Chikara's A Touch of Class, or Sugar Dunkerton Did Pants on the Ground

No Weekend Wrap-Up today. Why? Because I was there for most of the festivities that happened, and for what I wasn't present for, blog fan Tom Ford was. Part one of yesterday's festivities took place at The ECW Arena for Chikara's Season 9 premiere, A Touch of Class. AS you can see by the picture above, I got snapped with the 8-Bit Luchador himself, Player Uno of the Super Smash Bros. pre-show. Blog-reader and my Arena-buddy Sean McLaughlin got his picture taken too. Poor guy was trying to sell his masks. I don't think he sold out of them, but I would have bought one had I not been a little strapped.

After the jump... he show opened with Louden Noxious coming out and announcing his new, BDK-given name as Gavin Loudspeaker. He was all ready to announce the first match when a guy dressed in an all-white suit came out and snatched the mic. He didn't announce his name, but it was clear he was with the BDK as he announced Pinkie "Pink Ant" Sanchez's arrival in German. Green Ant came out shortly thereafter, and our opening match was underway. It was a tension-filled affair as it should have. The history between Sanchez and Green Ant started last year when Green Ant questioned the motives of Sanchez when he was masquerading as Carpenter Ant, a sleeper agent for the BDK inside the Colony. The crowd was solidly behind Green Ant, and Sanchez took every chance possible to mock and taunt the crowd. Match ended with Sanchez hitting Greenie with an Argentine rack into a sharp-angle powerbomb. I wouldn't quite call it a Burning Hammer, but it was similiar. BDK 1, Chikara 0.

Next match was a trios affair, the UnStable taking on a slightly modified Saturday Night Slam Masters, only instead of Player Dos, we got Sugar Dunkerton to go along with Uno and Create-a-Wrestler. The match began with Vin Gerard and CAW brawling to the back. Gerard came out triumphant after disposing of CAW. In the meantime, Dunkerton broke out the spot of the match, singing the "Pants on the Ground" song from American Idol and hitting a fist drop on one of the UnStable. That got the crowd going a lot. The tecnicos got into some trouble when sprinting out from the back was CAW again, in his Ultimo Breakfast get up. Yeah, Dasher Hatfield is my favorite persona, but any wrestler who has bacon on his ring attire can't be all that bad.

About mid-match, for no apparent reason, Breakfast rushed to the back from whence he came, and the tecnicos, outnumbered again, got themselves into a bit of trouble. At one point, Colin Delaney slinked on the canvas in gay viper mode a la Randy Orton. Delaney's schtick is the best. I may not be a fan of the other two guys in the stable, but Delaney's awesome enough for me to enjoy the UnStable every time. Just when the tecnicos looked like they were going to get creamed, out from the back came DASHER HATFIELD~!~!~! This got the second biggest pop of the day, and Dasher made good on those cheers, cleaning house. He ended up getting the duke for his team with a Grand Slam (top rope power slam) on Delaney.

Next up was the intergender tag team match, the one I was waiting for, the Osirian Portal taking on Team DeathHaze. It met my expectations, as the chicas held their own against the former Campeonatos. It was a crisp match, both teams with multiple spots to the outside, but the women won after Sara del Rey hit a sick piledriver on Ophidian into a German suplex by a not-as-used-up-looking Daizee Haze for the pin. BDK 2, Chikara 0.

Last match before intermission featured Hallowicked, accompanied to the ring by WON Rookie of the Year Frightmare, taking on Brodie Lee. Lee came out first like he was pissed off at the world, chasing off Loud... err Gavin Loudspeaker and Bryce (~!~!~!) and just acting onery towards anyone who looked at him. 'Wicked came out next and we got started. It was a pretty amusing affair. Lee played the bully role, 'Wicked teased GOOOO 2 SLEEPY HOLLOOOOOOW on the outside. Match ended with Lee trying to pull Frightmare into the ring. Hallowicked had none of that and intercepted Lee with a Rydeen bomb (think D'Lo's Sky High) for the win.

INTERMISSION TIME~! We walked back to the merch table. Player Uno was still hawking his masks. Delaney had a display of his WWE features at one of the tables. The Osirian Portal, now tecnico and fan-friendly, were taking pictures with the kids instead of Ophidian hissing at them, and I got a picture with Bryce Remsburg. See?



