For my money, each episode falls into one of three main categories and my category system is simply based upon how new the story is, or at least what the new twist on the story is (or even if there is one!). Some of the stories have already been told (even as their own individual one-hour documentaries) like “The Rise of the nWo” and “Embracing Attitude” but when they have been transposed here into the Monday Night War series they manage to feel like ‘new’ features. Hell, even The Kliq episode doesn’t feel like the “Kliq Rules” DVD documentary. On the flip side we had episodes like: “The Austin Era” and “The War Gets Electrified” which felt like condensed versions of Steve Austin and The Rock’s own DVD documentaries. I’m still really struggling with the “Monday Night Jericho” episode as well; WHY does Chris Jericho have his own dedicated episode while The Undertaker and Sting (icons of their respective promotions) share an episode.
However, there are some really cool little clips and features on the episodes, particularly a 1998 interview with Ted Turner discussing WCW, WWE and the “war”, the footage of Eric Bischoff’s WWE Tryout from 1990, behind the scenes footage of the DX Invasion, the Nitro press conference and lots of other little pieces of footage throughout the 20 episodes. It is really cool when WWE goes out of their way and includes this rare, never before seen footage.
So, that covers the episodes, now lets move on to the extras and bonus features…
Post Episode Analysis…
The primary extra on these sets (in fact the only extra on the DVD version) is the “Post Episode Analysis” with Sting & Triple H on Vol. 1 and Eric Bischoff on Vol. 2. The “analysis” segments on both Vol. 1 and 2 last around 3 to 5 minutes. While Vol. 1 offers us the views of two individuals – Sting & Triple H (plus we get Renee; you can’t go too wrong with Renee Young on a WWE DVD), the downside is that the limited time doesn’t really allow either party to get too in-depth with their opinions. In fact some of the episodes the analysis doesn’t actually feel like they even really watched the episodes!
Over on Vol. 2 though we have the singular opinions of Eric Bischoff. In contrast here it does indeed feel like “Easy E” took the time to watch the episodes and he does offer some interesting view points on the episodes talking points as well as some other general opinions. It is especially cool to have some up to date Eric Bischoff POVs, because, well, the interview WWE uses on these episodes is almost 15 years old!
It is the case that WWE did indeed film segments for all twenty episodes with Sting and Triple H, however thankfully these were dropped in favor of those with Bischoff for Vol. 2.
In terms of the DVD extras, THAT’S IT! Those “analyses” were the only form of extra that the ‘DVD folk’ were given. Now, let’s move on to the Blu-ray extras…
The Matches…
In all honesty the matches featured on Vol. 1 were a complete and utter waste of 32 minutes. All three of the matches (Bubba vs. Hogan, Rock vs. Mankind and Goldberg vs. Hugh Morris) have been released almost countless times and add very little to the set. Frankly, the only people interested in this release would have seen those matches at least a couple of times previously.
Conversely, Vol. 2 only features the one match. Ironically as well, it isn’t a match from either Nitro or RAW, it’s actually from ECW on TNN! The match features WWE Superstar, Tazz, taking on WCW star, Mike Awesome. For my money this is a really unique match and while we have seen clips of it before, this release here marks the first time it has been released in full on Home Video; because of that, this match is a worthy inclusion as a special feature.
Press Conferences…
The other main feature of the bonus footage on these two sets are the press conferences – in fact across the two releases we have four, which totals just less than 1 hour and 15 minutes of the Blu-ray extras runtime (that’s damn near 57% of the total extras runtime!).
Vol. 1 features the Monday Nitro announcement press conference from the Harley Davidson Café, sadly however the footage is plagued with audio issues, but it is still a really cool piece of wrestling history that we have never seen before.
Vol. 2 is packed with an additional three press conferences, firstly the complete Hulk Hogan contract signing from Disney MGM. To my knowledge this is the very first time this footage has ever been released in full and it is another really cool feature. However, I have my suspicions that those “members of the press” asking questions weren’t 100% legit! Ha.
The other two press conferences again are really neat, the first is from just after WrestleMania XIV with Mike Tyson and Steve Austin (yes, the one which HBK tried to interrupt) and the other was to promote the Bash at the Beach ’98 PPV with Hogan, DDP, Karl Malone and Dennis Rodman.
Other extras…
On top of the matches and press conferences we have a handful of other little extras across the two volumes. These included some unseen clips of the DX/WCW Invasion, a segment from Livewire featuring Paul Heyman and a rather bizarre promo from the nWo 2000 where Scott Steiner proclaims that “WCW Sucks”.
Conclusion…
All in all, even though some of the extras are fun (especially those on Vol. 2), I still can’t give either of these sets my full recommendation. Frankly, those extras while fun I don’t see anyone going back and watching more than once or twice. Even the post episode analysis, while cool, isn’t something that you would go back and re-watch all too often. So, with this in mind I have to say for these sets you should just save your money and get yourself six-months of WWE Network subscriptions.
“The Monday Night War Vol. 1 & 2” DVD/Blu-ray is out NOW in…
I’m sorry but I find the complaints about these sets being released even though they are on the network quite stupid. Just because you are subscribed to the network now doesn’t mean you will be forever so I would rather own a physical copy.
I’ve been watching the Monday Night Wars on the Network. And if I’m honest I’m not sure if the analysis makes the dvds worth while. the episodes repeat segments several times. I’ve learnt that this is one set you SHOULDN’T watch back to back!!
I loved the first disc of Monday Night War: Shots Fired; Volume 1! It was absolutely wicked!
Although Know Your Role; Volume 2 was good also, I didn’t like the fact that there were so many repeat scenes in the episodes shown (from other episodes before & after) 🙁
My favourite episodes on Vol 1;
•War Begins •Embracing Attitude •nWo & •DX
Vol 2; • Monday Night Jericho & • The Kliq
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I’m sorry but I find the complaints about these sets being released even though they are on the network quite stupid. Just because you are subscribed to the network now doesn’t mean you will be forever so I would rather own a physical copy.
I’ve been watching the Monday Night Wars on the Network. And if I’m honest I’m not sure if the analysis makes the dvds worth while. the episodes repeat segments several times. I’ve learnt that this is one set you SHOULDN’T watch back to back!!
Easy pass on the sets since they did not add a bunch of matches
I loved the first disc of Monday Night War: Shots Fired; Volume 1! It was absolutely wicked!
Although Know Your Role; Volume 2 was good also, I didn’t like the fact that there were so many repeat scenes in the episodes shown (from other episodes before & after) 🙁
My favourite episodes on Vol 1;
•War Begins •Embracing Attitude •nWo & •DX
Vol 2; • Monday Night Jericho & • The Kliq