I’ve stated many times in the past that one of my favourite things in the WWE is their DVD production, in particular when it’s a documentary plus matches format. So naturally I was excited when I heard that they were putting together a second three-disc Ric Flair set, with a documentary included this time. Obviously Flair has since left the company, but fortunately that only came after the DVD was completed and released.

The documentary portion of the DVD starts with an opening video of Flair in action, with audio provided by various Flair catchphrases from over the years. This two-minute or so introduction is so great that it’s almost worth the price of the DVD on it’s own.

The problem with a documentary on Ric Flair is that he’s had a thirty-five year career where so much has happened that it’s only natural that they’ll be skipping things over and also repeating stuff from his autobiography that came out a few years back, as well as covering some ground from both his original DVD and the Four Horsemen DVD that came out last year. However, Ric Flair is so great that I really don’t care that some of it is repeated information.

The addition of the usual collection of talking heads (no Steve Lombardi here, thankfully, although we do get Bruce Prichard) mean that they can cover the stories and give another perspective than just Flair’s view. Another difference as compared to the book is that Flair’s stories are interspersed with video clips from the time period, and you really do sense that you’re watching history.

His childhood, including being in Flair’s words a “black market baby” is skipped over quickly, as is his American Football playing teenage years, but we get into wrestling with him meeting Ken Patera and Flair saying that back then he was “the chunkiest thing you ever saw” and the famous story of him quitting training twice only to be begged back by Verne Gagne is stated. Mean Gene tries to say that he could tell immediately that he’d be one of the greatest ever, which is such fucking bullshit. I can believe he thought Flair would be really good, perhaps even a World Champion, but that he’d be RIC FLAIR as we’ve come to know him? No fucking way.

Flair talks about the great influence early in his career that Dusty Rhodes and Wahoo McDaniel had. Wahoo got Flair into Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling in 1974 and he’s lived in the Carolinas ever since, and that’s where he became the Ric Flair we know today. Wahoo was great, and he had excellent chemistry with Flair too, as anyone who has just got done watching the DVDVR Best of the 1980s in Mid-South can attest to. They have a match on that set, ten years past Wahoo’s prime by the way, and it’s just incredible, a match that I had in my top 10 overall in an immensely high quality set.

In 1975, Flair was involved in a plane crash which broke his back, as well as ending the career of Johnny Valentine. Flair was supposed to be retiring back then, and Harley Race and David Crockett (yes, the WWE interviewed David Crockett for this thing, which is so great) talk about how back injuries were usually career-enders in those days - and not just then, a back injury took Shawn Michaels out for four years only a decade ago and ended the career of Ricky Steamboat in 1994 - but Flair got back in a few months, and somehow this lead to a discussion of his various robes, which leads into a comparison with Buddy Rogers, the original Nature Boy.

In the old Rogers clips shown you do get a sense for his influence on Flair’s style and mannerisms, not to mention the use of the figure-four leglock finisher. Rogers was actually brought into Mid Atlantic in the late 1970s to put Flair over to further cement him as the new Naitch.

There is some discussion of Ric Flair’s tag team with Greg Valentine, son of the aforementioned Johnny who went on to become a mid-level star in the 1980s. Flair and Valentine’s team is not really talked of very much, maybe due to a lack of existing footage, but Flair really puts it over. Being a tag team champion and United States champion in the late 1970s was actually a huge deal, strange as that may seem to fans of today’s product. They were seen as steps on the ladder to the top, a route which with the exception of Edge none of today’s top guys have really gone. And Edge just happens to be the best all-round performer of the current main event set in North America right now - and I don’t think necessarily that that’s a coincidence.

We get a discussion of old NWA politics, including how Flair, before he was champion, would be sent to old territories to get over in as many different regions as possible in order to both build rematches once he’d won the title and to get himself recognised enough and make the political connections necessary to win the right number of votes to get the World Title. I’ve never really heard about the challengers going into different territories before, but now that I think about it, it really makes sense. It’s something that Ring Of Honor does very well today, in terms of if a guy gets super-over in one area, say Boston, he’ll get his World Title shot in Boston rather than somewhere that doesn’t respond as well to him like say Chicago. But the top guys are over everywhere.

Flair talks very badly of his first World Title win in 1981, and his first run in general. I don’t know if it’s just his memory playing tricks on him, or if he had personal things going on that effected him in that time period so it wasn’t good personally, but business wise this was Flair’s great run as the travelling World Champion who went everywhere and defended the title against everybody.

Also, Flair always talks like his first run was five minutes, when in fact it was for a year and a half. Everyone puts Flair over as the consummate World Champion, from contemporaries such as Tully Blanchard to modern guys who may have grown up watching him like Edge. Flair describes the role of the World Champion going into different territories as “your job was to make their guy look like he could beat the World Champion, then come back the next time and make even more money” - are you listening TNA? Ric Flair doesn’t say you make the top babyface look like a screaming lunatic spaz idiot.

However, we get the downside as Flair’s kids David and Megan talk about how hard it was that they essentially grew up never seeing their father, and Flair seems to regret it, although he admits that at the time it wasn’t something he gave any thought to. Which is usually how those things go.

A lot of time is spent talking about Starrcade 1983 when Flair won the World Title back from Harley Race. It’s a shame Gene Kininski did such a shit job as guest referee, although I don’t think that’s enough reason for some of the hate this match gets. It was shown in full and covered extensively in the extras section of Flair’s first DVD, and I couldn’t get over how great both the angles and the match were. I was marking out like stuff was happening now for an angle that happened two decades before I first had a chance to watch it.

We then go into a section on Flair’s great promo style, where he talks about how many cars and jets he has, and how much money everything costs. Flair’s financial problems now suggest he was - and by some reports still is - living that gimmick. But hey, it lead to some of the greatest promo work of all time, and you can definitely see the influence his promo style had on The Rock in terms of the cocky arrogant rich dude, and to be fair Rock is probably the only person who could get away with cutting similar promos and not have everyone immediately think “oh he’s trying to be Ric Flair and failing” which is how I feel with MVP a lot of the time, and how I felt with HHH for a long time, mostly in his Evolution days ironically enough.

“These shoes cost more than your house!” is still the greatest rich guy to regular guy insult I’ve ever heard, by the way.

