EP.4 - Hart vs Hart: “The King of Harts”

EPISODE 4: Hart vs Hart This week on Feud Rewind, we dive into the early 90s rivalry between two brothers from one of wrestling's most exemplary families. From Royal Rumble, thru Wrestlemania, and finally ending in a Steel Cage Match at Summerslam, Bret Hart and Owen Hart put on a 5 star classic in both the ring, and in our hearts.

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Transcript

ep-4-hart-vs-hart-the-king-of-harts
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Benza Lance: [00:00:00] Hey, this is Ben with Feud Rewind, with a quick word from our first unofficial sponsor. Water. You need some. I need some. We all need some. We're made of it. Guess what? It comes in a bunch of different varieties. Hot, cold, frozen. You can get it flavored, you can get it plain. With bubbles, no bubbles, out of your tap, out of a bottle, out of a box.

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August 29th, 1994. The WWF is holding their SummerSlam pay per view event at the newly opened United Center in Chicago, Illinois. The main event features two [00:01:00] brothers who are quite literally pulling each other by the hair in a steel cage match. Brett and Owen Hart are going at each other, fist to fist, brother to brother.

How exactly did we get here? Yep, you guessed it. We got to roll this back with a rewind.

So as we begin this feud, we have to wind that clock back and we're going back initially to 1993. Brett Hart is literally the top [00:02:00] wrestler on the planet at this time. He is a technical specialist. As Gorilla Monsoon coined him, he is the excellence of execution. The best there is, the best there was, the best there ever will be.

And, this was playing out on my TV as a kid. I, for one, was a big Hart family fan. In general, Brett will always hold a piece of my heart. My wrestling heart, no pun intended, just because he was so good. And as a kid, he did strike a little bit of terror in me. Bret Hart was one of those wrestlers in a very old school type of fashion that paid his dues.

Of course he comes from. [00:03:00] The famous Hart family out of Calgary, Canada. He wrestled and was trained by his father, Stu Hart and wrestled for his own promotion, Stu's own promotion, Stampede Wrestling in the eighties. Brett, furthermore. He paid his dues and rose up the ranks. He was never a strong character guy, so to speak.

His promos, especially early on in his career, even he would admit, were not his strong suit. I never Thought that Brett's promos were necessarily the greatest, but for someone who's nickname is The Hitman, for someone who's entire persona is that he's gonna go in there and take care of business with almost assassin like [00:04:00] precision, doesn't really need to say much to, you know, Get those points across.

By 1993, Brett has climbed the mountain for, you know, so to speak. He has been the champion and at this point he's feuding with Of all people, Jerry, the King Lawler, love you, King. They're feuding over who is the undisputed King of wrestling and to sort of help build this little feud along. Owen Hart's brought in Brett's younger brother.

Speaking of my fond remembrance of the Harts and them being one of my favorite wrestling families, Owen, to me, was the pinnacle. Brett was always the greatest [00:05:00] tactician. His moves always looked crisp. They always looked real. Owen had this, at least to me, he exuded this sense of Wild feralness there is a little bit of out of control To the way he ran the ropes his nickname was the rocket because he was just so damn quick At the same time it was almost like he was harnessing an animal maybe an animal with a Inside himself, but Owen was always my favorite.

In addition, he was also a little bit smaller. Brett was six ish feet, maybe a little taller, [00:06:00] 230, 235. Owen was Billed as more my, well, height in that 5'10ish range, he was more muscular than I am. I would love to be in as good a shape as any one of the Harts to be honest with you, but I digress. So Owen was pulled into this feud with Jerry Lawler and actually computed in Lawler's own USWA promotion based out of Memphis.

And won the U S W a unified world heavyweight title from Papa Shango. Of course, they didn't really bring this into our WWF TV and I didn't find this out until. Later, because I grew up on the West Coast, we don't really get Memphis wrestling on the West Coast, especially in the early 90s. At Survivor Series 1993 is really where [00:07:00] the Lawler and Bret Hart story was all supposed to pull together.

Unfortunately, Jerry wasn't cleared to wrestle, so they sort of swerved to Sean instead. What the showoff we would see would be, would be Team Hart, which would be Brett, Owen, and their brothers, Bruce and Keith, facing off against Shawn Michael and his knights, like royal knights. The Black Knight, the Blue Knight, and the Red Knight.

