Impact opens up with a simple memorial to George “The Animal” Steel, Chavo Guerrero Sr., Ivan Koloff and Nicole Bass who all passed away in the las week; it’s been a week that’s for sure. Thankfully, were graced with the return of “George Washington” to present great wisdom to Broken Matt and his journey back to his Egyptian roots; the “King in Gold.” This is followed by the revelation that Vanguard 1.0 has a severe drinking problem (I’m sure working for TNA doesn’t help) and this journey that Matt is about to embark on could cause him to lose his abilities. The solution? He will transfer his abilities to Brother Nero’s vessel for safe keeping, causing Jeff to unleased this strange hyena call and just like that he’s gained an accent and lets us in on a premonition of his own; Broken Matt is going to Egypt. This segment brought me up so high only to have my soul pillaged with the reminder that I have to what the wedding of Laurel Van Ness and Braxton Sutter…
Cody and Brandi Rhodes come to the ring, we get a mushy start about how they love each other, yadda yadda yadda, Cody keeps bringing up how someone helped his wife last week and when he does so he has a slight look of disdain on his face. He invites Moose to the ring so he could thank him personally and were seeing more and more play on the face of Cody. Moose mentions that Brandi has his number and Cody’s whole demeanor changes; I must admit that Cody’s facials were spot on this whole segment. Cody then goes full psycho accusing them of sleeping together in the future and more absurd bad relationship traits. He then proceeds to call Moose a “presidios slut,” (jail slut, in case you were wondering) which is absolutely amazing. Cody then swerves Brandi and Moose by saying he’s kidding but then kicks Moose right in his “moose knuckle.”
***Don West is selling a Jeff Hardy Louisville Slugger baseball bat for $29.99 if you’re interested. He’ll even throw in a shitty hat if you buy now!
Back from commercial, we get a little hype video for the Eli Drake and Tyrus feud and as Eli said: “if you aren’t right, you get left.” Profound words right there, words to life by in fact.
Eli Drake vs Tyrus
F**k building towards a match, right? I just don’t understand for the life of me why TNA does this time and time again. This time is a tad different, not in a good way; after attempting the “finger poke of doom,” Drake punches out Earl Hebner, Tyrus grabs the face of Drake to the results of a raise. The two hug and leave; if their music weren’t playing you’d be able to hear crickets. Pope of all people proceeds to say that when the new management puts their fingerprints on this product stuff like this won’t happen. Pope, I truly hope your right, for the first time in my life.
Broken Matt has returned from Egypt with a golden boat, Bryan Alvarez would be so proud. Matt has gained characteristics of his first vessel, “Arrunaki.” (not gonna lie, I don’t have the slightest idea how to spell it) He now has everything he needs to complete their expedition for gold, even a golden boat to house all their gold.
Jade then comes out in what looks like TNA’s knock off Kevin Owens shirt and grabs a mic (God help us all) to tell us that she’s not finished with Rosemary and what do you know, Rosemary comes out to confront her. It’s here that Josh Matthews starts playing his twitter gimmick, greatest announcer ever. They ultimately decide to fight in a “Last Knockout Standing” match.
Bram vs Jesse Godderz
So, it’s been damn near an hour into this show and we get our first real match, the one kicker, of course, is that both these guys are average as best. The match is essentially a two on one with Eddie Kingston getting involved whenever he can. Jesse wins via roll up; that is all.
Meanwhile, our Hardy’s teleport to none other than Mid-Atlantic Wrestling to procure more gold, they are cut off by the Mid-Atlantic Outlaws and a hot topic regular who mentions that their tag champs haven’t been beaten in 12 years; how old are these guys?! The three parties find a common ground and to the ring we go! We find out that the tag champs for 12 years are late 20’s at best and a garbage brawl breaks out, but above all this, a crazy Jeff adds so much more to this storyline.
In case you’re wondering, the mean girls have been all over the show talking about consummating marriages, dresses and more. You don’t want to read this shit.
Mid-Atlantic Tag Championship
The Broken Hardy’s vs Mathis & Rage
Once again, we see a match in clip form, I’m not complaining since no one is here to watch the match, it’s those Hardy hijinks we’ve come to see. We get Jeff throwing one competitor down the stairs in a garbage can while in the ring Broken Matt gets the pin to procure their third tag team championships then disappear. Back at the Hardy compound they throw their new titles in the golden boat and sparks start flying; I really hope they ride a golden Trojan horse to the ring at some point.
Josh Barnett vs Bad Bones
Bobby Lashley joins Josh and Pope on commentary in what turned out to be a pretty decent match. Barnett hits a wicked powerbomb, a northern lights suplex and applies a key lock for the victory. Finally, a match on Impact that wasn’t a glorified brawl.
Josh then says that the wedding between Braxton and LVN is the most controversial wedding in wrestling history; does no one remember Chuck and Billy? Dawn Marie and Al Wilson? In that case, Braxton Sutter better get married in his tighty whiteys and a dildo in his pants or I’m gonna be upset now!
X-Division Championship
Trevor Lee vs DJZ
Should I be complaining about this match? No, it’s wasn’t as bad as their ladder match, in fact, it wasn’t bad at all. But unfortunately, these two are the only X-Division competitors we see lately and that sir is a boring crock of shit. DJZ goes hit a very nice reverse huricanrana, Helms would hook the foot of DJZ to run the distractions allowing Lee to roll up DJZ and grab the tights for the victory. Post-match, Helms and Lee double team DJZ until Andrew Everett rushes the ring, domes Lee with a huricanrana followed by a shooting star press. Thankfully we should get a different match next week.
The Wedding of Braxton and Laurel featuring the Mean Girls
The stage is set, the red carpet is unrolled. A liquored-up Mike Bennet along with Braxton Sutter make their way to the ring, up next is the flower girl who turns out to be Rockstar Spud and Aron Rex, not in his naked attire this week, fortunately. An organ begins to play, here enters our lovely bride, Spud proceeds to try and look up her dress and Maria has the mic and calls out Allie; I want you all to know that it kills me to watch this, it really does and it’s all for you so you better share the shit out of this article! Even the fans in the Impact Zone are with me, they start chanting “We don’t care” and mercifully boo the hell out of this segment. We get vows and then Maria continues to yell at Allie as they say their “I do’s,” Braxton, however, has cold feet and does not go through with the wedding.
Mike Bennet update; his shirt is now half off and getting more shit faced by the minute. Braxton then proclaims his love for Allie and Maria has a conniption and it turns out that this whole time the only reason why he agreed to marry Laurel is to stop Allie from being fired as Maria’s assistant. Whoop-dee-doo! I was expecting a secret from Braxton’s closet like he collected nail clippings or something.
Allie then quits and all hell breaks loose, Sutter attacks a drunk guy while Broke and Robbie E rush the ring, finally Allie and Braxton go in for the kiss and we get a happy ending and hopefully the end of all this Mean Girl garbage. Who am I kidding…
Overall a much better show then the last few weeks, no really good matches still but the Hardy’s segments were great and Cody was brilliant playing the jealous heel; let’s see if they let anything build naturally or suffer the same rushed fate as Eli Drake and Tyrus which was one of the worst arcs I’ve ever watched.
3/5