WRESTLE HARVEST EXTRA: DEAN~!!! REVIEW
(Audio narration with a couple of extra bits above!)
As soon as this show was announced as a tribute to a man in Dean Rasmussen that is responsible for a hell of a lot of us getting into wrestling via the greatness of the Death Valley Driver Video Review message board (Myself being Cygnus 1987 back in the day!) I was calling this the show of the week and without further ado we dive in…
We begin with Colby Corino vs Alex Kane – very strong way to kick off the show especially given the love Dean had for Steve. Big fan of Kane since he started Bomaye Fight Club and his run in Paradigm, great to see him get his flowers.
Colby getting the headlock over with cheers feels like bizarro Cactus Jack near the end of his ECW run, kinda goofy but amusing nevertheless (more so than when MJF used it to taunt Darby.) Alex of course knows the best way is to back drop your opponent on the HARDEST PART OF THE RING when Corino tries it on the floor.
Colby naturally works the headlock into as many moves as possible – including a decent cross body into one - and a very sweet work through into an Air Raid Crash! Ultimately it proves to be his undoing as Kane suplexes him for the pinfall and retains the Action Wrestling world title.
AmBoss and O’Shay vs The Good Hand – Loving the modified team of Robert Driessker, Laurance Roman and O’Shay taking on the experienced faction of Suge D, Kevin Ryan and Tyler Stevens AKA The Wall. Pure trios madness abounds – history shown well between O’Shay and Suge, Kevin Ryan learning what happens when you try and fuck with a Kaiju and an Avalanche while The Good Hand show their experience by being sneaky whenever Amboss/Edwards try and get a tag – which I LOVE.
Avalanche vs The Wall = HOSS TIME for sure too.
In the end though The Good Hand’s cheating catches up with them as O’Shay hits an excellent moonsault onto The Wall for the win.
Ugly Sucklings come out for an Open Challenge… cue The Cranberries as VIOLENCE IS FOREVER make a surprise appearance and I grin from ear to ear…
This my friends is Tag Team wrestling at it’s absolute finest – VIF being one of fave teams of the past decade and good to see what Killjoy and White Mike together can do after seeing them on opposite sides for a long time.
Ugly Sucklings doing the Demolition Decapitator was cool to see and Violence Is Forever show their dominance with the backdrop into powerbomb finish… SO GOOD.
The Tag team madness continues with the COVEN OF THE GOAT vs 1 Called Manders and a literally arriving as Coven were making their way out to the ring Filthy Tom Lawlor and if the last was showcasing great tag wrestling this one was showcasing a god damn FIGHT under GYPSY JOE RULES. So lay down the deathmatch canvas H20 and let the Deathmatch Darlings have their fun for the first time tonight…
Filthy Tom and Manders paying tribute to the Miracle Violence Connection with the cris-cross during their entrance – you love to see it.
Such a beautiful Bunkhouse style brawl with beer drinking, chair shots, double foot stomps off a step ladder by Filthy Tom and naturally BLOOD with the Coven getting the deserved win.
Our first taste to delight the Darlings and we still have a DOG COLLAR MATCH to get to.
More trios action with 3 Flippy Guys (Bobby Flaco, Rico Gonzalez and Brayden Toon) vs 3 Strong Motherfuckers (Danny Demanto, Hoodfoot and Isiah Broner) and to paraphrase an old catchphrase there will be flips AND hits here AKA the WAR tribute.
Danny asking for the use of ONE door was nice when it was revealed to be a tribute to the great ref SPO (in DVDVR colours no less!)
First blood goes to the flippies as Brayden senton bombs onto Isiah and Hoodfoot after Bobby gets caught and Rico makes the save.
Team Strong MF counters this by hitting Brayden with the door naturally leading to them getting the advantage as Broner hits a massive sidewalk slam onto Bobby who when trying to counter a second one gets thrown into a lariat by Demanto.
This leads to a lot of flippy movez~! getting countered through strength and pure power – a cutter that flips Brayden over being a personal highlight - and the winner of who gets put through the door follows (well I say winner…) with Bobby getting the unfortunate prize.
Through the power of flips though a combo of a bottom rope Asai taking out Broner and Danny by Toon, a move by Rico (that the camera didn’t quite get) and a cutter from Bobby get the win for 3 Flippy Guys. Fun little match there showcasing everyone nicely!
