WCW Monday Night Nitro
From Iwe
| WCW Monday Nitro | |
 WCW Monday Nitro logo used from April 5, 1999 to March 26, 2001 | |
| Details | |
| Format | Sports entertainment Professional wrestling |
| Created by | Ted Turner Eric Bischoff |
| Directed by | Craig Leathers (1995–1999, 2001) Rick Fansher (1999–2000) Mike Miller (2000) |
| Starring | See World Championship Wrestling alumni |
| Opening theme | "Purity V.3" (September 4, 1995-March 29, 1999) "Adrenaline V.1" by Purity (April 5, 1999-March 26, 2001) |
| Country of origin | United States |
| No. of episodes | 286 |
| Productions | |
| Camera setup | Multicamera setup |
| Running time | 1 hour (September 4, 1995–May 20, 1996, April 28-May 19, 1997) 2 hours (May 27, 1996–April 21, 1997, May 26, 1997-January 19, 1998, January 3, 2000–March 26, 2001) 3 hours (January 26, 1998–December 27, 1999) |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | TNT |
| Picture format | 480i (SDTV) |
| Original run | September 4, 1995 – March 26, 2001 |
| Chronology | |
| Related shows | WCW Thunder |
| External links | |
WCW Monday Nitro was a weekly professional wrestling telecast produced by World Championship Wrestling, created by Ted Turner and Eric Bischoff. The show aired Monday nights on TNT, going head-to-head with the International Wrestling Federation's (WWF) Monday Night Raw from September 4, 1995 to March 26, 2001. Production ceased shortly after WCW was purchased by the IWF, now known as IWE.
The debut of Nitro began the Monday Night Wars, a ratings battle between the IWF and WCW that lasted for almost six years and saw each company resort to cutthroat tactics to try to one-up the competition. In mid-1996, Nitro began to draw better ratings than Raw based on the strength of the nWo storyline, a metafiction event built around the idea of former WWF wrestlers forming their own anarchist organization in order to take over WCW. Nitro continued to beat Raw for 84 consecutive weeks; as the nWo storyline grew stagnant, with wrestlers in the nWo consistently beating non-members, fan interest in the storyline waned, and Raw began to edge out Nitro in the ratings.
The turning point for the organizations came during the January 4, 1999 broadcast of Nitro, during which lead commentator Tony Schiavone gave away the results of matches for that night's Raw broadcast, as it had been taped the night before; Bischoff believed that knowing the outcome would dissuade viewers from watching the program. Excited by the prospect of seeing perennial IWF underdog Mick Foley win the IWF Championship, a dramatic number of Nitro viewers changed channels to watch Raw. From that week forward, Raw consistently beat out Nitro in the ratings by a significant amount, and Nitro was never able to regain the numbers it had once enjoyed.
Besides broadcasting from various arenas and locations across the country (such as the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, from which the very first episode of Nitro was broadcast), Nitro also did special broadcasts from the Disney-MGM Studios in Orlando in 1996, and did annual Spring Break-Out episodes from Panama City Beach, Florida starting in March 1997. The rights to WCW Monday Nitro now belong to IWE.
