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| SATURDAY SATURDAY SATURDAY all photos courtesy of WWE.com |
WWE's multiverse is crossing all the streams this autumn, and it's caused legit chaos off-screen to match the spandexified chaos on screen. Dream matches show up unadvertised, moved around, great on Wednesdays and above average on Fridays and Mondays...well, we don't like to talk about Mondays here. Angries up the blood.
The fact remains that on the penultimate show before the third TO: WG every cliche about chaos got filled, sometimes with blood on multiple occasions. Couple that with Papa Haitch's open invite to the entire "main roster" to come get some on tonight's show, and the only thing to know to expect is a ladder match with Cole/Dijakovic and the WarGames advantage on the line; even that, as with the rest of life, the card is subject to change.
Fortunately for NXT, their roster is as stacked as Victoria Lomba and grabbing...well, maybe not as many eyeballs, but plenty and for all the right reasons. And when it comes to staplegunning together some more wrestling nerd fantasies in light of the legitimate (?) injuries to Johnny Gargano, KUSHIDA, and the VELVETEENEST of DREAMS, one of the undercard matches on this weekend's show is plenty sexy in its own right...
GOLD: Finn/Riddle at Takeover
TAFKA Prince. Tsk, tsk, tsk. So many flavors to pick from and you choose to be salty. So disillusioned he might as well as come out to "Serve the Servants", he slammed NXT as a place he used to be proud of but got overtaken by little boys when he left and dissed Gargano for being the alleged heart of the brand. He mocked him for crying on social media -- news flash, it's 2019, and it's all we have left -- but when he started running his mouth about Matt thee Stallion, Riddle was right there to shut his mouth and fight him in the middle of the ring, recovering where Gargano hasn't and making Regal make the match for this weekend. As with most of the gold NXT's spun this summer and fall into the winter, it didn't seem like the thing to do until it was done, at which point you might as well clap your forehead and go duh doy, of course you run Riddle/Finn. What's the floor on a match with these guys, 8 out of 10? 4 stars? Appointment TV? If that's the floor, the ceiling is where certain Lords of a Stately Manor stack up clone corpses. This has the potential to go right behind such instant classics as Zayn/Nakamura as best Takeover titleless matches, and it wasn't even a blip on the radar a month ago.
With Master Regal granting Riddle's revenge, it turfed him off of Team Ciampa. Like NXT in general and the leader in specific, they'd bounce back with the emergence of their newest member...
GOLD: the latest iteration of Team Ciampa
Out came the Era to go after Riddle, but since the Champ took a few beats to start dancing at the 10, Tommy Champs and Keith Lee came out to metaphorically tackle him at the 4. Slightly surprisingly, Lee handled the babyface mic work and didn't give a rat's ass about the Era's claims to multiple show supremacy and dared Cole to stand up to him. Cole didn't, but Roddy did, and since the Limitless One wasn't picky that non-title bout bridged the hours.
Since the match was born in chaos, it ended that way as well. Not only that, but the triple threat Roddy barely survived by pinning Keith after Dijakovic had been removed from the picture came to bear as well. As you might expect, scavenging on the margins in a triple threat was far more palatable to the North American champion than trying to fight one of my old stunt doubles head-on. The Era came out to try to save the day for Strong, only to be usurped by a returning Ciampa and Riddle, who himself got into a brouhaha he was on the losing end of with Balor. It seemed to open the door for Roddy to slip in another W, but Lee bounced back and gave the champ Fallout to get the duke and maybe get another North American title opportunity down the line without his spiritual cousin also scoffing at the laws of gravity and trying to procure it in his own right.
To the surprise of no one, the Era was severely displeased by this turn of events. But the Full Sailors called it in advance and were proven right when Dijakovic came out and started put Undisputed meesters on Era-sized keesters. Lee recovered from the attack just in time to see D2 reiterate the case he'd made online since the triple threat to the Blackheart himself, who took the big man's hand in stride. Lee took a couple of beats to offer his longtime rival the Hand of Friendship, but once it was reciprocated Ciampa was psyched and who could blame him? If your backup was Godzilla and King Kong and you saw anything short of the 102nd Airborne coming, what couldn't you destroy? If this uneasy truce can hold and somehow isn't the prelude to either Lee or Dijakovic pulling a late-period Hennig on the other two...well, three, going to war with the uncrowned NXT champion and the Workrate Twin Towers is a fine slot for a fourth member to get in on the fun, no matter their standing...
GOLD: SWERVE~!
Just throwing that out there.
