King of Trios 2010: Night 3

MP4
On-Demand
DVD

Poor Gavin Loudspeaker. A weekend of frantic announcing and commentating has destroyed his voice and turned him into a less creepy Tom Waits.

Match 1
King of Trios Semifinals
Team Osaka Pro (Atsushi Kotoge, Daisuke Harada and Tadasuke) vs. the Colony (Fire Ant, Soldier Ant and Green Ant)

As the Colony walk out, Green Ant has a bag of sugar in hand. Prior to the start, it’s agreed by both sides that the sugar will be on the line in this contest, leading to a mighty, “SUGAR!” chant. Green Ant and Harada shake hands and start a slow feeling out process. Fire and Kotoge tag in there and pick up the pace with some sprinting and dodging. Kotoge keeps hitting Fire out of nowhere with flying kicks and eventually sends him rolling out. Soldier vs. Tadasuke is the logical follow-up, but it’s cut short when Harada aids his partner. They double team Soldier and when Fire and Green get involved, they’re taken apart as well. Tadasuke starts to heel it up a bit, messing with Fire’s antennae, garnering a handful of boos from the crowd. Harada gets in there and holds Fire up with a Gory Special while Tadasuke lands a dropkick. Fire is getting worn down and starts exchanging strikes with Kotoge. Once again, Kotoge tries for his flying kick attack, only this time he misses and falls out of the ring. Fire Ant dives out onto him, meaning he’s made his tag.

Soldier cleans house, culminating in a Northern Lights Suplex on Harada. Harada rolls to the outside with the rest of his team, the other ants join Soldier and they toss Fire Ant onto their enemies with the Antapult. Harada gets in there and faces down Soldier some more, catching him with his hiptoss/knee-to-face combo. He performs his own Northern Lights Suplex, follows with a Frog Splash and Soldier kicks out. After Harada suplexes Soldier off the top rope, Tadasuke is brought in to manhandle Green Ant with various backbreakers. He places Green in a Boston Crab, having to let go when he reaches the ropes. He pulls on him so he can put the move on again, but Fire makes the save with a kick into a Stunner, followed by Soldier picking Tadasuke up for the TKO. After dropping him down, he Baseball Slides onto Harada and Kotoge, dazing them both. Soldier and Fire climb to the second rope, Green stands in their hands and they gives a Super Antapult onto Tadasuke.

The Colony win and advance to the finals. A disgruntled Tadasuke hands over the bag of sugar and leaves while the other five celebrate their hard-fought match.

Match 2
King of Trios Semifinals
Bruderschaft des Kreuzes Team A (Ares, Claudio Castagnoli and Tursas) vs. Team Big Japan Wrestling (Daisuke Sekimoto, Kankuro Hoshino and Yuji Okabayashi)

Now here’s a clash of some big dudes. Sekimoto and Claudio start it off with some quick matwork into a standoff. Claudio grapples Sekimoto into the corner, condescendingly pats him on the face and shoves him. The intensity picks up with Claudio deadlifting him with a Gutwrench Suplex, but Sekimoto gets him back with a Spear. Ares and Okabayashi are next with a slow mix-up, ending with Okabayashi sending Ares to the floor with a shoulder block. Then it’s Hoshino vs. Tursas. Hoshino does a sumo stance and slams into him with a couple shoulder blocks, but Tursas won’t budge. They both run into each other and Tursas wins out easily. The BDK punish Hoshino, with Tursas breaking him down with a bearhug, bodyslam and a massive elbow drop. Hoshino tries to trade strikes with Claudio, but is silenced with a European uppercut. His luck picks up when Ares runs right into a hard clothesline, allowing Hoshino to make the hot tag to Okabayashi.

Okabayashi hits some power moves on Ares, including a deadlift vertical suplex. Ares doesn’t take punishment for too long, pulling Okabayashi in from behind and smashing him with a Black Hole Slam variation of a back suplex. Claudio comes in for a battle of strikes with Okabayashi and wins out after a second bicycle kick. Okabayashi kicks out. Okabayashi continues to fight on and tries to pick Claudio up for a Torture Rack. Claudio escapes and spins Okabayashi around with his impressive UFO slam. Again, Okabayashi escapes the pinfall. He catches Claudio with a powerslam and tags in Sekimoto. Sekimoto holds Claudio in the Sharpshooter until Ares makes the save. Sekimoto picks Claudio up and drives him with a deadlift German suplex, but again, Ares saves him from the pin. Sekimoto delivers some hard clotheslines to the BDK members until Tursas steps in and it’s on.

