The Wrestling Society Xperience - WSX Episode Four (2/27/07)
The One With the Promotion-Killing Fireball!
Wrestling Society X - Episode Four
Matt Sydal vs. Scorpio Sky
It's the battle of guys who beat Matt Classic on WSXtra! A bit of an odd match as both guys have been presented as heels, but other than a few exceptions, the face/heel divide isn't exactly clear in Wrestling Society X.
As always, Sydal has Lizzy Valentine with him.
Speaking of Valentine, I'm honestly surprised that MTV didn't use more female talent for WSX, considering that the show was devised with the intention of capturing the young male demographic. I'm not sure if it would have made a difference to the show’s survivability, but given MTV's history, I'm astounded that they didn’t at least have Lacey do more stuff on the main show.
Sky tries to offer an autographed photo to Lizzy, but she crumples it up! Rude!
We get a shoving match to begin as the fellas from Clipse make their way to the announce booth. Sydal gets a sweet headscissors, but Sky returns fire with a hurricanrana. Sky gets a quebradora for two as the announcers continue to push the idea of Lizzy being a liability for Sydal. She distracts Sky, and Sydal soon gets a moonsault into a leg-assisted inverted DDT for a near-fall. Sydal hits a clothesline into the corner and fires off some kicks. Sky comes back with a dropkick and a huge tope con hilo!
Back in, Lizzy grabs Scorp’s leg, allowing Sydal to hit a beautiful standing moonsault for another near-fall. Sky gets a high-angle spinebuster, but Sydal soon hits a top rope moonsault belly-to-belly for the three!
Post-match, Lizzy writes “H8R” in lipstick (or “Lizpstick” as the announcers call it) on Sky’s back. Also rude!
The Take: Really fun little match here, with both guys hitting some impressive spots, especially Sydal. Really dig that moonsault belly-to-belly Sydal does, and his execution is silky-smooth. The match also furthers the Sydal/Valentine dynamic. Not a bad way to kick off the show.
The Vibes: Fairly strong with this one.
We recap Jack Evans beating El Hombre Blanco Enmascarado on last week’s WSX and him kicking Marcus Riot in the testicles on WSXtra. It’s Evans vs. Riot on TONIGHT’S WSXTRA!
Backstage, Ruckus and Babi Slymm admire their newly blinged-out ladder, complete with super-cheesy sparkle effects. Amazing.
Keepin’ It Gangsta head out to the ring as we are DEVIATING FROM THE SCRIPT! They challenge any tag team to a sporting contest GOOD SIR, and it’s answered by That 70’s Team.
Keepin’ It Gangsta vs. That 70’s Team
One of the guys from Clipse astutely points out the tassels on Disco Machine’s ass, and likens the 70’s guys to “the Blues Brothers and Tenacious D”.
Joey Ryan slathers himself in baby oil, as does Disco. Ruckus hits some ridiculous high-flying moves, including a flipping kick that sends Ryan scrambling for his inhaler. Babi Slymm checks in and drops a big elbow after Ruckus hits a double-stomp. Ryan comes back with a jawbreaker and a dropkick, then tags in Disco. The Machine (Disco, not Brian Cage) gets a victory roll (with help from Ryan) for two, then hits a dancing flying headscissors. That 70’s Team briefly double-team Slymm, but Slymm comes back by *sigh* pulling down Joey’s trunks, slapping his ass, and making Ryan think that Disco smacked him. Yup.
Ruckus tags back in and fends off both guys. Razzle Dazzle (extra fancy handspring elbow) on Joey, then he smoothly transitions to a rolling fameasser on Disco. Slymm tags in, but Ryan hits a superkick on Ruckus to thwart a double-team. Slymm comes back with a huge spinning Bossman slam (almost losing Ryan in the process), and Ruckus hits Disco with a flipping neckbreaker. Ruckus then places Ryan in the Tree of Joey Lawrence (woah!), takes a disco ball, and smashes it on Joey’s junk! Ruckus then puts a small ladder against Ryan’s face, then climbs the blinged-out ladder and hits a FLIPPING VAN TERMINATOR. Good lord!
Ruckus understandably gets the pin after THAT one. The finish was the official Quiznos Slamwich of the night, possibly the greatest honor one can achieve in the wrestling industry.
The Take: This had some awkward moments, but Ruckus really got to show off his agility. He tended to be a fairly spot-heavy worker, so he was pretty much tailor-made for something like this. Slymm wasn’t outstanding or anything, but he was a solid hot-tag hoss, and they could have had something with this team if the show continued. The finishing sequence was absolute overkill, but at least it looked awesome. That’s pretty much WSX in a nutshell.
I could REALLY live without having to see Joey’s ass every time he’s out there, though.
The Vibes: Fairly decent, thanks to Ruckus and the finish.
We catch up with Arik Cannon backstage beating up some poor schmuck. He promises to unleash ANARCHY on the competition next week!
Not exactly a convincing promo as Cannon’s never been a big promo guy, but he was a really good worker, mostly of the ‘strike and suplex’ ilk. He was a regular in IWA:MS, CHIKARA, Dragon Gate USA, and has owned F1RST Wrestling since 2008. He’s made a few appearances in AEW, mainly on Dark.
Human Tornado vs. El Hombre Blanco Enmascarado
We don’t actually get this match as Tornado was taken out backstage!
Fabian Kaelin introduced him twice, complete with consummate twirling. This almost had to be a rib on him.
6-Pac comes out, kicks the crap out of El Hombre, and calls out Vampiro for an ass-kicking. Vamp comes out and looks to square off with 6-Pac…but RICKY BANDERAS attacks him from behind!
Banderas beats the crap out of Vampiro at ringside and unleashes THAT fireball. We get the heavily-edited version here, adding all kinds of blurring and distortion effects. This kind of makes it look like a *Dr. Evil voice* frickin’ laserbeam.
Banderas seems to blame Vampiro for what happened to his face, but we’re desperately out of time! We’ll try to get to the bottom of this story NEXT WEEK!
So, what happened? Why was the fireball such a big deal that it caused MTV to yank the show? Well, in 1993, a tragic incident involving fire was blamed on an episode of Beavis & Butt-head, which resulted in MTV being far more conservative about the depiction of fire on their network. Naturally, when Banderas threw the fireball, which was much bigger than the typical Memphis fireball, the network freaked the fuck out and pulled the episode.
The fireball was edited to make it look less fireball-y, and the show was broadcast the next week at 11PM EST. Interestingly enough, there was a slight bump in the ratings, ending with a 0.6 against the prior week’s 0.5 number. It’s possible that the controversy generated some interest. Not having to compete directly with WWE’s ECW on Syfy may have helped, too.
However, the damage was done. The very next day, February 28th, MTV officially announced the series’ cancellation. Most of the remaining episodes were dumped into a late-night marathon on March 13th-14th, with the exception of the unaired finale, which I’ll get into when the time comes.
As I pointed out in the first article in this series, the whole “show being cancelled due to a fireball” was possibly an urban legend, and the series was most plausibly axed due to low ratings. I don’t think we’ll ever truly know the exact motivation, but I think it’s a combination of both. I firmly believe that, given the network’s history, a fireball would be enough to send MTV into a show-cancelling tizzy.
Controversy aside, at least there’s an interesting cliffhanger to end the episode.
NEXT TIME: WSXtra Episode 4, with Team Dragon Gate vs. D.I.F.H., and Evans vs. Riot!