A good New Year's Resolution is to try to learn something new every day. For example, today I've learned that Ariel Sharon lives on a farm. Who knows what mysteries tomorrow's dawn will shed light upon?
That said, why not use 2006 to catch up on old wrestling viewing? I've never been much of one for New Year's Resolutions, but anything that results in me shunning reality in favor of watching grown men pretend to beat each other up sounds like a good plan to me. What better place to start on this grand scheme than that stack of Pro Wrestling Guerrilla DVDs it's taking me forever to get through? PWG is kind of like the West Coast version of ROH, except that it attracts far fewer people, I can't get into it nearly as much, and I believe all of their championship matches require pants. I'm not sure if those last two points share any relation.
Match #1: Brad Bradley & Babi Slymm vs. Supa Badd & Human Tornado
I recognize Babi Slymm, and I've seen both Supa Badd and Human Tornado before, but can't remember which is which. I want to say that the black guy is Human Tornado, as maybe he's supposed to be dressed like Dolemite may have dressed once? Wait, I think Human Tornado's on the tag team 2 Skinny Black Guys, which would seemingly guarantee that the black guy here is Human Tornado. You know what, maybe the commentary can help me figure this all out.
Decent tag match so far. Nothing too good, nothing too ugly. Well, lanky white guys tend to look silly when engaged in physical activiy (I should know), which does hurt this match a bit. I'm not sure who's doing commentary (Excalibur & Disco Inferno, I think), but they seem more content entertaining themselves than those of us watching at home. Not that there's anything inherently wrong with public displays of self-indulgence (*ahem*), but I think this is why I can never really get into PWG. It's always struck me that some guys got together and decided to run a wrestling federation as a joke, and somehow it took off into someting bigger. Not much bigger, but bigger, nonetheless. In fact, I think I've had enough of this commentary.
Human Tornado getting kicked into the crowd was pretty nice, and I liked Super Badd going to check on him rather than just standing around like an idiot. After a few more minutes, Bradley hit a decent enough lariat on Supa Badd for the pin.
Match #2: Chrish Bosh vs. Hook Bomberry vs. Quicksilver
The mediocrity of this match has gotten to me. I do enjoy Bosh, especially since he just yelled "BAAA!" after hitting Bomberry, but this is basically the Christian Rock of professional wrestling. Their hearts may be in the right place, but it's still pretty damn lame. Bosh as a constantly trash talking heel is kind of fun, but he needs to be in there with somebody who will actually make an attempt to shut him up, not some scrawny white guy in a mask with the charisma of a statue of Al Gore. Oh yeah, Al Gore jokes.
Ok, Quicksilver has just pulled Bosh's tights down, revealing his bare ass, and he doesn't notice? Sure, a bare-ass will result in an easy crowd pop, but I just don't get it. PWG really is the Family Guy/Adult Swim of professional wrestling. What painfully wacky and oh-so unpredictable thing will happen next?!?! I'll stick with my "Al Gore is boring" jokes and covered asses, thank you very much. Hey, Bosh just won. And here I thought this match was going to last another 20 minutes, like every other PWG match does.
Match #3: Top Gun Talwar & Charles Mercury vs. Excalibur & Disco Machine
An unfunny comedy match. This show is starting to wear me down. EXCALIBUR IS SLOWLY REVERSING A WRISTLOCK!! SURELY COMEDY OF THIS MAGNITUDE HAS NEVER BEEN WITNESSED BY HUMAN EYES BEFORE!!! Now, they're inexplicably running the ropes in slow motion. Ok, when Ebessan and Darkness Crabtree did this same bit a few months later at Chikara Pro's Tag World Grand Prix, it was funny because Darkness Crabtree is supposed to be like 100 years old, and Ebessan looked bored the whole time, but didn't want to hurt the old man. Two twenty year olds running in slow motion simply doesn't make sense. Quick, let's have some stupid 80s pop-culture reference interfere in the match. It'll be hilarious! I'm done with this, before something that retarded actually does happen.
Match #4: UK Kid vs. American Dragon
Here I thought I was unprepared, as I have no idea who UK Kid is, but he's cutting a promo to introduce himself to the crowd. If you're wondering, he's yet another skinny white guy, but this time he has a bad British accent.
I'm not sure where, but I'm positive I've seen American Dragon wrestle this same match before. Uk Kid keeps getting the better of him, until Dragon stops playing around and brutalizes him until he's crying. I guess it's probably Dragon's standard jobber match. I'm just guessing this is what's going to happen, though, based upon UK Kid coming out on top of the previous three lockups.
. . .
How am I so amazing?
Dragon non-chalantly avoiding that plancha and then looking around as if to say "what the fuck," without actually having to use any excess energy by actually producing sound is a thing of beauty. Ring psycology, folks. Dragon's plancha, on the other hand, is definitely not a thing of beauty. Wait, that's a pescado. Wait again, I think a pescado is a plancha.
The thing with this match, like every other match in PWG's history (I'm on the internet, so I can make sweeping generalizations like this), is that it goes on too long. Dragon should have beaten this guy a few minutes ago, but instead he has to come back yet again. At least this one is a bit more entertaining than other PWG undercard matches, but not every match has to be some 30 minute classic, and simply stretching a match to 30 minutes does not somehow make it a classic. The first sentence in this paragraph is much more fun when read aloud while doing some "drunk old guy at the bar" imitation. This whole show would probably have been more enjoyable so far, were I some drunk old guy at the bar, as opposed to the drunk young guy at home. Who am I kidding? I'm not drunk, and there's no way this card would have been enjoyable.
