{"id":3005,"date":"2015-04-18T15:56:41","date_gmt":"2015-04-18T14:56:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=3005"},"modified":"2015-04-18T15:56:41","modified_gmt":"2015-04-18T14:56:41","slug":"chikara-15-1-a-new-start-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=3005","title":{"rendered":"Chikara 15.1 – “A New Start”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Preamble:<\/em>\u00a0Okay, so. \u00a0I did a\u00a0preview of this show, the first Chikara show of 2015, back in January, and then never came back to the topic. \u00a0But I figured it’d be interesting to look back on all this year’s shows a few months behind,\u00a0to see where they ended up going. \u00a0It’s going to be more of an episode guide thing, I guess. \u00a0At time of writing, five\u00a0shows from this year have been released (the fifth came out while I was writing this, and I haven’t seen it yet); a further three\u00a0were taped in the UK last month and should be out shortly.<\/p>\n

These posts are going to be pretty erratic, by the way – don’t expect any sort of regular schedule. \u00a0If anything, I’m confidently expecting to drift further and further behind. \u00a0“A New Start” is the season opener, so this is going to be unusually lengthy; most shows will have a lot more matches that we can skip happily over in search of the bigger picture, and the next show is particularly light.<\/p>\n

With this show, Chikara took its video production in-house (and also started selling and streaming videos on its own website<\/a>). \u00a0The idea is solid; the initial results are\u00a0unfortunate. \u00a0The camerawork is erratic, the hard camera is set way too far back from the ring (which the editor obviously realises, since he barely uses it), and\u00a0the sound levels are badly out of whack, so that the audience is\u00a0way too low in the mix, at least if you don’t want to be deafened by the commentators. \u00a0This will improve over the next few shows as they find their feet, and it’s not quite as bad as I remember it seeing on first viewing, but\u00a0it’s\u00a0a definite irritant for all that.<\/p>\n

When and where?<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0It’s the afternoon of 25 January 2015, and we’re in\u00a0the 2300 Club in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – the former ECW Arena. \u00a0This is Chikara’s home territory, and it’s a decent turnout. \u00a0We’ve got an actual set and proper lighting. \u00a0The\u00a0Royal Rumble is taking place across town later that day.<\/p>\n

The Flood faction from 2014 has\u00a0apparently disbanded with the demise of Deucalion on the last show – the Flood wrestlers who have stuck around (many of whom were only with him out of fear in the first place) are\u00a0now back to entering through the regular entrance way, instead of coming through the crowd as they did last year.<\/p>\n

1. \u00a0Sidney Bakabella’s Open Challenge: The Wrecking Crew (Max Smashmaster, Blaster McMassive, Flex Rumblecrunch,\u00a0Oleg The Usurper & Jaka, w\/Sidney Bakabella) v.\u00a0The Throwbacks (Dasher Hatfield & Mark Angelosetti), Shynron, Jervis Cottonbelly & Princess Kimberlee.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Backstory:<\/em>\u00a0Wrecking Crew members Max Smashmaster and Blaster McMassive won the tag titles from the Throwbacks on the last show. \u00a0The stable is celebrating with an open challenge, and the\u00a0Throwbacks have rounded up a somewhat random selection of tecnicos to\u00a0accept. \u00a0Oh, and the seeds have been planted for a tecnico turn by Crew member Oleg the Usurper, with manager Sidney Bakabella starting to treat\u00a0him (not without justification) as a blundering liability.<\/p>\n

The match:<\/em>\u00a0I’m not doing play-by-play – if you want that, Kevin Ford is just down the hall<\/a>. \u00a0Basically, it’s a hot ten-man tag to kick off the season. \u00a0Oleg surprisingly accepts Jervis’ handshake without taking advantage, much to Bakabella’s horror. \u00a0Kimberley, being the smallest person on her team,\u00a0winds up as tecnico in peril. \u00a0After a while, the chivalrous Jervis can take no more and runs in illegally to rescue her, showing distinct signs of smittenness. \u00a0The\u00a0rudo team\u00a0wind up\u00a0piled up in their corner\u00a0together so that Shynron can hit the big showy spot of the match by diving diagonally across the ring<\/em> to hit them. \u00a0This isn’t a tiny indie ring, either. \u00a0The guy’s good. \u00a0Kimberlee gets isolated by the tag champs, and gamely holds her own\u00a0for a bit before finally succumbing to a\u00a0belly-to-belly superplex\u00a0for the clean pin in 15:39. \u00a0Jervis checks on her\u00a0afterwards.<\/p>\n

