IMPACT HITS

Jackie Moore vs. Gail Kim: The first 2 hour Impact started off bad (more later). In fact, the first segment that I enjoyed was the Moore vs. Kim Knockout match. It wasn’t great, but it was a good short women’s match. It makes sense as Moore and Kim have long histories in wrestling. Moore is a solid worker and Kim can do amazing things in the ring. It was the type of match that you expect from these two and hopefully a sign of things to come with the women’s division in TNA. The post match brawl with Christy Hemme and Roxxi Leveaux was decent and helped hype the new division. It was good to see the heel Knockouts fight amongst themselves after Kim had slipped from the ring.

Fight for the Right Preview Gauntlet Match: I had a major problem with the idea for this match. The problem is that these 10 wrestlers will be among the (at least) 16 who will be in the Fight for the Right Match at Bound for Glory (a reverse of this Gauntlet Match). But there will be a 10 Knockout Gauntlet at the PPV also. So here, two weeks away they are having the same type of match with the men that they will have with the women at the PPV, while the men are involved in a confusing match of their own. The problem is that instead of filling 18 minutes with a long singles, or two 9 minute matches, they put this together which just confuses issues heading into Bound for Glory. However, it was an enjoyable 18 minutes of action. There were a lot of nice spots and several wrestlers had a chance to show off their moves and athleticism. I would rather see this than more of Angle or Team 3D. This was a good way to showcase several wrestlers, but focusing on a few of the top guys would have been better. But it was fun.

Ultimate X Video: With TNA doing nothing to justify having Triple X vs. LAX in an Ultimate X Match (that’s it TNA! No more stupid X’s in any TNA name, be it a wrestler, a tag team or a new gimmick match!), it was good to at least see them pay the match attention this week. It started with the good video package of the Ultimate X match. I believe we’ve seen it before (maybe on their Monday Night special). But it was a good way to show the style of match to newer fans who aren’t familiar with it. And while LAX and Triple X were in the Main Event together, they still need to do more than just promote the gimmick itself. The video was a good first step, and having them in the same ring was a good second step. But really, that second step should have happened weeks ago to give a reason why these teams are facing at the PPV.

Samoa Joe [photo by Wade Keller (c) PWTorch]

Main Event: This was a good eight-man tag match. Not surprisingly, it was faced paced and featured a lot of good action. It also went 15 minutes which was nice. There were times when too much was going on. This might be a matter of taste, but sometimes slower is better. But it was definitely action packed and went back and forth. As I said above, at least Triple X and LAX were in the same ring at the same time. It also hyped Christian vs. Samoa Joe. If Impact can constantly deliver quality action packed main events of this length (with a few tweaks like actual in ring story telling as opposed to just spots), then Impact will at least deliver in the end. The 2 hour Impact was better in hour 2 than hour 1, so they still have a far way to go before figuring out how to best utilize the new length. There was plenty to complain about.

IMPACT MISSES

Off To a Bad Start: Impact started off bad. The TNA History video to start the show was decent, but we’ve seen it too many times (when they went to Fox Sports, to Spike, to Thursday Night, to prime time, and now again). But then things really got bad when the first wrestler on the new Impact was Black Reign. You have to be kidding me. The announcers did a terrible job explaining that Reign is James Mitchell’s new wrestler, while Mitchell was nowhere to be found. They never explained what happened to Judas Mecias or why Mitchell is recruiting talent. During the decent at best opening match, TNA cut randomly to the back to show Raven. What was that about? Why didn’t they show a shot of Shark Boy, or Eric Young, or Petey Williams? After the match, Raven comes out for no reason, then Abyss, then Mitchell, then Havoc (really, is Seratonin still around?), then Sting. It was a mess of random guys coming out (some more random than others). Then before any of that can sink in, Kurt Angle was up on the screen talking to Sting. All I could think was that this is the same old Impact.

Kurt Angle: Kurt’s stalking of Sting’s son was not good television. For one thing, it was inconsistent as to when Kurt could hear Sting and when he couldn’t. I know he is the Champion, but he was just on too much. It kept going back to him over and over again, to the point where I wanted it to stop. His line about slapping Sting’s son’s ass in private was very creepy. Then he basically committed assault and battery, which undoubtedly he will not be punished for. It bored me and did not make me care about their match at the PPV.

Team 3D: Just as I was tired of seeing Kurt Angle, I got tired of seeing Team 3D too. Everything that they were involved it was terrible this week. It started out with their backstage attack on Black Machismo and Sanjay Dutt. Once again, two smaller very talented wrestlers are destroyed by two fat over the hill wrestlers. The fight spilled to the ring, when Shark Boy made his comical save. Who cares about this guy? Why should I care that he shows some guts to try to attack them while wearing a neck brace? Then, they made an ultimatum that their match with Team Pacman be for the Tag Team Championship. But why would Jim Cornette say ‘yes’? That makes him look weak, as he rolled over on Team 3D’s demands. They should not have been rewarded for their behavior. Then the Tag Team Title Match itself was bad. Both teams have been heels, but apparently Team Pacman is good now? It is ridiculous to have Pacman Jones in matches when he can’t wrestle. If Team 3D was so intent on winning the Tag Team Titles, then why were they playing games and not trying to actually kick ass? And of course there was interference and run-ins. It was a bad night for Team 3D who took up too much time.

Robert Roode Interview: This was another waste of time for a number of reasons. For one, it was edited together. Why can’t they just have the interview and let it play? It’s like they couldn’t script the interview or decide what they wanted to have happen. So they taped several minutes, saw what was good and cut out the rest. Then we got some stupid revelations like where Robert Roode got his money from and why Miss Brooks is still working for him. Roode has nothing going right now, and this isn’t going to move his character into any type of direction. I don’t care about the tension between Brooks and Roode. Then the ending was horrible as Leticia came in and started yelling at Crystal for taking her interviewers job. Note to TNA, there has never, ever been a good wrestling storyline featuring a feud between interviewers!

Raven and Abyss: I mentioned above the confusing situation with James Mitchell’s new apparent stable of wrestlers. Well, things didn’t get better with Raven’s backstage promo. I am so tired of this guy. I hope he wasn’t actually comparing himself to Terry Funk. And once again, we have a TNA wrestler talking about a something that happened in another promotion in the ‘90s! It is unbelievable. Please Raven, go away. His excuse for wanting a match with Rhino and Abyss was ludicrous. Then Abyss’ acceptance of the challenge was silly and he makes it a gimmick match. Yes. And he says to include Black Reign too. Yes. I can’t wait.

Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com's Hitlist Specialist, providing his point of view in the Torch's hitlist format for Raw, Smackdown, ECW, and TNA Impact each week. Email him at jmezz-torch@sbcglobal.net.

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