Match #5: Rocky Romero, Ricky Reyes & Puma vs. Christopher Daniels, Bobby Quance & B-Boy
This is going to be a long one. At least it should be fun, though. Nice back and forth stuff from B-Boy and Reyes to start, with missed kung-fu kicks and everything. I like where this is going. Tags to Quance and Puma. A little bit more of the same, with some matwork that makes the earlier matches look like a game of Twister played by parapalegics. Puma and Quance seem to know that matwork entails more than simply switching from a wristlock to a headlock and back again. Sequence ends with Quance getting a triangle choke on Puma, but Romero breaks it up. Tags to Romero and Daniels now. I love Romero slap-boxing with guys. Man, I haven't seen much of him lately, as he's been over in Japan doing his Black Tiger thing, but god did he rule in 2004.
This match is a lot of fun, and might make me reconsider getting rid of this DVD. I'd forgotten how much fun Reyes and Romero were as a team, and Puma hitting Gran Naniwa's crabwalk-elbowdrop thing is just icing on the cake.
Reyes has B-Boy in a single-leg crab, and B-Boy reaches the ropes. Before letting go, though, Romero comes in and jumps on B-Boy. Not some indy-tastic "look how reckless/stiff I can be" stomp (this excludes Low-Ki's stomps, by the way), just a quick "I'm a dick and I know it, so I'm going to jump on your head" stomp. Romero is fucking great. Shit, watching more of Romero's greatness may cause me to begin getting current NJPW to see more of him, which is not a habit I want to pick up. And this is coming from the guy that regularly got NJPW when both Giant Silva AND Giant Singh were wrestling there.
Quance just threw some of the weakest knees I've ever seen. Thank God Romero chose not to sell them. Fuck, he should have no-sold that kick, as well. Reyes and Romero eventually hit their backbreaker/kneedrop thing on B-Boy for the win. This was a fun match which has temporarily restored my faith in watching the rest of this event. Too bad I need some food before I go any further.
Match #6: Super Dragon vs. Chris Hero
PWG is still bringing the indy dream matches of guys who look like they've none done a sit-up in their life.
Chain wrestling to start. Again, much better than that seen at the beginning of the show. Hell, I'll go ahead and say it was even better than that of the previous match, as Hero is supposed to be known for his chain wrestling SKILLZ. Rather than make a clean break, Dragon chooses to shove the ref. That was actually kind of funny. After a bit more chain wrestling, Dragon gains control with his strikes. That's the story I would do with this match. Hero wants to have a wrestling match, but Dragon just wants to fight. Of course, at less than 2 minutes in, I shouldn't start criticizing them for not catering to myself.
It seems they are kind of following the match I was looking for, but something seems to be lacking. The match is choppy, with no real flow to it. They have neat spots and reversals and whatnot, but the match doesn't seem to be going anywhere. Good enough, in the end, but that's about it.
Did Hero say "this is where I dine?" before hitting that diving swanton? I hope so, as the idea of Chris Hero eating exclusively at this Jewish Community Center every time he is in L.A. is much more entertaining than this match.
Match #7: PWG Championship Match: Frankie Kazarian (champion) vs. Samoa Joe
Is Kazarian Shawn Michaels' cousin, or is that Michael Shane/Matt Bentley? I can never remember. Shit, I can barely ever remember which guy is Kazarian and which is Shane/Bentley. Are Michael Shane and Matt Bentley even the same guy, in the first place?
Match is just Joe dominating, which makes sense. Kazarian is donig his best impression of Chris Jericho's heel run with the Undisputed Championship, which is going alright for him. Some might complain about how a cowardly champion makes the belt look weak, or some such nonsense, failing to realize that, generally speaking, it only makes a crowd want to see the champ get his ass kicked even more. This crowd, however, is just dead, and I'm not entirely sure why. The card has actually been good for the last few matches, yet the crowd seemed most alive for the first few (horrible) bouts, and has progressively gotten quiter. Hollywood is definitely out of touch with mainstream America's (read: my) values.
Joe goes for the Muscle Buster, but Super Dragon runs in to break it up. Ref does not seem terribly interested in all of this. Now American Dragon is in, to do not much. The ref finally decides to throw the match out. That was stupid.
Match #8: PWG Tag Team Championship Ladder Match: Scott Lost vs. Joey Ryan
I guess these two were tag champs, but split up, and now whomever wins this match will get to choose a partner to be new tag champs with. Riveting, I know.
And we begin our extremely dull match. Why is this the main event, anyway? Because it has a ladder? You'd think that when you have other matches featuring bigger names, better wrestlers and your promotions title, choosing a main event wouldn't be very difficult. PWG is weird like that. In fact, I think the championship match is rarely the main event.
For a feud so volatile that only a match as violent as a ladder match could settle it, these guys don't seem terribly pissed off at each other. In fact, any and all heelness on the part of Lost is little more than "look at him now" or "how do you like that" type taunts. Not even choking him with the ladder or anything.
Elbow drop off the top of the ladder gets a "holy shit" chant. Seconds later, they're both up, scaling ladders. It seems to me that their immediate recovery from such a high-impact move is more deserving of said chant, but what do I know?
Ugh. I really don't think a ref bump is necessary in this match, but there it is. Joey Ryan gets the titles, but the ref is still out. Heel chicanery results in the ref seeing the titles on Scott Lost, and declaring him the winner after he awakens, despite the fact that I heard the bell ring when Ryan grabbed the belts. Either way, I'm just glad it's over.
FINAL THOUGHTS: If this is the finest wrestling California has to offer, I think I will follow LL Cool J's advice concerning a return visit there.