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Pruett's Pause: TNA Impact Wrestling - Lethal Lockdown teams announced, Kenny King wins X Division gold, Jeff Hardy returns, the Aces and Eights leader is unmasked, and more!

Posted in: Pruett Editorials, MUST-READ LISTING
By
Mar 1, 2013 - 03:11 PM

By Will Pruett

- While I do expect Bully Ray to turn heel, I have to question TNA continuously replaying Bully being smashed with the pillar from his wedding. This was a brutal and crazy moment. I wonder how Aces and Eights and Bully Ray can explain this.

- I'm enjoying the Bully Ray and Jeff Hardy dynamic at the moment. It isn't exactly worthy of a steel cage, but it is fun to watch these superstars who have been linked throughout their careers lock up on the top of the card.

- Bad Influence continuously does great work. Christopher Daniels and Kazarian seem to be on fire. I still maintain my earlier point that Daniels could be main eventing Lockdown in a grudge cage match. Sadly, that is not to be.

- I liked the choice to give Magnus a little bit of promo time during this show. He's a star on the mic and can be a major player in TNA for years. Now is the time to put him on TV weekly and allow him to shine in upper-mid card programs.

- Gail Kim did a nice job on commentary. She was more natural than she usually is on the mic and promoted her match win Velvet Sky pretty well.

- TNA seems to have tired of their former favorite new toy, Tara (and her boo, Jesse).

- Austin Aries played an interesting role on this show. He was in a match against Hernandez, but he also inserted himself into the TNA Championship picture by discussing the Lockdown match with Bully Ray and Jeff Hardy. I'm happy to see Aries do more than just hang out in the tag team scene.

- One would think Kenny King vs. Rob Van Dam with major stipulations would be a fun match to promote a week out, then put on TV. One would apparently be wrong.

- Kenny King says he is the X Division. Well, technically he is only a third of it.

- Aries stashing the chain he used in Hernandez's trunks made me laugh.

- I should mention how happy I am that Hernandez is rocking trunks instead of shorts. Shorts are always a poor choice in wrestling.

- Joseph Park keeps asking for things he will not get. Will this play into his story at all? One would think he must be about to snap due to being told "no" by Hogan and Sting so often.

- This Impact Zone crowd was just as bad as ever. Hopefully we get some fun stuff from and for them next week in TNA's final Impact from the Impact Zone.

- Hey! Matt Morgan still exists! His beard has improved about 70% as well!

- Was this beard night in TNA? Everyone seemed to come back from the month off from TV tapings sporting some bonus facial hair.

- Kenny King and Rob Van Dam had a nice match with a very unfortunate botch towards the latter half. RVD still seems a step too slow for the X Division. Kenny King may be a decent X Division Champion, but he needs time to establish a character. Right now he's just a random wrestler who can occasionally do flips.

- Devon's reveal of his Aces and Eights team seemed pretty obvious. I have to wonder why Devon handled this promo instead of Taz, who was apparently brought in to cut promos for Aces and Eights. Sadly, he has only cut one promo for them.

- Speaking of promos, isn't Ken Anderson a better promo than Devon as well? Why isn't he handling a fair amount of this load?

- Sting's reveal of his team worked for me up until the very end. I liked the call of Samoa Joe and Magnus (their lack of handshake or hug also worked for me). I liked adding the directionless James Storm to this. I don't see Eric Young really fitting in well. Maybe I'll be proven wrong, but it is concerning.

- Kurt Angle is really good at stalking people.

- Ivelise vs. Lei'D Tapa was the match of the night and an absolute treat. TNA needs to sign both of these women as soon as possible. Their styles meshed extremely well. They each brought something unique and special to the Knockouts Division. This match reminded me of Awesome Kong vs. Gail Kim and it might be able to recapture some of the magic of that feud if allowed.

- Given the option to only add one, I would add Lei'D Tapa to the Knockouts Division before I added Ivelise. Lei'D brought something really unique and special that the rest of the division doesn't have.

- If A.J. Styles has a beard now and rides a motorcycle, is he officially an Aces and Eights member? That's how it works, right?

- Is it TNA's secret goal to make every former member of Fortune eventually take their ball and go home for a little while?

- I may or may not have fallen asleep during the Robbie E. and Rob Terry segment. Sorry about that.

- I don't love the choice to remove the extremely limited Rob Terry from the body guard role. He worked well as an imposing muscular body guard. I wonder if he will prove me wrong as a big babyface.

- I didn't like the way Bad Influence was handedly disposed of by Bully Ray and Jeff Hardy in he main event. It hurt Bad Influence to lose so easily. Hardy and Ray should have won, but they shouldn't have made it look as easy as it did.

- Kurt Angle unmasked the Bane-esque leader of Aces and Eights. The camera man was apparently working hard to protect his identity, since he did not pan down. In a truly "higher power" moment from Raw in 1999, Angle was suddenly outraged. Could it possibly be D'Lo Brown? D'Lo is my official guess at this moment.

This show was mildly disappointing to me. I may have had too high of expectations for TNA's return to live TV. The true disappointment to me was the lack of hype for Lockdown. They aren't being clear about how many matches are cage matches. They aren't really allowing the undercard to take shape. TNA is doing a poor job promoting this show at the moment. Hopefully next week improves it.

So, what did you think of the show? Agree? Disagree? Either way, feel free to email me at itswilltime@gmail.com or to follow me and interact on twitter at twitter.com/itswilltime.

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