Above you can watch the official trailer for the Backlash DVD and below, with thanks to WDN reader @JordanDVDWWE, we can get eyes on the finished product with some first look photos.
WWE’s latest Pay-Per-View DVD offering once again includes a free Topps trading card in the U.S and Canada, this time featuring Drew McIntyre. For a lucky few, there are “Autograph Issue” variants of the card up for grabs which are signed by the WWE Champ himself!
Fans in the UK will be treated to Backlash in just two weeks, and Australian fans this time next month.
BACKLASH 2020
To be part of a match that lives forever is an accolade that many WWE Superstars have tried to attain, but few have ever achieved. Now at Backlash, Edge and Randy Orton put on a match no one will ever forget in The Greatest Wrestling Match Ever.
Three’s a crowd, but not for the WWE Women’s Tag Team Champions as Sasha Banks and Bayley put their titles on the line in a Triple Threat Match against The IIconics and Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross. Two of WWE’s most physically dominant athletes collide when Drew McIntyre defends Claymore Country and the WWE Championship against “The All Mighty” Bobby Lashley.
The Irresistible Force meets The Empress of Tomorrow as Nia Jax looks to take the RAW Women’s Championship away from Asuka! Braun Strowman finds himself in a Handicap Match against The Miz and John Morrison with the Universal Championship up for grabs.
Plus, more! Get ready to feel the wrath at Backlash!
SPECIAL FEATURE
— United States Championship Match
Apollo Crews vs. Andrade (Backlash Kickoff Show)
There’s another case of editing on the 1991 Royal Rumble event,if you watch the network version,the Koko B Ware-Mountie match was clearly edited into the version for the network, because the video version that was released never included the match, throughout the event,Piper and Monsoon’s mentions of WWF are unedited,but when you come to the Koko-Mountie match,when Piper mentions Slaughter’s win,WWF gets muted,so they’ve inserted the match from the Anthology version.
I might be alone here but when I watch these current WWE pay-per-views I actually feel bad for the company in the way of how much the product has suffered because of lack of an audience. It really takes the fun out of watching the events and in general they just seem somewhat odd. I guess if I were WWE, I would probably still produce weekly TV shows, but the pay-per-views just seem very strange. I understand the product has been going downhill for a very long time but a lack of audience as well as no ticket sales certainly does not help.
The irony of it all is even with no ticket sales, let’s say WWE doesn’t sell one single ticket for the rest of the year, 2020 will still go down as the most profitable year in WWE history. All because of the new multi-billion dollar TV deal with USA and FOX that went into effect this year. Which is why, when they cut a bunch of wrestlers in the middle of a pandemic, it was a bunch of BS because the company is going to have it’s biggest financial year ever, and those cuts they made were a drop in the bucket compared to what they’re making.
I’ll admit I am quite out of touch with the current product besides reading results and watching occasional videos online, which is why I had no idea that the current TV deal even existed. I was surprised to see some of those cuts, especially Rusev and Drew Gulak.
Besides the cuts and finances, my sympathy for the company is not necessarily coming from a financial issue, but more that the product in general is a sad one. Having wrestling matches and events in an empty performance center just seems odd and silly. I’ll admit I’m unsure what the approach is from other companies like ROH or Impact, and I know WWE is this train that does not stop chugging along, but I would discontinue the PPVs as it seems no fans are going to be in attendance anytime soon. Seems like kind of a waste.
They still run PPVs because they have a Network to sell. And the biggest draw every month is still the monthly PPVs. If they stopped doing new PPVs then subscriptions would drop big time.
I suggest, one buys DVD’s while they still are avaliable..and if one wants the content not to be altered, deleted or edited by WWE..which they appearently like to do a lot with their own content on the Network.
Why do I mention that? Well, the latest is that WrestleMania 2000/16 has for the third time been altered in runtime within the past year: Going from 03.21.23 hours.. up to 03.21.35 hours.. And now: 03.18.24 hours..the latest cut is a complete omitting of Ice-T’s entrance with the Godfather, D-lo and the lovely train og you know who!
