WWE Untold: The Failed Relaunch of WCW

[clifford]

Anybody catch this short documentary, went up on the Network last Sunday.

Only 19 mins long so super short, but a nice little piece on the attempted takeover of WCW by Bischoff and Fusient Media Ventures in 2001 and the planned 'Big Bang' PPV for May 2001.

Some nice insight from Bischoff, Double J, Booker, among others.

I'd like to see more of these quick, snippet-like pieces on wrestling history.

[Deleted]

When I saw it advertised I thought it was gonna be about the wwf version of WCW I was kinda sad that it was this one instead.

[brettappedout (BLM)]

I really like this series.

2 Things

1: AEW looks alot like late WCW. Production wise. Not a bad thing or good thing, just noticed it.

2: I wonder who Borash was talking about, when he said someone everyone knew was going to jump Shane during that segment with Vince on the last Nitro.

[Deleted]

May 31, 2019 15:01:35 GMT -5 brettappedout (BLM) said:

I really like this series.

2 Things

1: AEW looks alot like late WCW. Production wise. Not a bad thing or good thing, just noticed it.

Both WCW & AEW have the same person in charge of tv production Keith Mitchell.

[DZ: WF Legacy]

Really cool to see that Big Bang advertisement touched upon. It does seem like WCW was gonna become something like early TNA, with a 'home base' to film (in Vegas) and a refocus in direction.

Also, holy crap at the revelation that someone was gonna jump Shane during the simulcast.

[Muskrat]

May 31, 2019 9:19:50 GMT -5 @mrbonezone said:

When I saw it advertised I thought it was gonna be about the wwf version of WCW I was kinda sad that it was this one instead.

Yeah, I thought this would be about the July relaunch where Raw would become Nitro and SmackDown would be the WWE show. I’d love to hear Vince talk about that. Him, and the poor schedule guy who had to redo a years touring schedule like 3 times in a 2 week span because of the WCW relaunch getting scrapped

[Ben Wyatt]

Jun 2, 2019 0:58:49 GMT -5 DZ: WF Legacy said:

Really cool to see that Big Bang advertisement touched upon. It does seem like WCW was gonna become something like early TNA, with a 'home base' to film (in Vegas) and a refocus in direction.

It's a shame, because the last few months of existence, WCW looked like it was finally figuring some stuff out.  You wonder if they'd gotten to do the relaunch, if it actually may have worked over time

[Alice Syndrome]

Jun 4, 2019 14:10:14 GMT -5 Ben Wyatt said:

Jun 2, 2019 0:58:49 GMT -5 DZ: WF Legacy said:

Really cool to see that Big Bang advertisement touched upon. It does seem like WCW was gonna become something like early TNA, with a 'home base' to film (in Vegas) and a refocus in direction.

It's a shame, because the last few months of existence, WCW looked like it was finally figuring some stuff out.  You wonder if they'd gotten to do the relaunch, if it actually may have worked over time

I watched Greed a while back, and the first 2 matches were Shane Helms and EZ Money getting actual pushes, and I really started to get annoyed this couldn't last.

[Deleted]

Jun 4, 2019 9:00:20 GMT -5 Muskrat said:

May 31, 2019 9:19:50 GMT -5 @mrbonezone said:

When I saw it advertised I thought it was gonna be about the wwf version of WCW I was kinda sad that it was this one instead.

Yeah, I thought this would be about the July relaunch where Raw would become Nitro and SmackDown would be the WWE show. I’d love to hear Vince talk about that. Him, and the poor schedule guy who had to redo a years touring schedule like 3 times in a 2 week span because of the WCW relaunch getting scrapped

When I kept seeing the 15 second ad saying Untold:Failed WCW Relaunch I just instantly assumed it was the wwf one but I guess in canon the WWF one was a huge success.

[Deleted]

Jun 4, 2019 14:10:14 GMT -5 Ben Wyatt said:

Jun 2, 2019 0:58:49 GMT -5 DZ: WF Legacy said:

Really cool to see that Big Bang advertisement touched upon. It does seem like WCW was gonna become something like early TNA, with a 'home base' to film (in Vegas) and a refocus in direction.

