Wrestling’s 4R’s 4.18.11: Impact, Superstars & Smackdown Reviewed!

In HD where available…

By: Jeremy Thomas

iMpact! 04.14.11:

QUICK RESULTS:
Orlando Jordon def. Douglas Williams, Jesse Neal & Crimson [* ½]
Matt Hardy def. Kaz [** ¼]
The Pope, Hernandez & Jeff Jarrett def. Samoa Joe, Matt Morgan & Kurt Angle [** ½]
Abyss def. James Storm [** ¼]
Mr. Anderson fought Immortal to a No-Contest [**]

MATT HARDY vs. KAZ: This match was the first of three matches to establish who would get an advantage in Lethal Lockdown. Both men came with their Lockdown partners to the ring, though they were all ejected quickly. I had a lot of hope for this match, as Kaz is the kind of guy Matt often works with well. The match started off a little elementary as Matt kept the offense slowed down, and it was done fairly effectively. It would have been a bit dull if for the fact that it didn’t last for long before things picked up. Kaz bumped nicely for Matt and got a few of his own shots in as well; the match seemed to be almost but not quite an extended squash. Matt eventually got the win via the Ice Breaker, which is effective but looks remarkably silly. Good enough match, though not great.

HEY, GUESS WHAT? WE HAVE A KNOCKOUT TITLE MATCH AT THE PPV: Midway through the first hour we saw Madison Rayne in the ring with Tara, giving a nice false sympathy about Mickie James getting messed up last week. Her promo was stilted at first, but was purposefully stilted before she went into Madison mode and went full-on bitch on Tara. This was of course a way to bring Tara back toward face, so that Madison will end up getting her comeuppance and Mickie won’t lose her hair at Lockdown. It was decent work by Madison before Mickie came out and mentioned that she had a separated shoulder and wasn’t going to let that stop her. Mickie did good promo work here and this reminded us that they had a match—something that’s been kept on the backburner with everything else they have going on—and gave us a reason to care about it. That’s exactly what they needed to do.

SIX MAN TAG ACTION: This was a really enjoyable in-ring effort. They put three singles matches for the PPV together into a tag team match and while this doesn’t always work, it did so fine here. I often bitch about both WWE and TNA not giving their matches enough time, and this was a massive improvement from what we’re used to seeing. They got nearly ten minutes and made the most of it. Joe was in there and he looked really good; he finally locked up with Pope too and gave us a reason to look forward to that match. The heels worked well as a group, Joe looked impressive and I was fine with Angle and Jarrett running out, because it let the other guys shine. Pope got the win via nefarious means, and that was just fine. The image of Pope and Mexican America standing over Morgan and Joe was a solid one. Nice work by all involved.

AN OFFER ROB CAN’T REFUSE: Since Mr. Anderson gave Immortal the middle finger last week, it was RVD’s turn to get the offer from Immortal. Hogan laid out a moderately persuasive argument here about how Rob wasn’t taking a backseat anymore and how Rob took advantage of a situation to pin Sting last week. This was decently done; I think that it’s grasping at straws a bit for Hogan to make the argument that way, and there could have been better ways to go about it. Reference Rob’s past as a heel in ECW, for one. There are several other things they could have done, but what they used carried well thanks to Hogan’s delivery. Sting’s promo when he came out and acted as the good angel on Rob’s shoulder was well done. Rob left the ring to build a bit of suspense here, and then we got a fun little asshole promo by Bischoff about how Hogan has always manipulated Sting and had done so now. That resulted in an ass-kicking for Bischoff and Hogan begged off. Good stuff here, all in all.

ABYSS vs. JAMES STORM: This was the second of three two matches to determine who got the advantage at Lethal Lockdown. The second of two because they won the match so they didn’t have to go to a third. That’s definitely the first time I’ve seen that, so that was an interesting surprise. This was a pretty good match between these two; Abyss is still a good big man and of course Storm is a good brawler; they booked this match well and the two guys worked well with each other. Storm looked impressive as he really took it fearlessly against Abyss and got overwhelmed a couple of times. This was one of those matches that builds both guys and you have to appreciate when TNA does that. The match was shortish but it played well for the time it was given; this could have been great given more time but I’m fine with good.

