Impact
Wrestling
Date: May 29, 2015
Location:
Impact Zone, Orlando, Florida
Commentators: Josh
Matthews, Al Snow
Reviewed by Tommy Hall
After all the insanity
that's been going on behind the scenes in this company, they're
really in need for a good show to calk things down a bit. This show
is being billed as May Mayhem, which is their version of a pay per
view this month. The main event is Eric Young challenging Kurt Angle
in an I Quit match. Let's get to it.
Eric Young pulls up to
the arena where Kurt Angle is waiting on him. They slug it out in
the parking lot until security breaks it up.
Knockouts Title:
Gail Kim vs. Taryn Terrell
Inside
a cage with Taryn defending. Gail goes right after her in the aisle
and takes over before the bell. They finally get inside with Kim
still dominating until Marti Belle reaches through the cage to pull
Gail down, allowing Taryn to ram the ring finger into the cage to
take over. Gail fights back again with ease until she tries to climb
out, allowing the Dollhouse to interfere again, allowing Taryn to hit
a quick Cutter for the pin at 5:20.
Rating:
D.
Well aside from how great Taryn looked, this was borderline
worthless. At the end of the day, you need more than five minutes
for a cage match. This is supposed to be some big blowoff to the
feud and instead the whole thing can't even make it to six minutes?
The Dollhouse is awesome, but they played it pretty straight here,
which defeats the purpose.
Post match the
Dollhouse goes after Gail until Awesome Kong comes out. They manage
to lock the door though, setting up the big beatdown. Taryn takes
Gail's ring off and stomps on Gail's ring finger, apparently breaking
it so the ring can't go back on. Josh: “I know Taryn has issues
we're not supposed to talk about on air but this is going too far.”
So, unless they're
actually going to say what happened in Taryn's marriage, this is
going to be another big tease that never goes anywhere. Also, this
would be more effective if they didn't keep name dropping Gail's
celebrity chef husband, who is so famous that I've already forgotten
his name.
Quick recap of James
Storm being creepy and getting Mickie James to come back for one more
match. Her husband Magnus isn't pleased with this but that's exactly
what Storm wanted. Josh: “This isn't PG.”
Here's Mickie (in a
very, very revealing dress) to talk about things. She can't wait for
the one more match but tonight she needs to talk about family and the
heart. Magnus is her fiance, but James Storm has been a friend for
years now. This brings out Storm, prompting Mickie to apologize for
Magnus bashing him in the head with a guitar. James doesn't need to
hear that but Mickie insists on apologizing, even though Magnus is
just trying to protect his family.
Storm
insists he's not a bad guy (has any good guy ever had to say that?)
because if holding a door open for a woman or keeping her from
getting attacked by Bram makes you a bad man, then yeah he's a bad
man. We hear about all the gifts James bought the family but Mickie
didn't think some of them were that funny.
James redeems himself
by surprising Mickie by saying he's set up some meetings with big
names (like Billy Corgan) who want to meet Mickie and advance her
career. Whatever Mickie picks, he'll have her back. Storm leaves
and Mickie tells the Cowboy (her word) she'll see them in Nashville.
There was a very subtle addition here as Storm kept inching closer to
Mickie, making her back up a half step every little bit.
Kenny King isn't worred
about defending the X-Division Title in a gauntlet match.
Eric Young shows us a
Tweet that we can't see and headbutts through a window.
X-Division Title:
Gauntlet Match
Why
do we always need a gauntlet match or an elimination match or
something other than a scheduled one on one match? There are seven
people in this and another enters every 90 seconds. The first five
will be eliminated over the top but when there are only two left,
it's a regular match for the win. Manik is in first and Rockstar
Spud is in second and Champion Kenny King will be in seventh. Both
guys go for eliminations until Manik sends him into the corner and
DJZ, now with a blue/purple mohawk, is in third.
Manik gets double
teamed until Mandrews is in fourth after a low less than ninety
seconds. Spud and Mandrews team up on Manik but Spud can't quite get
him out, even as he bites Manik's fingers. No one is eliminated yet
and Argos is in fifth to speed things up for all of five seconds.
Mandrews misses a shooting star and gets sent to the apron, setting
up a kick to the face and a ram into the post for the first
elimination. Crazzy Steve is in sixth as we take a break.
Back
with Tigre Uno, who entered sixth during the break, being eliminated.
Kenny King comes in seventh and the final group is everyone other
than Tigre Uno. A big kick to the head drops Manik and another kick
does the same to Young. Steve gets in a few shots and chokes over
the ropes, only to get superkicked out to put us at five. Argos gets
kicked to the floor for an elimination, followed by Spud jumping on
King's back. He manages to avoid elimination but eats the Royal
Flush.
DJZ gets back up with a
belly to back suplex into a facebuster on King, only to get
backdropped out by Manik a few seconds later. Down to Manik, Spud
and King with Manik offering an alliance with the champ. Spud is
tossed to the apron but Manik jumps King from behind, only to be
thrown out with an assist from Spud to get us down to the singles
match. King chops Spud down and rips at his face but the Royal Flush
is countered into a small package to give Spud the title at 16:48.
Rating:
D+.
So here's one of TNA's major troubles explained in one match. This
was a major title match and had no build, no hype, and nothing
interesting. There was no drama to anything here as the people came
in and were eliminated before we got down to the final two for a very
quick match with Spud winning. There was no reason to care about
this and it a lot of that is due to how the match was booked instead
of the action. The wrestlers didn't have time to do anything and it
caught up with them quickly.
Dirty Heels vs.
Wolves
This
is match #2 in a best of five series with the Wolves up 1-0. Roode
throws Aries through the ropes for a suicide dive to start but Davey
runs inside for a dive of his own on Aries. The Wolves double team
Roode inside until Austin gets back in and things settle down a bit.
