3PW United We Stand, Divided We Brawl

Lovefilm obviously felt that it was too long since I reviewed any 3PW shows, so decided to send me one as my latest rental. Thanks guys (I think)

CJ O’Doyle vs Rob Eckos

Not really much to this, good or bad. It’s just perfectly ok wrestling. O’Doyle has a nice looking powerslam and Eckos’ superkick looked good enough to have won the match (though it only got 2). I enjoyed Eckos’ character work, posing after hitting an Alpine Line, then realising he could pin O’Doyle and rushing to try and get the pinfall. The end sees O’Doyle hit this clothesline that the commentary team have been hyping up (it’s just a clothesline), which only gets two, before Eckos hits a sloppy Alpine Line from the second rope for the pin.

Jack Victory vs Rockin’ Rebel

This was rubbish. As usual in 3PW, Rebel seems to get paired with someone so bad that the Rebel is the worker of the match. Both guys are working heel here too, and for some reason end up trying to double team the ref, only to both eat a double clothesline. This doesn’t earn a DQ however, and the bout continues with Victory not actually being able to Irish whip his opponent properly! How is that possible? Rebel tries a pin with his feet on the rope, but gets caught by the ref. Victory tries the same, and gets the three count. Afterwards, both guys beat up the ref. Just terrible.

Gary Wolfe vs Damian Adams

Apparently, this was set up Wolfe assaulted Adams, who had beaten him in a previous match. This explains why Adams attacks Wolfe as soon as he hits the ring, working a sustained assault, until a single Wolfe clothesline seems to basically kill him. Like, Wolfe picks him up for a suplex, and Adams is barely on his feet, arm dangling dead by his side. Believe me, the clotheslines certainly didn’t look that impressive. Adams is able to come back with a nice dive to the floor, before Wolfe hits 2 powerbombs in the ring (before the second powerbomb, the commentary team seem aghast that Wolfe is going to try a second powerbomb. “This is inhumane” is uttered, right before Adams kicks out on 2). A Burning Hammer gets the win, and the whole thing is less than four minutes long. Really odd booking, as Adams looked like a chump, despite apparently winning the last match.

There’s another match on the DVD listing, which is supposed to be a bra and panties match between Jasmin St Claire and Gorgeous George, which is basically just them stripping, kissing and spanking Velvet Sky over Tod Gordon’s knee. I’m just glad my fiancée didn’t come in while in was watching this nonsense. Moving swiftly on…

Low Ki vs Ruckus vs Joey Matthews

This is elimination rules, and that actually makes this a really enjoyable bout. The reason being, Joey Matthews wisely stays outside and allows Ruckus and Low Ki to wrestle, only entering when Low Ki has beaten Ruckus, essentially giving us two Low Ki singles bouts instead of the usual three-way nonsense.

Ki/Ruckus, in this situation, is like an appetiser, and is pretty fun in that respect. I enjoyed their little section on the mat, where Ruckus was surprisingly competent, and whilst both guys had some fun offense, Ki’s stuff just looked nastier, finishing Ruckus off with the Tidal Crush and a Ki Krusher.

Ki/Matthews was really good stuff, loved Matthews using the ref to block a Tidal Crush and poking Ki in the eye over the ref’s shoulder. Matthew’s offense is a bit nastier than Ruckus’, and Ki misses a corner charge to give Matthews a focal point to work on. Matthews may not be flashy, but you can tell he’s got a brain for wrestling, everything looks professional and shows no sign of breaking down. You can see why WWE would want him as the anchor for the MNM team. He also isn’t scared of Ki’s blows, taking a big kick right to the jaw. Ki’s rolling kick in the corner looks vicious, and I loved the fluidity of Matthews trying a reverse suplex and Ki quickly countering with a Dragon Clutch. Ki goes for the Ki Krusher, but his shoulder can’t support the weight, and Matthews reverses to a small package for the win. Loved this whole deal.

