(8) Sting def. D.O.C.
Rating: D
I like Sting, but if he never wrestles in his own TNA-brand shirt again, you’ll hear no complaints from me. Dropping the “Insane Icon” shtick was enough to get me excited about Sting’s return, but I think dropping from the ceiling with a trench coat and a baseball bat would have been about 10x more effective on January 3rd. Particularly because the damn main event was inside of a steel cage…
Your basic Sting vs. Big Man match here. I still haven’t seen DOC do anything but punch people and use headbutts. Come to think of it, that’s pretty much true of Mike Knox, Devon and all the other members of Aces & Eights too. Another loss for the group. Another post-match attack thwarted by Bully Ray and his super chain of doom.
Sometimes I wonder if anybody from TNA reads these reviews and just assumes I’m another “smark” fan who hates their product. Couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact, I’m the closest thing to a “TNA guy” that Wrestlezone has ever had, so believe me when I say I wish I didn’t have to come down so hard on these angles. I don’t hate the Aces & Eights. I didn’t even mind the Mike Knox and Luke Gallows reveals. This group could have worked regardless of who is behind all of the masks, because at the end of the day a good story can be told effectively regardless of its participants. The key is a constant flow of progress and forward motion; neither of which TNA has had for about six months.
The worst part is that I think TNA believes it’s still moving along nicely with the Aces & Eights story. You can see it in the way they’ve done NOTHING DIFFERENT since they started. But at this point, the horse is dead. They’re not even beating the proverbial dead horse anymore; they passed up that mile marker back at Bound for Glory. No, at this point they’ve murdered the horse, beaten it’s body unrecognizable, and buried it in the dirt. However, that wasn’t enough, so they exhumed the corpse, cremated it, used the ashes as protein powder and are now trying to vend their dead horse smoothies on the side of the road in Orlando.
Harsh? Yes. But truth hurts, and while I may have wildly exaggerated my point on purpose, the fact remains that TNA has been doing the EXACT SAME THING every single week, and at every single PPV since the beginning of this angle.
DO. SOMETHING. DIFFERENT.