Flair sums up his money problems as “I let myself down between the hours of 10pm and 3am” - that’s a great line. Harley Race and Jim Ross talk about how when being the travelling champion Flair would have to face some people who basically sucked - but Flair is more diplomatic about this as he talks about how everyone who was a top guy was there for a reason even in a small territory, be it charisma or ring work or whatever else it may have been.

HHH talks about how great Flair was at always just retaining his title, keeping his champion aura and still making his opponents come out looking great. Wow, what insight, you’d think since he idolises Flair so much he’d apply some of that logic to his own career.

The Horsemen formation and Flair heel turn is more excuse to show great Flair promo clips, and have people talk about how The Horsemen paved the way for stables in wrestling. I don’t know how true that is, whether it’s one of those revisionist things because they were well known or if they were actually the first heel stable, but they were undoubtedly great, at least in the early years. And hey, any excuse to see Flair and The Anderson’s break Dusty Rhodes’ leg while a riot goes down is great.

Then it’s mark-out time for me as they show the Horsemen dressing room beatdown of the Rock N Roll Express including Flair grinding Ricky Morton’s face on the concrete floor, which is something I have heard talked about for years but never seen, so I was LOVING this and it was just as great as I’d heard.

Flair v. Sting at the first Clash of the Champions is put over as the ultimate example of a guy making a star in one night. Rock-Brock is really the only more modern example I can think of that compares really.

Some people get their subtle digs in at Sting, saying he only had good matches with Flair (Big Van Vader says hi), and only drew money with Flair (Hollywood Hogan says hi), but then others point out that he did end up with a really good career, and Flair puts Sting over huge, saying his only regret is that Sting never went to WWE. Flair insinuates that if he did, because he had the look Vince McMahon loved, and had charisma and was athletic, that Hogan and Warrior would’ve been fucked. Well, maybe Warrior would’ve been, but Hogan? That’s just bitterness talking.

The Flair/Steamboat rivalry is of course talked about, but only the 1989 matches with no recollections of earlier matches which I was hoping for, or even a reference to their final feud in 1994. But the 1989 matches were the peak, everyone agrees.

Strangely, especially considering he works backstage for the WWE as an agent, Steamboat isn’t interviewed on this DVD. I know that over the years if you learn to read between the lines in various interviews and newsletters that maybe Flair and Steamboat had a great rivalry in the ring but possibly aren’t that close out of it, but you’d think as his greatest opponent Steamboat’s involvement would’ve added something here.

WWE pull out something interesting and great out of the bag here as old interview footage of Jim Cornette is shown from what by looking at him appears to be the late 1990s, in the midst of the Monday Night War era, when Flair was in WCW, and Cornette is putting over the three Flair/Steamboat 1989 matches as the greatest wrestling ever. Flair even says about the third match at WrestleWar that he very rarely watches his stuff back, but even he saw that match again recently and was astounded by how great it was. I have always preferred the 2/3 falls match (their second match in the 1989 series) as the best one, but the third match seems to be the consensus choice amongst the people here. They’re all great regardless.

The Ric Flair/Terry Funk feud is something that I think has been downplayed by history, firstly because it’s overshadowed by immediately following the Steamboat series, and secondly because the people who do put it over just state that it was the beginning of hardcore wrestling. Given that hardcore wrestling has, in the eyes of most fans, evolved into little more than weapon shots for cheap pops, that does Flair and Funk a major disservice.

The hatred these two managed to put over in their angles and the heat stemming from that is in a completely different league to today’s garbage wrestling. The piledriver on the table that started the feud was a genuinely shocking moment for the time, and their I Quit match is put over as the masterpiece it genuinely is.

Flair’s last couple of years in NWA/WCW with the collapse of Jim Crockett Promotions are covered, of course with Dusty Rhodes taking no blame and rambling some bullshit about people getting ahead of themselves and it’s a shame.

Flair says that if Crockett never tried to expand nationally and just stayed in the south Crockett would’ve still been around, but seriously Vince McMahon’s ruthlessness would’ve killed them, or otherwise they’d have stuck around until Ted Turner lost power in his broadcasting network. On the early years of WCW Flair says that Turner put in charge a bunch of people who didn’t know what they were doing, and Flair gets two “refusing to job to Lex Luger” stories mixed up in his recollection of leaving WCW to go to the WWF, which he puts over as the bright lights and big show where people got treated respectfully by all. Wonder if he still thinks that now?

Anyway, Flair says that he refused to job to Luger because they were building up Sting, which was actually a year earlier at WrestleWar 1990. In that case, Flair was right because Sting was injured and had been built up to take the company over for a couple of years, and a job to Luger would’ve lessened the impact of eventually putting Sting over. The second time was when he was leaving and the whole “WCW want him to job earlier so he tells them to fuck themselves and leaves for WWF with the NWA World Title belt” deal.

Flair puts over Bobby Heenan even though he didn’t really get the chance to work with him as his manager in WWF like he wanted, and Curt Hennig who took that role over. Bruce Pritchard tries to defend the WWE’s decision to not go with a Flair/Hogan main event for WrestleMania VIII but we all know he’s wrong. It was THE dream match for both sides of the 1980s wrestling war, and hey even if Hogan was leaving after Mania VIII, it’d just make Flair THAT much more over, and Savage THAT much more over still if he’d eventually beaten him at SummerSlam or some other point later in the year.

Flair talks about the Royal Rumble victory, and - and this seems to be a common theme over his career - someone else putting over how great he is got Flair his confidence back.

However, he went back to WCW and all the confidence was taken out of him, starting from his very first day in the company when Ole Anderson made a comment to him backstage that just makes Ole look like one of the dumbest people in the businesses history.

Flair points out that he was the guy who recommended Bischoff for the top job in WCW, and in retrospect what a mistake that turned out to be.

Well, it was the right decision for WCW at the time, but for Flair it eventually lead to him being downplayed, after negotiating to bring Hogan and Savage into WCW, but then he was pushed out of the power structure as Bischoff was star struck by the former WWF guys.

He talks about his retirement being cut short because Vader (who he doesn’t name but that’s who he meant) would refuse to job to Hogan and they needed somebody who would. It’s amazing that Kevin Nash, who was one of the worst guys for causing shit and politicking backstage, never gets any heat from anyone for the atmosphere and general failures of WCW (besides from Eddie Guerrero), whereas Bischoff and Hogan are crucified.