Tursas throws Sekimoto in the corner, runs at him and misses an Avalanche. Sekimoto tries the same move and also misses. Tursas gives it another try and succeeds in crushing Sekimoto. Sekimoto’s able to muster the strength to kick out. Tursas climbs to the second rope for a Vader Bomb, misses and splashes hard onto the mat. Sekimoto sees the prone Tursas and tries to deadlift him up with a German. By this point, nobody’s been able to defeat Tursas, let alone get him off his feet. The crowd is unglued because surely Sekimoto is strong, but is he this strong?! While he does get him off the ground, we’ll never know if he could have pulled it off thanks to stupid Claudio.

Hoshino chops on Ares and wears him down enough to hit a second-rope senton. Claudio breaks the pin. Hoshino climbs to the top and Tursas grabs him by the leg. Ares throws him into the center of the ring, performs a Swanton and Hoshino still kicks out. Claudio and Tursas pick Hoshino up so as to assist Ares in a Diamond Cutter. Sekimoto breaks the pin. As Claudio and Tursas beat down on Sekimoto and Okabayashi on the outside, Ares is alone to pick up Hoshino in a fireman’s carry and turn it into a driver. He’s still able to get a shoulder up, but rather than get aggravated, Ares continues with a Tiger Driver and that’s enough to pin him. The BDK leave and Team Big Japan Wrestling stand in the ring to soak in the, “PLEASE COME BACK!” chants.

Match 3
Chuck Taylor vs. El Oriental

In a pre-taped promo, Chuck expresses how he’s won King of Trios, Young Lions Cup, “Rey of all the dingos”, been part of the Campeones de Parejas and so on while Oriental has done a big pile of nothing in his eyes. The match begins and Oriental starts rolling and flipping around the mat, much to Chuck’s confusion. He offers a handshake and Chuck considers it before outright refusing. Oriental out-grapples him initially and things start off rather slow between the two. It picks up into some armdrags and the two try to dropkick each other at the same time, causing a stalemate. Chuck tries some strength-based offense and knocks Oriental down with a couple shoulder blocks. Oriental gets him back with some slaps, winds up his arm for one more and then just pokes him in the eyes. The crowd reacts negatively to this. He armdrags Chuck to the outside and topes out into him.

Oriental seems a bit off in this match, almost like he’s being weighed down and can’t get any good air. Then again, he is kind of old, so there is that. He whips Chuck into the corner, Chuck jumps onto the top rope and surprises Oriental with a moonsault. Chuck puts him in some kind of leg lock and the two start slapping back and forth.

Chuck holds onto the advantage and goes methodical, focusing on the leg. Oriental starts gathering momentum and when Chuck tries to silence him by picking him up for a move, Oriental reverses it into a DDT. Chuck rolls to the outside and lays on the floor, but that doesn’t mean he’s safe. Oriental sentons out of the ring and onto the horizontal Chuck! OW!

He tries for some awkward nearfalls to no success. He does a bottom-rope moonsault, a second-rope moonsault and a top-rope moonsault. On that last one, Chuck gets his knees up. He springs up, rushes Oriental and stuns him with Sole Food. Then he holds him in a Half Crab and makes him tap out.

Match 4
Tag Team Gauntlet

Our starting team is the Throwbacks (Dasher Hatfield and Sugar Dunkerton) vs. the UnStable (Vin Gerard and STIGMA). UnStable chase them out of the ring and wait for them to reenter before dropping elbows. They miss and fall victim to some great teamwork from the Throwbacks. The coolest part being what I can only call the Doomsday Dunk, where Sugar dunks Gerard’s head into the top turnbuckle off Dasher’s shoulders.

They continue to outclass the UnStable again and again, but when they each do some mounted punches in the corner, Gerard pushes Sugar down and pins him with both legs on the ropes. He and STIGMA are ready to face their next opponents, Steve “The Turtle” Weiner and Dragon Dragon!

Turtle unleashes a nice Spear on Gerard, clotheslines him and then crushes him in the corner with his shell. Huge, “WELCOME BACK!” for everybody’s favorite plush dragon wrestler. Turtle attacks Gerard off the top, slams him down with a Flatliner and STIGMA is there to break the pin. He stomps down on Turtle, turns around and sees Dragon Dragon waiting for him.

