This week’s Impact was hit and miss. By no means was this week’s Impact a bad show; however it must be said that it was not among the top shows produced by TNA in the last year.
The best segments on this show were the segments that were most loosely related to wrestling. As always, everything the Hardy’s touched turned to gold. The show saw reoccurring segments at the Hardy compound as Broken Matt and his family welcomed “trick or deleters” that included local children, the Hurricane and both Donald Trump and presidential rival Hillary Clinton. I found these segments quite entertaining. Sure, they were crazy and random but that has pretty much been exactly what has made the Hardy’s great these past few months.
Another part of the show I found positive was both Aron Rex and Jessie Godderz. Rex didn’t quite feel right after his debut in TNA; however, his newer villainous character feels far better and more comfortable for him. I have also always been a major supporter of Jessie. He has clearly worked incredibly hard since his debut in 2012. His showing on this episode made him seem right at home with Rex, Eli Drake and EC3 – pretty good company – he had a lot of fire about him and looked like he belonged. A feud between the two of them could be good for both. Sure, one has got lose in the end, I’d assume it would be Jessie, but if that’s the case I see it only elevating both. Their backstage segment was also good, showing that both also have pretty good skills when it comes to talking as well as being in the ring. Hopefully this feud isn’t cut short to move Rex onto someone else though, which would be a shame.
I felt like for years the knockouts seemed like it was the same women over and over. Now sure, there were some really talented women in that group – Gail Kim, Awesome Kong etc. Nonetheless, rotating in and out the same small group of women for years meant we’d seem many of the combinations. This past year the division has felt really refreshed – Allie, Sienna, Rosemary, Laurel Van Ness, Maria, Brandi Rhodes and Jade. For example when seeing Laurel and Allie face off on this show, it felt fresh. Allie’s character has been progressively one of the most entertaining parts of Impact. Her and Laurel are both good in the ring and that was shown by the time they were given here.
Unfortunately in the main event, we didn’t get to see too much of Brandi and Maria. I’m still waiting to see Brandi get some real time in the ring and I’ll be interested to see how see does. Potentially we will see more of her once she moves onto another feud. As Maria has been mostly used as character rather than as a wrestler, most of the time when she has gotten in the ring, there are a lot of bells and whistles to minimize her in ring time. Possibly once we see Brandi face the likes of Sienna or Laurel we can start to see a bit more of what she has got.
Having Lashley attack Cody was an interesting way of what I’d assume is a way to get him off of TV. This sets up a feud I’d be interested to see down the line should Cody return to Impact. The beat down was a bit off, as I find it hard to believe a few punches would rule Cody Rhodes out for what could end up being months. Also having Brandi as part of this segment made it feel a bit awkward. She was berating Lashley as he basically ignored her. Added to this was her softly hitting him on the back, which he obviously couldn’t retaliate to. However; none of that will ever be as bad as how the show closed. Lashley standing over the camera to awkwardly deliver his line cringe worthy for sure. I can’t blame him for the delivery, because the idea in the first place was silly. How did we go from a third person view for years and years of TNA to suddenly being able to see a first person view through Cody Rhodes eyes? Or did Lashley, you know, the incredibly violent individual who just beat a man for no reason kindly allow the camera man to hold his camera over Cody’s face?
Next week on Impact we shall see Lashley challenge Eddie Edwards for his TNA World Title. We also know that both the Hardy’s and the DCC will be in the Impact Zone. I’m really expecting next weeks show to be a bit of a step up from this week.