Fron JR and King’s introduction it just gets right in the ring where Godfather is doing his thing on the microphone..problaly edited too..
Don’t know, if it has something to do with Ice-T, but more likely I guess it is these days political and cultural winds blowing that perhaps cause WWE to suddenly delete one of the most provoking yet cool over the top entrances.
Its all about charachters and acting..taking it too seriously, is a huge mistake imo. The 9.99’er is a great way to access the phantastic library of wrestling content..just don’t fall in the trap of the McMahon’s, when they proclaimed back in 2014, that: “..everything is Uncut and Unedited on the Network”!
So make sure..if you unlike me..liked this event and get it on DVD..before WWE deletes their own trademark for the Orton/Edge match and stops calling it the greatest wrestling match ever..or anything else they might find not suitable to show you, for what ever ridilicous reason. (although, that trademark is worth erasing) -lol-
“Don’t know, if it has something to do with Ice-T, but more likely I guess it is these days political and cultural winds blowing that perhaps cause WWE to suddenly delete one of the most provoking yet cool over the top entrances.”
I’d be minded to think it’s an Ice-T issue. He probably had an agreement that they could only make money from that footage involving him for X amount of years, kinda of like the way it is with some of the music licensing etc. Streaming is often different to selling physical media in that regard.
I mean it’s hardly a huge loss, is it? I forgot he was even there.
One of the most influencal persons in hip hop and pimping culture, how can you forget him!? And that entrance..is problaly one of the 3 only things at that show, that really is memorable..obvious along with the Triangle ladder match and the Angle-Benoit-Jericho match. Kat’s and Mae’s wardrobe scene too maybe, but that’s just me perhaps. -lol- Hell of lot more entertaining than today’s product, even if it’s trashy like hell. 😉
It’s almost definitely a licensing issue. If they were going to pull things for “political” reasons as the paranoid user you responded to suggested, there’d be a lot of things removed from the network long before they got to an Ice-T entrance on an incredibly mediocre Wrestlemania.
I echo your sentiments. As much as I love the network, the retroactive editing is really frustrating. The removal of not just this Godfather entrance, but many others can occur at an instance. Rick Rude’s WWF theme is an example of this, where it is used for years and years, even in the early years of the network and then overnight, it is gone and replaced with a horrible knock off. I doubt this Godfather Ice T issue is licencing related or it would have been removed long ago. We will never truly know because they don’t tell us why any of these edits are made.
It does make me wonder if this could have anything to do with Fremantle not re-releasing WrestleMania 16 a few months ago along with 15, 17, 18 & 19 here in the UK. I know at the time the reason given was they wanted to get the Austin Rock trilogy & Rock Hogan out there, but 16’s omission always seemed odd.
Leez: My main issue is that when they launched the Network in February 2014 they promoted it highly as the place where you will get every ppv’s uncut and unedited.. That is simply put not true..but we all know about McMahonism regarding perception of truths.. WM 2000/16 is in its original DVD and the Tagged Classics DVD edition has a runtime of H 03.M 28.S 40. That’s more than 10 minutes content missing on the stream edition.. I really would not call that Uncut and Unedited, like the Billionair Princess said at launch day back in 2014. -lol-
Over all, of the 388 ppv/tv-events that I own on DVD and/or Bluray, 265 have a longer runtime on DVD/Bluray than on the Network, while 113 is running longer on the Network verions. And the comparing I have done is from excact same starting point of the ppv’s/events. The different runtimes are in range from a few seconds to some being more than 15 minutes missing content. I think that speaks volumes of how important it is, NOT to get rid of the physical collection.
But.. I admit..I’m a sucker for the little fine details.. many times for me at least, they can make a good show better, or even perfect. 😉
Once again, I could not agree with you more. I have continued my physical DVD collection as well for this very reason. The fine details are very important in the enjoyment factor of a show. I am glad it is not just me.
