Despite the title, I don’t think we’ll be seeing Kenny Omega or the Young Bucks, as we saw the “go home” build for GWF Legacy on the season finale of Three Count.
We open with recaps of the confrontation between Cash Money Erkan and Chris Colen… Bad Bones’ plan to try and overthrow Ahmed Chaer… and Tarkan Aslan realising he’s been hallucinating.
We open up backstage as Rambo and Bad Bones are chilling with Crazy Sexy Mike… who tells them all about “crazy Tarkan”, who’s always complaining and wanting more. He vows to catch Ahmed and take his chance, rather than wait for handouts. From there, we’re in the locker room as Erkan’s telling the locker room about Chris Colen’s “tricks”, as he reckon Colen’s always cheated his way to the top. I do kinda dig the personalised tracksuit jackets that some of the roster are wearing…
Colen tells Erkan he needs to beat him to win the title… before asking the locker room if they believe Erkan’s stories. Colen ends up promising to slam Erkan’s “beanpole body” into the mat, if only to shut his mouth at Legacy. It’s a rather civilised spell of trash talking, unlike the norm for wrestling.
We jump into the arena, as Benji’s stretching on the ring apron. Vincenzo Coccotti tries his psychology out, but it’s clumsy and he gets shoved away as Benji has a match at Legacy to prepare for. Against Arash. I bet he won’t even make it to the ring… and Coccotti laughs it off just like that, as we see a montage of Arash’s failures.
Backstage again, and Lucky Kid is chugging energy drinks when he’s interrupted by Pascal Spalter. They’re arguing over an appointment with Ahmed Chaer, and their upcoming 3-way match with John Klinger. Spalter claims he’s “the GWF” while Lucky is a “nobody”, before he talked himself into more trouble… just as Bad Bones walks in through the door. Spalter directs him to the “midcard room”, but Klinger corrects him by saying he’s the superstar, while the subtitles provide this rather inopportune moment.
Elsewhere, Tarkan Aslan’s still hallucinating as he “sees” Ben again… his brother tells Tarkan that Crazy Sexy Mike is just jealous… and that’s the moment Icarus walks up and says that he doesn’t want to wrestle a “sick person” like Aslan. Icarus walks off, and cue titles! Holy crap, we’re starting with a 5-on-5 tag?!
Grup Anarşi (Abdul Kenan, Aytac Bahar, Georges Khoukaz, Cem Kaplan & Ali Aslan) vs. New Wave (Kris Jokic, Oliver Carter, Senza Volto & Arrows of Hungary (Icarus & Dover)
Ali Aslan was the mystery fifth man of the team, wrestling his first match in GWF in almost three years. If I’m wrong on that, blame Dave Bradshaw and his research!
We start with all ten men standing in the ring, squaring off as the Berlin crowd were virtually baying for their blood. Things quickly give way as a brawl broke out, but New Wave were left standing tall as they cleared the ring, prompting the crowd to chant “New Wave Rocks”… in time to a similar chant. Our first stand-off has Georges Khoukaz take Senza Volto into the corner, as Grup Anarşi exchanged frequent tags… but Volto avoids Bahar and Kenan before landing some springboard stuff as he tags out to Oliver Carter. Cem Kaplan’s next as those two have a brief exchange, and this is really throwing out too much for anything to settle.
Khoukaz is back as he’s tripped into the corner for a cannonball for a near-fall for Jokic, but Grup Anarşi flood the ring and focus on Jokic, who finds himself isolated. Ali Aslan comes in and drops a knee on Jokic’s arm, before a hiptoss keeps the Croat down for a legdrop… but there’s still no pinning attempt as he tags out to Kenan. The referee’s forced to hold back New Wave as they do the naive babyface thing of trying to rush the ring as the bad guys cheat.
