The Capsule Review - WWF King of the Ring 1996

In advance of tomorrow's King of the Ring revival, here's a look at the most influential one that the WWF ever ran.

Whenever it's possible with these things, I'll try to include a link to Scott Keith's rant on the show; if there's any kind of discrepancy between his star rankings and mine, just be aware that his are based on seeing essentially every match ever, while mine can be easily influenced by anything from "random grudges from 15 years ago" to "brand of bottom-rail liquor I'm currently imbibing". Anyways, here's his synopsis.

We start with the Free For All, which I honestly miss the concept of - they really only do it for WrestleMania nowadays, and even that’s just online. In addition to that, and this sounds crueler than I mean it to, I really miss the desperation of the WWF here. Really, this entire broadcast is just filled with pitches to buy stuff, and even ends with the hard sell of next month’s pay per view. It makes you feel as if the WWF has something at stake (and they did, since this was the period where they were nearly run out of business by Turner). Say what you will about the meaning of titles in a sport with predetermined outcomes, but when you’re always weeks away from going belly-up, putting the belt on a Bret Hart or Shawn Michaels really means something. A billion-dollar corporation putting it on Randy Orton or John Cena just doesn’t have the same impact - sure, they want those guys to succeed, but it’s not like they’re betting the house. This might be mitigated by only having one title belt, but you also feel a real urgency throughout the company in this period that, happily and sadly, we’ll probably never see out of the WWF again.

A Body Donnas (w/ tranny manager Cloudy) vs., New Rockers match is in progress, with a jealous Sunny in the back. Vince and JR are on commentary and Pettengill is on the phone, the arena is visibly half-empty. Like, as in “large blocks of seats have no one in them“. Vince and JR attribute this to “a big traffic jam”, and claim that the arena is sold out. Hmmmm. Decent match from what we saw of it on the broadcast.

Dok Hendrix is with an arriving Brian Pillman on crutches. Awesomeness is oozing out of Pillman here, and he promises to make his presence known at the arena.

Highlights of the Goldust-Ahmed Johnson feud are aired; apparently, they’re feuding because Goldust gave Ahmed some Super-Gay CPR!

Lawler, with taped hands, gives an interview recapping the events leading up to the Warrior-Lawler match, including video clips of the Warrior’s odd baseball-cap-wearing promo

Dok interviews Perfect by the throne and interrogates him about how he’ll ref tonight’s Michaels-Bulldog title match, which is apparently the main event.

Show’s about to start, and this is a copy of an old Coliseum Video release, so I love it already. Unfortunately, it also seems to have a few moments where it just skips for no reason. Let’s get to it, though….

WWF King of the Ring 1996

Live from “the Mecca” in Milwaukee, WI with Vince and JR on commentary; the Slammy Award-Winning Owen Hart is also out for commentary on match #1

Stone Cold is out (with his old Ringmaster music); he beat Bob Holly and Savio Vega on the way here, as this was the year where they started the lameness of only having the semis and the final match on the PPV itself. There’s a pretty snazzy crown decoration over the center scoreboard, which sort of makes up for the jarring lack of tournament matches tonight. The arena actually appears to be full at this point, I guess the Big Milwaukee Traffic Jam cleared up

Wildman Marc Mero (w/Sable) vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin

Owen :”Since when can a girl be a good manager?”

This is still in the phase where Sable was hot.

JR compares Owen’s lying about Mero holding his trunks in the qualifier to “blaming the flood in (some random town that wasn’t Altoona) on a leaky faucet in Altoona”. Ok, if you say so.

Stunner ends things and Stone Cold gets the clean pin at 16:42, match had a lot of innovative near-falls. I’d go ***1/2 on this one, a great opener and, as far as I know, Mero’s best match in the WWF.

Jake Roberts promo in the back with Dok, a lot of bible mumbo jumbo, which is a shame given how great Evil Jake could’ve been even at this late stage.

Jake Roberts vs. Vader

Wait, Owen’s on commentary for the whole PPV? Sweet!

I know the result but I’m still rooting Vader here. This, of course, isn’t the most memorable match between Roberts and Vader - for that, you’d have to tune into Boy Meets World on TGIF.

JR: “Jake Roberts has one big advantage……talk about drug and alcohol abuse, but this is a 458 pound monster……and as long as Vader has the advantage, he’s the biggest bully in the yard”. Yes, that’s the end of the quote.