It's a shame, because the last few months of existence, WCW looked like it was finally figuring some stuff out.  You wonder if they'd gotten to do the relaunch, if it actually may have worked over time

The thing to remember about those last few months of WCW that people seemed to like was it was lame duck programming.Once January rolled around and the sale to Fusient was announced the booking committee had to run everything by Bischoff and he didn’t want anything very interesting happening so that when the sale was final and he did his reboot with his new direction things would seem way more exciting and that new exciting direction was bring back all the old guys.

[chazraps]

I actually liked that it focused on The Big Bang and not the WWE-affiliated relaunch as we've really never gotten this in-depth on what 'The Big Bang' was and supposed to be.

While I would be interested in the WWE-WCW story, we do know quite a bit about that night between the Buff stories, the contracts, etc. 'The Big Bang' has usually just been a footnote or a curiosity. This contained quite a bit of new info directly from the sources and some great perspectives.

[Deleted]

Jun 4, 2019 21:33:15 GMT -5 chazraps said:

I actually liked that it focused on The Big Bang and not the WWE-affiliated relaunch as we've really never gotten this in-depth on what 'The Big Bang' was and supposed to be.

While I would be interested in the WWE-WCW story, we do know quite a bit about that night between the Buff stories, the contracts, etc. 'The Big Bang' has usually just been a footnote or a curiosity. This contained quite a bit of new info directly from the sources and some great perspectives.

For me it was mostly old news because from the day in January 2001 when Fusient announced they were buying WCW they had Bischoff do a ton of interviews about what they planned to do.It was barely 2 months and nothing came of it but its a cool little program for the people that either didn’t know or don’t remember.

My favorite story from that 2 month period was during one of Eric’s many radio interviews a caller threw out some of his ideas for the cruiserweights and Eric loved them and hired the caller to be the booker of the cruiserweight division of the new WCW.After nothing came of it that guy who was pretty active on various wrestling messageboards sent WWF like 6 months or a year of tv and wwf wasn’t interested.

[thetower52]

May 31, 2019 15:01:35 GMT -5 brettappedout (BLM) said:

I really like this series.

2 Things

1: AEW looks alot like late WCW. Production wise. Not a bad thing or good thing, just noticed it.

2: I wonder who Borash was talking about, when he said someone everyone knew was going to jump Shane during that segment with Vince on the last Nitro.

I’d put my money on Scott Steiner

[Deleted]

Jun 6, 2019 5:23:17 GMT -5 thetower52 said:

May 31, 2019 15:01:35 GMT -5 brettappedout (BLM) said:

I really like this series.

2 Things

1: AEW looks alot like late WCW. Production wise. Not a bad thing or good thing, just noticed it.

2: I wonder who Borash was talking about, when he said someone everyone knew was going to jump Shane during that segment with Vince on the last Nitro.

I’d put my money on Scott Steiner

I’d say Rick is more likely he was surly towards those last few weeks of WCW and was totally unprofessional shooting on a couple opponents and WWF never brought him back.Meanwhile Scott was on his best behavior putting over Booker T for the world title and WWE signed him the following year.

[auph10imitated]

I started watching this earlier and I pretty much started to nod off, I thought it would be an interesting story but it was pretty dull.

[schma]

Jun 4, 2019 14:10:14 GMT -5 Ben Wyatt said:

Jun 2, 2019 0:58:49 GMT -5 DZ: WF Legacy said:

Really cool to see that Big Bang advertisement touched upon. It does seem like WCW was gonna become something like early TNA, with a 'home base' to film (in Vegas) and a refocus in direction.

It's a shame, because the last few months of existence, WCW looked like it was finally figuring some stuff out.  You wonder if they'd gotten to do the relaunch, if it actually may have worked over time

Yeah, it seems like nearly everyone forgets that WCW had actually turned things around at the end and was finding its way again.  There was a younger crop of stars moving up, many of the older guys were in smaller roles or putting over the young guys.  The storylines were becoming less convoluted and actually entertaining again.  It had a lot going for it when it was sold. 

[corndog]

Jun 2, 2019 0:31:33 GMT -5 @mrbonezone said:

May 31, 2019 15:01:35 GMT -5 brettappedout (BLM) said:

I really like this series.

