wrestling / TV Reports
Csonka’s TNA One Night Only: Hardcore Justice 4 Review
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As a reminder, this will not be another traditional recap, but instead it will be a mash up of the Rs, Instant Analysis and my usual Twitter ramblings I would do during the shows; completely uncensored and as the ideas flow unfiltered to the old keyboard. Remember, this is a review; and I am here to review the show. As always, I encourage discussion and even disagreement, just do so in a respectful manner. I will be doing the review for Raw and most PPVs and iPPVs going forward.
TNA One Night Only: Hardcore Justice 4 Review
OFFICIAL RESULTS
~ Ladder Match: The Wolves defeated The Revolution @ 10:20 [***]
~ Pipe on a Pole Match: Drew Galloway defeated Kenny King @ 9:45 via pin [*]
~ Tables Match: Eric Young defeated Gunner @ 9:30 [**]
~ Street Fight: Gail Kim defeated Havok @ 7:30 via [**½]
~ Monster’s Ball Match: Matt Hardy defeated Abyss @ 11:30 via pin [**]
~ Hardcore Gauntlet Battle Royal: James Storm won @ 24:00 [DUD/DIRT FUCKING WORST/DRIZZLING SHITS]
~ First Blood Match: Ethan Carter III defeated Rockstar Spud @ 10:40 [**½]
~ Six Sides of Steel Match: Bram defeated Tommy Dreamer @ 11:35 via pin [**]
~ Last Man Standing Match: Bobby Roode defeated Lashley @ 13:00 [***½]
* The show was taped back on February 13th, 2015.
* Jeremy Borash and Josh Mathews are on commentary.
Ladder Match: The Wolves vs. Manik and Sanada: The Wolves tend to have good outings on these shows. Manik and Sanada never got the run as a tag team that they should have, which is a shame. For the most part they worked a conservative ladder match, more teases than anything until they did a sunset flip powerbomb spot onto a bridged ladder. Manik got to show off much more here, since he got more than two-minutes on Impact; it’s a shame that they didn’t run with Manik and Sanada as a team for a bit, because there were a lot of fun matches to be had. They thankfully did the MIST spot on the ladder, and then the Wolves hit a double stomp spot involving the ladder and scored the win. They were fighting for a future tag team title shot, which then never really focused on unfortunately. This was a good opener, but very conservative as far as a ladder match goes. That’s not a bad thing, just an observation.
Pipe on a Pole Match: Kenny King vs. Drew Galloway: The pipe is on the pole, and the first man to get it gets to use it. I would have preferred that this was Galloway vs. Ki, as they really have the beef. Galloway has done some really good work on the WWNLive events, with a lot of good post WWE showings. King is really hit or miss for me, and he seems to have some fun character stuff but lacks consistency in the ring. They worked really hard, but at around six-minutes in did the “dead tired, trading punches mid-ring” deal, to almost no crowd reaction. That was really the story of the match, they did stuff, almost no one cared, and then they did more stuff. King seems to have this backing online, but I feel that every time he gets an important singles match he disappoints, and he did so here. King got the pipe, and then Galloway hit him with a running kick and scored the pin. They worked for over nine-minutes, and then never even used the gimmick. This was not good, at all. The agent for that match should feel ashamed.
Tables Match: Gunner vs. Eric Young: Young issued an open challenge for a tables match, Gunner answered. They worked four-minutes with the fans chanting for them to use this rubber chicken, and then when they did it was all a set up for Borash to make a chicken choking joke. And I thought Taz was bad, Borash is giving him a run for his money with the bad jokes. Young played the crowd well, and actually kept them involved unlike the previous match, so that’s good. As for the match, they worked a long and boring basic match. It just really had no excitement, and felt as if it was way longer than it was. They barely did any table teases, and the ones they did were bland, which killed the possible emotion. You need to have those teases in a match like this because you don’t have traditional “near falls”. Young low blowed Gunner as they brawled on the apron and then hit a piledriver from the apron and through the table. That’s a pretty risky bump to ask a man to take when having them work such a lackluster match to get there.
Street Fight: Havok vs. Gail Kim: The basic layout was what you’d expect, the power of Havok vs. the speed of Kim. They worked the gimmick solidly, and Kim won clean with eat defeat. It was an overall fine match, but I was hoping for a bit more as I think they are capable of better. But it wasn’t bad and had much better crowd involvement than the previous two matches.
Monster’s Ball: Abyss vs. Matt Hardy: I would have separated this match from the last one, as it felt too similar to the previous match. If you’ve seen one Monster’s Ball match with Abyss you’ve seen them all. They worked a slow, “best of Abyss” match here, doing all of the spots you’d expect in the match. We got the barbed wire board, trashcans, the cheese grater to the balls, chair shots and the bag of tacks. Abyss took the bump into the tacks when Matt hit the twist of fate. Abyss then got Janice, the stupidest weapon in the history of wrestling, but Matt speared him into a barbed wire board and then hit the twist of fate on the chair for the win. It was a Monster’s Ball match, and not a particularly good one as they all feel the same in 2015. I like hardcore shit and some blood, but this was rough. I could do with TNA doing away with the match for a long time, it needs a hiatus and to come back with two fresh guys working the gimmick.
