In the month of three PPVs, what better way is there to gently sit back into your chair, grab a small snack, and go through the PPV with your good buddy Chris. When all is said and done, you just HAVE to know what was good, what was bad, and what was ugly…

The format for PPV review GB&Us will be different from the regular column. I will go through the PPV in chronological order, give my opinion on it, and give a Good, Bad or Ugly verdict. The verdicts are added up at the end to give the PPV it’s rank. Sounds interesting doesn’t it. Does it? I think it does. If you don’t think it does, don’t read it. I think that you’ll think it does though, so read it. Understand? I don’t.

Right, with that out of the way, let’s move on to the PPV.

NEW YEAR’S REVOLUTION 2006
Pepsi Arena, Albany, New York

And we kick off with…

WWE Intercontinental Title Match
Ric Flair vs. Edge

My Prediction: Ric Flair by DQ

I didn’t guess about the Edge title thing, but I did get it spot on with my guess for how the match finished. Maybe I’m just brilliant, I don’t know. The match itself was the usual entertaining Ric Flair chop ‘n WHOO fest, with Edge not looking too bad considering how long he’s been out with his pec injury. But no matter what the reason, in this case that Edge didn’t care about winning the IC title because of what he had planned for later, I still hate seeing DQ endings on a PPV. Although I enjoyed the match and seeing Lita in the Figure-Four on Lita, and Flair’s awesome blade-job, those highlights don’t do enough for me to give it a good rating.

VERDICT: Bad

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Kurt Angle Interview

Angle is always a good guy to go to for a good interview, and although the segment was short, he did a good job of putting over the fact that he gets cheered more than he gets booed because people appreciate his talent. Which is completely true.

VERDICT: Good

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Women’s Title Match
Trish Stratus vs. Mickie James

My Prediction: Mickie

As usual I’m going to advocate women’s wrestling in the same way I did during my Survivor Series review. The lack of Trish in 2005 meant that people started to criticise the division due to the lack of talent, but now it’s getting re-established again. I thought this was a good contest, and actually quite stiff for a women’s match. There were a few missed spots here and there, but nothing embarrassingly bad by any means. Trish’s title reign has been going on for over 12 months now, so I really would expect either Mickie or Victoria to get the gold soon.

VERDICT: Good

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Maria interviews Maria, then Helms

Ah Maria, she really does play her role as “cute unintelligent person” really well. I’m sure she’s bright enough in real life. Helms’ voice reminds me of Jeff Jarrett’s in some way, but then I hear Jarrett’s so much it tends to get stuck in my head. Given this interview by Helms you would have been certain that he would win the match. How wrong could you have been. This wasn’t good, it wasn’t bad. I can’t be bothered to think of a middle.

Verdict: None

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Gregory Helms vs. Jerry Lawler

Prediction: Helms

Of all the matches on the show, this is the match I would have bet my mortgage on the outcome of. But apparently, that young buck Jerry Lawler is the future of the company and needs to go over someone with talent such as Greg Helms. When Muhammad Hassan beat Lawler at New Year’s Revolution ’05 it did something to help establish him. Losing to Lawler will only make Helms sink further down the card, and make his job seem all the more in jeopardy. Many are speculating that Helms may be one of the next batch of releases, and I wouldn’t bet against it. Which is a shame.

Verdict: Ugly

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Viscera and Shelton’s Mama

I’m a Viscera fan, so I liked him being on the PPV. And I liked the fact that this segment set up a match for later in the show. But maybe it’s just the fact that I don’t like seeing a (fake) fat woman bend over and Viscera wanting to hit it. For those who don’t know, the actress playing Shelton’s mama isn’t fat at all, she wears a fat suit. Insane isn’t it. And why DID Viscera’s music start playing in the canteen?

Verdict: Ugly

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Triple H vs. Big Show

Prediction: Triple H

Ah, Hunter’s back to doing what he does best. Putting himself at the top. Recently I’ve started to warm to Show, he’s been doing a good job in the role he’s been given, and he did a very good job in selling his broken hand throughout this match. The match in general was pretty entertaining throughout, and told a perfectly good story of HHH working on the hand, meaning Show couldn’t chokeslam him, causing the left-handed attempt. The result, of course, was never in doubt.

Verdict: Good

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Viscera vs. Shelton Benjamin

As I mentioned, I like Viscera, but not when he’s wrestling. Sure, he does a few good things, and it’s always pretty cool to see such a big guy leap in the air for a splash, but he’s never going to have a good match with anyone. But of course the main purpose of this was to showcase Shelton’s mama at ringside, and man can that lady talk. Apart from the slight blunder of calling Viscera “Benjamin”, she kept talking pretty well in a manager role for the entire thing. But even so, the lack of in-ring stuff and the focus of the commentators on her made the match pretty useless.

Verdict: Bad

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Vince and Shawn segment

Just filler mainly, but it evolved the storyline that we’re all expecting to end with a WrestleMania match, and gave HBK a little time to show off all the stuff he’s achieved, quite an impressive list as well. They acted it out pretty well, and it was nice of Vince to wish HBK luck. Friendliness is a dying art.

Verdict: None

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Bra and Panties Gauntlet

Prediction: Victoria

Now I’m a straight guy, so I obviously like seeing women undress each other. And to a certain extent I can understand why Vince might see this as a selling point for the PPV. The girls all looked lovely in their underwear… except one. What the bookers’ fascination is with having Mae Young undress as often as possible just baffles me. Who wants to see it? Anyone? I give props to Mae for doing it, she is 80+ years old. It was quite nice to see that Maria’s wrestling training appears to be going well though.

Verdict: Bad (not Ugly, hot women in underwear isn’t ugly)

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Elimination Chamber

Prediction: John Cena

Man, that was a HUGE boo that Cena got when he came out, and it didn’t get much better for the champ throughout the match. New York crowds are smarky by nature, so it’s no surprise he got such a negative reaction. Some very strange booking here, with Angle, Kane and HBK being the first three to go. I did enjoy Masters and Carlito’s teaming up throughout, and both impressed me more than usual, Carlito especially. The dive from the ring to the steel was superb, even if he did overshoot a bit. The ending did annoy me somewhat, it just seemed to come out of nowhere and was ridiculously rushed. I thought Cena would pick off both of them to make him look even more like a superman. Overall I was impressed with the match, if a little disappointed that we didn’t get to see much wrestling between HBK and Angle.

Verdict: Good

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WWE Title Match
Edge vs. John Cena

When Batista defended the World Heavyweight Title against Triple H in a Hell in a Cell, I half expected Edge to cash in his match then. But this one made a lot more sense, and I’m annoyed I didn’t predict it. Obviously the match wasn’t any good, it was only a minute long, but I was SO relieved, along with most wrestling fans, that the title reign from hell was over, if only for a few weeks. The emotion in Edge’s eyes said it all, he’d worked eight years for this chance, and he’d finally won a World Title.

Verdict: Good

So, that was the show. By my calculations we have 5 Goods, 3 Bads and 2 Uglies, making this show “Good”, but with some low points. Again, that’s about right. As strange as the low points were, the good points outshone the bad ones.

The PPV certainly ended on a high note, and it will always live as the PPV where Mr. Money in the Bank lost his Money in the Bank, but got a brand new World Title in exchange.

If you agree or disagree, you know where to get in touch with me:

[Chris@Wrestling101.com]

So until next time, have a good… few days?

Chris Dewing