Hardcore History: The Extremely Unauthorized Story of ECW (By Scott Williams) Review

Rating 3.50 out of 5

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Hardcore History: The Extremely Unauthorized Story of ECW
By Scott E. Williams
Published by Sports Publishing
Released on April 1, 2007
261 Pages (Paperback)
Available in Hardcover & Paperback

The 90s were a great period of wrestling. Not only did you had WWF and WCW battling in the Monday Night Wars, but you there was also a small Philadelphia-based promotion called ECW (Extreme Championship Wrestling) run by Tod Gordon and Paul Heyman. ECW was founded by Gordon (who hired Heyman as his booker) in 1993 as Eastern Championship Wrestling and quickly grew from there. Many wrestlers passed through the promotion including Steve Austin, Cactus Jack, Terry Funk, Brian Pillman, Shane Douglas (who wrote the foreword), Raven, The Dudley Boyz, Rey Mysterio, Eddie Guerrero, Dean Malenko, Chris Jericho, Chris Benoit and many more. Many of these wrestlers were able to use ECW as a springboard into either WCW or WWF. Other names such as Tommy Dreamer, Sabu, Tazz, New Jack, Justin Credible and Mikey Whipwreck made their home in the promotion. By the mid-to-late nineties, people were throwing around the term "The Big Three" - WWF, WCW and ECW. Unfortunately, ECW ended up being too small to be big and too big to be small and it folded after seven years.

Hardcore History: The Extremely Unauthorized Story of ECW is to ECW what Death of WCW is to WCW. It tells the reader how the promotion was created, who was steering the ship, who wrestled there, why they left and goes into detail about the money problems that plagued the promotion for its entire existance. Every single era of ECW written about; the pre-ECW days, Eastern Championship Wrestling, becoming "Extreme," their first pay-per-view Barely Legal, the WWF invasion, getting on TNN, going bankrupt and everything inbetween. It also discusses the post-ECW days from the Alliance, where they are now and the paperback includes details about the first six month of WWE's ECW brand.

There are a few minor problems with Hardcore History. If you are a hardcore (no pun intended) ECW fan, you will see some minor chronological errors here and there. It also dedicates an entire chapter to Brian Pillman's short time there. While it is significant, one may question why it necessitated an entire chapter. With that aside, Scott Williams has done a great job researching this book and figuring out what exactly happened during this crazy time to be a wrestling fan. Williams was not an ECW fan per se, but instead wrote this book through the eyes of a journalist. Unfortunately, only ECW wrestlers not affiliated with WWE when this book was written were able to be interviews on record. Hardcore History is definitely recommended to any ECW fan or even anyone who is interested in learning about the promotion.

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