The Ultimate Ric Flair Collection (1 Viewer)

[TedT]

Please spell"woo" right. It's "WOO" (with how many O's you want to put after it, for emphasis). NOT "who". It's not a question, but a yell of celebration, intimidation, and victory.

 

[Scott_J]

It looks like the match listing has been released. This one actually seems accurate. This is taken from a thread at DVDTalk, which took it from www.highspots.com:

Wrestling match footage from the 70's, 80's, 90's and today. This includes some of Ric's most famous matches with: Harley Race, Dusty Rhodes, Barry Windham, Ricky Steamboat, Terry Funk, and Sting.

Ric Flair vs. ... (shown in their entirety)

Harley Race Starrcade (11/24/83)
Dusty Rhodes Starrcade (11/28/85)
Barry Windham World Wide Wrestling (01/20/87)
Ricky Steamboat Clash of the Champions VI (04/02/89)
Ricky Steamboat WrestleWar (05/07/89)
Terry Funk I Quit Match Clash of the Champions IX (11/15/89)
Royal Rumble (01/19/92)
Sting Undisputed World Title Unification Clash of the Champions XXVII (06/23/94)


Debut match with the WWWF vs. Pete Sanchez 3/1/76
A day in the life of the Four Horsemen
His match with Triple H from 5.19.03 Raw with a post-show tribute that has never-been-seen before on TV
Plus all the promos & controversies surrounding his greatest matches against Harley Race, Dusty Rhodes, Barry Windham, Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat, Terry Funk, Sting as well as his 1992 Royal Rumble victory.
BONUS: 6 hidden Easter eggs

Looks like a good set, with the I Quit Match vs. Terry Funk from Clash IX: NY Knockout being included, plus the ENTIRE '92 Rumble. WRT the Sting match they selected, I would have preferred to see the 60-minute draw from Clash I between Flair and Sting rather than the one they chose, but space issues may have caused that to not be included because they already have 1 60+ minute match, with the Rumble. All in all, looks like a nice set.

Interesting to note, of the 8 full matches included in the main program, 1/4 of them (2) took place here in the Albany, NY area. Clash IX was at the then-RPI Fieldhouse (has since come under corporate sponsorship I believe) in nearby Troy, NY and the '92 Rumble was at the then-Knickerbocker Arena (now Pepsi Arena) in downtown Albany. I never realized how a couple of Flair's top matches took place right here in Albany.

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

Including the entire 92 rumble sealed the deal for me ! Cant wait !

 

[Ray_Gootz]

This is a great set. Now if the WWE really wants to kick some ass they should do a 3-disc Bret Hart set.

Or a 6 disc box set best of Raw/Nitro. 3 discs of Raw. 3 discs of Nitro.

And of course the mother of all sets....THE WRESTLEMANIA BOX SET. 2 disc each with commentaries, behind the scenes and rare matches that add historical perpective to each event. For example on Wrestlemania 4 I'd put that Main Event match between Hogan and Andre where Hogan lost the belt and on 10 I'd throw in the first ladder match between Shawn and Bret. Shoot if this came out next year this would be a 20-40 disc set. Hmmm maybe in sets of 5.I'd buy 'em in a second!

 

[Steve_Knutzen]

Or a 6 disc box set best of Raw/Nitro. 3 discs of Raw. 3 discs of Nitro.

There've been rumors that they're working on a set highlighting the Monday Night Wars.

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

I wanted to hit a few things in this topic.

1. The matches on this DVD should be top notch. I'm disappointed that the match with Sting is not the 45 minute draw from Clash of Champions I, and there are about 1,000 other Flair matches that would've been good choices. From the list I saw, I see the first match of the Flair/Steamboat trilogy of 89 is missing, the ChiTown Rumble match. I find the fact that its not included to be odd, and the WrestleWar match is already an extra on the HHH DVD "The Game," They have Rumble 1992 which is good, Bobby Heenan on color is hallarious during that match but I'm surprised that the WrestleMania VIII match with Randy Savage isn't apart of the set that I can tell.
2. I'm glad they're finally using the WCW/NWA footage a little better.
3. They are working on a History of the Monday Night Wars DVD, but I'm just afraid it will end up more like the nWo Back in Black DVD than the Flair DVD. By that I mean a little too one-sided and a little too much revisionist history.

my $.02

 

[oscar_merkx]

This is absolutely a top notch dvd with most of these matches I have never seen only heard about

 

[Blu]

I would like to see the Kerry Von Erich vs. Ric Flair match in Texas where Kerry pinned Ric to win the NWA title for the first time.

I would also love to see sets from some of the major rivalrys from all of wrestling history such as:

Jake the Snake Roberts vs. Ronnie Garvin matches that stretched out over a year.