Vader grabs the ref while going down to the DDT at 3 mins, getting himself DQed; Jake wins but gets destroyed afterwards, which is exactly the right way to have Vader lose if you must have a face/heel finale. No stars, crowd not pleased.

Coliseum Video Exclusive! of Cornette and Vader flipping out in the back

WWF Tag Team Championship
The Godwinns (w/ Hillbilly Jim) vs. The Smokin Gunns (w/ Sunny)

Billy Gunn on Sunny on the interview: “hey, shes beautiful, she’s award winner….ummm….manager???”

This match actually has a relatable story and makes you root for the Godwinns; Billy plays “cocky dipshit heel who somehow gets the girl” to a tee. The Gunns win at about 10 minutes with Billy pinning H.O.G. after a Bart cheap shot with a cowboy boot. Slow and plodding for the most part. *¼, mainly because the story wasn’t bad.

Bulldog interview with Clarence Mason and Jim Cornette
Bulldog (caps meant to denote British screaming): “SHAWN MICHAELS....YOU'RE MINE…..IN LESS THAN…..A FEW HOURS AWAY”

Ultimate Warrior vs. Jerry Lawler

Lawler out first and he makes a trip to the throne with the mic, an RF Video sign is in the background. Jeez, they were around then? “Burger King” chants as he insults the home crowd., drawing on some cheap Brewers heat and then insulting individual crowd members, Classic King as he’s really, really infuriating some hicks here with lines like “look at this little kid, is that your face or did your neck throw up?” They’re actually reaching over the rail and trying to hit him. Great stuff from the King here, and a better setup for what I assume is a Warrior squash than anything else he could deliver.

Warrior is out to a decent pop and Lawler starts with some dirty tricks, a lot of heat for Lawler here. Warrior completely no-sells the piledriver at 3 minutes, then hit’s the clothesline-clothesline-clothesline-shoulderblock combo for the quick pin. ¼* just for Lawler drawing such intense heat for a squash.

Warrior mounts the throne, takes the crown, and for all we know, he may even think that he just won King of the Ring.
Dok and Gorilla backstage with Roberts, who has both broken ribs and a burning desire to continue. Also, probably a vicious hangover.

The Undertaker vs. Mankind

Mankind out first, this has to be like his first or second month in the Federation. Big pop for Taker.

Trickery as Taker starts off on the top rope and goes right after Mankind

At 16:30 JR asks “how much longer can this possibly go on?”, which had to be his most spot-on comment of the night. Mankind wins via the Mandible Claw and the Undertaker passing out at 18:30, after Bearer accidentally hits Taker with the urn. Accidentally, of course, JR says that this resembles a human demolition derby, which is sort of code for “that wasn’t a very good match”.

*¾. Length does not goodness make.

Dok backstage with Perfect, this is about the 10th time that they’ve outright accused Perfect of being in the bag for Cornette, so I’m assuming he aligns himself with HBK at the end tonight.

Owen calls Hendrix an idiot for throwing it back to Vince and JR, and not mentioning him.

WWF Intercontinental Championship
Goldust v. Ahmed Johnson

In terms of political correctness, this feud is not the WWF’s finest hour.

JR introduces Ahmed Johnson as the “Kuwaiti champion” without really explaining this. It might be fictional. Ahmed comes out, knocking down both of the KOTR jesters that are manning the entranceway,and sprints to the ring

Ahmed’s leap to the outside on Goldust looks reeeeealy awkward. He throws the ring steps at Goldust and misses as they bounce off of the post (Owen: “He better check his eyesight, Goldust doesn’t look like a ringpost.”)

Vince: “Ahmed Johnson, no quit in this man”
Owen: “No brains, either”

Ahmed wins via Pearl River Plunge at about 14 minutes, after an uncomfortable CPR sequence.

*½, I guess.

Coliseum Video Exclusive! captures Ahmed Johnson’s champagne celebration (???), which, if the video is to be believed, lasts 2.5 seconds.

And now, we throw it to Pillman!! He’s at ringside on the crutches, talking to JR and sticking his middle finger in the face of some kid in the crowd while making Jeffrey Dahmer jokes. Pillman is unreal at this point, calling JR a stupid son of a bitch back when that was absolutely off limits. Vince apologizes immediately. Sweet promo here, great job introducing Pillman as a tremendously entertaining whackjob.

