Heat: The Space Age of Pro Wrestling

RCW Presents The Marie Ewaschuk Memorial Show
April 21st, 2012
Glengarry Community Hall

Real Canadian Wrestling’s April offering is a tribute to the late Marie Ewaschuk, one of the founders of the promotion. The ring announcer whose name I don’t know (sorry, ring announcer) read a pre-written tribute speech, which was a nice way to start things out. It’s a bit of a nitpick, but it would have made a lot more sense to have HER SON read the speech. It also would have gotten him some babyface heat, which dear lord he needs.

Dan Druff, RCW’s long-suffering commissioner, then made his way to the ring to make a big announcement. In my favourite catcall from the crowd in recent memory, when Druff takes a pause after saying “and that announcement is…” a fan yells out “you’re gay!” Ignorant? Yes. Completely fucking hilarious? Also yes. Druff, who is actually quite charming on the mic here, shuffles his feet awkwardly and mumbles “well I guess that’s out of the bag now” before recovering some gusto and announcing the new RCW website, rcwrestling.ca. The fan and Druff’s reaction to him actually made this segment fantastic, because otherwise it was just an announcement that took too long. There’s also talk of there being “limited edition” fliers promoting the website, which is the opposite of how promotional material is supposed to work.

ANDREW HAWKS vs. MATT FAIRLINE

Matt Fairline’s music continued as Andrew Hawks entered because apparently somebody screwed up Hawks’ music. Not a great start, but then Hawks and Fairline proceeded to tear the house down with a fast-paced thrillride of an opener, so it kind of balances out. Looking back on old reviews, I seem to talk about how great the openers are a lot. I don’t know why, but something about being in the opener of an Edmonton indy fed seems to make guys bust their asses to try to steal the show. This match came within centimetres of doing just that. Andrew Hawks also came within centimetres of rendering Matt Fairline sterile, but more on that in a bit.

Fairline is out of the Canada’s Wrestling Elite promotion in Winnipeg, and this was the first time I’ve seen him. He made a good impression, hitting interesting offence and generally working very smoothly with Hawks, which was especially impressive toward the end when Hawks signalled for a big flying knee. Fairline ducked it, Hawks landed on the second rope and sprung off to try it again, but was caught in a fireman’s carry which, after a quick adjustment, led to an air raid crash for a near fall. Hawks put Fairline away after a sunset flip powerbomb followed by a sky twister press which only missed landing squarely on Fairline’s balls by the slimmest margin.

Since his music didn’t work, Hawks asked the fans to help him out by chanting “Hawks!” as he headed backstage. They obliged and an opener that could have main evented with an extra five minutes was in the books.

Winner: Andrew Hawks via Technical Neutering (sky twister press).

STEVEN STYLES & BARRICADE vs. C-BLOCK (Ugg & Vince Austin) w/ Officer Gordon

Steven Styles came out after C-Block and got on the mic, then proceeded to bury his partner for no explicable reason by introducing him as the guy he beat fair and square last month, Barricade. This of course did not lead to Barricade beating the ever-living fuck out of Steven Styles with a waffle iron, although I greatly hoped it would.

This match… happened. It was probably around five minutes. Steven Styles came in off of a hot tag and got the business end of Officer Gordon’s nightstick in the dome because… I don’t know. A couple of weak clotheslines to a 300 pound Ugg was apparently enough for Gordon to get his boys intentionally DQ’d. Barricade then cut a promo about something not feeling right and being twisted up inside his stomach. He may win the rumble later via nuclear pants-shitting, and now I wished I had brought a lead poncho. Fuck the goggles, they do nothing.

Winner: Steven Styles and Barricade via disqualification.

BONECRUSHER vs. KATO vs. KEISHI MATSUNADA

When this match started I was not optimistic about having a triple threat match for no reason, which I have seen enough of to determine is an RCW staple of some sort. Usually they suck. In this case, however, it was a delightful surprise, as the entire thing turned out to be a comedy break before the big rumble.

Kato usually wears Muay Thai gear, but tonight he came out in a sparkly gold hoodie cape and red leopard-print trunks complete with velcro-attached tail and I have no idea what I’m looking at right now. Keishi is finally wearing a shirt, which I approve of. Dude can wrestle, but the shirt is his friend.

