In Your House 11 - Buried Alive - Market Square Arena, Indianapolis Indiana, October 20th 1996

The opening video is narrated by The Undertaker and features the WWF debut of one of my favourite pieces of royalty free music. Since losing Paul Bearer as his manager Undertaker has done a LOT more speaking and it’s cool. I can’t do this video justice so just watch it. Oh and the PPV’s theme song is Oh Fortuna, which is also pretty cool.

Coming into this show there’s been a lot of attention paid to Jim Ross and his ongoing feud with Vince McMahon and the WWF in general. He opens the show complaining that he wasn’t given a microphone so Vince just offers him his and puts on false platitudes telling JR that he can speak his mind just like everyone else. Throughout the show JR has audio issues with his microphone muting and cutting him off which riles him up but Vince laughs off. 

Stone Cold Steve Austin vs. Hunter Hearst Helmsley

This match was supposed to be Stone Cold vs. Savio Vega but apparently Savio is injured so HHH is filling in. That’s not the only injury changing a match tonight but I’ll get to that later when the match happens.

Backstage before he comes out, Kevin Kelly asks Stone Cold about this match. He says that Savio isn’t injured, he’s scared of him and his strategy is still to whip somebody’s ass. This is a pretty huge match historically speaking with these two going one on one but it also features the debut of Stone Cold’s iconic theme song with the glass shattering and the awesome guitar line. Austin says that some people have a problem with his language but they can kiss his ass! 

Bret Hart will be back tomorrow night on Raw to make a major announcement which Austin hopes is that he’s retiring otherwise he’ll have to whip his ass too. 

These two grapple back and forth and show off some technical skills but the fans aren’t super into it being that they’re both heels. Austin gets some cheers when he gives the finger to HHH and more when he hammers him with punches so I guess he’s the de facto babyface. Jim Ross’ audio issues and relentless bickering with McMahon is REALLY distracting me; he’s in full angry heel character which thankfully didn’t last much longer and he’ll be back to a normal commentator by the next PPV. The action in the ring is really good and Austin gets more cheers for near falls off the stun gun across the ropes and a diving elbow off the middle rope. It’s not exactly news that these two are great wrestlers and they go back and forth.

Mr. Perfect returns to action tomorrow night on Raw with a match against HHH and he walks down to ringside to, as has become his M.O. steal Hunter’s girl. It distracts him so Austin can go on the attack but Austin 3:16 doesn’t want any help and gets in Perfect’s face before throwing a cup of water at him. Hunter sees Perfect still trying to leave with his girl so he gives chase and Austin follows him. They brawl in the aisle and HHH suplexes Austin out on the concrete. I was sure that would lead to double count out but the match continues and Stone Cold slingshots Hunter into the ring post and gets them back into the ring. Austin hits the Stone Cold Stunner and wins this match which was great despite all of the distractions. Stone Cold with his Stunner, bad attitude and iconic theme song is now the complete package and on his way to the top.

WWF Tag Team Championships

The British Bulldog and Owen Hart © (w/Clarence Mason) vs. The Smoking Gunns (Billy and Bart Gunn)

This match gets a video package, but not really. The video focuses on The Gunns and their relationship with Sunny. I included the interview with the Gunns too.

The story is simple - Bart wants the titles back but Billy is way more focused on getting Sunny back. I mean in 1996, I can’t blame a guy for being a little obsessed with Sunny. Jim Ross is STILL having audio issues and at this point I’m getting nervous that it’s going to continue all night long and distract from every match. 

Billy and Owen start the match and it's fast but after Bulldog tags in a cheap shot from Bart allows the Gunns to isolate and work over Bulldog in their corner for a bit. That doesn’t last long before Bulldog and Owen reverse fortune and work over Bart in THEIR corner. Bart’s comeback is cut short as Billy is too busy posing and showing off and Bart is whipped into him. The distraction allows Owen and Bulldog to take control but a sneak attack from Billy reverses that. This is really disjoined and it's being made worse by Jim Ross’ audio issues and his constant sniping at Vince McMahon. It’s SO distracting. Speaking of which, Sunny is shown more than once watching this match closely backstage and looking concerned for Billy’s well being. Maybe she has a little affection for him too? With the loss of Faarooq she’s currently not managing anyone on the WWF roster.

