NYWC Psycho Circus XV

Joe Gacy vs Alex Reynolds

This is for Gacy’s CZW title. I like both guys, but this wasn’t their best work. For a big guy, there was a lot of needless motion by Gacy, adding superfluous backward rolls into some of his moves at the start. Much more enjoyable was his big dive, where he threw his frame to the outside recklessly. Reynolds wrestles like a proper heel here, refusing the audience request for “one more” chop to dish out an eye poke instead, and nailing a nasty looking kneedrop. His pop-up Codebreaker looked a bit poor however. I also liked the quick DVD that Gacy hit, but by the end this just felt like guys hitting moves on each other. Gacy wins with a handstand cutter and the Rings of Saturn, but both are capable of better.

Anthony LaCerra & Jesse Vane vs Milk Chocolate

LaCerra and Vane are defending their tag titles here. Really enjoyed this match, thought both teams looked excellent. Vane was particularly impressive, guy has a good look and moved really well throughout the match. Both teams shared some fluid team work to start, with quick tags and smooth looking double-teams. LaCerra hits a big flip dive to the floor, which is impressive for a guy so big. He got really good height on it too. Vane eats an STO on the apron by Watts, before Watts nails a huge cannonball from the top rope to the floor. It had been built up by an earlier spot where Watts had been reluctant to go up top, so it got a nice response. The end was pretty effective here, as Milk Chocolate have control of Vane and look to be about to hit a double-team move, but Vane fights back on Randy Summers, and LaCerra rolls up a distracted Watts for the win. Good stuff.

Willow Nightingale vs J-Redd

This is for the Starlet’s title, a women’s belt held by the male J-Redd for some reason. The biggest issue people often have with intergender matches is that they find it unrealistic for the woman to be able to hurt the man. Here, I find it unrealistic that the ratty bag-of-pipe-cleaners J-Redd could cause any damage to the better built Nightingale. She easily wins a test of strength in a fun spot, but this isn’t a good match, with both performers looking tentative and sloppy in places. The best looking move of the match is J-Redd’s partner GIT sweeping out Nightingale’s legs as she runs the ropes, just a nice fluid movement. Thankfully, this is pretty brief, as two other female competitors come out, take out GIT, hit a double Twist of Fate on J-Redd, and Nightingale hits a powerbomb to win.

Bull James, Mouse, Tommy Dreamer & Rex Lawless vs Stockade, King Mega & the Hounds of Hatred

This is a Psycho Circus match, which seems to be an unholy mix of WarGames, Survivor Series and the Cage of Death. There’s two sides of a cage set up on the ring, one laced with barbed wire, and a whole heap of weaponry about. The match starts with two wrestlers, with one member of each team entering alternately, and if you are pinned you get eliminated. To further complicate things, this is for the NYWC title, with the belt going to one of the team captains, Stockade or James, depending on which team survives, and Mikey Whipwreck is guest referee.

On the whole, this was a lot of dumb fun, but there were a few things that weren’t great: in particular, King Mega puts in a rotten performance, barely selling a kendo stick shot from Dreamer, and taking a woeful bump on his elimination from a pedigree by James. He looked awkward and clumsy throughout, and is a detriment to the match. Whipwreck isn’t a great ref, being off the pace when Lawless pins Boo Sullivan for an elimination, and often counting from outside the ring. Also, things do get a bit messy in places, with some wrestlers looking lost.

There are also a lot of positives: this was the best James performance I’ve ever seen. He’s the first man in for his team and goes nearly 40 minutes, hitting some nice offence and taking some huge bumps – getting hiptossed onto a board covered in mousetraps stands out as something that has to have sucked to have taken. Stockade is just a big, nasty monster heel, and again he bumps really well for a guy who is so big. Lawless and Bamm Sullivan also look good, and Dreamer gets a huge pop and looks energised by the response. There are some really nasty looking bumps taken in this bout: aside from Bull getting thrown into mousetraps, we get Lawless blasting Boo with an exploding breeze-block to the head, Lawless getting slammed onto Lego, Stockade getting thrown into a netting made of carpet strips…just a load of bumps that absolutely must have sucked to have been on the receiving end of.

The match boils down to James and Mouse against Stockade. Mouse has been portrayed in the past as a weak guy who really can’t wrestle, so he spends most of the match handcuffed to the ring post after a beating. James frees him later on, but gets turned on with a low blow. A Stockade DDT only gets two, before Mikey takes out Mouse with a big side slam (unbiased ref?). This leads directly to the end, which was suitably match-ending. James placed a wooden board on top of two breeze-blocks, set it alight and spinebustered Stockade on top to gain the 3 count and the title. Despite or or two quibbles, this is a really fun match.