- 6 weeks ago
From the importance of Survivor Series to the lost art of tape trading, take a nostalgic trip back to the 1990s. This is a look at the unique experiences that only wrestling fans from that decade will truly remember.
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00:00It happens to us all, life moves on, and you're stood there thinking,
00:04what on earth happened, and why does nobody play with a pog anymore?
00:07You better embrace it though, because it is coming,
00:09and if you were loving wrestling in the 90s, well let me perk you up a little bit,
00:14because it's 10 things only you will understand.
00:17Number 10, Survivor Series being important.
00:19So the good news is that this is finally changing.
00:22Although for about two decades, WWE did not care about this Survivor Series,
00:27Triple H does.
00:27Sounds like it's going to be the permanent home of war games,
00:30and in 2023 CM Punk returned, the love is back.
00:34To stress how much Vince McMahon went off this event too,
00:37he actually thought about scrapping it all together at one point.
00:40That's right, November was planned to welcome a brand new named pay-per-view,
00:44before thankfully we saw sense.
00:46So many gimmicks were thrown at it too, like the whole Raw vs Smackdown madness,
00:50but I tell ya, if you wind back the clock, you will find something else entirely.
00:55I mean, back in 1991, The Undertaker defeated Hulk Hogan for the WWE title,
01:00Bob Backlund did something similar in 1994,
01:02and of course, we all know about 1997, nobody shuts up about it.
01:07There is a reason after all it got cemented as one of the top four,
01:10but again, in the modern day, I feel like it's going to be treated as such,
01:15and thank goodness for that, the Survivor Series rules.
01:18Number 9, must-see Monday Night Raw.
01:20So the three-hour length has affected this, that's just a long time to do anything.
01:25Much like the Survivor Series however, recently, Raw has become a really good show again.
01:30We've got stars, stories, drama, it's fun.
01:33There is no doubt that it would be better and more watchable at two hours though,
01:36and when you throw in a crazy hype crowd and sheer mayhem,
01:40well this was Raw in the late 90s.
01:41It really did become a major event that people would chat about the next day,
01:45and even though today, a lot of it is questionable,
01:47you can't complain about that atmosphere, it's incredible.
01:51To balance the books, you do have to go through a very bad period around 1995,
01:55but you also get the debut in 1993,
01:57and that wonderful transitional year in 1997, that still holds up.
02:02Without this crazy period as well, Raw wouldn't be the institution it is right now,
02:06so let's just hope the current momentum continues.
02:09It really has been quite the turnaround.
02:11I get very excited about Monday nights.
02:13Number 8, 5 pay-per-views max.
02:15It was WCW who decided to take pay-per-views to one a month though,
02:19and because WWE had to copy everything they did, they did it too.
02:23People at the time thought this was nuts as well,
02:25no way fans would pay for all of these.
02:28We are talking more about the early 90s here,
02:30and this is why the Big Four were called the Big Four.
02:33The WWF would use the Raw Rumble, WrestleMania, SummerSlam and the Survivor Series
02:37as huge tentpoles to look forward to and make them must-see events.
02:41The In Your House series changed all that,
02:44and it's why in 1993, the King of the Ring was a huge deal.
02:47A brand new pay-per-view that was a tournament?
02:50Wow.
02:50There's no way the company would ever go back to this today,
02:52because the structure is in place and works,
02:54and even AEW is edging more towards this.
02:57Whatever makes money.
02:59There was a genuine fear if you were a kid during all of this though.
03:02Your wallet was about to get a lot lighter,
03:04and you didn't have any money to begin with.
03:06Number 7, the importance of VHS boxes.
03:09This is quite timely.
03:10Silver Vision, who made these home videos,
03:12recently announced that there's no more DVDs,
03:14there's no more Blu-rays,
03:16meaning we have come to an end of an era.
03:18When the VHS tape was the people's choice, however,
03:21man, did we have all the fun with these,
03:23because if you collected them all and lined them up on your shelf,
03:26they would be all themed.
03:28It looked great.
03:29The cost argument does come into the frame again,
03:31because one of these costs more than the current price of the WWE Network,
03:35so oh, how times have changed.
03:37You also had to wait months for these, sometimes years,
03:40and it was a genuinely painful process.
03:42As you were a kid as well, there wasn't much internet,
03:45which we will talk about later,
03:46but sometimes it meant you didn't know what had happened.
03:49Just sat there like an idiot,
03:51hoping Lex Luger won the Rumble.
03:53We should all be ashamed.
03:54Number 6, tape trading.
03:55If you did want to see wrestling from places far, far away,
03:59you had to start tape trading.
04:01I mean, who has the time?
04:02Even when Dave Meltzer from the Wrestling Observer newsletter
04:04said to see what was happening in Japan,
04:06he would have to have a system like this set up,
04:08and closer to home, it was the same with something like ECW.
04:11I think that's the reason why it had this cult following.
04:14Trying to see it was like dealing drugs.
