The summer of 1998 was terrific for Vince McMahon and the WWF, but while business remained hot throughout the spring and summer of '99, this time period has not held up as well. Both behind and in front of the camera, Vince Russo's booking was starting to go absolutely wild, resulting in an extremely confusing product filled with a ridiculous amount of nonsensical swerves, title change and heel/face turns. The reveal of the "Higher Power" that The Undertaker and his Ministry had been subservient to as Vince McMahon might be the worst in history, though I don't have anywhere near enough time to get into that right now. By far, the absolute lowest point of the year came at Over the Edge, when Owen Hart fell to his death in a stunt gone horribly wrong due to the company's negligence and frugality. With all that being said, there were definitely some great acts and entertaining storylines, which helped SummerSlam 1999 hold it's place as one of the better pay-per-views offerings of the year.
- SummerSlam 1999 comes to you from the Target Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the first of many pay-per-views in WWE history to take place in this venue. It's also a very appropriate host for this show, considering the heavy involvement of Jesse "The Body" Ventura, who was shockingly elected Governor of the state late last year. As always, Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler are on the call.
- Jeff Jarrett and D'Lo Brown are always reliable for a solid opening match during these Attitude Era pay-per-views, and they delivered another entertaining one here. Jarrett sends Debra after their entrance to draw mega heat, and get D'Lo a huge pop for bringing her down to ringside. Both men have some slick offense, with Brown delivering his sit-out powerbomb and Jeff hitting a move I've never seen before, a tornado DDT on Brown's arm. Double J attempts to use his guitar for a cheap shot, but Mark Henry interferes, and we get a classic Russo swerve. Mark hits ally D'Lo with the guitar as Debra has the ref distracted, allowing Jeff to retain his Intercontinental title and win the European title. I thought this betrayal was executed pretty well and it helped that it had been built up, with Mark growing frustrated as D'Lo pushed him to lose weight. A good way to start the show.
- Time for a tag team turmoil match, which is mostly just used as a vehicle to get Edge and Christian over. They start with Jeff and Matt Hardy, who took their spot in The Brood with Gangrel, and it's virtually impossible for these two teams to have a bad match. Indeed, they are very impressive here, pulling off some great spots to the amazement of the crowd, including Edge running the barricade to Spear Jeff and the Hardys hitting some of their classic double team offense, which hadn't really been seen in wrestling at this point. Edge and Christian manage to eliminate Jeff and Matt, and go on a run, picking up pinfalls over the teams of Mideon and Viscera and Droz and Prince Albert, nothing too special here but at least the crowd is happy about it. Farrooq and Bradshaw then enter and clean house as the crowd pipes back down, with the Acolytes clobbering Edge and Christian and the Holly cousins to earn a title shot. Most of this match was pretty entertaining, though the final few minutes lost my interest.
- The Hardcore Championship is on the line in our next contest, as the Big Boss Man defends against Al Snow. There were plenty of more infamous moments to come in this feud, when Snow's Chihuahua Pepper is killed by the Boss Man and fed to Al, but this is a pretty standard hardcore match. They brawl out of the arena and across the street, with Road Dogg providing some useless roaming commentary, getting involved for the finish by laying out Boss Man with his own nightstick. I don't generally enjoy these hardcore matches, they all feel exactly the same to me and this one provided nothing special.
- I feel bad for Ivory, who did the best she could in her Women's Championship defense against Tori, who really just cannot wrestle. Everything she does looks horrible, and this is the absolute definition of a p*** break match. Ivory gets the win, thankfully.
- Ken Shamrock enters the Lion's Den for the second year in a row, this time taking on Steve Blackman. I loved Shamrock's match with Owen at SummerSlam '98, but unfortunately this match is nothing close to that one. It's just a weapons-based brawl, lots of weapon shots and choking that did make the match feel very personal, but didn't help it stand out from all the other hardcore matches of the time. I thought they really didn't make good use of the Den itself, as last year's match had some incredibly creative spots that just aren't in this one, so I guess Owen was responsible for coming up with all of those. Man, that just made me really sad. Shamrock gets the win by knocking out Blackman with the kendo stick, which was at least a cool, visceral finish, and Ken celebrating on top of the structure was nice.