An X-Plex from Kaplan nearly puts Jokic away, before Khoukaz returned… and there’s more lost control from New Wave, who really are making a rod for their own backs. Khoukaz blocks a wheelbarrow and hits a full nelson slam on Jokic for a two-count, before a tornado DDT from Jokic finally got him some breathing space. One enziguiri to Kaplan later, and Jokic tags out to Dover! Dover clears house with clotheslines, as a spinebuster dumps Kaplan. Bahar’s in to take a German suplex, but Khoukaz comes in and ends up taking an Electric Chair drop in the middle of the ring. Kaplan stops Dover from a dive… but he ends up taking a belly to belly to the floor before Ali Aslan tried to get involved. Ali just gets punched out as Senza Volto prepared to dive; but first, Carter and Jokic hit duelling Sasuke Specials, before a step-up top con giro from Volto adds to the pile.
Icarus is next, but he climbs the ropes and hits an Orihara moonsault before Volto and Kaplan returned to the ring. Kaplan gets a boot up as Senza tried to charge, but Volto returns with a 619 to sweep Kaplan out of the corner. A double stomp from Volto misses as Aslan returns… and gets lifted onto the apron, then dropkicked to the floor, before Kaplan’s back with a fireman’s carry gutbuster. Aslan tags in for a back senton… and that’s enough for the win! When that settled down, this was a pretty good, chaotic brawl, but you never got the feeling that this was truly settling the score. ***
Murat AK vs. Chris Colen
Our main event ahead of Legacy is Chris Colen facing Cash Money Erkan’s regular tag partner – Murat AK… coincidentally, Murat had the first match of this season.
Murat takes Colen into the corner, but there’s a clean break before the much larger Murat got a receipt as Colen backed him up. There’s some clubbing blows as Colen’s spun around with a chop, before a crossbody got Murat a near-fall. Colen throws a few chops as he tries to fight back, eventually knocking him into the corner before he clocked him with a big boot. AK hit back instantly with a big boot, before he looked for a chokeslam, instead opting to take Colen back into the corner as I thought we were looping back into the chops.
Instead, Colen goes for a Fireman’s carry, but has to make do with a clothesline after Murat escaped, but AK’s back to his feet first, only to get hauled up by Colen for a delayed death valley driver. Colen follows that up with a Macho Man elbow drop… and that’s enough for the win. Aside from the show of strength, Colen looked in big trouble throughout, but this wasn’t painted as Colen being weak… I’m still to be impressed by Murat, who still has those Khali-like attributes. **
Cash Money Erkan comes out after the match, and all of a sudden Colen has his title belt – the first time I think we’ve seen any championships this season. Erkan hits the ring and looks down on Colen (literally), as the staredown ends the show.
But then we go backstage as Crazy Sexy Mike has a row with Ahmed Chaer, feeling slighted at how much he’s “fallen” in GWF. Mike makes an offer to Chaer: all in. We’ve a match added to Legacy: Rambo and Crazy Sexy Mike vs. Orlando Silver & Ahmed Chaer… if Rambo and Mike win, Chaer’s out, but if Chaer and Silver win, then Mike’s gone for a year on a “creative break”. That’s really odd to announce a match with those high stakes DAYS before the show…
We then get a trailer for Legacy, before Vincenzo Coccotti has Bad Bones in his latest amateur psychology session. Klinger keeps sitting up, because he doesn’t like staying down for a three-count. Ba-dum-tish! Klinger tells Coccotti that he feels nothing, and so we get a shot of his crotch accompanied by the sound of crickets… followed by Klinger asking Coccotti what he feels when he hears “1, 2, 3”. The response? Coccotti’s clipboard rises, we hear a slide whistle as he grimaces to the innuendo. Klinger just looks disgusted as he consoles a wailing Coccotti, who’s still affected by being Loserweight Champion in the past… and we’re done!
As a season, Three Count did its job – it had a story arc that went throughout the season, with the New Wave vs. Grup Anarşi at least reaching a pay-off. The other story in Three Count perhaps didn’t pay-off as well, as the Kati Libra/Wesna feud to get women’s wrestling back on GWF shows somehow drew half measures, with women’s matches getting back onto flagship GWF shows… but not on Three Count for some reason.
I wasn’t exactly crazy with how Three Count existed in a universe that vaguely related to the current storylines, as champions were only identified on commentary and through name plates, rather than holding titles. It’s a means to an end, but it really didn’t help the product in any sense of feeling “current.” I assume there’ll be a third season, much in the same vein as this, but I also fully believe that I’d have gotten much more out of Three Count had this not been my only consumption of their product.