This was my second time seeing Bonecrusher, and the first was in a triple threat match for no reason (speak of the devil!) that… to say it sucked would be an insult to things that suck. Things that suck would be writing me angry emails berating me for making such a comparison. That triple threat match was on a whole other level. Turns out it wasn’t Bonecrusher’s fault, because he was incredibly entertaining in this match-up, despite his lack of experience.

Bonecrusher got beat up in the opening, then decided he’d had enough after falling out of the ring post gigantic knee to the beard and took a seat in the front row. Kato and Keishi decided to go along with that and just kept wrestling, and then the bit became amazing because the lady whose seat Bonecrusher was in came back. And she was old. And would like him to move. She yelled at him, then he gestured that she sit on his lap… AND SHE DID. YES. Old lady for spot of the night? Might happen. But then Bonecrusher got back in the ring and got beat up some more, leading to him getting squashed with a brutal splash from Kato. But uh oh, dissension amongst the babyfaces! Keishi pulled Kato off the cover and went for a pin of his own, which Kato broke up, then they had some sort of martial arts fight because they’re Asian. Wait, no, they just wrestled more. My bad. Eventually Bonecrusher came back by ripping off Kato’s tail – and no, I never thought I would write that in a wrestling show review either – and choking him with it. He then dumped Kato into the concession stand and blocked the door before returning to the ring to powerslam (I think? I can’t remember) Keishi for the victory in a match that got more laughs out of me – on purpose – than any that I’ve seen live in a long time.

Winner: Bonecrusher via his beard.

Following the triple threat, the First Nations Sensation, Wavell Starr made his way to the ring for his RCW debut promo. The mic broke immediately. Several minutes of awkward silence followed as somebody found a new one that worked, and Starr proceeded to cut part of a babyface promo, then turn on his heel and berate the audience for being jealous that a native could be so successful. This promo was really good, and set up Starr as a heel for later.

MARIE EWASCHUK MEMORIAL BATTLE ROYALE

Okay so here’s the deal: All-American Steve Rivers was the RCW Champion, then he did… something? Anyway, he was stripped of the belt and left to work for Monster Pro Wrestling. There was a triple threat match (the aforementioned pit of sucking terror) for the number one contendership, and now there’s a royal rumble to determine the champion. It’s a 20 man rumble, ostensibly, although only 18 guys actually entered.

The first two entrants were Kato and Andre Williams, and they did basically nothing because the entrants were coming out on thirty second intervals. It felt like less, because half of the entrants were already in the ring at the five minute mark, and that was also around the time when the first guy got thrown out. I’m not going to try to do play-by-play, becacuse it would be entirely composed of “and then a bunch of guys punched/chopped/elbowed each other in the corners.” I have no idea why the rumble for the RCW belt wasn’t the main event, other than they anticipated that it wouldn’t be very good. Although in that case, why have it at all?

Barricade was announced, then the announcer added that they couldn’t find Barricade roughly three seconds later, so clearly they looked very hard. Barricade was gone because he had assumed his alternate persona, Ted Dancin’, and entered a few numbers later. Apparently the knot in his stomach from earlier was caused by lack of dancing. Evan Inferno was announced as one of the last few numbers (I want to say 18 but I wasn’t keeping track, so that’s just a straight-up guess), then just didn’t come out. Andrew Hawks destroyed Kato with a torture rack into a spinning sitout powerbomb after the ring had emptied out quite a bit in what may have been the only actual move used in the match. He got thrown out shortly thereafter, leaving the final three to compete in a one fall triple threat match for the title.

Oh, did I forget to mention that the final three competitors in the rumble would compete in a one fall triple threat match for the title? Because they did. I don’t know why. The three wrestlers involved in the triple threat match were Kato, Andre Williams, and Wavell Starr. Starr and Williams worked over Kato, then turned on each other over who would get the fall. Hm… I think I saw something like this before. Half an hour ago, perhaps. Starr ate an inadvertent knee smash from Williams when Kato ducked a double team attempt, knocking Starr out of the ring and allowing Kato to roll up Williams for the three count.

Winner and NEW RCW Champion: Kato via roll-up.

