Why the Survivor Series Is Not An Outdated Concept

   For many years, WWE established what became known as 'The Big 4" Pay-Per-Views. Chronologically, those are the Royal Rumble, WrestleMania, SummerSlam, and Survivor Series. From 1993 to 2002, it can be argued that King of the Ring joined the four and it became "The Big 5." In the last few years, with the increasing importance of the Money In the Bank show, many fans believe it has surpassed the Survivor Series and replaced it in "The Big 4."  As much as I love the Survivor Series, I can agree with Money In the Bank becoming more important.  However, I don't think the Survivor Series getting bumped is because it's an outdated concept.  For one, I think it's more about how important Money In the Bank has become since leaving the WrestleMania card to become its own PPV.  In this blog, I am going to get into why I believe Survivor Series has gotten lost in the shuffle.

    The Survivor Series was invented in 1987 for two reasons. The first was because Vince McMahon wanted the WWF to be the leading force in wrestling Pay-Per-Views and actually threatened cable companies airing the NWA's biggest show, Starrcade. That Thanksgiving night, which was the original Survivor Series tradition, the Survivor Series would go head to head with Starrcade.  McMahon stated that if companies aired Starrcade, those companies would not be allowed to air WrestleMania IV a few months later.  Incidentally, WrestleMania IV also competed against the NWA that night against the NWA's Clash of the Champions.  As epic as the tournament for the vacant WWE Title would likely be, the Clash gave it stiff competition, featuring Arn Anderson and Tulley Blanchard against Lex Lugar and Barry Windham for the NWA Tag Team Titles, as well as Sting challenging Ric Flair for the NWA World Heavyweight Title.  Back to Survivor Series, another major reason for the inclusion of Survivor Series was to extend the feud between Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant.  That night, Andre bested Hogan and became the sole survivor of his team in the main event, but not without a valiant losing effort by one of Hogan's partners, Bam Bam Bigelow.

   As the Survivor Series rolled on in the coming years, it did become WWE's second flagship show next to WrestleMania.  In January of 1988, the first Royal Rumble took place but it didn't become an official Pay-Per-View until 1989.  Meanwhile, in August of 1988, WWE presented the newest Pay-Per-View, SummerSlam, which would soon overtake the Survivor Series in the number two spot. However, in 1993, the Royal Rumble then overtook both in the number two spot by adding the stipulation of the winner challenging for the World Heavyweight Title in the main event of WrestleMania.  Even so, the Survivor Series was still an important show for WWE.

    Along with it being a Thanksgiving tradition, the Survivor Series was a fun show that added new elements.  There were team captains, team names, and the different feuds intertwined and made sense, with the partners and opponents alike.  For instance, in 1989, Hulk Hogan captained a team called the Hulkamaniacs, along with Jake "The Snake" Roberts and the Tag Team Champions at the time, Demolition.  Their opponents were the Million Dollar Team, led by the Million Dollar Man himself, Ted DiBiase. Together, he joined forces with Zeus and the Powers of Pain.  Due to the storyline coming from Hogan's movie No Holds Barred, starring alongside Zeus, that was a major feud.  Of course, Hogan had feuded with DiBiase the previous year.  By this point, DiBiase was in a bitter feud with Roberts.  Of course, Demolition and the Powers of Pain were coming to the end of their feud which intensified at the previous year's Survivor Series, with the infamous double turn.  

   The 1991 edition introduced a non-elimination style match for the first time, featuring "The Gravest Challenge" with Hulk Hogan defending the WWF Title against the Undertaker.  In fact, many singles matches became pretty big parts of the Survivor Series in later years.  1994 saw Bret Hart lose the WWF Title to Bob Backlund, 1995 saw Hart regain the Title from Diesel, and of course, 1997 featured Hart against Shawn Michaels in the "Montreal Screwjob."  1992 featured only one elimination match with other matches on the card.  With the exception of 1992, however, the Survivor Series still revolved around the elimination match concept for the most part.  In the later years, WWE started to get away from the concept and would only feature one or two elimination matches.  In fact, 1998 revolved around a tournament for the vacant WWF Title and was the first time that the event had no elimination matches whatsoever.

    For me, the main reason the Survivor Series fell out of prominence is that WWE strayed too far away from the original concept.  It became a regular run of the mill PPV.  No care was given anymore to the Survivor Series.  I don't believe the concept itself is outdated at all.  I can understand eventually breaking away from doing the show on Thanksgiving night.  However, it used to be a big deal.  I can remember all of the names of the teams in the early years of the event, the team captains, and all of the feuds in between.  In the 1990 edition, the Warriors was a featured team, captained by the Ultimate Warrior.  With him were the Legion of Doom, also known as the Road Warriors, and the "Texas Tornado" Kerry Von Erich, who once wrestled under the moniker of "Modern Day Warrior."  Their opponents were the Perfect Team, consisting of team captain Mr. Perfect and all three members of Demoltion.  While I'm on the 1990 Survivor Series, this show was known for three main things.  One was that the main event consisted of Survivors from each earlier match in one ultimate elimination match.  Another highlight was of course, the debut of the Undertaker.  On the opposite end, there was the disappointment known as the Gobbledy Gooker.

   In the later years, the teams were just thrown together haphazardly.  During the first Brand Extension and the current one, there were at least Survivor style matches with a purpose in brand vs. brand warfare.  Unfortunately, to me that is lazy booking without much thought put into it.  It just isn't enough!  When all of the partners and opponents intertwined and made sense, it was great.  The elimination style matches continued feuds, started feuds, and brought about many other entertaining things.  Two years in a row, Bad News Brown walked out on his team.  The end of the 1988 show continued to plant seeds for the eventual downfall of the Mega Powers.  There have been times where an entire team has survived, as well as only one man left, becoming the sole survivor.  That leads me to a quick tangent about a pet peeve of mine.  The term is "sole" survivor, meaning one.  You can't have more than one person referred to as sole survivors.  It annoys me when both the fans and WWE themselves do that.

   Another big part of the Survivor Series, along with the elimination matches, was a big debut for a superstar every once in a while.  I already mentioned the Undertaker's debut in 1990.  We also witnessed the debut of The Rock in 1996 and the debut of Kurt Angle in 1999.  Who could forget the debut of The Shield in 2012?  Other than the Undertaker, the biggest debut that occurred at the Survivor Series was when Sting showed up in 2014, something no one thought they would ever see.  Somewhere along the line, WWE forgot about what made Survivor Series important.  See, it's not an outdated concept at all!  It's just that the attention to and care of the show hasn't been the focus in a long time. There's no reason why the Survivor Series can't still be considered one of "The Big 4."  To play off a certain WWE Hall of Famer, let's make Survivor Series great again!




 If you have any further thoughts on this topic, let me know in comments.  Heck, let us all know on The WAR Report podcast, every Tuesday at 7PM EST on YouTube, brought to you by tagmeadate.com, the first and only dating site for wrestling fans.  Go to askthewarreport@gmail.com or #askthewarreport.  For TagMeADate members, our Android and Apple apps are vastly approaching so stay tuned!
https://tagmeadate.com/