"From Grenoble in the French Alps." I haven't really thought about this until now, but that has to be as perfect a place of origin for a pro wrestler as you can get. Not so much the Grenoble part as I assume Grenoble is a very normal city all things considered, but the French Alps part makes it sound like Andre's this giant who's come down from a mountaintop to wreak havoc amongst the mortals. This was a total blast, and fittingly a lot of that is down to Andre wreaking havoc amongst the mortals. It's mostly a babyface showcase and in that sense I wish we'd gotten a structural tweak or two, maybe a few more minutes for a proper heat segment, but for what it was going for we'd be foolish to complain. We got a whole bunch of fun double teams and general nonsense from Andre and Patterson, with Patera getting to excel in his role as stooge and Bobby Duncam Sr bringing the stooging AND the surliness. Andre grabs Duncam in a kind of straight-arm full nelson so Duncam straddles both legs across the top rope, Andre holds on, then after the ref' puts on the count Andre releases and Duncam takes a splat on his back. Andre backs Duncam into the corner, ready to pounce as Duncam looks for an escape route, then Patterson comes sliding under Andre's legs and pops Duncam in the ribs. My favourite double team was when Andre squashed Duncam by sitting on his chest, Patterson got up on Andre's shoulders and both of them sat there for a few seconds, then when Patera made to come in Andre stood up like fucking Frankenstein with Patterson still on his shoulders and chased Patera out the ring! I loved Patera running into Andre's CABOOSE and bouncing halfway to Mars. I loved Patera running the ropes and skipping over a prone Patterson, stopping dead with a big exaggerated "whooooooa" as Andre sticks his tree trunk leg through the ropes, Patera turning around into a Patterson armdrag. I loved basically everything. Honestly it felt like a perfect touring Andre performance. He was super animated in the ring and on the apron, working from above and then briefly from below. He sold a nerve hold about as well as you could want, the way he was trying to get back to his base, flailing his huge legs, swatting air with his huge hands, punching Duncam in the thigh just to break free. Duncam catches him with a running knee and Andre's spill to the floor was amazing, breaking three chairs as he flies through the ropes. It didn't look like a pro wrestling bump, it was pretty much exactly what you'd expect from a man that size being kneed in the head by another very large man running at speed, where the gigantic man tried to stop himself from crashing but ultimately fell victim to gravity and physics. On the apron he stood up on the bottom rope, then grabbed the tag rope and used it to steady himself as he leaned allllll the way forward for the tag, and no joke his arm was practically in the middle of the fucking ring! When he did come in roaring he chased Duncam and Patera around the place and Patera just hopped out of there when he realised Andre wasn't playing. A sensational Andre show. Throw in the awesome figure-four/big splash combo finish and you've got a killer 11 minutes.
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