Billy and Bart set up the sidewinder and might be closing in on the victory but they miss the move - Billy was too busy showing off and making sure that Sunny was watching - and pays for it when Bulldog shoves Owen to safety and the King of Harts follows up with a spinning heel kick to pick up the win. Owen and Bulldog retain the Tag Team Championships in a pretty dull match (that’s two heel vs. heel matches in a row for anyone keeping track) and Sunny is shown applauding them backstage? Maybe she has designs on managing Owen and Bulldog next? Historically she’s jumped ship to whichever team holds the Tag Team titles. 

Jim Ross, tired of the audio difficulties, gets up into the ring with a mic and tells the crowd that Vince has his “butt kissers” messing with his microphone. He announces to the live crowd that “thanks to good old JR” Bret Hart will be back on Raw tomorrow night with a major announcement and an interview with him. JR says that he is the one who went to South Africa to win him over, not Vince. He seems a little thrown when JR suggests Bret Hart might have a lot to say to “the egotistical maniac” and since Vince keeps screwing with his mic he’s going to just leave. Vince sarcastically gives himself credit for catching the mic when JR throws it at him which was funny. 

Well with JR out of the way, lets move on to more important business - earlier tonight on the Free for All, Ahmed Johnson attacked Faarooq brutally and apparently injured him. The result is that Faarooq is not cleared to challenge for the Intercontinental title tonight as scheduled so he’d been replaced by Goldust. That means Goldust challenged for two titles on this night; during one of the post-show dark matches Shawn Michaels successfully defended the WWF title against Goldust to send the fans home happy.

WWF Intercontinental Championship

Marc Mero © (w/Sable) vs. Goldust (w/Marlena)

Mr. Perfect joins commentary for this match. He’s all worked up and says that Stone Cold Steve Austin pissed him off earlier and he’s going to take out all his frustrations on HHH tomorrow night on Raw. He doesn’t have the same audio issues as Jim Ross; Vince says that they fixed it just before JR took off. 

King points out that Mero has never beaten Goldust. That might be true; I'm not going to check. 

Goldust is bigger and likely stronger and rocks Mero with big uppercuts and punches, grinding him down. Mero picks up the pace and has the advantage then. He flies up and over the top rope but lands awkwardly, his knee buckling under his own weight. Thankfully he didn’t hurt himself but remember that I pointed out that move in a few shows’ time. He goes to the top rope but Goldust blocks that and brings him down the hard way with a powerbomb so that he can go back on the offence. He throws Mero into the ringsteps and then grinds him in the middle of the ring with a long sleeper hold.

Goldust requests a microphone so he can tell the crowd to “shut the hell up or he’ll come out there and stick my tongue down each and every one of your throats!” King goes into overdrive with the gay jokes after that.

Goldust sets up the Curtain Call but Mero flips up and over to land on his feet and turn it into a roll up. I was sure that was the end but Goldust kicks out and throws Marc out of the ring to pummel him on the outside. Mr. Perfect gets annoyed at the referee for losing control and heads over to check on Mero. He’s formed a bit of a friendship with the Wildman and as he tends to him, Triple H comes down to confront him. Perfect punches Goldust and then takes off after HHH and back in the ring, Mero hits a Samon drop and then the Wild Thing off the top rope to pick up the win and retain his Intercontinental Championship. 

Backstage on the Superstar Line, Jim Ross is doing the talking for “Razor Ramon” and “Diesel” JR is a good promo which is something I didn’t really know until his recent heel turn.

Winner challenges for the WWF Championship at Survivor Series

Vader (w/Jim Cornette) vs. Sycho Sid

I’m looking forward to this match! I think it’s become clear from the last few shows that I’m a big Sid fan. The story of this match, which I didn’t really get from the build I’ve seen on Raw, is that this is a battle to see who is the Master of the Powerbomb. Weirdly they had a feud over this exact same thing in WCW back in the early 90s. Here’s a video, including Shawn Michaels’ thoughts on which powerbomb hurts more. And of course the winner will face Michaels for the WWF title next month.

