HOGAN & JEFF BACKSTAGE- wow. Hogan was just plain swinging from Jeff's nuts here. This segment was entirely pointless. We know that Jeff needs to get ready for his title match, and so does Jeff, so Hogan telling Jeff this does nothing at all. The voice-over with Jeff Hardy talking in a dull monotone about his challengers was bad.

THEY'RE GONE! THEY'RE GONE! THEY'RE GONE! NO TAZ AND TENAY FOR THE FIRST HOUR! YES! YES! YES! YES! THEY'RE GONE! No pigeons, no overly-wordy stupidity! No dumb jokes and sh*tty, random scripted arguing. I just did a Ron Santo heel click! That is how happy I am!

TNA X-DIVISION TITLE MATCH: Rob Van Dam(c) vs. Zema Ion- 5.75/10
Great opener. Van Dam looked great here. I wish they would have given these guys more time.
JB and this Tod Keneley guy were GREAT!

MATT MORGAN JUST TOOK VAN DAM'S HEAD OFF! AND JOEY RYAN IS HOLDING THE X-DIVISION TITLE! GREAT promo by Morgan. Short and sweet. And now that Morgan actually is running around attacking people, that car insurance commercial of his seems a lot more menacing.

AUSTIN ARIES SPYING ON THE GUYS TRYING TO CONVINCE HOGAN TO GIVE THEM A TITLE SHOT- YES!

TAG TITLE HYPE SEGMENT- Kaz says that Chavo & Hernandez are "probably in this country illegally." Can TNA think of anything to do with Hernandez that isn't a race angle? This is the sort of thing that makes me roll my eyes when Chavo says "they totally didn't put me with Hernandez because we're both Mexican."
I did like Daniels promo a lot, though. Chavo was generic, but not bad. The segment itself was pretty good, but Kaz's comments put a bad teaste in my mouth in the beginning.

HOGAN PICKS A CONTENDER SEGMENT #1-
Hulk stated this segment off by saying "we're down to the final hour, guys; the eleventh hour, and we've got some decisions to make." As of the end of last week's Impact, Hogan knew who all four guys were going to be. Why the hell is he waiting until now to do this?
Then Hulk says that "Jeff Hardy is at the top of the mountain kind of unexpectedly because up until Bound For Glory, he wasn't on what I would say is one heck of a roll, not like everyone else in here."
Let's look at this statement for a moment. Jeff winning at Bound For Glory was unexpected? He wasn't on a roll before BFG? HE WON THE BOUND FOR GLORY SERIES so he must have been picking up some big wins over the past few months, and I believe he also won a few matches between No Surrender and BFG. Compare this to Ken Anderson who hasn't been doing a darn thing, and Kurt Angle who has been (I believe) losing a decent-sized chunk of his matches lately.
And why was Jeff not on a roll until BFG, but on a roll after it. The win at BFG has been his only televised match since then! Winning one match doesn't put you over the hump between "being on a roll" and not!
It really makes me wonder think whether or not Hulk thinks before he speaks.
Bully Ray and James Storm were good. Kurt says that he still hasn't had his championship rematch from when he lost the belt OVER A YEAR AGO! What sort of Velvet Sky BS is this? If the World Title is so damn important to Kurt, why hasn't he petitioned for a rematch at any point since he returned from injury TEN MONTHS AGO!
Anderson's elimination was the standard stupidity: Anderson says something that Hulk doesn't like so Hogan eliminates him. The stuff with Aries and Anderson was great... but they were fighting and shouting RIGHT OUTSIDE OF HOGAN'S OFFICE, and neither Hogan, Storm, Bully, or Kurt came out to try to break it up?
Then the segment ended... or at least it was supposed to because we heard someone say "CUT!... okay," but the camera stayed there for a few more seconds. Then the screen showed Hogan and Hardy together for about two seconds before just cutting to commercial. This sort of thing is absolutely inexcusable. TNA is a freakin' million dollar company! HIGH SCHOOL AV PROJECTS DON'T F*CK UP LIKE THAT!