WHAT?!
He lost to Roddy, he's been doing well since (except for the previous week's loss to...you guessed it, Dominik Dijakovic) and once again found himself going to the pay window in a win against Bronson Reed that could use a rematch and/or them becoming a wacky partner tag team. You want to see Bronson Reed dance to Ain't Nobody. You do. And if Keith and D2 can find their way and fight on the side of the angels, who's to say history can't repeat itself further down the card? The two segment match was honestly most notable for their pre and post-match respect, as well as Bronson getting more than his fair share of chants against another fan favorite via the Breakout tourney.
GOLD/PURPLE: the Cruiserweight Title tilt
Sure, that's Mrs. Lio Rush. But he's Angel Garza. If I was that handsome, some other dude's marriage wouldn't mean squat to me, either. I mean, I'm almost that good looking, but that is a completely irrelevant if factual point.
If you thought the show's opening fight for the Cruiserweight Championship was going to clear up any alignment questions, you'll probably blow the dust off the dreidel before you get things sorted in anything resembling normalcy. For instance, Angel high fived several male fans...but he also did the above after whipping off his pants, which sends a ravishing but rude message on its own. Lio Rush was ostensibly the wronged family man babyface '19 and even kicked out of an avalanche moonsault fallaway slam -- an actual move, I don't smell toast and my health's kosher, those words in that order are intentional -- but he didn't really retaliate in a manner of the deeply offended besides putting a couple extra MPH on his subsequent tope. What Garza is probably going to consider retaliation is the fact that during the pinfall after the second Rush Hour his foot was on the ropes before 3, but not during 3 thanks to Rush pulling it off, then having his foot back on the ropes when Rush laughed and walked out still with the big purp across his shoulders. Several Full Sailors live and Nigel McGuiness noted the same on commentary, only to have the matches replay magically cut off the moment of discussion. (You may remember this trick from NXT's own arsenal earlier this year, wherein to get the last two seconds of Takeover: Phoenix to fully further the Johnny Brasco storyline you had to watch the whole show on WWEN since they magically didn't appear on any social media platform.) Either way, we will presumably get to a rematch for Garza with the belt on the line, another two or three segment baller-ass match, we might even get an idea of who to cheer and boo full, and...hell, who can focus when Angel Garza IS THAT ATTRACTIVE?
John Legend my ass.
BLACK: noses
Like the real world, the wrestling world has its own sick ironies. Take for instance, the fact that Tegan Nox, Rhea Ripley, the Horsewomen Underlings, and Candice LeRae were playing laid out during the show.
Two women got the business end of the audit during the show.
First was Aliyah, who made the mistake of fighting Xia Li again and got r e k t 2 : the rektoning, as Li once again proved too dashing for the Canadian. In all seriousness, fake fighting somebody that well versed in the martial arts sounds about as fun as doing so for real.
Then came the main event, a ladder match between Choke Me the Fuck Out, Io Shirai and Mia Yim with the winner gaining the advantage for their team in their WarGames match. The babyfaces are to these kind of matches what the Washington Generals are to the game of basketball, except with possibly an even worse track record. Mia suplexed Io into the ladder in Act I (a shame Candice missed that bit of impactful karma, she probably would've at least given it a cackle) but then fell victim to Io's receipt in Act II; a springboard dropkick sent her off the ladder which went into her face and busted her nose something awful. Io was already fighting one-armed and even noticeably had to neuter her speed while the medics checked on Mia. Of course, you don't get a moniker like HBIC without willing to get in the grit and the grime, so Yim fought through something that'd probably kill me. Dakota Kai came out to check on her, only to be suddenly waylaid by Kay Lee Ray of all people. KLR then further contributed to Mia's hospital bill by shoving her off a ladder to the floor, where she went through another ladder bridged between the ring and the apron.
It's why you say predetermined instead of fake, kiddies.
KLR helped Io climb the ladder, and as she and Shayna gloated over the aisle to each other, Bayley suddenly laid out the Queen of Spades in what is certainly no longer the Rose Plant.
The women got the ovations and medical attention they deserved after the show, which was berserk from front to that end. And that's not even counting the fact that the Dain/Dunne match got nerfed when Priest jumped both of them and laid them out before they could even get going with the match thus springboarding that triple threat to tonight's show with the winner getting a shot at The Champ, BAY BAY! at Survivor Series.
The ladder of opportunity calls for Cole and Dijakovic with a ladder in a few hours, as it does for everyone who works at Takeover, let alone everyone who's going to end up doing double duty with that and Survivor Series. Human sacrifice, Lees and Dijakovics teaming together, mass hysteria.