Dr Cerebro vs Gringo Loco is next – a reigniting of a IWRG feud that while it tries to go the usual route of Lucha and even some chain wrestling turns into a No DQ match following Cerebro using a chair. Now given the absolutely violent fights we saw via the DVDVR board in 2009/2010 I was surprised it wasn’t no DQ to start but there we go – Gringo’s old rudo ways though come back to haunt him as despite hitting a Spanish Fly onto the Dr his use of a chair gets kicked into his face and Gringo’s forced to submit!
Krule vs Berlyn 2024 I mean Warhorse follows and this whole angle around the IWTV belt has to end soon PLEASE – to make it short Krule wins and then we get Jonathan Gresham challenging him for a future date – if you want a chuckle look at the staredown moment from this.
Back to the good stuff though as Arez vs Matt Makowski (shoot vs Strange) was a nice styles clash (even though they’ve both trained in Lucha styles – Arez by Skayde, Matt by Quackenbush (I think he was one of the Shard at a point too)) with Matt getting the tapout win via a rolling german into an armbar halfway through!
Southern Graps time next as Slim J takes on Adam Priest – past vs future! Priest of course brings up Slim J’s release from AEW a few days prior like a true heel and plays some great tactics to try and outsmart the veteran in Slim J – sneaky low blows etc. Slim J valiantly fights back like the great plucky babyface he can be and counters an apron piledriver into a back body drop after surviving a piledriver in the ring,
The short babyface fire though is cut off by a release German and Priest gets ready to do a super rana off the top when it gets countered by Slim who then proceeds to hit a spiked tornado DDT but doesn’t get the 3 so floats Priest over int a guillotine choke that is briefly broken by Priest grabbing the damaged ear of Slim, Slim refuses however to let go leading to Priest desperately flipping Slim’s face onto the top rope – which as pointed out is steel cable and could have injured the neck!
Priest then goes in for the kill but just like that Slim hits a spinning cutter and gets the 3!
Wonderful showcase and hoping that this isn’t the last time these two face off…
Sinner & Saint take on Marcus Mathers and Austin Luke aka Wasted Youth in a tag match and on a night where we see a Tornado Tag and some classic tag wrestling from veterans of the sport – here’s the tag teams of the future showcase right here.
First off shoutout to Bratty Bekka Skunk on Twitter who first notified me of Sinner & Saint a while ago – you were absolutely right on the money.
A lovely fast paced match that showed exactly how the future of tag team wrestling is going to be just fine – inverted X-plexes, a combination of a Gory special while the partner hits shots to the chest and then two kicks to the head on the ground by Sinner and Saint that was incredible,
Mathers and Luke hitting Chasing The Dragon at one point too as they make their comeback until Sinner and Saint hit a Stunner/German combo but that still isn’t enough for the win and cockiness ends up costing them as after a DDT/foot stomp combo Marcus hits a 450 for the win for Wasted Youth,
And now the Deathmatch Darlings MAIN EVENT~!!! Dog Collar Match!
Oh my God – this is up there with Piper/Valentine for how fucking great this was - Demus and Mad Dog Connolly are two of the baddest, sickest motherfuckers I have seen in some time and it brought the VIOLENCE. I mean the match started by Mad Dog whipping the chain into Demus’ face for god’s sake!
Mad Dog decides to have Demus meet the fans up close and personal at one point which… maybe don’t do twice just in case…
Demus then gets his comeback with chokes, crossfaces and a back senton onto the chain he’s put into Mad Dog’s mouth THEN chair shots his skull DOWNWARDS.
After all this Mad Dog does a triangle with the chain wrapped around Demus’ neck causing the tap out.
Speaking of submissions – the technical wrestling lovers (which I also am) get their main event to close the show. The final chapter in Daniel Makabe and Timothy Thatcher.
Now if you’ve not seen their trilogy Joseph Montecillo has you covered:
This if course is their first encounter since wXw did Ambition it Toronto before Timothy went to WWE for a while and it starts as expected with chain wrestling (after a refused handhake by Timothy) until Thatcher decides to play dirty and puts his boot over Makabe’s face. This gives Thatcher the advantage as he puts Makabe in a crossface hold which Makabe tries to counter with a single leg takedown and fails.
Thatcher then tries to humiliate Makabe with a ankle hold while fish hooking the face into a bow and arrow lock which is finally countered into a double wrist but he can’t get quite the full effect as Thatcher clenches his hands together so he’s easily able to wriggle out and starts attacking the face again whilst applying the arm submission.
