Impact Wrestling 2/23/2017 Review: Sutter/Van Ness Wedding!

[cero2k]

Impact Wrestling
February 23, 2017

Impact's President's day video was that of George Washington Vessel and Broken Matt Hardy. Beautiful. George Washington is really worried about V-1 drinking problem. Broken Matt Hardy is worried that this new Expedition of Gold will cost Matt his life, so he gives his abilities to Brother Nero's Vesssel. Nero has a premonition that Matt must go to Egypt, to which he is transported to by V-1

Maria's Wedding Commercial - A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. Honestly, it's nothing special, but the fact that they did it to being with, made everything so much better.

Cody and Brandi Rhodes - Cody is back, I think he saw footage of that Moose/Brandi affair and has come to make sure it doesn't happen again. Cody seems to not be happy about this "Mini-Moose" shit and the fans start chanting "Moose and Brandi", Brandi is not really good at reading her husband. Brandi is saying stuff that she always wanted to wrestle and that she is happy she got to fight off Decay. Cody says he is proud of Brandi, but you can definitely tell he's not cool with this. Cody brings out Moose. Moose again innocently says that Brandi and him have his number in case they need Moose's help.

Cody - "wait....you have HIS number?"

Cody seemingly turns heel for being jealous and embarrassing Brandi like this in the middle of the ring. As Moose tries to make peace with Cody, Cody goes for the low blow and hits the Cross-Rhodes. Bullet Club taunt! This was seriously perfectly done looking back at the last two weeks. When i read the spoiler that Cody was turning heel against Brandi, I was expecting to throw something at the screen, now I can only throw praises, they pulled if off.

Eli Drake/Tyrus Build Up - Eli talks shit that about Tyrus for not doing what he was paid for and for screwing him the last weeks for accepting bad matches. Tyrus talked about being tired of taking Drake's shit and abuse.

Tyrus vs Eli Drake - DUD
The best thing about the break up is that Eli Drake is back to cutting promos. Eli is giving Tyrus one last chance to take the dive and accept a pin. Then before the match can start, Drake knocks out the ref to throw out the match. Turys still goes after him, so Drake offers Tyrus a raise, which he accepts. Drake and Tyrus hug. I don't know why we had to go through all this fake break up, but at least i'm happy the team is back together.

Maria and The Lady Squad - They're getting ready, Laurel got a dress from Italy, it's SOO.....White. Allie is late. Also, Maria is not wearing the same dress as the rest of the bridemaids.

Broken Matt Hardy's Expedition - Matt Hardy returns along with a gold boat (new "Golden Ark" Skasgard) and a nice looking gold robe, he apparently now has the characteristics of his first vessel Erunaki? something like that. He has new knowledge about the EOG, annnd now they're gone again, transported somewhere else.

Jade Promo - Jade comes out to the ring, it feels like forever since I've seen her. She calls out Rosemary, she still wants the title. Rosemary comes out and wants to return the '08 TNA gimmick of wearing hoodies to the ring, AJ Styles entrance and all. Rosemary says that Decay is done with her, to which Jade's response was "I'm still standing," you know, I kinda agree with that, but it doesn't mean Jade deserves a title shot. Jade challenges Rosemary to one more match in a "Last Knockout Standing". Rosemary agrees and hopefully they get some good time. Nice face-off visual at the end.

During this segment Josh went on his tirade that he challenges anyone to come and do his job better than him. You know, maybe IT IS a work all his stupid twitter tirade and someone will replace him.

Braxton Sutter/Michael Bennett Backstage - Sutter wants out, Bennett is already drunk. Bennett actually had some nice words of encouragement for him.

Bram w/Kingston vs Jesse Godderz - 5/10
Kingston interfered very early in the match and Bram had the upper hand for most of the match. Eventually Jesse ade the comeback and got the win over Bram. After the match DCC tries to attack him, but Godderz takes off, he kept watching his back, unnecessary, but much appreciated.