They lock up and trade forearms. STIGMA kicks, gets caught and falls victim to a Dragon Screw. Dragon Dragon continues the onslaught with a full nelson suplex and locks on the Dragon Sleeper. Gerard forces the break and gets put on the receiving end of some rapid chops to the chest. Dragon Dragon crossbodies off the top, misses and gets maneuvered into the STF. Though Gerard wraps his legs around Dragon’s tail instead of his ankle. Despite the pleas from the fans not to tap, Dragon Dragon gives in.

The Future is Now (Equinox II and Helios) is next and things are getting interesting, as the Gerard/Equinox feud is back on track. The UnStable try to meet them by running out of the ring, but the two masked wrestlers speed past them, bounce off the ropes and dive out at them. It isn’t a very even match and the Future is Now handily takes out their old rivals. Equinox does the Overbomb into a piledriver on Gerard while Helios does a top-rope crossbody onto STIGMA. Both pins succeed.

Aeroform (Flip Kendrick and Louis Lyndon) are the fifth team. They focus on one member of the Future is Now at a time with double teaming. They’re on a roll until both miss second-rope kicks. Equinox and Helios hit them with a standing Shooting Star Press and standing moonsault respectively. Both members of Aeroform kick out. It goes back and forth with a lot of cool high-flying skills, ending when Kendrick hits a Corkscrew Lionsault onto Helios. Upon standing up from the move, he’s met with a huge haymaker from Equinox that’s surprisingly good enough to keep him down.

The North Star Express (Darin Corbin and Ryan Cruz) run out next, meaning we’re in for some even faster-paced tag action than before. Or are we? Cruz and Helios certainly are able to set the ring on fire with some quick reversals. After a standoff and a handshake, they tag in their partners, who each garner chants from the crowd, many of whom know what to expect. Corbin runs the ropes back and forth as Equinox continues to dodge and shove. Soon Corbin gets exhausted and shoves him out of frustration. Then, all of the sudden, things get slow. Matrix slow.

You see, years ago, there was a tag team match between the North Star Express and the Olsen Twins where Corbin and Jimmy Olsen proceeded to wrestle in slow motion out of spite of their ridiculously quick partners. It was amazing. In a callback, they do some slow motion armdrags and dodging of punches.

After some nearfalls, they both kip-up with the help of the ropes and things go back to normal. Corbin dumps Equinox out of the ring and Helios dumps Corbin out, making it Helios vs. Cruz again. They mix it up and Cruz ends up sitting down on Helios’ chest while locking down both legs. The Future is Now is history and the North Star Express get to face…

The Order of the Neo-Solar Temple (UltraMantis Black and Crossbones)! Corbin topes at them, but is met with Crossbones’ fist. UltraMantis stomps down on Cruz, steps back so Crossbones can splash him and then sentons himself onto Crossbones’ back. Cruz kicks out. UltraMantis and Crossbones attack one at a time, rapid-fire. Then UltraMantis gets on the apron, runs over and Cannonballs onto Corbin. He rolls back in and the two supervillains yell together, “RUDOS!” Corbin catches them with a Missile Dropkick, grabs UltraMantis for a swinging DDT and kicks Crossbones again on the way down. Cruz hurls Corbin at Crossbones with Incoming and then they bring down UltraMantis with a double STO. As Corbin picks Cruz up for the Cruz Control, Crossbones runs over and crushes them with an Avalanche into the corner. UltraMantis performs the Preying Mantis Bomb on Corbin and that’s that.

Next in is Incoherence (Hallowicked and Frightmare) and it isn’t even fair. Hallowicked just keeps going to the well with multiple Yakuza Kicks until landing a pin in a mere moment. After that, it’s FIST (Icarus and Gran Akuma). With Hallowicked raring to go, Icarus gives him time to simmer by walking around and jawing with the fans. Icarus and Hallowicked start fighting it out, but Akuma distracts Hallowicked with a kick to the back from the apron. Frightmare gets into the match as well by pouncing onto Icarus’ back. Both members of FIST are thrown out of there and Frightmare hints at a dive. Instead, he proceeds to scare them Scooby Doo-style.

