October 1993
At the start of the month MTV Latin America launched…
Doing this podcast tends to remind you not only how underdeveloped cable TV & technology was back in the mid 90s but also how much of a staple of pop culture MTV was compared to the 2010s.
Pearl Jam’s second album Vs. came out on October 19th 1993, selling 950,000 copies in the first week… Album sales weren’t a thing of the past either of course…
…and Tupac Shakur was arrested and charged (later dropped) with the shooting of two off-duty police officers in Atlanta a week after Halloween Havoc 1993… He was arrested again less than a month later for an alleged sexual assault.
September had been a blockbuster month at the cinema in 1993 and the hits kept coming (I’ll elaborate further on the podcast) but here’s a little taste of failure at the box office in October 1993…
Martin Scorsese flopped with The Age of Innocence starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Michelle Pfeiffer & Winona Ryder. The movie lost a little over $2 million and was critically acclaimed so all in all not too devastating for Scorsese.
The shockingly bad Fatal Instinct – an erotic thriller parody movie directed by Carl Reiner. That information alone and the fact it has an 18% rating on Rotten Tomatoes is all you need to know. The movie is available in it’s entirety here on YouTube… but that’s one link I actually wouldn’t want you to click.
…and at the end of the month actor River Pheonix died of an accidental drug overdose at The Viper Rooms on the sunset strip in Los Angeles. He was 23 years old.
There was a lot happening on American Television in this month but you’ve got to wait for 
that so let’s have a look at British Television instead…
QVC TV launched on October 1st becoming the UK’s first shopping channel. This might not mean a lot to you guys but Tony & Dan will remember my darker period of loneliness in 2012 where I used to stay up all night watching QVC and developing unhealthy sexual attractions to the female presenters on air. I actually ended up working with one of the presenters in question at a radio station a year later.
The Arena
WCW Halloween Havoc 1993 was broadcast on PPV from the Lakefront Arena in New Orleans, Louisiana in front of 6,000 people on October 24th. Someone on our Facebook pointed out how ridiculously ‘WCW’ it is for the company not to just wait a week and actually have the PPV on Halloween and unless the arena was booked it’s a great point!
The Lakefront Arena is still in use as of 2016 but was damaged beyond use by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005 and later re-opened in May 2008. 
The arena hosted UFC 27 in 2000 – with ex WWF star (sort of) Dan Severn losing to Pedro Rizzo by punching submission in the first round at an embarrassing 1 minute and 33 seconds.
New Orleans having been a hot bed of music and culture for generations means the arena has been frequented by a wide variety of music acts compared to most arena’s we’ve covered so far on the podcast…
The Lakefront has seen the likes of Lady Gaga, Christina Aguilera, Britney Speaks, Ne-Yo, Nas, Kid Rock, Tom Petty, Mötley Crüe, Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Pearl Jam, 
Rammstein, The Black Keys, R.E.M., Rush, Korn, Limp Bizkit, Slipknot, Sting and more pass through the doors since the arena opened in 1983…
…and Bill Cosby (urgh) Robin Williams (RIP) Katt Williams (douche) and Dave Chappelle (fair enough) have all performed at the venue.
The PPV
sees the return of ‘Spin the Wheel, Make a Deal’ match stipulation for another year (which
I’m pretty sure is also the last time) this time deciding the stipulation for the main event between Big Van Vader & Cactus Jack.
Cactus of course returned at Clash of the Champions XXIV to avenge his brutal injury suffered at the hands of Vader in the previous months… even though it turned out in our last episode at Fall Brawl that the effects of said injury had been greatly exaggerated by Jack as a ploy to trick Vader & manager Harley Race.
Elsewhere, Paul Orndorff steps in to cover for the injured Yoshi Kwan – okay I admit I have no idea when Yoshi Kwan ACTUALLY got injured in 1993 but he defiantly won’t be back so don’t worry about it.
The Matches
So we’ve sort of covered the main event there in the last section and I imagine a fair few of you are well aware of just how classic that main event is so let’s look at the rest…
Flair & Rude meet for a second time in a row on WCW PPV for the ridiculously named ‘WCW International World Heavyweight Championship’ and let’s hope it’s a little better than last time for Tony’s sake… from the podcast not Schiavone.
Sid Vicious meet Sting too which has a very ‘Sting vs Lex Luger’ vibe to it if you can cast your mind back to Superbrawl II which we covered almost a year ago now!
Apparently the Paul Orndorff vs. Ricky Steamboat match is amazing and I’m excited to see more of my main man The Assassin too.
It’s always a shame that we never get to witness the dark matches on these PPVs as Charlie Norris, Ice-Train & The Shockmaster Vs. Harlem Heat & The Equalizer sounds so so so so so so terrible I have to see it!
