BRM Reviews the 10/19/2018 RPW World of PRo Wrestling (EXCELLENT!)

[Big Red Machine]

They’ve got a snazzy-looking intro, full of action.

AN EXPLANATION OF THE RULES- EXCELLENT!
The important parts here are that all regular matches have a thirty-minute time limit while all title matches have a sixty-minute time limit, and they specified that a count-out count will begin “at the referee’s discretion.”

CHRIS BROOKES vs. JUSHIN “THUNDER” LIGER- 6.25/10
Some people might have an instinctive rejection of the idea of old guy Liger beating young guy Brookes clean, but I think that in this case it was necessary. If you want people to believe the announcers when they say “this guy is special/important/legendary” then you have to establish that credibility by having the announcers tell us someone is special/important/legendary and then having that person win. Also, any damage to Brookes was mitigated by the…

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- great!
Liger offers Brookes a handshake, and Brookes accepts it… and then assaults Liger. El Phantasmo comes out to make the save.

HARRISON THOMPSON vs. THE GREAT O-KHARN (w/Lord Gideon Grey)- good squash
Lord Gideon cut a promo building up his newest client “The Dominator” Great O-Kharn. Kevin Kelly pointing out that O-Kharn lost most of his matches in New Japan but has been undefeated since coming to RevPro several months ago kind of buries RevPro, doesn’t it? Then again, the entire goal of RevPro’s booking this year seems to have been to make sure that everyone realizes that RevPro is nothing compared to New Japan.

KEVIN KELLY INTERVIEWS DAN MAGEE- decent angle
Magee was cutting a promo but got interrupted by Sha Shamuels, who was angry that he didn’t get interviewed despite being the longest-reigning British Heavyweight Champion. He apparently just signed a contract making him the highest-paid person in the company. RevPro management has made some bad decisions this year, but that has to be the single worst one they’ve made. Samuels would eventually punch Magee, leading to a pull-apart.

COLT CABANA VIDEO PACKAGE/INTERVIEW- very good
They established Colt’s British wrestling bona fides, his history in RevPro, that he won the RPW British Heavyweight Title from Sha Samuels, and that he would very much like to be champion once again.

ZACK SABRE JR. vs. KUSHIDA- 8.5/10
They showed us Chris Ridgeway was shown watching from the ramp. These two had exactly the match you would expect them to have: full of hard strikes and excellent submission wrestling. Zack got the win, establishing him as the promotion’s biggest gun. This was an excellent main event for your first TV show.

A GREAT first show from RevPro. They got over a whole bunch of characters, have started building to some future matches, and gave us an excellent main event and a reason to tune in next week. The announcing (by Kevin Kelly and Andy Boy Simonz) was great, both in terms of calling a wrestling show well and in terms of being helpful to new viewers. This is definitely a show I will continue to watch.

They announced Chris Brookes vs. El Phantasmo for next week’s show.