DEVON BACKSTAGE WITH ACES & EIGHTS- FINALLY! Someone acknowledges the presence of the cameraman! Anyway, Devon says that he has brought some women for Aces & Eights to hang out with "like we used to back in the day." WAIT! WHAT?! Last week they said that Devon was a new member! Now, we don't know when Devon was recruited, but I don't think that a "new" member would have been hanging out with anyone "back in the day." The two things are just plain contradictory (unless, of course, these guys are all old buddies of Devon's and he only recently decided to join their organization... that or during his long hard, grueling schedule of TV tapings and house shows over the course of his career, Devon also found time to also be part of a biker gang and also managed to keep that fact hidden from everyone, but I don' think that is what TNA intended here). Devon then says that in order for them to hang out what the chicks he has brought, they have to beat someone up first. Um... okay. I guess the chicks are being used as motivational tools (although the Aces & Eights guys seem to already be hanging out), but why the hell is the new guy being allowed to make the rules?
Then we get to the dartboard. That was a FREAKIN' AWESOME idea. It is a great visual and gets over the whole random chaos thing, rather than some sort of targeted plan as they seemed to have in the beginning. The flaw in this, though was in the execution. Why the hell would the cameraman, being a TNA employee, not show us who the dart landed on! How is it that the one time that they acknowledge the presence of the cameraman in one of these things, they manage to screw it up by having the cameraman not do what any cameraman would do in that situation?

Okay, why the hell is this TV Title match happening? Joe made both Robbies look like bitches last week at the same time. If, even after wrestling a match, Joe was able to make Robbie T tap in a few seconds, why the hell would anyone think that 1) Robbie T. deserves a title shot, 2) that he has a chance in hell of beating a fresh Joe, or 3) based on number two, that fans would find the match exciting?
And on a related note, I'm pretty sure that Since Robbie E. lost the best back in March, the Robbies have had at least 80% of the televised TV Title matches (and most of those have been Robbie E). Why the hell does Hogan keep giving this guys title shots?

TNA TV TITLE MATCH: Samoa Joe(c) vs. Robbie T (w/Robbie E.)- 1.75/10
What do yo know... Joe crushed Robbie T. This was very short, but was made worth it by the awesome spot where Joe sat up and locked the Coquina Clutch right back in!

BROOKE TESSMACHER PROMO- wow. This felt SO scripted.

HOGAN PICKS A CHALLENGER SEGMENT #2- bad.
Hulk starts this one off by saying "We've got three main event contenders here. The logical choice might be someone in this room; the logical choice might be someone that's a wild-card. I don't know."
Well if the logical choice might be someone else, why the hell are you limiting yourself to these three? The thing that irks me the most about this is that Hulk brings up logic... and yet has completely ignored the most logical solution to all of this. At the end of last week's show, Hulk had four guys who he thought deserved a world title shot. This is a WRESTLING COMPANY! PUT THEM IN A MATCH AND GIVE THE WORLD TITLE SHOT TO THE WINNER! You have house shows... USE THEM! I'm sure people at the house shows would like the matches to mean something and I'm sure that, like me, most TV viewers would rather see matches get time that see these stupid time-wasting, kayfabe damaging segments.

Then Hulk asks everyone if they think that Bully Ray is focused on the World Title or if he is focused on Devon and Aces & Eights. First of all, why is this Devon thing such a big blow to Bully. He turned on Devon almost tow years ago, and they spent the next five months feuding. Since then, they have barely been on-screen together, Bully has been a heel the whole time and Devon has been a face the whole time. There was no reconciliation! They're not friends anymore. So why is this such a blow to Bully?
When asked if he thought Bully would be focused on the World Title or on Devon, James Storm says that when Bobby Roode stabbed him in the back, he wasn't focused on anything but getting revenge on him. Really James? Then why did you spend your first two months after that feuding with Kurt Angle instead of Bobby Roode?

AUSTIN ARIES vs. MR. ANDERSON- 6.25/10
LOVED THE FINISH! By which I mean I hated it in the best possible way. Austin Aries is a f*cking douche bag!

TARA, JESSE, & BROOKE HOGAN BACKSTAGE- okay.

Taz and Tenay have taken over commentary. BOO! Within their first minute, I am already annoyed at Tenay saying "yes, it's..." as if someone were asking him a question and am annoyed with a comment of Taz's as well (Taz says that he is glad that it is Hogan who has to determine who gets tonight's World Heavyweight Title shot and not him because it is a hard decision to make- that's not the kind of thing I want to hear from one of the guys responsible for determining who gets a contract and who doesn't- I know they aren't exactly the same thing, but they are both management decisions, and while the world title is a big deal, Taz has someone's ability to make a comfortable living in his hands). Within their first four minutes on commentary (two of which have been during the KO's title match), Tenay has mentioned Hogan picking a challenger at least four times already. Is he really afraid that a channel-surfing who will spend thirty seconds watching the show before deciding if he wants to stay around will certainly tune out if he doesn't hear the words "Hulk Hogan" or "world title match." This shows no faith that the rest of the show can draw viewers, which really pisses me off.

