Story Of The Monday Night War: February 1996

The Ringmaster apparently had a "stone cold" heart.

Listen to our February 1996 WCW show reviewing a busy month of Nitros!

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1) Lights Out – During the main event of the February 5th Nitro – the power went out in the building. Via a commercial break it was quickly restored and ensured that disruption to your viewing was minimal. But... such was the atmosphere around WCW at the time, it didn't stop Eric Bischoff essentially implied that it may have been the work of the WWF "I like competition...". That didn't go down well.

2) Shawn/Bret - After both won their respective matches at In Your House 6, the stage was set for Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart for Wrestlemania. The initial chapter of this run came via what was, at the time, a very long in ring promo segment. Both men talked about respecting each other, then a jarring amount of emphasis on "conditioning" before Roddy Piper announced that the match would be a sixty minute match where the most fall wins. Vince McMahon coined it as an "Ironman" match on commentary immediately after, and that name stuck.

3) Pillman/Taskmaster Tag Match – Where to begin with this Brian Pillman story? Six days prior to his final night in the company (that would play out at Superbrawl), Pillman tagged with Arn Anderson against The Taskmaster and Hugh Morrus. To further perpetuate the idea of the Pillman storyline being a shoot he and Taskmaster started having a "shoot match" - grappling and rolling around on the mat in an uncontrolled fashion. Watching it in full, "weird" would be the word.

4) Cornette is doing what? February was the month they pulled the trigger on a Yokozuna babyface turn. While we would get his first ever promo at the pay per view, it was a line by Vince McMahon, while Cornette was accosting Yoko on Raw, that stuck out the most. "Jim Cornette is verbally raping Yokozuna". This was the same company that 13 days later presented a "Cry Baby match" on pay per view – it would be fair to say they weren't exactly sure about who their audience was at this stage.

5) 3.7 Rating – February 12th wouldn't be the first time Nitro went onto Monday Night unopposed against Raw (their first show famously did, as did the Christmas day airing in 1995), but February 12th they were afforded the opportunity to air up against the Westminster Dog Show, that pre-empted Raw. The rating was only slightly below Raw's record high before Nitro even came to be. The rest of the month saw both companies exchange victories and one thing was for certain – the combined viewership was growing fast.

6) Axe Man – Diesel's transition back to being a heel continued at a pace with February – with the Undertaker providing a fan friendly foil and their memorable closing angle at the pay per view where Diesel was pulled through the ring apron by Undertaker, costing him his title match against the once again forgotten champion Bret Hart. On Raw the next night, Diesel came out during the main event between Taker and Tatanka carrying an axe. He took a cameraman hostage (well, to the back) and got him to film him destroying Undertaker's casket. Good stuff, this.

7) Luger/Renegade - If you were to say to me in 1995 – "you'd get a 5+ minute match between Lex Luger and the Renegade on TV", I'd probably predict it would be horrible and I'd be safe in that prediction. One would even think that would be true for 1996... but Renegade with six months of Powerplant work under his belt came back and wrestled a, dare I say it, competent match against Luger. The action was solid, Renegade had clearly been told "stick to what you can do", and the finish a surprise too – Luger would need the help of manager Jimmy Hart to get the job done – much to the chagrin of tag team partner Sting.

8) Billionaire Ted – While the developments with the Billionaire Ted story in February would more be pertinent off screen, this was still another noteworthy month on screen – with every 45 minute episode of Raw having segments dedicated to it. Not only did we get the airing of a print advertisement that the company wanted to run in both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal (specifically quoting Ted Turner's "Vendetta against the WWF"), we also saw two editions of "Larry Fling Live" - is that Terry from Venice Beach on the line?

9) Loch Ness – While Giant Haystacks was undoubtedly a big name in the UK, in more ways that one, the choice to have his 600lb+ presence on Nitro was a strange one. While he was, perhaps, a decent fit for the Dungeon Of Doom, quite what benefit he had being on television is anybody's guess. As is, while his best moment may have come on the pay per view (where he was "held back" from Hogan inside the steel cage essentially because he wouldn't be able to fit through the door), he did "wrestle" two matches on Nitro. Where the *big* boys play, indeed.

10) "Stone Cold" -- It was just a small line on commentary – but Vince McMahon twice referred to The Ringmaster as being "stone cold". Little did we know...

11) "The Booty Man" - Another man who had a name change was Ed Leslie. After being the Zodiac for a while in the Dungeon of Doom, Leslie inexplicably rocked up on Nitro as a babyface helping out Hogan run off the Dungeon Of Doom (what else?). In real life Hogan wanted Leslie (and The Giant) to be babyfaces so he could hang out with them, but it marked Leslie's fifth name in WCW in less than 18 months.

12) Kid/Hakushi - A nod (I needed another one for a even number!) to this very-good-for-TV match between The 123 Kid and Hakushi. It was easy to forget given all of the news and nonsense on both shows that good wrestling was still good wrestling. Both companies were becoming keener to showcase that.