October 2005

Talk about it here.

Talk about it here.

Talk about it here.

This was really good. Not as good as their Wrestlemania classic but better than their rematch at Vengeance. There was an obvious comparison with Daniels vs. Styles from Bound for Glory. Daniels and Styles were probably better workers than Michaels and Angle, but the book was better here with the scored locked at 2-2 heading into the final minutes and a more realistic finish. People who have issues with Angle & Michaels matches will have issues this one too as Michaels once again displays his superhuman ability to not tap to Angle submissions. If you buy into it, throw back the popcorn as this one has entertainment aplenty.

They loaded the stipulations for this one. The loser had to leave RAW and the winner claimed the Money in the Bank briefcase. It's a ladder match, so it was no great shakes, but they brought the drama with plenty of Matt Hardy and Lita exchanges, including her crucifix hold in the ropes to allow Edge to win the match. Not great if you were rooting for Hardy after that Unforgiven match.

OK, so the Atlantis heel turn is officially the best thing happening in CMLL. If you watch a lot of CMLL, you'll know that most of the time you're sitting around waiting for something to happen. I won't pretend that Atlantis is a great rudo, but it's fun watching him try. This wasn't as good as their match from the week before, largely because it was built around next week's Mistico vs. Atlantis match, and was strangely edited to boot, but the time flew by.

This is such an amazing match. Tenryu gives a hellacious beating to KENTA - who sells it fantastically. Tenryu was just so good in this delivering that asskicking & being the grumpy vet. KENTA was tremendous as the underdog selling his ass off while getting some brief comebacks in - only for Tenryu to cut them all off. Tenryu beating up anyone is a winning formula & then you get KENTA as the underdog which is another winning formula - you combine those 2 and you get fantastic pro wrestling match. ****3/4

This didn't get a very good rating from Meltzer, but it was Eddie's final PPV match which makes it required viewing. The parts where they wrestle are quite good. Eddie uses all sorts of tricks to try to get the big man off his feet and work on his injured back while Batista gets some decent moves in and even dabbles in a bit of defensive wrestling. What hurts the bout is the storyline of whether Eddie has reformed or not. As great as Eddie was at character work, the story elements feel forced. It doesn't help that they go to the well three times instead of having one big "will he or won't he?" moment after a hard fought championship bout. Every time Eddie thinks about che…

This was the only match from No Mercy that Meltzer gave a decent rating but it's nothing special. I would have much rather seen Benoit have a singles match against Christian or Booker T. The most exciting part of the match may have been afterwards when Taz and Cole tried to one up each other by naming Houston wrestling legends. Booker T's wife chastised him after the bout.

Kanemoto is such a great prick invader, it's a joy to watch. He completely overwhelms Sasaki in what is a near squash match just blasting him with slaps, kicks and knees. Sasaki does a pretty great job of someone defiant yet outmatched, like when he reaches for *anything* while he's stuck inbetween the ropes and in his childish facial expressions. Kanemoto is just above everyone here, and doesn't really care about the ref or any of Sasaki's pals that consistently yell at him ringside. My favourite moment may have been when Sasaki hit his first hope spot, started celebrating and Kanemoto quickly and swiftly took him down and trapped him in an Ankle Lock. Kanemoto's (runnin…

This was better than I thought it would be. I thought a rudo Atlantis might be exposed a bit in a singles match, but he did a good job of modifying his offense. He won't gonna give the top rudos a run for their money, but he's not embarrassing himself either. Mistico was having an off night. There was a large contingent of rudo fans booing him. I don't know if that affected him or not. Some of the blown spots were bad. There was moonsault spot where he was meant to land behind Atlantis, but he flew sideways and bounced chest first off the ropes. Despite the fact that Mistico was rattled, I still enjoyed the match. The finish was shit as Mistico pulled Atlantis' mask off …

This was slower than your typical CMLL television match. Unfortunately, that didn't make it any better than average. It was mostly built around Tarzan Boy vs. Lizmark Jr, which was only mildly interesting. Casas wore pants, which was off-putting. I hope the door is shut on the narrative about him being one of the best in the world for each year of his prime. It's not his fault that CMLL isn't doing anything with him, but he's not exactly stealing the show in matches like these. This was a crowd pleaser in the sense that they did a few house show style spots, and the tecnicos won, but there's nothing to really sink your teeth into here.