Monsta Mack & Mike Kruel vs Roadkill & the Blue Meanie

Thought Kruel looked excellent in this match, easily the standout. He schools Meanie on the mat, working a series of holds that actually made “Blue Meanie matwork” seem ok. The heels work a decent enough heat on Meanie, and I loved Mack standing in the middle of the ring, smugly posing to draw in Roadkill, whilst Kruel choked Meanie in the corner behind him. Kruel works over Meanie’s back, with some nasty kneedrops and painful looking forearms. Meanie’s comeback is pretty unexciting, as it consists of him in a Mack sleeper that he just casually escapes from and reverses. Roadkill doesn’t display a single emotion in this bout, even when a tag is disallowed because the ref didn’t see it. He’s equally inexpressive in the terrible finishing run – Roadkill brings out a chain, gets it taken away by the ref, so instead whips out a sock for a mandible claw. As the ref removes this, Mack clocks Roadkill with a chair. Hilariously, the ref definitely sees the chair in his hand, turning around to find Roadkill knocked out in the middle of the ring and Mack still holding a chair. Despite this, he seems happy enough to count the three. Sigh….at least Kruel was decent.

Matt Striker vs Jimmy Snuka

Striker comes out doing an excellent impression of Roddy Piper, you can tell he’s loving himself out there. Striker blindsides Snuka, and hits some weak offence, but gets caught with a REALLY soft backbreaker that puts him down for about 30 seconds and unable to avoid the Superfly Splash. This made Snuka’s 1993 ECW matches look like Iron Man matches.

Sabu vs Jerry Lynn

Sometimes, you just have to accept things aren’t for you. This was very much a case of two aging pros giving the crowd what they want, it just happens to be that I don’t enjoy what they like. Sabu injures his leg early on, which gets briefly worked over by Lynn, but has no impact on the rest of the match. This was really a bunch of spots loosely welded together. Some of those spots were pretty spectacular (Lynn hurling Sabu into rows of chairs and then diving in himself with a big crossbody was nuts) and some were pretty fun (Lynn getting up as Sabu tried the triple jump moonsault, causing Sabu to fall face-first into the chair). But there were no transitions to comebacks, no real sustained selling…just no glue to really hold it all together. As I said, the crowd loved it, so it did what it was supposed to. There’s one terrible spot right at the end, where Sabu is supposed to rana Lynn off the top through a table, but what actually happened is Sabu backflipped off, then a second or two passed before Lynn frontflipped himself onto a table, which didn’t break. A top rope Sabu legdrop got the job done.

Raven & the Sandman vs John Zandig & the Wifebeater

This….this was an utter mess. The basic gist is that 3PW commissioner Raven hates Sandman, taking away his Metallica entrance, his beer and smokes, but still orders him to be his tag partner for this bout. Seems like a partner you can rely on. Raven then accepts it when Zandig asks for a stipulation that he be put in charge if his team wins. For a supreme thinker, this seems like an idiotic request to accept.

So anyway, the bout starts with Sandman and Wifebeater working armdrag and hip toss exchanges. This lasts maybe a minute, before we get a punch-walk section, where they head to the balcony and the Raven/Sandman team throw Wifebeater off the balcony through a table. They return to Zandig, who’s somehow bleeding from the head and work a mild heat on him. After a while, Wifebeater returns and waits on the apron patiently to make a tag. Seems to me like the rules went out of the window when you got slammed off a balcony, mate. He gets in and works over Sandman…then somehow we end up with Sandman playing face-in-peril and Raven coming in as the fired up hot tag. The fuck is going on? Raven bulldogs Zandig through a table, but Sandman decides it’s time to DDT his partner and give the CZW boys the win. This is so Zandig can give him back his beer, fags and Metallica music….only the DVD doesn’t have the licensing for that, so we get a pissy muzak version of Enter Sandman dubbed in for 5 seconds, then the DVD abruptly goes to the credits. It wasn’t boring, I must admit, but certainly not what I would call “good” either.

