wrestling / Video Reviews
Dark Pegasus Video Review: Ring of Honor — Unscripted III
February 15, 2008 | Posted by
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| Ring of Honor — Unscripted III by J.D. Dunn I’m not sure what’s worse: that it keeps happening, or that I’m surprised it keeps happening. Every time I make a seemingly controversial comment in one of my reviews, it gets completely ignored and I get torched for something that’s far more innocuous. For reasons that should be obvious if you read this thread, there are some on the ROH board who are not happy with me. Some even bothered to come up with a complete psychological profile of me based on that one review. How cool is that?!? Most of it is based of misinterpretations of two separate reviews I wrote, but since enough people misinterpreted it, that comes back on the way it was written. Let me clarify. I never said in either my Glory by Honor or Final Battle 2007 reviews that Nigel was a phony or faking his injuries or that he purposely screwed the fans out of big title matches. Anyone who saw the post-show photos from the PPV taping knows that Nigel had been through a war. If you read closely what I wrote, it says that a fan sitting in the audience at Glory by Honor could easily interpret events Nigel as backing out of a fight because he wrestled through the same injury the night before. The point about Nigel backing out of Final Battle and the subsequent flap in the Observer was that I can definitely see ROH turning a real life event into a work. Even the 411 forumers questioned whether the original letter to the Observer could be part of a work not only to garner more attention and get people talking (there was a PPV to hype, ya know), but to turn Nigel into a more sympathetic figure. The fact that these flare ups between Nigel and the crowd made the DVD releases (while Samoa Joe’s rather innocuous TNA comment was edited out) makes it seem all the more possible that ROH is trying to weave the real-life tension with the crowd into their storylines. The fact that Nigel worked shows around the other shows he missed at least raises the *possibility* that something is up, and that has to be explored. Btw, I thought that the line about Gabe being creatively tapped out was much more controversial. On with the show… Oh, that pesky nor’easter, swooping in and socking in the Midwest with snow. Actually, I don’t even know what a nor’easter really is. Something from the nor’east, I guess. Anyhoo, this was scheduled to be a big Trios Tournament with the winners being able to book any match they want, and this year, it would have been a fine idea with all the faction warfare going on. Instead, inclement weather forced a heavy last-second rebooking of the show, so we get Unscripted III. You know, as devoted as Gabe Sapolsky is to kayfabe, you’d think “Unscripted” would be verboten as it relates to wrestling. Black explains that the Age of the Fall is about opportunity, and he’s going to capitalize against a former ROH Champion. He tries to headscissor Austin Aries early, but YOU CAN’T HEADSCISSOR AUSTIN ARIES! To the floor, Black slams Aries’ back into the apron. Back in, Aries stops short to avoid a dropkick, but Black backflips in mid-air to land on his feet. Cool. Aries dumps him and hits the best suicida in the business. Tyler takes over on the outside and tosses Aries into the barricade. Back in again, Black cuts off Aries comeback with a dropkick. Aries rolls Black to the apron to counter a sleeper. Tyler tries a springboard clothesline, but Aries ducks and hits his own clothesline. Aries takes over with the Stroke and Pendulum Elbow. Black gets his boot up to block the corner dropkick and hits a wicked boot to the face. Aries avoids a charge and hits his shinbreaker to a backdrop suplex. That sets up the corner dropkick for real this time. Black cuts off the 450-splash, but he can’t get whatever he was going for. They slug it out. Aries nails the Brainbuster and finishes with the 450-splash at 14:32. Black reminds me a lot of Punk in the ring, and not just because of the physical resemblance. Hopefully, he continues to grow as a wrestler. *** Lacey’s ring gear is… interesting. In a good way. This is a rematch from the SHIMMER Title finals. Del Rey dominates early, working over Lacey’s arm. Del Rey goes with the Gory Special into a pinning combination for a few nearfalls. Lacey catches her trying to slip through the ropes to escape a corner charge. Lacey yanks her down into a backbreaker. Allison makes herself useful by choking Del Rey on the ropes. Lacey avoids a charge and hits another backbreaker for two. Lacey stops to take a drink and gets clubbed from behind. Del Rey blocks a charge and comes off with a missile dropkick. Lacey makes the mistake of trading blows with Del Rey, but she manages to DDT her and roll over into a Butterfly Lock. Del Rey powers up and hits a