I’ve commented before that I love both these guy’s theme songs so here’s a link to them both on YouTube so you can enjoy them with me.

There’s a big surprise before this match even starts; the WWF Champion Shawn Michaels will be joining commentary! He and Sid have been friendly lately as fellow babyfaces and they shake hands before. HBK is less kind to Vader and taunts him and then kicks Cornette up the butt sending him flying out of the ring! Vader tries to jump Michaels but Sid stops that and the match begins from there.

The two big men throw forearms and clobber each other which Vader gets the best off and then they spill out of the ring, Vader distracts the referee so that Jimmy can crack him across the back with his tennis racket. Sid wrestles like the smaller guy and underdog which is funny given that he’s MASSIVE and uses some roll ups but Vader hammers him with clotheslines and forearms. Sid actually tries a move off the ropes too but Vader very impressively catches him in mid-air and slams him to the mat followed by a splash off the second rope. Vader has the three count but he breaks his own pin like an idiot! Cornette yells at him for it but Vader is confident and sets up the Vader Bomb. Sid gets his knees up and mounts his come back with a clothesline, a powerslam and then sets up a powerbomb. Cornette distracts him from the first one but when he sets up a second, Vader saves himself with a low blow. Vader can’t lift Sid for a powerbomb either and they battle back and forth for it but it’s Sid who hits a chokeslam and THAT keeps him down for the three count. The crowd go nuts for Sycho Sid who is now the number one contender for the WWF title at Survivor Series! I really enjoyed this, but also acknowledge that I’m biased and just love Sid.

HBK gets into the ring to offer his congrats to Sid but also to let him know that they won’t be friends at Survivor Series; may the better man win, and there’s no friends when it comes to the WWF title. They shake hands like good babyfaces while Sid’s pyro bangs above the ring.

Backstage after a commercial for Survivor Series, Dok Hendricks tries to interview Sycho Sid but Jim Ross pushes in; no more soft balls, he’s here to ask the tough questions. He reminds us that Sid powerbombed Michaels 5 times after Wrestlemania XI and asks if he will do anything including breaking HBK’s back to become WWF Champion. Sid says that he will do ANYTHING to become WWF Champion which is fair enough and very honest if nothing else. 

Buried Alive match

The Undertaker vs. Mankind (w/Paul Bearer)

A fitting main event for this PPV and my favourite feud of 1996 (so far). A great video package and another musical debut in this one; a song they used for video packages constantly throughout the Attitude era.

Mankind enters first and crawls around the ring, led by Bearer and the urn. It seems like Uncle Paul might be manipulating Mankind to do his bidding seeing him as a scarier monster than The Undertaker. A huge compliment. Undertaker sans Bearer makes a much quicker entrance and has ditched the coat, hat and tie which he wore for his entrance since his debut. This is a shift towards “modern” Undertaker, or as modern as you can call a character who’s peak was in the late 90s. 

They brawl in the ring trading big punches and on the outside, Undertaker kicks Mankind off sending the back of his head into the security wall. Undertaker climbs to the top rope and dives onto Mankind all the way on the outside which was pretty awesome. He wasn’t kidding when he said he’d destroy himself to destroy Mankind.

There’s lots of juicy shots of the grave site at the top of the entrance ramp; a huge mound of dirt with a grave and the headstone we’ve seen on Raw for the past four weeks. Mankind hits Undertaker with a shovel but when he tries to suplex him at the top of the dirt mountain, Undertaker turns it into a small package and the two of them roll down the pile and fight, covered in mud, back towards the ring. This is intense. 

Undertaker chokes Mankind with a camera cord and they clotheslines him into the crowd. They fight amongst the people - a spot which became very common in the attitude era but felt brand new in 1996 - and then clotheslines him back over followed by a running dive, clearing the security wall and clotheslining Mankind at ringside. That was another cool spot - Undertaker still moves methodically when wrestling in the ring but is moving like a cruiserweight flying around at Mankind. He’s adopted a totally different style to battle Mankind, or maybe it's since he’s lost Paul Bearer. 

