Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

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Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by cero2k » Oct 15th, '18, 12:47

Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018
October 14, 2018
New York City, NY

BFG Cold Opening - Local boys Santana and Ortiz were the MCs of the video, talking about NYC and walking around town. Video touched down on all matches tonight.

Rich Swann & WIllie Mack vs "Reborn" Matt Sydal & Ethan Page - 7.5/10
Josh is selling Page's experience as a tag team as a big deal, but Don is selling Mack as finally arriving in Impact. Mack had a great first showing against Sydal, pulling out all the flippy stuff, but then Page got in against Swann, and he played the big muscle, overpowering Swann into peril. Sydal and Page kept this control for a long while, even after some dives spots, but at the end, Swann finally got a chance to dodge them both and get the tag to Mack for a big hot tag.

There was a great spot with Page blocking a double Superplex, throwing Mack to the ground, hitting a Super Scoop Slam on Swann, and then a Senton Bomb for a near fall. They did some of those X-Division spots were a Rana feeds into another Rana on another person. Finish saw Mack take out Page with the Stunner, Sydal took out Mack, and Swann took out Sydal with the Phoenix Splash for the win. Awesome opener!

Post-match - Mack and Swann danced a bit after the match. Mack then did some fan hyping offering two front row seats to two loud fans. It was to promote the sponsor, and it was weird they did it on screen, but hey if it pumps the fans, it's all good.

Impact vs Aries Build Up - This was a recap of the TMZ appearance that Impact and Taya did as they were doing their worked shoot angle. They later showed the footage of the Hall of Fame Ceremony that escalated things greatly. You have to appreciate some good shades of reality storytelling now a days.

LAX Backstage - Konnan got attacked on the back by King, they get the medics and he tells Santana and Ortiz to take care of business.

Eli Drake Open Challenge
Eli Drake vs James Ellsworth - Squash!
Everyone is chanting for Y2J. Drake's promo says that he saw no one new backstage, so he starts shooting on the NYGiants, and the man to come out? James Elsworth. Not exactly a New Yorker, he wasn't exactly well received, even when he defended NYC, fans rather chant for Pizza and 'Fuck You Ellsworth'. It was all fuel for Eli Drake to shit on Ellsworth. Ellsworth cheap shots Drake to start the match, making Drake a super babyface tonight.

Drake just overpowered him left to right, Ellsworth got a hope spot going for the No Chin Music, but Drake kicked out, hit Gravy Train, a second by fan petition, and pin. This was what it had to be, especially after the fan's reaction to Ellsworth.

Post-match - Drake goes back to the mic and says he asked for the best, not Stanton Island Trash, he said he wanted the best, he wanted Hall of Fame level competition, so this brought out Abyss who just killed Drake and celebrated in the ring. Black Hole Slam and Chokeslam through a table. Even here, Drake was getting chants.

Tessa Blanchard Interview - Tessa says she is confident this is her night and that tonight Taya finds out diamonds are forever, and so is Tessa Blanchard.

Impact Wrestling Knockout's Championship Match
Tessa Blanchard (C) vs Taya Valkyrie - 6.5/10
Taya seems to be cosplaying for Natty tonight, with terrible pony tails. Tessa had a strong start, working on Taya's head, working her towards a comeback where Taya took control and got a near submission with a Guillotine, but Tessa just overpowered herself out of the lock. Tessa started chasing the Buzzsaw DDT, but Taya countered and looked for Road to Valhalla herself, also to be blocked out by Tessa. Taya hit a scary Moonsault, and locked in an armbar as Tessa kicked out. Taya hit a Super Dragon Curb Stomp and locked in a nasty STF for another near submission.

Taya hit the Road to Valhalla, but Tessa kicked out at 2, Callis and Josh selling that the ref was out of position, but not that much to me. Tessa faked Taya into a head bump on the corner, hit the Buzzsaw DDT, but Taya kicked out! One Magnum later, and Tessa gets the pin for the win. This was a good match, some spots seemed sloppy, mostly because Taya sometimes slows down, but Tessa was amazing. Tessa got 'Tessa B Ain't Nothin' To Fuck With' chants.

Moose Interview - Moose's attires ever since turning heel makes it all worth it.

Eddie Edwards vs Moose - Dud
Moose's entrance theme was changed, which I don't mind, because as a heel, I always found myself chanting to his old song. Moose came out with an entourage of valets. Really early in the match, Eddie got Boston Knee Party in and went for Kenny, but from the crowd came out Kross, and he choked out Eddie, setting him up for Moose, but out for the save, came Tommy Dreamer.

Dreamer got the mic and challenged both Moose and Kross to a tag match, so now we have...