Intermission. Yes, that’s right, the royal rumble wasn’t even in the second half of the card. During intermission, there was a couple that was like five seconds from straight-up fucking that were making out in various locations around ringside, including sitting on the apron. Security? Anybody want to prevent this potential ring-fuckery? No? Okay. Oh, and Konnan came out to sign autographs because a lot of RCW guys are working for him in AAA. If this was paid for out of the promoter’s pocket, it was a terrible use of money.

EVAN INFERNO vs. BUCKY BRIGGS

Here’s the ultimate summation of this match: when I was looking at the results I jotted down on my phone to write this summary, I realized I forgot to write anything about this one. It was boring. Bucky Briggs won with a small package. Evan Inferno has NO offence. Bucky Briggs gets a Mid-Heavyweight Championship match against Inferno next show. Nobody cared. This was not a smart choice to come out of intermission with, as it killed the crowd for the beginning of the lumberjack match.

Winner: Bucky Briggs via ennui.

SLAMMER vs. BIG JESS YOUNGBLOOD

In contrast to the lead-in, this match was excellent and, spoiler alert, the winner of the match of the night award. Slammer and Big Jess have wrestled a few shows in a row now, and their chemistry has really developed well. The lumberjack elements of this match were weird and didn’t matter at all until near the end of the bout when they actually started to do things other than kneel at ringside looking like entourages in the wrestlers’ corners. Slammer adjusted his offence and added a bunch of knew wrinkles to it that he could actually do to Big Jess, including a front-falling ace crusher (there’s an actual name for it but I can’t remember what it is) and a bunch of interesting new ways to throw clubbing forearm smashes and lariats. Jess plastered Slammer all over the mat with power moves, as he does. The two went back and forth beating the living man-piss out of each other for quite a while with limited use of the lumberjack stipulation until Slammer charged at Big Jess with an attempt at a diving shoulder block, but Jess moved and Slammer wiped out Andre Williams with what was essentially a suicide dive. The lumberjacks started brawling, then Big Jess told physics where it could shove its “laws” and hit a flipping dive over the top onto the lumberjacks. As the mass of humanity crashed to the floor, Slammer emerged from the far side of the pile, crowing about how clever he was for having avoided being pancake-ified. He didn’t escape the resulting giant brawl on the floor

Aaaand that giant brawl on the floor was the finish, as it would turn out. Yes, a lumberjack match ended in a no contest when the referee lost control of the chaos on the floor. Although saying he lost control implied that it’s possible to have control over 12 guys whose sole short-term desire is to punch the bejesus out of the closest man in his underwear. Anyway, the match was a no contest, which upset Slammer to no end. He got on the microphone and lamented the decision, asking what it was going to take to beat Big Jess. He says he didn’t want to go there, but now he’s going to have to, because goddammit he HAS to beat Big Jess – prison rules. The only way to win is to make your opponent declare that they are your bitch. So, uh, that’s going to happen on an alleged “family show,” but I can’t really complain because it will probably win match of the night on that show too, giving Slammer and Big Jess an unprecedented three-in-a-row.

Winner: No contest.

TEDDY HART & PISTOL PETE WILSON vs. SUPREME-ADONNAS (Heavy Metal and Tommy Lee Curtis)

The most important thing you need to know about this match is that Tommy Lee Curtis is wearing bright yellow Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake pants. Let that sink in. Bright. Yellow. Brutus. Beefcake. Pants.

The match began with Teddy Hart on the mic. If you’ve read these RCW reviews before you should be aware of what that means: crazy be up in heeyah. Teddy cut a fairly standard (for him) promo about how nobody cares about wrestling in Alberta except for us fans, and nobody makes a living in wrestling unless they’re full-timing in WWE, TNA, Japan, or Mexico. So he basically just shit on Alberta wrestling, as he often does.

