By Shane McKinkley, Torch specialist

"Your mind is of deceit
Always wanting the attention of everyone you meet
So take your stars
And all your scars
And get a grip"

-"You Never Cease To Amaze Me" by Showing Off To Thieves

People are asking themselves if WrestleMania 25 is worth the money, so we'll see how many PPV buys Destination X gets. TNA Impact has recently enjoyed higher ratings than usual, and it's mostly due to MEM soap opera drama. When I first heard the idea that "the wrestling PPV market is dead", I thought that statement was false. But maybe it's true.

Is this PPV worth buying before you check the reviews? Bigger question, will any current main event wrestler show some sort of behavior that parents can show their children? From Trips' breaking and entering, Cena blackmailing Vickie, Show getting down with Vickie and Angle being Angle...(credit to btvision.bt.com for pic).

Beautiful People & Madison Rayne vs. Roxxi & Taylor Wilde & "Sarah Palin"

Blinked, and you missed Rayne's turn to the dark side. More likely that TNA ran out of heels and behold, Rayne decides to light kitties on fire and spit on old people. This match has probably been shown on an Impact somewhere. Beautiful People want revenge for the tag team of Dumb & Dumber spilling stinky poo on them. Or maybe that was mud. Who knows. At least they put "Sarah Palin" in quotes. "Because she's fake." Oh, for the days of "Major Guns." Beautiful People are now in a group called "Mi Pie Sexay" or something ridiculous. Good thing you guys spend more time thinking up group names than finishes.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE EXCITED ABOUT THIS MATCH

-- Boring as they are, Knockouts at least don't try to injure each other as much as WWE Divas
-- That wacky outfit Sarah Palin might wear! Woohoo!
-- If drunk West shows up, he'll do the TNA women-hating thing! Hooray!
-- It's only going to last six minutes!

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BE EXCITED FOR THIS MATCH

-- Does anybody really win here? Not really
-- Cute Kip probably won't get smacked upside the head

VERDICT: In The Middle Of Absurdity

Samoa Joe vs. Scott Steiner

Joe's not so quick, is he? After announcing to the world that he was going to get his revenge on MEM, he decided to terrorize a poor man named Scott Steiner. Slowly. Everybody loves Steiner. Fans in the front row have big smiles on their faces when Steiner calls them "bleeping bags" or says "your bleeping mother was a bleeping bleep she bleeped my bleep bleep off you little bleep." Steiner: making the world a happier place. I'm kind of scared to approach Joe on his next autograph session right now. Orton's got IED (excuse me...hahaha!) while Joe's just got that "15 year old jerkwad anger towards everybody."

On a side note, do you remember the contract Joe signed to earn more money on that Impact about a year ago? Cornette forgot to bring a pen. Or the pen was out of ink. Or maybe all the pens were shoved up the writers's...

Joe destroys Steiner, and puts out a notice for his next victim...the grandfather in the strip club, Kevin Nash.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE EXCITED ABOUT THIS MATCH

-- Mr. Krispy Kreme vs. A Stereotypical Old Football Player
-- The slow reaction time of TNA's security staff when Joe whips out his zany 12-inch saw
-- Doesn't appear that Joe will be dropped like Rhino, Team 3D, Kiyoshi, Brutus Magnus, or LAX...at least not the next month

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BE EXCITED ABOUT THIS MATCH

-- If this feud had anymore camp in it, people would be dressing like trannies and throwing condoms at both wrestlers (Rocky Horror Picture Show reference)
-- Could be "monkey butt ugly." Credit to JBL. He's gonna shock the world. What, he punches out Lance Armstrong? Pisses on the Alamo? Does the Texas Two-Step with George W. Bush? Buy ECW?

VERDICT: In The Middle Of Absurdity

Abyss vs. Matt Morgan In A 100,000,000,000,000,000,000 Tacks Match

"Does Abyss talking to a doctor and making quips about the Jonas Brothers get you excited? It doesn't? Geez, can't you marks understand that as long as we show our wrestlers doing something, it gets over with the crowd?" Thankfully the last two weeks Morgan got inserted, but it's obvious that this feud doesn't have the same interest level as their buildup towards Against All Odds. Maybe Lauren can turn on Abyss and slap tongues with Morgan. To me, the tacks concept has lost its original "ooomph" (blame it on it being used to much), so cheer as Abyss guarantees himself another 3 months of being employed by taking a "glass shards on fire" bump.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE EXCITED FOR THIS MATCH

-- It's got tacks!
-- It's got Lauren!
-- It's the Janitor vs. Mr. Sticky!
-- It's probably got unprotected chair shots to the noggin! Hooray for concussions and permanent brain damage!

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BE EXCITED FOR THIS MATCH

-- This match was nowhere in sight until two weeks ago
-- Morgan likes to steal moves from the Undertaker
-- Abyss likes to steal pretty much everything from Mick Foley (credit to secure.internet-host.net for pic).

VERDICT: In The Middle Of Absurdity

Kong vs. Sojo Bolt for Knockout Championship

Ancient transcripts actually foretold of this match. "In the year 2009 A.D. a wrestling organization named TNA will hold a match with a failing champion and a ho-hum wrestler." It just feels like this match is already old news. Like to be proven wrong about my disdain for this match. I would like to say that I am interested in seeing how Sojo does on a PPV level, but frankly there are a lot of wrestlers TNA has that either get forgotten or underused. This could be just another ho-hum affair. We'll see.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE EXCITED FOR THIS MATCH

-- TNA Ted: "I think Khan is really believable as a wrestler in those platform boots"
-- Don West and Tenay can duke it out instead

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BE EXCITED FOR THIS MATCH

-- The World Baseball Classic match of Netherlands vs. United States (4:30 p.m. West Coast time) is more interesting. Go Netherlands! Achieve your dreams!

