We’ve got a monster of a Shotgun as wXw wound down ahead of their big event in Hamburg this weekend.
We open with Alpha Kevin flexing in the back, but he’s interrupted by Bad Bones… and before too long they’re all jumped by RISE – Chris Colen, Ivan Kiev, Lucky Kid, Pete Bouncer and Tarkan Aslan – who make light work of this beat down as Colen declared that wXw will fall “like the house of cards it is”.
Next up is the Avalanche video package we had a few weeks back detailing his rise, his injury and his return. That segued into a music video of the Avalanche/Nero/Dragunov three-way from Superstars of Wrestling, and then we get Julian Nero and his magic laptop. Apparently he’s got a meeting with Melanie Gray, who’s concerned about her relationship. Is this wXw or Jerry Springer?! Johnny Evers wants in too to go over his dance moves, which quite rightly has Julian putting his head in his hands, before Nero’s got a review of Superstars of Wrestling. It seems Nero’s taking the credit for Avalanche and Dragunov for going places, but his off-screen assistant makes a mistake by asking Nero why he’s not applied it to himself… so he’s fired!
Jaxon Stone vs. Julian Nero
We’re in Stuttgart here as Julian Nero’s taking on a man who did the unthinkable… and made Buff Bagwell bleed from a chinlock!
Nero started off well, before Stone shoved him into the ropes for just a one-count, but Jaxon’s offence only ends up irking Nero, who replied to a slap by laying into him with forearms. Some knees get a near-fall, before Nero runs into an impressive fallaway slam as Stone tried to get back into things.
Stone locks in the chin lock of doom, which this time doesn’t draw blood, before landing an over-the-knee brainbuster for a near-fall. More shots from Stone eventually prompt a Nero fightback, with a diving knee setting up for the Wasteland and a top rope kneedrop for the win. A perfectly fine match – Stone showed a lot more than he ever could have done against Bagwell, but he’s still got a long way to go. **¾
Next up is Thomas Giesen with Angelico, who builds up his Shotgun title defence against David Starr this weekend.
A video package for RISE follows, fronted by Chris Colen unhappy at how his time in wXw was reduced to him “teaming with Francis Kaspin against has beens”. Savage!
Christian Michael Jakobi is up next with Sebastian Hollmichel, and Jakobi’s still clearly troubled by something, but it’s not RISE. Surprisingly, Jakobi’s really happy to have a group like RISE come in and threaten to knock down wXw… but he’s not so thrilled at how easily A4 lost the titles. Is Jakobi behind RISE? All we need now is him in a chair with the RISE logo painted on the back in Tippex…
Another video package for Superstars of Wrestling follows, which takes us into a package ahead of the Loser Leaves Town match pitting Da Mack against Bobby Gunns this weekend, detailing Mack losing his Shotgun title to Pete Dunne last year, and how he’s never been able to shake Gunns since then. Originally this was billed as “loser never wrestles in Hamburg again”, but it seems this may well be a “loser leaves wXw” outing… we’ll see!
Marius van Beethoven vs. Laurance Roman vs. Da Mack vs. Kim Ray
We’re going back almost two months to Chemnitz for this four-way, and it starts with Marius running his mouth and getting slapped for it. After van Beethoven’s sent to the outside, the three good guys have a go amongst themselves, eventually settling down to Kim Ray dropkicking Marius back off the apron.
Roman takes advantage of a distracted Ray by elbowing him, and this quickly turns into one of those four-ways where it’s too much to call… apart from the parts where everyone took their shots at van Beethoven for comic relief. Laurance broke up a pin on Marius by Da Mack, because this isn’t an elimination match, and that earned him a Slingblade as Mack went to town with double handed chops.
Mack keeps up with a flying forearm off the top rope to Roman, but that’s the cue for Kin Ray to return… and take a Stunner as we had a parade of finishers of sorts. Marius gets a near-fall out of a Famouser, then gets caught on the top rope as we built to a Tower of Doom superplex to Marius! We get forearms between Mack and Roman, before those two collide with cross bodies at the same time, which left them down and out as Kim Ray finished off Marius with an enziguiri. It wasn’t bad, and having others in there meant that we didn’t quite have as much Kim Ray Kicks as usual! **½
We’re up next with Dirty Dragan, Marius van Beethoven and Young Money Chong – who’s wearing a tuxedo t-shirt and a gaudy chain. Chong’s going to turn the trio into body guys, but first he’s got to collect a debt from Francis Kaspin… who just happens to be in the room taking a nap. Dragan picks the wallet from Kaspin’s bag, just as Chong screams to wake him up… and that’s their cardio for the day! They look to beat up Kaspin, and we fade to black!