The big sticking point about this match is Owen sort of gets eliminated because of Brett, but not really. So what happens is, Brent's on the apron, feigning an injury, Owen gets thrown into the ropes, Brent gets knocked down, while Owen is standing there concerned for his brother, Sean rolls him up, and Owen is eliminated.

The sticking point [00:08:00] is Owen is the only one on the Hart family team who is eliminated in this match. While up to this point, Owen had eliminated two of the Knights, Brett had eliminated one, and Team Hart would ultimately go on to win this match. Afterwards, Owen would berate Brett in front of his family and in front of everybody, and the Harts would sort of take the holidays off under the guise of trying to rebuild the family relationship.

And if any of you listening have family, especially siblings, and not to single them out, but just because I come from a family of All brothers, especially if you have brothers, it can be a pain in the ass sometimes, so I [00:09:00] can totally get taken some time off, uh, especially during what is for most people an ority.

Hectic and stressful holiday season to recoup, regroup, and come back anew in the new year.

To sort of patch things over with Owen, Brett is able to schedule a tag team championship title shot for the two of them at the Royal Rumble in 1994 against the Quebeckers. For those of you under a certain age that don't remember the Quebeckers, I fondly remember them. I thought the Quebeckers were quite fun.

And for just a little bit of trivia, the Quebeckers are made up of Quebecer Jacques, who I remember as the Mountie, like the Mountie was sick. He was a Canadian Mountie. Like [00:10:00] you can't hate that unless you hate Canadians. And if you hate Canadians, you're sort of an asshole. The other Quebecer was Quebecer Pierre, who most of you probably know as PCO currently in TNA.

Um, PCO is fun, but I digress. Going back to the Royal Rumble, this match does not really go to Brett's plan. Um, Brett sustains an injury to his knee in kayfabe. Uh, the Quebecers work this over like you should, like I would. And the ref actually calls the match because Brett is so jacked up that he can't make the tag.

Obviously, this doesn't please Owen, and Owen just goes off, and his top blows, and Owen attacks [00:11:00] Brett. As someone with brothers, I can totally relate being frustrated and just wanting to pummel your sibling. I mean, I think we've all been there. At least anyone who grew up in the 80s has, was there. After this match, Owen is interviewed and he simply says he's tired with being held down by Brett.

And honestly, it felt so good to breathe his brother up. I'm chuckling, but obviously it's, this is not funny and the crowd doesn't think it's funny either. And Owen rightfully turns heel. Brett later on, And the evening does win the Royal Rumble, sort of. If you remember, this is the rumble where him and Luger are eliminated simultaneously, so they're credited as co champion.

You could [00:12:00] say that the knee injury from earlier on in the night sort of put a wrench into Brett's plan and maybe Inhibited him from being able to win the Royal Rumble. But, really, all this is used for is to not only keep Brett in that main event spotlight where he rightfully should be, but also add fuel to the fire of why Owen feels sort of like he's left out.

This is where the pieces of the puzzle sort of start to come together. Owen is the younger brother. He didn't have the same type of pedigree that Brett did, or at least appeared pedigree. Owen was a different style of wrestler that was trained to be a similar style of wrestler. He [00:13:00] did extensively travel in New Japan.

As did most wrestlers back in this time, really, before Vince and the other promotion started to keep their talent controlled with more of a iron fist. But Owen wasn't ever thought of unjustifiably. So in the same, on the same level, of As Brett, Brett was always viewed when he got to the S tier level as being S tier.

Maybe I'm too young because I was 9, 10 when this feud was happening in real life. And it's sorta hard to gauge just watching these shows back. In a vacuum, [00:14:00] and not really having anyone immediately close to me to ask if they were watching it how they felt about Owen at the time. But I never felt like he got his flowers during his competing days.

I felt like maybe he was on the verge of getting there. I felt like he should have been there. He felt like he should have been there, which is where all this rage and resentment Petty behavior is coming in. Brett, always coming off as the consummate family man. Of course he doesn't want to fight his brother.

