Vader vs. TAFKA Goldust (w/Luna)
A fine opening match. There was a lot of decent wrestling. Goldust has some decent evasive offence to avoid Vader trying to clatter into him so there was a lot of urgency. The crowd was hot for the action as well. Luna’s interference was minimal and made for a tremendous finish where she got on Vader’s back when. **1/2
Special Referee: Sunny: Max Mini, Mosaic & Nova vs. Battalion, El Torito & Tarantula
Sunny being exhausted at the end of the match summed up what type of match this one. A really cool showcase for the minis, aside from the appropriate height jokes (that I did laugh at admittedly), that got the crowd reacting after their usual silence at the start of the match. Fast paced, pleasing exhibition. ***
WWF Intercontinental Title Match: The Rock (c) vs. Ken Shamrock
Love the finish to this match. Rock planting the brass knuckles on Shamrock and then telling the referee about the Knuckles on tights after he loses, thus retaining the belt is ingenious. It's a famous Eddie Guerrero spot before he did it. The rest of the match was very fun to watch. It was simple punches, kicks and signatures but it was very competitive and back and forth. It flowed nicely to create tension and drama climaxing with the finish. ***1/4
WWF World Tag Team Title Match: The New Age Outlaws (Billy Gunn & The Road Dogg) (c) vs. The Legion Of Doom (Road Warrior Animal & Road Warrior Hawk)
More like an angle than the match. The Outlaws are getting popular but it's not really giving their matches much energy. It was short at least.
Royal Rumble Match:
While short of much depth and star power, this turned out to be a fun and pretty memorable Rumble. Terry Funk delivers a very underrated Rumble performance with his evasive ways of staying in the match, plus a strong opening stretch with Foley and Rock who have great showings of their own. The later story of Stone Cold attacks everyone was interesting and made Austin look like the biggest star of the match (he was). Exciting Rumble. Such a blast. ***1/2
WWF World Heavyweight Title Casket Match: Shawn Michaels (w/Chyna & Triple H) (c) vs. The Undertaker
Out of all their matches, this gets forgotten about (despite the back injury that HBK occurs early on) but it's a very good edition. It's better than the Ground Zero match for sure. Shawn Michaels looks fairly strong in this being the aggressive and most controlling out of the two. I suspect it was a decision to make Michaels look like a resilient, worthy champion for Austin to the new influx of fans that are tuning because its usually the opposite. But he did a fine job. He kept his offence to hard punches to the head and stomach while using the aerial moves sparingly. And when Taker gained back control, Michaels pin-ball’d himself around the ring. Sometimes it was over the top but it was reserved mostly. Then the finish with Kane attacking Taker after initially helping him from goons (The New Age Outlaws & Los Boricuas) and then setting the casket on fire. Super good main event with a strong finishing angle. ***1/2
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