This week’s episode of Shotgun concentrated on the fall-out from last weekend’s Superstars of Wrestling, and a look ahead to their next featured event in Hamburg!
As usual, the pre-show spoiler warning places this show after Superstars of Wrestling in wXw canon, and we open up in the wXw offices, where Christian Michael Jakobi is on the phone, bemoaning how he’s hated by the fans… and wrestlers despite “making them stars”. The seeds for him throwing it in?
A video package follows for the match between Da Mack and Francis Kaspin from Frankfurt a few weeks ago, ending with a to-camera promo from Mack on his way to the back, demanding another match against Bobby Gunns. That segues to a backstage segment with Thomas Giesen and Bobby Gunns, the latter of which isn’t so keen on that idea.
Next up is Sebastian Hollmichel with the new wXw Shotgun champion Angelico. He’s thrilled to have won the belt – after not even knowing who he was facing last week – before setting his sights on defending that belt against “any and all newcomers”. An interesting direction… and then we see that Angelico’s first defence will be in three weeks at the next wXw feature event, in Hamburg, against former champion David Starr.
A promo for the Shotgun to the Top (wXw’s Royal Rumble) follows, with the Avalanche being the posterboy.
Scotty Saxon & Veit Müller vs. “Bad Bones” John Klinger & Alpha Kevin
With Alan Counihan still laid up, wXw’s giving us this match from his favourite town on the wXw loop – Hoyerswerda – as two recently-formed teams faced off.
Klinger and Müller work over a headlock early, before Bones telegraphed a back body drop to Saxon and was kicked away. He got it at the second attempt, but Müller returns to land a snapmare, only to miss a resulting elbow drop as Klinger ended up taking the pair outside for a low-pe!
Back inside, Kevin comes in and celebrates landing a double-team hiptoss on Müller like an excited puppy, before he succeeds with some clotheslines to knock Veit into the corner. Some Dusty punches keep Kevin on top, as does a bad looking atomic drop. A back suplex followed for a near-fall, but he takes too long going for the Alpha Driver (package piledriver), and Müller fights free.
Veit rebounds with a belly-to-belly suplex as Kevin gets isolated away from Klinger, allowing Saxon and Müller to exchange a series of quick tags and power moves, including a pendulum backbreaker that got Saxon just a one-count from an arrogant cover. Kevin fires back with some chops, but quickly gets sandwiched by a pair of running uppercuts as Klinger was forced to run in to break up a pin from a gutwrench suplex.
Saxon decided to taunt Klinger by… crossing his arms at him as the veteran remained frustrated… and was knocked off the apron as Saxon press slammed Kevin across Müller’s knees for a unique take on a gutbuster. Veit rolled back over into a cover from there, but Klinger pulled him out of the ring to keep the match alive. More corner uppercuts follow as Kevin finally looked to end his role as a crash test dummy… only to miss a tag out to Klinger as Müller pulled him off the apron just in time.
Müller and Saxon continue to double-team Kevin as Klinger protested from the apron… and this time he was able to duck another double team uppercut sandwich and tag in Klinger! A missile dropkick puts Bones on top, as do a series of corner forearms, before he’s thrown onto the apron where he quickly returned with a slingshot spear to the pair of them. Superkicks follow, as does an Exploder, before Kevin was pulled outside as a double-team ushigoroshi and a clothesline looked like it’d have gotten the win… but the ref refused to count the pin as Klinger wasn’t the legal man!
Instead, Kevin returns to hit a Stunner, before a MX from Klinger allowed him to just drape Kevin on top of Veit for the pin. This was a really fun outing, with the Alpha Kevin isolation going on for perhaps a little too long, but I really enjoyed this! ***½
We immediately go to Kevin and John backstage, with Bad Bones telling Kevin that he’s been proven wrong. Klinger wishes Kevin the best for the future, and I’m guessing they’re fistbumping their separate ways.