Always fun to see these guys. Yeah, you wish they'd get more time to let the match breathe, but beggars can't be choosers when it comes to these guys making TV.

Talk about it here.

A lot of dead weight in this match, but it was worth watching for the Altantis vs. Wagner exchanges. Talk about your great rivalries with no payoff. If I could rewrite lucha history, I'd book a Wagner vs. Atlantis mask match with Atlantis taking the Doctor's mask. It probably wouldn't rival Atlantis vs. Villano -- a match, which in my opinion, signals the end of classic lucha -- but I like their trios work far more than the Atlantis/Villano matches.

This was more of a straight forward trios match than the brawls we've seen from the rudos in recent weeks. We get a glimpse of Perro vs. Ultimo, but they don't have instant chemistry. Some decent action in the tercera.

Fun match, though I'd be lying if I said I didn't expect a bit more from a match involving Santo, Casas. Halloween and Damian. The rudo side was a bit of a let down but the tecnico action great. El Hijo del Santo makes everything better. Exciting finish too.

This is the second of two ironman matches between these two in 2005, and this one, while not quite as good as the first one, is almost as good. The first one was more of a war, while this one was more of a wrestling clinic, as this match put over both Styles and Daniels as equals, as there were no falls at all until a few seconds left, when AJ hit the Styles Clash. Despite only one fall, this match never dragged, and was slightly faster paced than their AAO match. ****1/4 (Great match that put over both competitors as equals and the right person went over as AJ won the belt last month and Joe was clearly next in line for a run)

This ruled! The four way setting fits this type of match much better as you can have wrestlers continue to fight while others set up spots. Sabu's presence helped this a lot, he was the best worker in here, here was a spot where Jeff used him to jump onto Abyss and then offered Sabu to use him to jump onto Abyss as well and Sabu just stomped him and it was the best, the amount of disgusting bumps and insane dives delivered as you'd expect but I also liked how they used weapons to transition and as cut-offs. Jeff Hardy continues to jump off high things and it gets REALLY preposterous here. Finish ruled as well, Rhino hits a Piledriver off the top rope and gets the win but …

Joe taking on two puro legends in 1 month is pretty remarkable! Amazing cool entrance by Joe and Liger's wasn't too shabby with his NJ music, full shoulder pads, and streamers. Liger, sized wise, looked like a good match for Joe. Shorter but, thick as Joe. Crowd was amped. Joe pretty much did his 'standard' TNA act here but, Liger switched it up from his 2005 routine and played it like a younger junior taking on the heavyweight. So, we got a few moments of brilliance from Liger as well as him taking to the air. The only thing stopping this from being a great match was the time it was given. It reminded me of a Fire Pro Wrestling match where you get a Critical…

Someone liked this match-up enough to book a return bout. This was more of an angle than a match with Perros de Mal delivering a beating to Universo. The first bout was better.

This was edited in a way that made it seem like non-stop action. The cuts were a bit haphazard at times, but it came across as an enjoyable highlights package. Jado had a solid run in this as a nondescript Takaiwa style junior working an ass kicker role in a lucha cibernetico. Santo did a bunch of signature spots, but he did them in a way that made him seem like he was one of the best workers in the world. I really liked his amazing side belly-to-belly suplex off the top that eliminated Averno. That was such an unexpected badass elimination in this type of match. It came down to Santo vs. Casas in the end. It had been a while since Arena Mexico had seen them square off, s…

These two have awesome chemistry, which I discovered for the first time recently when I watched their November bout. I'm not sold on the authenticity of Danielson's heel act, but I do like it when he works nasty dishes out a hurting. The finish here was meant to be a worked shoot that was suppose to drive the internet into a frenzy, but they didn't quite nail the execution of it and the commentators were clueless when it came to putting it over. Fortunately, it didn't detract from the bout too much. It's late in the piece, but 'd go as far to call Danielson/Strong one of the better matchups of the year.