“So I have to make myself the babyface with one promo against a guy the crowd loves? Because the booker thinks he should be the heel? Man, I’m going back to Chikara.”
On the current episode of Ring of Honor TV as of August 5th, 2012, several instances occurred which lead me to believe that ROH is hurting, both creatively and from a production standpoint (the latter of which influences the former, I suspect).
First, the Guardians of Truth. The idea of Truth Martini having faceless henchmen bolster the ranks of the House of Truth and give the Briscoes somebody to feud with isn’t a bad one. In fact, it’s pretty solid. The problem I have with it is that the Guardians look like somebody dragged them kicking and screaming out of the 1980s and plopped them into Ring of Honor. They’re big, muscular, and decent workers, but they’re wearing gear that I’m pretty sure was stolen from the Undertaker’s bag back when he was “The Punisher” and working the territories. If they didn’t have little House of Truth logos on the front of their singlet tops you could make a strong case that they were bootleg action figures of the Punisher that were turned into people through some sort of mad science on Truth Martini’s part. He can do that. Fact. It’s why Roderick Strong has no discernible personality; that’s a side effect of the process of action figure to human conversion. My point is less absurd than the science I just invented. Simply put, the Guardians don’t look like they belong in ROH. They look like they’re up from Memphis to do some jobber matches on WWF Wrestling Challenge. I’ve read a lot of complaints online that Jim Cornette’s old school approach to booking is hurting ROH, and the Guardians are a clear example of something that SCREAMS “Jim Cornette thought of this.” They LOOK like Jim Cornette recycled them from Smokey Mountain. Hell, maybe he DID. But these guys in the ring looking like they robbed Memphis in the ’80s isn’t helping their already lacklustre production values.
The second, and more important, was the Eddie Kingston promo. Considering that Kingston is challenging for the World Championship, which ROH builds as its pinnacle of achievement, his inclusion in the whole process came off to me as a bit of a mess, which is disconcerting because a lot of things I really liked happened in that promo. He cut a fiery, heartfelt, and compelling promo about what being a World Champion meant to him and how that motivated him to do whatever it took to beat Kevin Steen for the belt, and in the process do Jim Cornette’s dirty work. The problem? Kingston’s previous appearance had been as a guy who did a run-in and got into a fight with Steen. Now he’s trying to cut a promo about why he’s challenging for the WORLD TITLE without having had a match in ROH since, what, 2009? That’s a loooooong time in wrestling years. So these fans may or may not be familiar with Kingston, depending on how long they’ve watched ROH and whether or not they’re familiar with Chikara. That’s a big problem for me, from a booking standpoint. Relying on your fans to know your product’s history isn’t unreasonable, but it might be asking a bit much. Asking them to do that AND be familiar with another company’s product so that they understand this other character that you’ve introduced into one of your stories is crazy.
That brings me to the fans themselves. They were dead during Kingston’s promo. Part of it can be attributed to lack of familiarity, as Kingston hasn’t been exposed to them as a significant player much, but I think a bigger problem is that ROH films four episodes of TV in one shot. Let’s say they shoot the Kingston promo in the third or fourth of that four episode session, because that seems about right based on the amount of times I’ve seen the Liger-costumed fan in his current location in the audience. That means the fans have already seen a minimum of three hours of wrestling, and that’s if ROH shoots the shows in essentially real time with little to no lag between episodes, which is pushing things, I suspect. More likely they’ve been there for five or six hours, and seen two or three big main event matches. Now have a guy who they saw run in (if that was the same set of tapings. I think it was) but know little else about cut a promo about how he’s getting a championship match. Nobody will care, because they’re goddamn tired. And Liger-costume guy is probably having his fourth or fifth heat stroke since arriving.
So the crowd is tired and doesn’t really know how to react to Kingston because he’s a new face. Let’s add a third problem to the segment, because it totally needs that: Kevin Steen is getting the wrong reaction as far as the bookers are concerned. His defiance of Cornette is supposed to make him a hated heel, but it’s getting him monstrous pops because Jim Cornette isn’t sympathetic. He’s an old, southern man clinging desperately to what he thinks wrestling should be and trying to dictatorially enforce that on Ring of Honor. That’s not an indictment of Cornette as a person, it’s what I’m seeing on my television from a character standpoint. Those are Cornette’s defining characteristics as he is presented on TV. He’s concerned about affiliate dinners and other network BS while Steen, who was denied A JOB for a year then came back to destroy the golden boy while simultaneously looking like 80% of the audience. How does that guy not become the hero of the people? Cornette has a bounty on him now, so Steen’s championship is in peril not through the threat of a powerful babyface but because “the man” is manipulating things behind the scenes. Now Eddie Kingston has to come out and try to get a crowd behind him against Steen. A tired, confused crowd. Good luck with that.