Or as NXT would probably refer to it in the USA Network era: the usual.
The fact remains that on the penultimate show before the third TO: WG every cliche about chaos got filled, sometimes with blood on multiple occasions. Couple that with Papa Haitch's open invite to the entire "main roster" to come get some on tonight's show, and the only thing to know to expect is a ladder match with Cole/Dijakovic and the WarGames advantage on the line; even that, as with the rest of life, the card is subject to change.
Fortunately for NXT, their roster is as stacked as Victoria Lomba and grabbing...well, maybe not as many eyeballs, but plenty and for all the right reasons. And when it comes to staplegunning together some more wrestling nerd fantasies in light of the legitimate (?) injuries to Johnny Gargano, KUSHIDA, and the VELVETEENEST of DREAMS, one of the undercard matches on this weekend's show is plenty sexy in its own right...
GOLD: Finn/Riddle at Takeover
TAFKA Prince. Tsk, tsk, tsk. So many flavors to pick from and you choose to be salty. So disillusioned he might as well as come out to "Serve the Servants", he slammed NXT as a place he used to be proud of but got overtaken by little boys when he left and dissed Gargano for being the alleged heart of the brand. He mocked him for crying on social media -- news flash, it's 2019, and it's all we have left -- but when he started running his mouth about Matt thee Stallion, Riddle was right there to shut his mouth and fight him in the middle of the ring, recovering where Gargano hasn't and making Regal make the match for this weekend. As with most of the gold NXT's spun this summer and fall into the winter, it didn't seem like the thing to do until it was done, at which point you might as well clap your forehead and go duh doy, of course you run Riddle/Finn. What's the floor on a match with these guys, 8 out of 10? 4 stars? Appointment TV? If that's the floor, the ceiling is where certain Lords of a Stately Manor stack up clone corpses. This has the potential to go right behind such instant classics as Zayn/Nakamura as best Takeover titleless matches, and it wasn't even a blip on the radar a month ago.
With Master Regal granting Riddle's revenge, it turfed him off of Team Ciampa. Like NXT in general and the leader in specific, they'd bounce back with the emergence of their newest member...
 |
| Disputing! |
Out came the Era to go after Riddle, but since the Champ took a few beats to start dancing at the 10, Tommy Champs and Keith Lee came out to metaphorically tackle him at the 4. Slightly surprisingly, Lee handled the babyface mic work and didn't give a rat's ass about the Era's claims to multiple show supremacy and dared Cole to stand up to him. Cole didn't, but Roddy did, and since the Limitless One wasn't picky that non-title bout bridged the hours.
Since the match was born in chaos, it ended that way as well. Not only that, but the triple threat Roddy barely survived by pinning Keith after Dijakovic had been removed from the picture came to bear as well. As you might expect, scavenging on the margins in a triple threat was far more palatable to the North American champion than trying to fight one of my old stunt doubles head-on. The Era came out to try to save the day for Strong, only to be usurped by a returning Ciampa and Riddle, who himself got into a brouhaha he was on the losing end of with Balor. It seemed to open the door for Roddy to slip in another W, but Lee bounced back and gave the champ Fallout to get the duke and maybe get another North American title opportunity down the line without his spiritual cousin also scoffing at the laws of gravity and trying to procure it in his own right.
To the surprise of no one, the Era was severely displeased by this turn of events. But the Full Sailors called it in advance and were proven right when Dijakovic came out and started put Undisputed meesters on Era-sized keesters. Lee recovered from the attack just in time to see D2 reiterate the case he'd made online since the triple threat to the Blackheart himself, who took the big man's hand in stride. Lee took a couple of beats to offer his longtime rival the Hand of Friendship, but once it was reciprocated Ciampa was psyched and who could blame him? If your backup was Godzilla and King Kong and you saw anything short of the 102nd Airborne coming, what couldn't you destroy? If this uneasy truce can hold and somehow isn't the prelude to either Lee or Dijakovic pulling a late-period Hennig on the other two...well, three, going to war with the uncrowned NXT champion and the Workrate Twin Towers is a fine slot for a fourth member to get in on the fun, no matter their standing...
 |
| Still Swerve's house, but Reed might be putting a name on his own lease soon |
Just throwing that out there.
WHAT?!