Mankind finally gets some sustained control when Paul Bearer shakes the ropes while Undertaker walks along them, dropping crotch first onto the ropes. 

Someone must be resetting the shovel at the grave site because the lads knocked it over and used it earlier but when cutting back to the camera in that part of the arena, it's once again standing up in the dirt to provide a cool camera shot. Probably one of the camera men. 

Paul Bearer hands Mankind a weapon which looks a bit like a prison shiv. It’s like a long, white shard of wood or something. Mankind stabs and jams at Undertaker’s head with it but doesn’t make him bleed. Maybe 1996 wasn’t ready for that yet.

Undertaker fights back but gets distracted chasing Paul Bearer which gives Mankind the chance to grab a steel chair. Taker no-sells Bearer hitting him with the urn but goes down when Mankind cracks him in the head with the chair. Hilariously the chair was already badly dented and marked up which tells me that the company at the time was so cheap, they only had a couple of chairs and had to take them everywhere with them to re-use. These days I suspect they get a fresh chair for every show. 

They fight back up the ramp towards the grave and Undertaker goes in first but grabs Mankind and pulls him in too and they trade blows standing inside the grave. The crowd cheered for that visual which is, to be fair, awesome. There’s another awesome spot when they get out of the grave; Undertaker hip tosses Mankind off the mound of dirt and he tumbles hard down onto the concrete ramp. Jesus. 

In the ring, Mankind shakes off the beating and hits a piledriver and then a DDT onto the steel chair. If this was a normal match Mankind would probably win it here but as he cradles the urn and gets a pep talk from Uncle Paul, Undertaker sits up and blasts Mankind with the chair followed by leg dropping it across his head. The crowd went nuts for that because they made it look brutal and Jerry Lawler squealed “he’s broken his skull!” 

In an insanely dangerous spot, Mankind tries for a piledriver on the outside but Undertaker stands up and with Mick upside down on his back, falls backwards into the ringsteps dropping him right on top of his head AND sitting on his head at the same time. That could have broken his neck! Mankind is fine so Undertaker hits him with the ring steps not one but twice and with the crowd cheering loudly for the brutality, drills him with a Tombstone and points towards the grave. Undertaker carries a limp Mankind up to the grave to finish the job but Mankind springs back to life and locks in the Mandible Claw!

He tries to then hit him with the urn but Undertaker grabs him by the throat and chokeslams him INTO the grave. Undertaker seems to have won this match and grabs a shovel to begin burying Mankind alive and after a few loads of dirt the referee rings the bell and declares Undertaker the winner! Mankind is effectively buried beneath a shallow pile of dirt but Undertaker isn’t done and throws referee after referee out of his way to continue shoveling the dirt on. He doesn’t just want the symbolic victory, he wants to LITERALLY bury Mankind alive. 

He’s attacked from behind by a large masked man who hits him with a shovel! With Paul Bearer giving orders this masked man gets Mankind out of the grave and then rolls Undertaker in instead. He and Mankind start to bury The Undertaker, frantically pushing as much dirt as possible into the grave while thunder and lightning flashes and booms in the arena. The lights flicker and flash as “the power of The Undertaker” goes nuts while he’s being buried. I’m sure he’d safely retreated to a secure hiding spot within the pile but the camera showing the flat surface with The Undertaker now gone is certainly dramatic. Mankind and this mystery masked man are joined by fellow heels Goldust, Crush, Hunter Hearst Helmsley and Justin Hawk Bradshaw and they work together to shovel pile after pile of dirt onto The Undertaker until he is literally buried alive! It takes the better part of 10 minutes with the fans throwing trash and getting restless but with the six men working together (Paul Bearer yells “I’ll pay you all well!” to explain their help) The Undertaker is finally completely buried. 

The arena lights flicker again and thunder sounds causing all of the heels to get scared and run off leaving Mankind to stand triumphantly on top of the grave in victory. He, Bearer and this big masked man finally leave and the PPV is over. Or is it? The final shot of the event is a bolt of lightning striking the tombstone and The Undertaker’s hand bursting up through the ground as Vince McMahon screams “He’s alive! The Undertaker lives!” That was awesome.