No DQs Match
Killer Kross & Moose vs Eddie Edwards & Tommy Dreamer - 6.5/10
This was all chaotic, but mostly within the rules. Moose and Eddie brawled on one side of the ring, with Dreamer and Kross on the other side. Later on, we got Eddie fight off Kross while Moose took out Dreamer. It all built to Eddie and Moose having a strike off in the middle of the ring, this was straight from a Puroresu match. Eddie and Moose took each other out leaving Dreamer to be taken out by Kross' Doomsday Saito, and when it seems everything is lost for Moose, Eddie rolls him up and pins him. Everything in the match with Eddie was great, everything with Dreamer was ok. At one point one of the NY Giants guys pushed Moose, but it didn't go anywhere, so it's obvious that douchebag was just trying to get attention.

Post-match - Kross and Moose take out Eddie and hit him with an assisted Apron Bomb.

OVE Promo - Callihan says that the Crists are taking down the Lucha Bros proving the Ohio is better than Mexico, and he will personally take down the machine. Best thing about these promos is always the interaction of Dave and Jake behind Callihan.

OVE Rules Match
Lucha Brothers & "The Machine" Brian Cage vs Ohio Versus Everything - 8/10
This felt more like a PWG match, with tons of spots, both in and outside the ring, people coming in and out of the match, and with really no use of weapons or low blows or anything of the like. Match was all over the place and everyone got their stuff in. We got a bunch of double and triple moves. We got a botched spot with Jake hitting a cutter from Fenix that was standing on Pentagon's shoulders, but Fenix didn't fully commit on falling down face first.

Finish saw all of OVE gang up on Cage, who wouldn't go down, but as they got him on his knees, they gave him the superkick execution, over and over again, until he was done for and easy for Callihan to hit the final shot and pin Cage for the very first time. They made a big fuzz about this being Cage's first pinfall, so I take it we may see Callihan vs Cage for the title soon. This match was great, but my words can't even come close to really recapping everything that went down in this match.

Austin Aries Interview - Awesome serious promo by Aries, he talks about putting Impact back on the spot while Johnny just comes and goes and thinks he can just drop to the main event. He says that this last week, everything has changed, and so tonight he's bringing his boys, and Impact should bring his wife to see him fall front row. Aries has been killing it with his promos.

OGz Promo - King is (hopefully) kayfabe drunk. He hypes H&H about NYC being their streets.

LAX vs OGz Build Up Video - Awesome stuff.

Concrete Jungle Deathmatch
LAX vs OGz - 8/10
Concrete Jungle entitles that the ring has no mat nor padding no turnbuckle pads, it's straight up wood, plus a bunch of weapons and tables surrounding it. LAX had a weird entrance, it started with a bunch of guys in cammo hunched up with a guy rapping, the group eventually broke up and Santana and Ortiz walked out, but it took a while and it was weird. It was too many people and the ramp too small to make this look cool, and considering they're coming in outnumbered because Konnan is not here, seeing all these people makes it harder to get behind the idea that they're going in handicapped.

Match started and Hernandez was busted open within a minute. OGz started with control of the match, King slammed Santana to the wood boards, and Ortiz was taken out with garbage can lids. LAX slowly started making a comeback, picking out one by one, at one point Superplexing Hernandez to a huge spot. OGz eventually came back with numbers, and King had Ortiz ready for execution, but suddenly, Konnan came back and joined his boys. Konnan came out with the blackjack, took out Homicide and Hernandez, and got in a brawl with King. LAX hit the Street Sweeper on King for the win.

Match went kinda short, but it had a bunch of spots making it feel like a lot happened. I was hoping for something bigger as the finish if this is to be the end of the feud, but I think the match overall was the perfect climax.

Allie, The Undead Slayer vs "The Undead Bride" Su Yung - Awesome
This is done in Impact Wrestling Cinematic Universe style, Allie is totally Buffy here. Allie gets into the coffin and she is greeted by James Mitchell. He tells her that Kiera is on the top floor and tells her that if she finds her soul (Allie's), she can see but not touch, as Allie's soul is to stay in the Undead Realm forever (spoiler alert: she finds herself, she touched it).

Allie starts investigating the house she's in, she gets attacked left ad right by Undead Bridesmaids, but she LITERALLY kills them again with an ax, we even get blood splatter on the screen. She makes her way to a chappel where she finds Kiera, but Su Yung comes out with an ax herself and starts attacking Allie. They fight each other into a closet where Yung locks in the Mandible Claw and chokes out Allie, and as Yung is about to stab Allie, Allie wakes up and kills Yung with the Ax.

Allie gets Hogan and they run to the exit, but they can't open it. James Mitchell tells her that he is a man of his word, he said he bring her in, but not get her out. All the Undead Bridesmaids come back, but suddenly, Rosemary makes her return and takes them out and helps Allie and Hogan open the door. Su Yung, half extra dead, comes back and finally faces off with Su Yung, but she gets ganged up by the Bridesmaids as she sacrifices herself to let Allie and Hogan escape.

