Last week we witnessed a frugal attempt to reboot Impact and make the company great again, can they capitalize this week? The answer is yes.

The show opens and what do ya know, Davey Richards has lost his pants and fondling his wife, Angelina Love. Oddly enough he looks like Finn Balor.

Davey Richards vs Suicide

All in all, that match was good. More importantly, Richards plays a good shit eating heel. Every chance he gets, he’s snuggling up with his wife and the fact that he naturally looks like asshole helps a lot. Davey Richards wins when he hits the Creeping Death following a failed double foot stomp. Yes, even after the Balor transformation. On a side note, Borash is talking about a “she” as in “she’s here” or “she’s coming,” does he have a direct line to El Patron? Even Borash is agitating me now.

All of a sudden, the heavens part and we are transported to what feels like a Californian basement where LAX are playing cards and drinking brews. The production is great and it makes it feel top notch, in my opinion, better than any backstage segment the WWE has ever done. Big thumbs up from my couch good sirs. Konnan goes on to explain with ease why he’s returned to Impact, to jack the tag titles like the jacked his tag titles. That and getting shafted by said company when needing hip surgery, I’m assuming of course.

The crazy cat lady welcomes us back from a commercial break, Sienna interjects and tells Van Ness that she has something in store for Braxton and Allie tonight. Oh, Joy. Nothing ever happens.

Reggie Watts, Fallah Bahh and Mario Bokara vs Shera, Laredo Kid and Garza Jr

First of all, it’s not actually Reggie Watts, if it was the music would be better and the show would be funnier. His name is actually Idris Abraham who came off looking great selling Garza Jr’s depanting like a champ. Speaking of Garza Jr and Laredo Kid, the came out of this looking so much better than last week and that’s with even with a guy the size of Fallah Bahh who certainly did not disappoint; keeping up with Laredo Kid and then crushing him with a running cross body was tremendous and fun to watch. Shera picks up the win for his team with a Sky-High Slam while Garza Jr and Laredo Kid hit stereo moonsault’s to the outside onto their opponents. A fun and entertaining match, I cannot say more good things about the new talent that has been flushed in the fold to freshen up Impacts stale look and feel. Post-match, Borash directs us to the back where there’s a limo, IT’S SHE!

Decay (Abyss and Crazzy Steve) vs Reno Scum

Honestly, nothing to write home about here; lots of head butts and Abyss walking around slowly. Eventually, it turns into a cluster when Rosemary gets involved and we descend into chaos. Reno Scum hit a Surfboard/Double foot stomp combo to pick up the victory. Meh, at least their pushing the young guys.

A creepy vignette plays with a lady walking down a dark stairwell cutting to an eyeball telling us that “Fury will be unleashed.” If you know me, you’d know that I’m a huge horror fan so this has my devoted attention. We’ll have to wait till April 4th to get an answer on Impact’s own “Post-Mania” show.

Impact Grand Championship
Eli Drake w/ Tyrus vs Moose

Backstage, Cody and Brandi exit the limo; Cody heads towards the entrance and attacks Moose from behind with a steel chair, eventually hitting a Cross Rhodes and posing with the Impact Grand Championship. Cody saved the day, this match would have been dreadful. Thank you, Cody.

LAX (Santana and Ortiz) vs the DCC

LAX are back with their very own entrance way, adding some variety for our eye sockets; the more they can differentiate from other promotions the better and so far, this show as done everything it can to do so. Ortiz and Santana come off looking good, using the numbers of LAX to their advantage. It’s not their numbers that win them the match, though, it’s miss communication within the DCC when Kingston spits water in the face allowing LAX to hit a double inverted suplex of Storm for the victory. Post-Match Storm and Kingston butt heads as Storm walks out on the group he started.

Cut to Brother Love who has sat down with Lashley for a tell-all interview and its now I notice that Lashley has eyebrows tattooed onto his face? Is this true? I’ve been wrong before so I could very well be wrong here but I really don’t think I’m wrong. This totally distracted me from this whole segment as you can see, that and the fact no one bothered to tell Brother Love that his jacket is riding up about a foot in the back making him look like a red-faced turtle. Raphael, only not badass. I did end up picking out how Lashley trained with the US Olympic team and pumping up his physical attributes.

Rebel vs ODB

Rebel has to be a stripper, right? That whole entrance reeks of a dance routine from Coyote Ugly. But forget the match, Earl Hebner is officiating this bout and let’s just say that Baby Hebner could learn a thing or two from his old man. Forever known for his no-nonsense attitude, Earl would grab the cowboy hat from Rebel, put it on and proceed to lock on the greatest kiss in wrestling history and end it with a strut and a shot from ODB’s flask accompanied by a mouthful of ODB. The winner? Earl Hebner.

Bobby Lashley vs Jake Holmes

Before the match, they continue the interview with Brother Love, he talks about his philosophy in the ring and taking Impact to the next level. During the match, Lashley dominates Holmes in a matter of a couple minutes and picks up the victory. Nothing to see here.

Borash is in the ring, he welcomes back to the Impact Zone “She,” Karen Jarrett which actually garners a chant from the Impact fans. She signs an autograph for what has to be an obvious plant in the crowd, hugs Borash and cuts a very rusty promo on how it’s been hard on her family since they left Impact. EC3 would interrupt Karen to say he should be her top man since he is the only star that Impact has truly ever made to which a crowd member yells AJ Styles, EC3 response with a “he’s alright.” It got a chuckle out of me. EC3 continues to say that he won’t be doing it for the Jarrett’s, he’s doing in for the Carters. What a twist! Double J pulls a McMahon and sets up the beginning stages of the Jarrett family trumping the Carter dynasty behind the scenes and in front of the camera. The interruptions don’t stop there, Josh Matthews grabs a mic and gets into the ring, he’s got a problem with the every move the new regime has made since the reboot. All this leads to a slap from Karen putting an end to a great heel promo. This hopefully leads to Matthews being a manager or mouthpiece and of the commentary booth, that’s something I can truly get behind, not because Matthews is bad at his job; because he is. It’s because I believe that he could truly excel as a shit head mouthpiece.

Overall, this week’s Impact was a really good two-hour block of programming. I was entertained at least 80% of the time and it really does seem like they have a nice plan in place for the future; at least for the coming months.

3.5/5