Upshot:<\/em>\u00a0Decent opener, wonky camerawork notwithstanding. \u00a0The Throwbacks\/DevCorp angle is kept ticking over\u00a0(we’ll see it again in February), Oleg’s angle continues (it becomes a big deal in March), and Jervis is aligned with Kimberlee for the first time (again, this is going somewhere next month). \u00a0And none of\u00a0that\u00a0overshadows the match itself.<\/p>\n

2. \u00a0N\u00f8kken v Ophidian (w\/Amasis).<\/strong><\/p>\n

Backstory:<\/em> Both guys won their last two singles matches, so a win here will give them three points and the right to challenge for the Grand Championship. \u00a0Loser goes back to zero. \u00a0N\u00f8kken is a\u00a0member of the ramshackle new incarnation of the once-dominant BDK; Ophidian\u00a0and his regular tag partner Amasis are\u00a0time travellers from ancient Egypt. \u00a0Ophidian is having a crisis of faith in his gods and is looking for a win here as a sign.<\/p>\n

The match:\u00a0<\/em>Power versus speed – Ophidian outruns N\u00f8kken for a while, but once\u00a0N\u00f8kken gets his hands on him\u00a0the beatdown begins. \u00a0Ophidian\u00a0kicks out a few times, and\u00a0makes a\u00a0comeback to hit his signature moves, getting 2 with a top rope knee drop. \u00a0Ophidian tries for\u00a0his Death Grip submission, but can’t get it on, and\u00a0N\u00f8kken piledrivers him for the clean pin in 8:00.<\/p>\n

The upshot:\u00a0<\/em>N\u00f8kken gets his title\u00a0match in March, so he gets to dominate an established guy with a clean win. \u00a0Unfortunately, as we’ll see when we get to March, the title match itself turns out to be a bit of an anticlimax. \u00a0As for\u00a0Ophidian, he doesn’t get his sign from the gods,\u00a0but hey, the Portal\u00a0still have 2 points towards a tag title shot – maybe that’ll work out?\u00a0\u00a0We’ll pick that up\u00a0in February.<\/p>\n

– Backstage promo: the BDK celebrate.<\/p>\n

3. \u00a0The Colony: Xtreme Force (Missile Assault Ant & Arctic Rescue Ant) v. N_R_G (Race Jaxon & Hype Rockwell).<\/strong><\/p>\n

Backstory:<\/em> None, really.<\/p>\n

The match:<\/em>\u00a0Squash match. \u00a0Rockwell pins Arctic with a spinning backbreaker\u00a0in\u00a01:12. \u00a0Missile is disgusted by his partner’s performance.<\/p>\n

The upshot:<\/em>\u00a0An N_R_G push begins, apparently. \u00a0Outright squashes are rare on Chikara shows, so they carry some weight. \u00a0The Xtreme Force’s\u00a0story has yet to be followed up, so hopefully they get back to it soon.<\/p>\n

4. \u00a0Juan Francisco De Coronado v. UltraMantis Black.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Backstory:\u00a0<\/em>On the last show, UltraMantis’\u00a0followers Hallowicked and Frightmare turned on him after being zapped with the mind-controlling Eye of Tyr by the departing Delirious. \u00a0UltraMantis says\u00a0the Eye has been damaged and its effects are now\u00a0unpredictable. \u00a0He hasn’t give up on his cohorts, and won’t rest until he has answers. \u00a0(We’ll see how long that lasts. \u00a0This\u00a0is<\/em> a guy who bills himself as “great and devious”, after all. \u00a0He’s very much a tecnico in name only.)<\/p>\n

The match:<\/em>\u00a0Derek Sabato – a corrupt referee who was reinstated for mysterious reasons on the last show, and also refereed UltraMantis’ last match – comes out to officiate and is heavily booed. \u00a0He calls the match straight, but the commentary makes clear that he isn’t to be trusted and that we should all keep an eye on him. \u00a0A solid, straightforward singles match –\u00a0back and forth, with JFDC working\u00a0on the arm. \u00a0 Mantis kicks out of JFDC’s German suplex,\u00a0and pins him clean with the\u00a0Praying Mantis Bomb\u00a0in\u00a08:40.<\/p>\n

The upshot:<\/em>\u00a0Good match. \u00a0Despite the loss of his stable, Mantis has now won two straight matches, so a third win will give him a title shot. \u00a0We’ll come to that in March. \u00a0Subtle booking, because a lot of the storyline interest is in what\u00a0doesn’t\u00a0<\/em>happen – i.e., Sabato calls the match straight, Mantis doesn’t fall apart without his stable, and Hallowicked doesn’t run in. \u00a0Sabato has yet to re-appear this year (unless they used him on the UK tour), so his plot seems to be on hiatus.<\/p>\n