I like Jim Cornette, but for ROH’s sake, the man’s gotta go.
Two of the luchadors in Lucha Libre AAA: Heroes Del Ring that you have heard of. I have no idea what the hell is happening in this picture otherwise, however.
I have a problem when it comes to wrestling video games. That problem is called WWF No Mercy for the Nintendo 64. Since playing the bejesus out of that game for years, I found myself unable to really enjoy later wrestling games, particularly WWF/E ones, because No Mercy was just too goddamn good. Everything after that just seemed… wrong. The Smackdown games were okay, but had arcadey weirdness like being able to hit people with an elbow drop after they stood up. Fire Pro Wrestling for the Game Boy Advance was the next best thing to No Mercy, although I only recently came to fully appreciate how brilliant the Audience Match concept is, but the wrestling games on consoles still didn’t stack up to the increasingly awful-looking (by comparison) but still outstanding N64 classic.
Recently, perhaps just because I haven’t played No Mercy in several years, I have become more accepting of wrestling games. I’ve gotten back into Fire Pro Wrestling and embraced the aforementioned genius of Audience Match mode, but I’ve also played some console wrestling games and found myself much less harsh in my judgement of them. WWE ’12 was genuinely enjoyable, although not to the point where I wanted to spend $60 on a game where the online servers still don’t work a year later. The wrestling game on the XBox Live Arcade, Action Arcade Wrestling, was crude but also a ton of fun and reminded me of the old WrestleFest arcade game. It probably didn’t hurt that it was, like, a dollar. The most recent wrestling game I’ve played was Lucha Libre AAA: Heroes Del Ring. I hadn’t heard good things about it, but a friend of mine bought it for five bucks so we decided to lace up our masks and throw down.*
*We didn’t have actual masks. I wish we did, though, that would have been awesome.
My first impression, upon being told the controls, was that there were a surprising number of buttons dedicated to striking, which made me think it would have a more fighting game-y feel. Against a human player, it kind of does, as a lot of time is spent trying to hit the big B button strikes (we played on Xbox 360) while making liberal use of the reversal button and occasionally using one of the light grapples if one got lucky. Against the computer, however, both grapples were able to be utilized because they were much worse at reversing things that humans. Despite only being able to use light grapples with any regularity against human opponents, we were still able to hit some pretty big moves as the light grapples included, inexplicably, an ace crusher variant of an Osaka street cutter.
In what is an accurate portrayal of lucha, as far as I can tell, the wrestlers move quite slowly when not making gravity their bitch and kicking people. I’m going to talk about that a little bit more in a bit, but as a result of the sluggishness of the luchadors, the run button got used quite, not just to throw dropkicks and leg lariats and stuff but often as a way to close the distance to do grapples and things. Performance and appeals to the crowd are important in lucha, and as a result the taunt buttons have pretty marked effects on the N64 style spirit meters which fuel your specials and determines which moves you can do. Many high level grapples are tied to your spirit meter, so if you don’t have the spirit you can’t do the move even if your opponent’s body is essentially non-functioning. In a nice touch, Rudos got extra spirit from brawling on the floor, cheating, and taunts outside of the ring while Tecnicos got their bonuses from being in the ring and upholding the rules. Once your special was activated, both human opponents and the computer AI would bail out of the ring as soon as was physically possible and run frantically around it in circles while waiting for the special to fade out. This naturally led to the opponent with the special attempting to time a dive to the floor so that your panicking opponent would run into your torpedo attack. The actual result of this tended to be smashing head first into the ringside barricade or splattering on the floor as your opponent gets halfway around the ring in the time it took you to fly through the air.