BAD MOVE, MR. ANDERSON: Impact kicked off with a promo opening as per usual, with Immortal coming down to ringside as a whole as they recapped Anderson’s swerving Hogan last week to get his referee spot. Hogan called out Anderson and the TNA Stone Cold came to the ring and got inside of it. Hogan delivered a good, consistent promo here about how he was going to have to make an example of Anderson for flouting his authority. Anderson’s promo was really good as well, though there were a couple of times that it sounded as if his voice was cracking a la a fifteen-year-old. Anderson basically told Immortal to screw off and he got an ass beating for his trouble. This was not as effective as some past promos, because it didn’t do much in terms of definitively setting the main event—that came later—but it gave Immortal their payback and the promos were well-delivered. That’s enough to land this in puRgatoRy.

KEN ANDERSON vs. IMMORTAL: This was established by the announcers early-ish in the show that Anderson would be running “the Immortal gauntlet.” Gauntlet matches are often double-edged swords; on one hand, if you do it right you definitely build up your guy going solo but at the risk of burying the entire roster. (Triple H vs. Spirit Squad comes to mind.) In this case it was four men—Murphy, Rob Terry, Gunnar and Bully Ray, taking on Anderson. This was completely fine as three of these four guys are nobodies and Bully is in a lesser program. The first portions of the match were unsurprisingly short as Anderson made quick work of Murphy, then took some abuse from Terry before Anderson put him away with a Mic Check. I was actually happy with Terry’s work, which was above his usual. Gunnar’s ring work was decent though not spectacular until Ray came down and we had the actual match. I liked how they all worked Anderson’s leg; it showed some psychology in the match. Otherwise, this was a pretty standard match. Nothing special, but it did put Anderson over strongly and didn’t damage the credibility of anyone who actually had credibility. The ending was a non-ending and that knocks it down a bit, but I didn’t have a huge amount of complaints. This wasn’t bad, and it wasn’t good; it was just simply okay.

CRIMSON vs. JESSE NEAL vs. ORLANDO JORDAN vs. DOUGLAS WILLIAMS: This was a four-way singles match with the tag team partners on the outside, in order to promote their match at Lockdown. I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that interference happens. This was a really disjointed match with no apparent rules. Apparently you didn’t need to tag in to enter this match…wait, what? Meanwhile, Shannon Moore taunting Steiner was the focus outside and got almost as much attention as what was going on in the ring. After a couple minutes Abyss came down and beat the crap out of Abyss on the outside, which I assume the ref missed or something. The ring work was okay, but it got severely undercut by the antics around the ring, the lack of any rules leading to chaos and the short time. It was too bad, because they could have done something great.

THE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE SITUATION GETS UGLY: Early in the show we had Velvet slamming on the locker room of Angelina and Winter. Winter came out to taunt Velvet and laughed at the assertion that she had done anything to Angelina. Velvet promised that she would be calling Angelina to the ring. Yeah, THAT’s going to work out well. Winter’s promo work continues to be calm and assured, while Velvet gets worse and worse when she gets histrionic. She just got a little irritating here, but it wasn’t so much to ruin this little bit.

Late in the show Velvet got into the ring and demanded that Angelina come down. That brought Zombie Ang out with a bit heavier eye shadow and the slack-jawed expression. She was definitely more zombie-esque this time around, and I’m starting to think it’s a magic potion of some kind. Roofie-type drugs is too sensical, and yet the drink obviously has something to do with it. Anyway, I give Angelina credit for this, she’s playing the role well but I’m just not into it. I like Winter, I like Angelina and I like Velvet, but I am really not digging this and can’t wait for it to end.

Not a thing!

By: Tony Acero

Superstars 4.14.11:

QUICK RESULTS
– Chris Masters Defeated Curt Hawkins [**]
– Natalya and Gail Kim Defeated Melina and Maryse [*1/2]
– The Great Khali Defeated Zack Ryder [*]

AWESOME KONG: Yay! So excited to see her kill bitches dead!

CHRIS MASTERS VS. CURT HAWKINS: Both Curt and Masters have talent and they’ve been able to display it throughout the past few months but I strongly feel that there are times when they are on and times when they are off. This was one of the latter. Nothing was wRong about the match, however. I especially liked Hawkins’s counter to the shoulderblock, a move that Masters does weekly. It falls in line with his “student of the game” thing they are trying to sell. Other than that, this was just there.

GAIL/NATTIE vs. MARYSE/MELINA: A typical women’s match with the added expertise of Natalya and bridged Melina (yum). Gail took a beating for the bulk of the match while Maryse and Melina traded tags. It never really impressed but it wasn’t as bad as some of these Divas sometimes are.

