My experience at a wrestling show last night:
When we arrived at the vaunted Waynesboro High School gym, I was amazed to find that the line for the event wrapped around the whole friggin' block. A card headlined by Kid Kash vs. Jerry Lynn? One boasting of a generic "Monster Truck" and someone in a Spongebob Squarepants costume as being the big draws? How the hell did this thing get so many people?
It was an act of sheer optimism to think we could still get tickets. But we tried. And we succeeded! I met a guy from Detroit in the line and we ended up buying some ringside seats from a scalper.
This Detroit guy was without a doubt THE BIGGEST JEFF FARMER MARK IN ALL OF HISTORY. In fact, he may be THE ONLY JEFF FARMER MARK IN ALL OF HISTORY. He drove 12 hours just to see nWo Sting.
The website had advertised appearances by Scooby Doo (no-showed!), Spongebob Squarepants (played by a kid in the worst costume and with the most apathetic attitude toward being a cartoon character you'll ever see) and a generic "monster truck" (which turned out to be a regular everyday truck with really big tires, or so a monster truck afficionado in the line pointed out). The site didn't, however, warn us that there would be a two-headed Cat In The Hat greeting kids. One human head, one cat head. That just freaks me out. If you were a kid, would you want to see that the Cat In The Hat is 7 feet tall and has a human face growing out of his trachea? I'm positive that none of those children stopped screaming in their dreams all night.
On the way in, I got a Jimmy Valiant autograph for Beren from Web Surf Nicaragua. I also got Jerry Lynn to autograph "DIE" on a photo. He was quite amused at my request. I had to tell him that him writing "DIE" on Steve Corino's chest in his own blood was my favorite Jerry Lynn moment. Lynn seemed like a really nice guy.
The show opened up with a few words from the organizers of the event. Then we were reminded that we were in rural Virginia when they brought out a local preacher to say a few words about how God was in the wrestling business because he wrestled for Abraham's spirit against Cthulu or something. There was also a ten-bell salute for Crash Holly, Stu Hart, Road Warrior Hawk and one of the event's organizers who had all passed away in the previous four weeks. Sheesh!
The event started off with a triple threat match. The contestants were 1) "Flawless" Brandon Day, who did a "dark side" type of gimmick 2) local boy "The Modern Rebel" Jason James (for a modern rebel, he had a very 80s haircut and Rock N Roll Express tights) and 3) some other "dark side" guy whose name I didn't catch but he had a mullet, a fat valet and used Gangrel's old WWF theme music.
You'd figure the two evil dudes would gang up on the local pretty boy, but it was a free-for-all. Mullet Vampire didn't last very long, leaving James to eventually get the win over Brandon Day. (By the way, what the hell kind of name for an evil master of darkness is "Brandon?")
A team called Body Count was up next. They fought a team that I think was comprised of Sean Christian and Scotty Rocker. Rocker & Christian were tag team champions of some sort and the titles were on the line (allow me to mention that it was really hard to make out anything said over the house mic so I couldn't quite get everyone's names and all the details).
The match seemed to be going at half-speed a lot of the time but they kept the fans into it. Body Count had a female valet in a skin-tight skimpy suit. Sound alluring? This skin-tight suit would've been baggy on most grizzly bears. With 80s hair to boot. I tried to get Meli to start a
"Show your tits!" chant to no avail.
The long-haired guy from Body Count was quite amusing. Good use of facial expressions and wackiness. He didn't detract from the action, but if you watched him he did a lot of little goofy things that totally established his character without having to say a word. Very nice. Body Count ended up winning the tag belts.
Did I mention that the tag title belts didn't match each other? They didn't.
Demolition Axe ran to the ring to inform the ref that they had cheated to win the titles. They put the beatdown on Axe until nWo Sting showed up to make the save. Sting was scheduled to be Axe's opponent that night, but instead proposed that they team up to take on Body Count for their titles later on. And so mote it be.
The special LEGENDS MATCH was up next. Jimmy "Boogie Woogie Man" Valiant took on The Assassin. Now, Valiant has got to be pushing 70. I mean that both in age and in weight. He looked rail-thin. His ability in the ring was extremely limited as well, but nobody watches Jimmy Valiant in 2003 and expects to see Kenta Kobashi. As for his opponent, the website listed it as The Masked Superstar. He was announed as The Masked Superstar #2. The program called him The Assassin. I'm admittedly unfamiliar with any of those guys outside of knowing that Bill Eadie played the original. So it could've been Louie Anderson under all that garb for all I know.
Anyway, the match was very old school basic heel vs. face wrestling pyschology from two guys who are in way worse physical condition than I am. And that's saying something. They still got the crowd going, as every match tonight did. This was a hotter crowd than most I've seen for WWE in a good while.
Abyss was up next against Hunter Guerrero. Guerrero came out to Eddie Guerrero's "Latino Heat" theme. He had a very WWE look and style. I could see him being brought in as a cousin of Eddie and Chavo at some point. He basically played David against Abyss' Goliath, only Goliath crushed the hell out of him in the end. Like it should be, dammit.
Body Count came back out and defended their new tag titles against nWo Sting and Demoltion Axe. Nice basic match, nothing too fancy. Sting got DQ'd for using a kendo stick against Body Count. Body Count turned on their valet after the match and gave her a Death Valley driver-into-a-powerbomb type of double team move.
After a brief intermission, Slash faced Delirious. Slash played the classic heel to the hilt, including a lot of decent mic work. (Well, he's no Arn Anderson, but I didn't even know the guy could do a promo.) Delirious was cool as hell. He has a visually different style that would be squashed in two seconds by WWE. He was using super-quick transitions and counters against Slash, who sold it with a "WTF??" look. Later he started doing that again, backed away from Slash and started running a really fast series of counter holds against empty air. He'd also pick imaginary bugs off the ref and bark at the crowd kind with a grunt similar to Mr. Peepers' from SNL.
A lot of cool spots in this one that eventually saw Slash take home the victory.
Trinity vs. Daizee Haze was passable, mostly carried by Trinity. Haze got the victory in the eye candy match of the night.
The main event of Jerry Lynn vs. Kid Kash was everything you'd expect from these two. Lots of highspots, nicer psychology than I would've expected and even a guest referee in the form of Scott from "Tough Enough 3." Lots of near falls culminated into a no-contest when Abyss ran out and attacked both men. That led to the schmozz with Mullet Vampire and others interfering until Lynn and Kash cleared house.
This was the first wrestling show I've been to in over three years and I think it's my first actual indy show. Let me tell you, after several years of talking to smarks about wrestling all the time it was quite refreshing to be awash in a sea of marks. Nobody complained about workrate, movesets, storylines or character development. They were into it on a much more pure level and I'm a little envious. And there was nobody named McMahon to be found, so you can't ask for much more than that.
