In Your House 4 - Winnipeg Arena, Winnipeg Manitoba Canada, October 22nd 1995

The In Your House PPVs did eventually get given names every month and I will mention it when it starts but this show is the closest so far to them having “a name” rather than a number, with them really driving home “the great white north” on TV during the build up. The show is in Canada and just in case you missed that, the PPV begins with a pretty lady singing “Oh Canada” while a montage of beautiful Canadian wilderness and impressive cities scrolls by on the screen. Lovely. You know who isn’t on this show though? Canadian hero Bret Hart. Figure that one out. 

After the WWF signature, Interim WWF President Gorilla Monsoon breaks the news that Shawn Michaels’ injuries are too severe for him to compete tonight and so he has been stripped of the Intercontinental Championship. He says that later tonight the championship will be officially awarded to Dean Douglas who in turn will then defend the Championship against Razor Ramon. Now, Razor already has a match tonight so if all goes well for The Bad Guy, he might be leaving this show as a double champion! That’s a lot of information to start us off tonight isn’t it? This PPV is notorious in WWF history as one of the worst of this period - let’s see if that’s deserved.

Hunter Hearst Helmsley vs. Fatu

No build for this match that I’m aware of but just like last month, I’m not mad at them putting matches like this on big shows to give a spotlight to new and developing characters. There’s a definite shift in presentation for the company as they work to establish a crop of new faces and I’m delighted that Raw is moving away being mostly squash matches.

Helmsley is still an uptight snob and has Rick Martel’s old gimmick of spraying his opponents (and the fans) with perfume because of their smell. For anyone wondering, yes Vince and Jim Ross are already making jokes about HHH’s massive nose. Did you ever notice that the jokes about how big his nose is suddenly stopped in 2001 right around the time he started dating Vince McMahon’s daughter and he was sitting in on creative meetings? Interesting.

Fatu jumps Hunter before he even gets his ring jacket and frilly white shirt off and bounces him around the ring with HHH bumping hard for every punch and head butt. He finally stops Fatu’s momentum by side-stepping a charge and the Samoan gets his head tied up between the top and middle rope, hanging himself.

He follows up with a nice looking piledriver and FINALLY gets his shirt off. 

They go back and forth with strikes and punches until finally Helmsley puts down the big man with a sleeper hold. He’s still undefeated at this point.

The action is pretty good here as Helmsley sends Fatu into the corner and then clips him with a big clothesline, turning him inside out in what is now affectionately known as “the Rikishi bump”. Fatu blocks the Pedigree and no-sells a DDT to build his own momentum with a superkick, back drop, back breaker and then a diving headbutt off the middle rope. HHH kicks out. A running cutter sets him up for a splash off the top but Hunter rolls out of the way and follows up with a Pedigree to pick up the victory. This was a decent opener, I enjoyed it. 

Jerry Lawler gets up off commentary and goes to interview the victor - HHH still speaks with a sort of faux English accent. He actually acts a lot like William Regal with the arm behind the back and the mannerisms and over the top facials. That makes sense as Regal worked with him a lot in WCW. As he calls Fatu “ghastly”, Henry O. Godwin comes down to the ring with his slop bucket. He wants to slop HHH who hides behind Lawler and makes his getaway. No one gets slopped tonight, and in fairness with these kinds of basic gimmicks - snobby aristocrats vs. pig farmers makes tons of sense.

Dok Hendrix interviews Jim Cornette and the British Bulldog backstage. Bulldog is supremely confident tonight - he pinned Diesel in a six man tag team match a couple of weeks ago and he’s going to pin him again tonight and become the WWF Champion. Good luck to you Davey Boy.

WWF Tag Team Championships

The Smoking Gunns © (Billy and Bart Gunn) vs. The 1-2-3 Kid and Razor Ramon

Before the match after the Gunns have made their entrances, Vince interviews Razor and the 1-2-3 Kid - they have nice new matching purple and yellow ring gear and look united as a tag team. Razor says they have put all of their issues behind them and are motivated and focused on becoming Tag Team Champions tonight. He gives Billy and Bart credit for being fighting champions as Vince and Jim Ross speculate that Razor might be a little distracted during this match now that he also has a chance to regain the Intercontinental title tonight later. The injury to Shawn is unfortunate but it has created a nice little one-night storyline for the show.

The two teams shake hands before the match and I noticed here that Billy has cut his hair short and gotten rid of the moustache. He looks MUCH better. Bart has cut his hair shorter too but it’s very much still a mullet. Come on man, it’s nearly 1996. 

The Kid and Billy kick things off and move fast, sizing each other up and moving through headlocks and shoulder tackles bouncing off the ropes. Billy wins the exchange and puts him down with a big slam but the Kid hops right back up and shows no fear against the bigger opponents. He wisely tags out to Razor who gets a massive reaction from the fans - he is super popular.

Razor and the Kid control the match, tagging in and out and isolating Bart. The 1-2-3 Kid shows a lot of aggression and does underhanded things like low-briding the ropes while on the apron to cause Bart to take a nasty spill to the outside. He’s definitely behaving more heelishly and that’s confirmed by Jerry Lawler throwing compliments at him and his attitude on commentary. 