GREAT KHALI vs. ZACK RYDER: It’s a Khali match, what do ya want from me, an analysis? Well it’s not wRong because Zack Ryder is awesome and even in match, his antics are on display. It’s a shame that he had to lose to Khali, but that was a given.

NOTHING

NOTHING

By: Steve Cook

WWE SmackDown 04.15.11

QUICK RESULTS:
Ezekiel Jackson d. Kofi Kingston (*)
Rey Mysterio d. Drew McIntyre (***)
Kelly Kelly d. Layla (*)
Christian wins a 20-Man Battle Royal to face Alberto Del Rio for the World Title at Extreme Rules (***)

ALBERTO DEL RIO PROMO & BACKSTAGE SEGMENT: The Essence of Excellence started Smackdown off by showing sympathy for Edge and requesting that he be crowned champion since he’s the #1 contender and all that. Teddy Long was all like “Nuh uh, we’re doing a battle royal and the winner of that be facing you at Extreme Rules, playa!” ADR got all mad and said he was happy that he made Edge retire and that he never liked Teddy. Teddy told him that his destiny was to shut up & stormed off. Good fire from Smackdown General Manager Long here, and ADR showcased his egoism & disgust very well. I also enjoyed ADR’s meeting with Edge backstage, where Edge shunned Del Rio’s attempt at a handshake after getting winked at. Probably a good idea.

REY MYSTERIO vs. DREW McINTYRE: The announcers were very impressed with Drew’s effort in a loss, as well they should have been. Dude’s become one of the top workers in the company over the past year or so and brought his A game to this match with Mysterio. My favorite part was either Drew clotheslining Rey while on his knees, or Drew falling flat on his back just in time for Rey to splash him off the top rope and end the match. Rey is Rey and had a typical Rey performance. His feud with Cody Rhodes was furthered with a pre-match promo from Rhodes that Rey interrupted. As I suspected, our man Cody is not happy with merely beating Rey, and will be looking to make him uglier than he is. Can’t wait! Seriously though, McIntyre really needs something to do because he’s got a whole lot of talent and nothing going on right now.

EDGE’S FARWELL TO SMACKDOWN: I’ll miss Tony Chimel’s voice cracking every time he tries to say “Rated R Superstar.” Part of me is still holding out hope that Edge will show up at Extreme Rules, screw over Christian and reveal that he’s not really retiring and he fooled all of us. It does seem like something Edge would do, except for the part where he’d willingly give the title to somebody else. Maybe he’ll run up the ladder and take it for himself.

Yes, I’m still in the “denial” phase.

20-MAN BATTLE ROYAL: Battle royals are usually pretty fun, and this one was no different. We got the feel-good moment of Christian winning the match so he could challenge for the title in honor of his best friend, and also take care of business with somebody who’s been a thorn in his side for quite some time. Rey Mysterio eliminated Cody Rhodes from the match and crushed yet another one of Cody’s dreams. We got some Corre dissension with Justin Gabriel tossing Wade Barrett out. Michael Cole tried to get back on Jack Swagger’s good side by absorbing a 619 meant for the All-American American, so we’ll see if Jack forgives Michael for that whole slapping thing.

EZEKIEL JACKSON vs. KOFI KINGSTON: There was quite a bit of good here…the dissension in the Corre was displayed well on commentary by Wade Barrett & Slabiel, Big Zeke tossing Kofi onto the Corre for no good reason was pretty funny, and he looked like a total hoss in defeating Kofi. What kept this from ending up in the “Right” section was my belief that Kofi shouldn’t be used as a jobber that gets squashed in two minutes. The fans like him a lot, he could be doing bigger & better things. Couldn’t Trent Barreta have done this? Zeke could have thrown him on top of the Corre from a lot further away and with a lot more force.

LAYCOOL COUPLES’ THERAPY & KELLY KELLY vs. LAYLA:
LayCool Couples’ Therapy & Kelly Kelly vs. Layla: There are only two things keeping this from ending up in “Wrong” or “Ridiculous”:

-My endless patience with people

-A Bert & Ernie reference

I think next week Layla should compare Michelle & herself to Peppermint Patty & Marcie and constantly address Michelle as “Sir.” The Kelly/Layla match was pretty uneventful except for Michelle & Layla having more issues after Layla losing again. Layla becoming the baby face here would be the smart way to go because it seems like pretty much everybody likes her more than McCool.

NOTHING OF NOTE.

NOTHING OF NOTE.

Until Friday, keep on kickin’ it!

…and remember to stay grounded!