DVD Review - "The Most Powerful Families In Wrestling"

WWE has done some incredible things with its insanely huge wrestling video library. This unfortunately, isn't one of them.

Don't get me wrong -- I wasn't expecting this to be of the same quality of some of their biographies (think the ones on Benoit, McMahon, Piper, Road Warriors, Piper, etc.), but I was expecting more than recycled clips from other DVD's, which is what 60 to 70 % of this seemed to be. Not cool.

Speaking of which, Carlito may have been the worst possible host for this thing. Sure, he's a second-generation wrestler and a popular guy, but could not make this thing interesting. He was clearly reading lines from a script, which doesn't suit his character at all. Oddly enough, the section on him and his father has some more candid interviews with Carlito and that part works fine.

Basically, the concept is that they look at wrestling families and what made them important. The usual WWE DVD crew (Eric Bischoff, Vince McMahon, Jim Ross, Road Warrior Animal, Brooklyn Brawler, Mean Gene, Gerry Brisco, etc.) comment at various points. The one thing I like is that they use clips from Chris Jericho, Lance Storm, Rikishi, and of all people, Christian, and identify them as "former WWE superstars". Weird.

Some of the families have an important history in wrestling (think the Harts, the Funks, the Ortons, the Anoai's, the Von Erichs, the Guerreros, the Rougeaus, and yes, even the McMahons), but when you get to the Snuka family (Jimmy and his son, Deuce of Deuce and Domino fame) and the Lawlers (Jerry and Brian Christopher), you know they're kind of stretching for material.

One part that IS kind of interesting is how they out "fake" families in wrestling, including the Koloffs, the Bushwhackers, the Andersons, Edge & Christian, etc. Nice that they can poke fun at themselves.

The match selection is marginal at best, and to be perfectly honest, I haven't even watched the entire way through. There really aren't a lot of matches I hadn't either seen before or was all that interesting in seeing. Why not Bret vs. Owen Hart, or something that was at least a highly-regarded match, instead of the Hart Family vs. Shawn Michaels' Knights, which sucked ass?

Overall, I can't really recommend this, and its honestly one of the more disappointing showings in recent memory.