It’s really sad that the greatest wrestler of all time was so downplayed and having such a shitty time during the hottest period in the history of the business.

HHH and HBK sum up this period the best, as “Ric Flair didn’t know he was RIC FLAIR even though everyone watching did.” We do get the “FIRE ME I’M ALREADY FIRED” clip, which is one of the great wrestling promos of all time. I was wondering whether that’d be included as you can see Chris Benoit standing in the background, but really you’d have to have known he was there or be looking for him to have noticed.

There’s a totally unjust dig at Diamond Dallas Page here, as Flair talks about people in WCW having no talent and not deserving to be where they were, and it’s at that point they show a clip of DDP winning a match with the Diamond Cutter. Page, regardless of what people backstage may have thought of him, was an over motherfucker who worked damn hard to have entertaining matches. Flair wraps up WCW by saying he was glad it ended and he was embarrassed to have to wrestle in a shirt on the last Nitro.

I’m so glad WCW hasn’t had a resurrection attempt like ECW has, as really Flair v. Sting is the perfect way to end that company, even if Flair himself wasn’t happy with the match.

His WWE run is put over as a career renaissance, so obviously things like Brian Gerwertz telling him he can’t cut promos or even say “WOOOO!” on TV or doing clean jobs to Rico and Kenny Dykstra in four minutes aren’t covered here. Flair says that when he originally went to WWE he didn’t intend to wrestle, but having The Undertaker handpick him to be his opponent at WrestleMania X-8 and having a great match got Flair his confidence back, and that, as well as the respect he’s been shown by the WWE guys backstage really reminded him that he’s RIC FLAIR.

Randy Orton and Batista both put over what a great learning experience being in Evolution was, and Flair talks about his Mick Foley feud, both on screen and backstage, and essentially paints himself as an asshole (writing a receipt for Foley’s book in his book, even though he never actually read Foley’s book makes you a fucking knob in my eyes), but they used that to cut some excellent promos and now Flair says they’re even friends, so things worked out well in the end.

The DVD wraps up with talk of the Hall Of Fame and WrestleMania weekend, which is strange because Flair’s interview for the documentary was done before that weekend and he tears up thinking about it. It was certainly a fitting way to end the greatest career ever, and I really hope that doesn’t become just his last WWE match with his current financial problems.

If you left click on “plane crash” on the chapter menu, there is a DVD Easter Egg as Flair tells the story of how Mr Wrestling Tim Woods, because he was a heel on a plane with the babyfaces and the promoter, had to walk away from the wreckage with a broken back and check himself into hospital under his real name, and somehow nobody caught on. It’s amazing the lengths people went to protect kayfabe in those days, but I guess it was a different time.

We also get some extra stories which were edited out from the documentary. Flair talks about school, buying wrestling boots, puts over Wahoo McDaniel as a class guy, and even talks about his idolatry for Dusty Rhodes. Can you believe Flair originally wanted to be called Rambling Ricky Rhodes? Thank god that didn’t work out.

Flair puts over how much fun he had early in his career hanging around Dick Murdoch and Dusty Rhodes, and carrying their bags and getting drunk with them. Two Murdoch rib stories include spraying a fire extinguisher and filling Flair’s entire hotel room with foam, and also getting Flair so drunk in Hawaii that he fell asleep on the beach and was several hours late for picking up his wife from the airport, which obviously didn’t go down too well.

His soon to be ex-wife talks about how much fun she had hanging around with the current WWE guys, and talks about how surprised she was that there’s such camaraderie. But she also says “its like being on the road with a bunch of 12-year olds” which is kind of telling. There are also highlights shown of the ceremony where Flair was given the key to the city of Columbia, South Carolina.

Disc 1 ends with the Leave The Memories Alone video package that was shown on WWE TV in the leadup to, and on, WrestleMania weekend. It’s one of the best video packages they’ve ever done, and that’s a major WWE strength so that is high praise.

Disc 2 is full of matches from Flair’s 1980s heyday, and while matchlists always get some criticism online, the fact is that you’re just not going to please everyone so I just hope for some good stuff.

Some good stuff? This is RIC FLAIR.

Ric Flair v. Jack Brisco - Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling August 18th 1982. It’s always interesting to see the choices for inclusion in WWE DVDs. It’s true that Brisco is a legend in wrestling, but his prime years and Flair’s didn’t really overlap, he wasn’t mentioned in the documentary and I don’t even think Flair mentioned him in his autobiography. So that means it probably wasn’t a Flair choice.

The most interesting thing here is the prematch stuff. Originally, it was supposed to be Flair taking on some black jobber, but Flair protested that “Where I come from, we don’t wrestle your kind of people, we employ them!” which is a shockingly racist statement that would never fly in 2008, but I guess in 1982 it wasn’t that much of an issue. This brings out Wahoo McDaniel to get Flair into a shouting match where by the time he turns back to the match, Jack Brisco is in the ring.

It’s a good match, which you’d expect from two guys as good as Ric Flair and Jack Brisco, but pretty basic, they essentially work an armbar for 10 minutes and that’s it. I say that, but there’s so many small nuances and little things to what they do, from Flair subtly cheating, to Brisco selling the fact that he used to be a top guy, isn’t anymore, but can still fuck you up. Even though Flair was the World Champion, this wasn’t a title match, as evidenced by the fact that Brisco won clean with a backslide. Flair then flips out only to be chased off by Wahoo.

Ric Flair v. Kerry Von Erich - World Class Championship Wrestling August 24th 1982. This is a great choice for the DVD as it is a quintessential example of Flair as touring NWA World Heavyweight Champion. Kerry Von Erich had a great look, had huge charisma and was incredibly popular, but never had a reputation as a great worker, and in fact his reputation in wrestling seems to be more along the lines of “he was a nutjob with a good body” like he’s the Ultimate Warrior or something. So here he is as the top territorial babyface, and it’s Ric Flair’s job, in this 2/3 falls match, to make Kerry look like he could be the World Champion.

