PWG: Is Your Body Ready? Review

The Unbreakable Fucking Machines vs. The RockNESS Monsters

A lot better than I was expecting. Cage and Elgin seemed to have finally grasped the fact that they are much bigger and stronger than most people they wrestle and they start wrestling like it. You had them showing off how strong they are and most of the offense from Goodtime and Yuma came from double team moves. They size dynamic was perfect and the match had some cool moves. There were some flaws (like when Yuma was able to shove Cage away from his corner and into a different when the size difference between the 2 is huge) but for the most part I had no complaints. If Cage and Elgin wrestle like this more often I can see myself enjoying them a lot. Probably the best Elgin match I’ve seen in a very long time.

***¼

Davey Richards vs. Kyle O’Reilly

Another match that I ended up enjoying a lot more than I was expecting. I’m sure this type of match would get old after a while but when you haven’t seen guys work with a more shoot style approach it really is refreshing. They had the whole student vs. teacher thing going here and you could see how they were constantly one step ahead of each other. Some of the stuff they did was just really impressive. The stiff strikes were fun but it was these amazing sequences of moves that they were able to bust out that made me want to pay attention. I would have liked to have seen either guy have more of a defined strategy in the match but other than that I don’t have many complaints.

***½

Dojo Bros vs. Chuck Taylor and Johnny Gargano

Another very fun match but not one I would call spectacular by any means. There was a pretty long feeling out process here as neither team was able to really control the match for very long.They did get a lengthy control segment in on Gargano which was good. Their stuff looked good and when they kicked things into high gear it was pretty awesome. I want to say that it was your “standard” PWG match but that doesn’t really give the match any justice because it was pretty great to watch.

***½

Kevin Steen vs. Drake Younger

I’m struggling to come up with the right combination of words to describe how good this really was. The dynamic was just perfect as Steen heeled it up as soon as the match started and he kept it up for most of the match. There aren’t many things better than Steen talking shit to fans while he’s in control of the match. Steen dominated the match, talked shit, cheated, and nearly killed Drake a few times. Drake didn’t get much offense in but that fit so perfectly with the match as he was playing the underdog all the way. While his offense was limited it was effective as whenever he had the chance it seemed he was either trying to kill Steen or himself or both with the moves he was doing. He really had the “kill or be killed” mentality going and it worked. These guys were just thrown together in a match because they’re both good and they killed it. In another universe I can only imagine how good a blood feud between Younger and Steen would be. Still, we got one match between them and it kicked a ton of ass. The interference and unclean ending didn’t bother me too much and enough happened between the finish and Cole’s involvement that I wasn’t too annoyed with it. Great match that we probably won’t ever see again.

***¾

The Young Bucks vs. AR Fox and Samuray Del Sol

Del Sol was on his A game and the Bucks are the best tag team that I’ve seen in a very long time. Fox is also much more tolerable in tag matches where he can disguise him coming in and doing a bunch of crazy moves as being the guy that comes in on the hot tag. You get a really good chunk of time where the Bucks are in total control of the match and they really do have some amazing control segments as they mix old school heel tactics with high flying moves perfectly. Del Sol and Fox were at different times the face in peril and I thought both were pretty good at that role against the Bucks. Once the hot tag was made things went crazy and you could see the momentum slowly slipping away from the Bucks. The Bucks just have this ability to make me feel like they have no chance at winning a match when the other team is on the offensive. My biggest complaint is that the match peaked and they kept going a lot longer. They tried to reach the same peak again and while they came close they didn’t. Also there was a terrible elbow exchange between Fox and one of the Bucks that just looked terrible. Other than that this was a blast to watch and furthers my belief that the Bucks are the best and makes me sad that Del Sol is already off the indy scene.

****¼

Iron Man Match for the PWG World Championship

Adam Cole(c) vs. Sami Callihan

It was really cool to see this because I’ve seen these two go from having opening matches on Evolve cards, to main eventing CZW, and now they were on the biggest indy stage main eventing. They have amazing chemistry and they always have good matches and they delivered once again, and hopefully for the last time on the indies but not for the last time ever. The beginning stretch was fun as they traded moves and control for brief periods of time. I was actually surprised that Cole didn’t just end up having the shit kicked out of him for about 10 minutes to start. Cole naturally cheats to take the lead and from that point I thought this was worked brilliantly.

Look, 60 minutes is a really long time to have a match and it’s not easy to keep people interested for the whole time. They were able to keep it interesting here though because they played around with the score. The match dynamic would totally change based on who was winning or if there was a draw. By constantly changing it the match was always fresh. Cole in winning the match and heeling it up and wasting time was awesome as was a desperate Callihan. When things were tied it was also great to see as both guys had the sense of urgency. And it was nice to see Cole play the aggressor. All of the different match dynamics worked really well. Throw in some good moves and a pace that is just insanely impressive to keep for 60 minutes and the match is pretty amazing. The 60 minutes, particularly the first 30, just blew by.

There were some problems that I had with this though. Cole did a lot of goofy stuff to get heat and make things entertaining. I was fine with that because he always did it when he was winning. Callihan however was doing goofy stuff when he was behind. I would be a little annoyed when he was down a fall with 20 minutes left and he teased a People’s Elbow after Cole had just done one. Yeah it’s kind of amusing to see but he shouldn’t be doing it when there should be a real sense of urgency for him to get a win. There were a few instances of that really got under my skin but the fact that this was 60 minutes it seems more forgivable that there were only a few instances that I thought were poorly worked.

The ending makes you want to rip out your hair but in a good way. Cole running away with 2 minutes left just makes you want to hate him and kill him. It’s the biggest piece of shit thing to do and it was just so aggravating. So now that you want to kill Cole for being a bitch he ends up locked in the Stretch Muffler with a minute left and he holds out to win. It’s just infuriating that he acts like the chicken shit heel and almost escapes from the match but when he’s forced to compete you have to admit that he’s really good as well. So yeah it was frustrating in the best possible way.
****¼

I loved the show. The 2 main events delivered and there was nothing that I disliked about the undercard at all. Lots of variety on a good card that’s top to bottom. I enjoyed even the guys that I normally don’t like.