Released in theatres the week leading up to the PPV: 
The Arena went on to become the Reliant Arena from 2000-2014 and is now formally known as the NRG Arena. The arena sits less than half a mile from the NRG Astrodome which hosted 
We’ve said everything there is to say on The Shockmaster but what about Harlem Heat? This is their first appearance on We Can’t Watch, having joined the WCW roster in 1992. It should be an interesting first glimpse of a tag team that go on to become a prominent staple of WCW television for many more years.
This is our 1st of 8 WCW PPVs under the Fall Brawl banner with the War games match featuring as the main event of the PPV until 1999.
In pro wrestling, the WWF held King of the King 1993 at the Nutter Center in Dayton, Ohio. It was the first King of the Ring tournament to be produced by the WWF as it’s own pay per view.
in operation today. It’s a multi purpose arena playing host to everything from Ice Hockey to Indoor Soccer & Live Music to Crawfish Festivals!
opened in 1972. As well as being the ‘home turf’ of the NWA/WCW it also held numerous concerts and was home to NBA team Atlanta Hawks for 25 years.
they’re in Atlanta – a hot bed of wrestling – so why not ask some local retired wrestling legends to attend and pad out the show.
concluded their six month feud on 
Sting continues his John Cena role of beating the asses of all the new heel jobbers as soon as they get through the door. This time going up against WWF’s Nailz whose been shamelessly and creatively been re-branded as The Prisoner.
We’re less than a week removed from Summerslam and as the dust settles it occurred to me that I’ve not actually watched an entire PPV live or otherwise since Wrestlemania 32 earlier this year in April.
s.
In radio – the average commercial radio listener in the United Kingdom listens for 1-2 hours a week. Most radio shows are three hours in length so the majority of the live listeners for a radio show will tune out before the conclusion of the show but will more than likely tune back in the following day.
in the story arc and surely couldn’t have been enjoying it that much to begin with.
If WWE intended their average viewer to watch RAW/Smackdown from start to finish then they wouldn’t relentlessly recap every preceding hour at the top of the commencing hour. Therefore WWE is more like radio than conventional television.
It doesn’t feel like WWE are trying these days. Plot holes are peppered throughout the product. Why did Big e not compete at Summerslam if he was fit enough to SPRINT to ringside during New Day’s match with The Club? Why did Bayley show up on RAW Monday night when she wasn’t seemingly drafted to either show?
I was watching King of the Ring 2001 last weekend with a lapsed WWE fan who was misty eyed over the complexity and originality of the storylines during the attitude era compared to the current product. At first I thought “oh give over” but by the time Shane McMahon vs. Kurt Angle rolled around at the half way point I realised they were right!
They even copy from themselves having recently resurrected old PPV titles like Backlash and No Mercy. Splitting the brands again just four years after the end of the original brand split and bringing back the Women’s championship like it had never existed before 2016.
Bleed for Business
of course never came to be as Macho Man instead opted to start up 
Smackdown and story lines were dominated by the McMahon’s.
I’m not exactly sure what was going on with Vince around this time in real life but he seemed almost hell bent on killing himself for the WWE crowd’s entertainment. The problem was that none of it was entertaining. It was harrowing.
The less said about his match vs. Stephanie McMahon at No Mercy 2003 the better. I think V1 of 
His Buried Alive match vs. The Undertaker at Survivor Series 2003 made a mockery of the Muta Scale. I remember being terrified at the time that Vince would bleed out before the conclusion of the match.
There’s a great story Missy Hyatt recalls where she used to tell Tommy Rich to knock it off (blading) because she was worried about the amount he was bleeding on a nightly basis and the infections and scars weeping from his forehead on plane rides. To which he responded by saying “Sorry Missy, I just can’t help myself”.
was an amputee that lost his left leg when he was nine years old due to cancer. By age 19, He was wrestling and had the nous to (falsely) claim on a backstage interview that Hulk Hogan had visited him in the hospital when he was sick and inspired him to go on and become a professional wrestler. This worked a treat and WWE came calling not long after, never ones to miss a good PR story.
Of course legend has it that hapless WWE agent and yes man – John Laurinaitis was sent to sign Gowen and returned instead with Steve Chamberland, a one legged wrestler that had lost his leg in a motorcycle accident and wrestled with his prosthesis on. For years I doubted the legitimacy of this story but Vince actually referenced it on an episode of Raw a few years back so whether or not it really happened doesn’t matter – It’s there now forever in WWE folklore.
the Mr. America/Piper feud as an incidental character along with the likes of Sean O’ Haire. After the Mr. America storyline an interaction backstage between Sable (Mr. McMahon’s on-screen mistress) and Zach led to a confrontation between himself and Mr. McMahon. Mr. McMahon was feuding with Steph at this point and was already aware of Zach from his quest to uncover the real identity of Mr. America. Turns out it was some closet racist guy.