Hardcore Gauntlet Battle Royal: James Storm, Chris Melendez, Crazzy Steve, Crimson, DJ Z, Jessie Godderz, Khoya, Knux, Mr. Anderson, Robbie E, Samuel Shaw and Tyrus were all involved. This was your get everyone on the card match, and they all brought a weapon with them to the ring. They used the usual weapons, as well as the rubber chicken and gummy bears. Yup. This was long, featured poor comedy, felt as if it lasted an eternity and involved exactly one person I cared about. It’s a sad state of affairs that the spots with the rubber chicken were more over than anything the guys did. This was one of the worst things I have seen this year, and I have watched a lot of wrestling. Yes, even worse than the geek battle royal on night one of King of the Indies. James Storm won after 24-minutes of my life I will never get back.
First Blood Match: Ethan Carter III vs. Rockstar Spud: Carter cut a promo about all of the bad things he did to Spud, and said that they didn’t need to fight again and told Spud to leave. He’s such a spectacular asshole. Spud refused and attacked to begin the match. Once again, they worked well together as Carter attacked the head of Spud (where you could see the mark from where Spud got busted open in their previous match). Unfortunately the crowd didn’t care all that much about the work that they were doing, as they chanted to use the rubber chicken that is more over than anyone on this card so far. They worked hard, but it lacked the magic and overall vibe of their Impact match, which was an excellent match. We had a ref bump, and Carter removed his arm brace to use as a weapon. Spud low blowed Carter and then skulled Carter with the brace. Carter was bleeding from the mouth, Tyrus wiped it away and then handed Carter a chain and then followed up with some rights to make Spud not even bleed enough to fill a thimble for the win. The overbooked ending and weak blood letting really took away from the match, which while it wasn’t great, was looking to be one of the better matches on the show.
* Dreamer gave an emotional promo about Bram being disrespectful and promising to make him show respect tonight.
Six Sides of Steel Match: Tommy Dreamer vs. Bram: Dreamer did comedy to begin the match, wearing a rainbow Mohawk from a fan and then stealing a soda and spitting it into the face of Bram. That’ll show Bram what respect is. They worked an 11-minute match and did a series of “near falls” which never made you bite and feel like it was a real finish. I won’t say that they didn’t work hard, because I feel they did, but the tepid crowd reaction to this semi-main event was not good in any way and took away from things. For the most part, this was a 2015 Tommy Dreamer match with the bells and whistles inside a cage. They also chanted for the chicken during this match, he’s the most over guy on the show.
Last Man Standing Match: Lashley vs. Bobby Roode: They worked this very similar to their title matches that they have had on Impact, which I appreciated. First of all they are familiar with the formula, secondly those matches were good and also they didn’t work it like a garbage match, separating it from the previous stuff on the card. They worked in all of their signature stuff, using those moves to try and keep the man down for the count, making it feel like it was a battle between men that respected each other and it worked well here. Lashley went for the spear on the floor, Roode sidestepped him and Lashley hit the steps. Roode hit the Roode bomb, and then made it to his feet just before Lashley to score the win. They chanted for the chicken during this match as well, I hope they signed him. This was Roode vs. Lashley, they worked to all of their strengths and it was good, but they have done better.
* End scene.
* Thanks for reading.
“Byyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyye Felicia!”
Here is the main problem with a PPV like this (the hardcore one night only thing). You have a bunch of matches that are either matches with some background, a rematch of some kind or matches with no build. So you’re asking people to invest in the performers that they like, but you’re banking on these gimmicks being enough to carry the show. From there, the gimmicks only prop them up so much, and in the case of some of the matches, the crowd tends not to care until you get to the juicy part (the table, the blood, the pipe, random weapons shots). And even then they didn’t seem to care all that much. I get that they have t run these shows due to international commitments, and making the shows have themes was good in theory, but they simply aren’t delivering. And that’s a shame, because TNA certainly has enough talent on the roster to put on an enjoyable show, Impact is proof of that. That show, while not always great, has been a good TV product with some really good matches this year. These shows, not so much.
This show was not good, in fact it was really bad and I have to say that considering that this show costs $15 I cannot recommend it in anyway. AT no time did I get emotionally invested in these matches, and considering what they asked the performers to do, that is a damn shame. I would highly suggest that you avoid the show. There is too much good wrestling out there to spend that money on. To be honest, most editions of Impact have much better wrestling on it, so if you are enjoying Impact stick with that and don’t waste the money here.
