TNA Impact Wrestling Coverage: More Flash Than Sizzle

When Austin Aries called out the leader of the Aces and Eights to start off this week’s Impact, you expected a drag-out no-nonsense show. But, of course, that didn’t exactly happen. That was essentially the theme of this week’s show- a lot of emotion, but a failed delivery overall.

While the show wasn’t terrible, it was more like all smoke and little sizzle. The matches were decent, but again, it’s more of a tease with the Aces and Eights than anything substantial. At this point, there needs to be more here than these continued beat downs.

Regardless, the build-up has been an effective one, but the delay in any type of real match with any member of the group may hurt the faction in the long run.

This was just an annoying part of the show; there were other issues as well. Kris Lewie’s Gut Check segment was a complete waste of time. Although he has an interesting backstory, the guy is plain terrible. The only thing that saved it was an appearance from Joey Ryan.

All in all, it’s easy to see how much the show has improved over the past two months, with better matched and more coherent storyline, but it’s not quite at the point where it can compete with RAW or Smackdown every week.

Matches:

Bound for Glory Series: Rob Van Dam vs. James Storm: Slow match until the end when Storm hit a nasty spike DDT. Storm hit The Eye of the Storm on RVD as well, as the former ECW TV champ looked legit frazzled. Although RVD battled back with his signature monkey flip, Storm won with his Last Call Super Kick.

Madison Rayne vs. ODB: Quick squash match that saw ODB get the win with the TKO. After the match, Eric Young made his Impact return and proceeded to strip off his clothes. It looks like TNA’s royal couple is back.

Bound for Glory Series: AJ Styles vs. Samoa Joe: Not the best match between these two, but definitely serviceable. Joe was consistently looking for the submission, while Styles was all about the pin and his trademark high-flying antics. It made for a nice balance. Then, surprisingly, Styles went for an Arm-Bar, but Joe countered with a few high impact maneuvers. When Styles went for the submission move again, Joe countered into a rollup for the win.

Bound for Glory Series: Kurt Angle vs. Jeff Hardy: These guys worked hard, but this was a pretty routine encounter. Angle delivered the Angle Slam, but Hardy kicked out. At this point, this was where the match picked up. A few near-falls later, Hardy hit the Swanton, but Angle kicked out. Angle couldn’t kick out of two though, as Hardy earned the much-needed win.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14230 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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