BRM Reviews the 4/4/2013 Impact (sh*t)

[Big Red Machine]

This week’s Impact started off with an all too common occurrence: Mike Tenay said something that pissed me the hell off.

“And we open with the unified, the united gang known as Aces & Eights, and they have been dominant in Impact Wrestling in TNA, especially since gaining the power and the control that goes with holding the World Heavyweight Championship, a belt that is in the possession of Bully Ray, at least for one more week until next Thursday night in Corpus Christi, Texas when he’s got to step into the ring against Jeff Hardy at Full Metal Mayhem.”

Fittingly, this begins with Tenay’s trademark immediately following up a word up with a synonym for no reason whatsoever, but while that is annoying as hell, my real issue with this is the content.
First of all, this is needlessly expository, as anyone who hasn’t been watching the show for the last ten months would have been able to figure out that the guys coming to the ring are Aces & Eights based on the recap video we just saw or through the promos their guys were about to cut. For those wondering why I am harping on this, it is because needless exposition (especially the way that Tenay does it) often sounds some combination of awkward and corny, which is not good. (And as a side note… talk about a run-on sentence! Dear G-d! SEVENTY-NINE WORDS WITHOUT A PERIOD!)
Almost everything else Tenay said here was already covered in the recap video, too. I normally wouldn’t fault an announcer for hyping up a big upcoming title match, but don’t do it thirty seconds after we just heard about it in the damn video package!

Most importantly, though is the following: “the united gang known as Aces & Eights, and they have been dominant in Impact Wrestling in TNA, especially since gaining the power and the control that goes with holding the World Heavyweight Championship,”
Dominant? They barely ever win matches and almost always run off like little girls, even when they have the numbers and weapons advantage! Hell, big bad Bully Ray (you know, your top heel right now) backed down from a crippled, fifty-nine year old man a few weeks ago!
“especially since gaining the… title”- well, since gaining the title they actually went to a draw in one fight, so I guess that is technically better than they were doing before, but they still lose the overwhelming majority of confrontations, which is pretty much the opposite of “dominant.”
“especially since gaining the power and the control that goes with holding the World Heavyweight Championship.”- While they do technically have this, they haven’t actually used it for anything yet, so why does it matter? Furthermore, Devon has held (and might I mention barely ever defended) the TV Title for three and a half months now and has never tried to use it as leverage for anything, so why should anyone think things will be different with the World Title? Hell, if Aces & Eights wanted to use a belt for leverage, why didn’t they do so back when they really needed leverage (before BFG when they won access to the Impact Zone) when Devon LEFT THE COMPANY AS TV CHAMPION!

ACES & EIGHTS PROMOS- Anderson offers AJ a spot in Aces & Eights and Devon comes out with an envelope for Brooke that has to do with Brooke & Bully’s marriage. D’Lo says that last week he got his notice of termination from TNA. LAST WEEK? Are you kidding me? He was exposed as a member of Aces & Eights A MONTH AGO! Did it really take them THREE WEEKS to fire a high-placed executive who it has been proven is part of an outside group who that has been responsible for assaulting company employees for the past ten months?
D’Lo then demands that someone from TNA management come out and explain to him why he deserved to get fired after so many years (in reality, less than four) of hard work. This would have been fine if D’Lo had been sarcastic or snarky (like Bully when said “I miss my wife” in the clubhouse later in the show), but he played it all perfectly seriously, which is utterly ridiculous. Does he really not understand that being part of an outside group that has been responsible for assaulting company employees (including the GM and his good friend the former GM), kidnapping and attempted kidnapping of other employees (including another executive), and trying to ruin the show multiple times is something people get fired for? Hell, they should all be lucky they aren’t in jail for what they did to Joseph Park!

Then Kurt comes out and starts a fight with Devon. Aces & Eights all start to beat Kurt down so out come the babyfaces to make the save. Well… not all of the babyfaces. Just the ones in the match against Aces & Eights tonight. It’s not like someone else with major beef with Aces & Eights (like, say JEFF HARDY or STING) would want to help. Or even just any TNA wrestler. I mean, it’s not like this is a big war between TNA and the Aces & Eights, right?
*flashes back to Tod Keneley at the beginning of the show:*
“the war between TNA Wrestling and Aces & Eights rages on!”

Oh. Well then.

Anyway, as if they couldn’t do anything to make me want to watch this main event less, the five guys on Team TNA beat up SEVEN members of Aces & Eights (including the guys they will be facing later on tonight). Hey Tenay! Could you explain to me again how Aces & Eights have been so “dominant?”

BROOKE HOGAN & JOEY RYAN BACKSTAGE- I swear this company must hate me. I was just about to give them credit for such a great segment (and Joey Ryan was great here; this is the sort of stuff they should have been doing with him all along!), but then they go and ruin it with an absolutely moronic premise! Having fired Taryn Terrell as a ref in order to make her a wrestler, Brooke is now distraught because she has no one to referee the Knockouts’ matches.