He lost to Roddy, he's been doing well since (except for the previous week's loss to...you guessed it, Dominik Dijakovic) and once again found himself going to the pay window in a win against Bronson Reed that could use a rematch and/or them becoming a wacky partner tag team. You want to see Bronson Reed dance to Ain't Nobody. You do. And if Keith and D2 can find their way and fight on the side of the angels, who's to say history can't repeat itself further down the card? The two segment match was honestly most notable for their pre and post-match respect, as well as Bronson getting more than his fair share of chants against another fan favorite via the Breakout tourney.
 |
| Oh, Angel! You NASTY! With yo FINE self! |
Sure, that's Mrs. Lio Rush. But he's Angel Garza. If I was that handsome, some other dude's marriage wouldn't mean squat to me, either. I mean, I'm almost that good looking, but that is a completely irrelevant if factual point.
If you thought the show's opening fight for the Cruiserweight Championship was going to clear up any alignment questions, you'll probably blow the dust off the dreidel before you get things sorted in anything resembling normalcy. For instance, Angel high fived several male fans...but he also did the above after whipping off his pants, which sends a ravishing but rude message on its own. Lio Rush was ostensibly the wronged family man babyface '19 and even kicked out of an avalanche moonsault fallaway slam -- an actual move, I don't smell toast and my health's kosher, those words in that order are intentional -- but he didn't really retaliate in a manner of the deeply offended besides putting a couple extra MPH on his subsequent tope. What Garza is probably going to consider retaliation is the fact that during the pinfall after the second Rush Hour his foot was on the ropes before 3, but not during 3 thanks to Rush pulling it off, then having his foot back on the ropes when Rush laughed and walked out still with the big purp across his shoulders. Several Full Sailors live and Nigel McGuiness noted the same on commentary, only to have the matches replay magically cut off the moment of discussion. (You may remember this trick from NXT's own arsenal earlier this year, wherein to get the last two seconds of Takeover: Phoenix to fully further the Johnny Brasco storyline you had to watch the whole show on WWEN since they magically didn't appear on any social media platform.) Either way, we will presumably get to a rematch for Garza with the belt on the line, another two or three segment baller-ass match, we might even get an idea of who to cheer and boo full, and...hell, who can focus when Angel Garza IS THAT ATTRACTIVE?
John Legend my ass.
 |
| OOFTA |
Like the real world, the wrestling world has its own sick ironies. Take for instance, the fact that Tegan Nox, Rhea Ripley, the Horsewomen Underlings, and Candice LeRae were playing laid out during the show.
Two women got the business end of the audit during the show.
First was Aliyah, who made the mistake of fighting Xia Li again and got r e k t 2 : the rektoning, as Li once again proved too dashing for the Canadian. In all seriousness, fake fighting somebody that well versed in the martial arts sounds about as fun as doing so for real.
Then came the main event, a ladder match between Choke Me the Fuck Out, Io Shirai and Mia Yim with the winner gaining the advantage for their team in their WarGames match. The babyfaces are to these kind of matches what the Washington Generals are to the game of basketball, except with possibly an even worse track record. Mia suplexed Io into the ladder in Act I (a shame Candice missed that bit of impactful karma, she probably would've at least given it a cackle) but then fell victim to Io's receipt in Act II; a springboard dropkick sent her off the ladder which went into her face and busted her nose something awful. Io was already fighting one-armed and even noticeably had to neuter her speed while the medics checked on Mia. Of course, you don't get a moniker like HBIC without willing to get in the grit and the grime, so Yim fought through something that'd probably kill me. Dakota Kai came out to check on her, only to be suddenly waylaid by Kay Lee Ray of all people. KLR then further contributed to Mia's hospital bill by shoving her off a ladder to the floor, where she went through another ladder bridged between the ring and the apron.
It's why you say predetermined instead of fake, kiddies.
KLR helped Io climb the ladder, and as she and Shayna gloated over the aisle to each other, Bayley suddenly laid out the Queen of Spades in what is certainly no longer the Rose Plant.
The women got the ovations and medical attention they deserved after the show, which was berserk from front to that end. And that's not even counting the fact that the Dain/Dunne match got nerfed when Priest jumped both of them and laid them out before they could even get going with the match thus springboarding that triple threat to tonight's show with the winner getting a shot at The Champ, BAY BAY! at Survivor Series.
The ladder of opportunity calls for Cole and Dijakovic with a ladder in a few hours, as it does for everyone who works at Takeover, let alone everyone who's going to end up doing double duty with that and Survivor Series. Human sacrifice, Lees and Dijakovics teaming together, mass hysteria.
Or as NXT would probably refer to it in the USA Network era: the usual.