VERDICT: It's So Absurd It Makes Me Want To Cry

Team 3D vs. Beer Money, Inc. For TNA Tag Titles in Off The Wagon Challenge

Would be pretty funny (e.g. stupid) for Team 3D to be "fired" after they just got "injured" at the hands of MEM. A Team 3D vs. Beer Money feud is somewhat intriguing. Would like for LAX to come in and clean house, but who knows.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE EXCITED FOR THIS MATCH

-- TNA does a better PPV tag team match than the WWE usually do (but not ROH)

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BE EXCITED FOR THIS MATCH

-- Ref distracted --> Jackie beer spit/beer bottle hit --> Whoa, you do know that you're not in "territory wrestling" mode anymore, right? That you just can't do the same finish over and over?

VERDICT: In The Middle Of Absurdity

Booker T vs. AJ Styles For Legends "Chumpionship"

If there's one man to give a worthless belt that has no merit, it's A.J. Styles. Have cannons go off in the distance and Tenay foaming at the mouth of AJ becoming the Legends "chumpion." TNA Ted would like to chime in: "I liked it when Book stole the police tape. Ha ha. A.J.'s the man cuz he like, you know, attacks Book from behind and steals his stuff. I can relate, man. Hand me another beer."

WHY YOU SHOULD BE EXCITED FOR THIS MATCH

-- A.J. might go to jail!
-- So long, Shane Sewell. Thanks for playing the "ref hulking up" bit you did.

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BE EXCITED FOR THIS MATCH

Was there a time when watching Book wrestle felt rewarding? They should probably advertise that on the PPV card: "Hey, Booker might even convey that he's trying this time. Buy now!"

After becoming "Legends Chumpion," what's next for A.J.? Wearing stupid outfits again? I hear that's how you get ahead in the X Division.

VERDICT: Very Absurd

DON WEST DRIVES IN THE ARENA

Tenay: "Where the hell is Don West? Why can't I stop talking about him? Why can't I remain professional and do my job?"

CRASH

West: "I'm here, everybody! Hic!"

Tenay: "Good gravy, man! You spilled my water! Damn you West and your unprofessionalism! Damn you to hell!"

VERDICT: Absurdly Awesome

Ultimate X Match: Shelley vs. Sabin vs. Lethal vs. Creed vs. Suicide

Free from the time constraints of Impact tapings. Trampoline match? Sure. But this could be the saving grace of the mid-card, since the other stuff is not exactly worth plopping down money for. X Division matches have gotten some nice love on TNA PPVs, and if another great outing from the X Division here, fans can say that they have a solid reason for buying TNA PPVs. Because...psst...not a lot of people buy into MEM soap opera drama

Of course, there's the nagging questions of "why the hell are these guys risking their bodies if X Division championship matches are on every Impact" or "does the X Division even have a contender list or do they pick names out of a hat?" But we can forget that and just enjoy twirling neck breakers and hurricanranas.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE EXCITED ABOUT THIS MATCH

-- Cool spots upon cool spots!

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BE EXCITED ABOUT THIS MATCH

Would like to say that Suicide winning the thing would bum me out, but frankly fans have no idea who the other guys are, based on the amount of air time

VERDICT: A Little Absurd

THE BIG MAMA JAMA: The Hardcore Legend Mick Foley is your Special Guest Super Duper Enforcer. Mr. Slap Nuts Himself Jeffy Jarrett is the special ref! The two leaders of MEM, Kurt Angle and Sting, go at it for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship!

They probably did throw away Sting vs. Angle during that Empty Arena match. Before Jarrett and Foley decided to butt their way into the match, the bigger focus was on Sting possibly fully becoming face. But now we've got Jarrett and Foley (credit to 4.bp.blogspot.com for pic).

People still remember the disaster that was Joe vs. Booker at their Houston PPV last year. Just a bad, bad finish. To their credit, TNA thankfully stopped doing bad PPV finishes (this was after the time Al Snow decided to show up to clock Mick Foley during one particular PPV).

Obviously the focus will be on Jeffy and Mickey. Will it go into cheesy and absurd? Probably. Is it worth your money? A hesitant yes.

WHY YOU SHOULD BE EXCITED ABOUT THIS MATCH

-- Sting, Angle, Foley and Jarrett
-- Possibly Shocking Storyline Advancement, "You Had To Be There"

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BE EXCITED ABOUT THIS MATCH

-- So the focus on actual wrestling (and not soap opera drama like this) is going to be placed on...Joe vs. Steiner? Or is it placed on Team 3D vs. Beer Money?
-- Possibly Dumb Storyline Advancement, "You Didn't Need To Be There"

VERDICT: A Little Absurd

MATCHES I WOULD PAY TO SEE

-- Morgan vs. Abyss (glutton for those type of matches)
-- Ultimate X Match

MATCHES I AM UNSURE I WOULD PAY TO SEE

-- Sting vs. Angle along with Mr. Con Man and the Tub of Goo
-- Booker vs. Styles
-- Evil Knockouts vs. Dumb Knockouts
-- Team 3D vs. Beer Money
-- Joe vs. Steiner

MATCHES THERE IS NO WAY I WOULD PAY TO SEE

-- Kong vs. Sojo

DESTINATION X FINAL VERDICT: A Little Absurd

Email is mckinley.torch@gmail.com.

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