William Regal is officially investigating who attacked Aleister Black. I’m betting they haven’t even decided who attacked him yet.
IN-RING PROMO: JOHNNY GARGANO, WILLIAM REGAL, & VELVETEEN DREAM
Terrific, emotional promo by Johnny. He sounds desperate and hopelessly lost. I love deep storylines like this. Regal asks if he attacked Aleister, and Johnny does a great job of neither confirming nor denying, but telling Regal to look into his eyes and he’ll have his answer, before Velveteen Dream interrupts. Dream lays down a promo that cuts deep, calling him “Johnny Failure”, and Regal makes a match for next week.
Johnny Gargano Promo Rating: Eight Cactus Jacks
Velveteen Dream Promo Rating: Four Roddy Pipers
VELVETEEN DREAM VS. AALIYAH
Aaliyah really needs to work on her selling. Mauro tries to suggest that the NXT audience is split in their support over these two, but it’s pretty easy to hear it’s like five guys chanting for Aaliyah and the rest of the audience responding, “SUCKS!” Aaliyah gets most of the offense in the match but spends a lot of time posing over Kai, and that costs here as Kai hits her Code Red inverted backbreaker for the win. If Aaliyah is going to be a heel and control a lot of the matches, she’s going to need to be more polished in the ring. Decent match.
Match Rating: Four Gold Medals
Looks like Lars Sullivan beat the piss out of EC3 backstage. Maybe that cancels the EC3/Raul Mendoza match.
Regal tries to interview Nikki Cross regarding the Aleister Black attack. Needless to say, he didn’t get much information. My girl Bianca Belair comes in and says she deserves a title shot. I think she’ll end up wrestling Nikki.
RAUL MENDOZA VS. LARS SULLIVAN
Like I thought would happen, Sullivan replaces EC3 in the match after cutting the best promo of his career. He butchers Mendoza in about two minutes in a “match” that never even got started. God damn, that was awesome.
Destruction Rating: Three Braun Strowmans
BACKSTAGE PROMO: TOMMASO CIAMPA
Ciampa’s promos are downright disturbing. He’s fucking terrific as a heel and loves to be hated. He continues to prove himself right and it adds more and more heat and makes his promos even better.
Promo Rating: Nine Jake Roberts
KEITH LEE VS. LUKE MENZIES
Lee exudes confidence and plays to the crowd while Menzies looks intense and focused on inflicting punishment. Lee seems like he was born to be an entertainer. Menzies; inexperience shows in this match, he looks a bit lost on what to do, the moves aren’t crisp, and the the timing is off. Lee finishes him off with a giant powerbomb. The wrestling wasn’t top-notch but the match was very entertaining.
Match Rating: Six Gold Medals
RICOCHET & PETE DUNNE VS. ADAM COLE & RODERICK STRONG W/KYLE O’REILLY
Cole and Strong let their kid brother tag along, that’s cool. Roddy’s backbreaker on Ricochet was absolutely filthy. Undisputed Era is so good in tag matches, they tag in and out seamlessly and are great at keeping their opponent in their corner and beaten down. Ricochet taking a lot of punishment including a brutal standing dropkick right to the face from Roddy. It was awesome the way Ricochet took out Strong and evaded Cole to get to Dunne, who cleaned fucking house after the hot tag. He hits a disgusting German suplex after Roddy bounces off the ropes, I don’t know how these guys’ necks don’t break sometimes.
Dunne is incredible. He has a Rhyno-type body and flies like a cruiserweight. Speaking of flying, Ricochet flies to the outside, misses the Undisputed Era, and hits his partner instead. Adam Cole finishes Dunne off with the Last Shot kick for the win. Are we going to see a championship vs. championship match between Dunne and Ricochet? I hope so. The Undisputed Era makes sure Ricochet gets his after the match too with a nasty beat down.
WAR RAIDERS! The Vikings are coming for the tag titles. I can’t wait for that. A really good ending to the show after a solid main event.
Match Rating: Seven Gold Medals
Overall Show Rating: Seven Gold Medals
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