Summerslam

The best thing one can say about Summerslam 1996 is that the overall card is pretty balanced. No gaping holes or absolutely atrocious pairings. Unfortunately, none of those matchups really generate all that much excitement.

A few examples:

-Owen Hart vs. Savio Vega is a pretty good technical match, but really no heat behind either figure. -Sycho Sid vs. Bulldog suffers from the same malady, with both guys being on the way out rather than up. -Goldust losing his luster a bit against Marc Mero. How many times can the enigmatic figure be cast as the "weird fella" that the macho guys beat up on? -Lawler vs. Roberts is a little sad, with Jake clearly past his prime and Lawler's mic skills having to carry the whole encounter.

Mankind vs. Undertaker in the "boiler room brawl" is inventive, but I'll argue these two are much better when allowed to create havoc in the ring with their risk-taking ways. Confining them to an enclosed space didn't really seem to work out all that well.

The Michaels/Vader finale is probably a better match than it gets credit for, but Michaels is a better "challenger than champion", if you will, and really is only covering for Bret Hart's absence at this point. Vader is an odd duck who never got the push with WWE that he did with WCW. So no really excitement behind this pairing despite a match that is decently watchable.

Overall, then, the theme of SS '96 is decent pairings of talent with little reason or excitement behind them. This is a general improvement for the WWE compared to previous years, but doesn't make this specific card any more exciting, either.