Fisherman’s Suplex. She kicks Lacey in the head and hits the Royal Butterfly Slam, but Allison Wonderland pulls her off the cover. Lacey rolls her up for two, but Del Rey kicks out and finishes with a German Suplex at 15:13. The wrestling was fine, but I kind of wish Lacey would alter her character to fit in more with the “revolutionary” ideals of the Age of the Fall. She just seemed like the same old Lacey with a dye job. **1/4 This is the Match for Wayward Indy Wrestlers. The “Party Danimal”? It’s too bad the WWE scooped up Silas. I think he could have gotten over based on the entrance alone. Speaking of fantastic entrances, Dingo comes out to Men at Works’ “Land Down Under,” and the ring announcer even announces him as “D-I-N-G-O, and Dingo is his name-O.” He looks like Bryan Danielson’s little brother. Lots of headscissors early. Silas, who reminds me of a young Jerry Lynn, catches Trik with a Northern Lights Suplex for two. Skyfire comes out of nowhere to hit a one-footed dropsault. The Party Danimal wipes out Skyfire and Dingo with a suicida off a corner whip. Daniels follows them out with a dive and then catches Trik in a gutbuster. Silas refuses to give the fans another dive, drawing some heel heat. Trik hits Dingo with the 2K1 Bomb (Cross-legged Michinoku Driver). Daniels hits him with a Shotgun Blast dropkick and then drops him on his head with the Rubik’s Cube (Electric Chair Piledriver). Everyone starts hitting finishers, but Dingo catches Lawrence with an enzuigiri and finishes him with the Dragon Suplex at 9:24. On the one hand, I see some good talent hidden in there. On the other hand, I can see why most of these guys are jobbers or not on the main show. ** Hero stalls, of course. Claudio catches up with him and goes for the Giant Swing. Hero grabs the ropes to block, so Claudio just pulls him off and applies a cravat. Hero freaks out and bails, so Claudio casually follows him out and puts him in another cravat. Funny. Back in, Hero grinds the match to a halt with his showboating. He comes off the top with a double ax-handle but Claudio gives him the stop sign and knocks him off his feet with an uppercut. This is like the Bugs vs. Daffy of wrestling matches. The Giant Swing gets two. Hero hits a roaring elbow out of nowhere and follows up with a neckbreaker. The front-flip neckbreaker misses, but Hero blocks a European Uppercut and slams Castagnoli’s shoulder into the mat. Hero goes to work on the arm, going so far as to have Bobby lay on Claudio while he slams Castagnoli’s arm into the barricade. Claudio powers out of a short-arm scissors but can’t get Hero up for the Ricolabomb. Hero hits another roaring elbow, but Claudio catches him on the top rope with an uppercut (sort of). That leads to a headscissors and Apomari Waterslide at 21:10. Larry Sweeney interrupts the celebration and announces that, because it was an unsanctioned match, ROH has caved to his demands and turned it into a 2/3 falls match. Second Fall: Hero jumps Claudio from behind and hits the Hero’s Welcome at 22:18. Third Fall: Hero goes back to work on the shoulder. Claudio tries to come back with an uppercut but whiffs on it. Hero locks in the Hangman’s Crossface. Claudio makes the ropes, though. He tries an O’Connor Roll, but Hero grabs his arm on the bridge and counters to the cross armlock. Claudio powers up and rolls Hero onto his shoulders to pick up the win at 26:11. Sweeney threatens to have the decision reversed and the ref fired. It really didn’t need the last two falls. Most of the fun in the match is just Hero’s antics as the arm work started to get monotonous. **3/4 The jobbers don’t provide much resistance. Pearce & Hagadorn finish with a spiked piledriver at 1:56. 1/4* Jigsaw wipes out the Hangmen with a twisting plancha. Albright catches up with him, though, and tosses him into the barricade. Back in, Jigsaw goes for a crossbody but misses and hangs himself in the ropes. Albright hits him with the Dragon Suplex, but Jigsaw elbows out of the Half-Nelson Suplex. Albright hits some Kobashi Knees and a Pump-Handle Uranage. ONE, TWO, TH-NO! The 61Knee misses, and Jigsaw rolls him up for two. Jigsaw springboards off the second rope – right into a Half-Nelson Suplex at 8:13. Honestly, Albright sold a little too much for Jigsaw. Like Jim Cornette said about Batista: He’ll make the WWE a ton of money, but they can’t have him going out there and selling armdrags and headscissors all night. Not that Albright it going to draw like Batista any time soon, but the principle still applies. ** Pearce, Hagadorn and Albright clear out and head to the back. They brawl into the audience, and Delirious bites BJ’s face. BJ uses chairs to come back. The fight spills back to ringside where Delirious hits a Panic Attack into the barricade. Whitmer’s forehead is ripped open. To the ring, Whitmer takes over for a while, and things lose focus. Delirious comes back