He doesn't want to fight anybody that's in his family. He loves his family. So, now [00:15:00] you have the unwilling participant who is sort of being presented as the paragon of virtue and good against his sniveling little brother who is stomping his feet and just wants his 15 minutes.

Well, this isn't We aren't gonna have to wait too long To see it pay off for this because at WrestleMania 10 We are getting Owen and Bret

At WrestleMania 10 Bret and Owen are going to go on Second they're gonna put on a 20 minute match that I would consider pretty damn good, I think it's Probably close to impossible for at this point in the early to mid 90s For either Owen or Bret Hart, let alone both of these men together, [00:16:00] to put on anything less than a fucking great match, and I think at the very least, it is a very good match.

Good match. And Owen pins Brett clean. Honestly, a little surprising. Typically you don't see the quote unquote heel slash bad guy get to a victory this early on in the story, but we would see later on in the evening that once again, the sweet, sweet aroma and effervescence. of being on the winning side of the scorecard only lasts for so long, as Brett is gonna defeat Yokozuna to win the heavyweight title, while Owen is watching mouth agape and seething in anger and childhood rage [00:17:00] ringside.

So beautiful and That little moment of the give and take, and especially adding in the sibling component of, well, if I can't have this, then he can't either, or if I'm not happy, he's not happy, or any of that dumb childhood stuff that I just tried to act out for you and completely embarrass myself. And with that being said Calendar wise on our feud schedule The next on our list is the 1994 King of the Ring Which is going to take place in June Now if you're unfamiliar with the King of the Ring, it's a Pissing contest is all it is [00:18:00] actually to not to take the Piss out of the situation But what it is, is a tournament to sorta determine who the quote unquote king of the ring is.

is. However, the top wrestler at the time who may or may not be the champion, and typically it's not the champion who is the king of the ring. It's a tournament style held over, eh, three to four weeks leading up to the pay per view. And then on the pay per view, at least at this time, you wrestle a couple of times throughout the night.

If you win and keep on advancing in the tournament, which Owen did, Owen plowed through Tataka, the one, two, three kid, and then finally faced off with Razor Ramon and defeated him. Owen was crowned the [00:19:00] 1994 King of the Ring. He adopted the moniker, the King of Hearts, and used his coronation speech to disparage Brett, and to really talk shit about his older brother, and add fuel to the fire.

The King is to be from this day forward, known as King of Hearts! The King of Hearts! And I want you people

to remember it, with respect.

Hey there, this is Benzo with Feud Rewind coming at you with a quick word from our second unofficial sponsor, The Sun. That's right, summertime is here and the living, if you're living is like mine, is extremely difficult. But what's not [00:20:00] difficult is popping in your earbuds, putting on those headphones, listening Using a little Bluetooth speaker and going on to the sun while you're listening to this podcast, you and me, let's go get some vitamin D while we enjoy the sun.

Thank you, son. Now back to the show.

Now the king of the ring wasn't necessarily. guaranteed a title shot why at the same King of the Ring pay per view Brett had successfully defended his title against Diesel. However, Brett was in that S tier that we were talking about and the [00:21:00] current King of Hearts in the former Rocket, well Whether the office wanted it or not, he had a rocket strapped to his back due to just how much the fans hated him and wanted his older brother to give him a little bit of a spanking in the ring.

So, we're gonna see this pay off at SummerSlam 94. This is the steel cage match between Brett and Owen. Yes, that steel cage match. Once again, for those of you of a certain age who don't remember the old school blue steel cage that WWE used to run. You need to go check this out. It's not the same steel cage that came before or after it.

This isn't Chain Link. This is big, square bars, welded [00:22:00] together, painted blue. They initially did it for WrestleMania 2, when Hogan and King Kong Bundy were going to face off. They had to reinforce the structure somehow. And also make it easy for cameras and the in house spectators to see through the structure and actually see the people on the inside.

Whether or not that actually achieved its intended purpose of making things more visible was debatable at best. However, the blue steel cage became iconic for this 15 year ish stretch of its existence. It did lead a short Lifespan near the end of its run as the spray painted black steel cage. But most of us [00:23:00] eighties and nineties babies fondly remember the blue steel cage.