2 Things

1: AEW looks alot like late WCW. Production wise. Not a bad thing or good thing, just noticed it.

Both WCW & AEW have the same person in charge of tv production Keith Mitchell.

When I had the network, I was watching some Nitro episodes from 95-97 and compared to the Raws of the same era they have aged so much better production wise. I always laugh when people knock WCW's production team and then give Kevin Dunn a bunch of credit.

[Deleted]

Jun 15, 2019 10:30:33 GMT -5 corndog said:

Jun 2, 2019 0:31:33 GMT -5 @mrbonezone said:

Both WCW & AEW have the same person in charge of tv production Keith Mitchell.

When I had the network, I was watching some Nitro episodes from 95-97 and compared to the Raws of the same era they have aged so much better production wise. I always laugh when people knock WCW's production team and then give Kevin Dunn a bunch of credit.

There was only a couple years where wcw’s production was really good during those early nitro years the rest of its existence before & after wasn’t so hot.Dunn lives off the fact that wwf had great periods of tv production in the 80’s,90’s and 00’s while now they have the state of the art equipment with all the bells & whistles but the actual tv production is atrocious at times.

Nitro in 95-97 was a very slick & clean looking show that was light years ahead of raw.Raw in 95-97 was hurting production wise due to wwf not having much money.When WCW tried to copy wwf style production in 99/00 it showed how limited they really were on that end.

[corndog]

Jun 16, 2019 1:05:10 GMT -5 @mrbonezone said:

Jun 15, 2019 10:30:33 GMT -5 corndog said:

When I had the network, I was watching some Nitro episodes from 95-97 and compared to the Raws of the same era they have aged so much better production wise. I always laugh when people knock WCW's production team and then give Kevin Dunn a bunch of credit.

There was only a couple years where wcw’s production was really good during those early nitro years the rest of its existence before & after wasn’t so hot.Dunn lives off the fact that wwf had great periods of tv production in the 80’s,90’s and 00’s while now they have the state of the art equipment with all the bells & whistles but the actual tv production is atrocious at times.

Nitro in 95-97 was a very slick & clean looking show that was light years ahead of raw.Raw in 95-97 was hurting production wise due to wwf not having much money.When WCW tried to copy wwf style production in 99/00 it showed how limited they really were on that end.

Even in '98 Nitro looked better. 99/00 WCW was garbage, so I wasn't really talking about that.


Another thing that has aged amazingly well, Saturday Night's Main Event from the 80s, 80s Superstars also looks damn good even with the crappy VHS quality on YouTube. Obviously lot's of money involved, but Dunn has money to play with now and the editing makes me have epileptic attacks.

[Deleted]

Jun 16, 2019 10:37:25 GMT -5 corndog said:

Jun 16, 2019 1:05:10 GMT -5 @mrbonezone said:

There was only a couple years where wcw’s production was really good during those early nitro years the rest of its existence before & after wasn’t so hot.Dunn lives off the fact that wwf had great periods of tv production in the 80’s,90’s and 00’s while now they have the state of the art equipment with all the bells & whistles but the actual tv production is atrocious at times.

Nitro in 95-97 was a very slick & clean looking show that was light years ahead of raw.Raw in 95-97 was hurting production wise due to wwf not having much money.When WCW tried to copy wwf style production in 99/00 it showed how limited they really were on that end.

Even in '98 Nitro looked better. 99/00 WCW was garbage, so I wasn't really talking about that.


Another thing that has aged amazingly well, Saturday Night's Main Event from the 80s, 80s Superstars also looks damn good even with the crappy VHS quality on YouTube. Obviously lot's of money involved, but Dunn has money to play with now and the editing makes me have epileptic attacks.

95-97 Nitro was a state of the art,innovative pro wrestling show.In 98 once Thunder starts their tv production regresses due to being overworked and understaffed.There was mishaps galore and some of their video packages were embarrassing for a company that was so innovative the 3 years prior.

mid to late 80’s WWF looked so good because Vince spent tons of money,they had big well lit solded out arenas and the NBC influence and production techniques.By 98 WWF was really finding it way again with a well shot show with tremendous video packages and that just got better as they headed into the 2000’s.