Hello! That's right, I'm back for more and after last night and the announcement that TNA are running through until next February I may well be on the verge of another boycott in the near future. But, last nights episode wasn't actually that bad in places- and when it was bad or something stupid happened it was almost always fucking hilarious.
If you missed it yesterday, there was this big TNA feature in Sports Illustrated and during it they finally acknowledged that they were getting cancelled on Destination America and were running through until February 2016. So, they're basically in exactly the same situation that they were in with Spike where they're still on the Network pretty much out of a favour from the Network to help them while they try and find a new one. It's both hilarious and depressing that TNA have found themselves in this situation twice within the space of basically a year. The problem TNA now has, what Network is going to want to touch a Wrestling show that's been booted off two Networks in the space of a year. The ratings in Wrestling have already been notable with their drops, combine that with the fact not many Networks want Wrestling on as it is and the outlook for TNA is pretty bleak.
Right then, enough about the future of TNA- let's get on with last night and the new most important show in TNA's history. I think they've had about 70 of them at this point (conservative estimate).
Dixie Carter, Jeff Jarrett Contract Signing
It's not that this segment was "bad", I just couldn't give a fuck. I just can't bring myself to have any emotional connection with Dixie fucking Carter. It's actually quite funny, when I was going back and watching a load of old Impacts to sort of prepare for a TNA eulogy of sorts that I was planning to do at the end of the month. I got to the EV 2.0 Era where they did the ECW Invasion- and again, the centrepiece of that angle? Dixie fucking Carter. At least this one makes more sense, but still I can't see through the fact that everything with Dixie is just because she's a money-mark and simply wants to be featured on TV. The Borash punch was hilarious, if for nothing else than with the Lethal Lockdown I briefly managed to convince myself that the 5th guy for Team TNA would in fact be JB.
Mahabali Shera v Abyss
I hated this match. 2015 Abyss is clunky at best, which isn't necessarily his fault- actually it is because of all the stupid bumps he's taken. Then we get Shera who has the weirdest character in Wrestling at the minute, he's someone taking on a serious Heel and is a complete monster- but he also wants to get everyone to do the Bollywood Bop. The match was just really mismatched and did nothing for me and the finish infuriated me.
I don't know how familiar TNA are with the mechanics of a Cow Bell, when it moves and gets shaken around IT MAKES A NOISE. So to have Storm run-in and attempt to hit Shera with the Cow Bell with the Ref's back turned is STUPID. ARE THE REF'S DEAF?!
I may well be being harsh on this match because of something that happened just before. THE BIGFOOT STUFF MADE IT TO AIR. It took all of my restraint and desire to see EC3 to not simply turn off right then.
Jeff Jarrett/Drew Galloway Backstage Promo
This made me laugh. Jeff came up to Team TNA and told them that Eric Young was on their team and it was a 5-Man and Team TNA were outraged. Did the Babyfaces not know Lethal Lockdown's are 5v5? Or did they just want to get one over on the Heels with a 1 Man advantage? Either way, what great Babyfaces.
EC3, Spud & Jeff Hardy Promo
It's not worth splitting up all of these segments, so I'll just do them all here. I said it last week and I'll say it again, Jeff disobeying EC3 makes him come off as a bit of a dick to me. Then EC3 said something along the lines of "you need this job to pay your bills"- because either TNA barely pay Jeff enough to get by or Jeff is horrible with money. As I said last week- can EC3 fire Jeff?! He isn't on good terms with Dixie so he can't fire him that way and as established on this show Dixie has the power. Unless they're going to do that god awful and never explained stuff they used to do with the Title with saying "he who has the Title has the power". The question if EC3 can indeed fire Jeff should he disobey, why not just tell Jeff to kill Matt or he's fired? It's a win/win for him. Unless EC3 is publicly acknowledging that firing stipulations mean fuck all, which they do- but still.
Gail Kim v Brooke v Lei'd Tapa v Kong- Knockouts Title
I actually really liked this match. It might just be because I've been starved of good Womens matches since Takeover- but I did really like it. It wasn't perfect and there were a few weird/botched spots but on the whole it was good. I'm just happy we got a clear and decisive finish with Gail Kim pinning Brooke as well rather than the usual 4-Way shenanigans where if they're doing a Title switch the Champion going in is always protected, for most recent example see Summerslam where Kofi pinned one of the Matadors. I'm not sure if they're going to turn Brooke, that would be the obvious way to go- but it did give them options. Hooray for a decisive finish on Impact!
Also, Royal Red was out there. How he didn't get inducted into the TNA HOF over Earl fucking Hebner is beyond me.