5. \u00a0The BDK (Jakob Hammermeier & Pinkie Sanchez) & Soldier Ant v. The Colony (Fire Ant, Silver Ant & Worker Ant).<\/strong><\/p>\n

Backstory:<\/em>\u00a0Soldier Ant used to be in the Colony, but now he’s seemingly a\u00a0brainwashed cyborg who (under circumstances yet to be revealed) has fallen under the command\u00a0of BDK leader Jakob Hammermeier. \u00a0But Jakob’s actual control over Soldier is a bit erratic. \u00a0Soldier is bitter over\u00a0being replaced in the Colony by Worker Ant. \u00a0Oh, and the other BDK member, Pinkie Sanchez, infiltrated the Colony years ago, so they don’t like him either.<\/p>\n

The match:<\/em>\u00a0Fire Ant\u00a0doesn’t want to\u00a0fight Soldier (though his Colony teammates are more willing). \u00a0Soldier is perfectly happy to fight the Colony, but isn’t exactly co-operating with his own team-mates – he hurls Pinkie out of the ring whenever they tag, and it’s only Pinkie and Jakob who actually muster\u00a0any coherent double-teaming. \u00a0But Soldier’s powerful enough to outweigh that. \u00a0Fire\u00a0and Soldier are\u00a0left together at the end, but Soldier starts wavering when Fire salutes him. \u00a0Jakob immediately hustles Soldier out of the ring, then submits Worker with a modified Scorpion Deathlock\u00a0for the clean (if somewhat out of nowhere) heel win in 20:27.<\/p>\n

Upshot:<\/em>\u00a0Too long – there’s a lot of\u00a0long-term storyline set-up in there, but not enough immediate story to need 20 minutes. \u00a0It also\u00a0suffers badly\u00a0from the show’s dodgy\u00a0production values, which has the crowd noise way too low in the mix, sapping the atmosphere. \u00a0Soldier will be stuck with the BDK\u00a0going forward, as we’ll see, while the Colony\u00a0will shortly find themselves tied up in other stories for now, so that explains\u00a0why\u00a0the trios match is being done here.<\/p>\n

6. \u00a0Kevin Condron (w\/Troll) v. Eddie Kingston.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Backstory:<\/em>\u00a0This is the in-ring Chikara debut of Kevin Condron. \u00a0He used to be\u00a0Kid Cyclone, a trainee who led a group of trainees\u00a0against the Flood\u00a0last year, and got them all killed\u00a0by Deucalion. \u00a0Kingston, at that point, was allied with the\u00a0Flood and\u00a0had a minor part in that exchange; being essentially a bastard, he is unrepentant. \u00a0At the last show, Cyclone\u00a0attacked Kingston with a wrench, then voluntarily unmasked to show his\u00a0contempt for\u00a0Chikara’s lucha-derived values, which he now sees as bizarre and hypocritical. \u00a0\u00a0Condron\u00a0also liberated the Flood’s prisoner Lithuanian Snow Troll; the Troll is now tagging along as Condron’s followed, calling himself “Troll”, and wearing new gear which is basically a sadder, dishevelled version of his old costume.<\/p>\n

Kingston\u00a0won his last three matches but can’t challenge for the Grand Championship on this show because Chuck Taylor is first in the queue. \u00a0Kingston is risking his three points by taking this match (if he loses, he’s back to zero\u00a0and forfeits his title shot), but he’s\u00a0no rocket scientist and he wants to get his hands\u00a0on the\u00a0guy who hit him with a\u00a0wrench.<\/p>\n

The match:<\/em>\u00a0Pure angle, basically. \u00a0Condron heels it up to the nines, tries to encourage Kingston to hit him with a chair (so that he wins by DQ and Kingston loses his title shot); tries to get a draw by brawling outside the ring; hits a grand total of one offensive move in the whole match; and finally takes advantage of a ref bump to feign a low blow and get Kingston DQ’d at 5:39,\u00a0Guerrero-style.<\/p>\n

