Sophia Michaels
Previously on NWA Powerrr: The Pope arrived and was somehow less violent on the holidays than the actual Pope. Plus, Jocephus sang Christmas carols and a drunk Eli Drake bragged about having the Shoes of a Champion.
If you’d like to keep up with these columns, you can do so on the NWA Powerrr tag page. Remember, NWA Powerrr and all its extra Rs is free to watch on YouTube, so check out episode twelve if you haven’t already:
Mama, Just Killed A Man
I just want to start off this week’s column by reiterating how much I love Tim Storm, and how happy him showing up in a “Mama Storm” t-shirt and dropping the line, “Mom, forgive me, I got one goal … I’m gonna kick his ass” made me. That’s the genesis of any good, fired-up, southern babyface’s story. I don’t want to commit unspeakable violence on you because I’m a good man who loves his family and God and America, but you’ve pushed me too far and now I’m going to literally beat you to death.
Storm is supposed to have a Television Championship tournament match against Nick Aldis later in the night, so Aldis and Kamille show up looking like a billion dollars to (1) intimidate a 54-year old man wearing a t-shirt with his mom’s face on it, and to (2) shade him for caring about something as inconsequential as the TV title. Aldis says he joined the tournament for fun, and thinks it’s funny that Storm cares so much about it. He then proceeds to get the year’s biggest pop out of me for referring to Storm and Ricky Morton as “Randy the Rams.” It is such an unfathomable burn on wrestling old-timers to accuse them of hanging on to glory far beyond their expiration date and will actually kill themselves in the ring before they’ll let it go. It’s the wrestling equivalent of, “OK Boomer.”
Because he’s an increasingly delusional and terrible human being, Aldis doesn’t even end up wrestling Storm in the main event; he pulls a 2Pac ‘Hit ‘Em Up’ and lets his homie ride on him, making a bitch made-ass bad boy bitch deal with it.
Aldis makes poor Royce Isaacs go out there and wrestle the tournament match in his place, giving Storm a strong win and allowing him to knock off the least threatening guy in Aldis’ posse. If Storm’s gonna have to go through the whole team to get to the champion, it goes Royce Isaacs, then Thom Latimer, then probably Kamille, and then Nick Aldis. Not a great match, really, but babyface Tim Storm is a damn treat, and the classic storytelling is the perfect match for the classic aesthetic of Powerrr. This is what I want out of my throwback studio wrestling program.
Karate Champ
No ?THE QUESTION MARK? this week aside from his appearance in a taped promo we’ve already seen, but National Heavyweight Champion SHOOTER STEVENS and his extremely country music friendly name has a non-title “submission exhibition” against Sal Rinauro to show off this third-degree Mongovian martial arts. Joe Galli is tremendous here, openly wondering what karate has to do with submissions. He just keeps getting madder and madder under his breath about the differences between karate and BJJ and it’s great.
Once Stevens wins with a cobra clutch he calls the “Mongrovian Clutch” — Galli once again proposes that he’s seen that move before and that Stevens is bullshitting, because he’s not stupid — the champ gets challenged to a match by Trevor Murdoch. Murdoch doesn’t need a title shot, he just wants to kick this dude’s ass for being super obnoxious. Stevens agrees if Murdoch puts his spot in the TV title tournament on the line, and Murdoch’s like, “sure,” because anybody with even a modicum of sincere pro wrestling offense can defeat Aron Stevens.
Sure enough, that’s what happens. Murdoch makes sure to tap him out to Harley Race’s Indian deathlock to make a point. This was dumb and very good if you like watching a guy who has obviously lost complete faith in professional wrestling do a bunch of comedy karate to keep himself interested. It’s like Superstar Billy Graham all over again!
Eschews Of A Champion
Eli Drake shows up sober this week to laugh about how sauced he was on the Christmas episode — extremely sauced — and run down Nick Aldis for his general manipulative tomfoolery as NWA Heavyweight Champion. Drake wants a match against anybody, since he’s spent two weeks wrestling nobody, and starts dragging Ken Anderson again. Colt Cabana shows up trying to defend Anderson, and that leads to some bickering about who will or won’t be Tag Team Champion, and who has or hasn’t been World Champ. Anderson wanders out, and Colt has to keep him away from Drake in a one-man pull-apart.
Can we hear more about the shoes, maybe?
I Can’t Stop Watching This GIF Of Marti Belle Having Her Arm Pushed In One Direction, And Deciding To Spin Her Entire Body In The Opposite Direction
Me, watching this:
The idea is that Melina is micromanaging her team too much and getting mad about them for everything, so they’re losing more than they should. Here, Belle loses to newcomer Tasha Steelz, who … uh, “steelz” a victory by countering Belle’s hilarious spin attack with a cutter. It’s an upset, so Melina’s mad again.
These issues and more will be talked about on GIRL POWERRR, the hilariously named roundtable segments featuring everyone in the women’s division divided up in heel and face focus groups. They should do a show where people sit around talking about nu metal and call it Powerrr Man 5000.
brb, going to space out while watching that GIF again.
Next Week
Thanks to Kyle Davis and local law firm representative Anastasia Fletcher, who might be the most bored looking human being on the planet Earth, we learn that next week’s Television Championship match will feature Caleb Konley and Outlandish Zicky Dice. First person to make Anastasia blink or react to anything wins!
Written by: Uproxx
