Unsanctioned, Uncut, Unauthorized, Unbelievable, Unsuitable for Human Consumption

If you were a fan of WCW, you had to put up with a lot of hot garbage. Truthfully, in the mid-1990s, if you were a fan of any major promotion in the United States, you had to put up with a lot of hot garbage. But hey, at least it was safe for children to watch. After all, you didn’t have to worry about things such as swearing or blood or other adult-like things that television was increasingly getting filled with. Remember when everyone made a big stink (no pun intended) of Dennis Franz’s naked ass on NYPD Blue? At least in wrestling, you didn’t have to worry about such a thing.

In fact, if you watched WCW, you didn’t have to worry about such a thing…pretty much ever. Because of Turner’s standards and practices, there was no blood, swearing, man-on-woman violence, or other adult-like things to worry about on WCW programming. It was family friendly, by God. (By late 1999, WCW would change their tune pretty much entirely, but that’s a different story.) Well, except for one night a year. That one night: Uncensored.

WCW Uncensored is often said to be a precursor to the WWE PPV Extreme Rules, but a more accurate analogy would be the ECW One Night Stand PPV that WWE put on in 2005 and 2006. It would be the one night of the year that anything goes and every match on the show was deemed unsanctioned by WCW. The following disclaimer ran in the opening moments of the first edition in 1995:

"The program you are about to see is a first in World Championship Wrestling. The following pay-per-view event, Uncensored, has been established due to the many grudges and differences which have developed between wrestlers over the past few months. With this in mind, the WCW Board of Governors has the following statement: Every match at Uncensored will occur without the sanction of the WCW board. The following matches have been agreed upon by all involved and will be held solely to settle any personal disputes. Get ready for a professional wrestling event like none other….it’s now time for WCW…Unauthorized, Unsanctioned and UNCENSORED."

A few things of note: this is pre-Nitro, pre-Cruiserweight division, and just happened to occur on the same week Michael Jordan’s return to basketball after a fifteen-month “retirement” and Mike Tyson being released from jail after spending three years on rape charges. Bobby Heenan lumping this with Vader ending Hulkamania to call it the biggest week in the history of sports is classic Bobby Heenan. It would also be incorrect. I don’t know what the correct answer would be, but if you have an idea, let me know.

The 1995 edition, emanating from the wrestling hotbed that is the Tupelo Coliseum in Tupelo, Mississippi, is one of the worst PPVs of all time. So bad that Dave Meltzer’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter named it the Worst Major Wrestling Show of the Year (the 1996 sequel also took home that “honor”). The show featured just seven matches, but it had quite the variety: a Texas tornado tag match, a “King of the Road” match, a strap match, even a boxer vs. wrestler match.

But how bad can it really be?

KB’s Wrestling Reviews: 

Overall Rating: O. As in oh what do you think I’m going to give this show? This is freaking terrible. The thing is though, the idea actually isn’t that bad: a hardcore PPV. The problem is it was about as thrown together as you could ask for. None of the gimmicks made any sense and the regular matches were boring. Also the main event being non title makes it sound weak. 

Jack Bramma of 411mania in 2012: 

They have a special circle in hell for wrestling shows like this. This thing will suck your soul dry of all the humanity inside you. Please, don't watch this. But if you MUST, you have to be under the same cocktail of influences that the booking committee was at the time. 

Scott Keith: 

The show is brutally bad, but it’s brutally bad in a Vince Russoish car crash sort of way, rather than WCW’s usual brutally boring sort of bad.
 That’s probably about the nicest thing I can think of to say about this show, and as my mother always says, if you can’t say anything nice about a show, don’t say anything at all… 

Good thing I had some cocktails and an energy drink. I’ll probably need it to get through this travesty.