King of Trios 2007: Night 2

On Demand
DVD

Match 1
Gran Akuma vs. MASAMUNE

We’re shown a MASAMUNE promo, but it’s entirely in Japanese so… yeah. Thing to note about CHIKARA is that usually the commentary is really good. UltraMantis Black, Larry Sweeney, Bryce Remsberg, Mike Quackenbush, Leonard F. Chikarason and later Gavin Loudspeaker are all at least bearable. For this match, we’re given the team of UltraMantis and Icarus. Oy. Icarus and commentary do NOT go well together. He mumbles, tries too hard to play it straight and any jokes fall completely flat.

On the other hand, Akuma vs. MASAMUNE itself is pretty good. The two are very similar in style and it seems that MASAMUNE is supposed to be just as much a heel as Akuma. It’s brought up that MASAMUNE is a tag champ in Osaka Pro, adding to the idea that the two of them are evenly matched. In a good opening bit of grappling, Akuma gets the best of the exchange and armdrags MASAMUNE out of the ring. MASAMUNE angrily throws a chair, making it a point that he isn’t any more virtuous than the despised Akuma after all. Akuma doesn’t play face either, as once MASAMUNE reenters, he knees him with a cheap shot. While the chemistry is definitely there, the match appears to go into a pattern. They do a strike war against each other (chops, kicks, forearms), then one gives the other an elaborate submission hold that won’t take. Akuma goes for the Yoshi Tonic, MASAMUNE escapes and then hits Akuma with an Ace Crusher. While grappling with Akuma from behind, MASAMUNE briefly shoves the ref out of the way out of annoyance. During that diversion, Akuma gives him a mule kick to the balls, rolls him up and puts his legs on the ropes to get the pin.

Match 2
Chuck Taylor vs. Create-a-Wrestler

Create-a-Wrestler is a new guy covered in question marks with the hook that whichever fan comes up with the best gimmick for him wins tickets to the 2007 Young Lions Cup. Here, he’s a bit botchy and it’s Taylor’s wrestling and personality that make the match watchable. Also, it’s weird to watch Create-a-Wrestler, as these days, in the form of Dasher Hatfield, he looks pretty great physically. In 2007, he’s got weird, lanky proportions. It might be the pants throwing me off. When Create-a-Wrestler has the advantage early on with some submissions, Taylor makes sure to scream like a girl. Taylor takes control after doing his picture-perfect belly-to-belly suplex.

There are some good laughs here. Taylor says that Create-a-Wrestler’s created gimmick should be “jobber”, which causes UltraMantis to gasp and yell, “That’s insider terminology!” Icarus states that Taylor should be given the prize as he’s won the contest by a mile. Wanting to create the most generic chant possible for a man with no persona, the crowd roots for Create-a-Wrestler with, “LET’S GO, WRESTLER!” Taylor, confused, points to himself as he too is a wrestler. For some reason that can only be speculated, there’s an action figure ringside of WCW wrestler Alex Wright. Taylor takes it and stuffs it into the back of his pants, figuring it’ll give him some choice moonsault powers. He misses the moonsault and later takes it out on the figure by angrily stomping it. Taylor holds onto the match about 80% of the time and although Create-a-Wrestler fights out of the Omega Driver, he’s still taken out when Taylor rolls him up and holds onto the ropes for leverage.

Match 3
King of Trios Round 1
Team PWG (Chris Bosh, Scott Lost and Joey Ryan) vs. Team Mucha Lucha (El Pantera, Lince Dorado and Sicodelico Jr.)

A pre-taped promo shows Team PWG backstage in an empty kitchen. As Lost is in the background, making himself coffee, drinking it and spitting it out, Bosh talks up how he recognizes Pantera as a lawn-mowing janitor who works in a fast food kitchen. Basically, he’s being racist. They enter first, followed by Team Mucha Lucha with the Green Hornet theme. Nice.