Hallowicked has a hard time getting his protégé back into the ring, but when he finally does, Hallowicked’s thrown into the railing. FIST focus on the smaller Frightmare, including a brief moment where Icarus holds him in the Cattle Mutilation. Hey, if Daniel Bryan can’t use it in WWE, somebody has to. He sets up for the Bluray (the cleverly-named Death Valley Driver into the corner), but Frightmare slips off and makes it a spiked crucifix pin. FIST is eliminated and we have one last entry.

Surprising to few, the final spot goes to the BDK (Sara Del Rey and Daizee Haze), who are given the role of spoilers for the tag team division. It’s up to them to make sure that nobody can get enough points to challenge Claudio and Ares. Naturally, their position as the last team is anything but random. They pull Hallowicked out of the ring and throw him into the guardrail. They go with the same strategy as FIST, working over Frightmare with suplexes, kick combos and even a piledriver courtesy of Sara. After Haze does a German suplex with a bridge, the pin is broken by Hallowicked. He sends Sara into the corner and follows with a rising knee to the face, then gets rolled up by Haze. She grabs the tights, but he still kicks out. Haze slaps Hallowicked, bounces the ropes and gets caught with a Sky High, getting an insane amount of air.

Not only do Incoherence get a three-count, but they get three points. By defeating the Order of the Neo-Solar Temple, FIST and BDK in one go, they have earned a title shot against Claudio and Ares. More importantly, the unbeatable BDK is starting to crack. After being undefeated so far, King of Trios has brought losses to five of its members.

Match 5
Christopher Daniels vs. Eddie Kingston

Absolutely fantastic promo starts this segment where Eddie goes into how he’s been given this task of being the anti-hero leader of the CHIKARA locker room against the BDK and all he’s done is fail. The pressure of the responsibility and the constant failure has taken its toll and he’s frustrated. But he’s been able to look into the mirror and realize that he’s all about being hopeless and it’s helped him reconfigure himself. He respects Daniels, but he’s got his swagger back and he’s going to show it off by taking Daniels out.

The two get some loud dueling chants, but in order to point out that he’s the heel, Daniels escapes from the opening lockup to walk outside the ring and stretch. In their first grapple exchange, Daniels wins out, walks all over Eddie’s back and does a victory lap. He puts Eddie in a headlock and gets picked up for a back suplex. Eddie starts chopping him hard in the corner and for a second, Daniels collapses onto the second rope. A fan jokingly yells, “619!” at Eddie and he gives that fan a death stare. He goes back to striking at Daniels to the point that Daniels falls flat on his face. Eddie suplexes Daniels around the ring and has everything well in hand until Daniels gets to the apron, gets a hold of Eddie’s head and drops his neck down the top rope.

Daniels brings Eddie to the outside and strangles him with the top of the guardrail. He focuses on the neck, giving us a lengthy neck wrench hold. Eddie takes the beating and vocally eggs him on. Daniels misses a corner attack and gets rolled up in various pinning combinations, kicking out each time. He goes back to working on Eddie’s neck and puts him in an Abdominal Stretch while pulling on the neck. Eddie fights out and turns it into a suplex. They both go down with Daniels getting up first. Eddie gets up and starts laying into him with strikes, a Yakuza Kick, a T-Bone Suplex and once again Daniels kicks out. He swings the Backfist to the Future, misses and Daniels capitalizes with an enziguri and STO. Eddie kicks out.

Daniels does a chokehold with his legs, having to break the hold when Eddie’s legs reach the ropes. Eddie starts fighting back and clotheslines him down, causing Daniels to escape the ring. Eddie uncharacteristically goes for a dive and gets slapped in the face instead.

Daniels runs at Eddie, gets caught and is thrown with a belly-to-belly suplex. Eddie picks him up for the Backdrop Driver, Daniels grabs the ref to keep himself grounded, rakes Eddie’s eyes and STOs him again. He climbs up for his picture-perfect moonsault, flips in the air and Eddie rolls out of the way. Daniels recovers by landing on his feet, rushes Eddie, misses him again and collides with the corner. This opens him up for the Backfist to the Future and Eddie pins him.