Dean Douglas is shown backstage watching and taking notes whenever Razor is in the ring - he has a match to prepare for later now of course. Bart finally counters off the ropes with a big sleeper slam on Razor to tag out to Billy who steamrolls through both challengers and the match settles back down with the Gunns now isolating and working over the Kid in their corner. Lawler speculates that Razor is leaving the Kid to the wolves to save his energy for his second match later which is a good bit of work to drive more of a wedge between these men - Vince and Jim both disagree with him of course because they’re silly babyfaces.

After a hot tag and a barrage of right hands, Razor hits Billy with the Razor’s Edge and has the match won but the 1-2-3 Kid insists on the tag - he wants to be the one to get the three count. Ramon humours his little buddy and tags him so he can dive into the cover but Billy has had too much time to recover and he counters into a roll up of his own to steal the pin and retain the tag team titles! The match itself was pretty dull but I liked the little story which continues after the match.

The 1-2-3 Kid is furious, throwing a temper tantrum and attacking both Billy and Bart in frustration. Razor comes back to the ring to calm him down and takes the Tag Team title belts off the Kid who’d stolen them and hands them back to the Smoking Gunns, leading a still angry 1-2-3 Kid to the back trying to calm him down. 

Goldust vs. Marty Jannetty

Goldust has some words for Jannetty before the match - he’s ready for his close-up. He didn’t initially but he’s now speaking mostly in movie quotes. This isn’t Goldust’s in-ring debut for the company but it is his on-screen in-ring debut. Jim Ross is oddly quiet during Goldust’s entrance - he was close friends with Goldust’s father Dusty Rhodes of course and it is fair to say that in 1995 there was a lot of shame directed at Dustin Runnels for accepting this bizarre slightly effeminate gimmick. A lot of people viewed the Goldust character as Vince’s attempt to humiliate Dusty’s son, which I think is unfair.

Goldust is a big dude - standing over 6 foot tall and weighing close to 300lbs, he removes his wig and attacks Marty right away before the bell. He pays for it and Jannetty fights him off and rocks him with punches and sends Goldust to the outside where he clubs him with a clothesline. Goldust keeps his distance and seems to be no match for Marty Jannetty which isn’t a great debut. It settles down with Goldust throwing big punches from standing and from his knees. His offense is designed to be strange and there’s a lot of standing around, getting in each other’s faces, posing and taunting. The Goldust character is all presentation. He slowly works over Marty with clubs and a sleeper on the mat and when he poses and caresses his own body the fans rain loud boos down on him. Marty has a little bit of a limp and seems to have hurt his ankle but I’m not sure when it happened because there’s been no moves done to his legs. Goldust sends Marty into the ring post and he flips before taking a bump; that was a bit OTT.

After a long, slow back and forth Goldust hooks Marty in a suplex but brings him down face first to the mat which is enough to give him the victory. This was not a good match - I think Dustin is still struggling to figure out this new gimmick and how to wrestle the slow style. He does have a single golden spotlight on him as he leaves the arena which the commentators say is in his contract and is something he insists on. I do like that. 

Yokozuna (w/Mr. Fuji and Jim Cornette) vs. King Mabel (w/Sir Mo)

This match was originally supposed to be King Mabel vs. Undertaker but, as discussed at length in the Preview, Undertaker is injured and these two are getting the blame. Before the match Jim Cornette calls Gorilla Monsoon a disrupter who wants to cause a problem between these two massive men so that they can’t work together and take over the entire WWF. Yoko is the babyface in this situation because despite Cornette being his manager, he’s the one Jerry Lawler is the most critical of and making fun of. He does get a little bit of a cheer from the live crowd who, despite themselves, are excited to see these two enormous men go one on one. Mabel is billed as being well over 500lbs which isn’t true and Yoko is billed as being well over 600lbs which probably is. 

They slowly bump tummies and run into each other, missing elbow drops and splashes. They roll to the outside and as they brawl, Mabel falls on top of Jim Cornette, crushing him. The match ends with a double count out and Vince calls it “a less than stellar match” which is as close as we’ll ever get to him admitting something was bad on TV. 

They both get back in the ring and go face to face as Sir Mo, Cornette and Fuji try to stop them from fighting. I can only imagine that when this was booked they thought the crowd would be cheering to see these two monsters fight but it’s silent. The two hug instead and the crowd mildly boos as they raise each other’s arms. Heels all united again. 

There’s a commercial for Survivor Series which is well-timed after the previous match as they’re plugging the return of The Undertaker who will no doubt want revenge on both of those men. The other big selling point is that Bret Hart will challenge for the WWF Championship, whoever the champion is.

Back in the arena, there’s another big Survivor Series announcement - there will be a Wildcard match where heels and babyfaces will team with each other in an odd mismatch of feuds. Gorilla Monsoon will tell us more about that tomorrow on Raw.