Expedition of Gold - They are transported to the Mid-Atlantic Territory. They are greeted by the locker room, including the current No 1 contenders to the tag titles. Hardys, in all fairness, challenge the Mid-Atlantic Outlaws for the No 1 contenership spot, but this little punk dweeb says that the tag champs haven't lost the titles in 7 years (are they the Young Bucks?) and say that House Hardy are the best chance to finally take them out and make some changes in the promotion, he asks the MAO to give them a chance to skip them, to which they agree. I'm really liking that they're actually doing something to excuse getting title shots, Konnan did the quick book to sell bootleg merch and these guys are doing it to get rid of the champs.

Maria and The Lady Squad - Allie finally arrives, all sad, not wearing the dress. She doesn't want to be here, Laurel rubs it in her face that Braxton chose her. Allie walks out and see Braxton outside, she asks Braxton if this is really what Braxton wants, to which he can't tell her the truth because he's doing it for her. Jesus, my heart is breaking along with Allie's.

Expedition of Gold - House Hardy come face to face with the champs. Brawl breaks out, The Champs agree on a match. Backstage we see the champs plotting to 'shoot' on the Hardys. I barely noticed that Brother Nero is acting more like Broken Matt Hardy because he passed him his abilities.

Mid-Atlantic Territory Tag Team Championship Match
House Hardy vs Mathis and Rage (C) - Unratable
So Mid-Atlantic territory consists of Pennsylvania, W. Virginia, Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware. We get the same split screen editing. Place looks ECW Arena big and it's pretty crowded, fans look really hot the match. I really hope that one day they can release these matches, because at least this one looked pretty decent. At one point Brother Nero took one of the champs, put him inside a trash-cart and threw him off some stairs. Hardys take the win with a Twist of Hate/Swanton combination. Match looked great. Fans and locker room all celebrated together. Again, kuddos for everyone selling the disappearance.

"The Warmaster" Josh Barnett Interview - He teaches us that he was trained by Inoki and others, he was the youngest UFC World Heavyweight Champ, and that he's not afraid of Lashley. Good info that we needed, but I think this should had been something to let the fans in the Impact Zone know so they react a bit better when he's out.

Bad Bones vs "The Warmaster" Josh Barnett - Squash
Lashley is out on commentary, Pope looked uncomfortable. Bad Bones is a big guy, so it didn't bothered me that he got the upper hand on Barnett, especially since he was mostly doing pro wrestling 'dirty tactics', but I feel this should had been a Golberg/Lesnar squash and not one of those competitive squashes were the loser gets the upper hand for 3 spots. Bad Bones taps out to the Kimura Keylock. Barnett almost killed Bad Bones with a really high angled powerbomb. Looked scary.

X-Division Championship Match
DJZ vs Trevor Lee (C) w/Helms Dynasty - 6.5/10
DJZ gets his title rematch, hopefully he loses and stops wearing that stupid attire. DJZ is still injured from the attack weeks back, Lee obviously focuses on that. DJZ taped his ankle outside the boot, and I'm like, that's not how this works. Not a bad match at all, but they started like on the second part of the match and it just didn't click, kinda like they only planned the last 10 minutes of the match, if we had seen the fully planned match, it could had been great.

Post-match - DJZ tries to take out Helms (he had interfered towards the end), but Lee and Helms just overtake him. They're about to Pillmanize his ankle again, but Everett makes the save, he hit Trevor with a "Hurricanrana Spike Piledriver" or something like that, you'd had to see it to see what i mean.

Maria/Braxton Backstage - Just Maria mocking Sutter. Maria reminds Braxton what will happen to Allie if she doesn't marry Laurel.

Lashley v Barnett for the title is next week.

