Heat: The Space Age of Pro Wrestling

A SHOW OF FORCE: MORINVILLE
Cultural Community Centre, Morinville, AB
August 20th, 2011

While officially titled “A Show of FORCE: Morinville,” the inaugural offering from FORCE Pro Wrestling could easily have been billed as “Card Subject to Change.” Despite substantial changes to the card, the show managed to exceed expectations and deliver an action-packed night to the raucous crowd in Morinville’s brand new Cultural Community Centre.

William Saint vs. Nightmare

Nightmare makes William Saint think about that bad ride he's about to take. Photo courtesy Trident Photography.

The first match in FORCE history will be remembered as a good one. William Saint started things off by yelling vigorously at the crowd, which only served to increase the volume of chanting in support of Nightmare. Nightmare started off with a very technical offence centred around the erstwhile headlock, which gave Saint a lot of difficulty in the early part of the match. After Saint was able to solve the headlock, he and Nightmare traded suplexes, a stalling vertical suplex by Nightmare and a snap suplex by Saint, and other high impact offence in an attempt to put each other down for the three count. Nightmare was able to land the biggest move first, nailing Saint from the second rope with a Taliban Backpack (a leaping variant of the lungblower), which was enough to keep Saint down for the three count and allow Nightmare to chalk up the first victory in FORCE history just shy of the twenty minute mark.

Winner: Nightmare via Taliban Backpack.

Following the Saint/Nightmare bout, Cam!!ikaze was welcomed to the stage by ring announcer What About Ivan. Cam informed the audience that he had seriously injured his knee a couple of days prior to the show, which would prevent him from wrestling Johnny Devine in the main event. He continued to say that he was incredibly sorry that he wouldn’t be able to perform, but he was able to secure a replacement. Miss Danyah came out onto the stage and accused Cam!!ikaze of faking his injury to get out of the world of hurt that Johnny Devine was going to put on him. She also mentioned that her own opponent, scheduled to be KC Spinelli, was even more scared than Cam, because she didn’t even show up. She then entered the ring and demanded that referee Kevin Sane raise her hand since she had just won by forfeit, as far as she was concerned. Sane was reluctant to do so, since she hadn’t actually done anything, but eventually relented and raised Danyah’s hand in victory… only to eat a clothesline from her free hand. Danyah pulled the poor referee’s shirt up over his head to feed him some short punches, then threw him out onto the floor where FORCE’s other official, Vijay Shankhar, was waiting to check on his colleague. Sane brushed off Shankhar and tried to storm the ring, but was held back while Danyah taunted him from inside the ring and the crowd screamed for Shankhar to “let him fight.” The decision made for him by the fans, Shankhar allowed Sane to get into the ring and called for the bell.

Miss Danyah bodyslams a small child. No, sorry, that's Kevin Sane. Photo courtesy Trident Photography.

Miss Danyah vs. Kevin Sane

Sane started off like a house of fire (once he finally got started, which took several minutes of being thrashed to take effect) putting the overconfident Danyah back on her heels with a flurry of offence. With the crowd solidly behind him, Sane countered Danyah’s size advantage with speedy moves like a tilt-a-whirl head scissors and hurricanrana, but was eventually felled by the incompetence of his own brother-in-arms, Vijay Shankhar. Danyah used her body to block Shankhar’s view as she mule-kicked Sane, then gave him another shot to the peninsula south of the equator for good measure. A big splash later and that was all she wrote for the fighting referee.

Winner: Danyah via Big Splash.

