TNA Impact Wrestling Coverage: Talking Matters

After TNA looked like they ate their Flintstones vitamins last week, they stumbled this in this week’s episode of Impact. Promo-heavy and lacking any real compelling moments, this show wasn’t worth missing the NBA finals for.

It all started on the wrong foot. After two weeks of cut to the chase TV, which saw TNA get to the in-ring action much quicker than they have in the past, TNA wasted the first 15 minutes with a promo between Eric Bischoff, Hulk Hogan, Sting and Mr. Anderson. With Slammiversary a few days away, TNA would have been smart to have some high quality matches with not a wasted minute. While there’s an obvious need for promo on the last show before a pay per view, too much of it was poorly written and lacking any real context or emotional connection.

On top of that, the matches were average and weren’t enticing enough.

Last week, it appeared that TNA was moving in the right direction and was ready to make good on their new slogan, “Wrestling Matters.” This show proved that they aren’t quite ready to live up to their own expectations.

Matches:

Angelina Love and Winter vs. Tara and Mickie James: A mediocre match that was highlighted by Love’s finishing move. A reverse DDT/backcracker-type move, it’s one of the best female finishing moves in the business. Now if they’d just get her out of this ridiculous program with Winter, then she’d be ready to be a legitimate challenger for the Knockouts championship.

Alex Shelley and James Storm vs. Hernandez and Anarquia w/ Sarita and Rosita:
A match that had a decent flow, but was more about establishing Mexican America as a legitimate tag team threat and exposing the communication problems of the newly formed Gun Money. The British Invasion team of Magnus and Doug Williams were ringside during the contest. Magnus didn’t help his team get over and provided lackluster commentary that was only saved by Taz calling Magnus a bastard. Overall, this match didn’t do its job. It wasn’t entertaining and didn’t convince anyone that Shelley and Storm can’t beat a British Invasion team that was simply thrown into the mix to see what sticks.

Bully Ray vs. Rob Van Dam: A short back and forth match that ended with a five-star frog splash from RVD. Nothing special.

ODB vs. Velvet Sky:
A long, hard-fought battle between this two that ended when Sky dropped OBD with a sloppy DDT. In spite of that, Sky sold a lot of offense and is getting better in the ring, but has a long ways to go before she can make any win she has over ODB look believable.

Mr. Anderson and Gunner vs. Sting and Eric Young:
An average match that above all else, makes Gunner look primed to get the TNA TV title back. Hitting Sting with his variation of the F5 for the win, Gunner, like Crimson is one of the only blue-chip prospects the company has. It’s nice to see them giving him a push.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 13821 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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