(and therefore the audience) felt watching ‘a cripple’ struggle and fight and how he would rather just ‘look away’ when he disabled people. Mr. McMahon concluded that since Gowen was now signed he would put an end to the absurdity of an amputee competing against the likes of Big Show and take him down himself at the next PPV. Vince made sure to get over the Mr. McMahon vs. Disability concept which I can’t imagine drew any extra buys for Vengeance.
there’s only so far a one legged competitor can go in the WWE. If your selling this much for Mr. McMahon you’re never going to beat anyone above mid-card level. Zach’s offence isn’t too bad all things considering. He gets around the ring as quick as anyone with two legs and his top rope offence is particularly impressive.
The finish of the match holds the key to the downfall of Zach Gowen in the WWE in my opinion. Zach Gowen finally fires up in the closing stages working over Mr. McMahon’s legs on the ring post, hitting a bulldog and dropkick from the top rope. He nearly pins McMahon after a moonsault which sends McMahon scurrying for a steel chair. Referee Brian Hebner intervenes to save Zach and is shoved out of the ring, Mr. McMahon 
selling the leg awkwardly drops to one knee with a chair in hand and – BANG – it sounds like a gunshot goes off as Gowen clatters the chair into McMahon’s scalp with a standing drop kick.
blade and the blood seemed to pour from behind his hairline where you just wouldn’t blade.
across the face of Zach Gowen for all to see and for a moment he is totally out of his depth. He goes for the weakest chair shot of all time across the back of Mr. McMahon and scrambles to the top turnbuckle as McMahon lies in the corner of the ring looking like he’s about to bleed to death.
out of the way into a puddle of his own blood.
McMahon’s pin fall reminiscent of The worst roll-up of all time after Austin broke his neck vs. Owen Hart but still had to pin him for the Intercontinental Championship.
a legitimate in-ring competitor. I’m sure it was nowhere near the finish that was intended but fuck me. In kayfabe, it meant if you want to beat Zach Gowen all you had to do was roll out of the way of his finish and pin him. Also the message it gave the WWE audience was not good. Here was Zach being told week after week by Mr. McMahon that someone with a disability like his had no place in a wrestling ring and all the finish did was prove Mr. McMahon right.
miraculously makes it to his feet and engages in full Mr. McMahon strut as he swiftly heads backstage for medical treatment.
Zach Gowen has since said that he thought that his WWE career was over as quick as it began and that his standing ovation from the live crowd felt more like a ‘farewell’ than a ‘good effort’ from his perspective. Vince however was apparently adamant that it didn’t matter and that the accident added to the drama of the match – which is true.
Christian the week before after the two met for what felt like the 457th match on Raw in a row, so I was hoping for a fresh match up tonight… but sadly not. They’ve had some classic matches to be fair but I’ve been watching these Raw’s in succession since Wrestlemania XIX and at this point I’ve seen Booker/Christian enough.
Bischoff makes his way to the ring donning a neck brace and informs us that Kane is not at the arena tonight for everyone’s safely and is actually in Stamford, Connecticut instead for a live sit-down interview with Jim Ross at WWE Headquarters. Oh. God. No.
the crowd pop much louder for his valet Stacy Keibler than Big Poppa Pump. Victoria’s less than a year away from a shockingly bad dancing gimmick and Stevie Richards is just happy to be there in his florescent pink shorts.
Storm comes out and cuts a promo bitching about the WWE fans chanting ‘boring’ at him, which they can barely even be arsed to do at this point.
sing the French national anthem. Raw cuts to break after the first verse and when we return Dupree is STILL singing badly. I hope they didn’t actually keep going through the commercials otherwise, Jesus.
expect) by Randy Orton. D-Von was then next to take an RKO and pin fall from Orton basically meaning that most of this match was spent more as a 3 on 1 handicap rather than six man tag.
honestly they’ve already done every possible finish a thousand times on TV between these two. The ref was out cold at this point so Nick Patrick came down and counted the three. The first ref, now back to his feet, argues with Nick Patrick as Stone Cold appears with a third ref and restarts the match. Booker wins it with a scissors kick. Christian beats up the referee and gets a neck load of stunner from Austin in retaliation.
no exception. Jim Ross tries his best not to make fun of Kane and questions what happened to the burns on Kane’s face that he claimed to have for all those years. I still can’t believe it took them 6 years to unmask Kane – really in my opinion he should never have unmasked but I don’t hate unmasked Kane nearly as much as most fans I question on the subject. X-Pac claims that when he was working with Kane in 1999, 2000 and again in 2002 he would argue weekly with creative who desperately wanted to unmask the Big Red Machine.
Kane resolves to burn Jim Ross alive (as you do) and gets going as Stone Cold Steve Austin hits the ring back in Indianapolis. His pleas for Kane to stop fall on psychotic deaf ears and Kane sets fire to Jim Ross!
Mark Can't Watch 