with a missile dropkick and bites BJ’s wound. BJ catches him with a German Suplex into a Dragon Suplex into a powerbomb, but that sequence only gets two. Delirious comes back and hits Shadows over Hell. Hagadorn returns and yanks Delirious off the cover. The H3 return and brutalize Delirious with a steel chain. To top it off, they wrap the chain around his neck and hang him over the top rope. Some of the underneath guys run down to save him, and they draw the H3’s wrath long enough for ROH officials to carry Delirious to the back. **1/2 Danielson heard his gimmick, if not his name, called, so down he comes. Jimmy attacks him during his entrance. Danielson roars back but can’t put the cross armlock on. Jimmy slips out of the trapped elbows, but Danielson takes him down again, this time into the Mexican Surfboard. That segues to a Dragon Sleeper. Jimmy bails and takes his knee brace off. Back in, Jimmy tries to elbow Danielson’s ribs, but Dragon powers out and drops him with a modified Schwein. He tries to rip Jimmy’s arm out of socket and nails him with a dropkick. Jimmy kicks him in the face to block a half-crab, and that knocks Dragon silly. Jacobs commences pounding him in the head, but Dragon roars back with a few clotheslines and a knee strike. CATTLE MUTILATION! Lacey hops up on the apron and distracts the ref. Danielson releases the hold and goes after her. Jacobs tries to use his trusty cane, but Danielson yanks it away from him. Oh, but Jimmy cleverly has a hidden spike in the cane that he slips out and stabs Danielson in the face with. That only gets two, but Jacobs has the advantage now. Jacobs wipes him out with a pescado. Back in, Jimmy goes up, but Danielson superplexes him. Danielson roars back yet again, this time with a running forearm and a jumping spin kick. Jimmy ducks out of the ring, so Danielson follows with a tope. Back in again, Jimmy blocks a charge and locks in the End Time. Danielson tosses him aside but jumps right into a Spear. Danielson blocks the Contra Code and slaps him. That sets up a German Suplex into Cattle Mutilation. Jimmy squirms, so Danielson segues to the trapped elbows. Jimmy blocks and counters to the Contra Code, though! ONE, TWO, THRE-NO! Danielson blocks the senton and knocks Jimmy silly with a lightning legline. That sets up the stomping and Triangle Choke. Jimmy makes the ropes, though. Dragon sets up for the belly-to-back superplex, but Jimmy elbows him and counters to a top-rope DDT. That leads right into the End Time. Danielson struggles, but Jimmy doggedly retains the hold and picks up the submission win at 23:44. This was good, but Match of the Year talk is WAY overhyping it. The Age of the Fall *finally* has some legitimacy. ***1/2 This seems rather anticlimactic after the last match. They do the usual brief one-on-one sequences before Jay assumes the face-in-peril role. That doesn’t last long as Stevens gets the hot tag a few minutes alter and cleans house on all three members of the NRC. Mark adds a no-hands over-the-top tope, but Davey missile dropkicks Stevens in the back to allow the NRC to take over again. Strong backbreakers Stevens into the tree-of-woe (that’s a keeper move for the arsenal). He launches Romero right into a dropkick (hitting Stevens right in the crotch – OW!). Mark gets the tag and cleans house with a thrust kick and the T-Bone suplex. The faces hit a series of double and tripleteam maneuvers. Richards cuts off the momentum with a handspring kick to Mark. He gets cute, though, and springboards right into a DVD from Jay. Richards and Romeo team up for the sandwich kicks, which is the first time I’ve seen that work in a long time. Mark hits an SSP onto the pile. The Briscoes hiptoss Romero into a powerbomb from Stevens. Strong blocks the Springboard Ace Crusher and shoves Mark into an Ace Crusher from Romero. Everyone hits big boots, but Davey catches Jay in a Capture Suplex. That sets up the Tombstone. He decides to go up instead of going for the Chimera, so Mark is able to recover and T-Bone Superplex him. The faces hit triple finishers (Doctorbomb, Cutthroat Driver and Jaydriller) to pick up the win at 24:00. This was not bad as far as effort goes, but the crowd was just out of it. They just don’t buy Stevens as a babyface, and Strong has made a pretty woeful heel stable leader. **3/4 |
The 411: Not surprisingly, this thrown-together mishmash of matches isn't much to recommend. I admire the fact that they threw out the big Jacobs-Danielson upset out there to send the fans home with at least *some* big moment. There isn't anything horrible to drag down the show, nor is there much excitement in any of the matches outside of the opener and the Danielson/Jacobs match. ROH's late-07 woes continue. Thumbs down. |
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| Final Score: 5.0 [ Not So Good ] legend |
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