By Liam Byrne @tvtimelimit
The interest and excitement for Mercury Rising lived or died based on your interest in whether you fancied seeing the same EVOLVE wrestlers from the 102 and 103 shows, alongside a smattering of other WWN talent, or so it seemed. As a man who enjoyed the two EVOLVE events, and with this being dubbed a ‘Supershow’, I was happy to chance my arm and give this a look with a main event of Matt Riddle against Will Ospreay, alongside a selection of other titles from across the WWN Network.
There has been talk about ‘the six man tradition’, with these shows offering up a three on three contest that has often showcased some of the brightest and best upcoming talents. Whether this is actually the case is not really within my wheelhouse, but it does give me another chance to see AR Fox as he teams with DJZ and Trey Miguel to take on Austin Theory, Travis Banks and Zachary Wentz. Banks was injured enough to miss EVOLVE, but is available for the show later in the evening, so you can only assume it wasn’t too serious.
With tags not necessary, it is always liable to be action packed and hard to do justice on paper, with each exchange between duos in the opening moments allowing a shine section to give the fans a sense of what they are about, finishing with DJZ using an Indian deathlock on Banks whilst suplexing Theory for extra torque. DJZ is the first man to fly, followed quickly by Wentz and Miguel before an amazing inverted springboard senton by Fox takes out all of the rest. The multiman aspect allows us to see some innovative ‘stacked’ moves, with Theory getting a DDT off the second ropes after a chain reaction of reverse DDTs is set off by a neckbreaker by Miguel on Banks. Banks takes control with his kicks on Fox and DJZ, but an attempt to hit Slice of Heaven is cut off by Miguel, who lands a 619 on Banks as he is tucked into the turnbuckle.
Bodies continue to fly around the ring, with a succession of moves ending with Fox hitting a rolling crusher on Wentz for a nearfall. Fox then makes the mistake of trying to hit a coffin drop on Theory, who reverses it into Three Seconds Around the World in an impressive feat of strength. DJZ has the better of Theory, only to get caught by a Banks Slice of Heaven and Kiwi Krusher, who in turn is caught with Meteora knees by Miguel. Miguel then takes a nasty bump on a springboard crusher by Wentz. Lo Mein Pain by Fox halts Wentz’s march, with a triple pin after a swanton bomb needing Banks and Theory to break the hold. Moments later, as Fox and Miguel dive to ringside, DJZ hits a 450 on Wentz for the pin. This was a spotfest as expected with little in the way of structure, but it did its job. Fox continued to do himself justice, whilst DJZ was better than he’d looked all week up until now.
The next match involves Jason Kincaid, but after their altercation yesterday, Jarek 1:20 has more success this time with his attack as he pops Kincaid in the mouth with a set of brass knuckles, sends the referee into the ringpost and ends up handcuffing Kincaid to the guard rail. It takes a while, but as Jarek 1:20 is choking Kincaid, some referees come down to ringside to halt the attack. This is one of those situations where the need to develop a storyline usurps the Wrestlemania Weekender as I’m sure this would make more sense if you followed EVOLVE.
A very exciting match is due to follow as Munenori Sawa takes on the former EVOLVE Champion, Zack Sabre Jr. Sabre Jr. offers a handshake pre-match; Sawa slaps him around the face. Unsurprisingly, the match hits the mat almost instantly, but after some real struggle on the canvas, the match goes to ringside and they begin to blast each other with slaps and strikes. Back in the ring, Sabre Jr. manages to lock on an abdominal stretch, though each man has a chance to reverse it as they switch several times. Both men attempt to apply leglocks whilst Sabre Jr. used slaps and Sawa kicks to take control. Neither comes out on top, but Sawa takes advantage with a lightning fast hand combination and jumping kick to the head.
Slaps and kicks (with one Sawa headbutt) take place on the apron now, whilst the two men also trade submissions including a rope-assisted Octopus hold for a brief moment by Sabre Jr. A misguided attempt to kick Sawa off the apron allows the Battlearts veteran to apply a dragon screw legwhip. Both of these spots are repeated in the ring, with Sawa following his with a shining wizard for a nearfall and a big Ohtani punch. An impressive reversal of a kick allows Sabre Jr. to take Sawa down to the canvas and stretch him like a rubber band. Sawa manages to get the ropes with his foot, before Sabre Jr. has to struggle to break an Octopus Hold with a rope break of his own. Neither man can completely lock on a cross armbreaker, but Sabre Jr. can apply Orienteering with Napalm Death moments later for the submission victory – he also finds time to flip a double bird at someone at ringside post-match. A hard fought contest that had some excellent counter wrestling from bell to bell.
