BRM Reviews the 12/5/2013 Impact

[Big Red Machine]

OPENING VIDEO PACKAGE- yeah, I just lost it and started bursting with laughter the second they said “the heavyweight apocalypse.”

OPENING SEGMENT- okay
Kurt’s opening promo really felt like it was just Kurt reciting lines rather than the character Kurt Angle speaking from the heart. Once Magnus came out and Kurt had someone to play off of, it got much better.
Kurt says that Magnus “left [him] high and dry against four wrestlers” last week. Is Kurt delusional or something? Because between this stuff and last week’s promo, it really seems that way. Magnus was clearly injured! And did these two good friends really wait a week to talk about this?
Kurt questions Magnus’ heart, so Magnus cuts a promo about his “hunger” to win the title. Yeah. He’s definitely going heel.
Then Bobby Roode comes out and cuts a promo about having the killer instinct needed to be a champion. This really just felt like a lame attempt to segue to his match tournament match with Jeff Hardy. Speaking of Jeff hardy, he then came out and set up a table, and Tenay exclaimed “Jeff Hardy is in the arena!” as if this was some sort of accomplishment. Jeff then just cut a generic promo, then started to get the fans to chant his name… but the way Jeff was saying his name sounded like he was using a Boston accent and not pronouncing the “R.” This made me laugh.

TNA WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE TOURNAMENT SEMIFINAL TABLES MATCH: Jeff Hardy vs. Bobby Roode- 6.5/10
The spot where they both went through the table at the same time was something I hadn’t seen before in a tables match and it was very well done, but it felt like it just killed all of the momentum the match had. I did like the fact that they resolved the whole dispute during the commercial, though. If this show is kayfabe live, then sometimes stuff has to happen during commercials, and given the choice between watching action or watching referees argue, I’ll pick the action every time.

Apparently TNA has some sort of new app where you can go and participate in a live Q&A with Bad Influence right now! As in right now DURING THE SHOW.

EC III PROMO- the same sh*t as always. I don’t care anymore. This character is a total flop. They have no idea what the hell they want to do with him. If they did know, they wouldn’t be putting him against jobbers for two straight months. Give the time to Sam Shaw, who they actual seem to be trying to develop a character for.

Hey Dixie? If your company treats its women so well, how come every single commercial for TNA’s store involves displaying the knockouts as sexual objects?

DIXIE CARTER PROMO- wait. Did they really start this tournament to crowd a new champion without a championship belt? And why can Dixie just legally order AJ to give the title back? He won it fair and square. It’s his title. She can order him to stop calling ti the “TNA World Heavyweight Championship,” but the physical belt belongs to him.

ETHAN CARTER III vs. EARL HEBNER- DUD!
I saw this coming. Hebner was the only guy old enough to have been in the ring with those guys. Also, does anyone remember when Dixie banned everyone was saying Hulk Hogan’s name? Well EC III was the first person to break that.
So Earl doesn’t want to do it, but EC III orders him to do it, and therefore he has to. I’m pretty sure his contract doesn’t say anything about wrestling, so I’m not sure how he can be forced to do this. In an attempt to get more heat, they force Brian Hebner to referee the match. Then he wastes a lot of time demanding that Earl Hebner lie down for him. So he beat up the other chumps with little problem, but he needs to order Ealr Hebner to lie down for him?
While EC III did come off like a total douche, we already know that he is a douche, so this accomplished nothing other than wasting time… unless they are building to the Hebners screwing EC III over to create his first loss, which wouldn’t make any sense given EC III’s threats here.
Tenay questions the quality of competition that EC III has faced, as uses Curry Man as an example of this. This would be the same Curry Man who Tenay tried to put over as a very successful wrestler when he came out to face EC III just last week.

SAM SHAW & CHRISTY HEMME ON A DATE- so the gimmick here is that Sam Shaw is a possessive psychopath, but Christy doesn’t know. Well… until she watches Impact and sees this footage, anyway. Also, why did they submit to having their date filmed and aired on TV?

AJ-DIXIE VIDEO PACKAGE- okay, so now they are using footage from both the Friends of AJ commercials and footage of Dixie on Impact. Why would TNA do this? Don’t they know they can get sued?

BOBBY ROODE PROMO- good

FEAST OR FIRED IS BACK- yeah. Bring back the universally panned Money in the Bank rip-off. I swear they are trying to look like a second-rate WWE.
Tenay refers to it as “the ultimate risk-reward concept” Yes. “Concept.” IT’S A G-D DAMN WRESTLING MATCH WITH STIPS! JUST SAY SO!