Outside, Allie wants to go back, but Hogan stops her. As they argue, Evil Allie comes out hinting that Allie's soul indeed stayed in Mitchell's hands.

Impact Homecoming PPV is coming to Nashville on Jan 6th.

Johnny Impact Interview - Great babyface promo, lots of intensity. Tonight he takes what validates Arie's whole career, the World Title.

Impact vs Aries Build Up Video - Awesome stuff, great promos by both men.

Impact World Championship Match
Austin Aries (C) w/Killer Kross & Moose vs Johnny Impact w/Taya - 9/10
Aries kept his word and came out with black trunks, black boots. The heat for this match is increadible, fans are 50-50 on them

They had a worked shoot match, everything they did made me wonder if they were shooting on each other, even botching as the momentum in their moves would betray them. After an initial flurry of shooting in the ring, they started trading momentum here and there, but soon enough Aries got control and started working on towards Last Chancery. All of the offense here looked stiff and shooty.

Impact had some flurries of comebacks, slowly chipping down on Aries, always coming close for a big move, but Aries kept getting out of trouble, all leading to Impact finally hitting a Top Rope Spanish Fly for the first near fall of the match. They kept trading momentum and near falls, including a 450 by Aries, but after that one, Aries starts to lose his cool.

Impact landed a Starship Pain for a near fall as Aries got the rope. Aries hit the Roaring Elbow and Brainbuster, but Impact also got his feet on the rope to break the pin. Aries locked in Last Chancery, but Impact made it to the ropes. At this point, Aries is getting distracted by Taya quite a lot, which leads to Aires taking her out with a dive as Impact dodges him. Impact went to attack Aries afterwards, and he didn't really check on Taya. Impact lands a Brainbuster and Starship Painfor the pin. Aries just got up and walked out flipping off Callis and the crowd.

This was a great match, the shooty aspect of it really brought out a lot of intensity. I'm not happy with how Aries walked out at the end because it really puts a bad foot note on the whole thing. This title change made all the sense in the world, at least given the build up, so I hope Aries is not just throwing a fit.

OVERALL THOUGHTS
Top to bottom, a good show for Impact. The venue wasn't all that big, so some stuff didn't feel right, but all the wrestlers went out there to do things right. This show is an interesting turning point (no pun intended) since I would have to imagine that LAX vs OGz is over and I think that Lucha Bros need to move on too. We'll see on Thursday how the storylines proceed.
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by Big Red Machine » Oct 15th, '18, 13:11

Reasons why I won't give Impact another chance:
1.
cero2k wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 12:47

Eli Drake Open Challenge
Eli Drake vs James Ellsworth - Squash!
Everyone is chanting for Y2J. Drake's promo says that he saw no one new backstage, so he starts shooting on the NYGiants, and the man to come out? James Elsworth. Not exactly a New Yorker, he wasn't exactly well received, even when he defended NYC, fans rather chant for Pizza and 'Fuck You Ellsworth'. It was all fuel for Eli Drake to shit on Ellsworth. Ellsworth cheap shots Drake to start the match, making Drake a super babyface tonight.

Drake just overpowered him left to right, Ellsworth got a hope spot going for the No Chin Music, but Drake kicked out, hit Gravy Train, a second by fan petition, and pin. This was what it had to be, especially after the fan's reaction to Ellsworth.

Post-match - Drake goes back to the mic and says he asked for the best, not Stanton Island Trash, he said he wanted the best, he wanted Hall of Fame level competition, so this brought out Abyss who just killed Drake and celebrated in the ring. Black Hole Slam and Chokeslam through a table. Even here, Drake was getting chants.
They decided to waste time on their biggest show of the year with this.

2.
cero2k wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 12:47 Eddie Edwards vs Moose - Dud
Moose's entrance theme was changed, which I don't mind, because as a heel, I always found myself chanting to his old song. Moose came out with an entourage of valets. Really early in the match, Eddie got Boston Knee Party in and went for Kenny, but from the crowd came out Kross, and he choked out Eddie, setting him up for Moose, but out for the save, came Tommy Dreamer.

Dreamer got the mic and challenged both Moose and Kross to a tag match, so now we have...

No DQs Match
Killer Kross & Moose vs Eddie Edwards & Tommy Dreamer - 6.5/10
This was all chaotic, but mostly within the rules. Moose and Eddie brawled on one side of the ring, with Dreamer and Kross on the other side. Later on, we got Eddie fight off Kross while Moose took out Dreamer. It all built to Eddie and Moose having a strike off in the middle of the ring, this was straight from a Puroresu match. Eddie and Moose took each other out leaving Dreamer to be taken out by Kross' Doomsday Saito, and when it seems everything is lost for Moose, Eddie rolls him up and pins him. Everything in the match with Eddie was great, everything with Dreamer was ok. At one point one of the NY Giants guys pushed Moose, but it didn't go anywhere, so it's obvious that douchebag was just trying to get attention.
They took a singles match on their biggest show of the year and bait-and-switched it for a completely pointless Tommy Dreamer tag team match. (And yes, I have seen the ROH spoilers and have seen some of the recent TV results, and I'm not watching that, either.)