The next match has Tracy Williams and Dominic Garrini teaming together, but without Stokely Hathaway as he decides a New Orleans Streetfight might be too dangerous for him. Their opponents are The WorkHorsemen, Anthony Henry and James Drake, as well as The End. The stream cuts out a bit and we come back to Henry taking out Parrow with a tope con hilo, before a rolling senton by Garrini wipes out everyone. Some brawling around the ring follows, before Williams grabs a table, seemingly unaware of Garrini getting booted about in the ring. The End are keeping themselves outside the ring, only for them to jump both teams as the stream plays up again. Garrini introduces a ladder to take out Odinson, whilst Williams takes out both WorkHorsemen by playing catch with the ladder. Drennan, the manager for the End, interjects himself into the contest, only to get absolutely squashed by a Drake corner cannonball amongst a sequence of moves.
With the table set-up at ringside ever looming, a collision between Odinson and Parrow helps Williams powerbomb the latter on the table…which shoots out from under him without breaking. Odinson has more luck in the ring as he is double suplexed through a table that breaks. As the WorkHorsemen take control, a pretty sickening spot follows as the WorkHorsemen trap Garrini’s toes in the ladder before wailing away with chairs – I have a thing about toes breaking, so sue me. We get duelling powerbomb/superplexes as the End return to the ring, before hitting Henry and Williams with the Supercollider. This isn’t enough, but they follow it up with an Odinson pounce on Garrini through another table. It takes Drake armed with a chair to take out Drennan once more and halt an End double team move. Drake lands the moonsault, but it is Henry who stops the count, telling his partner for them to end this now.
This time, Henry hits a double stomp on Odinson onto a table, which doesn’t break again, though collapse a bit onto Parrow who is underneath. It is enough for the win, but a worse visual than the big Drake moonsault. Like the other multi team tag matches EVOLVE have offered this week, it felt fine, but scrappy and inconsequential. I’m sure if you followed this more, the defeat of the End might have meant more, but it rang a little hollow after their victory yesterday. No-one really got over in any of these matches.
A title match is up next as SHINE champion, LuFisto, meets Holidead. There are some more technical issues as this match takes place, with audio and television glitches that make it almost impossible to review adequately. LuFisto hits a cannonball on Holidead in the tree of woe position and Holidead misses a top rope legdrop to set up a finish that is also missed due to issues with the audio/video. A real shame. These are fixed for the post-match promo by LuFisto in which she makes it clear she doesn’t care who she will defend the title against at Shine 50, only to be confronted by Kimber Lee.
Daisuke Sekimoto gets another ‘dream match’ ticked off of his docket as he faces off against Keith Lee in the next contest. Sekimoto is 0-2 in his US excursion, but Lee isn’t going to be a pushover at all. After Sekimoto tries to control Lee with a side headlock, we get shoulderblocks that I think are going to be repeated ad nauseum, only for Lee to bust out a huracanrana! Sekimoto cannot match strikes with Lee, eating a double chop to the chest and big punch to the mouth for his troubles. Several more punches have Sekimoto out on his feet, but he is still standing which is impressive in and of itself. Sekimoto even manages to halt Lee’s usual strike combination that ends with double chops by launching a headbutt at the big man’s stomach, before avoiding Ground Zero and hitting a slam that is raw strength.
Lee escapes an abdominal stretch with a hiptoss, but is still struggling a little from the sudden burst of offense. A shoulderblock gets Lee a two count, yet it is Sekimoto who then has the fans on their feet as he hits a vertical suplex on Lee! A top rope dropkick scores Sekimoto a nearfall, only for Lee to turn the tide with a big crossbody moments later. The stream becomes choppy again, coming back to Sekimoto hitting a back body drop on what might be an attempted Spirit Bomb, a move that Lee then hits seconds later for a very nearfall. Lee misses a Doomsault, Sekimoto hits a headbutt, traps an arm and hits a beautiful German suplex for the win. He can barely celebrate before he is jumped by Nick Gage, who also wipes out the referee and several officials. This seems primarily to make a statement before Style Battle, though the audio quality makes his promo hard to hear. The actual match was good, although probably more about the big moments than the cohesive whole.