Before starting, Ryan makes sure to oil himself up in front of the crowd with Bosh getting his back. The first pairing is Ryan vs. Sicodelico. Ryan gets him in an armbar and boasts, “Got your arm!” until Sicodelico flips out of it and makes a fool out of him. Lince vs. Lost is really fast-paced with Lince gradually getting the best of Lost until sending him rolling out of the ring. Then it’s Bosh vs. Pantera. Pantera tosses out Bosh and runs for a plancha. As Bosh braces for it, Pantera turns it into a fake-out while Lince and Sicodelico attack Bosh from each side.

The tide turns when Lince finds himself in the PWG corner and briefly fights off Lost and Ryan until turning around and eating a superkick via Bosh. Lince spends a lot of time in peril, but it’s kept interesting by the PWG team’s exciting offense and comedic, cocky attitudes. Lince saves himself with an enziguri, then tags Pantera. Bosh backdrops Pantera into the corner, but Pantera grabs the top ropes, stands upside down for a second, then bends his body and kicks Bosh in the back of the head. Lince and Pantera each perform a tope on Lost and Bosh, leaving Sicodelico vs. Ryan in the ring. They grapple back and forth with various pin attempts until Sicodelico succeeds in locking Ryan into a roll-up pin. After the match, the PWG guys insist that they somehow won and get angry that the ref doesn’t see it their way.

Cool match and all, but three roll-up wins in a row? Okay.

Match 4
King of Trios Round 1
The Colony (Soldier Ant, Fire Ant and Worker Ant) vs. Hallowicked and Up in Smoke (Cheech and Cloudy)

The joke with Worker Ant is that he’s a parody of indy workers in general, so he throws his own pre-match streamers and gives Cheech a very soft handshake to start things. Their opening mix-up leads to a couple spots where Cheech has Worker stretched out across his back while he walks around the ring. Worker has enough and angrily dropkicks him out of there. Then it becomes Cloudy vs. Soldier Ant, going from a test of strength to a lot of flips between the two. They each go for a crossbody at the same time, collide in mid-air and roll out. That leads to Fire Ant vs. Hallowicked. Hallowicked does better for the most part, dude to Fire Ant constantly going for the fireman’s carry and getting it reversed.

Things get weird where Fire Ant sends Hallowicked to the outside and does a sloppy hurricanrana onto him. Hallowicked helps him hit the move, which even UltraMantis on commentary points out and wonders why he would do that. The answer comes as the momentum causes Hallowicked to forward-roll away from the ringside area and outside into the snow. Fire Ant stands around, confused and alone while Cheech and Cloudy take apart his partners in the ring. When Fire Ant decides to pursue his opponent, Hallowicked comes back from outside with a huge slab of snow, which he shatters over Fire Ant’s back.

Being “the Hot Property” and all, Fire Ant sells this like he just got engulfed in kryptonite and Soldier Ant comes to try and help him. That leaves Worker Ant alone to get worked over by the opposing trio. There’s a nice spot where Cheech and Cloudy fold Worker’s arms across his chest and Hallowicked delivers a Yakuza Kick to the back of the skull.

Immediately after, Worker succumbs to Party Cloudy with a Chance of Cheech. Fire Ant races into the ring and hits a fireman’s carry on each opponent, rapid-fire. He evades attacks from all three to pull off this snazzy triple attack.

They perform the Ant-apult, where Soldier and Worker boost Fire Ant out of the ring and onto their opponents. Worker and Soldier then bring Cheech into the ring and deliver Ants Go Marching, a powerbomb/neckbreaker combo. Hallowicked and Cloudy storm the ring and start clearing it until the only ones left in there are Hallowicked and Worker Ant. Hallowicked gives him Go 2 Sleepy Hollow (a Go 2 Sleep variation where he kicks the torso instead of head) and then finishes him off with a Yakuza Kick to the face. Pretty great match right here.

Match 5
King of Trios Round 1
Team Canada (Maxime Boyer, Jagged and Shane Matthews) vs. QuackenShaneSaw (Mike Quackenbush, Shane Storm and Jigsaw)

A rematch of sorts from Night 1. Backstage, Team Canada introduce themselves to the viewer and Jagged excitedly introduces a pizza flipper he found. Shane Matthews talks about the prestigious history of the King of Trios and how the original winners, way back when, were George Hackenschmidt, Frank Gotch and Sonny Warcloud. They’re all on the same page and are certain that they’ll be in that same company. Upon entering the ring, Jagged discovers that Alex Wright action figure from earlier delivers an elbow drop to it because that’s kind of his thing.

