With the pay-per-view product starting to falter at the end of the year, the WWF decided to swing for the fences at Armageddon, tossing all of their biggest feuds into one chaotic Hell in a Cell match. WWF Champion Kurt Angle, The Undertaker, Steve Austin, Triple H, Rikishi and The Rock would all enter the Cell, creating one of the wildest matches in company history. It's only been attempted one other time since then, and that was a dark match following a Monday Night Raw in 2011, making this the only televised six man Hell in a Cell match in existence. Could this one unique attraction give the WWF some momentum to finish 2000 off right?
- Armageddon 2000 comes to you from the Legacy Arena in the Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Complex in Birmingham, Alabama. Those weren't the names being used for the arena or the complex at the time, but I'm just using the current names to ease confusion, as they've used lots of names over the years. This is the first and to date, last, WWE pay-per-view hosted in Alabama, and I've personally never understood why Alabama doesn't get to host any WWE pay-per-views, though maybe I would have to live there to get it. The crowd for this show was definitely very happy to see the Federation, as they stay pretty hot all night long.
- Our opening contest is a six person intergender tag match, just like at Survivor Series, as Team Xtreme take on the Radicalz. There is definitely some good action to be found, with a lot of really good athletes facing off out there, but the elimination stipulation really holds it back, as they need to put together five falls in eight minutes. It comes down to Dean Malenko and Lita, which was an obvious final two, as they have been feuding lately, as the horny Malenko defeated Lita in a match to earn a date with her, where she and the Hardyz ambushed him. Dean looks like an absolute bastard here, as Lita is completely out of it following a superplex, but he refuses to end the match that easy. After a DDT and a backbreaker, Malenko forces Lita to tap to the Texas Cloverleaf, continuing to cinch in the hold after the bell, as he has to be pulled off Lita by the officials. If you can get past the male on female violence and wonky pacing, this was a solid opener.
- Apparently, the William Regal-Hardcore Holly match from last month was good enough to run it back, as the two men face off over the European title one more time. Holly is very over in his home state, and while nothing about this match is technically bad, it's a bit too slow to be interesting, plus it's pretty close to being a carbon copy of their previous encounter. Holly is very dull on offense, which is a shame since Regal is selling for most of the match, before Raven, of all people, interferes, hitting Hardcore with the Evenflow DDT which allows Regal to retain.
- Chyna's feud with Right to Censor continues on this show, as she takes on Val Venis, with Ivory running interference from ringside. I do like Chyna's babyface fire, but her moveset is extremely limited working with a bigger guy like Val, as she can't really use her impressive power. Ivory distracts Chyna multiple times, which eventually allows Venis to get the win with a fisherman's suplex, setting up the two women to fight at Royal Rumble.
- I was not impressed by what Kane and Chris Jericho showed me in their match at Survivor Series, but now they get a chance for a do-over, as they fight in a Last Man Standing match. Unfortunately, this one, while better than the previous match, still wasn't anything too impressive. After some backstage brawling, Kane slowly dominates in the ring, hitting a big chokeslam. Jericho attempts the Lionsault but eats some knees, as both men now move to an electrical area near the stage. Y2J manages to get the win after tipping over a piece of the set, a whole pallet of connected barrels, onto Kane, trapping him underneath for the ten count. The Last Man Standing stipulation can be difficult to make interesting, as it forces the competitors to constantly stop the action for the referee to administer a count, so you have to stuff the match with tons of excitement so the crowd doesn't just get bored during the breaks. These two men just didn't get that memo, as they wrestled a mostly normal match that just randomly included a referee counting occasionally, and it was a bit of a mess. The finish was pretty lame, as I have a ton of difficulty believing a supernatural monster couldn't manage to lift a stack of barrels, though the shot of his hand reaching through a gap in the chain to try and grab Jericho was cool.
- The tag team division has definitely fallen out of focus the last couple months, as the WWF just threw together a four corners match for this show, with champions Bull Buchanan and The Goodfather defend against Edge and Christian, the Dudley Boyz and Road Dogg and K-Kwik. Bubba Ray and D-Von completely carry this one, as the crowd is so into their act and they go absolutely wild on everyone. Eventually, Christian manages to sneak in and steal the titles by pinning Bubba, setting up those two teams for a future match.
- Billy Gunn has now become the Intercontinental Champion, dethroning Eddie Guerrero in between the last two pay-per-views, and he's now defending against Chris Benoit. Benoit spends most of the match focusing on the leg, which is a bit of a curious choice as he has no well known leg submissions. The work does pay off when Billy manages to tweak the injury while on offense, allowing Benoit to apply the Crippler Crossface, beginning his third title reign. Not much to say about this one, a fairly straight-forward win for Benoit as Gunn was a very obvious transitional champion.
- I'm going to be real with you, I pretty much completely missed the next match, as I was cooking lunch while listening to the show on my headphones, and when I turned back to actually watch, the match was already over. Ivory manages to successfully defend her Women's title against Trish Stratus and Molly Holly, and with the match lasting just about two minutes, I seriously doubt I missed a masterpiece. After the match, Crash Holly and the returning APA confront Test and Albert, before Molly joins in to send T&A packing.
- Main event time, as Kurt Angle defends the WWF title inside Hell in a Cell against five other competitors. This match has been hyped all night long, with interviews from all the participants and tons of highlight packages of the biggest moments in the history of the gimmick to this point. A majority of the match is just all six guys brawling with each other, with my favorite part coming when Austin drags Triple H's face across every side of the Cell. Vince McMahon arrives to tear the Cell down, as he doesn't approve of Mick Foley making this match, but the WWF's commissioner brings in some local police to carry Vince out of the building, leaving the truck that McMahon arrived with behind. All six guys brawl to the set and get in some big spots on a bunch of cars, as The Rock takes a Pedigree and a bloody Triple H takes more punishment from Austin, including a catapult onto a car and a boom mic to the face. They all climb to the top of the Cell, which really gets the crowd going as they're hoping to see a big spot, and they finally get one when Undertaker pushes Rikishi off the top into the bed of the truck, which was conveniently filled with sawdust. The spot does look very good, but the whole chicanery with Vince and the truck was so obviously setting up for this spot that it kind of broke my immersion. The crowd goes nuts for a showdown between Austin and Rocky, foreshadowing their WrestleMania main event to come, but after Austin nails a Stunner, Triple H gets his revenge, not allowing Stone Cold to make the cover. Kurt Angle, who has not done much all match, sneaks in, getting one arm over Rock to retain his title, before he takes a Stunner to send the fans home happy. This was a pretty fun watch that mostly lived up to the hype the WWF had been giving it, though it's pretty far from the best Hell in a Cell matches I've seen. The spot with Rikishi was really the only thing that made this match stand out from those others, but that wasn't enough to make it a classic in my mind. That being said, this was still easily the match of the night, a chaotic brawl that never once slowed down due to having so many more competitors in it.
6/10
Armageddon has the same fundamental issues as No Mercy and Survivor Series, as the undercard felt half-baked and almost nothing really stood out. The opener was the best pure wrestling match on the night, and even that had a lot of pacing issues, while the Last Man Standing match was a massive disappointment and the main event, while good, might be a bit overrated in terms of what it actually provided. I still think 2000 was one of the better years for the WWE on pay-per-view, but after watching 10 out of the 12 shows on offer, I'm ready to move on.
Next time on Henry's Pay-Per-View Reviews: Royal Rumble 2001, which contains one of the most beloved Rumbles ever. See you soon.
- Henry
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