Issue #1: Why can’t they just do what they had been doing up until last August and have a male referee officiate the women’s matches? This seems like not only the simplest, but also the MOST F*CKING OBVIOUS SOLUTION IN THE WORLD?! The only one whose judgment we have any reason to suspect is Earl Hebner, and his girlfriend is currently out on pregnancy leave, so I doubt that even he would present a problem... and if he is a problem, you still have Brian Hebner and Brian Stiffler.

Issue #2: Taryn was fired as a referee TWO WEEKS AGO! That means Brooke has had TWO WEEKS to deal with this and has not yet done so. That last week, on Open Fight Night, where anyone can call out anyone and they have to have a match… they went into the show without anyone to referee the Knockouts’ matches! Any number of things could have been done in these two weeks to rectify the situation, such as asking around backstage to see if someone could ref (there must be someone with some refereeing experience backstage), asking Traci Brooks to come in (after all, it’s not like her husband is on the active roster or anything) or, once again, extremely simply and obviously, HIRE A NEW REFEREE! If, for whatever reason, you really want it to be a woman, that’s fine, you can hire a woman, but how the f*ck did it not occur to anyone in TNA that if they needed a new referee THEY SHOULD HIRE ONE?

Issue #3: Joey asks Brooke if he can ref the Knockouts’ match “tonight,” which would mean that Brooke booked a match despite not having referee. How, exactly, is this woman qualified to run this division, again? Oh yeah. That’s right. Her daddy is the General Manager. HOORAY FOR NEPOTISM!

Oh, and to make things worse, as we would find out, this match is next. So not only did they book a match for which they had no referee, but they scheduled it as THE FIRST MATCH ON THE CARD.
Issue #4: How is it that a male referee is not allowed to officiate this match, but a male non-referee is? WHAT THE F*CK?!

VELVET SKY & TARYN TERRELL vs. GAIL KIM & TARA (w/Jesse Godderz)- no rating, decent segment
I guess they don’t have any spare referee shirts lying around either, because Joey was officiating this match in his street clothes. This went on a bit too long and Taryn seemed to have screwed up her double-team with Velvet a bit, but it was entertaining enough. The finish makes Brooke Hogan look like an idiot, too, so that should be good to make fun of in future weeks. The stuff after the match with Joey was great.

TAG TEAM TITLE CONTRACT SIGNING- Bobby Roode says that neither Chavo nor Hernandez can hold a candle to either him or Aries, and points out that both he and Aries have been World Heavyweight Champion while neither Chavo nor Hernandez have ever been World Heavyweight Champion. Chavo responds by saying “don’t you know I’m a Guerrero, baby?” Yes, Chavo, you are a Guerrero, but David Flair was also a Flair.
They then add the following stips to next week’s tag title match: 2 out of 3 falls, and if Chavo & Hernandez lose, they will never be able to team again in “Impact Wrestling” (so I guess they can team together on X-Plosion [X-plosion is still on the air, right?]).

ADAM PEARCE GUT CHECK VIDEO PACKAGE- great

MAGNO GUT CHECK VIDEO PACKAGE- also great

GUT CHECK MATCH: Adam Pearce vs. Magno- 3/10
Both guys are pretty good but Pearce’s real skills are on the mic and the place he can help TNA the most is on the booking committee. The match wasn’t particularly good or exciting and didn’t get much time. In addition, I absolutely hated the finish. First, from an execution point of view, Pearce TOO HIS HAND OFF OF MAGNO’S UPPER BODY in order to put it on the ropes. Just looking at the pin, it looked like gave Magno a much better chance to get his shoulder up once Pearce took his arm off of Magno’s body. Nowadays whenever people do the “grab the rope for illegal leverage” thing they almost always do so in a way that doesn’t actually give you any extra leverage, which is just moronic. It’s like they think there is some magical enchantment at work that makes it harder for the other guy to get up as long as you are touching the rope. It’s not magic. It’s physics. It works the same way both in and out of kayfabe. You want to see illegal leverage done right, go back and watch some Flair matches from the late eighties.

Also, from a kayfabe point of view, Pearce knows that the judges are going to watch the tapes and review the match, so he must know they will catch him cheating. All three judges now are babyfaces. There isn’t even anyone who is a little ambiguous at times like Taz was. Why would a babyface be impressed by cheating?

ACES & EIGHTS TALK TO AJ STYLES BACKSTAGE- dumb

RECAP OF THE WHOLE “CAN WE TRUST BULLY RAY?” SAGA AND THE TURN AT LOCKDOWN- Did we really need to waste an entire minute on this? I’m pretty sure everyone watching the show knows by now.

HOGAN BACKSTAGE- Hogan says that Sting (the guy leading the fight against the Aces & Eights) isn’t here because Sting is a “politician” not a “warrior,” then says he is going to go call out someone else. Sure. Why not? I will admit that Sting was being obnoxious as hell last week and by his actions seems to have indicated that he clearly hasn’t been paying attention to any of Hogan’s segments since Lockdown, but Hulk is letting his ego get in the way of doing his job as GM. And yes, I know that is in character for Hulk to do… but we all knew that way before he even got the job and as a result it just makes Sting and Dixie look like morons for giving him the job in the first place.