Every so often as a wrestling fan you realise you are watching wrestling perfection and this is one of those examples. Flair put in an absolutely masterful performance here, and Kerry did a fantastic job with it too. In wrestling today, it seems a lost art to look like you’re a great wrestler but still be over as a heel. Nowadays you either go the Edge route of looking like a chickenshit who gets lucky wins or the Triple H route of being booked as a heel but playing for crowd cheers by being funny on promos and/or being totally dominant in the ring.

Here, Flair can get NUCLEAR heat just by not doing a clean break in the corner. Of course it helps that the Von Erich’s matches in the first half of the 1980s had as much crowd heat as just about any matches in the history of wrestling because they were seen as heroes to the local crowd who really looked up to them. Flair manipulates the crowd brilliantly, knowing when to stall, when to slow the pace down, when to kick things into a higher gear and doing it in such a way that makes his opponent look like a star but still make sure everyone knows Flair is the top dog.

The booking of the first fall is absolute GENIUS. Flair doesn’t do a clean beak in the corner, for the second or third time after a few warnings, so the ref gets involved and tries to break things up, so Kerry swings a discus punch aimed at Flair but of course clocks the ref. With the ref down, Kerry gets a sleeperhold on and Flair passes out, but just as another ref is dropping Flair’s arm, the original ref is up and calls for the bell, disqualifying Kerry for the punch. Of course in the second fall this means Kerry starts all pissed off, but that just means Flair is now more desperate, with a harder cheapshot and mercilessly working Kerry’s leg. That’s so great, in the first fall Flair puts Kerry over as the stronger, faster, unstoppable dominant babyface who got shafted by a fuck finish, and in the second fall Kerry is the injured valiant underdog fighting back against Ric Flair aka THE MAN.

Kerry fights back and wins the second fall with THE CLAW~! Of course, while in the claw Flair started bleeding, so now onto the start of the third fall and Flair is bumping all over the place, Kerry looks dominant, and Flair is bleeding buckets and hanging onto the title by the skin of his teeth. The third fall is short, as they both brawl with each other and shove the referee out of the way, so the ref calls for a DQ. That’s just fucking BRILLIANT. After the match, they continue brawling with Kerry on top until Flair bails with the title. Then a whole bunch of people including Fritz Von Erich (promoter of World Class, Kerry’s father and Texas wrestling legend who the local fans see as God) come into the ring to argue the decision.

Kerry looks unbeatable, Flair escapes with the belt, and they have built things perfectly for a rematch. In a cage. With a fellow top babyface as the special referee. Surely Kerry can’t lose there can he? BUYS BUYS BUYS BUYS BUYS. This was fucking perfect pro wrestling that I could watch forever.

Ric Flair v. Harley Race - Mid-Atlantic Championship Wrestling August 31st 1983. This is a fairly famous match, as it ends with the angle that lead to their Starrcade 1983 match that really invented the closed-circuit supercard concept which evolved into the monthly PPVs the business is driven by today. Since the Starrcade match is on Flair’s first DVD set, and Race is one of his most famous opponents, and a guy Flair always puts over as the toughest guy he ever faced, there was always a good chance this would end up on the DVD.

Race is the NWA World Champion here, and has placed a $25,000 bounty against Flair. So you’d expect Race to be the epitome of evil, while Flair comes out in a rage against the machine who is trying to end his career, right? Well, ordinarily yes, but Harley Race was the Triple H of his day. Meaning he was slow and boring, and, even against Ric Flair, far too dominant a heel in his matches. In fact, lots of the things Race does here reminds me of HHH, from the slow pace, to using a backdrop as a transition move to move the match from slow heel domination to a babyface comeback (Race does it via counter to a piledriver while with HHH it’s of course countering the pedigree).

Race also uses the knee in a lot of his attacks, he takes exaggerated but slow bumps on missed moves like HHH used to do back in 2000 at the start of his main event push, and also has the reputation of being a great worker even though to be honest he’s really boring and dull most of the time, but good enough at the basics that he can work a decent match and occasionally come up with something magical. This isn’t one of those times though because this match sucked. And Flair isn’t completely blameless either, he goes in as the babyface challenger against an evil heel that put a bounty on his head and wants to end his career.

You’d assume Flair will be fired up and out for blood. But no, once he finally gets on offense it’s a ten minute (or what felt like ten minutes anyway) armbar. Also, one thing I noticed was that in 1980s you always hear about this incredible crowd heat that never happens today. Here, with the heel World Champion against the local hero babyface God, in the Carolina’s which has always been a hotbed of wrestling, in a hot feud with a bounty on the babbyface’s head, the crowd were fucking SILENT until Flair hit the backdrop on the floor, and even then didn’t really get up for anything.

The ending saw Dick Slater interfere, then Bob Orton make the save only to turn heel and attack Flair with a spike piledriver, collecting the bounty. A bad match, with an important angle. But Flair’s return a month or so later, where he chased the heels away with a baseball bat, ripped off his neckbrace, and stated he was out for blood, which isn’t shown on this DVD but is on his first one, is one of the greatest angles of all time and well worth going out of your way to see.

Ric Flair, Ole Anderson & Arn Anderson v. Dusty Rhodes, Magnum TA & Manny Fernandez - NWA WorldWide Wrestling December 15th 1985. You can’t really have a Flair DVD without a Horsemen tag if you’re going for a wide selection of matches, and this coming against Dusty in his comeback from the heels breaking his leg, and Magnum just after he’d destroyed Tully Blanchard in the I Quit match, is as good a choice as any. Well, it’s as good a choice as any if you’re not going with a War Games match.

I have often said that it’s impossible to have a bad match as a 6 or 8 man tag if you’ve at least got some star power there. This match sees that my theory hasn’t been proved wrong yet. We start with the babyfaces in the ring standing tall, the heels stalling outside, the crowd going apeshit, the announcers Tony Schiavone and David Crockett being as hyper as an 8 year old on a sugar rush, and instantly it’s got my attention.

The Race match is the anomaly; the Kerry match and this match prove it IS true what they used to say about 1980s crowds. It’s so simple as well, nobody really does much of anything besides running the ropes and doing dropdowns and shoulderblocks and basic stuff for the first few minutes, but it’s the babyfaces looking strong, the heels bailing, the crowd going nuts, and it just builds the anticipation for when the match kicks into gear. And the heat is masterfully worked by the Horsemen.