3.
cero2k wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 12:47

Allie, The Undead Slayer vs "The Undead Bride" Su Yung - Awesome
This is done in Impact Wrestling Cinematic Universe style, Allie is totally Buffy here. Allie gets into the coffin and she is greeted by James Mitchell. He tells her that Kiera is on the top floor and tells her that if she finds her soul (Allie's), she can see but not touch, as Allie's soul is to stay in the Undead Realm forever (spoiler alert: she finds herself, she touched it).

Allie starts investigating the house she's in, she gets attacked left ad right by Undead Bridesmaids, but she LITERALLY kills them again with an ax, we even get blood splatter on the screen. She makes her way to a chappel where she finds Kiera, but Su Yung comes out with an ax herself and starts attacking Allie. They fight each other into a closet where Yung locks in the Mandible Claw and chokes out Allie, and as Yung is about to stab Allie, Allie wakes up and kills Yung with the Ax.

Allie gets Hogan and they run to the exit, but they can't open it. James Mitchell tells her that he is a man of his word, he said he bring her in, but not get her out. All the Undead Bridesmaids come back, but suddenly, Rosemary makes her return and takes them out and helps Allie and Hogan open the door. Su Yung, half extra dead, comes back and finally faces off with Su Yung, but she gets ganged up by the Bridesmaids as she sacrifices herself to let Allie and Hogan escape.

Outside, Allie wants to go back, but Hogan stops her. As they argue, Evil Allie comes out hinting that Allie's soul indeed stayed in Mitchell's hands.
All of this. You're not Lucha Underground, so don't try to be. And the Buffy rip-off doesn't make it better. It just makes yo look worse.
4.
cero2k wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 12:47
Impact World Championship Match
Austin Aries (C) w/Killer Kross & Moose vs Johnny Impact w/Taya - 9/10
Aries kept his word and came out with black trunks, black boots. The heat for this match is increadible, fans are 50-50 on them

They had a worked shoot match, everything they did made me wonder if they were shooting on each other, even botching as the momentum in their moves would betray them. After an initial flurry of shooting in the ring, they started trading momentum here and there, but soon enough Aries got control and started working on towards Last Chancery. All of the offense here looked stiff and shooty.

Impact landed a Starship Pain for a near fall as Aries got the rope. Aries hit the Roaring Elbow and Brainbuster, but Impact also got his feet on the rope to break the pin. Aries locked in Last Chancery, but Impact made it to the ropes. At this point, Aries is getting distracted by Taya quite a lot, which leads to Aires taking her out with a dive as Impact dodges him. Impact went to attack Aries afterwards, and he didn't really check on Taya. Impact lands a Brainbuster and Starship Painfor the pin. Aries just got up and walked out flipping off Callis and the crowd.
It's like Russo and Inoki had a baby who subsequently ran away to live with Steve Corino!
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by cero2k » Oct 15th, '18, 13:57

Big Red Machine wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 13:11 Reasons why I won't give Impact another chance:
1.They decided to waste time on their biggest show of the year with this.

2 They took a singles match on their biggest show of the year and bait-and-switched it for a completely pointless Tommy Dreamer tag team match. (And yes, I have seen the ROH spoilers and have seen some of the recent TV results, and I'm not watching that, either.)


3. All of this. You're not Lucha Underground, so don't try to be. And the Buffy rip-off doesn't make it better. It just makes yo look worse.

4. It's like Russo and Inoki had a baby who subsequently ran away to live with Steve Corino!
1. Yeah, Drake is awesome, if while a misjudge on how the fans would react to Ellsworth, if you see the pops that Ellsworth gets on WWE, you imagine it be a good one. If anything else, this whole thing was Smackdown's fault for getting him over, and you still review it.

2. I can't argue that I rather have the singles match, but it's not like it's this terrible booking move, it got Killer Kross on the show. The only real bad thing here was using Dreamer as Eddie's tag partner.

3. They've been doing it for years and it's been awesome all the time. They're not trying to be LU at all, they were not when they did the Final Deletion, they're just taking advantage of a unique way to do matches. If you followed the whole story between Allie and Su Yung going back months, this is what had to happen. If you want to argue that fantasy angles are not your thing, that's ok, but this was perfectly executed.

4. And they booked an awesome angle/match!
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by Big Red Machine » Oct 15th, '18, 14:54

cero2k wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 13:57
Big Red Machine wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 13:11 Reasons why I won't give Impact another chance:
1.They decided to waste time on their biggest show of the year with this.