Chucky Blaze vs. Mr. Fantastic

Chucky Blaze entered the arena to a huge ovation from the Morinville crowd, which was only heightened when he charged up the bleachers in an apparent effort to high-five the entire population of the town before stepping into the ring

Referee Vijay Shankhar hustles to make the count as Chucky Blaze pins Mr. Fantastic. Photo courtesy Trident Photography.

to take on the masked Mr. Fantastic. In a wild battle that spent nearly as long on the floor as it did in the ring, Chucky Blaze pitted his fast-moving and high-flying offence against Mr. Fantastic’s arsenal of high-impact throws and slams. Blaze seemed to have things well in hand after hitting a death-defying suicide dive that resulted in both he and Mr. Fantastic sprawling into the front row. Chucky strung together several of his signature moves in sequence, including a flying knee strike in the corner and a springboard cross body block, but Mr. Fantastic proved to be remarkably resilient, and responded with a double overhook suplex. After a series of reversals, Chucky escaped a back suplex attempt and caught Mr. Fantastic off-guard with a super kick, which finally kept the masked man down.

Winner: Chucky Blaze via Super Kick.

Intermission. Normally I don’t mention the intermission in show recaps, but I wanted to point out that the intermission ran longer than intended to accommodate the large crowds that formed when several FORCE stars set up shop at the merchandise tables to meet fans, take pictures, and sign autographs. The crowd was still fairly substantial when the show was scheduled to resume, so the call was made to extend intermission so that everyone who wanted to could meet their favourite wrestlers and get an autograph.

Handicap Match
C-Block w/ Officer Gordon vs. Strife

Originally scheduled to be a tag team match, Strife’s partner failed to arrive and thus left Strife to battle Officer Gordon’s uncaged animals on his own. Strife started off well, nullifying Slammer and Ugg’s power advantages with technique, but once the cons started cheating, things went downhill fast for the lone warrior from the Orient. Officer Gordon attempted to get involved to turn the tables, but after choking Strife across the middle rope and being admonished by the referee, he attempted to choke Strife again (this time with his back turned in an attempt to use his bulk to block the referee’s view), only to strangle the life out of Slammer before realizing what was happening. After being launched across the ring with a capture suplex by Ugg and a combination sidewalk slam/Yakuza kick, Strife shocked C-Block by refusing to stay down for the three count. Officer Gordon got involved again, this time far more effectively, by removing his helmet and cracking Strife in the head with it. With Strife stunned, Slammer applied the Billy Goat’s Curse, setting Ugg up to nail the defenceless Strife with a thunderous leg drop to the back of his head. The three count was academic. After scoring the pinfall, C-Block continued the assault on Strife until Officer Gordon was able to subdue them, handcuffing Slammer and choking Ugg unconscious.

Winner: C-Block via combination Billy Goat’s Curse/Leg Drop.

Once C-Block were en route back to Arkham Asylum, hometown hero Sgt. Hazard made his return. He got on the microphone and praised the crowd who came out to see him, but then regretfully informed them that his scheduled opponent for the night, Bill Yates, had run into travel problems and wasn’t present. At this point Hotshot Johnny Devine made his presence known, claiming that he was the main event and that Sarge being from “Moron-vile” wasn’t anything worth bragging about. While Devine verbally ran down Hazard and his home town to jeers and boos from the fans, astute observers noticed that one fan was wearing elbow pads and approaching the ring. As the man climbed into the ring behind Hazard, Johnny Devine informed Hazard that just because Bill Yates couldn’t make it didn’t mean he didn’t have an opponent. He introduced Livewire Matt Richards just as Richards introduced his forearm to the back of Sarge’s head.

Sgt. Hazard makes Livewire Matt Richards regret jumping him from behind by making him experience involuntary flight. Photo courtesy Trident Photography.