BAD INFLUENCE & JOSEPH PARK SEGMENT- OH MY F*CKING G-D!
So Park, Park, & Park closed thirteen years ago. I’m pretty sure that TNA has used them for legal work in the past! Either we have a major kayabe inconsistency or TNA ARE F*CKING MORONS FOR NOT DOING ANY SORT OF BACKGROUND CHECK AT ALL! Once this revelation occurred, the people started booing because of how f*cking dumb it was.
His secret exposed, Joseph begs for them to leave him alone. Kaz spits gum in Joseph’s face, prompting Tenay to say “you’ve gone too far, Kazarian!” Are you just not paying attention, Mike? JOSEPH PARK HAS BEEN DEFRAUDING YOUR COMPANY!
We get a short beatdown of Joseph until a lone comedy jobber Eric Young makes the save. EY then books a tag match for next week because apparently he has booking power. Yay. Another match we’ve seen a whole bunch of times already.

STING & MAGNUS BACKSTAGE- dumb.
Sting verbally puts Magnus over, then asks “you know that whole entitlement thing? Have you had people coming to you and saying it was somehow tied to you?”
What “entitlement thing?” You mean that vague concept that Sting talked about a month ago and then hasn’t been mentioned since? They have been so vague about this entitlement thing that I have absolutely no idea what this statement means? All it seems to be doing is telegraphing a Magnus heel turn.

Apparently the name of the One Night Only PPV is not “Old School” but “#Old School.” Yes. The hash-tag is officially part of the name of the PPV. Just when I thought I couldn’t lose any more respect for TNA, they prove me wrong.

BRO-MANS vs. JAMES STORM & GUNNER- no rating. Okay segment.
TNA’s entrance graphic has no hyphen. It just says “Bromans” as if they are just some family named the Bromans, essentially killing the joke.
Storm had the pin, but Gunner apparently got so angry he just decided to punch the other guy, then shoved the referee, causing a DQ, which angered Storm.

STING & ROCKSTAR SPUD OUTSIDE OF KURT’S LOCKER ROOM- dull. I don’t know if this was supposed to be funny or not, but if it was, it was completely not worth it just to set up the “I’m Sting. I’m sure you’ve heard my albums” joke. Anyway, after arguing with Spud to try to get to see Kurt, once Spud leaves… Sting just walks off without even knocking on Kurt’s door.

GAIL KIM & HER HUSBAND IN A 365 VIDEO- Gail’s husband actually cut a pretty good promo.

SABIN & VELVET 365 VIDEO- Sabin is becoming obsessed with his title. I don’t care. What I do care about, though, is that we well get Aries vs. Sabin next week!

GAIL KIM (w/Lei’D Tapa) vs. LAURA DENNIS- 2/10
After the match, a fight between Tapa and ODB ensues. At leastr it seems like they are building to ODB vs. Tapa instead of ODB vs. Gail.

TNA WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT TITLE TOURNAMENT SEMIFINAL LAST MAN STANDING MATCH: Kurt Angle vs. Magnus- 5.75/10
So Kurt’s gimmick at the moment is that he needs to win the title to prove to himself that he is worthy of being in the hall of fame. Is the difference between being an eleven time world champion and a twelve time world champion really that different? Tenay even pointed out that Kurt already has more TNA World Heavyweight Title reigns that anyone else in history!

Apparently this match was so important that it was okay to interrupt it to show Dixie receiving (not even opening, just receiving) a package that they spent all night building up that it was going to be delivered to her. To make matters worse, Rockstar Spud then texted Taz to have him make an announcement about it on the air, rendering the whole thing even more pointless.
For some reason they felt the need to have a ref bump in a No DQ’s match. I guess they decided that if Magnus was going to advance in the tournament, they wanted to have him look weak because… um… they’re stupid.
Nowhere near good enough for a main event, and everyone was waiting for Roode’s interference, so they didn’t care about anything that happened before it. Jeff and Magnus have a stare down after the match.

DIXIE OPENS THE BOX- and it contains a carboard version of one of the old TNA World Heavyweight Title belts. Who cares?

THE SHOW CLOSES WITH A FRIENDS OF AJ COMMERCIAL- this totally craps on kayfabe.
AJ says “I see you got my package.” HOW? What guarantee does AJ have that this thing will show up on time? Either that, or AJ somehow cut into the feed.
AJ's promo itself was good, though, but I'm afraid we'll wind up with some skit with Dxiei Carter and Rockstar Spud walking around Gainesville and interacting with the locals.

Another bad show from TNA.