That would be all well and good on its own, but then Tommy Dreamer shows up. Dreamer has never associated with CHIKARA in any fashion, so this is a huge shocker. After the chants of his name and, “ECW!” Dreamer gets the mic and promises everybody that, no, he won’t cry. He talks up CHIKARA and everything he’s seen from the back, claiming it’s some of the most fun he’s had in a long time. He also notes, “Before my career is over, I’m gonna wrestle that dragon because that shit was awesome!” The crowd suddenly turns on him and Eddie has to explain that he’s not allowed to curse. He backtracks and says that that “stuff” was awesome. He recognizes Eddie as being very much like himself and knows that Eddie was inspired by him, so he offers him a match at a future show. Eddie accepts the challenge and they shake hands. Eddie holds the rope open, citing, “Respect, brother.”

Then Dreamer removes his jacket to show his new shirt.

Sweet. After Dreamer leaves, Eddie bows down to the crowd… except for that guy who told him to do a 619. Yeah, Eddie doesn’t like that guy.

Match 6
Generation Me (Nick and Matt Jackson) vs. QuackSaw (Mike Quackenbush and Jigsaw)
0 points vs. 1 point

The Jacksons consider shaking hands with QuackSaw, but then sneer and walk away. One guy in the crowd loudly says, “Not cool, man!” Quack wrestles circles around Matt, throws him out of there, then does the same with Nick. Nick gets back in to face down Jigsaw, who gets the better with him via grappling and holds him up in the Gory Special for a second. He and Quack start tagging back and forth and doing different springboard drops onto Nick. Nick performs a Sunset Flip over Quack to the outside, but when he tries to turn it into a powerbomb to the floor, Quack holds onto the rope, stomps down on Nick’s chest, gets back into the ring and then dives into him. He gets up and eats a diving dropkick from Matt. Jigsaw prepares to follow on that, but Nick gets to the other side of the ring and trips him as he bounces the ropes. Matt Missile Dropkicks Jigsaw and for the next few moments, Jigsaw’s at their mercy.

There’s a cool part where Matt punches at Quack on the apron, Quack blocks it and hits him back, opening him up for Nick doing a springboard dropkick and knocking him to the floor. The two keep up the double teaming against Jigsaw to the point that they’re just playing with him. Matt announces a brainbuster – one of Jigsaw’s trademarks – and Jigsaw ends up evading it by landing on his feet and rolling over to tag in Quack. This would be great, as Quack is on fire and lets loose on both brothers, but due to their numbers, Matt is able to stomp down on him, roll him outside the ring and dive onto him. Therefore, the hurt Jigsaw is forced back in. Generation Me go back to working on Jigsaw in tandem. Finally, he catches a break when he’s thrown in the corner. He backdrops Matt out, moves out of the way so Nick hits the corner, ducks a clothesline and then topes through the ropes and into Matt.

Quack gets in there and delivers a German suplex on Nick so hard that Nick lands on his stomach. Quack does a superplex and ends up hurting himself almost as much. Quack and Jigsaw work over Nick and when he’s whipped into the ropes, Matt pulls his brother out, slides in and takes his place. He Sunset Flips Jigsaw, Quack shoves him back so that Jigsaw is winning the pin positioning and then he Cannonballs into Nick on the outside. Matt kicks out. The Jacksons regain themselves and start doing a divide and conquer strategy of double teaming one guy at a time. They work on Jigsaw, but Quackenbush pulls Nick out of the ring, slams him down and keeps him down with an Asai Moonsault.

He gets in there and ends up laying under a standing Matt. Jigsaw enziguris Matt in the head, Quack kicks him upwards and Jigsaw follows with a brainbuster. Kickout. The four wrestlers slowly get to their feet and the Jacksons are the first to attack. There’s a huge war of superkicks between the four that ends with Jigsaw holding Matt for the Jig ‘n’ Tonic, getting superkicked by Nick and having it turned into a Yoshi Tonic.

Jigsaw kicks out and fights back. He German suplexes Matt and holds him in a bridge. At the same time, Nick jumps off the top and splashes on the defenseless Jigsaw. Quack breaks the pin. Matt claws his eyes, blinding him for a moment as Nick gets back to the top. This time, Jigsaw is there to knock him off the top. Quack picks up Matt and delivers the Jig ‘n’ Tonic while Jigsaw spikes it with a top-rope double stomp.

Yeah, that’s all she wrote on that one.

