Poor Jakob: Chikara Under the Hood Review

ACH even looks good in mark photographs next to overweight wrestling bloggers!
Photo Credit: Joey O.

In the TWB format!

Highlights:

• 3.0 earned their third point towards Campeonatos de Parejas contention with the wheelbarrow lungblower on Gargano.
• Icarus scored a cheap win using Sugar Dunkerton as a human projectile against Dasher Hatfield.
• In a match that featured more dysfunction per square inch than your average Daniel Bryan/Kane tag, the Jigsaw-led rudo team defeated the Mike Quackenbush-led atomico squad as deviANT scored the pin over his former Swarm comrade assailANT.
• Mark Angelosetti retained his Young Lions Cup over ACH using a questionable pin counter near the ropes.
• Veronica Ticklefeather won Homecoming Queen, but it was the Mysterious and Handsome Stranger who won King. He unmasked as Archibald Peck and gave Ms. Ticklefeather a slopping for her troubles.
• The Devastation Corporation also earned a third point towards CdP contention by demolishing Los Ice Creams.
• In a hectic and sometimes sloppy match, the Spectral Envoy (f/ Crossbones and Blind Rage) defeated Delirious' army when UltraMantis Black pinned Delirious with the Cosmic Doom.
• The Young Bucks retained the CdP with More Bang for Your Buck on the 1-2-3 Kid
• Eddie Kingston retained his Grand Championship as Tim Donst's irreparable rift with Jakob Hammermeier cost him his chance to win the title.

General Observations:

• Before the show, I actually got a business card from Condor Security. LOOK:
  
• Johnny Gargano was snacking on some Dots candy before the match, which got more than a few chants during the opening match.
• "YOU! YOU'RE THE JERK FROM CLEVELAND!" -- Shane "Big Magic" Matthews, always an entertaining quipper.
• "AH SHUT UP, WE'RE TRYING TO WORK HERE!" -- Chuck Taylor, also fast with a line.
• Taylor bit Matthews' hand during a rest hold, and it drew a "YOU HAVE RABIES!" chant from the crowd.
• I will never not cringe whenever Gargano breaks out the Lawn Dart. He did so in this match on Scott Parker.
• 3.0 is known for comedy, but they have some of the best double team offense, which they used pretty well to finish off Gargano.
• Dasher Hatfield wasted NO time getting to Icarus, who came out with a fanny pack.
• I know Hatfield and Icarus are more known for their character chops and showmanship, but both guys really threw down technically during this match. Hell, Hatfield has probably had the sneakiest great year in the ring in '12.
• I missed nearly EVERYTHING that happened on the outside of the ring because of where I was situated in the Troc. It really isn't a good venue for watching live wrestling.
• Poor Daniel Yost caught powder in the eyes!
• Sugar Dunkerton, in what was the theme of the night, rebelled against his Chikarametric-mandated affiliation, putting Hatfield's foot on the ropes during a pin and then trying to stop Icarus from rampantly cheating. Too bad he got thrown into his former partner for his troubles.
• Jigsaw and Mike Quackenbush had a staredown before the match, as expected.
• I was actually surprised at how hard Jig went into going rudo. I was impressed.
• Soldier Ant playing saboteur wasn't surprising. assailANT going whole hog into being a part of his team? That was.
• Seriously, assailANT's enthusiasm on the apron may have been my favorite part of my favorite match of the evening.
• ACH in person is just as awesome as I thought he'd be.
• "This isn't football, this is a man's sport!" -- ACH, proving he can talk poop just like the rest of them.
• Touchdown got ACH wrangled up and then "put glasses on him" with his hands before going back in a sleeper. Maybe Icarus isn't the best heel in Chikara...
• Just when you think you've seen it all from a wrestler, ACH had to go and give a perched-on-the-top Touchdown a Guile-style somersault kick flush to the dome. So gosh darn good.
• To quote Alex Torres on Twitter: "Oh man that's the worst ending to a wonderful match in recent memory," in regards to Touchdown/ACH finish.
• Ms. Ticklefeather probably had the slop coming to her, but that's probably all she really needs to have done to her. Remember, Touchdown's the one who killed Sapphire and stole Veronica in the first place.
• Sidney Bakabella brought us back from intermission demanding money from Herb Abrams and discussing the points system with Toots Mondt. Sidney Bakabella is also one of the greatest things going in pro wrestling nowadays.
• There was a third member of DevCorp who came out during their entrance, but went back to the back before the match began.
• There was a coterie of fans to the left of the ramp facing the stage wearing Amasis matches, and they were jabbing with Ophidian during the ten-man.
• Oh, and from that coterie? Amasis was really in there. Ophidian reacted as if he saw a ghost.
• The ten-man match was fun, but it was sloppy and hard to follow. I did enjoy the tete-a-tete between Mantis and Delirious at the end.
• Marty Jannetty looked like he was just woken up from a dirtnap. He kinda moved like it too.
• I did chuckle when Jannetty during his beginning-match stallfest checked Bryce Remsburg for foreign objects.
• Kid was steady taking bumps all night. He took the first fall on a spike tombstone that always looks like it hurts.
• For the second fall, Kid dealt right back with maybe the stiffest X-Factor I've ever seen. Seriously, it looked more like a deconstructed piledriver.
• Jannetty looked like he didn't even know where he was trying to make that hot tag near the end of the match. Man, I know the crowd loved him, but he's gotta hang it up.
• Conversely, Kid kept taking huge bump (crotch first into the ring post) after huge bump (SICK spike DDT on the apron), redeeming himself for his somewhat lackluster King of Trios appearance this year.
• I will never not mark out for the Space Flying Tiger Back Rake by Matt Jackson.
• Eddie Kingston was not having any kind of delay before getting his hands on Tim Donst. I loved that he was trying to hurry Gavin Loudspeaker through the intros.
• A good portion of the beginning of this match was around the outside of the ring, so I didn't get a really good look at it.
• Kingston went crotch first into the corner, and Donst went right up leaning his back up against Kingston's. Little things like that make Donst so good. Of course, the German suplex he followed up with wasn't bad either.
• Kingston came off the top rope with a flying bulldog, which was the most air I've seen him get all year.
• I really dug how Hammermeier really didn't succeed with his interference but really ended up giving Donst the upper hand anyway because it caused momentary hesitations in Kingston's movements to leave an opening. That's the kind of thing a great manager does even if he's totally hapless.
• "You made me hate wrestling." -- Donst. There really was an evolutionary Raven/Tommy Dreamer vibe to this match.
• Donst talked some major poop trying to get Kingston to lose his cool, and it pretty much worked. It was great psych.
• Donst went into beast mode giving Kingston a belly-to-belly suplex OVER the top rope onto the ramp. So awesome.
• Donst pulled Remsburg into the path of an oncoming Kingston lariat. Oof!
• Poor Jakob helped Donst at every turn, and he got crapped on at the end of the match by Donst.
• Donst's abuse of Hammermeier directly cost him the match. I know people were disappointed that Donst didn't win, but his chase of the title wasn't the story from where I sat... it was his relationship with Hammermeier.
• After the match, Kingston had Hammermeier ready for execution, but he was spared.