CZW Cage of Death IV (2002)

As stated before, I was a massive CZW a decade ago. While the likes of Bryan Danielson, Low Ki and Samoa Joe were the big indy stars of the day, the Messiah, Trent Acid and Adam Flash were amongst my favourite wrestlers. Pretty much every EWR game I played at the time would feature the Messiah as world champ, with the Backseat Boys as tag champs. Of course, I'm pretty aware now that I wasn't really with the majority on this, so it's going to be interesting to see how this 11 year old show has aged.

Before we get to the opening match, which is the titular Cage of Death match between John Zandig and Lobo, we get a hilarious video where Zandig gets massacred by Lobo and his cronies. They kidnap him in a lorry, hurl him through barbed wire boards and even hang him from hooks through his skin. Lovely. This apparently means Zandig wont be making it to the match, but unsurprisingly, he still comes to the ring, wearing the same bloody rags he got beaten up in a few hours earlier.

Zandig Vs Lobo
We excitingly start off with a load of promos where fun stuff like legality of contracts and double-double crosses take place. To cut a long story short, Lobo has to face Zandig in the cage for the ownership of CZW, with the winner being decided by grabbing a contract hanging from the ceiling. Despite being a bloody mess who we saw getting killed earlier, Zandig totally dominates, with Lobo thrown into the electrified cage within a minute. I do quite like a Falcon Arrow onto a cactus by Zandig. Lobo finally gets a period of offence, but soon Zandig fires back and powerbombs Lobo into a table and drops another plant on him. Zandig sets up a table and a plane of glass over it before both decide to climb to the top of the cage to grab the contract. I was about to sarcastically comment how obvious it was that one of them would get thrown from the top through this table, but FUCKING HELL!! Lobo hits a death valley driver from the top of the cage through two tables OUTSIDE the ring. Absolutely mental. Though the impact of this is kinda ruined as they're back on their feet brawling again within a minute. Zandig puts Lobo on a table outside the ring, then drops an elbow on him from the top of the cage. No attempt to grab the contract. They both climb the cage, and Zandig press slams Lobo from the top through the glass table from earlier before grabbing the contract to win. Absolutely no attempt to tell a coherent story, and some of the brawling was a bit weak, but when they hit the big spots, they really went for it.

Rockin' Rebel, Greg Matthews, "Doomsday" Danny Rose, Chris Cash & GQ vs Chris Stylz, Ian Knoxx, Derek Frazier, Jon Dahmer & Adam Flash
Wrestlers in this match I was convinced 10 years ago would go on to become big stars: Knoxx and Matthews. I was an idiot. This is an elimination match, so expect this to be a bit of a clusterfuck. A few early dives are pretty fun, especially Flash diving onto everyone into the aisleway. Some of the early exchanges with Frazier taking on Cash, Rebel and Matthews are pretty fun, before Matthews pins Frazier with a Snow Plow. Rebel takes out Stylz with a fireball to the eyes and a huge legdrop to make it 5 on 3. Flash takes Matthews out with a top rope facebuster to help the numbers. Flash falls victim to the numbers game as Rose and Rebel team up to eliminate him, with a Rose death valley driver followed by a Rebel legdrop for the pin. Flash decides he's not leaving yet and levels Rebel with a chairshot whilst Dahmer comes in and nails Rose with a lariat allowing Dahmer to pin both men simultaneously. Weak section. Knoxx looks really good here, and it's a shame injuries caught up with him to the extent they did. GQ manages to maintain his one-botch-per-match average by missing a top rope stomp to Dahmer's head. Things break down and Dahmer hits GQ with the Move of 1000 Maniacs to eliminate him. Despite being down 2-to-1, Cash manages to eliminate his two larger opponents, hitting a top rope Cash Flo on Knoxx and a facebuster on Dahmer to be the sole survivor. CZW were clearly looking to give Cash a big push, and he looked really impressive here.

