BRM Reviews wXw 16 Carat Gold 2020: Night 2

[Big Red Machine]

wXw 16 Carat Gold 2020: Night 2 (3/7/2020)- Oberhausen, Germany


OPENING VIDEO PACKAGE- great!

16 CARAT GOLD TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Jeff Cobb vs. Cara Noir- 6.5/10
Another match where Cara Noir’s opponent takes the majority of the match, but the moment he locks that rear naked choke in, that’s it.

16 CARAT GOLD TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Eddie Kingston vs. The Rotation- 6.75/10
Similar to the previous match in its one-sidedness, but with more emotion, as the fans were really behind The Rotation, making the nearfalls he got particularly dramatic. The zig of a finish to that match did a good job of setting up the zag in this one.

MARIUS AL-ANI INTERRUPTS DANIEL MAKABE’S PHOTO SHOOT WITH HIS AMBITION TROPHY TO CHALLENGE HIM TO A MATCH EARLIER TODAY- this was mostly fine, although I do have two complaints:
1. They put his video out before they put out the video for Ambition XII spoiling the tournament.
2. Al-Ani is apparently wearing the exact same outfit two days in a row (you notice things like this when you binge a weekend-long tournament).

MARIUS AL-ANI vs. DANIEL MAKABE- 6.75/10
When Makabe was getting into the ring, the “lid” on the bowl of his trophy fell off, which I assume means he is now cursed and will never win another tournament ever again. Whether the curse is real or not, Makabe definitely lost this match. I could watch these two wrestle for days, though. I absolutely adore they way they managed to integrate Al-Ani’s more athletic stuff into Makabe’s shoot style.

JAY-AA PROMO- fun
The short version is that they got permission to set up this gauntlet match where teams enter but then the partners get shuffled into pairings that have never teamed together in wXw before, with the winners earning a tag title shot. This is a fun idea, but does technically come off as heelish because the champs- an established duo, are setting things up so that they will get to face a pairing who haven’t teamed with each other much. Andy made this quite entertaining, and I think he’s my early frontrunner for best promos in 2020.

JAY-AA WILD CARD TAG TEAM GAUNTLET MATCH: Julian Pace & Puma King vs. Leon Van Gasteren & Lucky Kid vs. Black Taurus & “The Avalanche” Robert Dreissker vs. Norman Harris & TARIK vs. DJ Hyde & Levaniel vs. Chris Ridgeway & Scotty Davis vs. vs. Young Guns (Ethan Allen & Lucas Jacobs)- 5.75/10
Absolute Andy is on English commentary. Lucky Kid was once again distracted by that weird eye graphic popping up on his screen, leading to his downfall.
DJ’s reaction to f*cking Levaniel being revealed as his tag team partner was brilliant. This led to my favorite comedy match of the year, which was Levaniel going on and on on the outside with these outrageous claims that his father “used to be a deathmatch wrestler in Japan” and thus “I was only four years old the first time I jumped into light tubes” and claiming that before his father would tuck him in at night, he would set the blanket on fire…and in the background of our hardcam shot we can see that the match has started and DJ is getting his ass kicked two on one. And finally, when Levaniel wraps up his shtick and says “now I’m going to go win this match” he is interrupted by the bell ringing because DJ has been pinned. GREAT stuff.
All of the matches had some good action, but there really wasn’t much of a story or even a motif running through the gauntlet. The key idea here is that the Young Guns managed to avoid getting mixed up and partnered with someone else because they had never teamed together in wXw before, which gave them an advantage and allowed them to become the new #1 contenders. Avalanche and Taurus were a fun hoss team, but I think the match could have had more a of story-based focus by having the Young Guns come in earlier and/or adding some more makeshift teams for them to work through.