Being a modern fan makes it hard to appreciate Dusty in a way, because to look at him you think he’d never make it today. WWE would tell him to lose weight, the ROH fans would shit all over him because he’s “a bad worker” - but by doing basically nothing here he gets a huge reaction and controls the crowd completely. When he’s strutting around the ring mocking Flair I laugh along at Flair getting upset by it. When he’s hitting everything in sight with the bionic elbow I’m cheering for him to kick ass. When he’s selling I want him to make the comeback.

Despite the look, despite the fact he couldn’t matwrestle for twenty minutes or get dropped on his head a million times a match, there’s just something about Dusty that makes you want to see him win wrestling matches - and isn’t that what this is all about really. It appears like they used commercials to get the heat, a tactic which is still used today a lot, but it’s false heat, as the heels are dominating Magnum, but he makes a comeback, and after Dusty kicks ass for a bit he tags to Fernandez, and it’s he who gets cheapshotted and the heels work him over.

Again, they’re keeping it basic, but it’s all that great shit I love like cheating behind the referee’s back and Flair does this great thing where he just runs over to Dusty to draw him into the ring so the heels can cheat, then as soon as the referee turns back towards the action Flair runs right at Magnum and draws him in so they can cheat some more! So great. Eventually the babyfaces get mad and jump in for a massive brawl, but in the confusion Magnum gets ran into the ringpost by Flair, and Arn nails Manny with a chair so Ole can crawl over for the pin.

Dusty hasn’t seen the chairshot though, and locks Flair in the figure four - a spot that always got a pop but is something that I think Flair did far too often to the point that it looks bad for him. I mean how many people these days give Cena the F-U or HBK the sweet chin music? Anyway, Ole and Arn jumped Dusty, then Flair grabbed a chair and was about to try to re-break Dusty’s leg when Magnum ran in for the save, grabbed the chair, swang but didn’t actually hit anyone (which is exactly how you do an angle like this), and the heels ran for the hills.

That is MONEY and if I was a fan in 1985 watching this live I would’ve emptied my wallet then and there for tickets to a rematch. Great fun match that I’m glad found a place on Flair DVD even though it isn’t a particularly famous match of his, or indeed something that’s well known.

Ric Flair v. Sting - NWA Clash Of The Champions I March 27th 1988. This is a match that definitely deserves inclusion on a Flair DVD. In fact, the decision to go with their vastly inferior and also vastly less historically significant match at Clash 27 in 1994 on the first Flair DVD was head-scratching to say the least.

This is a match that is pointed to by Flair backers as far as why he’s great, and also by Flair bashers as far as why he’s overrated. The idea that Flair could make someone a star is definitely shown here. The idea that he’s a routine man who does the same thing in every match could also be shown here, if you were looking to pick holes in stuff and forget that everybody in wrestling has a routine to some degree.

After watching this, I was in awe of Flair’s performance. He managed to carry the aura of somebody who truly is the best wrestler in the world, while still making his opponent, who in 45 minutes did nothing more athletic than a Stinger Splash and nothing showing greater strength than a suplex, look like he could be a megastar. Early on in the match, Flair is overconfident, WOOO-ing and playing to the crowd during early lockups and armbars, yet pretty soon Sting is able to dropkick Flair to the floor and that sets the stage for Flair’s first flip-out, Jim Ross’ first Oklahoma Sooners reference (hey, some things never change) and already the idea is established that Sting isn’t someone you can take lightly.

They have Horsemen manager JJ Dillon suspended in a cage above the ring, which is something I’ve not seen done in a long while, but I think if WWE put effort into managers getting involved and running interference it’s an idea they could steal. Hell, ROH should steal the idea for Larry Sweeney, him flipping out in a cage unable to help his guys would be greatly entertaining to me, as Dillon showed here, flipping out but being unable to do anything about it, and even allowing Sting to yell and mock him while he was on top a few times. Even the rest hold spots tell part of a greater story, that Sting is this young guy who is stronger than the champion and can dominate him with power and his bearhugs and headlocks were put over as painful vice-like grips that even the World Champion couldn’t escape from.

Even when Flair gets on top it’s from things like cheapshots or Sting missing a Stinger Splash, which shows his inexperience, rather than doing anything to portray Flair as BETTER than Sting. Even when Flair was on top, he wouldn’t even do basic suplexes or other “wrestling moves” - instead choosing closed-fist punches behind the referees back, cheapshots, back rakes, being dominant in the brawling on the floor and then begging off for the comeback - which made me come to the weird realisation that nWo era Hulk Hogan wrestled like Ric Flair. A crippled, broken down, unathletic Ric Flair who didn’t take the bumps, but still like Ric Flair, and isn’t that ironic given the problems they had at that time?

There are times in the match where Sting’s inexperience really shows, both from a storyline perspective where he’ll get too excited and miss a Stinger Splash sending him crashing out to the floor, or make a mistake such as not doing a clean break in the corner allowing Flair to cheapshot him, and also from a real perspective as he hit the most ridiculously bad clothesline I’ve seen in a while at some point, and it’s also really obvious that Flair is carrying him, his bumping is great at making Sting’s moves look good WITHOUT making it look like Flair is pinballing and trying to steal the show and get the attention on himself.

Even when Flair is on top and works the leg over and locks in the figure four it’s to put Sting over, and it’s not the usual reaching the ropes to break the hold either, as here Sting drags himself into the middle of the ring so Flair can’t reach the ropes to use leverage himself, and then beats his chest like a madman and just overpowers Flair. The last seven or eight minutes is total Sting domination as Flair is bumping like a maniac, bleeding, and letting Sting get all the momentum and coming unbelievably close to winning the title, as Flair will escape moves by ducking at the last second, will be hit with moves and kick out or drape a foot over the ropes at literally the last possible nanosecond, and the crowd is whipped up into a frenzy, Jim Ross is screaming at the top of his voice about how Flair’s title is hanging by a thread and Sting is so charismatic while Flair is just a masterful heel that you can’t help but lose yourself in the action, especially the final 45 seconds as Sting hits the Stinger Splash to a gigantic pop and locks on a scorpion deathlock but the time limit runs out.