Matthews starts against Jigsaw and overpowers him. Jigsaw and his friends each beat on Matthews until he’s had enough and rolls out. Storm easily out-grapples Jagged, naturally leading to both teams’ MVPs, Quack vs. Boyer. Quack shows himself superior and dropkicks him out of the ring once done. The one-sidedness continues as Storm gets the best of Matthews and Jigsaw does the same against Boyer. Jagged comes in and demands to face Quack, which is about equal to suicide in this situation. Quack quite effortlessly out-grapples him, but Jagged then starts biting him. They go back to doing holds and Jagged yells, “Going back to the well!” and bites him again. Eventually, Quack has enough, bites Jagged and then delivers a palm strike so hard that Jagged flies out of the ring.

Boyer grabs Quack from behind and Quack moves out of the way, allowing Jagged and Matthews to clothesline their partner by accident. Quack and Storm put their opponents in a pile, so Jigsaw can hop off the top rope and crush them with a double-stomp. Finally, things go in Team Canada’s way when Storm misses a tope to the outside and flies through several chairs. They work on the hurt Storm, including some tags where one member of the heel side would jump off the top rope and punch the prone Storm. Jagged decides to play it safe by climbing to the top, going down rope-by-rope, walking forward and punching him in the ribs. Then he yells at a fan in the crowd for not silencing his phone properly.

Storm gets the tag eventually and his partners succeed in tearing the others apart. A great spot has Quack try and pin Boyer, only to move out of the way just as Matthews and Jagged go for elbow drops. Immediately after, Jigsaw hops on their chests, one at a time and Storm jumps off the top to splash them all. They all go for a triple pin, but there’s a triple kickout. In the chaos that follows, Storm misses That Japanese Move on Jagged, Jagged tries for a backslide and Storm reverses it into the Air Raid Crash. Quack’s team advances.

Match 6
King of Trios Round 1
Team TNA (Alex Shelley, Chris Sabin and Sonjay Dutt) vs. BLKOUT (Joker, Ruckus and Sabian)

The TNA guys cut a promo where they discuss throwing their hats into the tournament and Sanjay Dutt being on the gas. With this match, it’s weird in that there isn’t a real face/heel style established despite both teams being pretty popular, so they just get through it by acting like complete jerks to each other. Like when Shelley goes to town on Ruckus, he takes a second to blow a snot rocket onto his prone body. Ruckus gets a spurt of offense in there, only to run right into Shelley’s elbow. They all mix it up in different combinations for a bit until Shelley works over Sabian, as even though Sabian had success nailing a suicide dive, it simply took too much out of him. All three TNA guys hit legdrops on him in a row, then stand over him and pose.

When being Irish whipped, Sabian slides down and escapes the ring, constituting a tag. The BLKOUT triple-teams Shelley with Joker and Ruckus holding him with a double Boston Crab while Sabian rushes the ropes and dropkicks him. They’re pretty much cheating exactly like the TNA guys did earlier and do a triple-team stretch hold on Shelley while posing, obviously revenge for that legdrop spot.

A minor mistake opens a window and Shelley starts kicking all sorts of ass out of nowhere. Sabin is tagged in and fights off all three BLKOUT members. Ruckus performs a backflip and is caught by Shelley and put into the Motor City Stretch. Dutt and Sabin each put an opponent in a submission hold, but none of them tap. Instead, Ruckus escapes the Motor City Stretch and saves his partners. They focus their attacks on Dutt, culminating in Joker running towards the corner and hitting him with a forward-flip, or Cannonball. Dutt kicks out. The TNA guys then focus on Ruckus and hit him with a million different moves, ending with Sabin putting him down for good with the Future Shock. TNA advances.

