Dark Pegasus Video Review: SHIMMER Vol. 2

SHIMMER Women Athletes Vol. 2 by J.D. Dunn November 6, 2005 From Berwyn, Ill. Your hosts are Dave Prazak and Allison Danger. Lacey complains that the stars aligned, the sun was in her eyes, her shoe came untied, and Daizee Haze cheated because that’s the only way she could have beaten Lacey on SHIMMER’s debut show. Opening Match: Krissy Vaine vs. Cindy Rogers. Team Blondage cheated to pin Rogers in a tag match at the first show. Vaine comes out to “Hollaback Girl” and makes fun of Rogers’ rather, erm, ample butt. Rogers outwrestles Krissy early, prompting Krissy to complain that Cindy is using her ass for leverage. Cindy takes a Bret Bump off a corner whip, and Vaine rides her around the ring like a pony. Rogers comes back with a drop toehold and a Mr. Perfect neck snap. She smashes Vaine’s face into the mat. Vaine objects because Rogers is messing up her beautiful face. Rogers hits her with the buttbump and a buttalanche to set up the TCB (Dragon Sleeper) at 7:59. Vaine would make the jump to the WWE Developmental before dropping out to focus on her personal life. *1/2 Lexie Fyfe vs. Nikki Roxx. Roxx looks so wrong with blonde hair. Roxx tries to wrestle, but Fyfe uses her size advantage to overpower her. She starts snapmaring Nikki around just to be a bitch. A painful-looking leg-scissor Full Nelson follows. Nikki makes the ropes, so Lexie punishes her with a Pendulum Stretch. A Camel Clutch follows, but Fyfe keeps utilizing the fishhook to make it an illegal hold. Roxx finally fires back, but Fyfe spikes her down and goes up. A fan makes fun on Fyfe’s ass, so she pauses to glare at him before jumping off with the guillotine legdrop. Nikki is able to roll out of the way and hit the Cruncher (?) – a bodyscissor jawbreaker – at 9:01. ** Cheerleader Melissa & Tiana Ringer vs. Ariel & Shantelle Taylor. Melissa & Ringer are all business, and the faces are all bubbly. Yeah, they have no idea what they’re in for. Melissa no-sells a few dropkicks, so Taylor dropkicks her in the knee. The heels isolate Shantelle and start dismantling her. Shantelle looks like someone. I’m thinking it’s porn star Mary Carey only about 30 pounds lighter. Allison points out that Melissa is always so grumpy, which is ironic because she’s a cheerleader and all. Taylor and Ringer hit each other with clotheslines for a double KO spot. HOT TAG TO ARIEL! Shantelle and Ariel go for a doubleteam superplex, but Melissa runs in and turns it into a Tower of Doom spot. Melissa goes for the Schwein, but Ariel rolls her up. The Schwein finishes at 10:41. The usual formula tag match. **1/4 Recap of the Mercedes Martinez/Sara Del Rey epic on Vol. 1. Del Rey joins us in the locker room promising to prove that she’s the top woman in independent wrestling. Mercedes overhears her and barges in telling her not to sing it and, instead, to bring it. Amber O’Neal vs. Christi Ricci. Few times I been around that track…oh, um. I wasn’t singing along. That would be silly. I’m an adult male. It’s not like I have “Hollaback Girl” on my Ipod set as one of my favorites. I-I don’t. Anyway, O’Neal is the other half of Team Blondage. I, and I’m sure many others, keep wanting to type Christina Ricci. Amber is a great, irritating cowardly heel – even better than Krissy. Ricci blocks a suplex and small packages her, and they fight over that. O’Neal blocks a dive off the top, but Ricci ducks a swing and finishes with the Northern Lights Suplex at 7:15. Amber throws a fit after the loss and claims a conspiracy is out to get her. ** Rain vs. Allison Danger. They trade headlocks to start, then wristlocks. Rain ties her up in the ropes and dropkicks Allison. She bites her and hits a running knee to the back. Danger misses the Shimmering Warlock (Tee hee. Get it?). Rain takes it to