By Curtis Shanks, Torch specialist

Welcome to the TNA Impact edition of Under the Microscope. We're here to review all those little observations and tidbits you may have missed. This is not a detailed recap of the show, but a review for those of you that saw the show but didn't actually "watch" it.

After last week, we know that Trevor Murdoch is trying to form a new tag team, Mick Foley loves to interact with the public, and a pogo stick is a deadly weapon. But what else is there to notice? Let's see what we can spot. Cue the opening pyro.

Yet another former champion has returned/debuted in TNA this week. Amazing Red couldn't resist the chance to see his name in a bracket and he teamed with Suicide in the 3D Invitational Tag Team Tournament. Red has plenty of experience in his TNA past and is well known on the indy circuit, including some time spent with ROH. He debuted with TNA when the company first started and was one of the mainstays of the X Division for the first couple of years before lightening his schedule due to various knee injuries. The last we saw of Red in TNA was November of 2005, when he made a one-match return in a loss to Samoa Joe.

Red is a former champion in TNA, as he held the tag titles with Jerry Lynn along with the X Division title. Although both of Red's TNA title runs lasted less than one month, he did manage to hold both at the same time. April and May of 2003 saw a lot of action for Red in TNA. After winning the tag titles on April 16, he won the X Title two weeks later. One week after that, he lost the tag titles and topped it off the following week by dropping the X title. Red is a former tag champ in ROH as well, as he held the belts for half a year with A.J. Styles (the second champs in the promotion's history).

The Team 3D Tag Team Tournament rolls on this week with two more first round matches. Before each match, a graphic was shown on the screen similar to the ones we get for all the various title matches. The background behind the graphic is a scrolling list of dates and locations. While it may seem like some generic items to add some pizzazz to the graphic, the dates and locations actually have meaning behind them. Upon closer inspection, the dates listed are actually a tally of all the tag titles won by Team 3D in the past.

The bottom end of the card in TNA is no doubt worrying about job security as we got two more debuts this week. Brutus Magnus was back on TV, as we got a new British faction also consisting of Doug Williams and Rob Terry. Williams is a familiar face to TNA fans, as he participated in last year's X Cup for Team International. Williams has been signed to a TNA contract for the past few months, but other than some house shows during the U.K. tour, has not been used.

Like Amazing Red, Williams spent a good deal of time in ROH as well. Williams wrestled on-and-off again for ROH from 2002-2007, even receiving a few world title shots along the way. While he was never successful in his attempts, he did hold the promotion's Pure Championship (a secondary belt later unified with the World Title). After A.J. Styles was crowned the first Pure champ, but he was stripped of the title due to TNA pulling all of their talent from ROH shows. A tournament was created (more brackets!) and Williams outlasted the competition to win the belt before dropping it to East coast independent wrestler John Walters a month later.

The third member of the British faction along with Magnus and Williams is newcomer Rob Terry. This is the first national exposure for Terry, as he has only two years of professional wrestling experience under his belt. He is very green in the ring and relies more on his look and power than actual wrestling ability. If you think those attributes sound like something WWE would be looking for, you'd be right. Before signing with TNA, Terry was under a developmental contract with WWE, spending time in FCW before being released by the company last year.

TNA is running some kind of deal with ask.com, as they've posed questions the last two weeks and instructed viewers to go to the site to find out the answers. This week Tenay asks, "Who did Sting defeat for his first world title?" In case you don't feel like researching such a trivial fact, you can find the answer right here. Sing defeated Ric Flair in July of 1990 at the Great American Bash to win the NWA/WCW Heavyweight title, the first of his career. While it was his first World Title, it was the second major title win for Sting overall as he held the WCW Television title the previous summer.

Although it's pretty much a given that we will see Taz in TNA, he still has not debuted in the month since he left WWE. Taz more than likely has the standard 90-day no-compete clause to overcome from his WWE contract, but there are hints that he will show. All signs point to some type of allegiance with Samoa Joe, as he has begun wearing a towel over his head similar to the way Taz wore a towel before entering a match. It could be a Taz hint, or Samoa Joe has come to his senses and realized just how bad his new face tattoo really looks and is now ashamed to be seen by his peers.

In a fun little segment, the Guns call out Christopher Daniels after their recent frustrations with the Suicide character. TNA loves to appease the smart fans and the Internet fans, and this segment was the shinning example of that. The Guns accuse Daniels of portraying the character and have evidence to back it up. Chris Sabin points out that the fans chant "Fallen Angel" or "Daniels" whenever Suicide makes an appearance. I'm glad someone pointed out this fact and asked the question, as the announcers have ignored it in the past. It would be ridiculous to simply ignore the chants, and it's nice to see someone besides the fans put two and two together to make the assumption. When the Suicide character debuted last year, the vignettes asked us "Who is Suicide?" TNA may actually reveal that answer to us.

Our second ask.com question of the evening concerns Jeff Jarrett and his weapon of choice, the guitar. The question is posed "what sitcom star did Jarrett hit with his guitar?" I can think of a list of sitcom stars I'd like to see take a guitar shot, but the one to receive the shot was none other than Gary Coleman. Coleman appeared at the WCW Fall Brawl PPV in 2000. Despite losing to Mike Awesome in a Bunkhouse Brawl match, Jarrett still managed to nail Coleman with the guitar shot during the match. Not sure who's next in line for a celebrity guitar shot, but TNA mobile has just informed me that TNA is in talks with Greg from Dharma and Greg as the companies next big acquisition and plan to insert him into the Jarrett/Foley/Mafia saga storyline.

Last week saw the retirement of the bleep counter, as TNA gave us gaps in audio rather than a bleep to conceal their vulgarity. Retirements usually don't last long in the wrestling world, and the same is true for the bleep counter. They are back tonight as we got six, most of them during the Rhino training segment. The censor appeared to lax a bit though, as there were four instances of the word "ass" not omitted from the episode.

Numbers crunched harder than an unprotected chair shot to the head: titles can change hands routinely in the wrestling world with all the convoluted finishes, run-ins, and overbooking we see today. While most times title matches result in either retention or a swap, there is one other alternative - a title being declared vacant. Stripping a wrestler of a title is not only a good way to draw heat for an authority figure, but a solution to switch the title from a face to another face or from one heel to another.

Since TNA debuted in June of 2002, both TNA and WWE are right on track when it comes to title vacancies. In TNA, we've seen nine title vacancies, amounting to 217 days total. WWE is very close in that time frame, as there have been ten title vacancies (excluding instances when a title is retired) adding up to 219 days total. The type of title isn't always the same in both companies, as TNA's World Title has had only one vacancy while we've seen five for the tag titles. WWE's tag titles have never been vacated in that time frame, but we've seen six vacancies amongst their three World Titles.

WWE has the two longest vacancies in the past six-and-a-half years, as the U.S. title was vacant for fifty days (during the Booker T and Chris Benoit best-of-seven series) and the Women's Title for 49 days (following Trish Stratus's retirement). Of course, the bookers and writers aren't responsible for every title vacancy we've seen in the past. Injuries are all too common in wrestling as they can hit title holders just as easily as non-champions. Two of TNA's title vacancies were the result of an injury (both with the X title) compared to four official vacancies in WWE because of injury (three with the World Title and one for the Intercontinental).

Curtis Shanks is a self-described wrestling nerd. Who else understands what Matt Striker is talking about all the time. Feedback is welcome, as comments, suggestions and questions can be sent to Curtis at curtisshanks.torch@gmail.com or in the comments section below.

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