Match 7
Icarus vs. Player Uno

With another Kings of Wrestling singles match on their day off from the tournament, Icarus comments about his singles match with the 8-Bit Luchador. He’s pretty reluctant, claiming that he doesn’t need this and that he’d rather be taking a nap. Player Uno walks out in a Pac Man baseball cap, which Icarus steals and wears. The crowd boos. Uno puts it back on and the crowd cheers. It’s weird seeing some early Player Uno because he’s grown to be this fantastic worker, but back then, he was still trying to get his style down while using his NES gimmick as a crutch.

Icarus has the match in hand for most of it. At one point, a frustrated Uno throws his elbow pad at Icarus, causing Icarus to slap him around with it. Uno gets some licks in and ties Icarus in the ropes upside-down before nailing him with some chops and a dropkick. He enters the Konami Code into the giant NES controller on his tights, picks Icarus up for an Electric Chair Drop and gets it reversed into a reverse hurricanrana. Uno defends himself from Icarus’ onslaught with a backslide, but Icarus rolls out of it and turns it into a Pedigree for the win. Lots and lots of boos, as expected from an Icarus match.

Match 8
The Olsen Twins (Jimmy and Colin) vs. MIYAWAKI and Yoshiaki Yago

Ooooh ho ho, this match is a treat. An interview shows the Olsens getting ready with Colin throwing rapid punches in the air. Jimmy hypes up his skills, then pulls out two pieces of paper with some stick figure drawings of MIYAWAKI and Yago on them, which Colin proceeds to punch out of his hands.

They leave and Colin remarks, “Those are pretty good drawings.” Entering the ring, Colin continues his shadow boxing. They try not to give into the taunts when someone in the crowd flat out tells them, “You guys MIGHT die.”

Match begins and Colin snapmares Yago. He gets way too excited about it and plays to the crowd, so Yago grabs him, snapmare and then a kick to the back so hard that Colin rolls to the outside and sells it like a shotgun blast. Jimmy faces MIYAWAKI and the crowd chants for a headbutt. Jimmy tries to fight him with a series of running shoulder blocks and loses. He tries to slap him back and forth and loses. He tries to headbutt him and loses very, very badly. Things turn around when Colin knees MIYAWAKI from behind and Jimmy follows with a back suplex. During their beatdown, they toss in a sweet hiptoss/neckbreaker combo.

Colin holds up MIYAWAKI, MIYAWAKI moves out of the way and Jimmy accidentally clotheslines his brother. Yago is tagged in and starts drilling his punches into them both. MIYAWAKI gets back in and works over Jimmy. He gives him chest slaps in the corner and Jimmy sells it like crazy.

The two Japanese guys put the Olsens in submission holds, but they get to the ropes. Yago MURDERS Jimmy with some more punches.

Colin helps Jimmy and even though Yago tries to ward them off with punches, they overwhelm him. MIYAWAKI gets Colin onto the outside, leaving Jimmy and Yago. Jimmy goes for a full nelson suplex that gets reversed into Yago’s own version. He holds him up for a crucifix powerbomb, says, “Bye-bye!” and plants him neck-first into the mat. Yago and MIYAWAKI win and celebrate with the fans for a sec. Jimmy and Colin get up, slap hands with each other, then pass out.

It’s less of a match and more of a snuff film.

Match 9
King of Trios Quarter Finals
Hallowicked and Up in Smoke (Cheech and Cloudy) vs. Team Mucha Lucha (El Pantera, Lince Dorado and Sicodelico Jr.)

Pantera and Hallowicked shake hands and Pantera outclasses his opponent with a series of lucha submissions. Sicodelico comes in and puts Hallowicked in an armbar, escaped through a series of flips and an armdrag. Cheech uses his speed against Sicodelico, confusing him and almost pinning him repeatedly until Sicodelico catches him with a superkick and knocks him out of the ring. It becomes Lince vs. Cloudy with the two doing your usual indy standoff spot. Then Pantera and Hallowicked go at it again, also ending with a standoff before shaking hands once again.