TNA KNOCKOUTS TITLE MATCH: Tara(c) (w/Jesse Godderz) vs. Miss Tessmacher- 3.5/10
After the match, Brooke Hogan comes out and says that she just got off the phone with ODB, and next week, on Open Fight Night, ODB will be calling out Jesse. First of all, Jesse is not on the roster, so he shouldn't be bound by the rules of Open Fight Night. Second of all, if you are going to have ODB call Jesse out, I think it would have been better to just have ODB come out next week and do it. ODB is much more over than Brooke, so it would have gotten a bigger pop, and a swerve (or at least one that makes sense like this one does, anyway) always works better when people don't have time to think up a way out of it.

IMPACT WORLD TOUR COMMERCIAL- They have some fourteen year old kid say "I love TNA because it's just real. I'm told they love what they do and they show it." I'm sorry, but you should never, ever have a fan say that the product is "real." Everyone over the age of nine knows it is a work, so having a fan say this (IMO) just reflects badly on all wrestling fans by propagating stereotype that all wrestling fans are marks.
From a totally opposite corner of things, the kid saying "I'm told they love what they do" is just stupid as it makes the kid seem like someone who just believes everything he is told. was this really the best interview they could find for this commercial?

JOSEPH PARK & HULK HOGAN BACKSTAGE- not good
Joseph comes in an says that he has a letter that indemnifies Hogan, Dixie, TNA, SPIKE and everyone else... but they never say WHAT it indemnifies them from! I'm actually not certain that they are using the word indemnify correctly, but from what I understand, this means that either 1) Joseph Park's law firm, rather than TNA, Hogan, Dixie, SPIKE, etc. will pay off any law suits that arise from Joseph's actions, or 2) Joseph agrees to not sue TNA, Hogan, Dixie, SPIKE, etc. if he gets hurt doing something. Yet Hogan says that this means that he can't help Joseph. I assume, based on the context of everything, that Joseph wants to go fight Aces & Eights. Why can't Hogan help him? He helps his wrestlers when they want to fight Aces & Eights, so why cant he help one of the company lawyers? Secondly, I can't see the other partners at Park, Park, & Park agree to this, as they stand to lose a lot of money if someone does sue, and if Joseph gets destroyed, they stand to lose a talented lawyer.
And speaking of the other partners, why did none of them ever call the cops and tell them that their partner got kidnapped on national TV? Hell... shouldn't Joseph Park be suing Aces & Eights? We know where at least tow of them live (the camera guy who got tortured and Devon), and we know that their hideout is a short drive from the Impact Zone. It shouldn't be too hard to round them up.

BULLY RAY & DEVON SEGMENT- crap. This segment had a lot of problems, but the biggest is that it really didn't fit together well. It was all over the place in was that made very little sense from both a logical and continuity point of view. They first start off with Bully saying that he was shocked by Devon joining Aces & Eights. Then Devon says "we're not brothers anymore because you attacked me after Turning Point 2010. Then Bully says that in the locker room, after their match at Turning Point 2010 he was distraught that someone had kicked out of the 3-D, but Devon responded by saying "so what? We're rich. Screw the fans," and that this was some deep, dark secret that Bully had never told anyone.
So this whole time when Bully had been saying that he attacked Devon because Devon was weak the weak link in their team and he was tired of carrying him, etc, etc... Bully was really attacking Devon because Devon said "screw the fans?" What possible motive could Bully possible have for keeping that secret for two seconds, never mind two years! Secondly, Bully has been a heel from the time of that turn until eleven days ago at Bound For Glory, and in that time, I'm pretty sure he has said "screw the fans" or something similar a whole bunch of times. Bully then says that he and Devon have always been about fighting, not talking. This is coming from the same guy who has run his on every episode of Impact for the last two years! Bully then says that his entire career Devon has been nothing but a coward who hid behind him. Anyone who has seen a Dudley Boys match knows that this isn't true! GRRR!
I did like Bully telling Devon he was going to call him out next week, especially if they have Devon not show up next week... but the problems with the whole "Devon is now and has always been a coward" thing means that I think this type of heel awesomeness is best saved for a different situation.