Buzz Sawyer vs. Tommy Rich: A huge grudge program that lasted a very long time and ended in that memorable cage match with the top and Paul Ellering in a seperate cage.

The legendary Midnight Express vs. The Rock N Roll Express feud that was one of the best feuds this side of any Road Warrior (yea the Road Warriors not the LOD) feud.

Bob Backlund vs. Sgt. Slaughter a great all around feud.

Magnum TA vs Mr. Wrestling II this feud broke my heart when I was a youngster watching Mid South Wrestling!

If they ever put out some of these great moments on DVD I'm all over it!!!

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

Blu, I know that WWE owns the NWA/WCW footage and is pretty close to acquiring the AWA and ECW footage but territories like Mid-south and WCCW I'm not sure who holds the rights to that stuff.

For the wrestling fans on the HTF, how many have seen the Wrestling Gold box set? I think it is a very well put together set, with the highlight being the audio commentary from Dave Meltzer and Jim Cornette.

Long live the Midnight Express!

 

[TedT]

I got them all. I don't even listen to the original soundtrack. The commentary is amazing!

 

[jonathan_govols]

Ah this reminds me of the good old days when wresting was actually good. Now since they split Raw and Smackdown I can't get into it anymore. I was always a WWF (WWE) guy but now I realize more than ever how important WCW was. Not only did they put out a great product but competition is always best for the audience. It pushes each company to put out the best product. And now the WWE has no competition. It's really sad.

 

[AnthonyL]

Anyone buy this yet? any reviews?

 

[teapot2001]

Apparently, the first printing run has completely sold out in the first two days.

~T

 

[ChrisBEA]

Picked up a copy today, haven't wacthed any of it yet...
Just started watching the Bloodbath set.

BTW: Wonder who the brainiac was who decided to put the the top edge label on this thing, it's like the ET set, you start to take it off and it starts taking the cover with it!

It's a really good cover other than that.

 

[Ray_Gootz]

Deepdiscountdvd.com hasn't shipped my copy yet, the bastards.

Aslo I heard they edit out all verbal refrences to the WWF from promo's and such. This is a rare exception where sometimes VHS beats out DVD. I'm so glad I have most of the Attitude era taped off TV. All future sets will have lamsot everything blurred out. To me that's worse than pan and scanning a movie.

 

[Nick Graham]

Picked it up Tuesday...awesome set! And yes I agree, Chris, my set already has a damaged top cover. Thanks for the brilliant packaging, Sony!

Anyways, I'm waaay too tired to do a full review right now, and I've barely scratched the surface of the set itself, so you guys just tell me what you want to know about, and I'll give you the answers. There is an invaluable wealth of material on these three discs, and the funny thing is, they don't even scratch the surface of the man's career!

A lot of us were worried WWE would shortchange all of his WCW/NWA stuff, and focus on his WWF/E runs. The funny thing is, it's the WWF stuff that gets the short end of the stick (though to be fair, they cram as much as they can in 3 discs).

I sense a Volume 2 coming if this one does well, as the feuds with Savage are left uncovered, as is the Hogan feud (which I could honestly do without, anyways), the real life backstage feud with Bischoff (and the angle/on camera feud they made out of it), the feud with the nWo, and no sign of the Vader match I've always wanted to see.

As I said, don't slight them on this though, as the three discs are just jam packed with great stuff....they could have made a six disc set and still not have been able to cover everything just from the 80s to today.

The full matches in the set:

vs Harley Race, cage match, Starrcade '83

vs Dusty Rhodes, Starrcade 1985

vs Barry Windham, Worldwide Wrestling, 1987

Flair and Windham vs Ricky Stemaboat and Eddie Gilbert
(Steamboat's TV return to the NWA)

vs Steamboat, 2 out of 3 falls, Clash of the Champions VI

vs Steamboat, Wrestlewar '89

vs Terry Funk, I Quit Match, Clash of the Champions IX

The Entire 1992 Royal Rumble match (Flair enters at number 3 of 30, leaves over an hour later the last man standing and with his first WWF World Title)

vs Sting, Clash of the Champions XXVII, 1994

vs HHH, Monday Night RAW, 5-19-03

vs Pete Sanchez, WWWF (they used to have 3 Ws, for World WIDE Wrestling Federation) TV debut, 3-1-76

Plus every conceivable TV segment, interview, and angle leading up to and following the above matches and feuds, and more, like his speech on the final episode of Nitro (though not his final match with Sting on that episode), being presented with the PWI Wreslter of the Decade award in 1989, the off camera post-show tribute that happened after the match with HHH, an obscure TV segment from 1982 with he and Roddy Piper having a little amateur wrestling friendly skirmish/work out....and I'm still forgetting stuff, like pretty much every WWE Confidential segment that has had to do with him or the Horsemen.