Moving on, there’s match. Now, Hart and Pistol Pete are the RCW Tag Team Champions, but as far as I can tell this was a non-title bout, which will make more sense when I talk about the finish. The bulk of the match featured the Supreme-Adonnas and Pete Wilson doing lucha libre chain wrestling, which, if you haven’t seen it, is mostly North American chain wrestling but with like 900% more arm drags. This part of the match was a lot of fun. It was all the things I like about lucha libre (colourful costumes, fast pace, and flips) with none of the things I don’t (complete absence of psychology that I understand). So that’s great. Then Teddy Hart was tagged in and psychology went out the window in favour of a bunch of head drops and super flips. His omnipresent powerbomb onto double knees was only done twice, which was a nice change of pace from the last time I saw him, when he hit roughly 37 powerbombs onto said double knees in the span of about two minutes. Teddy goes on his rampage, then there are dives to the floor from both he and Pistol Pete. Then there’s a weird, scary spot involving dives into the ring. With both Supreme-Adonnas prone, Pistol Pete goes for his 450 splash on Tommy Lee Curtis but is met with knees. So far so good. Teddy Hart then proceeded to eat Metal’s boots on the way down during a moonsault. Again, so far so good… except that Teddy Hart was about two inches from landing with both feet on Pete Wilson’s head. Pete Wilson was clearly the luckiest man in the building. At some point in this whole thing, Heavy Metal busted out a cool new move, which was a variation of Shingo Takagi’s wrist-clutch bomb finisher that was a suplex instead of driver. If you don’t know who Shingo is, YouTube some of his Dragon Gate stuff. I fucking love Dragon Gate.

As is the tradition in these Supreme-Adonnas vs. Hart and somebody matches, the somebody takes the fall. Heavy Metal picked up Pistol Pete in a Gory Special, then throws him backwards into the waiting Mr. TLC with a Gory Special Bomb/Ace Crusher combination that looked really difficult to time. They got the win, but at no point did the belts come anywhere near them, so I assume the Tag Titles weren’t on the line.

The Supreme-Adonnas then decided to be dicks and attack Teddy Hart’s wife, as they often do since Ted keeps bringing her to sit in the audience despite the fact that that she is attacked pretty much every show. This time, Andrew Hawks ran out to save her and chased off the Supreme-Adonnas. Then he hit a shooting star press from the top rope to the floor, which was fucking outstanding, but seemed unnecessary since the Adonnas (that sounds stupid, I shall not use that again) were basically thwarted and making no move to threaten anybody. Still, it was REALLY cool. Then a trios match was made pitting Teddy Hart, Sabu (who had been announced for the next show several months earlier), and Andrew Hawks against the Supreme-Adonnas and a partner of their choice.

Because I’m writing about a show that happened a few weeks ago, I now know about Sabu’s recent medical issues. RCW has made announcements addressing those issues, and have promised to replace Sabu with an equal star should they need to.

Spot of the Night: The flying knee/springboard/fireman’s carry catch/air raid crash spot from the Matt Fairline vs. Andrew Hawks match. Awesome.
Match of the Night: Slammer vs. Big Jess. The lumberjacks were mostly pointless before the end, but it was an excellent match anyway.
Pants of the Night: Tommy Lee Curtis for his bright yellow Brutus Beefcake pants. He wins that award in perpetuity.
Overall: Much better. This was significantly better than Goldrush. There was typical RCW booking weirdness, but this show boasted one excellent match (Slammer vs. Big Jess), and three solid matches (Fairline vs. Hawks. Supreme-Adonnas vs. Hart/Wilson, and the triple threat) book-ending some duds in the middle (the rumble and Inferno/Briggs).

RCW Goldrush
March 10th, 2012
Glengarry Community Hall

This show review is going to be a little different, because this show was a little different. It was great fun in the same way that watching Botchamania is great fun: it was so bad it was hilarious. One thing to note off the top, because it comes up quite a bit, is that the bass on the sound system was up too high, so all of the mic-work sounded muffled. Not that being able to hear it clearly would have made most of it make any more sense.

To begin the show, Teddy Hart comes out to cut a promo. Crap. He has apparently recovered his kidnapped wife and cat since the last show, and cuts an unnecessarily long and rambly promo about how guys can’t make a living in indy wrestling unless they’re getting international gigs, then starts talking about how he’s going to bring the winner of the opening match to AAA Mexico with him. Okay. Knowing for a fact that both guys in the match are already booked to go to AAA in the spring makes this seem like a goofy thing to add to the match, and I can only imagine how little a fan who didn’t know that would care. Because you know what fans love? Hearing about wrestlers having matches in places where they can’t see them.

This announcement brings out Heavy Metal, who is also booked on that AAA tour. He claims that Teddy Hart is trying to politick Metal off of the tour by giving his spot to the winner of this match, and should be added to this match to defend his place on the tour. Did I mention all three guys are already booked on the tour? Anyway, it’s a match.

