLY SH*T!

Back from commercial with a pair of bikers driving up.

Mean Gene interviews 1999 Wrestler of the Year Chris Benoit. 'Life is about being true to yourself. Bret was a great role model true to himself and his friends, never compromised himself. I loved you as a brother but that all ended Monday night. You ripped my heart out, tonight I'll rip your heart out.'

Hey, PG-13 has that ICP/Dead Pool music, isn't it? One of them raps a bit, I hate rap. Varsity Club is out with GOOD GOD! Leia Meow. Hey, where's Coach Buzz Stern when you need him? Kevin Sullivan was the Gamesmaster back in those days, an evil Satanic guy, not a coach. Don't get any hopes up for play by play. I'm much too fascinated about all the problems with this booking. Wasn't the world just waiting for the return of Mike Rotundo? Or is it Rotunda these days? Will Rick Steiner now feud with Saturn over the 'Goofy member of the group' gimmick? Will any match in crap TV go over 1 minute and not be a lame DQ? What's on Smackdown! right now? (Test v. Roaddog)

More shots of the unknown bikers walking down Electric Avenue. (That's for you old school MTV fans)

David Flair beats up a drive thru guy as Daphne laughs. They steal some food. Wow.

The Voice That Be laughs with Hennig about the nWo swerve and how they are dumb patsies and such. Hey, the two bikers were Creative Control. I'm glad I didn't make a DOA joke earlier. They knock Hennig off the screen, overturn the Voice's table and promise payback will be slow and hard and boring and involve lots of bad matches. They should go back to wearing suits.

Filthy Animals return. Except where's Torrie? Rey out on crutches. Duggan is the out as well and he starts up a (surprise!) USA chant. EDDY~! on the mic. Ouch, turn that guy heel. Face just don't suit him as he says nothing worth writing about. Kidman talks a bit. *sigh* Konnan talks a bit. Hey, remember when he was nWo 4 life? Rey talks some. I soooo much performed the rather silent masked luchador. Duggan with more Hoooo USA USA. He promises to make the Revolution his personal HOOOO! Hacksaw, no!

Revolution out. Malenko wants the fans to 'pledge allegiance to the flag of Revelation.' Duggan says 'USA.' Saturn says, 'You know where you are but can you spell it. How many times will Fred Flintstone tip his car before he realizes that side of ribs is just to big. etc.' Douglas: 'Hacksaw you will denounce this stinking country.' This goes on for like forever. I can just see SKeith pouring venom on this show right now. WRESTLE, DAMMIT!

The Voice to Be talks to Hennig. Hennig and Jarrett to take out Creative Control tonight.

Tank Abbott vs. LaParka. Lolight of the match is Tank no selling LaParka's chairshot. Another DQ in about a minute as LaParka plays dead outside the ring from Tank's 'brutal' offense. Tank takes out Doug Dillinger as well.

Norman Smiley prays and cowers. 'Please don't let the cameraman give away my position, please Lord, don't let the cameraman give away my position.'

As Snow takes on the Rock in a cage match on Smackdown!, I'd like to remind you that Thunder! is special again. I'm this -> ' ' close to finishing my Thunder! report with a recap of the second hour of Smackdown!

A producer asks Artist FKAP Iaukea, 'were you happy with that music?' and tells him 'Your lyrics make no sense.'

Fit Finlay returns to action vs. Norman Smiley. Action goes into the crowd and into a concession stand. Knobbs joins the fray. Meng saves Smiley from certain doom. Lots of punching and hitting with objects. A year ago I'd mark so hard for a Fit v. Smiley match (or indeed any Fit match) These days I really don't want to talk about it. I'm guessing some will rave about how funny Norman is when his savior Meng puts the Tongan Death Grip on him at segment's end.

Jarrett gets a note, 'See me now.' He puts on his shades and heads out to the rendezvous. Don't suppose it's a setup do you? Naaaah.

Jarrett shows up at the Voice's office to find Goldberg waiting for him. 'Jarrett before I snap our neck, I want you to do me a favor. Tell Bret Hart that blah blah blah rip his heart out.'