A lot of the reviews I read of Lucha Libre AAA really hammered the game over how slow the luchadors were, claiming that real lucha libre is fast and furious with the luchadors bouncing and flying all over the place at breakneck pace. I’m pretty sure these reviewers have never actually watched lucha. It’s actually not that fast. The rules are structured to make it SEEM fast, but nobody is actually moving at lightning speed most of the time. In that regard, I think the speed of Lucha Libre AAA actually does an excellent job of capturing the pace of lucha, because while the characters are kind of slow, they end up doing a lot of running between spots, which involve a lot of flips and big moves. So while the physical speed of the characters is sluggish, the action moves at a fairly good pace.
Aside from a bizarre system for saving created wrestlers that links them to Gamer Tags in a move that makes sense only to whoever’s idea it was, Lucha Libre AAA was surprisingly fun, and worth the $5 my buddy spent on it. It was DEFINITELY worth the $0 that I spent to play it.
I posted this in the Bonus Art section as well, but I have no idea how many, if any, of you actually read that section at all. Actually I’m not sure if any of you really read THIS section much either, but meh.
I’ve been watching a bunch of stuff from Japan recently, and as a result I’ve been making notes and developing ideas to use later on in the comic. Part of those notes were a big list of Japanese wrestler names that I came up with, and I decided to take a crack at designing one of the first ones I thought of, Michi Okagawa. Michi was the name of my dad’s Japanese business partner when he was over there all the time in the late ’80s/early ’90s, and Okagawa was the result of forgetting whether Yoshinari Ogawa’s last name was Ogawa (which it is) or Okawa (which it is not). I was going to go with one of them, then couldn’t remember which one was attached to a semi-legendary-by-association wrestler and which one was made up, so I mashed them together and went with the result of that instead.
The “Diamond King” nickname came from the idea that he should have gear based on the suits of a card deck. I don’t know why I thought that, but in my brain at the time that was very important. Then I started thinking about “king of ______” which morphed into “the Diamond King” when it occurred to me that he could use Diamond Dust as a finisher.
I’m not sure at what point in the card suit thought process I decided to use Hiroshi Tanahashi’s tights as a basis for the design, although that may have been influenced by the fact that he was on the cover of a Japanese wrestling magazine I had on my drawing desk. It doesn’t hurt that he’s the 100% Ace of the Universe and has really cool gear, I suppose. Actually, he’s basically Suwama’s head on Tanahashi’s body. Which I suppose is fitting for a character that will be holding a major title, since Suwama was the AJPW Triple Crown holder in most of the DVDs I was watching, and Tanahashi was the NJPW IWGP Heavyweight Champion.
Also, it just occurred to me that this guy won’t be appearing in the comic for at least a year. So… SUPER sneak preview!
A Show of FORCE: Return to Morinville
June 24th, 2012
Ray McDonald Sports Complex, Morinville, Alberta
I don’t know why this drawing exists, but this is Stephen Dafoe and he’s responsible for FORCE’s inclusion in the St. Jean Baptiste Day festivities. Thanks for having us, Stephen! Image courtesy The Morinville News.
FORCE Pro Wrestling returned to Morinville, Alberta on June 24th, 2012 as part of the St. Jean Baptiste Day festivities, this time emanating from the heart of the festival grounds, the Ray McDonald Sports Complex, home of the Morinville Jets of the CJHL.
“LION WARRIOR” BOBBY SHARP vs. GABRIEL LESTAT
The first contest of the afternoon featured two men making their debuts for FORCE Pro Wrestling. The fans got behind Bobby Sharp early as Gabriel Lestat played mind games with the Lion Warrior, stalling for time on the floor in an effort to frustrate Sharp. It wasn’t overly successful, as the two exchanged holds and counters with Sharp getting the better of Lestat. The Omen attempted to change strategies and overpower Sharp, but he couldn’t establish dominance until a miscue sent Sharp hurtling shoulder-first into the steel ringpost. Lestat was quick to capitalize on the opportunity, attacking Sharp’s shoulder with brutal stomps, a variety of submission holds, and bending it like a pretzel using the ring ropes. While applying a shoulder lock, Lestat appeared to be struggling with whether or not to attack the exposed neck of Sharp, which gave the Lion Warrior the opening he needed to escape the alleged vampire and plant him with a Michinoku Driver. After scoring a near fall with the Lionsault, Sharp was able to battle through being planted into the mat with a reverse suplex to score the victory by leaping from the top rope with his signature Lion Splash.
Winner: Bobby Sharp via Lion Splash.
