Mixed Match Chambers – Jake’s MMC Review – Week 4

How do you “review” a wrestling match?

This is the main question I’ve been pondering during the first few weeks of the second season of Mixed Match Challenge. For the first three episodes, I produced review columns to accompany episodes of a show that I expected to enjoy based on the first season. So far, I still do enjoy the show, although last week’s episode was a strain that hinted at this becoming as much of an unwatchable mess as I find the WWE cable TV shows. But I’m trying to stay positive, and to take my mind off the negatives I thought it’s time for a little self reflection, like asking how does someone review a match… like technically?

I started by creating a “rubric” (see below) that seeks to place my ultimate subjective final thought on a match into some kind of logical system. This part is somewhat easy, and a hobby for just about every online wrestling fan. On the other hand, what is a reviewer supposed to actually write about? It’s gotta be more than just, “I liked this,” or “This sucked,” that’s obvious. But part of me thinks that spending more time writing about a match than it does to actually watch said match is fundamentally cannibalistic. Does one ruin whatever joy comes from watching wrestling by over-analyzing what happened in a single, isolated match?

Those first few weeks I watched the MMC matches closely on the WWE Network and tried to take notes. I have no idea how other reviewers here like Larry or Kevin Pantoja can watch a match and thoroughly dictate the move-by-move action in a readable way without re-watching it multiple times. Clearly that is a skill that requires years of practice. So I realized quickly that I needed to focus on theoretical aspects of micro or macro narrative aspects isolated in the match, closer to a TJ Hawke review at 411mania. However, to me that kind of analysis requires an acute critical sense of what you are looking for in advance and reacting to how the content bounces off your ideology. Even though I’ve been watching pro-wrestling for over 30 years now, and have written opinion pieces about it on this website for a number of years, I don’t think I have a strict sense of what I want in a wrestling match.

I preferred always to look at a wrestling show itself as a serialized narrative, no different than any other TV show or movie series. This slightly appeals to the way I experienced WWF as a child through the lens of Saturday morning Superstars and Saturday Night’s Main Event in combination with VHS rentals. The cartoons and action TV shows I watched regularly, and movie series like Friday the 13th or Porky’s, gave me that same universal serialization feeling. While loose in retrospect, the WWF episodes were kind of like chapters of a story in a fictional universe, also not unlike the Marvel and DC comic books I was reading everyday at the time. So it was never about 5-star matches or championship titles at the time as much as it was new characters coming in, stars maintaining their dominance and feuds being played out.

Thus this is what I’ve chased as a wrestling fan ever since: good shows. No doubt this is why I gravitate towards the clear structure of Lucha Underground and New Japan in 2018, and have continued to reject the disorganized method the WWE uses from week to week. I don’t want to look at matches as self-contained content removable for review, but rather as parts of a show that is enjoyable on the whole and important to a grander narrative scheme.

As for the Mixed Match Challenge, all I can really do is look at these matches separated from the “show” itself. While the larger tournament format tying it all together is compelling, this show they’re packaging it in is not good, with a terrible studio “pre-show” with painful clock-killing host banter, the sub-par commentary (why are we being subjected to Renee Young’s training period, can’t they keep her off TV until she sounds less monotone than Siri), and the overall weird flow between the matches with too much time wasted on solo entrances.

So for this week, I decided to watch the show without making any notes, in an attempt to shake myself back into liking what I was doing after a difficult episode last week. I wanted to see if I could still enjoy the MMC without thinking about my new self-imposed roll as reviewer. Ready to see how it went?

Of course, as stated above, 411mania is the home to the greatest show/match reviewer alive, Larry Csonka, and his weekly reviews of this show will breakdown the matches and expertly rate them in relation to his extensive knowledge of the pro-wrestling canon. However, I’m sticking with my alternative “star ratings” for now that specifically focus on the MMC universe. Presented below is a rubric of what I’m looking for in comparison to the other mixed gender matches WWE has put on this year, and my star ratings will be measured against this, NOT matches you’d see on a weekly Smackdown or something like Danielson vs. McGuiness from the early ROH.

MMC Match Rating Rubric

5 Stars – a transcendent match that truly evens the playing field for the male and female wrestlers involved at a main event level.

For example = Ronda Rousey & Kurt Angle vs. Stephanie McMahon & Triple H: a marquee match that enraptured a Wrestlemania audience with action, drama and moments of believable inter-gender combat, and a star-defining debut for mainstream celebrity Rousey. It is unlikely any match from MMC 2 will be able to reach this rating level.

4 Stars – near-flawless and exciting wrestling action, where characters are out of the element and realistically trying to win the match in dramatic fashion; elements of inter-gender wrestling will be a strong bonus.

For example = MMC S2 – Week 1 – AJ Styles & Charlotte vs. Jimmy Uso & Naomi: featured a house-show level competitive back-and-forth between Charlotte and Naomi, fun verbal interactions between Styles and Uso, and inter-gender elements that resulted directly in the finish.

3 Stars – solid, clean wrestling where you don’t notice any continued errors or lethargic sequences; if lacking in drama or action, superior exterior features such as macro or micro storylining and/or character flourishes are taken into account.