Creative Control on the mic. They are the Harris Boys. The silence is deafening. Hennig comes out to be part of the tag match vs. The Harris Boys. Remember when Hennig got kicked out of the nWo at the airport? I'm off track, aren't I? Hennig loses what turns out to be a handicap match since Jarrett didn't show up. After the pin the nWo comes out and punks the Harris Bros out and spray paints them and the music plays and Tony confesses it's 96 again. What I'm dying to see is the Lackeys That Be vs. the nWo B team.

KIENTAI~! on Smackdown! Thunder! and Russo can kiss my ass, Kientai vs. Christian/Jeff Hardy is on.

Hollywood Kanyon talks as Maestro takes on Bam Bam. Man, I don't know how much more I can take of this. Maestro gets beat up. Symphony tries to protect him from the top rope headbutt of 3B but fails. J Biggs in the ring to attack Bigelow but gets clobbered by Bam Bam with his champagne bottle as Kanyon's hos distract the ref. Kanyon pulls out a title belt from a briefcase and waffles Bam Bam. Maestro gets the pin.

Mean-O Gene-O interview Page about Buff and Kim. yawn.

Recap of Captain Evan Courageous' angle of the last month. He introduces his new group 3 Count and they lip sync a lame boy pop song. RUSSO IS A GENIUS~! I will say this, the segment pays off as Chavo bumrushes the fools and clears the ring.

Flair visits a gas station where Devon Storm claims some people call him Crowbar. ( On the other hand, currently on Smackdown! Mark Henry is out with Moolah and Mae Forever Young. ) I was going to do a MST tribute by coming up with a 'Let's Have a David Flair Christmas This Year,' song. Something like 'Oh let's have a David Flair Christmas this year, we'll act really crazy, like the Nature Kid... etc' but then decided it's not worth the effort. Maybe next year.

Vamp and the Misfits attack David Flair at the gas station and Crowbar Storm makes the save. Then Erik Watts shows up and puts the STF on Vampiro.

Kidman and Konnan and Duggan vs. Saturn and Malenko and Asya. There was a time when I'd be up for this even with the anchors of Asya and Duggan. Saturn hit a good top rope elbow drop, then tried to powerbomb Kidman. It's been so long I guess he forgot. Finish has Rey hitting Malenko and Saturn with crutches leading to a double sunset flip and double pins by Kidman and Konnan.

In the interest of being a good reporter: Page walked out instead of taking part of his scheduled match against the Wall so The Russo That Be decided Kevin Nash will fight the Wall. I think the nostalgia of the nWo reunion will last shorter than the Hogan red and yellow nostalgia, which means the nWo nostalgia was over about 40 minutes into tonight's Thunder!

Thunder! is special! Nash vs. The Wall. Stop. I want to go home. Take off this uniform and leave the show. Finish has Hall tearing down the Wall with his silver ballbat and then there is some spraypainting.

Wall goes crazy. Cameraman follows Hall which can only mean Goldberg's ready to attack. Back to Nash in the shower. Cut to Hall laid out through a table in the locker room. Cut to an incredibly lame 'Psycho'esque camera shot of shampoo washing down a drain with Nash's still hand just in frame. I suppose you can't blame the cameraman, he's probably just a film school dropout.

Bret vs. Benoit in a World title main event match. Or as I like to call it: Countdown to Goldberg's run-in. How bad is Thunder!? I can't even get excited about a Benoit world title match. I mean it's 10:03. It's obviously a schmoz. Cut to the end: Benoit has the Crippler Xface on Hart when Jarrett smashes a silver guitar for the DQ and here comes Goldberg. Hart runs off. Goldberg follows.

Hey, black and white TV is back. Goldberg breaks the glass windows of a white Power To Be limo since Bret jumped in a car and speed off and there was no police cars around for Goldberg to jump into to give chase. Reports are he had a serious injury to his arm from using his elbow to smash out the glass. Like him or hate him, you got to admit that Russo is a genius. Way to go Vinnie. Happy holidays everyone!

mdb
very independent

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(My guess is, the blood - and it did look like there was a lot of it - doesn't look as bad in black & white, so that's why they did that. Yup. - CRZ)