SLAMMER vs. KEVIN SANE
Slammer threatened to eat a child in the front row while Officer Gordon was trying to wrangle him to the ring. I don’t think much else really needs to be said about what he would attempt to do to Kevin Sane, but it will be said anyway because that’s the point of these things. Kevin Sane gave up roughly 60 pounds to Slammer, and attempted to use his speed to counteract Slammer’s size. He didn’t account for Slammer’s crazy, however, and before long Slammer was headbutting Sane’s fingers while trapping him in an arm wringer. In a match largely defined by counter-attacks, Sane put up a brave and clever fight, countering Slammer’s signature choke-lift suplex into a head scissors takeover. Slammer responded by countering a handspring elbow into attempted
Kevin Sane catches Slammer with a flying head scissors prior to being subjected to a series of attempted murders. Good news! Kevin Sane lived. Bad news! He wished he didn’t. Photo courtesy The Morinville News.
murder, spiking Sane on his head with a German suplex. Sane nearly put Slammer away with a European missile dropkick from the top rope, but upon returning to the top rope he fell victim to Slammer’s rule-breaking tactics, as Slammer shoved the referee into the ropes and caused Sane to crotch himself before demolishing him with the Tower of London. A fitting finisher for convict who loves to torture his opponents in the ring.
Winner: Slammer via Tower of London
Following Slammer’s removal from ringside and Kevin Sane’s presumable journey to an entire tub filled with ice, What About Ivan introduced “Hotshot” Johnny Devine and Miss Danyah. Devine had a bone to pick with Sgt. Hazard, but unfortunately Hazard had been unable to make it to the show. As such, Devine needed somebody to beat up, and that somebody would be Andrew Hawks after the “High Risk” Newfoundlander emerged from the locker room to answer Devine’s open challenge. Hawks complimented Devine’s career, saying that is what he aspired to, and to get there he would go through Devine. Unimpressed, Devine declined the challenge, only to be slapped hard in the face, provoking him into accepting the fight. With the main event settled, the proceedings moved on to day’s third bout.
Triple Threat Elimination Match
THE NIGHTMARE vs. STRIFE vs. BIG JESS YOUNGBLOOD w/ Drew Dalby
The first triple threat match in FORCE Pro Wrestling’s history was fought under elimination rules. Unbeknownst to fans prior to the show, infamous manager and loudmouth Drew Dalby would be making his debut in FORCE to unleash his newest client, Big Jess Youngblood. The fans rained down hate on Dalby while Nightmare and Strife rained down blows on Big Jess, recognizing the danger posed by the mammoth 300 pounder. After low-bridging Youngblood out of the ring, Strife and Nightmare turned their efforts to each other and showed off their mat skills with an excellent series of holds and reversals. This was broken up by Big Jess dragging Strife out of the ring and smashing him head first into the ring post, at which point Drew Dalby took a few cheap shots while the referee focused on Jess and Nightmare in the ring.
In an ill-advised move, Nightmare attempted to slam Big Jess. It didn’t work out especially well, and resulted in Nightmare being squashed by
Big Jess puts the “FORCE” in pro wrestling. By attempting to separate his opponents’ heads from their shoulders against their will. Photo courtesy The Morinville News.
the big man. Strife broke up the pinfall attempt, but only to capture the glory of the first elimination for himself, as he smashed Nightmare’s head into the mat with a wrist-clutch driver shades of Dragon Gate’s Shingo Takagi.
Elimination: Strife eliminates Nightmare via wrist-clutch driver.
Enraged at Strife’s theft of his moment of glory, Big Jess assaulted the warrior from the Orient and then the two engaged in a brutal chopping battle. Youngblood came out on top and proceeded to punish Strife with a brutal power attack punctuated by a massive sidewalk slam for a near fall. “The Mohegan Sun” attempted to finish Strife with the sitout powerbomb that has won him many a match across Canada, but Strife was able to fight out of it and score a nearfall that brought the crowd out of their seats with a big running elbow. That started a valiant comeback on Strife’s part, as he followed up the running elbow with several near falls and attempted a back superplex, only to eat a huge elbow from Big Jess when Drew Dalby distracted him momentarily. Big Jess followed up with a moonsault that was akin to a mastodon falling out of the sky onto Strife’s chest, ensuring that the Pearl of the Rising Sun would stay down for the three count.