- Time for more hardcore mayhem, but certainly the best weapons-based match on offer on this night, as Shane McMahon takes on Test in a Greenwich Street Fight. The storyline between Test and the young Stephanie McMahon has been riveting to this point, and the crowd is totally into seeing Test beat some sense into the bratty Shane. Shane deserves a ton of credit for making this match as good as it was, selling well for everything Test delivers and taking some insane chances, including his famous elbow drop through the announce table. I also thought the involvement of the Mean Street Posse really added to the story, making Test an incredibly sympathetic figure and getting Gerald Brisco and Pat Patterson a massive pop when they run in to even the odds. The drama down the finishing stretch is just top notch, and Test hits the pumphandle slam before delivering an incredible flying elbow drop for the win, what a way to end it. Considering the lack of any real ring general in there, this was pretty much a perfect match and a real coming out performance for both men.
- Kane and X-Pac have been arguably the hottest act in the company for the past few months, as both were cast out by the Corporation and formed an incredible unlikely team, with Kane's character becoming more and more human with help from X-Pac, a really terrific character evolution. Both faces look like absolute stars here as they defend their tag titles against another new team, The Undertaker and the Big Show. Kane cleans house whenever he's in the ring and his inverted color scheme is incredibly intimidating, while X-Pac just desperately fights to survive against the bigger men, taking every opportunity he can to stay alive. But the two monster heels are just too much for the champions, as 'Taker puts down X-Pac with the Tombstone Piledriver to win the tag titles. The wrestling may not have been top notch, but the storytelling was terrific and everyone was put over really well, so thumbs up from me.
- Billy Gunn may have been intended to be a major star in the WWF, but his big push during the summer of '99 failed miserably. His King of the Ring win is generally considered the worst ever, and he just got eviscerated by The Rock in a legendary promo a couple weeks earlier, removing any real drama from their Kiss My Ass match on this show. That being said, I think the gimmick itself could've killed this match all on it's own, it's definitely the worst stipulation match ever cooked up by the WWE. Billy brings in some random obese lady, who's posterior the loser will be kissing, and JR and the King just spend the whole match ripping on the poor woman for her weight in a painfully embarrassing showing for the two of them. I suppose it doesn't help that the match is also very bad, consisting of about 10 minutes of brawling that absolutely no one in attendance is interested in, before Billy, of course, gets to smooch some buttocks. Sometimes, I wonder why I even watch this garbage.
- Main event time, as "Stone Cold" Steve Austin defends his WWF title against Triple H and Mankind. The build for this match hurts my brain to think about, as Chyna became number one contender at some point, lost it to Mankind for some reason, there was a double pinfall, and we've somehow ended up here. Also, Jesse Ventura is the guest referee, because we really needed one more entity added to this complete mess. For as messy as the story was, I thought the match was entertaining enough. Jesse does a great job, as his natural charisma and still great physique gave him an intimidating aura, and he's obviously got tons of experience performing for a crowd. I thought his interactions with Hunter were great, refusing to count a pinfall after Hunter used a chair, before refusing to back down from a blustering Shane McMahon, who eats a Stunner. We get a terrific moment after Jesse throws Shane out of the ring, as Austin manages to get himself tangled in the ropes, forcing Triple H to break kayfabe and save him, your world champion, ladies and gentlemen. In a genuine surprise, it's Mankind who picks up the win, as he capitalizes on a Pedigree to Austin, knocking Hunter down and hitting the champion with a double arm DDT, stunning the crowd. There have long been rumors that Austin apparently refused to drop the belt to Triple H, forcing this title switch, though I would sooner believe the rumor that Jesse's camp just didn't want to see him raise a heel's arm, especially one as dastardly as Triple H. Either way, this was an entertaining match that certainly had it's moments, though the actual wrestling wasn't great, not much of a surprise given the three men in the ring. After the match, Triple H attacks Austin's leg with a chair, providing a good hook for the next few months of television and getting him his heat back.
7/10
This show is certainly very far from perfect, with the Kiss My Ass match being an obvious lowlight, though the Lion's Den match wasn't much better. In general, most of the action was underwhelming, lots of kicking and punching and weapon attacks, but the storytelling more than made it for it. I particularly loved what they're doing with the teams of Kane and X-Pac and Undertaker and Big Show, plus the saga of the relationship between Test and Stephanie and the shocking win for Mankind in the main event, Mick Foley's third and final WWE title reign. In many ways, I suppose that makes SummerSlam 1999 the ultimate Vince Russo show, too busy and too crass at times but genuinely compelling at others and giving just about everyone something to work with.
Next time on Henry's Pay-Per-View Reviews: No Mercy 1999. See you soon.
- Henry
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