The Wedding of Braxton Sutter & Laurel Van Ness - man, the vignettes for this are awesome.
Bennett and Sutter come out first, Bennett is pretty drunk. He offers champagne to the guy officiating the ceremony.
Aron Rex and Manservant Spud come out, they're invited apparently. Spud is the flower boy.
Maria and Sienna come out, Maria did end up wearing the same color as the bride's maids.
....and we get a commercial to build up to Laurel's entrance.
Laurel comes out, no one walked her to the ring. Shold have gotten the world champ for that maybe.
Maria kinda cuts a promo and brings out 'ringbearer' Allie, to her song. Allue looks super hot and Braxton's jaw drops! hahaha this is amazing! Rex is crying of joy. Maria is running the game tonight so nicely.
Fans are chanting "we don't care" while the official starts talking, seriously, shut the fuck up.
Laurel's vows were a super rich girls' delusional promo. Fans chanted Just Say No and DELETE. TONS OF HEAT! Allie is about to cry!
Braxton didn't bring vows, so he just wants to get this over with.
When the official asks if anyone objects, the whole crowd objects and Allie was also about to say something but Maria shuts her up. Laurel says "I do", Braxton - "I...I....Don't" YES YES YES! Rex's reaction! "Laurel, I can't stand being around you" Allie is now fully of joy an Maria is going crazy!

Braxton: I always have been and I'll always be in love with you, Allie!"

My heart melts. Braxton reveals that Maria was going to fire Allie if he didn't play her game. Maria goes super heel, gets in Braxton's face and fires Allie. Allie quits instead. Braxton takes out Bennett, Allie takes out Maria, Robbie and Brooke come out to take some people out and among the chaos, in a ring full of fights, Allie and Braxton embrace and kiss in the middle of the ring. OH MY GOD, THIS IS BEAUTIFUL!

GREATEST STORY EVER. I didn't get to watch Macho/Liz when I was young, but this makes up for it.

OVERALL THOUGHTS:
Show was crap inside the ring (more story than wrestling), but this had to be the best ending that i've seen in Impact (include WWE and ROH there too) in a long long time, I'm full of joy. I've never cared for wedding angles, before this the only other one I had cared for was Lita/Kane, but this was awesome, a fantastic payoff to a long build up story. If you think about it, it was a great show in terms of story, I think all angles advanced in some way.

[Big Red Machine]

Just got done watching the wedding. ON the whole I thought it was pretty awesome, with everyone playing their roles absolutely perfectly (even the crowd). Just about the only thing I didn't like was Robbie E. showing up and attacking Bennett. They had spent so long establishing that Bennett was totally drunk that I thought it would have been fine for Braxton to lay him out with one punch and just have stay down.
My other issue with it is a common issue with wrestling weddings, which is the lack of presence of families; in this particular case, Laurel's (I can pretend that Braxton has no siblings and that both of his parents are dead). The idea that Laurel has a rich father is a huge part of her character, so shouldn't her father be at his daughter's wedding. I actually think this is a big missed opportunity because you could turn Mr. Van Ness into a character by having him use his fortune to bring in wrestlers to try to take Braxton out for breaking his little girl's heart (and building to Laurel & the hired henchman vs. Bratxon & Allie).

[cero2k]

I also didn't like Robbie E coming out, at least Brooke with Sienna made more sense and was more necessary.

As for the father thing, that be a cool follow up to the story, but I can totally see Mr Van Ness as the type of man that is too busy to go to his daughter's wedding. I think it would be best to have him debut next impact instead after Laurel went crying to him

[Big Red Machine]

I also didn't like Robbie E coming out, at least Brooke with Sienna made more sense and was more necessary.

As for the father thing, that be a cool follow up to the story, but I can totally see Mr Van Ness as the type of man that is too busy to go to his daughter's wedding. I think it would be best to have him debut next impact instead after Laurel went crying to him

Right, but if that's the case then give me a quick segment telling me that. She did an in-character interview with Josh Mathews the day the show aired (in which she mentioned that she had a sister, who was also notably absent from the wedding). If you're going to do something like that then you should be using it to lay groundwork or explain away plotholes (ideally preemptively). If you're not then what is the point of the whole thing? Why even do an in-character interview if the character isn't going to say anything that even remotely matters?