Match 7
Rey De Voladores Finals
Matt Cross vs. Ophidian

A pre-match promo gives us a little introduction to Matt Cross, who is disgusted that Ophidian claims to be from Egypt, as Cross has been to Egypt and all over the world as a dominating gymnast. Now he’s dominating wrestling and he’s the king. In the ring, Ophidian offers a handshake and gets his hand kicked away. They start it up with Ophidian grappling him into various pin combinations with none working. A hurricanrana does little, as Cross cartwheels out of it. Another exchange between the two ends with Ophidian sweeping his arm at Cross’ legs and Cross backflipping away. Cross shoves Ophidian and gets repaid with a kick to the head.

The fight goes to the outside and really just slows down before it can really go anywhere. The match really suffers from Cross’ heel role. He’s supposed to be a heel and all, but he doesn’t do a good job getting people invested in that as a new guy, so the match just comes off as needlessly subdued when it’s supposed to be about high-flying action. At least we have this cool counter against Ophidian’s satellite headscissors.

Cross holds onto the advantage and, as mentioned, there’s really no heat to it. He does that nice corner kick move from the previous night among other things. He goes for a split-legged moonsault off the top and lands on Ophidian’s knees, shifting the tide. Ophidian gets his second wind, spinning and flipping circles around him. Ophidian throws him from the ring and gets him with a corkscrew crossbody. Cross escapes back into the ring and gets smashed in the face when Ophidian does a springboard double knee attack. Cross kicks out when Ophidian holds him down with a Fisherman’s Suplex. Ophidian goes for some kind of wheelbarrow-based attack and Cross fights him off by kicking him and then doing a suplex. He goes to the apron, springboards into a stomp and can’t keep Ophidian down for the pin. Ophidian grabs him for the Cobra Clutch and suplexes him, follows with a 450 Splash and surprisingly Cross kicks out as well.

Cross starts gaining momentum with a Tornado DDT and a standing Shooting Star Press, but Ophidian continues to kick out. They fight on the top rope for positioning, Cross picks him up like a vertical suplex and drops him on his face, then lands a Shooting Star Press. Ophidian kicks out again! Now Cross’ offense is laced with desperation, as he can’t figure out how to keep Ophidian down. This distracts him enough that Ophidian catches him with a roundhouse kick. After a moonsault on a standing Cross, Ophidian rolls him up for a sloppy pin. The new Rey De Voladores, Ophidian is given a plaque to commemorate the moment.

Match 8
King of Trios Finals
Bruderschaft des Kreuzes Team A (Ares, Claudio Castagnoli and Tursas) vs. the Colony (Fire Ant, Soldier Ant and Green Ant)

In the tecnico locker room, we see Mike Quackenbush rallying the troops. Of course, this is a little odd in the fact that Ophidian is kicking it with a t-shirt in the background when we literally just saw him five seconds ago, but whatever. Quack talks up how they’ve been able to cause some chinks in the BDK’s armor over the weekend. Now it’s time for the Colony to finish the job. The three run out of there, determined. Jigsaw pulls Quack aside and asks why he isn’t teaching them the reversal for the Inverse CHIKARA Special. Quack dramatically explains that there IS no reversal. This moment is ruined a little by Steve Weiner reacting a little too hard to that news in the background.

Gavin Loudspeaker and Bryce Remsburg start up a drumroll for the announcement of the night’s main event. In mid-sentence, Gavin is knocked over by Jakob Hammermeier, who gleefully announces the BDK team in German. When it’s time for the Colony, they storm out of there to a remixed version of “Ants Marching” and go headfirst into the battle. There’s no slow startup or lengthy peril spots here. The Colony get in there and start the assault, although Green Ant’s crossbody at Tursas only earns him a shove. Tursas beats on him outside the ring and knocks himself silly by running at Green, missing and colliding with the ring post. The Colony hit their triple team Ants Go Marching attack on Claudio extremely early, do their triple running dropkick, then they turn their attention to Ares. Fire performs the Stunner, Soldier does a saluting headbutt off the top and Green follows with a top-rope splash. Ares kicks out. A little frustrated, they go back up top for the Super Antapult that won them the last match. Claudio, meanwhile, has other plans.

