Date: February 10, 2006 (aired January 30, 2007)
Company: Wrestling Society X
Rules: Royal Rumble where after the final man enters it becomes a Ladder Match
Stipulation: The two wrestlers who grab the contracts suspended from above the ring challenge each other for the WSX Championship the following week
Roster (10): Alkatrazz, Justin Credible, Chris Hamrick, Teddy Hart, Kaos, New Jack, Puma, 6-Pac, Vampiro and Youth Suicide

Wrestling Society X is this wonderful little hiccup in professional wrestling history. It didn’t last long and very few people saw it, but it was certainly memorable in its uniqueness. Back in the mid-00’s, MTV put together a wrestling series pre-taped well in advance featuring a roster of three dozen guys, mostly made up of promising indy talent. You had the likes of Joey Ryan, Scorpio Sky, Human Tornado, Matt Sydal (Evan Bourne), Arik Cannon, Matt Classic and many more. Unfortunately, a lot of the established talent weren’t the kind of guys you’d go running to the TV for, but whatever.

Taking place in some kind of warehouse, WSX was incredibly over-the-top and everything exploded. And I loved it. Each episode was only a half hour, meaning that many matches were just a bunch of flippy indy moves one after another with zero psychology (to be fair, Teddy Hart was on the roster) when we weren’t getting live musical performances, but there were also additional matches online. Much like TNA, the first episode took the first steps in crowning a champion for the promotion via a Royal Rumble variation.

Unlike most Royal Rumble matches, there are tables and the like set up around the ring. And by “and the like” I mean a pile of electrical wires and a fence cage filled with explosives. Chekov’s gun, indeed. After #10 is in the ring, two contracts will be lowered down and some ladders will be slid into the ring. The first two to get the contracts will be penciled in for a match to decide the company’s first champion.

Pre-match, we get some neat quick promos from backstage. You’d see Justin Credible talking up how he’s going to win and then it would cut to New Jack shoving Chris Hamrick while threatening what he’s going to do to him in the match. The camera pans around the hand-picked MTV crowd, they go over the rules and Justin Credible walks out at #1. One thing that works really well with WSX’s style is how during entrances, they’d pause the footage to do a little stats card to hype each guy.

#2 is Teddy Hart. Cool thing is that there doesn’t seem to be a single entranceway. Teddy just kind of shows up from a corner of the warehouse and climbs his way down to ringside. Teddy is able to get the best of Credible with his high-flying style, but his ego goes to his head and he begins to showboat a little too much.

Once Kaos comes in there, Hart and Credible put their differences aside and work on the new guy. Vampiro comes out next and begins to clean house. As he stands tall, they go to a commercial. As shown when they come back, Puma had entered and was immediately thrown out of the ring by Vampiro and through a table. Alkatrazz is next and stops Vampiro’s momentum. 6-Pac (Syxx/X-Pac/1-2-3 Kid) steps in and momentarily knocks out Vampiro with an X-Factor.

When it’s time for Chris Hamrick to come out, New Jack chases him. New Jack ends up knocking him off the apron and through a table. Not finished with Hamrick, he exits the ring and the ref tells him he’s disqualified. New Jack breaks a guitar over that ref’s head. Considering the guitar looks shoddy as is and explodes with confetti, it looks like an incredibly tame spot. That doesn’t stop the commentators – which includes rock legend Zakk Wylde – from acting like they just watched someone get run over by a train.

Chaos reigns as New Jack sets Hamrick up on another table, climbs up a balcony and jumps off. Meanwhile, Vampiro superkicks Alkatrazz into a table and Kaos gets knocked into a box of wires. All within the same ten seconds!

The final entrant in is Youth Suicide, showing up with a bucket. He reveals it’s filled with thumbtacks and pours a pool of them on the mat. You can tell that they’re really good thumbtacks and in no way super fake because when he gets powerbombed onto them, there’s not a single one lingering on his black shirt.

In a weird editing hiccup, Teddy Hart is simply gone from the match. He does a Tornado DDT to Vampiro, Youth Suicide does his entrance and there’s suddenly no sign of him for the rest of the episode. Huh. With his sudden disappearance, we’re down to 6-Pac, Justin Credible, Vampiro and Youth Suicide.

As Youth Suicide and Vampiro go at it, 6-Pac climbs the ladder unopposed and gets his contract. He walks off, victorious. Youth Suicide climbs back up and Justin Credible eliminates him the best way possible.

Beautiful.

Vampiro and Credible climb up the two sides of the ladder and trade punches. Vampiro grabs the contract as 6-Pac enters and shoves the ladder over for the sake of being a dick. Vampiro falls to the mat with contract in hand and the episode literally ends right there. Just cuts to the production company’s logo and we’re done.

Vampiro ended up winning his match against 6-Pac… BY TOMBSTONING HIM INTO AN EXPLODING COFFIN! I seriously love this show.

WSX wasn’t long for this world, especially after MTV cut it off at the knees. One of the episodes was to feature Ricky Banderas – the shows’ disfigured top heel and eventual champion – attacking Vampiro and throwing a fireball into his face. Now, fireballs in wrestling have been around for years. Just toss some lit flash paper and it looks cool. Unfortunately, MTV had a cow over it and pulled it from its original airdate. It aired maybe a month later, only with some crazy-ass editing that made it look like Banderas’ fireball was some kind of Dragonball Z attack that made Vampiro’s body blur and ripple as he agonized. It was a total improvement, but still.

If the show wasn’t already doomed from the start, this act killed its momentum. MTV didn’t even air the final episode and it instead got left to the DVD box set release. Which I own. You should too.

Vampiro may have his detractors, but hey, there could be worse champions for your promotion. And if that isn’t an obvious segue for tomorrow’s battle royal article, I don’t know what is.

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Posted in 20 Days of Battle Royals, Wrestlecomics by Gavok |