Now that the history out of the way, let's look at the logic and continuity issues of the segment itself:
Firstly, according to this segment (in which Bully mentioned both WWE and Japan), a star as big as Devon couldn't find a job that paid enough to make ends meet? Really?
But even if we ignore the existence of WWE, the indies, and Japan, stuff still borders on ridiculous: At Turning Point 2012, just under two years ago, Devon apparently said that he didn't care about the fans because he was rich. Devon then continued working for TNA until last month... and yet, the minute his contract ended he needed a job so super-badly that he couldn't make ends meet? Did he really blow absolutely ALL of his money?! So not only did this segment both make no sense, but it made angles from the past retroactively dumb, and crapped all over Devon's star-power.

Aside from that, Bully also said that no one ever kicked out of the 3-D in WCW... which is true, but not for the reason that Bully meant. No one ever kicked out of it in WCW because the Dudleys were never in WCW (the Alliance was an alliance of ECW and WCW wrestlers, so they were still in "ECW").

So I wasn't totally paying attention to the ShopTNA commercial, but I saw Christy Hemme and I saw the word "INFECTION" on the screen a bunch of times so I started marking out for a Rock N' Rave Infection return, but then I saw that it was a ShopTNA commercial and I was sad again.

JOEY RYAN & MATT MORGAN BACKSTAGE PROMOS- GREAT promos.... but why is Morgan allowed to walk around backstage? He isn't a TNA employee.

CHRISTAN YORK WILL BE ON GUT CHECK- finally something different than a generic young guy that even people who know the indies haven't heard of.

HULK HOGAN PICKS A CHALLENGER- Hulk says that he is giving Kurt the title shot tonight, but he has something super-big and special for James Storm. What could be bigger and more special than the World Title? Unless Hogan is giving Storm a title shot in a few weeks to give him time to heel up from his brutal match at BFG (which his comments about Storm having been through a war might be hinting towards), I am probably not going to be happy with whatever this is.

What is more important to do? Show Jeff's entrance, or give your main event world title match more time? And this is doubly true if they were going to do the big, fancy, main event introductions. Why not have both guys come out during the commercial and then do the fancy intro when you come back from commercial? This would save you time on both sides of the break. And what the hell did they do during the commercial, anyway? Just have Kurt stand there and do nothing for three minutes?
TNA WORLD TITLE MATCH: Jeff Hardy(c) vs. Kurt Angle- 6.25/10
Grr... I really hate it when they come back from commercial, start the main event, then go right back to commercial in two minutes. They really tried to get there just by doing near-falls. I think there was one Angle Slam, a Swanton, and at least three Twists of Fate.

AUSTIN ARIES ATTACKS JEFF HARDY AN CUTS A PROMO- GREAT!
I LOVED Aries taking the non-custom title belt.

ACES & EIGHTS JUMP KURT ANGLE BACKSTAGE- Oh. I had forgotten that they were going to beat someone up this week. Why is Wes Brisco backstage? He kayfabe doesn't work for TNA, either. And... wait... did six Aces & Eights guys just get chased off by WES BRISCOE and GARRETT BISCHOFF?

Overall, this was a VERY up and down Impact. The good stuff (Aries & Anderson, Matt Morgan & Joey Ryan) were awesome, but the bad stuff was utter crap. There was AY too much stuff that didn't make sense, and the production glitch at the end of Aries' and Anderson's brawl is inexcusable. For the most part, this show was crap, but I will say that I think it will be remembered in the long run for JB and Keneley, who made the show SO MUCH MORE ENJOYABLE than Taz and Tenay. They should be announcing the whole show.

STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. Mike Tenay said that Aries took the "original" TNA World Heavyweight Title belt. No he didn't. He took the one that Sting had made last March. The original belt was dropped in a trash can by Hulk Hogan and later found and carried off by Eric Young. The belt that Aries took is actually newer than the one that Jeff has right now. One of the reasons that I can't stand Tenay is that he constantly tries to sound more fancy by using bigger words but always manages to use those words in situations where they aren't actually the right word to use.

This may sound stupid, but what I like bout the new guy and borash was they commented on the match and what was happening. I find Tenay and Taz start talking about stuff that has nothing to do with the match. The new guy and Borash briefly mentioned somethingelse then go bk to calling the match!!!

Very good