Winner: Big Jess Youngblood eliminates Strife via a moonsault.
Intermission
WILLIAM SAINT vs. HEAVY METAL
Originally scheduled to be William Saint against Mr. Fantastic, Heavy Metal took his complaints about not being booked by FORCE management into his own hands, entering the ring while wearing Mr. Fantastic’s mask on his hand like a sock puppet. Metal mugged Fantastic in the parking lot and took his place, a substitution that Saint agreed to simply because he was there to beat somebody up, and Heavy Metal qualified as somebody.
The bout began with some fast-paced technical work from which neither man could gain a clear advantage. Heavy Metal used his size to take control, but taunting Saint with the mask of Mr. Fantastic lit a fire under the Silver Lining of Professional Wrestling and Metal ended up wearing the mask while having his head smashed into the turnbuckles. Metal was able to slow down Saint and the pace of the action by throwing Saint to the floor and sucker punching him whenever he attempted to climb back into the ring. Upon Saint’s return to the ring, both combatants failed to hit a high-impact move from the turnbuckles with Heavy Metal dodging an attempted dropkick from Saint who in turn rolled out of the way of an attempted Tumbleweed by Metal. Saint tried to put Metal away with his signature Athabasca Slam, but ate a backdrop driver after a near fall for his trouble. The seesaw battle continued when Heavy Metal climbed the ropes again, apparently not having learned his lesson last time, and found himself in a tree of woe position on the apron where he took a brutal dropkick to the midsection.
Sensing that he was in trouble, Heavy Metal searched under the ring and found himself an ally in the form of a steel chair. He then tore off a turnbuckle pad to distract the official, who went about attempting to put it back in place. He attempted to get Saint disqualified by pounding the chair into the mat then throwing it to Saint while pretending he was hit in the head, but the referee was too preoccupied with the pad to notice, and instead Saint just actually pounded Heavy Metal in the skull with the chair, putting him down for the three count when the referee finally turned his attention back to the competitors.
Winner: William Saint via chair shot.
Guess how this is going to end for Andrew Hawks. Hint: not great. Photo courtesy The Morinville News.
“HIGH RISK” ANDREW HAWKS vs. “HOTSHOT” JOHNNY DEVINE
As the two men circled to begin the bout, Hawks busted out an evasive shoulder roll. Unimpressed, Devine busted out a roll of his own, followed by a derisive derpy hop. Devine got the better of a scientific wrestling exchange focused on doing damage to Hawks’ arm, then sat down in a corner to take a breather after Hawks got to the ropes. Hawks taunted Devine, saying that the veteran couldn’t keep up, then the two locked up again with Hawks coming away with a headlock which transitioned into a sidesaddle single-leg crab. Devine kicked away from the hold, then took another breather, inciting the fans who wanted to see Hawks’ fast-paced, high risk style. Devine received from help from Danyah in an attempt to make Hawks submit to a figure four head scissors, but Hawks was able to escape only to be felled an eye gouge and more cheap shots from Danyah. Hawks tried to put Devine away with a shooting star press after countering a sleeper hold with a back suplex, but Devine was able to roll out of the way. Quick to recover, Devine was able to hook the stunned Hawks for a twisted-lift suplex which he transitioned into an ace crusher, a devastating move that was enough to put away the already dazed Hawks.
Winner: “Hotshot” Johnny Devine via twisted-lift ace crusher.
After the match, Devine grudgingly acknowledged that Hawks put up a much stronger fight than he had anticipated, and had earned his respect as a competitor. Devine told Hawks that he would welcome a rematch in the future, but that next time Hawks should try not to lose.
FORCE’s return to Morinville ended with Johnny Devine and Danyah raising Andrew Hawks’ arms in the air as a sign of respect and the crowd cheering for both combatants.
Special thanks to The Morinville News, who covered FORCE’s return to Morinville on the front page of their paper and also provided the photos for this show recap.
RCW 9th Anniversary Show
May 12th, 2012
Glengarry Community Hall
Real Canadian Wrestling’s 9th Anniversary Show has come and gone, and it was the best RCW show I’ve seen. It wasn’t free from the “wait, what?” moments that RCW’s booking is prone to, but it was a much better effort overall than they’ve put on in quite a while.