In the ring, Dok Hendrix introduces Dean Douglas first followed by the Intercontinental Champion Shawn Michaels. HBK walks to the ring looking very sad, slapping hands with fans. He has a nasty black eye to match his serious concussion. I talked a little about this during the Preview but Michaels, while on a messy night out with some other wrestlers, apparently angered the wrong person and was beaten half to death by some navy service members, which is a fairly ridiculous aspect of the story isn’t it? Sailors. You’d think that being so out of it on pills and booze that you were almost murdered would be a turning point for party boy Michaels but he didn’t have his changing of the ways until 2001 sadly. 

The other element to this story is that Michaels and The Klique’s politicking ways were in full swing and most people believe that HBK simply didn’t want to lose to Dean Douglas and “put him over” and so this was all an elaborate exaggeration to avoid “doing the job” which is probably also true. This is amazingly the fourth time that Michaels had lost a championship without actually losing to anyone and it’s probably not a coincidence that Douglas’ opponent is follow Klique member Scott Hall. Douglas snatches the belt from Michaels and excitedly straps the Intercontinental title belt around his waist - he is officially the new champion and Shawn Michaels leaves without speaking, a serious look on his face. He looks like he might cry as he watches Douglas celebrate with the title belt.

WWF Intercontinental Championship

Dean Douglas © vs. Razor Ramon

With Shawn Michaels gone and Dean Douglas now established as the Intercontinental Champion officially, his opponent for tonight Razor Ramon heads down to the ring. He lost to Douglas last month of course.

I actually don’t have much to say about this match - Razor slowly works over Douglas, pasting him with big punches and locking him in long holds like sleepers and abdominal stretches. On the outside, Razor clobbers Douglas and even pours a bottle of water of his head - he is making him look like such a nobody, which is what he did last month too. Douglas builds a little bit of offense by sidestepping a charge into the ring steps but when he comes off the top with an axe handle it’s countered with a punch to the gut and chokeslam. Douglas’s spurts of offense never last longer than a move or two before Razor counters him. He hits a big back suplex and with both men laid side by side on the mat, the referee counts the three. They kind of had one arm on each other’s chest but the referee has decided that razor Ramon won. What a weird finish, and it did protect Douglas in losing but it makes the referee look like an idiot. On the replay, one of Douglas’ legs was out of the ring which definitely should have made the pin not count either. Bizarre. 

The main thing though is that Razor Ramon is the new Intercontinental Champion and the first man in history to win the title four times. The title wasn’t out of the Klique for long. After the match they promote that Shawn Michaels is on the superstar line talking to fans right now and he certainly still looks sad - that must be a real bummer.

In a nice surprise for the fans, Bret Hart is introduced to join commentary for the main event - he is slated to face the WWF Champion at Survivor Series next month. Will it be Diesel who he’s failed to beat twice, or will it be his brother-in-law Bulldog who famously defeated him for the Intercontinental title at Summerslam 1992? Jerry Lawler tries to leave when he sees Bret coming so the Hitman attacks him and clubs him with a few blows, chasing him away from the ring not once, not twice but three times. Lawler is gone, leaving our three man team for the main event as Vince McMahon, Jim Ross and Bret Hart. 

WWF Championship

Diesel © vs. The British Bulldog (w/Jim Cornette)

Before Diesel enters, Dok Hendrix takes a break from aggressively selling t-shirts to us to ask Big Daddy Cool how he feels? “Funky” is his answer. Alright then. Diesel marches to the ring looking focused as Bulldog warms up in the ring. Not counting Royal Rumble matches, this is the second time Bulldog main evented a WWF PPV with the first being in Wembley Stadium at Summerslam 1992. 

The two start out trading blows which Diesel wins. He hammers Bulldog in the corner until a well timed distraction by Cornette lets Bulldog go to his knee. He dropkicks the WWF Champion out of the ring where he lands on his feet and stumbles into the announce desk. He and Bret get into a little shoving match of their own and that distraction lets Bulldog take him down with a chop block and then back in the ring, focusing on Diesel’s leg. Bret puts the altercation down to adrenaline and miscommunication. 

This is a really slow match as Bulldog spends roughly 10 minutes slowly working over Diesel’s legs by dropping elbows and locking in long, long holds. On the outside, Jim Cornette does what he can to help out - dropping his full body weight onto Big Daddy Cool’s legs and stomping on his knee. 

Diesel finally mounted a comeback with a pair of suplexes but Bulldog shrugs those off and goes back to the knee, locking in a sloppy Sharpshooter to taunt Bret on commentary. Diesel kicks out of it and counters a powerslam attempt by just…landing on Bulldog for a nearfall. He hits a big boot and might have the match won but Bulldog rolls out of the ring. They fight and Diesel is sent crashing into the ring post. Bulldog for some reason decides to shove Bret who loses his cool and attacks Bulldog right in front of the referee. What a lame finish to a pretty rubbish main event.

Bulldog wins by disqualification, so Diesel is still champion. He leaves and Diesel questions Bret’s actions. They get into another shoving match and start throwing punches as the ring fills with referees, officials and WWF Superstars to hold the two top babyfaces apart at the close of the show. Bret and Diesel are both just barely restrained as the realisation sinks in that these two will now meet in the main event of Survivor Series for the WWF Championship next month.