If you wanna be technical, Mania 2000 was actually just under 4 hours. The live PPV version ran about 3 hours and 55 minutes. Right after the main event they cut backstage where they did a bunch of post match interviews, including one with Vince where he said he owes nobody an explanation for why he turned on The Rock. After the post match interviews they then played the highlight music video that they did for most Manias back then. So even the DVD releases don’t include the full uncut show. There’s about a half hour missing.
LP1: Was’nt aware of that original runtime for WM 2000.. still.. does not change the fact, that WWE alter runtimes and content on the Network.. while they on the other hand made people buy into that it will all be Uncut and Unedited when they launched it..
It is a very terrible cut to the ring with the Godfather in WM 2000, so not only are they omitting content, but the edit is more horrified terrible than this years Extreme Rules subtheme and promotion posters for it are!
Same goes for the fitting theme music for Rude that Leezoo pointed out, which suddenly has been changed to some crap..If I recall, it is an original WWE-produced piece of music..but, maybe Vince has beef with former many years employeer Jim Johnston after he was let go few years ago.
Rude’s theme is a licensing issue. Yeah it sucks, but editing old theme music is an unfortunate part of the process when it comes to WWE. Look at ECW, pretty much every theme is dubbed over. Has nothing to do with Jim Johnston. If Vince was just trying to get back at Johnston then they’d have to cut the themes of about 90% of the wrestlers between 1985 and 2012, which they haven’t done.
Music rights is a big issue. There have been plenty of old TV shows from back in the day that had to edit out certain songs when they released them on DVD, BD and streaming. WKRP In Cincinnati is probably the biggest victim of this as that show played nothing but pop chart music from 70s/early 80s. And that DVD release was butchered. When it comes to The Godfather’s entrance at Mania 2000, they had 2 choices, either cut the entrance out completely or dub it over with a generic song and show Ice T’s lips moving, but not be a able to hear what he’s saying, which would look ridiculous.
Before the Network was launched, the biggest issue they faced was having to blur out all the WWF logos and bleep out every time somebody spoke the WWF letters. They finally worked out a deal with the Wildlife Fund to allow WWE to not have to censor and edit the old logos and WWF letters anymore. That’s what they meant when they said unedited and uncensored. Also they meant no editing of language during the attitude era, which is pretty much untouched for the most part. There’s nothing they can do about music, short of spending a small fortune to have every last piece of music available.
Interesting…didn’t know the runtime of the actual WM2000 PPV was almost 4 hours. I remember I taped it live back in the day and i think it was about 3.5 hrs and once it was over I stopped recording so missed on the post match interviews. I even taped the WM All Day Long special – i had to use like 2 tapes for that plus another for WM. Great times!
You’re right, the DVD releases were never uncut either and most obvious cuts are the promotional/sponsorship ads, botches, etc. but close enough to the original airings where it doesn’t ruin the enjoyment.
One event that I would prefer having the live airing is ECW One Night Stand 2005 as the DVD version is heavily edited, the obvious being themes as that was probably the best part like Sandman for example and I read WWE toned down on the crowd reactions as well. Thats why its a bit difficult to get into ECW on the Network so I’m glad I actually kept my original ECW DVDs I got from various traders over the years. I don’t want to support the pedophile Rob Feinstein who has almost every ECW event and television unedited on his website but the quality is crap from what I read, most are like 3rd or 4th generation masters and you get much better quality from other traders which is what I did.
If you look at all of the advertisements for Mania 2000, it mentions the All Day Long PPV pre-show as airing from 12pm ET to 8pm ET and then the Mania PPV itself as airing from 8pm ET to Midnight ET. Like I mentioned, Mania itself ran about 3 hours and 55 minutes roughly. They did a bunch of interviews. One with Vince that I remember for sure and I know they did an interview with Edge & Christian which teased the beginning of their heel run. Michael Cole also interviewed Hardcore Holly about not winning the Hardcore Title fairly and Holly cursed at Cole. Can’t remember what exactly he said, but they immediately cut back to JR and King at ringside and JR said “We apologize for that.” I don’t remember off the top of my head who the other interviews were with.