Upshot:\u00a0<\/em>A lot of people were treating Condron as an anti-hero going into this show, so this match is clearly intended to send a clear marker that, no, he’s a heel. \u00a0Not a stellar in-ring debut, but it wasn’t\u00a0designed\u00a0to be; part of the\u00a0angle is that Condron is deliberately trying to get cheap wins as part of his show of contempt for the promotion. \u00a0He can’t do deliberately cheap finishes forever, but I can see that there’s potential heat in building up to the point where Condron really has to wrestle a proper match for once. \u00a0As for\u00a0Troll, he hasn’t appeared again since this show, but I’m assuming he’ll be back, not least because his former faction-mate the Estonian Thunderfrog is returning later in the year. \u00a0(We’ll come to that in future shows.)<\/p>\n

7. \u00a0Hallowicked & Frightmare v. The Batiri (Kodama & Obariyon).<\/strong><\/p>\n

Backstory:<\/em>\u00a0See match 4 above. \u00a0This is the first time we’ve seen Hallowicked and Frightmare since they got zapped –\u00a0what’s their condition?<\/p>\n

The match:<\/em>\u00a0Hallowicked and Frightmare come out with weird new music and\u00a0bizarre new gear – a sort of\u00a0sickly version of their old\u00a0costume\u00a0in red white and black. \u00a0They’re carrying a banner with a weird symbol on it.\u00a0\u00a0They\u00a0wrestle more aggressively than before, but they’re still working as a team and aiming to win, not just to hurt. \u00a0\u00a0Mantis, on commentary, seems\u00a0troubled by the idea that\u00a0he’s responsible for all this – but also quite\u00a0impressed. \u00a0Good fast-paced match, even if any semblance of actually obeying the tag rules breaks down after a while. \u00a0A\u00a0combination of teamwork and occasional cheating gives\u00a0Hallowicked and his mini-me the upper hand. \u00a0Frightmare gets the clean(ish) pin with a crucifix\u00a0in 13:02.<\/p>\n

Upshot:<\/em>\u00a0Strong debut for Hallowicked and Frightmare’s new gimmick. \u00a0The Batiri will wind up being allied with Mantis in March (whether they like it or not), so this gives Hallowicked a head start on claiming that he’s beaten all Mantis’s allies.<\/p>\n

8. \u00a0CHIKARA Grand Championship:\u00a0Icarus\u00a0\u00a9 v Chuck Taylor.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Backstory:<\/em> Taylor\u00a0and Icarus used to be teammates in the rudo faction F.I.S.T.. \u00a0Icarus has reformed now, thanks to the existential threat to Chikara posed by\u00a0Titor and the Flood.<\/p>\n

The match:<\/em>\u00a0Taylor is in outright cheating rudo mode – though he’s also more serious than usual. \u00a0At first Icarus wrestles clean, but after a while he\u00a0cheats right back. \u00a0It’s retaliation, but after a while he\u00a0responds to Taylor’s powder-throwing by producing his own powder, which he clearly brought with him to the ring in the first place. \u00a0Icarus\u00a0gets a visionary clean pin during a ref bump, and kicks out of Chuck’s finisher (and a low blow), but ultimately\u00a0wins by whacking Chuck in the head with the title belt (which draws boos), then\u00a0submitting him with the CHIKARA Special in 11:40.<\/p>\n

Upshot:<\/em>\u00a0Interesting but not completely successful; I think they intended it to play mostly as a throwback to Icarus’s rudo days but\u00a0the degree of his cheating seemed to confuse the crowd. \u00a0I suspect the longer-term plan here is that with the\u00a0threat of the Flood behind him, Icarus is starting to backslide. \u00a0That would also play into the story that previous champion Eddie Kingston became obsessed with the belt the longer he held it. \u00a0(The title belt was commissioned when the evil Titor Corporation were in control, and there’s a fan theory\u00a0that it might be Not\u00a0Quite Right.)<\/p>\n

Bottom line:<\/strong>\u00a0 Largely\u00a0decent matches (leaving aside the squash and the Kingston\/Condron angle), and some notable storyline points, particularly the debut of Hallowicked and Frightmare’s new gimmick. \u00a0But you\u00a0do have to put up with some production values that are likely to test the patience of someone who isn’t already a fan. \u00a0Still, if you’re following Season 15, a pretty key\u00a0show, as you’d expect.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Preamble:\u00a0Okay, so. \u00a0I did a\u00a0preview of this show, the first Chikara show of 2015, back in January, and then never came back to the topic. \u00a0But I figured it’d be interesting to look back on all this year’s shows a few months behind,\u00a0to see where they ended up going. \u00a0It’s going to be more of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3005","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wrestling"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3005","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3005"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3005\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3016,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3005\/revisions\/3016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3005"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3005"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3005"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}