KURT ANGLE & JOSEPH PARK BACKSTAGE- entirely pointless

HULK HOGAN, AJ STYLES, & JAMES STORM SEGMENT- pretty good
Hogan says that “TNA is being held hostage by Aces & Eights.” HOW? What demands have they made?
Then Hogan says that the regular AJ Styles (you know, the one who won all of those championships over the years?) isn’t dangerous, so they need this new, dangerous AJ on their side against Aces & Eights. Then James Storm comes out and cuts an awesome promo in which he tells AJ to go ahead and join the Aces & Eights… and Hogan, who just a minute ago was said that TNA needed AJ on their side in the fight against Aces & Eights, just stands there and doesn’t react to this at all until the end of segment when AJ starts to walk away. Then, after the commercial, we have Hogan saying that he is done “sucking up” to AJ (yes, he actually said “sucking up” meaning that he was just blowing smoke up AJ’s ass and TNA really doesn’t need him to help fight Aces & Eights), and he wants an answer from AJ next week whether he will continue to wrestle for TNA or whether he will quit.

WINNER GETS A TNA X-DIVISION TITLE MATCH: Sonjay Dutt vs. Petey Williams vs. Mason Andrews- 5/10
The match was okay, but I got to see the Canadian Destroyer, so I’m happy.
Christie Hemme called this an “X-Division Qualifying match,” which would mean that the winner would become part of the X-Division… which, of course, makes no sense at all because Sonjay is already a part of the X-Division and under contract to TNA.

BULLY GIVES ACES & EIGHTS A PEP TALK- Bully tells the guys that it’s not their “fault” that the babyfaces beat them up earlier in the show.” WHAT? They had a seven-on-five advantage. They shouldn’t be losing!
Then they built up whatever this thing that is happening between Bully and Brooke later tonight (which, since they are now going into the intros for the ten man tag team match, will get the main event spot tonight *rolls eyes*).

KURT ANGLE, JOSEPH PARK, MAGNUS, SAMOE JOE, & ERIC YOUNG vs. GARRETT BISCHOFF, DEVON, WES BRISCO, KNOX, & DOC- 5.5/10
Totally unacceptable for a main event. A dull, bland match that will likely have no consequences whatsoever. Aces & Eights win after a low-blow that there was almost no way the ref could have missed.

HULK & BROOKE BACKSTAGE- Brooke is ready to go out there alone to face a member of a group which has tried to hurt or kidnap her multiple times. She then says “okay, I’ll bring a security guy.” Right. One or two security guys against the whole Aces & Eights faction. Hulk, not being an idiot, tells her to bring more people and she accepts.

BROOKE & BULLY SEGMENT- DUD!
To build up to this, we waste over a minute with a video package recapping events that have already been beaten into our heads with video packages out the wazoo for the past few weeks (and other parts of it have been beaten into our heads with video packages for much longer than that).
Bully started this off by cutting a quick promo on Jeff to hype up their title match next week. Brooke then comes out with just two security guys (so I guess she didn’t listen to Hulk after all, because she is a moron). Bully just taunts her a lot, then gives her a front row ticket to next week’s show. Yes, that’s right, he gave a company executive a front row ticket to the show because he wants her to watch the main event of her own show. Brooke slaps Bully so he taunts her some more, then Jeff Hardy comes out and he and Bully brawl a bit. Next week’s match is Full Metal Mayhem, so of course, no weapons are even teased.

Overall, an extremely sh*tty episode of Impact. The wrestling stunk, the angles were bad, and pretty much everything they did made one of the company executives look like a complete and total moron. Even the AJ stuff, which is usually great, was dragged down by Hulk Hogan. They did do a decent job at building up to next week’s two title matches and more importantly… Petey Williams is back!

STUPID ANNOUNCER QUOTES:
1. See above.
2. “Taryn didn’t even have a chance for her Impact Wrestling in-ring debut because of the attack by Gail and Tara.”
Well seeing as how Taryn was healthy enough to brawl with Gail in the back about five minutes later, there was no reason that they couldn’t have just had the match later in the show. The real reason she didn’t have her in-ring debut last week was because there weren’t any referees that Brooke found acceptable… which we just learned IN THE LAST F*CKING SEGMENT! Pick on Cole and Lawler all you want, but at least they PAY ATTENTION TO THE F*CKING SHOW!

[badnewzxl]

1. This Joey Ryan as KO's ref is awesome for three reasons: 1) what we saw on Thursday (The ladies played well off Ryan and Ryan got some much needed air time to show what his character is really all about), 2) the fact that it shows how terrible the idea of Brooke Hogan as KO's GM is (who in their right minds would let Joey Ryan officiate a ladies match? Why not have Pete Rose as umpire this World Series), and 3) EVENTUALLY HE'LL HAVE TO OFFICIATE AN ODB MATCH! I wanna see THAT interaction....