PROGRESS Chapter 65: Have Some Faith in the Sound

ROB LYNCH vs. DOUG WILLIAMS - 5.5/10

Decent opener. Lynch gets the win over the veteran, which should help him a bit, but to be honest I'd rather just see Doug win and go on a tear.

MILLIE MCKENZIE vs. "SESSION MOTH" MARTINA VS. CHAKARA (w/Jinny) vs. CHARLIE MORGAN (also w/Jinny) - 4.5/10

One unlucky fan in the front row was "treated" to a face full of Martina. At least she was wearing something over that tattered, ratty old shirt she wrestles in that she probably doesn't even wash. When she got into the ring Martina began to grind on some of the others. Jim Smallman made sure to cover his crotch with his hands while this happened, which was a smart move because whatever diseases are surely living on Martina are almost certainly strong enough to jump right through clothes. Now he just needs to wash his hands for about thirty straight minutes and he'll have escaped this ordeal without catching anything.

Jinny and her contingent were, of course, disgusted with Martina's behavior. One fan threw his glow-stick into the ring to support Martina, and Charlie Morgan picked it up and threw it right back, prompting all of the fans to throw their glow-sticks in support of Martina. That was a cool moment, but these fans' affection is sorely misplaced.

Martina ran off to get some beers during the other women's introductions because she's a raging alcoholic. When it was time for her introduction she wasn't ready and said "oh sh*t. It's me," and had to run back to the ring. That was funny. Then she offered one of the beers to Millie McKenzie, who, according to my research on UK drinking laws, is not legally old enough to consume alcohol in this situation. Hopefully someone calls the police on this terrible criminal who is attempting to corrupt Britain's youth by offering alcohol to a minor.

They were both about to drink (I didn't see them open the beer cans) when they got clobbered by the House of Couture. This made me laugh. Also, I choose to interpret them not opening the beer cans as follows: Millie did not do so because she didn't want actually want to drink but just wanted to seem cool in front of everyone, while Martina didn't open hers because she was already too hopped up on substances to not notice that it wasn't open.

The reason there are two House of Couture members in this match is that Killer Kelly, who was originally supposed to be in this match, was injured in a match at wXw's We Love Wrestling 2018 Tour: London against Millie McKenzie which everyone should go see. It was short, but really great for the time it got, and did more in one match to get Millie or to be as a tough brawler than any other match of hers I've seen.

Martina, of course, did her idiotic comedy spot where she is about to do a dive but keeps running the ropes until she runs out of energy and needs the referee to give her a beer to "recharge" her but this time it was even dumber than usual because she spit the beer out, meaning that she could not possibly have gotten whatever energy she supposedly gets by consuming it.

Martina and Millie tried some team stuff that did not look good at all. Mostly because of Martina's clumsiness. I'm not sure if this is supposed to be her working for comedy or she's just this bad, but either way, she looks like a kayfabe idiot.

The match started off as the two babyfaces working against the House of Couture, but eventually the alliances broke down. I got a laugh out of Chakara and Charlie going to Jinny to settle their dispute about who should get the pin. The babyface alliance soon broke down to and thus we had the actual four-way that this was supposed to be in theory.

Martina nailed Charlie Morgan with a huge Tombstone Piledriver but didn't go for the cover because she got distracted by Jinny shouting at her that she was a bitch. Charlie Morgan got the pin on Millie, and Dahlia Black, on commentary said she thought that Chakara could have broken it up but didn't. The best part of this match was the big exchange towards the end between Millie and Chakara. I'd like to see a lot more of those two. Charlie Morgan played her role in the match fine, but really wasn't very impressive, and Martina was repulsive, as always.

NO DISQUALIFICATIONS MATCH:
T.K. Cooper vs. Chris Brookes (w/Kid Lykos) - 6.75/10

They did some big spots and some gross stuff involving hammers and staples in orifices. They did some deathmatch-y stuff, but the match didn't really feel like it build so much as it was just a bunch of big spots in a sequence that happened to make sense. This was entirely too comedic in tone for what is supposed to be a No DQs grudge match where people are using stable guns on each other. Dahlia Black's commentary was disturbingly impartial for a match in which someone tried to rip her husband's nostrils open with a claw hammer.

The fans were very unhappy when Cooper destroyed Kid Lykos, but for the life of me I can't understand why. He's a cheating, annoying heel with a vaguely creepy mask. Why shouldn't we want to see T.K. murder him?

