Impact Wrestling Review
October 28, 2016
By Gerald Bocook of Wrestleview.com
Ah, Halloween vignettes. It was nice to see House Hardy contain all of the holiday antics, and we had just about everything but a hay ride. A corn maze, “Treat or Deleet!” – only Broken Matt Hardy would give kids green beans as their treat – a joke about Fat Hardy to a girl dressed as a dozen donuts, Hurricane Helms being rejected for entry, Itchweeed doing yard work, Señor Benjamin tazing a Donald Trump costumer and Matt and Itchweeed wondering if a Hillary Clinton costumer Deleeted their e-mails before [u]Vanguard 1.0[/u] scared her off and Broken Matt Hardy proclaimed to run for President, and – following a premoneetion had by Broken Matt in the amazing maze of corn, a threat made by the masked group of anonymous vigilantes, now finally, officially referred to as DCC.
Aron Rex continues his turn to the dark side on Impact, driven by his desire to hold on to the Impact Grand Championship as if it’s going to be Hobbited to Mount Doom if he lets go of it for even a second. Using a new twist on the ol’ “brass knuckles” routine is a nice move, as it’s not too obvious, but you know that something ain’t right, and he did a good job of calling attention to his hands so you knew to look. The match itself was good, both teams had a chance to shine, and all the competitors had some fun things to do. EC3 got his hands on Drake near the end, when Drake was in the ring as the non-legal man, distracting EC3 and Godderz while Aron Rex geared himself up, and Godderz got a little shine in as well, and it’s nice to see him continuing to be a thorn in Aron Rex’s side for the Impact Grand Championship. My only issue with the match was Godderz going for his Adonislock after he and EC3 had been targeting Aron Rex’s shoulder and elbow. C’mon. Be smarter than that. The audience is.
Grado came out to support Robbie E in tag action, masquerading as a BroMans. The audience was confused as heck when Grado introduced Robbie E as “the best wrestler in the world”, but, it’s Grado. Go with it. After a costume change, a can of spray tan, and some glasses that were pulled out of… somewhere… we got a great bit between Robbie falling into Grado’s trance as they headed down to the ring, as Robbie was begging Grado to stop the entire time. Eventually, Robbie E just went with it. Why not? But just as Robbie E was feelin’ it, the black-and-white countdown started and the DCC appeared and destroyed Grado and Robbie E. Especially Grado. Poor bastard got a huge spike piledriver.
Team X Gold continued tonight as they made the smart decision to inject some story into the proceedings. And good thing, too, otherwise it could’ve gotten as stale as the opening round of the Cruiserweight Classic. Rockstar Spud made a declaration that his opponents in the newly-renamed Team DJZ, Team Go-For-Broke, were going to Decay, and boy, did he look smug while doing it. And, not surprisingly, took the fall for his team. Decay tried during the fast-paced, fun match, but Team Go-For-Broke sent Decay out of the ring and destroyed Spud to pick up another victory in the Team X Gold… what is this? A tournament? A round robin series? Have they said?
Contract signing! Boy, am I getting tired of Lashley’s lackadaisical attitude. It just doesn’t work for a guy chasing the title. He doesn’t seem to care. He doesn’t seem to care what happens, he just wants to punch someone, and that’s great for a Champion that’s been on a tear and has run through them all… but not for a guy that’s jumping through hoops to get his hands on a Championship. He downplays the efforts of the man that beat him, he says it was a fluke, a feel-good story, but all that really does it make Lashley look bad. Promo class 101; if you hype your opponent as a loser and you lose, you lost to a loser, and if you win, you beat a loser. If you hype your opponent up as a killer and you lose, you lost to a killer, and if you win, you beat a killer. What sounds better? It’s just poor presentation for Lashley, and that’s not something he needs.
After earlier in the day, Allie received some motivation from a hoodie-wearing TNA President Billy Corgan, she knew she was gonna get her ass kicked by Laurel van Ness (who had another creepy stalker interaction with Braxton Sutter in the back.) Allie, the former Knockouts Champion, was bullied by Laurel the entire match. It was pretty much exactly what we expected, with Allie getting in a couple of shots but ultimately falling to the more experienced Laurel. This story continues to build slowly, and that’s just how it should. Allie has been shown to be completely incompetent in the ring, and if she suddenly just beat down Laurel van Ness here, it wouldn’t make sense.
Throughout the show, we saw backstage segments hyping up tonight’s main event, including Brandi chasing down Maria for talking smack, Cody and Brandi saying that the Miracle was just smoke and mirrors, and the Bennett’s saying they’re just better than everybody else. They finally met in the ring in action, and lord, are the Bennett’s good at making everyone hate them. Cowardice, double-teaming, cheating, using the referee, everything they could do to keep Maria out of the match, it was great for the Bennett’s, until it started breaking down. Once Brandi got her hands on Maria, it was over quick, as Maria could only run for so long. Brandi seems well-trained, but she’s definitely inexperienced – I’m guessing that she didn’t get much time in the Performance Center before getting the gig as a ring announcer. I am confused, though, as to why Lashley attacked Cody. They’ve interacted before, but now, Lashley has a problem with him? It was funny seeing Brandi attacking him, though, and Lashley not even registering the hits.
This week’s Impact was a fun show. They certainly had a lot of fun with the Hardy’s segments, with Maria and Brandi, with Allie, and with Aron Rex acting like it was no big deal that he’s turning into a desperate cheater. Solid, entertaining wrestling everywhere (except the green Brandi, which was still exciting, just to see Maria getting some comeuppance,) and there weren’t a billion backstage segments! Good, but not great.