Zombies chased a local yokel, Jack Skellington beat Sting for the NXT North American Championship, POPPY, Pete Dunne came back and “turned heel” on one of the guys who made it his mission to fuck up his NXT career (but sure that makes him the bad guy), Shotzi had multiple costume changes and a cross promotion for Scream 5 interfered in multiple matches.
This Week: What is the fallout of Johnny Gargano winning the North American Championship? Will he issue a formal apology to wheels everywhere? Will Ciampa show the world who the Greatest Generation really is? Who’s Io Shirai’s next victi-I mean opponent?
POP: No Bruh, Kai
If there’s one thing NXT loves doing, it’s starting the show with a fast moving, high-impact opener, and it’s business as usual this week. In case you need a refresher, Kai and Moon have beef because Moon and Rhea beat her and Raquel in her first match back, so she’s pretty hot about it.
That bit where Ember tricks Kai into a Crossface by doing a fake “I’ll let you get a free shot” bit was A1. Dakota got the win here which was very much needed because it’s been a minute since Dakota got a good win. Granted it wasn’t clean, but that gives us a reason to keep this story going.
POP: PTSDead
Poor, panicked Cameron Grimes is clearly still mentally suffering from being attacked by non-brain eating contortionist zombies last week, so much so that he can barely get through an interview without sweating. He even gets scared off by one of the refs that was zombified last week:
Yet appears to be fine now. That’s odd. Anyway, Kushida ain’t doing anything so hey, might as well throw him and Grimey in a match with each other. The actual match part of the match is good, but the fun part comes after the ref bump (that sure felt weird to type out).
Once that ref is out of commission, the non-zombie zombie ref runs down to the ring and freaks Grimey out enough that he gets himself tied up in a hoverboard lock. Or maybe he’s just scared of brown people (joking, that was a joke). Please pray for Cameron Grimes in his time of mental suffering.
He should sue Regal for putting him through that. Look at his mental distress.
Unfortunately Grimey, according to the historical document/video game known as Call of Duty: Black Ops III, there are indeed zombies on the moon.
POP: Alpha vs. Alpha
OH MAN, Io vs. Rhea is gonna be a banger. The two promos we get from the both of them hyping up their eventual encounter are done really well and get the job done.
POP: Royal Pains
So they have us think we’re getting another match between the Worst Friends and Ever-Rise (oh joy) and it’s whatever until we cut to outside where the newly christened “Kings of NXT” (good thing Vic Joseph said “Kings of NXT” like 7 times to really drive the point home) pull up to the CWC, steal a TV Camera and go beat those guys up.
I feel kinda mixed on Pete in this segment though, Like alright sure, he’s a heel but it was justified with Kyle considering there has never been any love lost between him and the UE. But just stomping on a defenseless Drake? That’s cold, man. But, I’m probably just overthinking it (even though they went on to bring it up a few minutes later).
The Kings are out here to shit on the UE some more and have a ceremony celebrating their “end”. Pat’s doing some good heel work here, even though part of his promo was somewhat repeating his recap of how his plan went down. Overall I thought it was a great segment that even set up another feud with the Worst Friends after Dain comes back around to attack Pat and Pete Dunne Kingpins him. Good stuff all around.
POP: Wheel Love, I’m Searching For a Wheel Love
How am I not tired of these Evil Dork Johnny Gargano segments? Literally every single one kills me. After setting the record straight and letting it be known that he actually in fact LOVES wheels and anyone saying the opposite is a LIAR, he lets us know he’s gonna defend the North American Championship next week.
Ghostface is there too and they appear to be passing the time doing Scream homages and playing Life. The decision to put whoever this is into a Ghostface costume is an interesting one, but I wanna see where this is going, even if I’m about 45% sure it’s Indi.
POPBOTCH: Tanks For The Memories
As a reward for doing such a dope job hosting Halloween Havoc (again, you all saw the wardrobes), Mr. Regal let her choose her opponent this week, so she decides to go with someone she looks up to in Toni Storm.