As for the old ECW videos, I agree with you about RF. Go to HighSpots instead. They also have every ECW show on DVD uncut with the original music, just like RF does.
This site is acting weird. Every time I tried to reply to David, it didn’t go through, it said “502 Bad Gateway”. I did it 3 times and now all 3 posts show up afterward. If an admin can delete the first 2 posts and keep the most recent one(I remembered another interview), that would be great.
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There’s another case of editing on the 1991 Royal Rumble event,if you watch the network version,the Koko B Ware-Mountie match was clearly edited into the version for the network, because the video version that was released never included the match, throughout the event,Piper and Monsoon’s mentions of WWF are unedited,but when you come to the Koko-Mountie match,when Piper mentions Slaughter’s win,WWF gets muted,so they’ve inserted the match from the Anthology version.
I might be alone here but when I watch these current WWE pay-per-views I actually feel bad for the company in the way of how much the product has suffered because of lack of an audience. It really takes the fun out of watching the events and in general they just seem somewhat odd. I guess if I were WWE, I would probably still produce weekly TV shows, but the pay-per-views just seem very strange. I understand the product has been going downhill for a very long time but a lack of audience as well as no ticket sales certainly does not help.
The irony of it all is even with no ticket sales, let’s say WWE doesn’t sell one single ticket for the rest of the year, 2020 will still go down as the most profitable year in WWE history. All because of the new multi-billion dollar TV deal with USA and FOX that went into effect this year. Which is why, when they cut a bunch of wrestlers in the middle of a pandemic, it was a bunch of BS because the company is going to have it’s biggest financial year ever, and those cuts they made were a drop in the bucket compared to what they’re making.
I’ll admit I am quite out of touch with the current product besides reading results and watching occasional videos online, which is why I had no idea that the current TV deal even existed. I was surprised to see some of those cuts, especially Rusev and Drew Gulak.
Besides the cuts and finances, my sympathy for the company is not necessarily coming from a financial issue, but more that the product in general is a sad one. Having wrestling matches and events in an empty performance center just seems odd and silly. I’ll admit I’m unsure what the approach is from other companies like ROH or Impact, and I know WWE is this train that does not stop chugging along, but I would discontinue the PPVs as it seems no fans are going to be in attendance anytime soon. Seems like kind of a waste.
Drew Gulak is still with WWE, he re-signed with them shortly after his contract ran out.
My mistake… I thought he was one of the ones that got cut.
They still run PPVs because they have a Network to sell. And the biggest draw every month is still the monthly PPVs. If they stopped doing new PPVs then subscriptions would drop big time.
I suggest, one buys DVD’s while they still are avaliable..and if one wants the content not to be altered, deleted or edited by WWE..which they appearently like to do a lot with their own content on the Network.
Why do I mention that? Well, the latest is that WrestleMania 2000/16 has for the third time been altered in runtime within the past year: Going from 03.21.23 hours.. up to 03.21.35 hours.. And now: 03.18.24 hours..the latest cut is a complete omitting of Ice-T’s entrance with the Godfather, D-lo and the lovely train og you know who!
Fron JR and King’s introduction it just gets right in the ring where Godfather is doing his thing on the microphone..problaly edited too..
Don’t know, if it has something to do with Ice-T, but more likely I guess it is these days political and cultural winds blowing that perhaps cause WWE to suddenly delete one of the most provoking yet cool over the top entrances.
Its all about charachters and acting..taking it too seriously, is a huge mistake imo. The 9.99’er is a great way to access the phantastic library of wrestling content..just don’t fall in the trap of the McMahon’s, when they proclaimed back in 2014, that: “..everything is Uncut and Unedited on the Network”!