The show got off to an inauspicious start as the ring announcer brought out Steven Styles to announce that two of the three big names that had been booked to perform on the show (Sabu and Konnan) would not be there. Given that two weeks prior Sabu had been found unresponsive in his hotel room on the day of the ECW reunion show, this wasn’t overly surprising. Konnan wasn’t explicitly mentioned but also unsurprising, since RCW probably blew the money they should have been using to bring him up on bringing him up last month just to sign autographs. Anyway, the words “suitable replacement” are tossed around and then Styles leaves and Evan Inferno comes out to announce his retirement due to a nagging neck injury. Well this is a bummer of an opening promo. Commissioner Dan Druff put a bit of a positive spin on things by announcing Andrew Hawks vs. Kid Kash for the Mid-Heavyweight Championship vacated by Evan Inferno later on tonight.
Bucky Briggs is very excited that he's doing something resembling an offensive move.
IRISH MIKE vs. BUCKY BRIGGS
I had never seen Irish Mike before, but hilarious bland name aside, he was pretty fucking impressive. This match was fast paced with Irish Mike demolishing Bucky Briggs with strikes that seemed motivated by an intense hatred of Briggs’ ability to live. He also took time out from making Briggs regret being born to hit him with an interesting variety of suplexes, highlighted by a northern lights and a running suplex, which I was previously unaware was a thing. He also missed a moonsault which looked like it hurt quite a bit. Bucky Briggs fired up and made a quick comeback before pinning Irish Mike with a sitout Rock Bottom bomb.
Aside from the finish, which came after Briggs hit about three moves (in total, throughout the match), this was a fun, high energy opener.
Winner: Bucky Briggs via Sitout Rock Bottom Bomb
Four Corners Tag Team #1 Contendership Match
THE FRENCH CONNECTION (Andrew Williams & Jean Marius) vs. BONECRUSHER & WILDCHILD vs. C-BLOCK w/ Officer Gordon vs. STEVEN STYLES & TED DANCIN’
RCW’s 16 foot ring is not big enough for a tag team match involving eight guys. Wrestlers could tag out from pretty much anywhere in the ring,
"Stop choking yourself, stop choking yourself, stop choking yourself!"
which would have really killed things if it was even the slightest bit serious. I actually had no idea it was a number one contendership match until I saw the results post the next day, which really explains the ending. I think my favourite part of this match was Jean Marius, despite the fact that he did virtually nothing in the ring. He came out dressed like a gladiator and then, when a fan ripped on Andre Williams for speaking an allegedly “foreign” language (French), he looked at the fan like he was retarded and said “foreign? Really?” Then he just shook his head sadly and walked to his corner. He wasn’t heeling on a fan, he was legitimately disappointed by that fan as a person. Outstanding.
Oh, and Steven Styles and Ted Dancin’ won. Ted Dancin’ got beat on for most of the match, but then he hit… somebody with a sidewalk slam. Steve Styles followed up with a big splash from the second turnbuckle for the victory while everyone else brawled on the floor. Andre Williams ended up down on the floor, which resulted in him being stomped by every participant from the other teams as the walked to the back.
This match didn’t kill the momentum of the first match, which is basically all there is to say about it. It wasn’t that good, but it didn’t ruin anything, so it was just sort of there.
Winner: Steven Styles & Ted Dancin’ via sidewalk slam and second rope big splash.
RCW Mid-Heavyweight Championship Match (Title Vacant)
ANDREW HAWKS vs. KID KASH
As far as the match goes, just watch it.
Winner: Andrew Hawks via Shenanigans.
There was also an extended aftermath. A very extended aftermath. The post-match promo was over ten minutes long and only half of it was understandable is what I’m saying. So buckle up, this is gonna take a while.
Irish Mike is also an amateur chiropractor. Bucky Briggs probably won't be a repeat customer.
First off, Kid Kash complained about Heavy Metal and Tommy Lee Curtis’ treatment of Kash like he was their henchman, then put over Andrew Hawks. Andrew Hawks returned the favour, then stood in the ring for like nine more minutes as a seemingly endless sea of other promos washed over the hall. Teddy Hart came out and said things. Many things. Many, many things. The gist of it was that Sabu was a druggie and that explained his absence, and that Kid Kash turned face to side with Hart and Hawks in the six man tag team main event (originally scheduled to be Sabu, Hart, and Hawks vs. Kash, Metal, and TLC). Hart challenged Metal and TLC to find someone who would be willing to team with them, but Metal said he had a contingency plan… it’s Bruce Hart. Bruce Hart has gotta be in his 60s at least, and he looked kind of terrible. If he knew where he was it would have been a borderline miracle. He will be the Supreme-Adonnas’ tag team partner. There was an unintelligible promo cut by Bruce, the gist of which is that Teddy Hart isn’t a real Hart. I think? Teddy Hart rebuts this, which doesn’t make it make any more sense, but the main event is set. If you followed all of that, give yourself a pat on the back.