the floor and applies a bearhug. She rams Danger’s back into the post and tosses her back in. Danger summons FIGHTING SPIRIT and levels Rain with a clothesline. A bridging suplex gets two for Danger. Rain picks her up for the Ki Krusher, but Danger reverses to an O’Connor Roll. Allison kicks her leg and catapults her into a half-crab. Rain hits the Rain Drop (Inverted DDT). ONE, TWO, THR-NO! She tries for the Acid Rain (Japanese Ocean Cyclone Suplex), but Danger slips out and finishes with the Shimmering Warlock (see, it’s a play on Shining Wizard, in case you didn’t get it before). Allison picks up the win at 13:17. **3/4 Daizee Haze puts over Mercedes and Del Rey. Lacey… not so much. Beth Phoenix vs. MsChif. Beth is freaked the hell out by MsChif. Can’t say I blame her. MsChif just mauls her, but Phoenix yanks the ropes down and sends MsChif to the floor. She encourages the ref to count faster. Now that’s a profile in courage. Beth puts her in a reverses chinlock, so MsChif screams (she screams a lot). Beth asks, “Is that a yes or a no?” MsChif knees her way out of a backbreaker and takes Beth down in a headscissors. Chops just piss off MsChif, and she hits a swinging facebuster for two. A standing moonsault gets two. Beth gets two on a flying leg rollup and blocks the Desecrator. That sets up the Death Valley Driver at 8:27. Beth scurries out, still scared to death of MsChif. It’s easy to see why she was already under WWE developmental contract. **1/2 Four-Way Elimination: Lacey vs. Daizee Haze vs. Mercedes Martinez vs. Sara Del Rey. Lacey demands to start with Del Rey and then scurries over and tags Martinez. Martinez and Del Rey go to a stalemate, so Haze offers to tag in (but only if Del Rey tags her in with a peace gesture). Lacey tags in once she sees Martinez has things in hand. Big “Lacey sucks!” chant. Lacey hits Del Rey with a double knee charge, but Del Rey headbutts her and tags Haze back in. Daizee hits Del Rey with a ganmengiri and flies out on her with a diving crossbody off the top. Del Rey and Martinez trade nearfalls, and Del Rey suddenly shoves Daizee in the face for taking things to the floor. Daizee takes a beating from all three ladies in succession. Lacey even distracts the ref as Del Rey yanks Haze off the top with a snapmare. Haze finally makes the big comeback against Lacey, but Martinez tags herself in and finishes Lacey off with the Fisherman’s Buster at 12:54. Haze objects to Martinez getting the pin off her hard work. Del Rey and Martinez slug it out. Haze pays her back by blind tagging herself in, hitting Martinez with a missile dropkick, hitting the Heart Punch, and finishing her with the Yakuza kick at 15:04. Both Del Rey and Martinez are pissed at Daizee now because they wanted to settle things between themselves. Del Rey lifts her up and powerbombs her. Haze hits a Kidman-esque facebuster, but Del Rey counters another attempt to the Royal Butterfly at 17:13. The personalities and storylines pushed this ahead of the other matches. *** Cheerleader Melissa complains that MsChif got lucky on Volume One. After all, everyone knows that Melissa has been in Japan, Mexico and Canada. She thinks MsChif is ducking her. We some clips of Lexie Fyfe versus Lorelei Lee from FIP. Fyfe finishes with the Attitude Adjuster (TKO). Allison Danger hypes the debut of Rebecca Knox on Vol. 3. Oh, she’d change her tune after that match, you can bet.

The 411: The sophomore jinx kind of hit this show as there was nothing really worth buying the DVD for. The main event was okay, but it was just okay. You get a lot of references to things that happened on the first show, and things that will happen on the third show, but nothing really happens on *this* show. Nothing was actively bad, though. Mild thumbs down.
Final Score:  5.0   [ Not So Good ]