 Winner Goes to AAA Mexico
“High Risk” Andrew Hawks vs. “Hotshot” Danny Duggan vs. Heavy Metal

Being three of the best workers on the card, this match is really good until the ending. We’ll get to that though. Hawks and Duggan, being faces, double team the heel Heavy Metal until he ends up on the floor, where he stays for a while. Instead of selling being super injured by the small amount of offence that he absorbed, Metal just stands there and watches the faces beat the tar out of each other, which was a wonderful little touch of smart storytelling. Danny Duggan nearly won the match after hitting his finisher, a double knee drop from the top rope, which killed Heavy Metal. Most of his sternum touches his spinal column now. Hawks broke up the pin, then smashed Duggan’s injured arm (he banged it up at a show a couple of nights before) into the ring post. Hawks and Metal went at it, with Metal somehow being able to move after the double knees. Apparently a functioning torso isn’t that important to his style of wrestling. Metal smashed Hawks into the post, which busted him open, then body slammed him on the floor. After dragging Hawks into the ring and locking in the camel clutch, RCW commissioner Dan Druff had the referee stop the match, explaining that their insurance wouldn’t cover somebody leaking that much blood all over the place. “No insurance, clap clap clapclapclap” chant, which highlights the value of being at a show with about seven people: it’s really easy to start chants for your own amusement.

Winner: No Contest.

So the match is a no contest. Metal thinks he won, because he was in control. Teddy Hart returns, claiming Hawks never tapped out. After a whole bunch of hard-to-follow arguing, an eight man tag team match is set up for the main event. On one side is Teddy Hart, “Pistol” Pete Wilson, Andrew Hawks, and Kato. If they win, Teddy gets to shave Heavy Metal’s head. On the other side is the Rock ‘N’ Roll Revolution, comprised of Heavy Metal, “Mr. TLC” Tommy Lee Curtis, Byron Wilcott, and Pete Powers. Wait, who the hell is Pete Powers? He’s not in that stable. Anyway, if they win, Metal goes on the tour AND is Teddy Hart’s tag team partner, which is apparently the spot that Duggan and Hawks were wrestling for. If Teddy Hart’s team wins, Teddy Hart gets to shave Metal’s luxurious locks.

Duggan isn’t in the eight man tag, because his arm is too hurt. SO WHY WASN’T THAT THE FINISH!?!?!? If Metal and Hawks would have worked over Duggan’s arm they still could have done the doctor stoppage finish AND they wouldn’t have had Hawks bleed FOR NO REASON, then wrestle another match later. Argh.

And now we have a ten minute or so intermission as the janitor mops Hawks’ blood up. There’s a lot of it. I don’t know if he bladed wrong or what, but he was bleeding profusely and it got all over the place. So after a late start and a match of less than ten minutes, we’ve got an intermission.

Aaaand we’re back with the new C-Block line-up in action, which I’m looking forward to seeing.

C-Block w/ Officer Gordon vs. Tyler Colten & Marius

I don’t know which is which on the Colten/Marius team. We referred to them as flame pants and headband. C-Block has added Vince Austin as Ugg’s partner, as Slammer won his freedom a while back. This is the first I’ve seen of Vince Austin, but he stole the match with a flipping senton off the top rope to squash everybody on the floor. The fact that he somehow managed to avoid landing in the audience, which was about two feet away from the ring, was impressive. Ugg did his usual Ugg stuff, and capped things off with the 5 Star Ugg Splash, which was the second coolest thing to happen behind Austin’s flip.

Winner: C-Block via 5 Star Ugg Splash.

Dan Druff is back in the ring. Crap. For a guy whose entire position revolves around being able to talk, he’s not all that good at it. He’s got a Woody Allen-esque character that I kind of enjoy, but the fact that he spent the entire promo with his back to the hard camera bugged me. Anyway, the gist of it is that Steve Rivers, the RCW Heavyweight Champion, has been suspended for beating him up last month, and the following triple threat match will determine the number one contender. The participants are announced and I get sad.