2 They took a singles match on their biggest show of the year and bait-and-switched it for a completely pointless Tommy Dreamer tag team match. (And yes, I have seen the ROH spoilers and have seen some of the recent TV results, and I'm not watching that, either.)


3. All of this. You're not Lucha Underground, so don't try to be. And the Buffy rip-off doesn't make it better. It just makes yo look worse.

4. It's like Russo and Inoki had a baby who subsequently ran away to live with Steve Corino!
1. Yeah, Drake is awesome, if while a misjudge on how the fans would react to Ellsworth, if you see the pops that Ellsworth gets on WWE, you imagine it be a good one. If anything else, this whole thing was Smackdown's fault for getting him over, and you still review it.

2. I can't argue that I rather have the singles match, but it's not like it's this terrible booking move, it got Killer Kross on the show. The only real bad thing here was using Dreamer as Eddie's tag partner.

3. They've been doing it for years and it's been awesome all the time. They're not trying to be LU at all, they were not when they did the Final Deletion, they're just taking advantage of a unique way to do matches. If you followed the whole story between Allie and Su Yung going back months, this is what had to happen. If you want to argue that fantasy angles are not your thing, that's ok, but this was perfectly executed.

4. And they booked an awesome angle/match!
1. The whole thing was a terrible use of time on one of their few PPVs a year. There was zero purpose to doing this at all, never mind on a PPV. This is house show stuff.
And I did sh*t all over Smackdown for everything they did with Ellsworth, and I will sh*t on everyone else who uses him because, to quote a wise Jedi Master, "who is more foolish: the fool, or the fool who follows him?"
(And SD both hasn't burned me as many times as Impact, and also gets a pass in some ways because WWE almost feels necessary for having any common conversational ground with any casual fans I might meet).

2. I do think it's terrible booking because they asked you to pay for a match, then gave you a different, sh*ttier match instead, and all for the sake of getting a pop for f*cking TOMMY DREAMER IN 2018.

3. There was no "match" here. That was the difference between The Final Deletion and all of the others. This was an LU backstage segment, but done with a pointless Buffy homage for no reason other than to do a Buffy homage, which IMO makes the show feel desperate for someone to say "cool! They did a thing that's like another thing I like!" rather than coming up with their own ideas.
As for the idea that it was perfectly executed, I will counter with Alvarez's totally legit nitpick that it is completely unbelievable that no blood got on her shirt.
I also think that once you've established magical powers and missing souls and stuff, it gets very hard to turn the characters back into in-ring characters in a way that doesn't cause contradictions or logic-holes due to these new-found powers. At best, they can ignore that the magic stuff ever happened for the purposes of in-ring competition, which is bad storytelling.

4. No they didn't. All of the hype for this match had to do with a desperate worked shoot they came up with that had nothing to do with the TV angle. Did they work a legit fight in a believable manner? Yes. But so what? All of that goes away the moment they lock up and start doing pro wrestling moves. The goal isn't to trick me into temporarily doubting whether or not this is a work; it's to tell a good story. They could have done that if they didn't waste half of the match trying to make me think this was a shoot.
This sort of worked shoot bullsh*t has NEVER worked. Worked shoots work when you know the emotions are real but you also know that the stuff you're seeing in the ring is 100% a work (with the ROH vs. CZW feud being the premier example). But trying to make people wonder if the stuff they're seeing in the ring is real has never worked in the post-kayfabe era. How are you going to explain Aries not selling anything after the match other than by saying "THIS IS ALL FAKE." And if you're going to flat out tell me on the show that it's all fake then why should I care who wins and who loses?
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by cero2k » Oct 15th, '18, 15:38

Big Red Machine wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 14:54 1. The whole thing was a terrible use of time on one of their few PPVs a year. There was zero purpose to doing this at all, never mind on a PPV. This is house show stuff.
And I did sh*t all over Smackdown for everything they did with Ellsworth, and I will sh*t on everyone else who uses him because, to quote a wise Jedi Master, "who is more foolish: the fool, or the fool who follows him?"
(And SD both hasn't burned me as many times as Impact, and also gets a pass in some ways because WWE almost feels necessary for having any common conversational ground with any casual fans I might meet).

2. I do think it's terrible booking because they asked you to pay for a match, then gave you a different, sh*ttier match instead, and all for the sake of getting a pop for f*cking TOMMY DREAMER IN 2018.

3. There was no "match" here. That was the difference between The Final Deletion and all of the others. This was an LU backstage segment, but done with a pointless Buffy homage for no reason other than to do a Buffy homage, which IMO makes the show feel desperate for someone to say "cool! They did a thing that's like another thing I like!" rather than coming up with their own ideas.
As for the idea that it was perfectly executed, I will counter with Alvarez's totally legit nitpick that it is completely unbelievable that no blood got on her shirt.
I also think that once you've established magical powers and missing souls and stuff, it gets very hard to turn the characters back into in-ring characters in a way that doesn't cause contradictions or logic-holes due to these new-found powers. At best, they can ignore that the magic stuff ever happened for the purposes of in-ring competition, which is bad storytelling.

