WWE In Your House 13: Final Four Review
December 4, 2011
By Ricky Dozan
Just a mere few days before the event, Shawn Michaels retired his WWF (now WWE) title due to injury and forced WWF to create a new main event in a matter of days. How well does WWF work under pressure?
Leif Cassidy vs 'Wildman' Marc Mero
Cassidy, better known as 'The Snowman' Al Snow, spends the match working down Mero's knees to stop him from using his high flying moves. A brief distraction from Mero's manager, Sable and Mero no-sells all the work Cassidy has done and puts him away after a flurry of speedy maneuvers. Ergh, one of my pet peeves in wrestling. A solid PPV squash match.
4.5/10
Goldust, Bart Gunn & Flash Funk vs The Nation of Domination
Talk about a random team. Who choose the face team? Anyways, it's not that important. This matches purpose was just to feed The Nation some solid midcarders so that they would look dangerous walking into WrestleMania. It's still worth watching to see Flash Funk's epic aerial assault though.
5/10
Rocky Maivia vs Hunter Hearst Helmsely - Intercontinental Championship
In three years, these two men would be the two biggest in the company. I'm sure no-one back then thought that. Rock was stuck with a one dimensional face character and Triple H was lumbered with a rich snob gimmick that wouldn't survive in the main event. The match itself was very back and forth and there's even a callback spot from their initial match a few days before where Rock won the title. Rock retains his belt after Goldust comes down and distracts Hunter which allows Rocky to hit a beautiful bridging back drop. After the bout, we see the debut of Chyna. Again, this is another match which sets the mood for next month's WrestleMania.
6/10
Phil LaFon & Doug Furnas vs The British Bulldog & Owen Hart - WWF Tag Team Championship
LaFon & Furnas were criminally underrated and I'd recommend you all check out some of their classic matches from Japan. They really should of got given a bigger push during their short stay in the WWF. The fans really didn't care for them though, even if they were extremely talented. The match is really good and LaFon and Furnas get really close to winning when the team of Bulldog and Hart nearly break up after Owen's spinning wheel kick accidentally hits Bulldog. When Bulldog has one of his opponents in a Powerslam clutch, Owen plants them with his Slammy award, causing the DQ. Furnas & LaFon win the match, but not the titles. They tease Bulldog and Owen breaking up after the bell, which was just a small step in reforming The Hart Foundation.
7/10
Vader vs Steve Austin vs Bret Hart vs The Undertaker - WWF Championship - Final Four Match
A Final Four match is a 4 way elimination match where a wrestler can be eliminated by pinfall, submission or being thrown over the top rope. Austin is thrown out first, by Bret, then Vader is eliminated after a failed Vaderbomb by Undertaker and finally, Bret wins his forth WWF title after eliminating Undertaker, even after Austin tried to seek revenge after being eliminated by Bret earlier in the match. His reign would be short lived though, as he would lose the title the next night to Psycho Sid. The match is good, but easily forgettable. The shot of a bloody Vader is very iconic though. It was another sign of the WWF gearing towards an edgier product which would later be known as The Attitude Era.
6.5/10
An enjoyable show. It lacks historical value and the crowd is dead for most of the event, but the matches are good and we see the debut of the announce team of JR and King, who provided brilliant commentary. If you fancy some wrestling from this era and you've seen all the good shows, I suppose there is no harm in giving this a watch. If not, then I would not recommend going out of your way to see this.