For example = MMC S2 – Week 2 – Alicia Fox & Jinder Mahal vs. Mickie James & Bobby Lashley: Some very well-timed sequences fit together like dominoes, giving four wrestlers with often little opportunity to stretch their legs on the main roster a chance to fill out a compelling and satisfying match.

2 Stars – even if the wrestling performed is average or the outcome predictable, a match at this level should feature a solid pace that stops it from being boring or pointless.

For example = MMC S2 – Week 3 – Naomi & Jimmy Uso vs. Lana & Rusev: Overly relied on dance off segments that failed to pay off, but the quick-paced short wrestling segments rescued the match from being dull.

1 Star – basically a match that goes through the motions, relies heavily on rest holds, or features a lop-sided effort from competitors of one gender; mistakes and botches that stand out significantly more than any of the actual action in the match.

For example = MMC S2 – Week 3 – Finn Balor & Bayley vs. Jinder Mahal & Alicia Fox: a mess of awkward exchanges and rest holds featuring wrestlers who were clearly not having fun but straining to make it look like they were.

MMC2 – Week 4 Review

Match #1: B ‘n’ B (Finn Balor & Bayley) vs. Monster Eclipse (Braun Strowman & Ember Moon)

What this match lacked in the wrestling exchanges, compared to the Week 1 match Monster Eclipse had with Natalya and Kevin Owens, it made up for by being slightly more unpredictable, as B ‘n’ B felt like they had a shot to win given the higher status of Balor and Bayley on the main roster.

Balor continues to feel like the most misplaced wrestler on this show, although to be fair that’s how he feels on RAW as well. He’s gotta be wondering how his career was lapped by the guy on the other side of the ring who can so effortless integrate into the light-hearted atmosphere of the MMC despite his gnarling heel persona.

Balor’s lazy offense in this match can be summed up by him moving out of the way of a charging Braun and hoping he slams into the ring post. This contrasted poorly with Kevin Owen’s clever Week 1 strategy of goading Braun into repeating the same move twice outside the ring to catch him off guard, and then attempt to get him counted out. Both still lost though.

Nothing came of the order-barking character Ember Moon showed in that first week match, which was disappointing. She desperately needs a reason to be in this tournament, especially after replacing Alexa Bliss in the monster-meet-cute spot that was one of the most intriguing parts of Season One. Turning Moon’s current empty personality into an over-reaching taskmaster felt like it had some potential, but clearly that was abandoned.

I watched this match only once and I made no notes in the process. I was pretty happy watching it, even though all four of these wrestlers are often targets of criticism in my internal monologue when watching their main roster matches (thus my natural inclination above). The focus of the match was basically always on winning, no goofing around, and I really liked the way they handled Balor’s struggle to tag in Bayley once Braun started dominating him. So for clean wrestling and a solid pace, this experience of this match nicely settled in to the base level of enjoyment I expect from the MMC.

Match Rating: ***

Match #2: Fenominal Flair (Charlotte Flair & AJ Styles) vs. The Fabulous Truth (Carmella & R-Truth)

A win here by R-Truth and Carmella would have made this block much more interesting, implying that the unpredictable nature of this team at least poses some threat for the WWE Champion and women’s division’s favourite star in the neutral space that the MMC offers. Instead the producers inserted ANOTHER dance-off segment, complete with music and lighting effects. Not sure who it is behind the scenes that settled on this show requiring a weekly dance-off, but whoever you are: that shit is tired!

Again, like Match 1, I refrained from taking notes while watching this one, hoping to capture my initial pre-reviewer role joy of watching the MMC. My concentration did drift though, which is strange considering the four wrestlers here are ones I generally view favourably and forgivingly on the main roster. Mostly I found myself thinking of what angle I’d want to cover for this review, and struggled to come up with an answer, which was distracting. So basically I came out of it with little opinion other than that dancing sequence sucked. It was all over quick enough and painlessly, so while I’m not going to say I liked this match it at least was better than last week’s weak and awkward 1-star match between B ‘n’ B and Mahalicia.

Match Rating: **

So moving forward, as this season of Mixed Match Challenge progresses, I’m going to start taking into account how the matches fall into the serialized structure of the round robin tournament structure. After this week’s episode we have two teams that are 2-0 and two teams that are 0-2. Considering that a final score of 4-0 basically locks up a win in your block, the fight to attain 3-1 should now become an important driver for the upcoming weeks. The 0-2 teams are all but eliminated already, short of knowing how the WWE will handle the tie-breakers and/or final standings (with about 2-3 weeks in-between the logical ending of the block matches and the TLC PPV finals, one would assume some tie-breaking will come into play).

However, my patience for “dancing” segments has officially run out.

6.0

The final score: review Average

The 411

A fine episode of the MMC that utilized its basic format to present two fun-ish matches that still felt a step removed from the randomness of the WWE main roster. As the tension of the tournament pushes forward, I would expect more competitive drama in the coming weeks, and less chum-y dancing. This episode tightrope-d the line of fun over a ground full of stupid, but I do worry the danger of watching this series try to pull off that stunt is becoming more distracting than thrilling.