Dark Pegasus Video Review: Ring of Honor — Return of the 187

Ring of Honor — Return of the 187 by J.D. Dunn Videowire Recap of Kevin Steen & El Generico winning the tag titles at long last. Daizee Haze tries to talk sense into Delirious and gets stabbed in the face. Danielson and Nakajima have a classic. Stevens turns down a chance to join Sweet ‘n’ Sour. Roderick Strong gets revenge on Davey Richards. Nigel McGuinness agrees to put the title on the line against Danielson. Jerry Lynn puts Nigel McGuinness in his sights. October 24, 2008 From Danbury, Conn. Your hosts are Dave Prazak and Lenny Leonard. Outside, Grizzly Redwood prepares to chop some wood. Elsewhere, Rhett Titus catches up with the women’s bathroom/locker room where Sara Del Rey screams at the ladies. Rhett fails to score. Jimmy Jacobs claims to have had an epiphany – nothing saves. He drones on about things until former ROH Champ Homicide returns. “Jimmy… what the fuck happen to you, man?!” Jimmy lips off, leading to a brawl and beatdown from the Age of the Fall. Ruckus makes the save (really?). Tyler to Homicide: Why don’t you go back to Orlando! Homicide to Tyler: Fuck you, Jesus Christ! I guess any efforts to make ROH more kid-friendly went out the window with this show. Opening Match: Ruckus vs. Jason Blade. Jason has decided to go with the MVP look – or maybe the Charlie Haas playing MVP look. Ruckus doesn’t often get to flaunt his wares in ROH singles matches, but he actually looks like a wrestler who uses flippy moves rather than just a flippy guy who wandered into a wrestling ring. His shooting star press to a standing position on the floor followed by multiple back handsprings into a splash is pretty impressive. Blade tries to wrestle a more traditional match, but man is he vanilla without the YRR at his side. Ruckus hits a weird sort of piledriver out of the tree-of-woe. Not even sure what you’d call it. Ruckus finishes with the twisting senton at 7:01. Not bad. Ruckus got to showcase his stuff and did so in a way that didn’t completely remind me that wrestling is fake. ** Jerry Lynn has something to prove. Sara Del Rey vs. Ariel. Del Rey now wears a white wig to the ring, making her look like the villain of a J-horror movie. Prazak actually brings up Ariel’s matches with Mickie James and her managing of the Christopher Street Connection. Thankfully, it’s not Del Rey vs. Daizee Haze Part 56641. Ariel gives a spirited performance before falling to the Royal Butterfly at 3:33. * Larry Sweeney discusses all the money Go Shiozaki is bringing in as champion (as well as the cinematic quality of Uncle Buck). He thinks Austin Aries will be distracted tonight. Top of the Class Trophy: Rhett Titus vs. Grizzly Redwood. Hey, what happened to the Jackyl entrance music for Redwood? Daizee Haze jumps Rhett before the match, yelling about his lies about her. I can’t actually remember a time when a woman jumped a man before the match, but I’m sure it’s happened given all the love triangles in the WWE. Rhett makes use of a stump-puller, which you’d think would be part of Redwood’s arsenal. The match reminds me a little of Rick Rude vs. Koko B. Ware. Not bad, but just there to put Titus over. Grizzly chops some brocco-lie, but Rhett nails him with the dropkick and finishes with the Razor’s Edge at 5:31. ** After the match, Daizee Haze returns to attack Titus but gets dragged away. Titus using the trophy as a phallic symbol is very disturbing. In the back, Chris Hero and Davey Richards talk about their new tag team. The camera angle makes Hero look like a young Kevin Nash. Brent Albright vs. Jay Briscoe. Albright goes a bit heelish here, which is probably a good idea, given Jay’s popularity. He doesn’t openly cheat or anything, but he allows Jay to fight from underneath for most of the match. Jay eventually takes it up-tempo with a somersault plancha, but Albright sidesteps his crossbody attempt and rides him down into the Crowbar. Jay rolls through and hits a legdrop, but Albright