Pro Wrestling Revolution Workrate Report 5/2/15

1. The Grapplers (Grappler III & VI) vs. Los Campesinos vs. Anarkia & Cazador del Alma vs. Los Chicanos (Memo Cuevas & El Pistolero)

You know you're hilariously bad at pacing your TV show when the show starts with ring entrances, then has to take a commercial break in the middle of the ring entrances, only to return for the rest of the ring entrances. I mean damn, guys. But you know? This match was actually quite good. Sometimes their multi mans can be kind of a mess, and this was still kind of a mess but had plenty of good. The Grapplers looked really good here. They're Rik Luxury and Bay Area vet Bobby Hart under masks with their long ponytail braids popping out the back. They're both the biggest guys in the match, but that doesn't stop them from breaking out some large dude topes. Hart has some cool offense and nice presence, his Psycho Driver looks crushing and rightly gets a pinfall, and I dug him slingshotting Anarkia into an ace crusher. He and Luxury bump around nicely for bigger guys. The dive train in this was a nice one, Anarkia especially had a nice one getting backdropped to the man pile. Oddly the match felt a little clipped, which would be amusing if they clipped the match but showed full ring entrances. Pistolero only got in towards the end, and other things felt rushed or skipped. Some of the match was designed to put over new valet Sada Simone who is a curvy pretty gal who apparently was on a TV show called The Real L Word, which existed, and she was on it. I don't know if it was reality or scripted reality or a drama or what. But she was on it. It is kinda funny to book a woman as distracting and foxy to men, when she's most famous for being a lesbian. The distraction spots were all clunky, through no fault of her own. The finish comes when a Campesino has Cuevas pinned for the likely win, but boneheaded referee Tom Castor stops counting the pin to tell Sada to get off the apron. I'm....unsure why he couldn't have finished counting the pinfall, as she was several feet away on the apron and not affecting the finish in the least. But then of course, as a tecnico, that Campesino has to threaten to forcefully tongue kiss Simone, while the announcer creepily chants "Beso". This leads to him losing. Woof. Still, with this fed it's best to ignore as much of the braindead stuff as possible and try and enjoy the good, and this match had more good than most. A bunch of big dives, really good performance from the Grapplers, some fun armdrags, and some decently paced action (until the too-quick eliminations).  This may have actually been the quickest paced match I've seen from this fed. Normally there is a lot of cliched rudo stalling, or ref shenanigans, or just guys that aren't good at working fast. Here they made good use of having a lot of fresh guys, as multi man matches always should. A pleasant surprise.

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Pro Wrestling Revolution Workrate Report 4/11/15

1. Damian 666, Vaquero Fantasma & Cazador del Alma vs. Gallo Tapado Jr., Piloto Suicida & Anarkia

This was from the 10/4/14 King City show, the last match they could wring from that card, and it was both amusing and a complete sloppy mess. I had not seen Anarkia or Cazador before this, and I believe they're both PWR trainees. They did not look very good, but we'll chalk that up to being new at this. There was a corner chop exchange between the two of them that seemed like it would never end. Damian, to the shock of nobody, doesn't really "show up" for these matches. He whips people with his belt, and puts about as much effort into his rope running as modern Super Porky does. Gallo Tapada is a guy I always like, because even though he has obvious physical deficiencies, the dude very clearly ALWAYS tries. Sometimes stuff doesn't look good, sometimes it does! But he puts in effort and the matches he's a part of are NEVER bad because of him. Here he stooges for all of Damian's belt spots, and breaks out a few springboard crossbodies that look like they hit with a thud. They don't look pretty, but they look effective. Fantasma runs a little hot and cold and here he was kind of stuck as Damian's lackey, but towards the end of the match he gets to break out a real nice tope. Piloto Suicida was a pleasant surprise as a guy I've seen several times in SoCal indies but hadn't seen in years. A lot of his stuff had a polish to it that the match really needed. Damian did have some fun rudo moments, my favorite being him begging off from Piloto, getting down on his knees to beg, kissing Piloto's boots...and then punching him right in the dick while he was kissing boots. Overall things were just a little too sloppy, bad lucha exchanges done in almost comical slow motion. But it still had its charms.

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