4. No they didn't. All of the hype for this match had to do with a desperate worked shoot they came up with that had nothing to do with the TV angle. Did they work a legit fight in a believable manner? Yes. But so what? All of that goes away the moment they lock up and start doing pro wrestling moves. The goal isn't to trick me into temporarily doubting whether or not this is a work; it's to tell a good story. They could have done that if they didn't waste half of the match trying to make me think this was a shoot.
This sort of worked shoot bullsh*t has NEVER worked. Worked shoots work when you know the emotions are real but you also know that the stuff you're seeing in the ring is 100% a work (with the ROH vs. CZW feud being the premier example). But trying to make people wonder if the stuff they're seeing in the ring is real has never worked in the post-kayfabe era. How are you going to explain Aries not selling anything after the match other than by saying "THIS IS ALL FAKE." And if you're going to flat out tell me on the show that it's all fake then why should I care who wins and who loses?
1. It got Drake more over than he was and it didn't really take time away from anything. There is zero problem having this, it didn't take anything away from the show.

2. Card Subject to Change, a thing we've seen with wrestling ever since it's inception. You probably see it at least once every week during the weekly 10 hours of WWE. New Yorkers like Dreamer regardless of the year, it's the season of bring out the old bald men to wrestle, everyone is doing it, big deal, Eddie vs Moose will come, most likely on a show it can take a better spot in the card.

3. so is that the issue? that it wasn't a 'match'? because it was never announced as a match, it was just referenced as 'Allie is going to the undead realm'. Why was it a Buffy homage? because Allie has said for years that a lot of her character is based on Buffy. No one is trying to look 'cool' or anything, they're just telling a story that made little sense to try and pretend things are always dealt with inside a ring with pins and moves, this story was better because it happened like this. No blood on her tshirt is indeed just a nit-pick and just looking for excuses to shit on it.

Rosemary and Yung have always had those fake powers that we see in wrestling, and if there is any issue with seeing a power's battle, then easy, it happened inside the undead realm and that's it, things work different there. This isn't WWE were fake lightning happens inside the ring.

4. it had EVERYTHING to do with the tv storyline, from day one Aries started talking real stuff to Impact and the real shoot stuff started weeks before. It's not a 'desperate' thing or anything.
If worked shoots only work when we know the emotions are real, then this worked, because they shooty stuff with TMZ and twitter was real, so then I guess this worked. Inside the ring worked because we ALL know wrestling is fake, we know these men are professionals that even when having beef, they're not gonna actually shoot on each other and fuck up a big PPV, the worked shoot aspect is the stiffness of the action, not whether they're breaking the 4th wall, broken YEARS ago. This is what Strong Style is built on, making us believe the action in this fake sport is real.

Aries getting up as I mentioned in the review is bad, but until it's confirmed that it was all an angle and Aries not going into business by himself, then shitting on Impact for this is irrelevant.
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by Big Red Machine » Oct 15th, '18, 16:16

cero2k wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 15:38
Big Red Machine wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 14:54 1. The whole thing was a terrible use of time on one of their few PPVs a year. There was zero purpose to doing this at all, never mind on a PPV. This is house show stuff.
And I did sh*t all over Smackdown for everything they did with Ellsworth, and I will sh*t on everyone else who uses him because, to quote a wise Jedi Master, "who is more foolish: the fool, or the fool who follows him?"
(And SD both hasn't burned me as many times as Impact, and also gets a pass in some ways because WWE almost feels necessary for having any common conversational ground with any casual fans I might meet).

2. I do think it's terrible booking because they asked you to pay for a match, then gave you a different, sh*ttier match instead, and all for the sake of getting a pop for f*cking TOMMY DREAMER IN 2018.

3. There was no "match" here. That was the difference between The Final Deletion and all of the others. This was an LU backstage segment, but done with a pointless Buffy homage for no reason other than to do a Buffy homage, which IMO makes the show feel desperate for someone to say "cool! They did a thing that's like another thing I like!" rather than coming up with their own ideas.
As for the idea that it was perfectly executed, I will counter with Alvarez's totally legit nitpick that it is completely unbelievable that no blood got on her shirt.
I also think that once you've established magical powers and missing souls and stuff, it gets very hard to turn the characters back into in-ring characters in a way that doesn't cause contradictions or logic-holes due to these new-found powers. At best, they can ignore that the magic stuff ever happened for the purposes of in-ring competition, which is bad storytelling.