Z-Barr vs Rick Feinberg & the Hurricane Kid
Feinberg was CZW's very subtle parody of the RoH owner Rob Feinstein, a flamboyant camp character, whose ring music was Abba's "Dancing Queen". The commentary seems to suggest that this match is the result of a romantic interlude in a truck between Feinberg and Barr. Obviously. Feinberg and Kid dominate to start, but essentially they're comedy jobbers and Barr soon takes over. Decent tope by Barr takes both down. Feinberg kisses Barr midring, so Barr destroys him with some weak offence. Everything here is slow and telegraphed as the crowd starts to turn on the match. Barr dominates a bit more, before pinning Feinberg with the Donkey Punch. Not very good.

Nick Berk vs Josh Prohibition
This is a submission match. I like both guys, with some reservations, so this should be decent. They trade a few holds, before Prohibition ups the tempo with a suicide dive. The commentators talk up a previous Berk neck injury as Prohibition locks on an Indian deathock. Prohibition keeps on the neck, both with holds and impact offence. Berk hooks on a nice reverse cattle mutilation. A seated guillotine by JP keeps the offence focused on Berk's neck. In an odd spot, Prohibtion hits the Straight Edge and goes for a futile pin. This gives Berk time to recover and lock on a Scorpion. Prohibition nails Berk with brass knucks and locks in a surfboard half-nelson called the Path of Resistance, but Ian Knoxx comes out to distract him, based on a "boozing vs teetotal" feud. This gives Berk time to fire back with a powerbomb, and lock in a Texas2K2 Cloverleaf for the tap. Prohibition really carried this match, as his offence was focused on one body part and made sense due to Berk's known injury. In contrast, Berk just locked on some submission holds without bodypart focus. This was ok, but should've been better.

M-Dogg 20 vs Sonjay Dutt vs Ruckus
The winner of this match becomes the no.1 contender to Trent Acid's CZW Jr Heavyweight title. If this is anything but a spotfest, I'll be shocked. Some of M-Dogg's early stuff looks a bit sloppy, though in fairness they run through a series of reversals that looks super-slick before throwing Dutt from the ring. M-Dogg nails the first bit of offence that actually looks hurty by catching Dutt in midair and ramming him into the turnbuckles. Dogg also hits an awesome highspot, by diving onto his two opponents outside the ring with a huge number of twists. A subsequent Dutt dive is both less impressive and manages to barely hit his opponents. Dogg gets the next swank highspot by getting elevated up a pillar, climbing further up then diving 12ft onto his opponents. A slightly clumsy Tower of Doom spot doesn't come off as well as you suspect they'd intended. M-Dogg tries an overly complicated double DDT that looks like shit. Chris Cash comes out to interfere, but gets beaten up by all 3 competitors, thus totally taking the shine off his big win from earlier. They spend about 3 minutes destroying Cash before getting back to the match. Dutt picks up the win by reversing another overly complex M-Dogg move into a pin and grabbing the tights to win. Frustrating match, which was really fun in places, then boneheadedly awful in others.

The H8 Club vs Chris Hero & B-Boy
Hero cuts a pre-match promo, declaring himself IWA-MS through and through. Man, I forgot how intimidating the H8 Club looked. Hero does a great job schticking it up in fear of Nate Hatred. I always liked Hatred, he always came across as a dominant beast and wrestled like a monster should. The H8 Club pretty much beat the shit out of Hero to start. It takes B-Boy coming in and dropkicking Hatred's leg to give them an advantage. This doesn't last long as Hatred takes his head off with a clothesline. B-Boy finally gets a prolonged period of offence after hitting a twisting neckbreaker on Nick Gage. Hero's cravate-plex on Gage is pretty choice. B-Boy is pretty stiff on offence, and Gage seems happy to take it, so this period of offence is plenty fun, before Gage nails a brainbuster on B-Boy. Hatred just kills guys on the hot tag, blitzing Hero with chairshots. They pancake Hero on a flat table on the floor, which absolutely has to suck. B-Boy gets a very close two after a Shining Wizard on Gage. Decapitator by Hatred turns B-Boy inside out and gets the win. After the match, the H8 Club continue to kill Hero whilst B-Boy leaves him to die. Quite fun, they certainly presented B-Boy as the stronger link of the team here, and it's always enjoyable watching the H8 Club kills guys.