When Shotzi makes her entrance for the match she is noticeably missing her signature tank and runs out and begins immediately accusing Toni of stealing it with 0 evidence and no real reason to even think she did it. The match itself is probably my favorite of the night (granted some of that may be Toni Storm bias because I’m admittedly a huge fan) and the actual “match” part of the segment is damn good because both Shotzi and Toni are damn good.
But then there’s about to be a count out in the match as Shotzi makes her way back to the ring, and Candice shows up on the CenterTron. Turns out in a predictable turn of events, SHE was the one who stole the tank (why was she not suspect #1 Shotzi, she already assaulted Helmet)!
This of course distracts Shotzi long enough for Toni to get a flash pin on her and win the match, then Candice pops back up on the Tron to put in a Grand Theft Auto cheat code to get a Hummer to appear and run over Shotzi’s tank. Are there no lows Candice LeRae will sink to? Ghostface makes a second appearance on the show in the backseat which makes for a hilarious visual.
Ok, so why is this a “POPBOTCH”? Well, this is the third match of the night and also the third time tonight a match has featured some kind of shenanigans that had an effect on the outcome of the match. It’s not that I mind shenanigans in a wrestling match, I mean it comes with the territory, but having them happen 3 times in a row (granted, at least in varying ways) is a bit much.
On Sight!
Footage is shown of Legado Del Fantasma rolling up to the CWC earlier in the day, bragging about the win Santos got over Jake Atlas (with some help from a loaded mask). Atlas just so happens to roll up with a pipe to get even with them about it then drives off. Not the most heroic actions for a babyface to take but hey, at least Jake Atlas is getting some dimension I guess.
Mid: Class Clown
I was so close to giving this a BOTCH because I am so tired of this Thatch-As-Thatch Can class shit. I just want Thatcher to go back to tapping people the fuck out and being the intense badass he was when he first showed up in NXT.
The only reason I didn’t give it a BOTCH is that something to progress the story actually happened when August Grey, the guy Thatcher had a match with a couple weeks back after getting rough with him, showed up to kick Thatcher in the face for doing the same thing he did to him to another student (Why do any of these guys even do this? Does the PC not have good enough coaches to show them how to do decent submission holds? Also couldn’t any potential opponents for Thatcher watch these segments and find out how to break his holds? Why is Thatcher even doing this? Is it just an excuse to hurt students, because he doesn’t even seem to really like doing the classes that much. Also, I never noticed until I heard the crowd chant “WE CAN’T HEAR YOU” but shouldn’t he at least have a wireless Lav mic or something so the people can hear him? Let me just end this before I wind up changing my mind and giving this a BOTCH).
“August Grey” sounds like the name of a character in an erotic novel.
Whatever: Paper Trail
Xia is asked by McKenzie backstage about the Slender Man letters Boa keeps giving to her after matches. She says that they’re letters from her family (who Boa knows I guess) but refuses to go into detail about what they’re actually about. Well then, why even tell us that they’re from your family Xia? Also who writes letters anymore? They can’t email or send a text to berate you for losing? I guess it wouldn’t be as cinematic or whatever.
Regal pops up with another letter for her and after she reads it, she immediately tells Regal that she wants to face Raquel next week because she “dishonored” her. Starting to get kinda tropey in here but ok. I sure can’t wait for Xia vs. Raquel guys. Maybe the letter she gets after losing will be on red paper this time!
NXT, Make My Uncomfortableness Grow!
Yeah, so the main event features a guy that right now I would really rather avoid mentioning so instead I’ll just say Tommaso Ciampa is out here dressed like a Power Rangers villain for some reason and when I saw him I laughed for 3 straight minutes.
Here, watch Tommaso Ciampa vs. Aleister Black for the NXT Championship. That was a great match.
After the show, Ciampa cut a nice promo talking about how weird 2020 has been for Pro Wrestling and thanking the fans for sticking with them. It was cool, if not weird considering how Ciampa (the character) has been acting lately.
So, that’s it for NXT this week. It was a pretty average episode, not too many low spots or high spots really.
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Peace.
Next Week:
Johnny Gargano (c) vs. An Opponent of his Choosing – NXT North American Championship Match
Oney & Danny (c) vs. Breezango – NXT Tag Team Championship Match
Xia Li vs. Raquel Gonzalez