That’s not the end of it however, as we have three ringside judges (including a woman I don’t recognise who JR essentially called a slut on commentary during the match), and it goes to the scorecards. The woman votes for Flair, one guy votes for Sting and one guy votes a draw, so Flair keeps the belt. I’m so glad that’s an idea that got dropped, but it’s a minor flaw in an otherwise excellent match.

I don’t understand what the people calling this match overrated are watching really, it’s Flair being great at what he does best.

Ric Flair v. Terry Funk - NWA Great American Bash July 23rd 1989. This is Flair’s first match back from the famous angle where Funk attacked him after the final match of the Ricky Steamboat 1989 trilogy. So it’s a chance to see a different side of Ric Flair that you don’t usually see from him.

In his entrance, yes he has the robe and the fireworks and the women, but he’s ranting throughout his entrance, not concerned with looking cool, just being excited to be back and yelling at Funk, and during the match he’s the pissed off angry babyface out for revenge rather than the cool guy who just wants to show how great he is and keep the title. And it’s a role Flair excelled in, especially when against someone like Funk who was really threatening and menacing in a way that you believed he was a crazy old dude trying to break Flair’s neck rather than the parody punch-drunk comedy routine some newer fans might know him as.

This is evident right from the beginning of the match as Funk comes outside and they brawl in the aisle, there’s none of the usual Flair stuff of slowing things down and going for holds, running his hands through his hair, WOOOO-ing and playing to the crowd. Not that I don’t love that stuff from Flair because I do, but here the fact that he did things differently really put across the hatred. They do payback spots to earlier things in the feud such as Flair attacking the neck and even hitting two piledrivers which Funk sells by going into convulsions for the first one and going limp on the second.

They even do payback spots in the match, as Funk gets the heat when Gary Hart distracts the referee to allow Funk to nail Flair with a branding iron.

Flair now bleeds and that just adds more to the danger, and more to the crowd heat (which was incredible throughout).

Funk as a vicious evil heel was so great, but eventually Hart distracts the ref so Funk can use the branding iron again, and Flair instead gets control of the weapon and uses it so now they’re both bleeding for the comeback. A great match ends when they do finisher counters, as Funk goes for the spinning toehold but Flair counters by tripping him and going for the figure four, but Funk counters with a cradle only for Flair to shift his weight on top for the pin.

I seem to be saying this a lot about this DVD set thus far, but it’s a truly great match that I’m glad was included on here. But the great match is only the half of it, as Great Muta comes in after the pinfall and spits Green Mist in Flair’s face - which gave Flair a face that was a mix of red blood and green mist and blonde hair which just looked fantastic, and the heels beat him down until Sting saved, then everybody brawled all over the building, and despite things settling down two or three times they would jump right back into the brawl which set up a tag team electrified cage match on the NWA’s next PPV.

Disc 3 continues with more matches, in what is definitely the inferior half of Flair’s career, starting with his jump to the WWF in 1991.

Ric Flair v. Roddy Piper - WWF Madison Square Garden House Show October 28th 1991. Even though he had two great runs in the WWF/E, ending in his most recent retirement earlier this year, it’s still weird seeing Flair in a WWF ring, like he’s out of his natural environment. And while his cartoonish bumping and over the top personality might on paper seem like it fitted the WWF like a glove, after spending so long as the face of the NWA/WCW, Flair just seems out of place.

Piper was in many ways the perfect opponent for Flair in that he could fire up, Flair could take his trademark bumps, and Piper had the big personality. Piper is an interesting case, because this match shows to me that he wouldn’t get over with today’s crowd.

In 2008, there’s a certain segment of wrestling fans who judge how good a wrestler is by how many moves they know and how flawlessly they are executed. It’s that kind of thinking which has a significant number of people thinking Christopher Daniels is a good wrestler and John Cena isn’t. Wrestling is about emotion and drama, not inch-perfect execution. Roddy Piper shows light on his punches, his clothesline is really slow, his kicks are awful, but oh my god when he fires up you can’t help but want him to kick ass and to me that’s what wrestling is about. And in this match Flair was there to tell that story, he acted cocky, Piper punched, slapped, and kicked him down and the people went crazy.

Having said that, it was an unremarkable match that didn’t showcase the best of either man, and isn’t really worth a re-watch. It’s inclusion probably stems from the fact that Flair is a gigantic Piper mark so they thought they’d get that on there. Well, that, and Flair’s major opponent in his first WWF run was Randy Savage who seems to be persona non grata for these DVD sets.

The best thing about the match is the ref bump believe it or not, which is one of the best I’ve ever seen. The finish sees Flair win when Piper got in a chair tug-of-war with the ref, and Flair cheapshotted him and won with his feet on the ropes, only to be beaten down and sent running away postmatch, which is still a much-used “protect the babyface when he’s jobbing” finish on WWE house shows to this day.

Ric Flair v. Ricky Steamboat - WCW Spring Stampede April 17th 1994. Ahh the classic rivalry. You really can’t have a Flair DVD without a Flair/Steamboat match. This particular match is the “worst” of their well-known matches, but at ****1/4 or so, who’s really complaining.

At this point, WCW were in a holding pattern waiting for Hulk Hogan to come in and turn the company into another version of his fucking cartoon show until the nWo angle kicked off two years later, so to kill time before Hogan debuted in the summer they went with the best in-ring rivalry of all time. Not a bad decision I’m sure you’ll agree.

For all the shit that Tony Schiavone gets as an announcer, usually from people who only watched WCW during the Monday Night War era, here he was fucking fantastic, going through Flair and Steamboat’s history together, and not just the three matches in 1989, but “fighting for the TV title in Mid Atlantic Championship Wrestling back in 1978!” - which really did an excellent job of putting across to the viewer that these two have basically spent an entire generation as natural rivals. Not that the guys couldn’t do that in the ring though, because they absolutely did.

There were an ungodly number of great flashbacks to their past matches, even stuff that Flair didn’t usually pull out for just anyone like when he would SPRINT across the ring to nail Steamboat with a flying bodypress that sent them toppling over the ropes to the floor. Because they have so much history together they can afford to work headlocks and headlock counters for ten minutes and not lose me as a viewer, because you don’t watch it and think “they’re killing time” you watch it as trying to gain an advantage, or even as “that’s Flair/Steamboat doing Flair/Steamboat” but as them working to gain an advantage where they might wear down an opponent enough to win the match.