The Backseat Boys vs Ric Blade & "Sick" Nick Mondo
We open with a lengthy sequence of reversals that almost feels like a dance routine, before the face team of Mondo and Blade hit stereo dives on the Backseats. Weaponry is swiftly brought into the ring and a ladder is balanced over two chairs, which Acid puts Blade through with a Blue Thunder Driver. Trent goes to hit a tornado DDT on Mondo onto a ladder, but Mondo reverses into a Northern Lights suplex onto the same ladder. The Backseats remain one step ahead, playing up their tag team familiarity, hurling Blade into another ladder in the corner. They split up, Kashmere and Blade fighting in the crowd as Acid and Mondo stay in the ring. Apparently this is Blade's first match back in 18 months, so obviously putting him into a TLC match makes perfect sense. He's also the worst wrestler in the match, all milky strikes and average flips. Everyone else at least looks like they're hurting their opponents. Splitting up has hurt the Backseats, as both faces take control and they reunite to set up the Backseats on tables next to the balcony, with a ladder drapped over both of them. Blade and Mondo then hit stereo moonsaults on the ladder/Backseats/table sandwich. Unsurprisingly, the faces look in worse shape after that. Back in the ring, they've learnt nothing, hitting dives from the top rope onto another ladder sandwiching the Backseats and AGAIN hurting themselves. Blade hits a legdrop from the top of what must be a 15ft high ladder onto Kashmere, which only gets two. Trent Acid has recovered in this time and takes Blade out, giving the Backseats time to double team Mondo, then both diving through a Ric Blade-covered table. Kashmere puts a ladder round his neck, Terry Funk style, but Mondo stomps on the ladder in a nasty looking bump. The match ends with Mondo getting thrown through a ringside table and the Backseats sandwich Blade in a ladder to win. Spotty as all Hell, but ridiculously entertaining, and the story of the Backseats dominating in a team environment, but suffering when separated, made total sense. The faces were too daredevil to survive, taking bumps even when on offence, and the Backseats were able to hold out longer.

Justice Pain vs the Messiah
Both hold gold here, with Messiah holding the Iron Man title whilst competing for Pain's world title. This is apparently under Iron Man rules, which essentially means anything goes. Messiah is one step ahead of Pain in the opening minutes, until Pain suplexes him into the turnbuckles. I like Pain catching Messiah mid-leapfrog and slamming him down. Messiah is able to come back with a killer tornado DDT. They end up outside the ring, and the logic of booking another hardcore brawl right after the tag TLC is pretty odd. Messiah goes for a cannonball off the apron, but misses and lands on a non-breaking table. Swanky neck-snap on the floor by Pain. Blockbuster gets two in the ring, and Pain is looking pretty good here. His movement and execution is great. He also takes a killer bump as he flies into the guardrail off an Irish whip. They blow a Pain dropkick into a chair, so Pain levels Messiah with a chairshot for two. Insane bump as Pain stands on the apron and Messiah throws himself at him, sending both men onto a pile of chairs on the floor. Nick Gage comes in for a totally pointless run-in, nailing both guys with big moves, though he does helpfully pour a bag of thumbtacks on the canvas. Messiah hits a cutter on Pain onto the tacks for two. The Fall From Grace (running burning hammer) onto the tacks only gets two. Pain gets the Pain Thriller (barely on the tacks) for two. A top rope superplex by Messiah onto the tacks gets a more direct hit, but only gets two. After all that, the Messiah is finally able to pick up the win...with a crucifix. Well, I suppose he's the right man to have perfected that move. Decent main event fight, this is probably the best I've seen Pain look.