PROGRESS ATLAS TITLE MATCH:
WALTER(c) vs. Rampage Brown - 6.75/10

A fun hoss fight that WALTER dominated a big chunk of.

NATURAL PROGRESSION SERIES V FIRST ROUND MATCH:
Danny Duggan vs. Danny Jones - 7.5/10

These two just went out there and had a really great wrestling match. The injured Eddie Dennis showed up to try to help his fellow Welshman Danny Jones but Jones told Eddie he didn't want any of his help. Then Duggan rolled Jones up for the win.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT - Eddie Dennis told Danny Jones that if he wanted someone to blame for this loss, he should blame his trainer, Mark Andrews (who Dennis is currently feuding with) because he was off wrestling in WWE rather than being there for Danny in his hour of need. Jones yelled at Dennis, who quickly ordered Jones not to put his hands on him because he's just three weeks removed from surgery… but then Dennis, heel that he is, started to shove Jones until Jones decided to take the high road and walk away. Great heel stuff from Eddie Dennis.

THREE-WAY ELIMINATION MATCH FOR THE PROGRESS TAG TEAM TITLES:
James Drake & Zack Gibson(c) vs. David Starr & Jack Sexsmith vs. Jimmy Havoc & Mark Haskins (w/Vicky Haskins) - 6.75/10

This was a fun, fast-paced three-way tag match. Havoc & Haskins were eliminated first via a cool German Suplex/Meteora combo from Starr and Sexsmith, so this is yet another disappointing outing for that pairing. Starr & Sexsmith soon hit the same move on Drake but Jimmy Havoc came back to pull the referee out of the ring, so after what seemed like a sure babyface turn on the last show, Haskins & Havoc are back heel again… which really is where they should be right now. Drake & Gibson eventually won, but the interference gives Starr & Sexsmith a reasonable claim to a rematch.

PROGRESS WORLD TITLE MATCH:
Travis Banks(c) vs. "Flash" Morgan Webster - 7/10 (and an interesting segment)

Vicky Haskins came out before Banks even made his entrance but Webster told her to go to the back, saying he wanted to do this his way. Banks was extremely tentative on a match-opening handshake… and then he just decided to start things off by pretending to be Roman Reigns. This was weird.

They did some good stuff and then we got a ref bump, which predictably led to interference… but the unpredictable part was that the first interloper would be T.K. Cooper. He speared Webster, and then he, too, pretended to be Roman Reigns (so I guess we know whose tapes SPPT have been studying. Even less predictably, Travis Banks gave Cooper a thumbs up, signaling his approval of this. Webster overcame the interference… and then hit some of his moves and made the cover but he had to wait for a new referee to come out. One did… and he counted to three and Webster won the title.

Or not. They got REALLY far into this- making the official introduction, Wbster celebrating, and Banks even heading to the back- before the original ref revived and apparently noticed that Banks' feet were under the ropes and thus the decision should be nullified and the match restarted. I doubt it was intentional, but I am tickled by the poetic (in?)justice here, as Banks, while wrestling totally cleanly, thought he had won the wXw Unified World Wrestling Title back in November but had the match was restarted because John Klinger's feet were under the ropes, and now that Banks himself has started cheating, he benefits from the exact same fluke.
Banks then won in about a forty seconds full of great reversals and nearfalls. The crowd did not like this one bit.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT - Good. Banks cut a heel promo in which he makes yet another Roman Reigns reference by telling us that "this is my yard, now." Then WALTER came out, and it seems like we're getting champion vs. champion. Banks made some threats, then went for his Superman Punch but chop chopped down by WALTER, who stood tall at the end of the show.

"FLASH" MORGAN WEBSTER BACKSTAGE - Good. Webster is having a total breakdown. He says that he needs to have the title back, and walks into Havoc & Haskins' locker room and tells them he'll do it their way this time.

Final Thoughts
This was a pretty disappointing show in the ring from PROGRESS, but I think it's going to be one of those shows where all anyone talks about is the heel turns resulting from the main event. Banks going heel a mere six months after achieving their huge pinnacle of babyface victory ten chapters ago is certainly a bold choice, but based on tonight's reaction, they appear to have pulled it off successfully. Both Banks and Cooper going heel seems to mean that Dahlia Black should wind up heel, too. If this were pretty much any other promotion (maybe other than EVOLVE or wXw) I would be worried about this seemingly abrupt change in direction, but PROGRESS has earned the benefit of the doubt from me. Banks vs. WALTER should be awesome when it happens.