#1 Contendership Triple Threat Match
Bonecrusher vs. Barricade vs. Steven Styles

Steven Styles takes a clothesline and bails to the floor, selling like he was shot in the face. The whole thing was kind of a clusterfuck. Styles, the owner and booker, apes AJ Styles but without the talent and with about a hundred extra pounds. Barricade is inexperienced but improving steadily, and Bonecrusher is still pretty green (his beard, however, is a veteran). This match was so bad that the retired wrestler sitting next to me got up and left because he couldn’t bear to watch it after about two minutes. The booker won, by the way. Indyriffic.

Winner: Steven Styles. I forgot how.

Oof. That was rough. Hopefully this next match will be a good palate cleanser. And then the participants are announced. Shit.

Andre Williams vs. Bucky Briggs

I don’t mind Andre Williams as a worker, and Bucky Briggs is serviceable in the role of “guy who gets brutalized and occasionally throws a dropkick,” but after the… thing… that I just watched, this isn’t the kind of match that’s going to grip my attention and reel me back in. Williams cut a promo that was probably about wanting the referee to count all of the falls in French, but I couldn’t really understand most of it due to the sound system muffling it. He had a French/English dictionary that he gave to the referee to help him out, which was funny. I didn’t really pay attention to the beginning, but towards the end Williams started busting out cool stuff to crush Bucky with, so that got my attention. He hit a nice spinebuster and powerbomb before missing a big splash from the second rope, which looked fantastic. And painful. Bucky escaped a Canadian backbreaker and won with a roll-up, ending Williams’ long winning streak with no build. I didn’t even know Williams was on a streak of any significance until the ring announcer mentioned it after the match.

Winner: Bucky Briggs via Roll-Up.

Intermission.

Slammer vs. Big Jess Youngblood

Slammer won his freedom from C-Block at some point over the last few months, and is now competing as a singles wrestler while Vince Austin fills in as Ugg’s tag team partner. Chants of “naked Slammer! Clap clap clapclapclap” led to Slammer tearing off his prison jumpsuit to reveal his new gear. I was told prior to the show that he was wearing Steve Austin-style black trunks now, which turned out to be a heinous overstatement of the amount of clothing he was wearing. They weren’t wrestling trunks, they were a black Speedo with the brand name scratched off. Then the match starts and he and Big Jess beat the bejesus out of each other. I’m not sure if Slammer even did a move the entire time, he just punched, kicked, choked, stomped and bellowed angrily. Big Jess did a moonsault which may have killed the ring. The finish came when both men were brawling on the floor and got themselves counted out. With a clean finish this probably would have been the best match so far, but as it was it was still pretty good and set up a lumberjack match down the road. I’d personally rather see a No DQ match, because lumberjack matches kind of suck, but a lumberjack match is what we’re getting.

Winner: Double Count Out.

After the match, Slammer and Jess continued to brawl on the floor, bringing several wrestlers and staff out to break things up. This is what led to the lumberjack match decision, and ended with the absurdly ramshackle entrance position taking a hard enough bump to bring the whole thing crashing down. The promoters are lucky it didn’t land on anyone in the audience (which it almost did). Also, whoever came up with the idea of building the entryway out of stacked up folding tables needs a smack, because that’s unnecessarily dangerous to everyone involved.

Some half-hearted attempts were made to rebuild the structure, with seeming uncertainty over whether to bother, then they gave up. But then spent a solid five minutes or so doing the 50/50 draw. If they knew they were going to do that, they might as well have just rebuilt the entryway during that time.

Teddy Hart, “Pistol” Pete Wilson, “High Risk” Andrew Hawks, and Kato
vs.
Heavy Metal, “Mr. TLC” Tommy Lee Curtis, Byron Wilcott, and Pete Powers

Pete Powers is part of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Revolution, apparently, despite having never appeared with them on an RCW show, or appearing on an RCW show at all in the last year or so (in Edmonton, at least). Kato is also added to this match with no explanation, instead of just having these two guys who aren’t involved in the Revolution vs. Teddy Hart feud wrestle a singles match. Okay then, moving on. Danny Duggan is in the corner of Teddy Hart’s team, since he wasn’t allowed to wrestle due to his arm injury. That’s important later. Kato looks SO high during his entrance that if he knows where he is or how he got there it’s a borderline miracle. Naturally, we wanted to see him get into the ring and botch so hard Maffew’s spidey-sense starts tingling from across the Atlantic, but he was just as good as he always is, so apparently he was just highly aware that his inclusion in the match made no sense and he was just there to kick some people. That was slightly disappointing, but then he did a bunch of cool stuff and everyone was happy.