So make sure..if you unlike me..liked this event and get it on DVD..before WWE deletes their own trademark for the Orton/Edge match and stops calling it the greatest wrestling match ever..or anything else they might find not suitable to show you, for what ever ridilicous reason. (although, that trademark is worth erasing) -lol-
“Don’t know, if it has something to do with Ice-T, but more likely I guess it is these days political and cultural winds blowing that perhaps cause WWE to suddenly delete one of the most provoking yet cool over the top entrances.”
I’d be minded to think it’s an Ice-T issue. He probably had an agreement that they could only make money from that footage involving him for X amount of years, kinda of like the way it is with some of the music licensing etc. Streaming is often different to selling physical media in that regard.
I mean it’s hardly a huge loss, is it? I forgot he was even there.
One of the most influencal persons in hip hop and pimping culture, how can you forget him!? And that entrance..is problaly one of the 3 only things at that show, that really is memorable..obvious along with the Triangle ladder match and the Angle-Benoit-Jericho match. Kat’s and Mae’s wardrobe scene too maybe, but that’s just me perhaps. -lol- Hell of lot more entertaining than today’s product, even if it’s trashy like hell. 😉
It’s almost definitely a licensing issue. If they were going to pull things for “political” reasons as the paranoid user you responded to suggested, there’d be a lot of things removed from the network long before they got to an Ice-T entrance on an incredibly mediocre Wrestlemania.
I echo your sentiments. As much as I love the network, the retroactive editing is really frustrating. The removal of not just this Godfather entrance, but many others can occur at an instance. Rick Rude’s WWF theme is an example of this, where it is used for years and years, even in the early years of the network and then overnight, it is gone and replaced with a horrible knock off. I doubt this Godfather Ice T issue is licencing related or it would have been removed long ago. We will never truly know because they don’t tell us why any of these edits are made.
It does make me wonder if this could have anything to do with Fremantle not re-releasing WrestleMania 16 a few months ago along with 15, 17, 18 & 19 here in the UK. I know at the time the reason given was they wanted to get the Austin Rock trilogy & Rock Hogan out there, but 16’s omission always seemed odd.
Leez: My main issue is that when they launched the Network in February 2014 they promoted it highly as the place where you will get every ppv’s uncut and unedited.. That is simply put not true..but we all know about McMahonism regarding perception of truths.. WM 2000/16 is in its original DVD and the Tagged Classics DVD edition has a runtime of H 03.M 28.S 40. That’s more than 10 minutes content missing on the stream edition.. I really would not call that Uncut and Unedited, like the Billionair Princess said at launch day back in 2014. -lol-
Over all, of the 388 ppv/tv-events that I own on DVD and/or Bluray, 265 have a longer runtime on DVD/Bluray than on the Network, while 113 is running longer on the Network verions. And the comparing I have done is from excact same starting point of the ppv’s/events. The different runtimes are in range from a few seconds to some being more than 15 minutes missing content. I think that speaks volumes of how important it is, NOT to get rid of the physical collection.
But.. I admit..I’m a sucker for the little fine details.. many times for me at least, they can make a good show better, or even perfect. 😉
Once again, I could not agree with you more. I have continued my physical DVD collection as well for this very reason. The fine details are very important in the enjoyment factor of a show. I am glad it is not just me.
That..that’s Cool.. 😉
If you wanna be technical, Mania 2000 was actually just under 4 hours. The live PPV version ran about 3 hours and 55 minutes. Right after the main event they cut backstage where they did a bunch of post match interviews, including one with Vince where he said he owes nobody an explanation for why he turned on The Rock. After the post match interviews they then played the highlight music video that they did for most Manias back then. So even the DVD releases don’t include the full uncut show. There’s about a half hour missing.
LP1: Was’nt aware of that original runtime for WM 2000.. still.. does not change the fact, that WWE alter runtimes and content on the Network.. while they on the other hand made people buy into that it will all be Uncut and Unedited when they launched it..