Another promo package for the wXw show in Frankfurt follows, before we go to another backstage promo this time with Ilja Dragunov, who’s licking his wounds after losing the three-way at Superstars of Wrestling. As a result, he’s less than thrilled when Sebastian Hollmichel enthusiastically does Ilja’s catchphrase, silencing him before shaking his head. Just like I was! Ilja walks off, and that’s our lot!
We find out that Emil Sitoci’s win over Jurn Simmons at the last feature event in Frankfurt’s earned him a shot at Jurn’s Unified World Wrestling Championship… at the next feature event in Hamburg on June 2.
That news has Da Mack and Sebastian Hollmichel horrified, with Mack annoyed at him getting chances despite being a part timer in his eyes. Other companies do it… Emil walks in and backs up everything Mack said, saying that he “picks the nicest cherries to make a championship pie”. That’s quite the analogy. Sitoci threatens to make Mack his cleaner if he wins the title…
Next up are A4, with Marius al-Ani annoyed at Absolute Andy having a candy bar after they’d lost the tag titles. al-Ani suggests Andy have a shake… so he just puts the crushed up bar in a shaker. Hah! They argue over the other being upset, before Andy seemed to hint at being too trusting after they lost to the Young Lions – and the newcomers in RISE. Marius seems to think that they lost because they made a mistake, and they vow t put things right.
wXw World Tag Team Championship: Emil Sitoci & Marius van Beethoven vs. A4 (Absolute Andy & Marius al-Ani) (c)
We’re in Stuttgart for this one, with everyone in this match having since lost the gold they came in with. This was announced as being for the tag titles live, which forces Jeremy Graves on commentary to acknowledge the timelines that were going on. Yes, it does telegraph the result…
Andy and Emil start off with wristlocks, as they run down the fact that Marius has since gone from teaming with Sitoci to teaming with two other Dutchmen in the form of Dirty Dragan and Young Money Chong. Sitoci sends Andy flying with a back body drop, before bringing in van Beethoven to… get pancaked. Poor Marius gets flattened with a series of shoulder tackles, before he’s clotheslined all the way to the outside.
Sitoci returns, only to get dropped with an al-Ani suplex as A4 go to work on the then-Shotgun champion, with al-Ani and Andy working over Emil’s left arm. A diving dropkick from Andy keeps the pressure up, before Dirty Dragan and Young Money Chong come down to get involved, causing a distraction that allows Sitoci to throw al-Ani into the ring apron. Van Beethoven celebrates his friends’ dirty work, as referee Tassilo Jung focuses more on Andy being in the right corner, rather than the undesirables at ringside.
A gutbuster gets Sitoci on top, before he lands a split-legged moonsault for a near-fall on al-Ani. Marius fires back with an Exploder before bringing in Andy to clear house with chops to van Beethoven, who then takes a massive stalling suplex. Emil gets one too, before his attempt at a Headlock Driver is shoved away.
Marius van Beethoven tries to sneak in, but takes a spinebuster for his troubles, It’s all A4 from here as Sitoci takes the leapfrog seated senton on the ropes, before Sitoci makes the save as van Beethoven was about to take a double-team stunner. A4 really need to stop counting that move down!
A double-team electric chair splash nearly wins it for the challengers, as Sitoci then countered an F5 into a DDT. After trying to mock an Absolute Kneedrop, Sitoci finds himself on the receiving end of some Absolute strikes, then an al-Ani crossbody for a near-fall, before finally falling to an Absolute Kneedrop! Andy tunes up the band and followed up with a superkick, before Dirty Dragan shoved away an al-Ani frog splash attempt with the referee distracted.
Marius van Beethoven uses a belt shot on Andy for a near-fall, before the Dragan/Chong/van Beethoven trio tease a Rocket Launcher. The referee allows it, but Sitoci gets shoved into the trio before taking an F5, before Andy went after van Beethoven with a top rope ‘rana, as the double-team stunner secured the win for A4. Another fun tag team outing, as the run of A4 defences against makeshift teams continued! ***½
We segue from that into the RISE logo, and that’s your episode of Shotgun for the week – a fun episode with two really good tag team matches as wXw prepare to build to Hamburg and Shortcut to the Top!