Two title matches left on the show, with the EVOLVE Tag Team Championships up for grabs first as RINGKAMPF battle Chris Dickinson and Jaka for the gold. Thatcher and Jaka start the contest for their respective teams, with Jaka trying to use his feet to avoid the grappling of Thatcher, so Thatcher just punches him several times instead. WALTER unleashes the first chops early, whilst RINGKAMPF are able to isolate Jaka by keeping the fresh man in. Not only are they controlling Jaka, but Thatcher and WALTER both take shots at Dickinson in order to wind him up, WALTER booting him before landing a vertical splash on Jaka. Several kicks to Thatcher finally allow Jaka to make the tag, leading to Thatcher getting stuck in the champions’ corner with them gaining a measure of revenge by utilising quick tags.
After an attempted double back suplex sees Thatcher roll out the back, a belly to belly suplex on Dickinson allows him to make the hot tag to WALTER. Chops, clotheslines and suplexes have the big Austrian in complete control, wiping out both champions on his own. It is Dickinson who stands up to WALTER’s chops this time, firing back with his own kicks and seemingly enjoying the challenge. All four men end up on the canvas after Jaka and Thatcher also trade strikes, before an enziguri by Dickenson allows him to hit WALTER with a falcon arrow. This isn’t enough for the win; neither is WALTER’s powerbomb moments later.
Jaka ends up needing to use a big splash off of the top rope to save the tag team titles as Dickenson looks to be fading in WALTER’s gojira clutch. Thatcher sets up for the butterfly suplex on Jaka, yet Dickenson saves him, the champions hit the Death Trap stacked chokeslam and that is enough to retain the titles. A very good match that built well to the WALTER hot tag, before having some believable nearfalls. Tracy Williams joins the celebration, grabbing the microphone to talk about the ‘elephant in the room’. Williams talks about Hathaway running Catch Point into the ground and fires him. Hathaway makes it clear that he owns Catch Point, so fires Williams instead! As there is confusion in the ring, Dominic Garrini runs down to the ring and hits a low blow on Williams, before Jaka and Dickinson rip Williams’ shirt off of him and leave with Hathaway.
It is main event time as Matt Riddle makes his second defense of the EVOLVE Championship by taking on Will Ospreay. Once again, there are no rope breaks allowed, but that isn’t the immediate concern for either man as the match begins at a frenetic pace that sees Riddle no-sell a German suplex, land a big knee to the face and then get hit with a suicide dive after Ospreay landed on his feet following a Riddle German suplex. Ospreay even teases an apron Spanish fly, though ridiculously takes a German suplex on the apron instead! As they return to the ring, Riddle uses several forearms and an exploder that dumps him on his injured neck. Rolling gutwrench suplexes can’t help the injury much either. However, a handspring spinkick allows Ospreay a way back into the contest, landing a springboard forearm and a standing shooting star press for his first nearfall.
A superkick to the back of the head and an inverted DDT also target Riddle’s neck, but a powerbomb and a big knee strike to the face quickly have Riddle back on top until a European uppercut blocks a Superman punch. A Cheeky Nandos set-up sees the move avoided by Riddle, who turns it into a sleeper and a release German suplex, with the Bromission applied seconds later. This leads to another ridiculous spot where Ospreay climbs the turnbuckle with Riddle on his back, with both men taking a huge bump to the canvas. There is what appears to be legitimate concern for Ospreay as several officials hit the ring, though clearly the challenger is fine to continue moments later.
Once again we get Riddle’s slight variation on the tombstone, but Ospreay is able to kick out at 2.9. Riddle rips the tape off of Ospreay’s injured neck before targeting it with stomps and a senton as he receives some boos from the crowd. A knee strike has Ospreay kick out at one this time and the crowd are behind him now, with a huge pop as Ospreay turns a piledriver attempt into a triangle choke and then drops the champion with a short lariat. They bite on a sitout powerbomb as a potential finish, but an Os Cutter attempt sees him jump back into the Bromission for the tap. Whilst the match against Sekimoto saw Riddle reign in some of his OTT tendencies, this match with Ospreay was wild and delivered, emphasised by garnering the biggest pops of the weekend. I’m not sure about playing off of the injury so explicitly, but that’s my only real concern.
Five shows down, this is probably the best show for the final two matches alone. Outside of those, there was a lot to be impressed with, although it was a real shame to effectively lose the woman’s match to audio/visual issues. Lee/Sekimoto had some really big spots, whilst the last two matches were very strong title contests, and that doesn’t even include Sabre Jr. versus Sawa. Definitely check them out, if nothing else.