Jailhouse Rules Match
SLAMMER vs. BIG JESS YOUNGBLOOD
This was easily the best-built feud in RCW in quite a while, in part because it was so simple. They had a match; it ended in a double count out. They had a rematch, but there would be no repeat of their previous bout, as it would be a lumberjack match; it ended in a double disqualification when the referee lost control of the lumberjacks. So now, the final encounter. In his desperation to beat Big Jess and prove that he’s the better man, Slammer challenged Big Jess to the ultimate contest of wills: prison rules. It’s basically an I Quit match. It’s also a 37 minute long bloodbath.
You can't really see it, but Slammer is about to jam a shank into Big Jess' head. Yes. A shank.
The beginning of this match was something that I wish heated blood-feuds would do more often: they just started to fucking fight. There were no cautious feeling out processes or nonsensical pinfall attempts to in the first two minutes (because if you hate somebody, attempt to beat them with a roll-up in 30 seconds, that’ll show ’em). Nope, Slammer gathered up as much of the chain connecting the two men by the wrists as he could, screamed, and launched himself at Big Jess like a jailhouse missile. Slammer got busted open the hard way early on after being thrown through three rows of chairs and then getting smashed in the back of the head with a trash can, which resulted in enough blood flowing from him that Michael Phelps tried to swim laps in it. Slammer also played into the gimmick of the match by pulling out A SHANK and going to town on Big Jess’ forehead, even using the shank as the basis of several modified submission holds. Because a camel clutch becomes infinitely more effective when you’ve got a big chunk of razorblade jammed into the guy’s head while you’re applying it. That’s just science.
I’m not even going to try to do play-by-play because this match was both long and chaotic. You can watch the video for that. Suffice to say, these two EARNED their third match of the night in a row, and I’m a little sad to see this feud go after Big Jess strangled Slammer into submission with the chain after moonsaulting onto him and putting him through a door (yes, a door).
Winner: Big Jess Youngblood via Technical Strangling.
The only knock I have on this match was that the emotional crescendo came about 25 minutes in with Slammer chaining Big Jess to the ring post and screaming at him to quit while bludgeoning him with various foreign objects in front of a terrified child. The ten minutes after this were still good, but I had a constant feeling of “okay, THIS spot will be the finish… nope, okay, then THIS spot will be… nope…” The strangling finish also took longer than it seemed like it should have, with Slammer being in the hold for about two minutes. Still, it was an excellent match and the best live indy match I’ve seen in a long time.
Intermission. This was a well-placed intermission, because it followed basically the perfect “time for a break” match. Everyone was pumped up about what they just saw, but also needed a break before being able to bring themselves to give a shit about anything else.
RCW Canadian Championship Match
KATO (c) vs. WAVELL STARR
This one took a few minutes to get the fans back and focused after the carnage that preceded it and the intermission. Kato was making his first defence of the RCW title, won in a battle royal at the Marie Ewaschuk Memorial Show last month by pinning Andre Williams with a roll-up. Wavell Starr was the third man in that scenario, and as a result got himself the first crack at the new champion.
This was very much a classical style of match, the type of thing you would have seen in the NWA in the ’80s. Wavell Starr played the dastardly heel who was determined to grind out the champion and very willing to cheat his balls off to do it while Kato played the plucky babyface who did his best to overcome the heel’s dickishness. The biggest spot in the match was Kato hitting a frog splash, which has become one of his signatures, but Wavell Starr was able to withstand the blow and escape. Kato was thrown out of the ring by Starr, distracting the referee who was busy counting the champion out, when all of a sudden Red Thunder showed up and threw a pair of brass knuckles to Wavell Starr! Red Thunder was a staple in Alberta wrestling up until a few years ago, having been a part of the Stampede Wrestling revival in the early 2000s and probably the biggest Native name in the Province. Of course, this was less exciting during the match because I hadn’t seen Red Thunder in a few years and didn’t recognize him with a goatee, so the live impression was “a random native guy is helping Wavell Starr! Weird.”