4. No they didn't. All of the hype for this match had to do with a desperate worked shoot they came up with that had nothing to do with the TV angle. Did they work a legit fight in a believable manner? Yes. But so what? All of that goes away the moment they lock up and start doing pro wrestling moves. The goal isn't to trick me into temporarily doubting whether or not this is a work; it's to tell a good story. They could have done that if they didn't waste half of the match trying to make me think this was a shoot.
This sort of worked shoot bullsh*t has NEVER worked. Worked shoots work when you know the emotions are real but you also know that the stuff you're seeing in the ring is 100% a work (with the ROH vs. CZW feud being the premier example). But trying to make people wonder if the stuff they're seeing in the ring is real has never worked in the post-kayfabe era. How are you going to explain Aries not selling anything after the match other than by saying "THIS IS ALL FAKE." And if you're going to flat out tell me on the show that it's all fake then why should I care who wins and who loses?
1. It got Drake more over than he was and it didn't really take time away from anything. There is zero problem having this, it didn't take anything away from the show.

2. Card Subject to Change, a thing we've seen with wrestling ever since it's inception. You probably see it at least once every week during the weekly 10 hours of WWE. New Yorkers like Dreamer regardless of the year, it's the season of bring out the old bald men to wrestle, everyone is doing it, big deal, Eddie vs Moose will come, most likely on a show it can take a better spot in the card.

3. so is that the issue? that it wasn't a 'match'? because it was never announced as a match, it was just referenced as 'Allie is going to the undead realm'. Why was it a Buffy homage? because Allie has said for years that a lot of her character is based on Buffy. No one is trying to look 'cool' or anything, they're just telling a story that made little sense to try and pretend things are always dealt with inside a ring with pins and moves, this story was better because it happened like this. No blood on her tshirt is indeed just a nit-pick and just looking for excuses to shit on it.

Rosemary and Yung have always had those fake powers that we see in wrestling, and if there is any issue with seeing a power's battle, then easy, it happened inside the undead realm and that's it, things work different there. This isn't WWE were fake lightning happens inside the ring.

4. it had EVERYTHING to do with the tv storyline, from day one Aries started talking real stuff to Impact and the real shoot stuff started weeks before. It's not a 'desperate' thing or anything.
If worked shoots only work when we know the emotions are real, then this worked, because they shooty stuff with TMZ and twitter was real, so then I guess this worked. Inside the ring worked because we ALL know wrestling is fake, we know these men are professionals that even when having beef, they're not gonna actually shoot on each other and fuck up a big PPV, the worked shoot aspect is the stiffness of the action, not whether they're breaking the 4th wall, broken YEARS ago. This is what Strong Style is built on, making us believe the action in this fake sport is real.

Aries getting up as I mentioned in the review is bad, but until it's confirmed that it was all an angle and Aries not going into business by himself, then shitting on Impact for this is irrelevant.
1. One random segment that most of their audience won't see where he gets squashed by Abyss will not get Drake over any more than he already was. As for it not taking time away from anything:
The women's title match only went 10:36
LAX vs. OGz went less than ten minutes
Moose vs. Eddie was a singles match with a lot of time could have been awesome.
The main event was the only thing that got more than 13:16.

2. "Card subject to change" is for either emergencies or when you need to do something because of the story. To ask people to pay for a PPV match- especially a big singles match- and then instead give them a sh*tty tag match with fat, old, Tommy Dreamer just for an ECW nostalgia pop only tells people that TNA should not be trusted to deliver the advertised card.
New Yorkers love Dreamer? So what? We also love Eddie Edwards. People around the country love Eddie Edwards. People around the country do not care for Dreamer the way his hometown crowd does. This is not a house show. It's a worldwide PPV.
Just because "everyone else" is having their old dudes wrestle does not mean you should make the same mistake (and lt's be honest: old Shawn Michaels will be a million times better than old Tommy Dreamer, and that's not even factoring in that we've seen old Tommy Dreamer do the exact same Old Tommy Dreamer stuff for the past decade, in WWE, in ROH, in his own promotion, and for several different runs in TNA).