Back to the action, and it's our second trios match of the afternoon, the Order of the Neo-Solar Temple taking on the ROH young'uns, Andy "Right Leg" Ridge, Pelle Primeau and the newly disenfranchised Grizzly Redwood. Redwood got a really good reaction, but he got squishified for his troubles by the beefy Crossbones at one point during the match. The tecnico newbs held their own, but was there any doubt as to who was going over here? Delirious went for the Praying Mantis Bomb (think Tiger Driver '98, i.e. double underhook piledriver with head impact), but UltraMantis Black ordered him to stand down and let the leader of the Temple get the pin.

The Young Lions Cup match was up next, with Player Dos taking on Tim Donst. Another heated BDK/Chikara tilt, Donst got the most heat not for his traitorous ways but because he had swamp ass. Yep, he had a wet streak going up his butt-crack, which elicited a chant of "Skid mark! Skid mark!" from the Arena faithful. Dos thought he had the match won with the Chikara Special, but Donst grabbed the ropes and then locked a little later, locked in the twisted BDK variant of the move, the Inverted Chikara Special, for the tap out win. Swamp-Ass Donst is your new YLC Champion, and thanks to a decree from new Director of Fun Dieter von Stiegerwalt, Dos won't be able to get a rematch, and neither will any former holder of the Cup. Bummer. BDK 3, Chikara 0

Finally, we got to the first of two main events, the match of the afternoon, in my opinion. This one was the atomico between the BDK team of Tursas, Claudio Castagnoli, Ares and ??? and the team of Mike Quackenbush and The Future Is Now, featuring Jigsaw, Lince Dorado and Equinox... well at least that's what everyone thought. TFIN rushed the ring after the BDK was introduced. Equinox hopped up on the ring steps and Lince gave him the old heel hook, causing Jimmy Olsen to fall flat on his face. Yep, ??? was Lince Dorado. Blog-fan KoppoKick was right all along, and it made sense. The Arena fans already hated him, and Jigsaw in essence stole his stable away from him (as he reminded us during the match through one of his many taunts). As you could imagine, the 4 on 3 (which was more 5 on 3 because Tursas was like two Chikara wrestlers rolled up into one) was an exhibition in carnage. Tursas fit in well with the fed, as he worked crisply and didn't slug around. The ongoing theme of the match was the tecnicos trying to take the big Viking down by striking his chest and him no-selling it and just unleashing.

All seemed lost for the tecnicos until Claudio mockingly delivered two Backfists to the Future to Jigsaw, a taunt to his defeated rival Eddie Kingston. Well, the Last of a Dying Breed was in the house and he didn't take too kindly to it. He rushed out and joined the match as the fourth member of the Quack-led team. This brought the house down. Kingston may be the most over guy at The Arena, and people want to cheer him in Chikara like they do in ROH. Now they have their chance. The BDK still pretty much controlled the match until the end, when the tecnicos landed four planchas to the outside to the four members of the invaders. It looked like Kingston would get the duke over Ares until Claudio delivered a low-blow and a schoolboy for the win. Afterwards, the three other members held Kingston up and Claudio demanded that Kingston say he respected CC. Kingston refused and they beat him down some more. If you're counting at home, the final tally in the first battle of this war reads BDK 4, Chikara 0. A complete white-wash for the Brotherhood of the Cross.

Finally, the Campeonatos de Parejas match between the Colony and Team FIST. I have to say, I was a bit disappointed by this match. Both teams looked kind of sloppy in there, and there were a few Botchamania moments, the most egregious being Soldier Ant attempting a reverse rana and ending up piledriving himself onto the canvas. Eek. Still, it wasn't terrible, and both teams tried their best not to let the previous events overshadow it. FIST won the first fall after Akuma drilled Fire Ant with a Rubik's Cube, which is a sharp piledriver out of the electric chair position. The Colony scored the next two falls, with Soldier Ant tapping Icarus in the Chikara Special and then Fire Ant reversing a Rubik's Cube from Akuma into a roll-up pin. The Colony retained and the crowd went home happy.

All in all, it was a very strong open to Chikara's 9th season. The war between the BDK and Chikara was set-up quite nicely, and the BDK was put over strong like they needed to be. The wrestling action as well as the interaction with the personalities of Chikara showed why this is the best ticket available for family wrestling fun. I'm amped so much for King of Trios now.

I'll be back with my Rumble reaction a bit later!