If you have not seen the summer slam Brett and Owen Hart steel cage match. If you're take Meltzer's star ratings with any type of credence, he gave this a very, very solid five out of five. I personally would give this a 1000 out of 10. Just in my opinion,

the 1994 Summer Slam Heart vs. Heart Steel Cage Match is the peak, the apex of what a Steel Cage Match should be. For just over 32 minutes, these brothers literally traded blows. Pulled each other by the hair, by the arm, by the finger, by the leg. By unmentionables, probably, because they're brothers fighting.[00:24:00] 

And to a degree, this was for the title, but it was more than just for the title, right? This is the younger brother, Trying to get one over his older brother. He's trying to get a little bit of respect, he being Owen, from his older brother Brett. He's just trying to be viewed as an equal and not as a little kid.

Brett is just trying to keep his family together. He doesn't want to fight his brother. Never has, never did, never will. However, speaking as an older brother, if you have to make an example out of somebody, you gotta make an example out of somebody. With that being said, [00:25:00] Brett does a very, very good job of selling the fact that he doesn't want to do this.

Damage to his brother. He's actively holding back. He would much rather just escape without causing any type of unnecessary collateral damage and Brett does when to retain the crazy part about SummerSlam and this in particular was that was even the main event If you remember 94 Summer Slam, this was the Undertaker vs.

Fake Undertaker. That was the main event. It lasted less than 9 minutes. Why would you put a match after the Heart vs. Heart Steel Ugh. I'm not saying I Should be the one holding the pencil in situations like [00:26:00] this. But, god damn, especially since it's for the fucking title too. God damn vents. So Summer Slam is the, what I would consider the true crescendo of this feud.

It's not really gonna get any better than a Steel Cage match. With the Blue Steel Cage, and Bret and Owen Hart. However, we do have a couple addendums, so to speak. We're talking about sibling rivalry stuff, and if you have siblings, I mean, it gets messy. It is sort of poetic that, considering the feud starts to bubble around the previous year's Survivor series, that the last sort of Knife in the back, so to speak, from Owen to Brett.

Happens at the 1994 [00:27:00] Survivor Series. Brett is facing Bob Backlund in a submission match. The stipulation for Brett's WWF Championship match with Bob Backlund at Survivor Series was the managers of either men would have to throw in the towel of whoever the manager was representing in this submission match.

Davey Boy Smith would be Representing Hart while Owen Hart would be backing Bob Backlund because why wouldn't he? If he can't have that title, he being Owen, then Brett shouldn't have it either. Sibling stuff. I totally get it. Some point during the match, Davey Boy gets knocked out. Bret Hart is put in Backlund's cross faced chicken wing and Owen persuades his mother Helen to throw in the towel for [00:28:00] Bret, giving Backlund the victory.

Brett will go to feud with Backland into 1995. And while this doesn't put a bow on Owen's feud with Brett, it does add a nice little sibling rivalry wrinkle. Going into the year of 1995, Diesel wins the championship from Backland and challenges Diesel to a match for the championship at the 1995 Royal Rumble.

In the match, Owen does interfere, which once again costs Brett the match. Brett and Owen will have a match a few weeks later. Well, when to sort of in their feud, it's a little bit of a [00:29:00] moment, but as we know, Brett is once again on to the main event scene and we'll keep on circling the WWF world heavyweight championship.

Oh, in, in my opinion. Should have been right there with him. Maybe not necessarily feuding with him. Although, with the Hart family history, there would definitely be some meat still on that bone for them to chew on.

When a sibling rivalry ends up boiling over into the public space. Whether that public space is the grocery store, Or, Or, A restaurant that your family is out eating at. Maybe your brother's little league games. Or, in certain circumstances for certain people. The [00:30:00] wrestling ring inside of Madison Square Garden.

These are classic tropes that are timeless and universal and they always make for a great story.

That's it for me this week at the Feud Rewind. Once again, much love to everybody in the heart family. Thank you very much. Thank you for everybody listening this week. I do greatly appreciate it. If you have any feedback, suggestions, criticisms, hate mails, dog photos. You can shoot me an email at feudrewind at gmail.

com. You can hit me up on all those social media platforms at feudrewind. I'm your host Benzelance. Thank you so so much for listening. I want you to have a good [00:31:00] week and I will see you next time on the Feud Rewind. Thank you.