The first pinfall attempt by Timothy gets a 2 and he tries to do a belly to belly suplex from a Gerco-Roman position but Makabe has it scouted leading to a reversal which is then countered by Thatcher near the ropes leading to a gruesome looking wrist submission from a floatdown position. Makabe quickly counters it with leg scissors and punches to the shoulder blade and wrenches in a wrist submission attempt of his own.
Thatcher switches it up and drives the elbow first into Makabe’s back before attacking the fingers on the right hand bending them to an insane degree (and I’m double jointed so I know even with that they’re not supposed to bend quite like THAT!) Makabe then turns that into a heel hook on the already injured possibly leg that Thatcher had going into the match.
Thus begins the ESCALATION with both men exchanging uppercuts, clubbing blows and forearms with Makabe winning the exchange into the float-through armbar then back into the heel hook which Thatcher tries to stop by kicking Makabe but fails to do so. Makabe then does a few rib shots until Timothy goes ah fuck it and headbutts him down!
This does release the hold but noticeably you can see Thatcher starting to limp on the right leg which Makabe notices and begins another heel hook attempt that is briefly countered by Thatcher doing some kicks to the face but ultimately the hook is fully applied with extra twist but a rope break puts paid to that.
Thatcher attempts an ankle hook to Makabe after the pair exchange ground leg kicks which segues to a cocky pin including a knee to Makabe’s face that only gets multiple 2 counts.
We then get more bending of Makabe’s hand as the crowd groans in digust and then Thatcher decides to twist the hand more then apply akick and I join the crowd in going OHHHH in response.
Uppercut to the back follows and a two count then becomes an armbar by Thatcher which Makabe attempts to counter first by grabbing the beard then the ear then punching the knee of Timothy so cue the rolling armbar as a FU back to Makabe.
One slight mistake leads to the briefst of escapes for Makabe before another armbar is applied, Makabe tries kicks to the face but then a leg hook is applied, Makabe then tries to put in the clutch but fails however this leads to a full mount by Makabe onto Thatcher and the palm strikes to the face and ear hit HARD.
Makabe attempts a cross armbreaker but gets a punch from Thatcher for his troubles. This isfollowed by a single leg crab after a kick to the back!
He then decides to let go and do a jumping armbreaker to Makabe!
Thatcher then tries to do a crossface chickenwing but that’s countered by Makabe into CATTLE MUTILATION!!! (Project DRAGONBORN coming this summer folks!)
Timothy however remembers the weakness to the left hand and uses that to shift out of it and foils every attempt Makabe does to try and do anything with that hand and bends the fingers to finally get out of a half body scissors Makabe had put on him.
Thatcher goes for the seated headscissors but Makabe goes for a leg scissors on the injured leg of Timothy who in desperation nostril hooks Daniel in order for him to stop the hold and gives Daniel a knee to the back a few times for good measure.
Thatcher attempts the downward elbow strikes to use another playbook of Danielsons but Makabe grabs the beard with one hand and starts slapping Thatcher’s face with the other but this only pisses Timothy off and here comes headbutts to back while the arms are stretched backwards.
Sleeper by Thatcher after originally trying for a Makabe Lock of his own but suddenly Makabe shifts his weight to the injured right leg of Thatcher and turns the ankle upwards but a kick to the head from the left leg stop any more damage being done for now.
Thatcher goes for the belly to belly again but standing switch leads to a big boot by Makabe and a running dropkick attempt but it is foiled by Thatcher hitting a flurry of uppercuts, however Makabe knows that the right leg is damaged so keeps trying to go back there after each one.
In a game of turnabout is fair play Makabe decides to drive Thatcher’s uppercut arm down and stomps on it then unleashes three of his own before Thatcher again grabs the hand he damaged of Makabe’s and drives a stomp of his own onto it then gives another kick to the back.
Cue the Headbutts!
Winner of the Headbutts: Makabe
Thatcher then goes back to the uppercut and forearm well but one more uppercut gets countered by Daniel into a DEATH VALLEY DRIVER in the most apropos moment of the show!
A Makabe Lock Pi attempt though is quickly turned by Thatcher into a Fujiwara Armbar but Makabe goes back to the injured right leg of Thatcher using his head to apply pressure and hits a two hard punches to Thatcher and one kill shot to the ear and FINALLY puts Thatcher down for the 3.
A beautiful masterpiece to close out the rivalry.
Simply put – this is my show of the entire week right here. A mixture of everything I love in wrestling for the most part – brawls, blood, flips and technical greatness all in one.
Just how Dean~!!! Would have wanted it.