By Jon Mezzera, Torch Specialist

IMPACT HITS

Angle and Booker T: I enjoyed the scene between Kurt Angle and Booker T. I have enjoyed most of the scenes with Jeremy Borash interviewing Booker in his lavish dressing room. It was nice to see TNA play off those scenes with Borash trying to coach Angle on how to act in the dressing room, while Angle complained about not having a similar dressing room. The interaction between Booker and Angle was fun. I’m not sure what Booker is trying to sound like. My wife watched a bit of Impact for the first time in a long time last week, and (being a big fan of Booker from his WWE days) asked why he was talking with a British accent? I couldn’t give her an answer. I think it was slightly different this week. But, I did laugh when he talked about having to wrestle a rhinoceros. I’m not sure what Booker is doing, but it is entertaining me.

Booker vs. Rhino: It was predictable that Booker was going to win and advance to the 4 Ways To Glory match at the next PPV. The ending with Rhino missing his first attempted top rope move in a very long time was bad. However, despite that I am giving the match a Hit as it was enjoyable up until the end. Booker and Rhino worked hard to put on a good match. It had nice back and forth action. It was nice to see TNA giving a heel a clean victory for a change. Yes, Sharmell did interfere early on, but she was gone at then end. It wasn’t a great match, and suffered from the predictable and ridiculous ending. Yet it still had plenty of good action.

Creed vs. Williams: This was a solid X-Division Title match. I am not a big fan of Consequences Creed, but he looked good here. Petey Williams did as well. They worked well together. The match only went 6 minutes, but it was fun to watch while it lasted. It had a lot of energy and cool spots, but it didn’t feel like a typical X-Division spot fest. There was more of a story being told in the ring. There is still a lot of room for improvement in that front, but it was better than many X-Division matches that are too hectic and frenetic for any single move to sink in. Sheik Abdual Bashir’s presence was o.k. I like the disqualification as opposed to cheating to let Williams win. Presumably, this sets up a triple threat at the PPV, which isn’t a bad thing.

Kong vs. Kim: This was a pretty good brawl for the two top stars of the Knockouts Division. Awesome Kong and Gail Kim have been in some of the better segments on Impact over the last year or so as the ratings will attest to. If this was Kim’s final appearance in TNA, then it was a good one. They had a good physical brawl, without using too many weapons. They played into the street fight gimmick by brawling around the ring and through the crowd and to accent their match with the use of weapons in the right spots, not just nonstop weapon shots. TNA still does too many of these types of matches, but when they are done well it is o.k. This gives TNA an excuse to write Kim out of storylines.

Ladder Match: I don’t like giving away a ladder match between Kurt Angle and AJ Styles away for free without any advanced hype (similar to Chris Jericho vs. CM Punk from Raw this week). However, the match itself was good (also like Jericho vs. Punk). It went a good length at 13 minutes, and while it was interrupted by a commercial break, we still got to see a good amount of wrestling. I like that the ladder was in the background to a wrestling match. The use of the ladder was minimal. This was not a spot fest ladder match. This was a wrestling match with a ladder. Spot fest ladder matches can be a lot of fun, but they are dangerous and should be kept to a minimum, especially where someone with a history of neck injuries in concerned. The actual wrestling was good. Angle and Styles are capable of more, and the presence of Booker and Samoa Joe at ringside was a bit distracting, although I liked the idea of Joe shouting advice to Styles on how to break a hold. We don’t see that very often and it was a nice touch. The end with the predictable magically appearing guitar brought the quality down a bit, but it was still a good t.v. Main Event.

IMPACT MISSES

Karen’s Angle: I said I wouldn’t give Karen’s Angle a Miss, as I’m glad Karen finally has a real job, but I have to this week. Karen isn’t good. When her guest isn’t good either, the segment is going to suck. So Cal Val isn’t good either. This has been one of my least favorite storylines of the year. Val’s character has been poorly written, and her performances have been bad. And like every other Karen’s Angles, this one ended in violence and craziness. Can’t Angle get through one interview without being threatened, or having someone interrupt the proceedings?

Tenay’s Interview: One of the positives of Karen’s Angle has been that it replaced Mike Tenay’s terrible sit down interviews. That is, until this week. Was anyone at home wishing these would come back? One sit down interview a week is enough. We don’t need two. And we certainly don’t need Tenay doing them. I haven’t enjoyed a single one of his sit down interviews over the years. His over the top facial reactions are ridiculous. Hearing him talk to Kevin Nash about the good days when younger wrestlers showed respect to older wrestlers made it more apparent that TNA is going to rehash the Millionaires Club vs. New Breed from WCW’s dying days. Hearing Tenay and Nash talk about the good old days makes me think that they might be sad that they were once part of something relevant, but that was almost a decade ago.

PJB vs. R & R I: So someone at TNA creative (and I use that term loosely) pitched an idea. And, it went something like this: “Let’s put the two most annoying acts in TNA, and by extension the entire world of professional wrestling, together. We’ll get the Prince Justice Brotherhood to complain to the Rock & Rave Infection that they are being too loud. It will be great. Curry Man can hit on Christy Hemme which will be hilarious in his Japanese accent. Ha ha. And we can get more of Sharkboy’s great Steve Austin imitation which everyone loves. And, we can play into the theme of guitar mystery by having Rock and Rave attack them in the end with their Guitar Hero guitars. It will be the start of the funniest angle of the year.” And everyone else applauded. Whoever proposed this idea should be fired.

Giving Away Ladder Match: I mentioned it above, but I just want to take a quick moment to reiterate that giving away a ladder match between two of the top stars in the company for free with no hype was a mistake. This could have been a PPV match that people would want to pay to see. At the very least, by announcing it ahead of time, it could have popped a rating. Instead it will largely be forgotten by next week.

Guitar “Mystery”: I am not the first to point this out, and I probably won’t be the last. But, it is utterly ridiculous that nobody in TNA is saying the name Jeff Jarrett in connection with the guitar “mystery.” It started out right from the beginning when Kurt Angle arrived and talked about the guy that everyone knows is behind the guitar appearances, but he didn’t say Jarrett. The announcers talked about it all night long, but nobody ever said that Jarrett might be behind it. Why not? When mysterious black baseball bats suddenly started appearing, everyone was quick to verbally assume that Sting was responsible. Here, everyone calls it a mystery, but acts like they know the answer to the riddle. But, they don’t say the answer. Why did they say they thought it was Sting, but won’t say they think it is Jarrett? There is no reason not to name Jarrett, and by not doing so, the entire company (practically) comes off as idiots.

Jon Mezzera is PWTorch.com's Hits & Misses Specialist, providing his point of view for Raw, Smackdown, ECW, and TNA Impact each week. Email him at jmezz-torch@sbcglobal.net.

For another view from the original Hitlist author, compare Jason Powell's views to mine by visiting prowrestling.NET's "Hitlist" section here.

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