The pace picks up dramatically. Lince and Cloudy have another go at it with a lot of counters until Lince simply kicks the hell out of Cloudy’s face when Cloudy is in sitting position. Lince’s partners come in to help triple team Cloudy, the ring fills up and once the dust is settled, we have Cheech taking on Lince. They exit and it’s Hallowicked and Cloudy in the ring against Pantera and Sicodelico. Pantera knocks Hallowicked out of the ring and then hits a crossbody follow-up. Cloudy knocks Sicodelico out of the ring and then jumps onto him from the top rope. That leaves Lince against Cheech again, where Lince takes him down and finishes him off with a twisting splash off the top. He gets the pin and the lucha guys move on to the semis.

After the match, a fan tells Hallowicked and friends, “I had you going all the way!” He grunts and shrugs before walking off to the back.

Match 10
King of Trios Quarter Finals
Team TNA (Alex Shelley, Chris Sabin and Sonjay Dutt) vs. QuackenShaneSaw (Mike Quackenbush, Shane Storm and Jigsaw)

As Team TNA walks out, Shelley is favoring his neck and sells the hell out of their earlier match. Once both teams are in the ring, Shelley gets in Quack’s face, with UltraMantis explaining on commentary that it’s due to their history at the 2005 IWA-MS Ted Petty Invitational tournament. Storm and Dutt start it off before tagging Quack and Sabin. The two trade holds and then trade over-elaborate hold escapes, much to the other’s show of respect. Jigsaw comes in and gets Sabin with a crossbody off the top. He goes for a pin with a bridge and Shelley casually breaks it.

Haha, what a jerk.

The TNA guys hold their own early on with Dutt getting Quack and Jigsaw with a suicide dive to the outside. That allows Shelley to put the Motor City Stretch on Storm until he reaches the ropes. They work on Quack for a sec until Sabin keeps trying to smack him and repeatedly hits his partners instead. Quack’s team gets in some offense with a series of dives on each TNA member until Sabin turns the tide back with an enziguri on Jigsaw. They start heeling it up some more by working on Jigsaw’s mask, each TNA member tugging on it and risking disqualification. Shelley heels it up better than the rest, but also out-wrestles Jigsaw by tying up his arms and legs and leaving him in a human knot, prone to Sabin dropkicking him. Storm makes a go at Shelley, fails to get him in an Air Raid Crash and then has That Japanese Move blocked before receiving a kick to the face. Storm ends up in peril while the TNA guys refuse to take it seriously. They’re all incredibly nonchalant about taking him apart.

Shelley puts him in an abdominal stretch and while the ref yells at Quack and Jigsaw, Dutt and Sabin grab on their partner’s hand for more leverage. They go for a pin and Quack breaks it, allowing Storm to roll out of the ring, thereby acting as a tag. Shelley and Sabin give him a double team Lung Blower, followed by Dutt delivering a moonsault. Quack endures it and proceeds to fight them all off and tag in Storm. Storm goes for Sabin and clotheslines him so hard that they both go out over the top rope. Shelley gets Quack in the Motor City Stretch and the other TNA guys put Jigsaw and Storm in submissions, but all three are then countered and turned into submissions of their own. Shelley breaks out and saves his partners.

Quack goes for a top-rope hurricanrana, but Shelley reverses it into a top-rope Manhattan Drop before sending Quack to the outside and hitting him with a tope. The TNA guys work on Storm but can’t seem to keep him down. Chaos erupts in the ring until we’re left with Jigsaw fighting with Dutt. Dutt hits a 450 Splash, but Jigsaw kicks out. After a series of reversals and failed move attempts, Dutt’s piledriver is turned into the Jig-n-Tonic (a piledriver where the opponent is held behind you instead of in front). Jigsaw gets the pin.

After the match, Quack and his partners offer handshakes. Shelley speaks with Dutt and Sabin, they reach for the hands, but then pull back Flair-style and walk away. Fantastic match.

Good show here, although it doesn’t stack up to Night 1. Mainly due to the exhibition matches not being all that strong in comparison. Join me tomorrow for the finals.

King of Trios Retrospective: Contents Page!

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• The King of Trios Retrospective: Day 1
• 20 Days of Battle Royals: Day 16
• The King of Trios Retrospective: Day 4
• The CHIKARA Comic-to-DVD Cover Gallery
• The King of Trios Retrospective: Day 9

Posted in Chikara, King of Trios, Wrestlecomics by Gavok |