Sgt. Hazard vs. Livewire Matt Richards

Richards used the element of surprise to his advantage, but Hazard was quickly able to regain his bearings and make Richards regret his underhanded tactics with a hip toss that in other venues may have seen Richards collide with the ceiling, as well as a flurry of powerful punches. Richards, not prepared for Sarge’s heavy artillery, remained in the floor for several moments after being thrown through the ropes by Hazard. Richards regrouped while referee Vijay Shankhar warned Sarge to make sure that he didn’t throw Richards over the top rope, which is an illegal move in FORCE. Richards came back in, with similar results. Sarge ducked an attempted cross body block, which sent Richards sailing over the top to the floor. Despite Hazard not having actually thrown Richards, Shankhar issued him a yellow card; one more infraction would earn him a red card and a disqualification. While Sarge argued that he hadn’t actually done anything to Richards, the Livewire jumped him from behind and began to work him over with an offence highlighted by an excruciating flipping neck snap that Sgt. Hazard was, shockingly, able to fight through to remain in the match. Vijay Shankhar found himself the unfortunate recipient of an attempt at a corner avalanche, which led to Richards bailing out to grab some furniture. He set up the chair to perform a double jump moonsault, but the slightest miscue on Richards’ part allowed Hazard to get his knees up and knock the Livewire silly. With the fight gone out of him, Richards decided that a win was a win, no matter how he got it. As Vijay Shankhar started to recover, Richards handed the chair to Hazard, then flopped onto his back and lay still. Shankhar, seeing Hazard standing over Richards holding a chair, issued a red card – Sarge was disqualified. His hometown fans went berserk as Richards scuttled away, but Sgt. Hazard would eventually get the last laugh.

Winner: Livewire Matt Richards via Disqualification.

Hotshot Johnny Devine suplexes Andy Anderson during their main event clash. Photo courtesy Trident Photography.

Hotshot Johnny Devine vs. Andy Anderson

Hotshot Johnny Devine entered first with Miss Danyah by his side. Cam!!ikaze came to the ring, at which point children in the audience implored him not to wrestle so he didn’t get hurt. Johnny Devine agreed with them, then attacked Cam!!ikaze. Cam was able to escape to the floor, where Danyah landed a few kicks while Johnny Devine taunted him from the ring. Devine turned around to find, to his horror, that Cam!!ikaze’s replacement had arrived, and was standing right behind him. Andy Anderson, “the Lone Wolf,” a similarly experienced international wrestler, had hit the ring while Devine was busy berating Cam. Anderson lit up Devine with a series of right hands, a Manhattan drop, and an atomic drop before Devine took a powder to regroup on the outside.

Devine returned to the ring and immediately went to work on Anderson’s left arm, catching him by surprise with a variation of the shoulder DDT. Despite weakening Anderson’s arm, Devine still had to resort to breaking the rules in his attempt to keep his surprise opponent down for the count. Danyah didn’t pass up the opportunity to land cheap shots, and Devine had some sort of foreign object (which can best be described as small and gougey) with which he would jab Anderson whenever the referee’s vision was obscured (which was a lot, as Devine has had plenty of experience cheating). Despite Cam!!ikaze’s myriad attempts to point out the wrong-doings to the referee by telling him where Devine had hidden the object, but Devine always managed to move it before the referee checked him. Anderson proved to be incredibly resilient, however, and even Devine’s rulebreaking wasn’t enough to sap his will to win. Devine and Danyah both realized this, causing Danyah to subtley toss a chain into the ring while she distracted Anderson and the referee. Devine wrapped the chain around his fist, then waited for Anderson to turn around to meet him with a cracking shot right on the button. Anderson stayed down for the three count and beyond, but Sgt. Hazard quickly made his way to ringside. Hazard, who had been watching from the entryway, saw Devine hide the chain in his singlet, and convinced referee Kevin Sane to check. This time, Sane was able to find the chain, and asked the audience if they wanted the match restarted. Of course they did, and said so as loudly as possible.

Shortly after the match was restarted, Danyah attempted to intervene with the chain again, but this time chaos ensued. While referee Kevin Sane and Cam!!ikaze attempted to get Danyah out of the ring, Sgt. Hazard made his presence felt. While Devine was wrapping the chain around his fist, Hazard spun him around, which startled the former X Division Champion into dropping the chain. Anderson quickly scooped up the chain and, with referee Sane occupied by spanking Danyah (who had been pushed over his knee by Cam), blasted Devine square on the chin, cooling off the Hotshot and earning the pinfall victory after nearly twenty-five minutes of gruelling action.

Winner: Andy Anderson via Chain Shot.