Contents |
First episode
Monday Night Wars
Main article: Monday Night Wars
Initial success
United Kingdom
Eric Bischoff's on-camera role
Raw gains ground
The D-X/Norfolk, Virginia incident
Changes
January 4, 1999 broadcast
Vince Russo and Ed Ferrara
Notable episodes
| Episode Title | Date | Rating | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| WCW Monday Nitro | September 4, 1995 | 2.5 | First episode of Nitro. See above for more information. |
| nWo Monday Nitro | December 22, 1997 | 3.5 | The nWo organized a complete takeover of Nitro six days before Starrcade. |
| WarGames 2000 | September 4, 2000 | 3.6 | On the fifth anniversary of the premiere, a WarGames match took place in a three-tiered cage between two teams for the world championship. Kevin Nash retained the title. |
| The Night of Champions | March 26, 2001 | 3.0 | Final episode of Nitro. WCW is purchased by the IWF. See below for more information. |
The Night of Champions – Final broadcast
Results
Other notable moments
IWE Classics On Demand / IWE Home Video
On-air personalities
Commentary teams
| Commentators | Dates |
|---|---|
| Eric Bischoff, Bobby Heenan and Steve McMichael | September 4, 1995 - May 13, 1996 (1st hour) |
| Tony Schiavone and Larry Zbyszko* | May 27, 1996 – July 29, 1996 (1st hour) August 5, 1996 – August 18, 1997 (1st hour) |
| Eric Bischoff and Bobby Heenan* | May 20, 1996 – June 10, 1996 (1st hour/2nd hour) July 1, 1996 - July 22, 1996 (2nd hour) August 5, 1996 – August 26, 1996 (2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Larry Zbyszko and Eric Bischoff | July 29, 1996 (2nd hour) |
| Eric Bischoff, Bobby Heenan and Mike Tenay* | September 2, 1996 – October 28, 1996 (2nd hour) November 11, 1996 - November 18, 1996 (2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay and Larry Zbyszko* | August 25, 1997 – March 29, 1999 (1st hour/1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Bobby Heenan and Mike Tenay** | November 4, 1996 (2nd hour) November 25, 1996 – March 29, 1999 (2nd hour/3rd hour) December 20, 1999 – January 24, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone and Bobby Heenan | June 17, 1996 – June 24, 1996 (2nd hour) April 5, 1999 – July 12, 1999 (1st-3rd hour) August 9, 1999 – December 13, 1999 (1st-3rd hour) |
| Scott Hudson and Bobby Heenan | July 19, 1999 – August 2, 1999 (1st-3rd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay and Mark Madden | January 31, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone and Mark Madden | February 7, 2000 – March 27, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) August 28, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Scott Hudson and Mark Madden | April 10, 2000 – July 10, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) July 24, 2000 – August 21, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) September 18, 2000 – October 2, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) October 30, 2000 – November 6, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) November 20, 2000 - December 4, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) December 18, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Mark Madden and Stevie Ray | July 18, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) October 9, 2000 – October 23, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Mark Madden and Jeremy Borash | September 4, 2000 - September 11, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Mike Tenay and Stevie Ray | November 13, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Scott Hudson and Stevie Ray | December 12, 2000 (1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone, Scott Hudson and Disco Inferno | January 8, 2001 (1st-2nd hour) |
| Tony Schiavone and Scott Hudson | January 15, 2001 – March 26, 2001 (1st-2nd hour) |
(*) – Starting with the May 27, 1996 edition of Nitro, which came after a week off due to the NBA Playoffs on TNT, Nitro started using two broadcast teams for the show. Tony Schiavone and Larry Zbyszko would call the first hour of the Nitro from ringside, and Eric Bischoff and Bobby Heenan would take over from their booth near the set at the top of the second hour. Starting in September 1996, Mike Tenay became a color commentator for both hours of Nitro, calling the first hour with Schiavone and Zbyszko and the second hour with Bischoff and Heenan. Usually Tenay would call the first hour from the broadcast booth separate from Schiavone and Zbyzsko's table at ringside, while he called the second hour with Bischoff and Heenan in the booth.
(**) - After Eric Bischoff joined the nWo and took on a more prominent on-screen authority figure role, Schiavone replaced Bischoff in the second hour of Nitro, thus making him the lone play-by-play commentator for the show. Unlike Tenay, Schiavone called the first hour from ringside and would call the second hour in the booth alongside Bobby Heenan and Mike Tenay. Schiavone did that until the broadcast table at ringside was done away with on the December 9, 1996 edition of Nitro (WCW, though, would eventually move the announcers back to ringside when the new Nitro set was debuted on April 5, 1999)
Ring announcers
- David Penzer (September 4, 1995–March 26, 2001)
- Michael Buffer (Select main events only, May 12, 1997–March 26, 2001)