As you can tell, it's jam-packed, but there is plenty of material that wasn't used that can be used for future releases. This set covers all the cornerstones of his career in depth...but there are plenty of stones left unturned. I pray WWE releases another volume. Hopefully with Bret and Vince mending fences, we may have a Bret Hart set like this to look forward to in the next couple of years.

Remember when you used to look forward to watching wrestling as opposed to doing it just out of habit...buy this set!

Oh, nothing is blurred or edited out. The old WWF logo is a legal safe zone, so it's not edited out, and Flair was never in WWF when they used the pre-WWE scratch logo, so there aren't any logo blurs.

Also, there is no audio editing...you'll hear the term "World Wrestling Federation" quite a bit, so no worries.

 

[Casey Trowbridg]

I'll give a mini-review myself, though Nick said a mouth full.

In a way, picking Ric Flair matches to put on a DVD set is just as hard as picking Looney Toons shorts to go on a DVD. No matter what you're going to leave something off.

I could think of several matches they could put on a second volume.
1. Flair Vs. Steamboat ChiTown Rumble 1989. The beginning of the Flair/Steamboat trilogy I'm shocked it wasn't here.
2. Flair Vs. Savage WrestleMania VIII
3. Flair Vs. Bret Hart, WWF Championship match (Bret wins the title)
4. Flair Vs. Vader, career match Starrcade 1993
5. Flair Vs. Hulk Hogan, Steelcage match Halloween Havoc 1994
6. Ric Flair Vs. Arn Anderson, fallbrawl 1995.
Ok, so I just listed some stuff that would be good, but that is not to knock this set at all.

The set contains all the matches and angles Nick mentioned as well as newer comments from the man himself. These were some of Flair's more famous feuds, and the DVD does them justice. Even the ending of the first Sting/Flair match from Clash of Champions I is somewhere on this set I do believe, or so I have heard, not the entire match but the end itself.

Look its a wrestling DVD, you buy for the matches more than anything. I have a lot of these on video tape that is like 20th generation so having them restored to glory for the DVD has got to be a bonus over what we've got on those old tapes.

This is easily the best WWE DVD I own, and I've really only gone through disc 3 so far, but its Ric Flair. This is 1 of the better DVDs I've purchased this year.

I didn't have a grievence with the packaging no problems at all in fact.

To the comment above, regarding whether or not they blur out referrences to the WWF, well I watched the 1992 Royal Rumble and their were constant referrences to the WWF championship.

WWE will have to work hard to top this, it is just too bad they aren't compelled to hire more people to do more of these things.

The 1 thing I'm not sure if it is on the set as an easter egg, but if it isn't that would be reason enough for a volume 2 is Ric Flair's return to Nitro in September 1998 when Arn Anderson reformed the Horsemen, 1 of the most emotional nights in wrestling history.

 

[Xenia Stathakopoulou]

Well, so far ive gotten till the end of disc 2 where Flair wrestled Funk in an i quit match , great stuff ! Casey, dont ever expect to see the wrestlemania 8 match on a future Flair set, the trend they have with these wrestler theme sets is only put there winning matches on there.I checked both my Hogan set and Michaels set and not 1 losing match.I cant wait to see the 92 rumble match tonight on disc 3 .

 

[Nick Graham]

Casey, I've been looking for easter eggs but have come up empty, aside from highlighting the WWE logo on the main menu of either disc 2 or 3, which yields an old, funny TV promo. With the easter eggs I've heard about on Bloodbath, plus the fact there was at least one per disc on Hulk Still Rules, I assume there are more.

I'm not too surprised the Flair/Steamboat Chi-Town Rumble match isn't there. I think they just planned to include what was considered the best match of each feud, but an equal amount of people say the Wrestlewar match is better than the Clash match, and vice versa, so they just gave us both to appease both sides.

I wouldn't be surprised if (when?) they do a Volume 2 that it has all the classic Sting matches, like Bash 91', the full Clash I match, as well as the awesome Savage feuds including the WM VIII match as well as their PPV matches from mid nineties WCW.

 

[Bill Williams]

I hope that if they do decide to do a Volume 2 set, that they include some of the long-running feud matches between Flair and Lex Luger for the NWA (WCW) World Heavyweight title. The matches they had were real wars, and every time Luger came within a hair of beating Flair for the title, but somehow Flair would always find a way of winning. Those were some great matches that could go 45-60 minutes apiece as well.

Another good one to include that I enjoyed was the Ric Flair/Randy Savage title match from WCW Monday Nitro from late 1995 in Las Vegas, where Savage defeated Flair for the WCW World Heavyweight title. Flair was again at his best.

And I agree, the reformation of the 4 Horsemen in 1998 was a very powerful moment, and Flair's emotion was so genuine. That deserves to be included.