Match of the Night: Jigsaw, deviANT, Soldier Ant, and The Shard vs. Mike Quackenbush, Fire Ant, Green Ant, and assailANT - If you wanted to give someone a textbook example of storytelling in a professional wrestling match, you should show them this atomico. The Gekido storyline didn't seem to have the kind of juice that people thought it should have early in the season, but here, we saw what it was all about. It was about Jigsaw showing his true colors, not as an uncaring butthole, but as a guy obsessed with winning. He was ruthless, cold... a killer. He was even trolling towards Quack, teasing going for castigo de excesivo with brainbusters on Fire Ant, a callback to Indianapolis when Quack's rage made him do all four Quackendrivers on 17.

It was about Soldier Ant playing the good soldier, pun intended. It was about him standing with his former stablemates for the first time since they were involuntarily split by Wink Vavasseur, actively sabotaging his own team, getting thrown around by Jigsaw when they got too obvious. It was about assailANT playing the polar opposite, accepting his new role, whether through genuine feeling or Stockholm Syndrome, cheering his teammates on from the apron and taking a superkick for Quack. It was about dragging humanity out of Quack himself, holding up from delivering a shotei to Jigsaw at first, thinking there was some good still left in him.

But most of all, it was about everything coming together, all eight men weaving their reeds to create one piece of violent art. This match, like many atomicos that came before it, was the epitome of Chikara's mastery at storytelling.

Overall Thoughts: First off, after seeing two shows there, I am not a fan of the Troc as a wrestling venue. I don't know how it comes off on iPPV, but as a live venue, the sightlines are bad, the lack of seats on the lower level are inconvenient, and the seats in the balcony aren't even as comfortable as steel chairs. I appreciate Chikara trying to run Philly in an easy-to-get-to arena, but maybe they need to start considering the Armory on Roosevelt Blvd. in the far Northeast or even this Roller Derby arena they're doing the Pro Wrestling Day event at in February. The Troc isn't doing it for me.

However, that didn't take too much away from the actual show for me. There were at least four really good matches and two others that were at least good as popcorn spot fests. I don't want to hate on the ten-man match too much, but I thought it was clearly the low point of the show, which is a shame. Still, it was definitely a show that showed off a lot of the strengths that the company offers in the ring.

In terms of story, it was, as I expected, not too heavy on the resolution. I doubt any story concluded here, but that's to be expected as Chikara seems to run in two year cycles for their big angles. I'm glad to see that Archibald Peck is back out the mask, although the way he was handled by Condor Security doesn't leave me warm and fuzzy. I'm most excited about seeing where this House Divided/Gekido is going. The motif for the 2013 shows seem to be trending towards Watchmen, but I feel like we're headed more towards Civil War, and that excites me.