ALEXANDER JAMES PROMO- GREAT stuff
AJ bares his heart to us, listing all of his frustrations about how things aren’t going well and he is “reduced to the spot on the card after you bought Absolute Andy’s t-shirt. After you’ve had your piss break. After you’ve taken your creeper pic with my girlfriend.” He warns that whoever his opponent is tonight had better be at his level. Cue his opponent’s music and we get…

ALEXANDER JAMES vs. ALPHA KEVIN (w/Melanie Gray)- no rating, GREAT segment
Melanie Gray is on crutches, so I guess her scheduled title match tomorrow night isn’t happening.
Kevin got his fun Kevin offense in and one nearfall with a piledriver that everyone bought because losing to Alpha Kevin is exactly the sort of humiliation that might have send James over the edge, but then James got back on offense and just mauled Kevin. Even after the bell he kept the attack up. He even locked Kevin in Melanie’s finishing hold right in front of her, which prompted Melanie to get into the ring and try to save Kevin but being on one leg she couldn’t get up fast enough and AJ was ready and able to easily block the crutch when Melanie swung it at him. AJ back Melanie up into a corner and seemed like he was ready to throw a punch at her when Killer Kelly (James’ aforementioned girlfriend) ran out to pull him away. She shoved AJ and yelled at him to stop, and AJ finally did… but not before he kicked Melanie’s crutch out from under her.
Kelly went to check on Melanie while Kevin charged at AJ and hit him from behind. AJ was able to scramble out of the ring after only a few shots, and which point Kevin went over to check on his wife as well… which allowed AJ to get a chair and hit Kevin in the back with it several times… and, as the announcers pointed out, the first one almost hit Kelly, too. Kelly eventually got the chair away from him and yelled at him some more before he left. Kelly went over and apologized to Melanie before running off after AJ.

NORMAN HARRAS IS A DICK TO TARIK BACKSTAGE- good
Harras has his arrogant douchebag “international superstar” gimmick down pat. He was a douchebag to TARIK, blaming TARIK for their loss. TARIK stood up for himself, and now we’ve got a challenge for an eight-man tag pitting TARIK and his buddies Tyson Dux, Brent Banks, and Sebastian Suave vs. Norman Harras and three of his buddies.

16 CARAT GOLD TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: “Speedball” Mike Bailey vs. Bandido- 6.25/10
I know I’m probably in the minority here, but I thought this was fine at best. They did a lot of cool stuff, but everything felt so segmented that it came across as a planned-out performance and not something natural. “First we’ll do our flips and dives, then we’ll do our fighting spirit spots and strike battles, then back to the flips, then out big spot for the finish.”

KILLER KELLY & THE ALPHA LOVERS BACKSTAGE- very good
Kelly comes up to the Alpha Lovers and once again apologizes for her boyfriend’s actions. She insists that “I need to support him,” despite all of the things he has done (which Melanie points out even includes trying to hit Kelly with a kendo stick at the 19th Anniversary Show) because “he’s going through something.” Melanie holds up the Alpha Lovers’ relationship as an example of true support, but says that she also supports her friend Kelly, and offers Kelly the title shot tomorrow night that Melanie is too injured to have.

16 CARAT GOLD TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Shigehiro Irie vs. Jurn Simmons- 6/10
This had the makings of an epic hoss fight but it was sadly cut short by a lack of time.

TITLE VS. wXw CAREER MATCH: Bobby Gunns(wXw Unified World Wrestling Title) vs. David Starr(wXw career)- 8.5/10
Oh great. Now even wXw is doing the spot where you fight on the outside forever and the referee doesn’t count you out because “we can’t have a count-out in match this important.” Then David Starr misses a dive and all of a sudden there are count-outs now.
Other than that, this was the expected excellent match. They gave it the necessary epic length, but it felt a little too repetitive to me. I’m hard-pressed to remember a move that wasn’t that brainbuster onto the knee, a German Suplex, a strike, or a roll-up. Both guys’ necks got worked over, as well as Starr’s arm. There was a lot of drama, although I really didn’t like the overbooked stuff towards the end (and especially the fact that it was Starr who cheated). David Starr’s wXw career was either going to end or reach new heights, and the fans understood that although wrestling is a work, both of those situations would also be very real.

BOBBY GUNNS INTERVIEW- GREAT heel stuff
He cut a promo not just on David Starr, but on all four men remaining in the tournament.


This was a good show from wXw, with a lot of fun stuff going on, an excellent segment with Alexander James, Killer Kelly, and the Alpha Lovers, and an epic-length main event. That being said, I’m still quite disappointed with this year’s eponymous tournament. The matches all feel like they’ve been hamstrung by not being given enough time for anything to stand out. This weekend has felt big, but it has not felt like the true marquee weekend that it is.

[cero2k]

missed the rating for the wild card tag match

[Big Red Machine]

missed the rating for the wild card tag match

Added.

Thanks for the catch.