Team TNA v Team GFW- Lethal Lockdown
This was the perfect way to end TNA's run on Destination America, in a way I wish last night would have been the end. It was just so TNA. They didn't do anything monumentally stupid before the last guy got in, which is a big plus. This match is in essence War Games, it is seriously the simplest match on the planet to book. TNA in the past has actually managed to fuck it up, whether that was giving the Babyfaces the advantage heading into the match- or having the Heels make 1 v 2 comebacks on the Babyfaces and Heels coming in to even the odds. They didn't do anything like that, which wasn't a guarantee- and the booking of the match last night made me doubt somewhat that Vince Russo is in fact back.
Then it just got SO fucking hilarious/bad/TNA. I had genuinely forgotten who the 5th Guy for Team TNA was. As already said I'd briefly managed to convince myself it was JB, before that I thought it was going to be Jeff Hardy/Willow before I remembered he was hurt and just as I was trying to work out who it would be Bram's music hit. I DIED LAUGHING. I realise TNA had already taped all of this stuff, but it's still SO funny and such a LOLTNA moment. The thing with the Bram stuff is, it's not "hindsight being 20/20". Bram has a history of violence, that's how he got fired from WWE- so TNA brought him in and pushed him knowing he has the capability to do what he did. Therefore it's foresight being 20/20. As I said I was watching a load of old Impacts/PPVs and I can't remember which one, actually there were a few where Waltman, Hall and Nash either got convenient injuries when they were presumably doing the job or simply no-showed. On one such occasion they simply explained it as "Syxx Pac being Syxx Pac". I can't feel sorry for TNA when they make the same mistakes over and over again.
I actually had a massive issue with the finish as well and not just for the fact GFW lost making it one of, if not the worst Invasion angle in history. The finish was such a big anti-climax. Towards the end they did a spot where Jarrett tried to escape through the Camera Hole things they have in the Cage and they did a Tug of War spot where KAREN JARRETT HELD ONTO JEFF FOR AT LEAST 20 SECONDS WHEN ALL FIVE TEAM TNA MEMBERS WERE TRYING TO PULL HIM BACK IN. I'd actually forgotten that until I was writing that sentence, fuck that was stupid. Anyway, they pull Jarrett kicking and screaming back in and I thought everyone would hit their finish on him and Jarrett would take the pin. Nope. After the big tug of war spot they just carried on wrestling for about 5 more minutes. The Wolves hit the Coast-to-Coast spot on Jarrett, and again I thought they'd get Jarrett up and pin him. Nope. The finish was Galloway hitting the Futureshock DDT on BRIAN MYERS. Not only that you couldn't even see Jarrett's reaction to his big dream/idea coming crashing down BECAUSE HE HAD A BIN ON HIS HEAD.
We then went off the air with Dixie fucking Carter coming in and celebrating with Team TNA and it was all about Dixie as they went off air- and it made me want to be sick. Worst. Invasion Angle. Ever.
Just if you're interested the final stats on the Invasion Angle and the GFW Guys (and Girl);
Wins: 3 (PJ Black winning KOTM, The Feast or Fired Cash-In that made Myers & Lee look like shit and then drop the Belts back a week later & the Mordetzky/Galloway match where Galloway had the match won and was being stupid and only lost it because of an EY turn)
Draws: 1 (Lei'd Tapa/Awesome Kong)
Losses: 9 (Wolves/Lee & Myers, Tigre Uno v Sonjay Dutt, EC3 v PJ Black, Tigre Uno v DJ Z v Sonjay Dutt, Lashley v Chris Mordetzky, Bobby Roode v PJ Black, Wolves v Lee & Myers, Gail Kim v Brooke v Kong v Lei'd Tapa, Lethal Lockdown)
Now that's how to book an Invasion.
Now that TNA are running through until next February I'm not going to be so lenient when it comes to whether I go on another two week boycott. Last Night's episode wasn't so monumentally bad as some of the one's we've had in recent weeks, so on that front last night wasn't boycott worthy. Basically as long as things can get worse I'll keep watching. I can only assume with no Tapings booked and them only being taped through until the end of September that the House Shows they're running before Bound for Glory will make up some of their TV and similar to Spike we'll be getting "best of's" in the latter parts of the year and early next year.
Thanks for reading as always, we're getting ready for Night of Champions now so hopefully you'll be coming back here for the Predictions/Review on Sunday and Monday. Then we get to do it all again with the RAW Review and Impact Reviews next week. I suppose there was one big positive from this show, they found Bigfoot. Destination America's pretty much going out of business now with all of their programming becoming moot.
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