By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
Impact Wrestling Hits
Eddie Edwards and Moose vs. Lashley and KM: A minor Hit for a tag team main event that turned out to be entertaining even if it felt inconsequential. It’s nice to see that an effort is being made to make KM feel like more than an undercard bully. Lashley is still lost with all of the focus being shifted to his manager. Moose’s only storyline purpose seems to be finding random partners to team against American Top Team. Edwards had a run with the Pro Wrestling Noah Champion, but he hasn’t had a meaningful Impact Wrestling storyline since Davey Richards left the company.
Allie promo: Lovable and naive Allie has transformed into strong and confident Allie. I will miss the previous version of her character, but it’s been over a year since anyone in creative seemed to understand that character, so it’s probably for the best. For that matter, Allie’s character evolution is occurring as she enters a title feud with Laurel Van Ness and therefore it makes sense to position her differently.
Knockouts Champion Laurel Van Ness vs. KC Spinelli in a non-title match: An entertaining match. I haven’t been the biggest fan of the over the top Van Ness character, but she’s really all in with it and does a fine job. Meanwhile, we continue to see Spinelli on the show, yet there’s no sense of storytelling or character development. She is apparently a heel based on the fact that she went out of her way to blow off fans who hoped to slap her hand during her entrance, which is odd in this case in that Van Ness is definitely a heel and the fans had no incentive to root for either woman.
LAX and OVE segments: The only truly cool portions of the show involved OVE raiding the LAX clubhouse and the LAX response that set up a barbedwire match between the teams. If only LAX could share a little of their cool factor with the rest of the roster.
EC3 vs. Petey Williams: A solid match that concluded with Matt Sydal inexplicably interfering for the DQ. I realize EC3 and Sydal are feuding, but Sydal’s interference still felt random in that it was a bit odd for a babyface to interfere in another babyface’s match. Perhaps this happened for a storyline reason that will play out later?
Sonjay Dutt, Dezmond Xavier, and Garza Jr. vs. Trevor Lee, Caleb Konley, and Hakim Zane: A minor Hit for a decent time filling X Division six-man tag match. I still can’t believe Garza was allowed to work these tapings with shoulder issues that left him working with one arm. They wisely gave the win to Xavier heading into next week’s X Division Title match with Taiji Ishimori, which they hyped with a post match angle. In fact, Impact did a nice job of setting up next week’s show with additional hype for the barbedwire match and the Impact Wrestling Global Title match.
Impact Wrestling Misses
Dan Lambert promo: Lambert continues to be a surprisingly good promo. Unfortunately, everything about his on-air persona feels low budget. And while it’s hard to assess what the live crowd is actually thinking, his heat strikes me as being more of the “go away” variety than actual quality heat.
Joseph Park, Chandler Park, Jimmy Jacobs, and Kongo Kong: Chandler Park using an obnoxiously nasally voice ruined this segment. Is he the cousin of Joseph Park or Miranda Sings? Meanwhile, as someone who wanted to be excited by Jacobs showing up in Impact, it already feels too quirky and uninspired. It also feels like creative is acting like everyone knows him from other companies rather than actually taking the time to introduce his character to the viewers who do not.
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