Goddamn! Tursas then grabs Fire and Soldier off the top for a double spinebuster. Yes, that is a thing that exists. Ares does a Swanton onto Green and he kicks out. Green fights back with a swinging bulldog, but it’s reversed into a slam. Things shift into Tursas vs. Soldier and although Tursas dominates – as he’s wont to do – he misses an elbow drop. Soldier tries to put the massive man in the CHIKARA Special, but before he’s able to really get any kind of grip on him, Tursas stands up and crushes him. Fire kicks him in the head, stands against the ropes and then pulls them down when Tursas lunges at him. Tursas doesn’t just fall out of the ring, but over the guardrail and into the crowd as well!

Claudio hits a bicycle kick on Fire and fails to get the three-count. He spins around for the UFO, Fire gets out of it and turns it into a prawn hold. Claudio kicks out. The Ricola Bomb is reversed into a Fireman’s Carry and Fire locks him into the CHIKARA Special. Ares steps in and does the Inverse CHIKARA Special onto Green Ant. The two keep their holds on while looking at each other face-to-face and start trading strikes.

Soldier and Tursas break it up. Tursas gets Fire out of the ring and throws Soldier down onto him. A huge brawl erupts on the outside and Fire climbs up a nearby pole before hopping off onto Ares and Tursas. Tursas even goes down! …although I don’t think that was planned, since the commentators don’t mention it, being the big deal that it’s supposed to be. Claudio and Green are in the ring and do some “YAY!”/”BOO!” punches back and forth, ending with Claudio hitting Green with the Swiss Death. Green kicks out, slowly gets to his feet and eats a running European uppercut. Another kickout. The Ricola Bomb is reversed into a Sunset Flip, which is transitioned into the Texas Cloverleaf. Ares gets in there and punches Green a couple times, but he refuses to even budge and keeps the hold on. Fire and Soldier get Ares out of there and dive onto he and Tursas. Green loses his grip on the hold and turns it into a CHIKARA Special. Claudio is able to kick him and break out of the move. He places him in the Inverted CHIKARA Special and Green is thankfully saved by his partners. Huge, “COLONY!” chant is breaking out.

An Antapult is set up and Fire is fired out into Claudio and Tursas. Soldier TKOs Ares, then also dives onto Claudio and Tursas. Fire drops Ares with the Beach Break and Ares continues to kick out. As Fire goes for his Stunner, Ares knocks him into Bryce. He performs a Tiger Driver, a weakened Bryce makes a slow two-count just as Fire gets a shoulder up. In a big surprise, Tursas shows up and splashes down onto Bryce, putting him completely out of commission. The Colony join together, rush Tursas and kick him to the outside. Ares is picked up and flattened with the Ant Hill. They have this. They totally have this.

Referee Derek Sabato slides into the ring, slams his hand down twice and then claims that the immobile Ares lifted his shoulder. The Colony are confused and angry at this call and get in his face, but he insists he’s right. Tursas and Claudio reappear and nutshot Green and Soldier. Sabato sees this, but shrugs it off. They finish Fire off with the Ragnarok, Sabato does a needless fast count and the BDK are the winners of the tournament. Sabato removes his blue referee shirt to reveal a white shirt underneath, showing that he’s their personal referee.

I remember there being a huge online backlash to the results of this show. The BDK won everything before this, so to say that BDK winning King of Trios got people up in arms and even caused the site Chikarafans to turn on the company. Which is funny because people who were there and saw it thought it was really good in context, but that seemed to fall on deaf ears. I recall people were also sore over them doing a heel referee angle as those never work out. This one did end up working out and I personally thought the booking of the BDK’s rise here is pretty damn good, even if it is the most predictable winning team in the show’s history.

I’ve always thought that the best heel in wrestling is the guy who is completely capable of beating anyone, but chooses to cut corners anyway. You take Andre the Giant and Virgil away from Ted Dibiase and he can still beat you handily. So in the first round, you have the BDK cheating because they feel like it. Second round, they’re up against a team that they completely trump to the point that it’s practically bullying. Then they’re faced with a team of badass super-strong types who show that the BDK are still capable of crushing the heavy hitters when need be. This unstoppable team is finally shown to be fallible against the Colony and have to cheat purely out of necessity. They win, sure, but they aren’t the unstoppable force that they once were.

Throughout the weekend, the BDK’s theme song, “Engel” by Rammstein, played a total of 13 times. That’s a lot of creepy German whistling.

Tomorrow, we move on to happier times and a man in his late-30’s who reverts back into a child named after counting. …I promise that’ll make sense.

King of Trios Retrospective: Contents Page!

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