3. It not being a match often results in a lack of structure. This one had more than most, yes, because it mostly had a clear goal for the characters and I liked it better than most of the others, but like most of the others, it came off to me as just (lacking a better term) "spots."
I haven't seen much Buffy, but I've seen enough to know that the incompetent goofball that has been Allie is nothing like Buffy Summers. Vinny V, who has seen all of Buffy, said that Allie's outfit was directly lifted from Buffy.
If the magical powers only worked in the underworld then that would be one thing, but we've seen at least Rosemary use her magical powers in the Impact Zone, and probably at Matt's house, too. And I'd bet Su has as well. Any time one of these people does something magical during one of these segments or any other segment (like a "lights go out!" disappearance) it opens up logical questions as to why they don't do it during matches as well. This is a major problem with "magical powers" characters, and is why you shouldn't do them unless you're prepared to answer those questions.
And while the lack of blood on the shirt is a nit-pick, it is a little ridiculous to me. If you're going to do all of this stuff with all of these special effects, then why not make it look more realistic by getting the blood on the shirt. And yes, looking "realistic" is important, even in magical powers segments, because they are asking me to believe for the moment that it is real.
4. The only thing anyone was interested in was the Twitter/TMZ "personal" stuff, not anything Aries said about having rescued the company. It was the comments about Taya and then the press conference and everything stemming from that that people were interested in.
This worked up until the moment when they turned their worked-legit fight into a clearly worked pro wrestling match. It would have worked much better if they just went out there and had an intense pro wrestling match. Take the "real" (or maybe worked, who knows) emotions and transfer them to the pro wrestling match. Be stiff while having a pro wrestling match. Don't waste it trying to trick me into thinking you're shooting on each other and then just go and have a pro wrestling match afterwards. If we all know it's a work then just have a regular working pro wrestling match, not one where you try to make me think it's a shoot for the first half of the match.
There is a HUGE difference between the cat being let out of the bag in terms of kayfabe and "breaking the fourth wall" in terms of telling me while I'm watching the show that the stuff I'm watching is fake.
cero2k wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 15:38 Inside the ring worked because we ALL know wrestling is fake, we know these men are professionals that even when having beef, they're not gonna actually shoot on each other and fuck up a big PPV
Oh really?
cero2k wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 15:38 Aries getting up as I mentioned in the review is bad, but until it's confirmed that it was all an angle and Aries not going into business by himself, then shitting on Impact for this is irrelevant.
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by NWK2000 » Oct 15th, '18, 22:03

Big Red Machine wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 13:11
All of this. You're not Lucha Underground, so don't try to be. And the Buffy rip-off doesn't make it better. It just makes yo look worse.
What is the difference between this and having one character with magical powers among real people like Undertaker, Bray and Kane alongside the rest of the roster in WWE? I say that if you have the budget to do it, and you MUST have a character called "The Undead Bride" you might as well go full Buffy with it.
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by Big Red Machine » Oct 15th, '18, 23:33

NWK2000 wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 22:03
Big Red Machine wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 13:11
All of this. You're not Lucha Underground, so don't try to be. And the Buffy rip-off doesn't make it better. It just makes yo look worse.
What is the difference between this and having one character with magical powers among real people like Undertaker, Bray and Kane alongside the rest of the roster in WWE? I say that if you have the budget to do it, and you MUST have a character called "The Undead Bride" you might as well go full Buffy with it.
Taker and Kane (especially Taker) are relics of a bygone era. They get grandfathered in. Taker in particular is also almost always a babyface, so maybe he thinks it's unsporting. But yes, I would have a problem with Kane not just immediately telelporting himself out of the ring to win a cage match, just like I would with Bray Wyatt, or anyone else who has these stupid magical powers.
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by NWK2000 » Oct 16th, '18, 03:59

Big Red Machine wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 23:33
NWK2000 wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 22:03
Big Red Machine wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 13:11
All of this. You're not Lucha Underground, so don't try to be. And the Buffy rip-off doesn't make it better. It just makes yo look worse.
What is the difference between this and having one character with magical powers among real people like Undertaker, Bray and Kane alongside the rest of the roster in WWE? I say that if you have the budget to do it, and you MUST have a character called "The Undead Bride" you might as well go full Buffy with it.
Taker and Kane (especially Taker) are relics of a bygone era. They get grandfathered in. Taker in particular is also almost always a babyface, so maybe he thinks it's unsporting. But yes, I would have a problem with Kane not just immediately telelporting himself out of the ring to win a cage match, just like I would with Bray Wyatt, or anyone else who has these stupid magical powers.
So don't use your magic powers to immediately circumvent wrestling logic? Fair enough
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by Big Red Machine » Oct 16th, '18, 07:45

NWK2000 wrote: Oct 16th, '18, 03:59
Big Red Machine wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 23:33
NWK2000 wrote: Oct 15th, '18, 22:03

What is the difference between this and having one character with magical powers among real people like Undertaker, Bray and Kane alongside the rest of the roster in WWE? I say that if you have the budget to do it, and you MUST have a character called "The Undead Bride" you might as well go full Buffy with it.
Taker and Kane (especially Taker) are relics of a bygone era. They get grandfathered in. Taker in particular is also almost always a babyface, so maybe he thinks it's unsporting. But yes, I would have a problem with Kane not just immediately telelporting himself out of the ring to win a cage match, just like I would with Bray Wyatt, or anyone else who has these stupid magical powers.
So don't use your magic powers to immediately circumvent wrestling logic? Fair enough
Which works for babyfaces, but not heels. Which is why you shouldn't create characters with magical powers unless you're prepared to deal with the implications of those powers.
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Re: Cero Reviews Impact Wrestling Bound For Glory 2018

Post by Big Red Machine » Oct 18th, '18, 17:58

Dave everything was a work, including Aries no-showing TV and the idea that his contract has expired.
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