Anyway, Starr popped Kato with the knuckles upon the champion’s return to the ring, then pinned him to win the title. But wait! As he celebrated with Red Thunder, he dropped the brass knuckles by accident, causing the referee to realize what chicanery had occurred and reverse his decision, disqualifying Starr. Starr and Red Thunder then attacked Kato, laying him out with the belt and smashing him with a spike Tombstone piledriver.
Winner: Kato via Disqualification.
The Final Encounter
TEDDY HART, KID KASH, & ANDREW HAWKS vs. HEAVY METAL, TOMMY LEE CURTIS, & BRUCE HART
This match is billed as the final encounter between Teddy Hart and the Supreme-Adonnas, a feud which has been going on since I started going to RCW shows. For the most part it has been about Heavy Metal and Teddy Hart, with Tommy Lee Curtis and various random tag team partners of Teddy Hart providing some additional facets to it. Now there’s an additional wrinkle with Bruce Hart being related to Teddy (I’m not entirely sure how, and Teddy isn’t technically a Hart, so… yeah) and apparently having been brainwashed by the Supreme-Adonnas. I assume liquor was involved. Andrew Hawks and Kid Kash are also there.
Oh, and Steven Styles was there too, as the guest referee. Konnan was originally supposed to be in that role, but he wasn’t there, so clearly the best way to replace a Mexican icon is to use a guy who isn’t over in the company he owns. He also wasn’t much of a referee, as he kept attracting attention to himself at every opportunity. If the heel isn’t arguing the speed of a count, there’s really no need to start that argument with them, and at no point should a referee be laying across the middle ropes like they’re a hammock. Just sayin’.
Kash and Hawks were only really active in this match for the first ten minutes or so, after which they sort of faded into the background while Metal, TLC, and Bruce kicked the bejesus out of Teddy. At one point, both myself and the friend I went to the show with FORGOT that Kid Kash was in the match because it had been so long since we had seen him (he was lying on the floor on the opposite side of the ring). Towards the end they were both taken out with “injuries,” which was just as well since they weren’t really accomplishing much.
Bruce Hart, despite looking like he lived at the bottom of a bottle, was shockingly spry. When he got in the ring he moved around just as well as as the guys thirty years (maybe more) his junior and threw some really great looking strikes. I miss the old school foot-stomp during a punch, it just makes such a great noise and makes it seem like you really blasted the guy. Sure, he just stood there on the apron when Hawks and Kash were taken out of the equation and things started to get crazy, but the dude is like 60, so it’s hard to really give him crap for it.
The last known photo of Heavy Metal before Teddy Hart imploded his spinal column.
The crux of the match was a spot where the Supreme-Adonnas held Teddy Hart and Metal demanded that Bruce slap the shit out of him. Up until this point, Teddy and Bruce had only interacted when Teddy threw water at Bruce and screamed for him to “snap out of it,” which mostly just resulted in three rows of fans getting wet as he COMPLETELY missed Bruce with the sprayed water. Anyway, Bruce wound up, but couldn’t bring himself to hit family, and ended up smashing both Metal and TLC instead. Hawks and Kash returned to remove TLC and Bruce from the equation, leaving Teddy Hart to beat the everloving fuckshit out of Heavy Metal.
Hart dragged Metal around the venue in a wild brawl, hitting him with anything that wasn’t nailed down and smashing his head off of anything that was. The highlight of this section of the match was a piledriver on top of the merchandise table. Eventually Hart decided Metal had no more everloving fuckshit left to be beaten out of him and dragged him back into the ring, hit him with the powerbomb onto double knees, and that was that. The final encounter was over, and Teddy Hart stood triumphant over his bloody husk of a now-former rival.
Spot of the Night: Pretty much any of the high spots in the Jailhouse Rules match, but I’ll go with the moonsault through the door because… ouch.
Match of the Night: For the third show in a row, Slammer and Big Jess earn match of the night with their Jailhouse Rules match. Good on ya, boys. I hope you’re both still alive.
Overall: This was top-to-bottom the best RCW show I’ve seen. It’ll be interesting to see where things go in the coming months as the top draws, one of which is the booker, are in AAA Mexico.