Edwards chops away at Aries but Austin punches him in the face,
setting up a tag to Roode for chops of his own.
The
Heels (who aren't heels) load up what looked like a Sharpshooter but
Aries gets kicked into his partner, allowing the Wolves to double
team even more. Davey puts Rode into a reverse figure four (with
Roode facing the mat and Davey facing up) for a unique looking
submission. The German suplex into the jackknife rollup gets two as
the announcers are overhyping the heck out of this. Eddie puts Roode
in a chinlock for a bit until Bobby fights up and makes the hot tag
to Aries.
Austin
speeds things up and snaps both Wolves' throats across the top,
setting up a missile dropkick to Edwards. There's the Last Chancery
on Davey and a Crossface to Eddie but both Wolves make the ropes.
Something like Chasing the Dragon but with a Michinoku Driver instead
of a brainbuster gets two on Aries but he pops right back up for the
running dropkick in the corner, followed by the 450 to Eddie with
Davey making the save. Another Last Chancery has Edwards in trouble
but Richards comes in off the top with a double stomp for the save,
setting up the powerbomb into a Backstabber to pin Austin at 11:09.
Rating:
B.
This was straight out of the indy playbook with the entire match
being action from bell to bell. That sounds cool on paper, but
between everything going all over the place and Josh telling us about
two minutes in that this was a classic and something we were going to
remember forever, the match kind of dulled on me very quickly. It's
definitely fun, but I prefer building up to the insane finish instead
of just having it run the entire match.
Kenny King can't get
hold of MVP and wants him to call back.
Here's
Angelina Love to deal with Velvet Sky, who is sitting in the
audience. Love brings out her own personal security to deal with
Velvet if she tries anything. She screams at Velvet (with a voice
that Vickie Guerrero would find annoying) and tells her to try
something, of course drawing Velvet over the barricade for a quick
beating until security pulls her off. Sky beats up security and goes
after Love again until she's handcuffed and taken away.
Mr. Anderson is very
happy to not have Tyrus around for his match with Ethan Carter III
tonight.
Ethan Carter III vs.
Mr. Anderson
Anderson
has a one man cage to lock Tyrus inside, guaranteeing that it's one
on one. Amazingly enough, Tyrus doesn't want to go in so Anderson
goes after him, allowing Carter to ram him face first into the cage.
Back in and a quick suplex gets two for Carter as Snow challenges
Dixie Carter to a street fight. A running clothesline gets two more
on Anderson but he throws Carter through the ropes and into Tyrus,
who still isn't in the cage. Anderson nails Tyrus with a chair a few
times to FINALLY get him in the stupid cage.
They slug it out back
inside with Anderson taking over with the usual. A powerslam and
backdrop get two each but Mr. gets crotched on top, setting up a TKO
for two. Carter hits a Stinger Splash (complete with shout) but the
1%er is countered into a Regal Roll and Swanton for the same. The
Mic Check connects for two and Anderson is stunned. He loads up
another but Carter counters into a 1%er for the clean pin at 8:00.
Rating:
C-.
That's a pretty clear ending to the feud, but my goodness TNA needs
to slow down. This match started with a flurry with the Tyrus stuff
then was just trading big moves for a few minutes until Carter won.
They have to speed through everything on every show because they need
to get so much stuff in. Calm down a bit and spread some stuff out
so that stuff like this can have time to breathe.
Anderson offers a
handshake but Carter shoves the hand away. Tyrus is left in the
cage.
Rockstar
Spud is very, very happy to be a two time champion. He hasn't even
had time to think about Destination X and Option C yet but maybe he
needs a new goal.
TNA World Title:
Eric Young vs. Kurt Angle
Angle
is defending and this is an I Quit match. Both guys come out with
security after being separated all night in another idea that didn't
go anywhere. Angle goes right at him to start and they're slugging
it out a minute in. Eric tries to jump over him in the corner but
gets caught in rolling Germans to knock him even sillier. He won't
quit though so Kurt rolls even more Germans, only to be sent to the
floor as we take a break. Back with Young slapping on a Figure Four
for a bit until Angle turns it over, sending Young to the ropes.
Eric can't get an Angle
Slam so he puts Kurt in an ankle lock with a grapevine, only to have
Kurt reverse into something resembling a Figure Four. More ropes are
grabbed so Young goes up, only to dive into the real ankle lock.
Young taps so Angle lets go, but Young never said I Quit. The
distraction lets Young hit a low blow and piledriver. Still no
quitting so Young loads up another piledriver, only to be countered
into the ankle lock with the grapevine to retain Angle's title at
13:10.
Rating:
C-.
Raise your hand if you expected ANYTHING but that as the ending.
That's where this match and feud died with me: no one in their right
mind thought Young was winning the title at any point in this feud
and that makes for some very dull matches. The match was watchable,
but my goodness don't let this feud keep going any longer and get
Young down the card where he belongs.
Overall
Rating: D+.
This one didn't do it for me. They were flying through every
possible thing they could get through tonight and it made the show a
lot weaker than it should have been. The matches were good while
they lasted, but none of them had time to set up any kind of story or
psychology, which really kills the show.
We've got a few weeks
before Slammiversary and then just a few weeks before Destination X
and then a few months before the show is probably getting kicked off
the air because not enough people watch it. Could it be because they
rush through hastily announced gimmick matches like these and don't
let anything have a proper build because they have to get through
everything they can when they have two pay per views a year and
seemingly could do things at whatever pace they want? This was an
action heavy show but the lack of a foundation takes away anything
good they had set up.
Remember to check out my website at kbwrestlingreviews.com and head over to my Amazon author page with cheap wrestling books at:
http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Hall/e/B00E6282W6
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