They do the chop battles you’d expect, both early on, towards the end, and on the outside by the guardrail. Unfortunately unlike Chi-Town Rumble 1989 there’s no Dave Meltzer sat ringside marking out. Flair was a babyface here (although they were about to do a ridiculously rushed heel turn so he could be jobbed out to Hogan when he came into the company) but he still had to play subtle heel, but did it in a way where he appeared (and was put over as) the smart intelligent wrestler, doing things such as non-clean breaks, or positioning Steamboat’s body so the referee couldn’t see him use a closed-fist to the face, or even using the eye poke to break Steamboat’s figure four, which the announcers, both Flair supporter Bobby Heenan and babyface Tony Schiavone put over as a brilliant move, and that since Flair is the master of the figure four it stands to reason he’s also the master of countering it!

This is very slow paced for 1994, hell at times it felt slower than their 50-minute match from 1989 and this one only goes a shade over 30. However everything they do means something, and towards the end the crowd are into the nearfalls, and especially the chop battle. The ending is weird in terms of including it on the DVD, as it’s just a double pin off Steamboat attempting a chickenwing. This lead to the title being held up, and a rematch on WCW Saturday Night that went 45 minutes and was apparently better than this match, although I’ve never seen it. Here’s hoping for the WWE to do a Steamboat DVD at some point in the future.

I think the impact of this match might actually be lessened by having it on the Flair DVD. On this set, it’s another Flair match. At the PPV itself at the time, it was the two best in-ring performers in the company having a classic match in the ring, to main event a PPV for the World Title after they’d had lightweight matches, big-man contests, Regal doing submissions and British matwork, a hardcore brawl that ran all over the building, heel screwjobs, heel screwjobs fucking up to give the babyface a fluke win and more in one of the best PPVs in WCW’s history. And this match, with no gimmicks, no interference, no smoke and mirrors, they kept it in the ring and just wrestled for the title in a beautiful contrast to the rest of that show.

Ric Flair v. Triple H - WWE Taboo Tuesday November 1st 2005. Yes, there’s an 11-year jump in extra matches, but to be honest unless you’re going with a million discs then the time period they missed is always going to be the overlooked part of Flair’s career.

In terms of his in-ring style, for the majority of this most recent WWE run, Flair’s strength was when he could be a crazy old man in hardcore matches, where his shortcuts and cheating and use of weapons could make up for the fact that he was an old man now, and this is probably the greatest example of that, in a steel cage match with HHH only three weeks after Hunter had turned on Flair and given him a huge bloody beating, so here was Flair going for revenge.

This is one of very few instances where HHH’s slow-paced style actively helps the match, as when he’s dominant as he was for the majority of the match, it just lets the punishment sink in, prolongs the agony for the fans, and just has them begging and begging for Flair to make the comeback. In this internet-era where everyone knows everything, it is a testament to how well HHH plays his character that he could be in a feud with Flair, who everyone knows he was a huge fan of and they had a close relationship backstage, and have people totally buy into him being a cold heartless bastard who wanted to end his mentor’s career.

Flair bleeding early on really helped the match, as you’d get the visual effect of HHH destroying this guy and enjoying it. In fact, the only down points in this match are when Hunter uses his Flair worship to rip-off two of Flair’s spots, firstly falling off the cage to crotch himself, and secondly to do the Flair flop. When he’s just being an evil vicious bastard bloodying Flair up and taking him apart, it’s great. When Flair makes the comeback and now Hunter is bleeding all over the place and getting his head bashed into the cage repeatedly and getting his legs taken apart to set up the figure four, it’s great.

Oh, this is also the show where Joey Styles made his debut as a WWE commentator, and I totally see why the WWE so quickly lost faith in him, he was downright awful here and of course they quickly realised that replacing Jim Ross is harder than they thought. Again. Flair of course goes for lowblows a couple of times, and counters a HHH chairshot with the testicular claw followed by three chairshots to the head before stumbling out of the cage for the win.

Ric Flair v. Shawn Michaels - WWE WrestleMania XXIV March 30th 2008. I really hope this actually turns out to be the final match of Flair’s career, because I can’t see how he tops it if he wrestles again, especially if it’s on some no-mark indy or even a major indy like ROH - you aren’t going to get the retirement match of the greatest wrestler of all time, against the best still-living in-ring performer of the current generation happening again.

There have been matches where moves were executed more crisply, or with riskier highspots, or harder-hitting. But there’s very few matches in the history of wrestling that have came close to hooking me on an emotional level as this match did, and to me that’s the sign of a great match. I had been worried going into it, too. While Flair was still arguably the best promo in the business - slapping Shawn’s cowboy hat right off as he flipped out about being called Old Yeller is one of my favourite moments of 2008 thus far - in the ring he was a broken down shell of his former self.

They actually played off that Old Yeller moment early in the match as well, with Flair shoving Shawn and getting slapped in the face and having his lip split for his troubles. They blew a bridge spot, and Shawn injured himself, cracking his ribs on the announce table as he did a moonsault to the floor, but those are minor imperfections, they took the crowd on a great emotional ride that nobody who saw it live that night will ever forget. And while we didn’t get the Ric Flair of 20 years ago, we got the current Ric Flair doing his damndest to be as close to the Ric Flair of 20 years ago as he possibly could because he knew it was his last chance to be The Man one more night.

He even managed to hit a crossbody from the top rope, which as a heel him missing it almost became clichéd, so they can throw it out there as a babyface and when he hits the move it gets a huge reaction, especially under these circumstances. From the mule kick lowblow onwards I watched this match with a huge smile on my face, because I knew Flair was going out on the high that his great career deserved. Michaels was as magnificent as you’d expect him to be, especially in selling how conflicted he was about being the man who would put the final nail in the coffin of Flair’s career, but this was all about Flair being great one last time.

The ending, with Shawn set up for the superkick, Flair dragging himself to his feet in tears and telling Shawn to bring it, while Shawn does the “I’m Sorry. I Love You” moment before hitting the superkick is one of those moments where the WWE get the mix of wrestling and soap opera drama absolutely spot on. It’s the perfect way to end this DVD, and the perfect way to end his career.

Or so I thought, since the first of the Special Features that close out disc 3 is the retirement ceremony from Raw the night after WrestleMania XXIV.

