NWA Into The Fire (December 2019 PPV)

(So there was an earlier, incomplete version of this musings that published automatically and I completely forgot about it. The end result was a rough draft of a musings with some Wiki results copied and pasted on there. So here's the completed version. Sorry to those who saw the earlier version and wondered what the fuck was up with this guy. My bad.)

So... this was on the cheap and I figured why not? I enjoyed the three free PPVs that NWA provided and so might as well chip in a couple bucks to check out the rest of the shows.

Into The Fire took place at the studios where they shot their episodes of NWA Powerrrrrrr, which means a small studio set modeled after the old Mid-Atlantic techwood studios from thirty plus years ago. It's a nice setting for a weekly studio wrestling show, but not a particularly inspired look for a paid PPV event.

Eli Drake defeated Ken Anderson in a pretty short but perfectly acceptable little match with a neat finish involving Anderson going for a sunset bomb, but Drake just drops and rolls him up for the win. Fun opener to get me in the mood.

Thunder Rosa defeated Tasha Steelz. Rosa continues to beat on Tasha until some other girl shows up to eat a shoulder breaker from Rosa. I don't recall if this was Rosa's debut, but she got a strong start... as any star you'd want to push hard should.

The Question Mark defeated Trevor Murdoch in a short but otherwise fun little match. Mark might come across as goofy for some, but I don't know... he seems fun in short bursts. Key word being short.

NWA World Tag-Team Champions The Rock & Roll Express defeated The Wild Cards in a five-minute match to retain the titles. This was a thing that happened and I don't necessarily mean that in a bad way. The Express may be in their sixties, but the crowd is still pretty much into them, so you can't fault them for that much. The Wild Cards are a couple guys. Not much else I could add there.

Allysin Kay and ODB (replacing Kay's original partner whose name I don't recall, but I do remember that she got beat up, thus needing the partner switch) defeated Melina and Marti Belle. It was slightly longer than five minutes; I'll give it this much. Beyond that... eh, I haven't watched enough TNA to care about ODB, so this really did nothing for me. This was a thing that happened... which is what I usually say about matches like this.

Aron Stevens (with the Mark Of Questions) defeated NWA National Champion Colt Cabana and Ricky Starks in a three-way to win the title. Lasted about twelve minutes and for what it was, this was pretty good. Each of these guys got to showcase their stuff and it turned out great. Ricky Starks shined despite not winning the title and that's why he got a job in AEW months down the road.

NWA Woeld Heavyweight Champion Nick Aldis defeated James Storm in a best-of-three-falls to retain the title. I would've made a joke about Mickie James and trains, but I already played that card when I did the Pop-Up show that also featured this main event. This was contested in best-of-three falls, with Storm winning the first via pin, Aldis winning the second fall via pin, and Aldis eventually winning via submission when Storm paased out to the move. Then Aldis cuts a promo and out comes Marty Scrull to tease our next PPV main event feud.

Into The Fire was an interesting show to say the least. There's some good matches. ... All that said, my only gripe is that they held this show at the same studio where they filmed their NWA POWERRR show, which gave the impression that I had paid $20 for an episode of Powerrr. I realize you gotta work within your means, but if you want your shows to feel special - even the ones with terrible names - you've got to make them look special.