RADICAN’S DVD REVIEW SERIES
TIMELINE THE HISTORY OF ECW ’94 w/Shane Douglas
RELEASED BY KAYFABECOMMENTARIES.COM

The Timeline series from Kayfabe Commentaries is the one of the best series of releases based on wrestling that I’ve seen. The series started with WWE themed releases, but the company also began putting out ECW-themed Timeline releases starting with Sabu. “Timeline: The History of ECW ’94 with Shane Douglas” more than holds its own as a standout edition from the Timeline series, although Sabu’s release was better with more entertaining stories that Douglas’s is.

Once again, the main takeaway here is you get to sit through host Sean Oliver and Shane Douglas taking you month-by-month through the major events and happenings in 1994 in ECW. Nobody in wrestling is a genius, but listening to Douglas talk about ECW booker Paul Heyman and his ideas for characters and building the promotion never gets old.

Douglas talks about the differences between working in WCW and WWE compared to coming to ECW and working with Heyman, who gave him direction for the “Franchise” character and let him run with the ball from there. Douglas’s comments about working for Heyman are just another illustration of how Heyman got the most out of his talent and when you look out at the independent companies today, there just aren’t those well-rounded characters that existed in ECW.

Douglas talks about the politics between promoters with ECW still under the N.W.A. banner as Eastern Championship wrestling in ’94. There are some hilarious stories about jobbers being named as a rib after other promoters. Douglas, who was there for the ride during this time tells some great stories about Heyman and it’s hilarious to listen to him discuss how seriously these promoters took what they were doing when they weren’t even close to the WWE or WCW level, but they would still go around and try to screw each other.

One of the common threads throughout the release is the amount of stupid stunts the wrestlers tried to pull off. Terry Funk is the main culprit here, as on a couple of occasions he called for the fans to throw chairs into the ring. Douglas candidly discusses these situations and how some of the things that were done in the company could have gotten it shut down if something had gone wrong.

Douglas also talks about the bigger name wrestlers that came through ECW that were used to working a certain style, but quickly learned ECW was something totally different. It’s interesting to see how everyone from Dory Funk to Jimmy Snuka reacted to working in the ECW environment.

Another high point on this release is Douglas discussing the fans and their involvement in making ECW so special. Douglas talks about everything from the fans bringing weapons to the shows to how smart the fans were, which ultimately made them easy to work. There are some crazy stories mixed in here including one involving a pane of glass from a sliding door that got by security and ended up being used in a match.

’94 was also the time when Tommy Dreamer got over with the crowd and seeing the footage from him getting caned is still hard to watch. Dreamer is touched on throughout the release and Douglas tells a great story about how the Sandman-Dreamer rivalry was built by Heyman and it worked so well because he was able to work the smart fans. As mentioned during the Sabu review, seeing the ECW footage while Douglas is telling a story makes everything better.

Of course, the biggest story from ’94 is when Douglas won the NWA Hvt. Title tournament, but ended up throwing the belt down after cutting a promo. Douglas gives his side of the story and says Heyman didn’t pressure him to do anything, but Douglas said right up until the time he was cutting the promo he hadn’t decided whether or not he was going to go through with it.

Douglas claims that one of the main factors going into him throwing down the NWA Hvt. Title came from NWA president Dennis Coraluzzo going on Mike Tenay’s radio show and burying him. It’s a heck of a story and matches up with what Douglas has said about the situation in the past, but it’s hard to believe Douglas hadn’t decided in advance alongside Todd Gordon and Paul Heyman to do the angle to launch ECW to a new level.

This is definitely a release worth picking up. Heck, there’s even a story about Torch columnist Bruce Mitchell thrown in here for good measure. I’d argue that it doesn’t matter what Bruce looks like when it comes to his ability to reviewing matches, but apparently Douglas and Tommy Dreamer don’t agree. If you were a fan of ECW and want to listen to Douglas’s side of the story when it came to the major happenings in ’94, this release is well-worth picking up due to the outstanding production values, content, and the inclusion of actual footage from ECW to support Douglas’s stories at certain points.

You can purchase this release at Kayfabecommentaries.com

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Contact Sean at PWTorchSean@gmail.com

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