Peter Kostka
Before we start, a bit of a shameless plug as I wrote a review here at Culture Crossfire of a super low-budget independent adventure game called Contradiction: Spot the Liar! It’s a super charming game that is just $10 on Steam. I’ve talked with some of the cast on Twitter and they seem to be really cool people, so check it out.
From the NXT Arena at Full Sail University. Your commentators are Rich Brennan, Corey Graves and Byron Saxton.
Tonight: Finn Balor returns to the NXT Arena for the first time since winning the title.
Sure enough here he is, looking quite dapper in a suit and almost looking embarrassed to be getting such a big reaction from the crowd. Greg Whatshisface is in the ring to interview him and Finn talks about where his career has taken him and the decisions he had to make, one of them being the decision to go to NXT and when he was handed the NXT title, he knew that all those decisions were worth it. Greg brings up the rematch with Kevin Owens at Takeover in Brooklyn (which is booed by the Full Sail crowd) and the contract signing will take place tonight. Finn brings up everything Owens has done since coming to NXT, but he didn’t beat Finn in Tokyo and he will go into and out of Brooklyn (more boos; get over yourselves) as champion. A pretty standard babyface victory promo, but Finn has that “Aw shucks” charm that lets him pull it off. You can’t help but root for the guy.
Devin talks with Eva Marie about her NXT debut. Eva is taking this seriously and has been training hard for this opportunity and tells the fans “open your eyes, because you’re gonna like what you see.”
Eva Marie vs. Cassie
Well…..Eva didn’t hurt herself or Cassie in this match, so you can chalk this up as a win already. For some reason the crowd decides to do the Cena call and answer chant for Eva even though every time she’s been on previously she’s been booed out of the building. This crowd can be really annoying sometime. Eva keeps it pretty simple and Cassie is actually the impressive one as she fires off kicks and plays the fiery babyface role really well. Eva sends her stomach into the ropes and hits a heavily assisted Sliced Bread #2 to get the pin. The bar here was low enough that anything adequate would be a positive.
GM Regal walks into his office to see Tyler Breeze sprawled on his cabinets. He wants to know what Regal has planned for him at Takeover, preferably something monumental. Regal tells him he’s working on it. “It better be something good.” Well, I’m not gonna spoil it for those who haven’t heard yet (WWE pretty much spoiled it themselves last week), but yeah, I think it’s pretty good.
Baron Corbin squash. Next. He kinda acts dismissive to the crowd, but still gets cheers when he dispatches the jobber in 10 seconds. After the video last week they have to have him act more heelish than that.
Samoa Joe vs. Mike Rollis
JOE HAS NEW MUSIC! Praise the damn Lord! It’s a bouncier beat that sounds a hundred times better than what he had. We find out that Joe will face Rhyno in two weeks as Rollis makes a comeback, but Joe catches him on a charge, plants him and hits the Kidd Krippler for the pin. Now hopefully they give him something good to do for Takeover since Owens is occupied and I thought that was a sure match.
Devin talks to Emma and Dana Brooke and this is the greatest segment. Emma laughs at Bayley’s threats and promises to do more to her than break her hand, but Dana thinks Emma needs a hug to calm down and delivers. Emma: “That’ll fix everything, right?” Dana doesn’t forget to pat Devin on the head. Who knew these two would mesh together so well and make such an entertaining duo? They are the new BFFs but ten times more annoying and self-absorbed.
Emma (w/Dana Brooke) vs. BAYLEY!
Yay Bayley’s back! Emma has one of her slap bracelets and taunts her with it because she’s evil and jumps Bayley from behind. She rams Bayley’s head into the turnbuckle, but Bayley shakes it off and runs wild until Dana gets involved and Emma sends Bayley’s hand into the post. She works on the hand as the crowd claps for the comeback. If they need to restock the women’s division in NXT, building around Emma as the top heel with Dana as her toadie is definitely a good way to go. She has basically completely reinvented her character and ring style like Tyson Kidd did last year. And if this *sigh* “Divas Revolution” actually sticks, Emma could be the star people thought she could be the first time she got called up. Bayley fights back and hits her spinning back elbow off the top for 2. Double clothesline spot and Dana gets involved again, so the ref ejects Dana and Bayley hits the Bayley to Belly for the pin. Afterwards Bayley grabs a mic and says she wants to be the next NXT Women’s champion and knows she has to beat the best to get there, so she challenges Charlotte. Uh….Sasha is still the champion Bayley. I get what she is saying as this is basically her version of the Sami Zayn Redemption Tour, but the crowd was completely puzzled at Bayley’s promo.
We recap the past week with the NXT women performing at Battleground and on RAW. The matches were pretty decent but I just hate this whole team thing that they have to be involved in. Charlotte can stand on her own, Sasha can stand on her own. Hell, Becky can stand on her own. I don’t think a “revolution” is gonna happen when they are tied down with women most of the crowd have made up their minds on already.
Dasha (who looks like Sasha’s twin. Is that a rib?) talks to Charlotte about Bayley’s challenge. Charlotte gets emotional talking about RAW and says Bayley does deserve the chance. Dana steps up and tells Charlotte that she’s probably going to blow that chance too. Dana hasn’t got the chances that Charlotte had so she’s decided that beating Charlotte would make a statement. Charlotte decides to put Bayley on the back burner for a week and I guess we have a match next week.
The Vaudevillains vs. Angelo Dawkins and Sawyer Fulton
Dawkins and Fulton beat on Gotch for a bit, but Gotch fights out of a back suplex attempt by pulling his own foot up and hitting Angelo in the head in an impressive show of flexibility before making the hot tag to English and they finish Angelo quickly with the Whirling Dirvish for the pin. A strong showing for the #1 contenders.
Blake, Murphy and Alexa applaud the Vaudevillains and oh my god what the hell did Blake do to his damn hair? I think he grabbed the wrong style book at the salon. Devin asks them about the tag title match next week and the goofs goof around before Alexa gets serious and promises to make sure her boys stay champs.
NXT Championship Contract Signing
There’s a really weird edit as Regal starts talking about the biggest crowd in NXT history at Takeover and suddenly we get Owens’ entrance. I guess the Full Sail whining got bad enough that they had to completely cut it out. Don’t these people get in for free? Shut the fuck up. I don’t want to coin the phrase “NXT Mutants” here. Owens asks Finn how does it feel to be champion and defending at the biggest main event in NXT history (shouting “IN BROOKLYN!” at the crowd because Kevin Owens is the best heel ever) as the underdog. He calls back to Finn’s opening promo about his accomplishments and is going to show that the Tokyo match was “a fluke” and take Finn Balor out for good. Finn knows Owens loves to talk, but he’s gonna take Owens’ words and shove them down his throat. Both men sign which is the cue for the physicality as Owens shoves the table over and punches out Regal when he tries to stop him. Finn however gets the upper hand and sends Owens packing up the ramp, standing tall as we fade. Pretty much a straight and to the point segment to build up the main event and they pulled it off very effectively.
OVERALL: The wrestling wasn’t much, but when NXT has something to build to the creative part of the show is always high quality. Although really only one match has been officially announced, plenty of seeds have been planted (obviously or subtly) for possible matchups for this show and it is going to be fun to see how the card shapes up. Even with Lesnar vs. Undertaker being hyped as the big match, I think I’m looking forward to Takeover much more than SummerSlam at this point. NXT just does a great job of making you want to see what is coming next.
That’s it for me this week. I’m @PKisTwitting on Twitter if you want to say hi.
