By Jason Powell
TNA Impact Wrestling Hits
Decay interrupts Gail Kim promo: The highlight of the night. Kim was passing the torch to Jade and seemed to be be on the verge of announcing her retirement when Decay interrupted. Rosemary’s attack on both women was great. It looked like she came up short on the coast to coast attempt, but the camera angle used covered it nicely. I’m looking forward to Rosemary becoming a Knockouts regular rather than being just the woman behind Abyss and Crazzy Steve.
Eddie Edwards vs. Eli Drake for the TNA Title: A good main event. They never really sold me on Drake being a threat to capture the championship, but this was still a nice step in his rapid development and he was able to have a quality main event match with Edwards. The post match attack by DCC will be addressed in the other section.
Broken Matt and Brother Nero: Matt’s amnesia made for a fun night of videos from the Hardy Compound. The skits were brief and entertaining. The creativity of the Hardys continues to shine as they find new ways to keep the momentum going.
EC3 vs. Abyss: EC3 looked good in the match and did a great job of showing that he was all business in this quest to get another title shot by leaving the ring without celebrating this win.
Overall show: TNA had no way of knowing when they taped this show that Monday’s Raw would be filled with too many talking segments and not nearly enough in-ring action. It could not have worked out better that this wrestling heavy show fell when it did. This was a good night of wrestling and the talking segments were kept brief and were entertaining for the most part.
Trevor Lee vs. Rockstar Spud vs. DJZ: It was nice to get back to an actual X Division singles match (albeit one that was actually a qualifying match for a TNA Title number one contender match) rather than the pointless Team X Gold matches. I’d still prefer to see the X Division work singles matches, but this was a good three-way with a good finish.
Mike Bennett vs. Moose: The match was nothing special, but Bennett getting the count-out win was a nice surprise. He did a great job of emoting that even he was surprised that he won the match. The finish gave Bennett the fluke win that works for his character while also protecting Moose.
Brandi Rhodes and Allie: Brandi planted the seed with Allie that it’s time for Allie to step up and be her own woman. She wasn’t receptive, but this was a necessary step toward the lovable character finally standing up for herself.
Aron Rex and Jessie Godderz: Rex is a full fledged heel at this point and it could not have happened soon enough. He’s arrogant and cowardly, and this is going to work so much better than his miscast babyface run. Meanwhile, Godderz continues to click as a mid-card babyface. Rex is so good as a heel that they may even be able to use him to make the Grand Championship mean something.
TNA Impact Wrestling Misses
DCC reveal: The DCC reveal came out of nowhere. It was very surprising that they didn’t tease the unveiling at least a week out with the goal of drawing more viewers to the show. James Storm, Bram, and Eddie Kingston have potential as a faction. They need a strong promo and mission statement. Storm is one of the better talkers out there, so hopefully he can get this off to a strong start next week.
The Tribunal and Mahabali Shera: This segment and these acts have the Xplosion B-show written all over them.
You put the DCC reveal in the Miss section, yet really didn’t give a reason for it. It was a good segment and honestly didn’t belong in the Miss segment at all.
Believe it was because he wanted them to tease it a week ahead of time thinking it might draw a bigger audience. I was fine with it.
Anyone else think Aron Rex seems a bit effeminate? Not a bad thing just think that could be something they could do more with to get him even further away from any resemblance to his old Damien Sandow character. For one thing have him wear more elaborate outfits. The “puffy” shirt on this episode was a good start.