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Post by simplydurhamcalling on May 24, 2021 2:29:17 GMT -5
Everything up until Wrestlemania was fine really, in an ideal world they should have had HBK instantly replace Hogan the night after Wrestlemania X8 which would have maintained a high level of star power.
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Post by Andee9001 on May 24, 2021 3:25:12 GMT -5
Looking back - mostly no. The whole thing just seemed so half baked plus a lot of outside factors ruined it. From No Way Out to Mania was pretty good. Seeing Hogan, Hall and Nash together was cool but after Hogan split it all fell apart. Hall had his issues obviously, Nashs body fell apart, adding Big Show and X Pac was cool but it couldn't be the NWO without Hall or Nash. An NWO with Nash, Shawn Michaels, Triple H with Pac and Show could have been cool but by all accounts Triple H vs Nash was going to be the Summerslam match so that version wouldn't have lasted long. That first month was pretty cool and having the NWO in SD Shut Your Mouth was cool too. Everything else was bad.
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Post by Oh Cry Me a Screwball on May 24, 2021 3:51:05 GMT -5
As bad as Hogan leaving the group was, the thing that really killed the nWo concept was having them adhere to a brand split to begin with. The nWo of 1996-1997 would not have given a crap about a construct like a brand split. They would have shown up to both shows, beat up the Smackdown security guards, and made off with Reverend D-Von's donation bucket and spent it on beer. This was the lethal dose of poison, and they couldn't even get on the same show as the guy who brought them to the WWF. That right there showed me that Vince never got the concept of the nWo, a rival organization that in kayfabe, was not part of WCW to the point where events were branded WCW/nWo events, not just WCW events. On top of that, they ended up becoming Ric Flair's lackeys against Austin, which was borderline sacrilegious since they spent the better part of four years leaving Flair a bloodied mess every Monday night. With Hogan going back to the red and yellow and Hall leaving the company shortly afterwards, they were just another upper-midcard faction with X-Pac and Big Show, not even bothering to rebrand them Syxx and The Giant for any form of authenticity.
However, I will say when Nash went down with the infamous quad injury, they did a pretty good job salvaging the angle into a D-Generation X reunion turned Triple H heel turn on Shawn Michaels, leading to one of the best Summerslam matches of all time. Of course that angle was going to work, because Vince McMahon understood D-Generation X, because all of that happened on his show in the late 90s.
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4real
Wade Wilson
Posts: 27,924
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Post by 4real on May 24, 2021 18:31:54 GMT -5
I wasn’t watching WCW in the late 90’s so I missed the nWo run but I read about it afterwards so was excited to see what they could do when they came in. Losing Hogan so early killed them though Hall wasn’t in a great place it seems and Nash got injured quickly after as well. It just didn’t seem to me that WWE was fully invested in them and it was the right decision to just end it when they did.
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Phosphor Glow
Bill S. Preston, Esq.
Is a real girl!
Posts: 19,874
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Post by Phosphor Glow on May 24, 2021 20:37:29 GMT -5
I thought pretty much everything from the "lethal dose of poison" vignette to losing Hogan was pretty great TV and I had a lot of fun with it. I was just getting back into wrestling after falling out of it for awhile in like mid-2000, and it was one of the first big angles that was happening when I got back into it, and it definitely had my attention considering how much I was a WCW mark during the late 90s.
Also that lethal dose of poison vignette f***ing rules, I don't care what anyone says.
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Post by Baldobomb-22-OH-MAN!!! on May 25, 2021 7:19:01 GMT -5
it started off somewhat promising but between Hogan turning face and Scott Hall leaving it became pretty pointless pretty quickly.
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salz4life
Grimlock
Prichard is a guy who gets that his job is to service his boss.
Posts: 14,045
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Post by salz4life on May 25, 2021 10:33:15 GMT -5
The actual visual of them in the WWE was cool, but the storyline sucked. Also, after Hogan turned face I totally would have been down with The Kliq being the NWO. However much like every other NWO storyline ever attempted, their WWE run did in fact end with a wet fart. I enjoyed it until Mania 18. Austin/Hall sucked and Hogan was UBER face after his match with The Rock. After 18, the 3 guys were own their own and it should've been dropped, not revived with "new" people.
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Post by corndog on May 25, 2021 11:35:25 GMT -5
They were pretty much dead in the water after the reaction Hogan got at Mania 18. And even before that, they were having a hard time getting him over as a heel. But you just weren't going to get a WWF audience to boo him. Especially one that had grown up with Hulkamania and were now teens/young adults bitten by the nostalgia bug. I enjoyed it until the aftermath of Hogan leaving. It could worked if Nash could keep his body together and Hall didn't fall back into bad habits. It was surreal seeing them on WWE television with the nWo colors and their interactions with the talent were fun. It was always going to be hard keeping them heel, especially Hogan. The reason it worked in WCW, despite the company bringing in new fans, they still worked a lot of the old Crockett and other southern territories where Hogan was seen as the enemy. Seeing Hogan in the ring at Wrestlemania 18 felt like him finally coming home, couple that with him actually putting a genuine effort in the match for the first time in years and I feel like even he didn't expect that big of reaction.
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Post by The Rick Jericho on May 25, 2021 12:01:59 GMT -5
Sting coming in shortly after the nWo did would've been great continuity.
Having Sting end the nWo at Summerslam would've been a great ending for Sting, nWo and WWE.
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