gets serious, backdrops out of the Jaydriller and finishes with the Half-Nelson Suplex at 12:10. Jay seemed to bring it down several thousand notches, and it made for a more realistic match. The fans still don’t totally buy into Albright, though. **1/2 Albright calls out someone from Sweet ‘n’ Sour, so Larry Sweeney offers up… Bobby Dempsey. Man, don’t you want to save that for PPV?! Albright tells Bobby to stick up for himself and refuses to fight him, instead chasing Sweeney to the back. Three-Way No DQ: Mark Briscoe vs. Necro Butcher vs. Delirious. Whoa. Mark has hair. Delirious attacks Mark before the bell, but Necro makes the de facto save. The brawl spills into the crowd where Delirious tries to smash Mark’s brains in with a chair, but another chair makes the save. Necro grabs a piece of guardrail and brings it in the ring. He takes the worst of it, though, getting Cobra Clutch Suplexed into it. Necro takes a beating in the match but keeps coming back like the homeless zombie that he is. Eventually, he manages to toss Mark and finishes Delirious with the Tiger Driver at 13:57. Normally, I don’t like the garbagy stuff in ROH, but this was pretty fun. Necro takes a good beating. **3/4 Jerry Lynn vs. Claudio Castagnoli. Before the match, Prince Nana returns and begs ROH to take him back because he lost all his money. Is he the guy who had all of his assets seized by a corrupt government so now he’s sending me e-mails offering me a large sum of money if I can help him secure a visa? Security drags Nana off. DA EMBASSEE! After that little bit of fried gold, Lynn puts on yet another good match. Granted, most of it is just him selling the leg as Claudio works it over. Claudio even slaps on the figure-four. Lynn really does generate a lot of sympathy, though. Not only is he a good seller, but given that he hasn’t been full-time for a while, you get the feeling that his body is falling apart. Plus, Claudio has such a big size advantage, and he’s a big dick about it. He even uses the one-legged Giant Swing into a half-crab! Lynn makes the ropes and slips over Claudio’s shoulder for the sunset flip and a flukish win at 13:02. Lynn only got in a handful of moves, but the match really established him as a resourceful Bret Hart style of wrestler. Claudio looked good in the loss too. *** FIP World Title: Go Shiozaki (w/Larry Sweeney) vs. Austin Aries. Actually, it just hit me. Why is Sweeney keeping the money when Sean Davis is Shiozaki’s FIP manager? By the way, it’s interesting that Sweeney is essentially a jobber in FIP but a mogul in ROH even though ROH recognizes FIP storylines. Aries puts over the chop by totally avoiding it early on. Go looks like a friggin’ genius for putting Aries in a triangle headscissors, thus proving the old axiom YOU CAN TRIANGLE HEADSCISSOR AUSTIN ARIES! Go dominates for a good, long while before Aries finally mounts a comeback. Sweeney has the temerity, the unmitigated gall to break up the heat-seeking suicida. Aries tosses Go on the other side and hits it anyway. Back in, Go makes the ropes to avoid tapping to the Last Chancery but whiffs on a shoulder tackle. He ducks the punt to the head and does a nice schoolboy to a German Suplex. Aries tries to fire back, but Go’s chops provide too much firepower. Go gets too cocky, though, and chases Aries to the apron, allowing Aries to surprise him with a Death Valley Driver on the apron. Aries nearly wins the title on a countout, but Go makes it in. Go nails him with a superkick and lariat that knocks Aries for a flip. Aries avoids the moonsault, though, and dives into the Last Chancery! Go makes the ropes, so Aries hits the brainbuster and goes up. Go catches him, but Aries slips out and hits the IED. Aries goes for the superplex, but Go is too powerful and counters to the SUPER GO FLASHER! ONE, TWO, THREE! Go retains in a really good match at 24:32. Go looked very Kobashi-esque here, dominating with power moves and chops. Aries struggled just to work in his usual