Teddy Hart doesn’t get involved until the very end, and Andrew Hawks is only involved sparingly, which I suppose I can’t complain about overly much since most of his blood found itself on the mat instead of inside of him earlier. How much can you really expect a guy with no blood to do? I’m no doctor, but apparently that stuff is pretty important. He was still more exciting than half of the opposing team. Heavy Metal really carries the match on the heel team, as Byron Wilcott, while a solid worker, has a few chemistry issues and TLC and Pete Powers are pretty bland. Basically, when Metal is in the ring, things are going quite well. For the most part it’s a decent 8-man punctuated with plenty of whole-team brawls and chaos. There’s another attempt to kidnap Teddy Hart’s wife, who is sitting in the front row next to Danny Duggan, who does exactly nothing about it. Teddy Hart is able to step in and break things up, preferring using his violence to entertaining the idea of perhaps not putting his wife in proximity to people who had already kidnapped her once very recently. Speaking of Teddy Hart, he doesn’t get into the ring until very late in the match, at which point he comes in and hits his finisher, a powerbomb onto double knees (ROH fans will know it was Project Ciampa), roughly ninety-four times in a span of two or three minutes. Seriously, I’ve seen that move more times live from Teddy Hart than I have IN TOTAL in any other circumstance. Transitions? Pfft. Transitions are for dicks. POWERBOMB. Teddy was in the ring for two or three minutes total, and hit some neat stuff, and botched some attempts at neat stuff. He hit Heavy Metal with a short piledriver out of a rope-draped position sort of like Randy Orton’s DDT, which was pretty cool, but tried to hit some kind of swinging DDT thing from the top rope on Byron Wilcott and Pete Powers that resulted in somebody spinning the wrong way and the whole lot of them going down in a heap.

The match ended shortly after a spot straight out of lucha libre, which was appropo since half the guys in the bout would be working for AAA Mexico in the next few months. After some of the heels spilled out to the floor, everybody else took turns hitting big dives to the floor, highlighted by a TLC moonsault (perhaps the most interesting thing he’s ever done) and Andrew Hawks hitting some kind of corkscrew thing. Metal and Kato ended up back in the ring, when all of a sudden Danny Duggan got involved, getting into the ring and distracting Kato, which allowed Heavy Metal to punch the Asian Assassin in the balls which in turn gave Danny Duggan the balls to pop Kato square in the jaw. Kato went down, Duggan bailed, and Metal got the three count.

Metal made a big show of trying to get Teddy Hart to raise his hand in victory, and made several attempts to shake Hart’s hand before he finally gave in and accepted his handshake, saying that he was a man of his word and would honour his promise to take Metal to Mexico as his partner if he won. The Danny Duggan heel turn thing kind of got swept under the rug. I’m not sure why he turned on Kato instead of Hawks, since a turn on Hawks would instantly escalate the little feud they’ve been building into something major. But “why did they do that?” was the question of the night, so, I shouldn’t be surprised that I’m asking it again.

Spot of the Night: Vince Austin’s somersault senton to the floor. The lucha-style “everyone dives” spot from the eight man tag was probably more impressive, but Austin’s dive was more surprising and so gets the nod.
Match of the Night: Slammer vs. Big Jess Youngblood. This was actually a hard choice. The eight man tag had the most impressive moves, but the storyline surrounding it had a lot of holes that bothered me. C-Block vs. Marius and Colten was well-executed and accomplished what it needed to, but it was basically an extended squash. Slammer vs. Big Jess was well-wrestled and told a good story, building logically to the next step in their feud, so it gets the nod.
Overall: What an odd clusterfuck of a show. Was it an entertaining clusterfuck? Yes. Was it entertaining for the reasons intended by the promoters? Probably not.

 

From FORCE Pro Wrestling’s debut show in Morinville, Alberta on August 20th, 2011. “Cold as Ice” William Saint and Nightmare clash in the very first match in FORCE history, and I can’t think of a better match-up to kick off a promotion than these two guys in a 15 minute battle.