It is a very terrible cut to the ring with the Godfather in WM 2000, so not only are they omitting content, but the edit is more horrified terrible than this years Extreme Rules subtheme and promotion posters for it are!
Same goes for the fitting theme music for Rude that Leezoo pointed out, which suddenly has been changed to some crap..If I recall, it is an original WWE-produced piece of music..but, maybe Vince has beef with former many years employeer Jim Johnston after he was let go few years ago.
Rude’s theme is a licensing issue. Yeah it sucks, but editing old theme music is an unfortunate part of the process when it comes to WWE. Look at ECW, pretty much every theme is dubbed over. Has nothing to do with Jim Johnston. If Vince was just trying to get back at Johnston then they’d have to cut the themes of about 90% of the wrestlers between 1985 and 2012, which they haven’t done.
Music rights is a big issue. There have been plenty of old TV shows from back in the day that had to edit out certain songs when they released them on DVD, BD and streaming. WKRP In Cincinnati is probably the biggest victim of this as that show played nothing but pop chart music from 70s/early 80s. And that DVD release was butchered. When it comes to The Godfather’s entrance at Mania 2000, they had 2 choices, either cut the entrance out completely or dub it over with a generic song and show Ice T’s lips moving, but not be a able to hear what he’s saying, which would look ridiculous.
Before the Network was launched, the biggest issue they faced was having to blur out all the WWF logos and bleep out every time somebody spoke the WWF letters. They finally worked out a deal with the Wildlife Fund to allow WWE to not have to censor and edit the old logos and WWF letters anymore. That’s what they meant when they said unedited and uncensored. Also they meant no editing of language during the attitude era, which is pretty much untouched for the most part. There’s nothing they can do about music, short of spending a small fortune to have every last piece of music available.
Interesting…didn’t know the runtime of the actual WM2000 PPV was almost 4 hours. I remember I taped it live back in the day and i think it was about 3.5 hrs and once it was over I stopped recording so missed on the post match interviews. I even taped the WM All Day Long special – i had to use like 2 tapes for that plus another for WM. Great times!
You’re right, the DVD releases were never uncut either and most obvious cuts are the promotional/sponsorship ads, botches, etc. but close enough to the original airings where it doesn’t ruin the enjoyment.
One event that I would prefer having the live airing is ECW One Night Stand 2005 as the DVD version is heavily edited, the obvious being themes as that was probably the best part like Sandman for example and I read WWE toned down on the crowd reactions as well. Thats why its a bit difficult to get into ECW on the Network so I’m glad I actually kept my original ECW DVDs I got from various traders over the years. I don’t want to support the pedophile Rob Feinstein who has almost every ECW event and television unedited on his website but the quality is crap from what I read, most are like 3rd or 4th generation masters and you get much better quality from other traders which is what I did.
If you look at all of the advertisements for Mania 2000, it mentions the All Day Long PPV pre-show as airing from 12pm ET to 8pm ET and then the Mania PPV itself as airing from 8pm ET to Midnight ET. Like I mentioned, Mania itself ran about 3 hours and 55 minutes roughly. They did a bunch of interviews. One with Vince that I remember for sure and I know they did an interview with Edge & Christian which teased the beginning of their heel run. Michael Cole also interviewed Hardcore Holly about not winning the Hardcore Title fairly and Holly cursed at Cole. Can’t remember what exactly he said, but they immediately cut back to JR and King at ringside and JR said “We apologize for that.” I don’t remember off the top of my head who the other interviews were with.
As for the old ECW videos, I agree with you about RF. Go to HighSpots instead. They also have every ECW show on DVD uncut with the original music, just like RF does.
This site is acting weird. Every time I tried to reply to David, it didn’t go through, it said “502 Bad Gateway”. I did it 3 times and now all 3 posts show up afterward. If an admin can delete the first 2 posts and keep the most recent one(I remembered another interview), that would be great.
Same issues here.