arsenal, which meant he wasn’t just going through the motions as he sometimes does with other opponents. ***1/2 Brent Albright promises to get Larry Sweeney. Corrected… Non-Title 30-Minute Iron Team Match: Kevin Steen & El Generico vs. LAX vs. The Age of the Fall vs. Chris Hero & Davey Richards. First Fall: This is more notable for all of the character interactions than the wrestling. Homicide makes fun of Jimmy. Steen and Hero try to out-asshole each other. Steen and Generico are having as much fun as possible as the new champs, playing shit disturbers between the other teams. Tyler and Davey are super serial. Hernandez just stands there looking menacing because everyone is scared to death of him. Hero illegally tags himself in against Davey, prompting a discussion of whether or not you can pin your own partner. Fans of Home Movies may notice that when Prazak becomes more of a smartass, he sounds just like Brendan Small. Thankfully, Todd Sinclair is on the scene to restore order. Davey and Hero work Generico over and taunt Hernandez. Oh, that can’t be wise. Funny moment as Generico and Homicide reach an agreement because they’re both Hispanic. Hernandez finally tags in and destroys both heel teams. Generico wants to have a go at him, but Steen tells him to get the hell out of the ring before he gets killed. Black jumps Steen before we can get the power matchup. That leads to everyone hitting dives. Hernandez finally gets his hands on Richards and powerbombs him to hell. Richards blind tags Tyler Black, and Tyler nails an unsuspecting Homicide with the springboard clothesline. That sets up God’s Last Gift and the Phoenix Splash at 19:14. Age -1, Steenerico – 0, LAX – 0, SNS – 0. Second Fall: The Age of the Fall makes the mistake of talking trash to Homicide, so when the match goes into the Scramble Period (by rule, at the 20:00 mark), EVERYONE targets them. Hero stomps on the back of Steen’s knee and turns him over into a half-crab. Richards adds an assist and takes over with the Texas Cloverleaf for the tapout at 21:25. Age-1, SNS – 1, LAX – 0, Steenerico – 0. Third Fall: Hero tries to knock Homicide out with a Rolling Elbow, but Homicide ducks and nails him with a lariat at 22:31. LAX – 1, Age – 1, SNS – 1, Steenerico – 0. Fourth Fall: Jimmy jumps Homicide with the End Time, but Hernandez breaks it up. Richards and Hero get Generico isolated, but Steen roars back in to make the save. Steen can’t pick up Davey because of the knee that’s been worked over, so Davey slaps on the Texas Cloverleaf. Jacobs jumps in with the End Time, but Homicide comes in and nails him with the Ace Crusher. Cop Killa finishes Jimmy at 26:12. LAX – 2, Age – 1, SNS – 1, Steenerico – 0. Fifth Fall: Davey and Hero go hard after a fall, targeting Tyler Black. Davey gets two with a German Suplex. Hero two with Lygerbomb. Generico saves. Yakuza Kick. Brainbuster… but Davey breaks it up. Moonsault by Steen! ONE, TWO, THRE-NO! Steen can’t get Hero up for the Packaged Piledriver, so Hero rocks him with a forearm. Everyone suddenly starts hitting moves, but there are so many people that no one can get a fall. The match just sort of peters out at 30:00, giving LAX the win. This had a really good vibe going for the first 25 minutes or so. After that, it just turned into too much of a train wreck with no real direction. The crowd reaction in the last few minutes really showed that too. **3/4 After the match, Homicide thanks everyone for supporting him and ROH. He says he’s looking forward to finding out who the best team in the business is – the Briscoes or LAX.

The 411: Homicide always brings an energy and excitement to an ROH show, so it was nice to see him back. The undercard isn't so great, although I thought the pace of the show was pretty good compared to some of the recent ones. Overall, the wrestling was good enough to keep my interest, but not something to go out of my way for. I did like Aries vs. Shiozaki, though. Thumbs in the middle.
Final Score:  6.0   [ Average ]