I actually hadn't watched this since the DVDVR Memphis project, which was a whole ass 15 fucking years ago now. It was my #1 during the vote for that and at one point I would've called it the best match to ever happen in the US. I've watched a whole lot of a whole lot these last 15 years and sometimes a re-watch will bump a match down a peg, the lustre of that first watch worn away, the participants no longer the new discoveries they were in 2008.
Or, you know, sometimes I should just shut the fuck up. Because this really is the pro wrestling.
What a pair on unbelievable performances, possibly (probably?) the career best from both, and the bar on that is HIGH. Dundee's onslaught in the first half is absolutely incredible stuff. Maybe the best punches ever, but everything else he did looked sensational as well. The way he fuckin headbutted Lawler in the face as a cut-off was amazing, he was throwing sharp elbows, booting him right in the face, hitting top rope fist drops, and all of it was zeroed in on Lawler's eye. He was ducking and dodging, circling a half-blind Lawler, peppering him over and over, the perfect shark smelling blood in the water. Then he'd showboat and strut and at one point made the finger gun gesture and pulled the "trigger" as Lawler was lying flat on his back. It might be the greatest heat segment ever and it almost resembled the first fall of a bloody lucha apestas match, where the tecnico essentially gets nothing. Lawler's selling was of course spectacular. It might not just be HIS greatest sell job, but the greatest sell job of anyone ever. The way he was staggering around throwing wild misses, absorbing shots from the literal blind side, taking punches while falling, trying and failing miserably to get a foothold, it was basically perfect. I think he got two punches in during that first 10 minutes and one was an absolute corker from a kneeling position, but not nearly enough to swing the tide.
Obviously the clip in the middle is infuriating, but the saving grace is the TV highlight package they play at the end, which allows us to fill in some of the blanks and at least piece together where they went narratively. We see Dundee getting more and more frustrated, even going for the top rope whoopie cushion. Then we see how Lawler managed to drag himself back into the fight, fittingly with the piledriver. Plus, while it sucks that we missed a Lawler comeback, when we join the action again he still has the strap up, so we sleep well in the knowledge that we never missed THE Lawler comeback. Dundee getting yeeted face-first into that table was fucking amazing and then they end up on the stairs after Dundee tries to hightail it with his wife. He sensed that he'd missed his chance to put Lawler away, so rather than risk losing his AND his wife's hair he'd just get in the car and drive until Tennessee was in the rear view. Lawler taking that bump over the rail was total Puerto Rico, the sort of thing where you're thinking "he won't actually take a bump off that" and then he fucking does take a bump off it! Dundee basically pleading with Calhoun to count Lawler out while Lawler stumbles back to the ring was a great moment, and I love Dundee hitting a desperation baseball slide dropkick just as Lawler is crawling back in the ring. Then they build to the comeback of all comebacks and the last couple minutes are off the charts. Lance, as he very often does, puts it perfectly on commentary, saying that they're just trying to annihilate each other. Even if you think the finish is a bit of an anti-climax given everything else they'd unleashed on each other, I still love the idea that Dundee brought it home by throwing something in that bad eye.
I remember watching all of this stuff for the first time during the Memphis project. Going through that footage is maybe the most fun I've ever had watching wrestling, properly deep-diving a new territory and seeing how great people like Lawler, Dundee and Mantel were, listening to Lance Russell narrate it all and knowing after a disc and a half that he was the greatest to ever do it. With that comes a sort of nostalgia and sometimes with the nostalgia comes rose-tinted memories. Unless you count the blood in Lawler's eye there was nothing rose-tinted about my memories of this. It holds up as one of the best matches there's ever been, and a real strong contender for match of the decade.
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