We start with Flair coming out for a goodbye promo, and he’s already in tears. He talks about how it’s a great honour to finish his career by wrestling Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania, and what an amazing 35 year journey he’s had, and how people shouldn’t be sad that he’s retiring, they should rejoice the fact that he’s had the greatest wrestling career in history. Then HHH interrupts, and now Flair is really losing it. He bows down infront of Flair and says he just wants to join the fans to say thank you.

But he’s not the only one - and he flashes the Four Horsemen sign, and the late-90s Horsemen theme kicks in and out comes ARN ANDERSON~! BARRY WINDHAM~! JJ DILLON~! TULLY MOTHERFUCKING BLANCHARD~! They all hug Flair, but while I’m busy marking out for these guys, apparently we’re not done. Out comes Batista, Ricky Steamboat, Harley Race, Greg Valentine, Dean Malenko, Chris Jericho, John Cena, Flair’s wife and children, and finally Shawn Michaels and they all hug Flair too. Jericho and Cena really look out of place in that group, but maybe they were just really close to Flair backstage or something.

Then Hunter just invites anyone else and the entire WWE roster comes down, applauding and chanting “Thank You Ric.” Seeing hated evil heels Edge and Randy Orton look so happy and so tearful as well is quite the contrast and a testament to how good they are that they could go out on TV the next week and be just as over as they were before. This was truly a special moment that was probably the greatest thing I’ve ever seen in wrestling. It may be tarnished right now slightly by the fact that Ric’s relationship with the WWE fell apart so soon afterwards, but it’s still really his farewell from the wrestling business at the highest level, and that’s just great.

And what we get on the DVD that wasn’t shown on RAW at the time is the appearance of The Undertaker, who gets an awesome moment as the superstars form a corridor in the aisle for him to walk up (which again hammers home my point that the regular entrance way shouldn’t be so fucking wide), then hugs Flair, before going down to one knee and giving him the Hand Of Tribute like he used to do with Paul Bearer. We also get the appearance of Vince McMahon, who comes to the ring, raises Flair’s hand and they hug, with Vince having a huge smile on his face, before leaving and letting Flair’s family get back in the ring. Then HE TAKES OFF HIS JACKET AND GIVES IT AN ELBOWDROP AND A KNEEDROP BEFORE DOING THE STRUT~!

OK that definitely makes this the greatest thing I’ve ever seen now. Especially with a whole locker room of guys marking out for it, even Vince.

Flair finally leaves, walking past the entire roster bowing to him, and stopping to shake hands and hug a few of them as he went. That was great.

The DVD ends with a series of promos and vignettes.

The first one sees Flair arrive at an airfield in a limo, about to take his private jet. He says he has a better lifestyle than Joe Montana and Burt Reynolds, because he’s a real man. There are two women there also, and HIS MAN SAM - the limo driver who gives a thumbs up to the camera, then he and the women disappear into the private jet while Gordon Solie states that “despite the economy being in a worldwide recession, The World Heavyweight Champion Ric Flair always travels first class!”

The next one starts with Flair pointing out to a woman in the crowd that he’s not taking his clothes off today because he’s stylin and profiling. He says he’s the man, he’s custom made, he’s the greatest champion of all time, and runs through all the cities he’ll be in the next two weeks where he’ll back up all his words.

The next studio promo sees Flair point out that Magnum TA isn’t ready to wear $500 ties or $1000 shoes or a diamond studded rolex, he’s not ready to be The Man. And also Nikita Koloff better not get in Flair’s face because he’s gonna beat him and make him his gardener at the big house on the big side of town. He also wants all the women to know they don’t have to go to Florida to find Space Mountain, because it’s right here and they can ride Space Mountain all night long. WOOOO!

Next one sees Flair put down Bruce Springsteen because he’s really The Boss, then flash his muscles and talk about how he’s not Dusty Rhodes in blue jeans and a baseball cap, he’s the man and he’s custom made, he’s the World Champion and all the ladies love him.

Next one sees Flair get a gang of girls in the front row to scream “SLICK RIC” before Flair warns Dusty Rhodes to stay out of his business, which would lead to the famous heel turn where Flair and The Andersons broke his leg. Flair talks about the towns he’s going to and how he and the NWA are going to run the show. He runs down Buddy Landell, saying he spent more money in spilled drinks last year than Landell made, and how he’s all man.

The next promo is the only thing repeated in full from Flair’s first DVD, but I’m sure it was an extra on that set so it’s somewhat excusable to make that oversight. It’s the first promo after breaking Dusty’s leg, so Flair says real men don’t cry about their problems, that’s why he’s the World Champion, and his sport coat cost $800 but he doesn’t know what Tony Schiavone’s cost because he’d be ashamed to wear it. He also says he’s the man because he’s got a limousine a mile long outside full of women just dying for him to go WOOOO! and Dusty got what he deserved.

Flair’s next promo is talking about what a great man he is, and how he’ll beat Ronnie Garvin and there’s a great Flair mark in the crowd going along with everything he says, as he runs through the list of names he’s beaten and a guy yells “that’s right Ric” - then Flair yells at the camera man for turning the camera on some fans “when Ric Flair is on TV” and takes a dig at Dusty Rhodes to finish off.

Next up is Flair auditioning for The Space Mountainettes - his own cheerleading squad! He talks about wrestling 30-60 minutes, making $10k a night, then going into his limo and fucking women. He invites Precious out, gives her a mink coat and they leave. WOOOOO!

The final promo sees Flair talk about how everyone’s jealous that he was born with a golden spoon because he’s got money, talent, looks, and everything that everyone hates because he’s the man, and all the fans know he’s the man, which turned into a pro Jim Crockett Promotions interview about how they’re the best company.

Well as much as all those promos were great to watch, and if you’re doing a Ric Flair DVD you have to have a collection of promos there, but it just made me want to watch several dozen more! What a fantastic collection, it should be required viewing for all wrestling fans. The documentary cannot possibly cover everything in Flair’s 35 year career, but it has a good go, and the match selection sees Flair play a variety of different roles from throughout his career so you don’t just get Flair doing the prototype Flair match 15 times.

If you’re in the UK and Europe, you can buy this online today from Silver Vision at this link.

Mark Bright
mark@wwepreview.com