04:16You just didn't have an endless library on demand back then,
04:19which was another reason the WWF could dominate.
04:22They had the best TV deal.
04:23Mick Foley has also talked about how his IWA King of the Deathmatch Wars
04:27became a collector's dream,
04:28and think of this,
04:29once it was gone,
04:30it was gone.
04:31No one was mass producing these,
04:33which is why it's important to save such footage.
04:36It cannot be lost to the passages of time.
04:39Number 5, pre-booking the TV.
04:41Because yeah,
04:42there was no DVR or Magic Live recording back during the 90s,
04:45so if you weren't going to use a VHS,
04:47you had to make sure the TV was free.
04:50It was even more crazy over here in the UK,
04:52as while Raw aired on a Monday,
04:53we didn't get to see it until Friday night.
04:56Kind of worked,
04:57as you'd invite your friends around to start the weekend,
04:59but imagine that today,
05:01it ain't gonna fly.
05:02The other issue, of course,
05:03was what if somebody wanted to watch something else?
05:06Given you were likely a kid,
05:07no way you're telling your parents tough luck,
05:09you just had to miss the wrestling.
05:11It's why we really should appreciate the on-demand world we now live in.
05:15It's just made everything so much easier,
05:17and there's a lot less arguing.
05:19Number 4,
05:19seeing WWE live once a few years at best.
05:22So this is another British-focused entry,
05:24but we count too.
05:25The reason I say that is because during the 90s,
05:28it didn't really feel like we counted for much.
05:30Because while today,
05:31WWE love coming over to our shores,
05:33this was not the case 30 years ago,
05:35as Vince McMahon mostly kept an eye on his American operation.
05:39SummerSlam 1992 only happened at Wembley,
05:41because US business wasn't all that great,
05:43and that's why it sold the place out.
05:45The World Wrestling Federation in our backyard?
05:48That's a huge deal.
05:49Any other shows were few and far between,
05:51which is why that Raw Albert Hall event is talked about so much.
05:54It was just such a novelty,
05:56whereas now,
05:57at the very least,
05:57WWE will be this way a few times a year.
06:01And good,
06:01this should be the way across the globe.
06:04Number 3,
06:05ECW.
06:06So we kind of touched upon this earlier,
06:08but ECW was something you had to see at the time.
06:11Context is so important,
06:12because if you were used to the WWF or WCW,
06:16seeing Extreme Championship Wrestling go bonkers blew your mind.
06:19Who were these people,
06:21and how the flub were they getting away with this?
06:23It was everything that the more corporate companies weren't,
06:26and it created an environment where you had to check it out,
06:28just to have your own take on it.
06:29Then you would see how far they would push the envelope,
06:32and insane.
06:33It became tape trading gold,
06:35especially in the early days,
06:37and it's likely why it still has a following today.
06:39You had to put in all the effort to see ECW,
06:42and that stayed with you.
06:43A lot of it has aged nowadays,
06:45and become commonplace for wrestling,
06:46but that's why you needed to be there.
06:48Paul Heyman really did change the game.
06:50Number 2,
06:51The Rise of the Internet.
06:52In many ways,
06:53the popularity of the internet is what sent wrestling to the next level.
06:57Look how many people today care more about the backstage drama,
06:59than what's happening on the actual screen.
07:01When it really kicked off in the 90s though,
07:03sports entertainment was right there along with it.
07:06Although my gosh,
07:07when you learned about these websites with spoilers,
07:10you better have some time on your hands.
07:12The connection speed was painful,
07:14it took forever.
07:15And I challenge you right now,
07:17to go a day without reading about the industry at large,
07:20it's almost impossible.
07:21You would definitely be more happy doing that,
07:23if you did have to deal with this back in the 90s though.
07:25Some people say,
07:26that WWF AOL webpage,
07:28is still loading.
07:30Number 1,
07:30it's much better now.
07:32Because it just is.
07:33We've laid out a lot of reasons why,
07:34but it deserves saying again.
07:36A huge step forward to all of this,
07:37is the in-ring work across the board,
07:39because you can pick any wrestling show,
07:41and within 5 minutes,
07:42you're probably going to see an amazing match.
07:44The bar has been set so high.
07:46This wasn't what was happening in the 90s,
07:48because with the WWF especially,
07:50a lot of it,
07:51was nothing.
07:52Yep,
07:53people would just stand around.
07:54Now this was fine,
07:55because it was expected,
07:56and the schedule was way harder.
07:58But don't forget,
07:59most of the TV had the likes of Mantar,
08:01Duke the Dumpster Drozzy,
08:02and the Dungeon of Doom.
08:04It's just so hokey.
08:05Thankfully,
08:05towards the end of the decade,
08:07the WWF realized this,
08:09as we shifted into the Attitude Era.
08:11Even then though,
08:12it's not like the overall match quality,
08:13was through the roof.
08:15So yeah,
08:16never forget this,
08:17today,
08:18we really are spoiled.