King of the Ring Finals
Jake Roberts vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin

Austin wins via Stunner at the 3 minute mark or so, after the match was nearly stopped by Gorilla as broken-ribbed Jake was completely unable to fight back. No stars here, as this wasn’t a match really, but the real story is the promo cut afterwards, where Austin introduces “Austin 3:16” with the definitive Austin breakout promo that ended up making the WWF millions and millions of dollars. Note to current WWF officials: GIVE YOUR GUYS UNSCRIPTED PROMO TIME. Good things happen.

Bar none, the most important single promo in the history of the WWF. Take a look.



As Steve Austin claims the crown, we segue into the championship match, with Owen receiving admonishment from Vince that he is in no way to interfere in the match. Perfect is out first.

WWF Championship
Shawn Michaels (w/ Jose Lothario) vs. British Bulldog (w/ Jim Cornette, wife Diana, and Clarence Mason)

This was set up the prior month with a controversial double-pin finish at Beware of Dog, the “most controversial championship match ever” if Vince is to be believed.

Bulldog enters with Owen giving him a standing O - literally, he’s standing on the announce table. The crowd’s reaction to Michaels doesn’t seem as big as I expected; I think they popped louder for the Undertaker.

Gorilla Monsoon comes into the ring and informs the Fink that Perfect will actually be an OUTSIDE ref, with Hebner on the inside.

Owen refers to Shawn’s manager as “that dirty old Mexican Jose Estrada”. Vince asks him why Perfect being moved to the outside is a ripoff for the Bulldog if Perfect was going to ref fairly; his response is “psychologically, maybe the Bulldog was counting on a bigger referee”. If Owen had lived, I have no doubt that he would have Lawler’s job by now.

There’s a “Save the Brewers” sign in the crowd; wait, the Brewers were in danger in 1996?

At about 24:30 Bulldog goes for the Michaels flip into the corner and does it too early, which looks goofy but also devastating when he just bounces right off of the ropes. Weird finish at 26 minutes when Shawn hits the superkick, both refs count, and Owen pulls Perfect out but not Hebner. Not sure what they were going for here, or why Perfect was even involved in the first place, but the match itself was quite enjoyable and a great example of drugged-up Michaels’ finest face work. Bulldog lagged behind at times and had a few botched spots, but one of them was better than the same non-botched spot would’ve been, and he did a good job of conveying power as his counterpoint to Michaels’ speed and agility, I liked the story and I appreciated the length. ****

Owen and co. attack afterwards, but Ahmed and the Warrior make the save, as this is back when all of the babyfaces and all of the heels were just naturally pals. We end with Ahmed and the Warrior raising Shawn’s hand as his music plays, as well as the announcement that they’ll be joining forces at International Incident against Vader, Bulldog, and Owen. This is also sold nicely by a Coliseum-exclusive group promo with the heels, including Cornette.

JR: “Any closing remarks?”
Cornette: “Yeah. You’ve got the biggest jowls I’ve ever seen in my life! Vader would eat you alive if he wasn‘t on a low-fat diet!”

On that note…..

This show had a lot of duds mixed in, but it’s certainly worth checking out for the main event and the opener, as well as some really great examples of promo work - Austin’s famous one, of course, but also two classic ones from Pillman and Lawler. Owen’s commentary work was gold throughout. I’m an unabashed WWF homer, but this really epitomizes how great their old model really was - even at their darkest hour, they were bailed out by the simple formula of letting their talent get themselves over. The main issue I have with today’s product isn’t just the lack of urgency, it’s the fact that everyone’s promo work sounds like it’s written by the same guy. It probably is. I know Austin’s been pushing this idea to Vince for years, but if anyone can bring urgency and life back to the product, it’s the individual performers who have everything on the line, rather than the behemoth corporation with very little incentive not to just go through the motions. Let them talk!

Tangent aside, this is classic WWF promo work at its finest with two really good matches. On the just-invented TCR scale of 60 to 100, with 100 being the can't-ever-humanly-be-topped greatest show of all time and 60 representing wrestlers lying down in the ring and doing nothing for three hours, this show holds up at a solid 85. Check it out if you can.


TCR Rating: 85


EDIT: We here at Heenan Family Reunion have scrapped that rating system, due to excessive awfulness. It's 0-10 from here on out. Therefore, the new and improved rating of this show.....

TCR Rating: 6.5