After an advert for Shortcut to the Top, we return to see Francis Kaspin standing over the laid out bodies of Chong, Dragan and van Beethoven.
Next: Absolute Andy bumps into Chris Colen, who’s angered at how wXw were apparently reneging on promises by not getting a variety of opponents. Colen tells Andy that he’s taken matters into his own hands, and Andy tries to stand up to him… only for our second RISE beatdown of the show that sees the Young Lions take out Andy’s knees with a chair.
We’re back with Hollmichel and Jakobi, and this time they address Karsten Beck. Jakobi seems to think that Beck’s had a setback, which surprises Hollmichel who was looking for a response to what was said last week. Instead, he’s distracted as Jakobi talks up the card in Hamburg, before Hollmichel reveals that Beck will reveal his comeback date this weekend!
I only just noticed, but those “match graphics” really make Karsten look a lot like the XWA/Pro Wrestling EVE’s Dann Read…
Elsewhere on the Hamburg show, we’ve got the loser leaves town match between Da Mack and Bobby Gunns, Pete Bouncer vs. Kim Ray, Francis Kaspin vs. Chris Colen, Ivan Kiev vs. WALTER, Bad Bones and Alpha Kevin challenging for the Young Lions’ wXw world tag team titles, David Starr challenging Angelico for the wXw Shotgun title, and Emil Sitoci against Jurn Simmons for the wXw Unified World championship.
That leads into a video building up Emil Sitoci with some wacky music that suits his sleazy persona.
RISE (Chris Colen & Young Lions (Lucky Kid & Tarkan Aslan) vs. A4 (Marius al-Ani & Absolute Andy) & Francis Kaspin
We’re in Bielefeld – apparently the German Tipton – for this week’s main event, and we start with an all-out war as everyone pairs off, before things settle down as Colen gets isolated by the good guys.
Absolute Andy takes Colen into the corner for some shots, before Marius al-Ani came in to land a leg lariat, before the Young Lions hit the ring to cut-off the leaping sit-down splash on Colen. There’s barely time for anything here to breathe, but what is notable is that whenever RISE tried to double-team, they were easily swept aside!
Lucky Kid comes in chokes away on Kaspin as the referee’s distracted, and those distractions allow Colen to come in and just throw Kaspin down with a slam… but he doesn’t make the cover as RISE continue the beat-down, with Tarkan Aslan viciously coming in with a clothesline for a near-fall. Kaspin finally gets a ray of hope with a crossbody, before bringing in Absolute Andy to clean house with chops to Lucky Kid and Chris Colen!
Colen escaped a suplex but couldn’t avoid a back body drop as Andy hit that suplex anyway on the Kid, who perhaps wasn’t as lucky as his name would have you believe! Marius comes in and tries to flip into a sunset flip as he and Colen went back and forth, ending with an Exploder to Colen.
Marius’ path of destruction ends when his double DDT is blocked by the Lions, who targeted the still-legal Andy… but he managed to elbow free and tag Kaspin back in. That quickly led to Kaspin getting caught with an enziguiri/Flatliner combo by the Lions though, as they circled their prey for the Circle of Life (German suplex/Shotei combo).
Absolute Andy returns to try and finish things with an F5, but plans changed as the Lions clipped Andy’s knee. Referee Tassilo Jung rolls checks on Andy on the outside, which meant that he missed some more double-teaming from the Young Lions on Kaspin, before a sit-out double underhook facebuster gets Colen the win over Kaspin. I’m quickly falling in love with this RISE faction – at least with their performance here, as they displayed a lot of viciousness that you’d expect from an invading group. None of this “we’re here to take over, here, let me grab you in a chinlock” malarkey – all hard-hitting, urgent offence that is a breath of fresh air! ***½
The show ends with the RISE logo, and that’s it for another week – next stop for wXw is Hamburg later today, and a show that’ll have plenty of repercussions!