Dragon Gate Pro-Wrestling USA Presents

Independent Tour De Force Volume 1

DGUSA.tv

$20.00

Reviewed by Joe Babinsack

Getting fans into indy pro wrestling is always a challenge. There’s little glitz, very little production values, almost never any pyro or large crowds or signs to tell you how you should respond to the product. And while the names are known to the “in” crowd, knowing who’s on the screen, knowing who’s doing the matches, and “getting it” – getting the back story, the motivations and the characters – isn’t a given.

From time to time there are opportunities to sample. CHIKARA recently offered a sampler DVD. Some promotions do crossover type feuds and introduce guys from other parts of the country, and while the days of internet trading seem long gone, I’m sure there’s a vital undercurrent of selling bootleg copies going on.

Lord knows there’s a score of wrestling web sites that just loves to post columns without permission.

But now we’ve got one more gateway for you mainstream fence-sitters. The Independent Tour de Force may not be the be-all, end-all of indy wrestling, but it is a great compilation of what a half-dozen different promotions (including the Jeff Peterson Memorial Cup) has to offer.

Indy wrestling is consistent in a few things, notably in the passion in the ring, the displays of talent and the often unique approaches to the sport. Sure, indy wrestling isn’t always stellar, and it can set itself up to fail, but more than often it provides something worthwhile in the product.

Whether it’s an interesting visual, an interesting series of moves or a creative finish, there’s always something to appreciate, even if there are distractions.

And distractions will abound.

If you want to pay more attention to the venues, the bad lighting or the inconsistent announcing, I hear you. It’s easy to ignore those things in a grand and a half of words. It’s easy to overhype and overpromise. But I will remain consistent in screaming that indy wrestling keeps the industry vital, keeps fans in places lucky enough to have a local promotion going to live events when the WWE just isn’t going to be there more than a few times a year, and it keeps the sense of wrestling as an attendance driven business alive to some small degree.

What’s great about this Dragon Gate DVD is the formatting: each promotion get’s its logo prominent, but also gets a graphic with the competitors, match date and event at the opening, and the web site displayed during the duration of the match.

What’s great is that this DVD offers someone interested in seeing more indy promotions an opportunity to see 19 competitors in six matches, and six pretty distinct styles showing what these six promotions have to offer.

We start with a match from the 2008 presentation of the Jeff Peterson Memorial Cup, featuring Larry Sweeney against Sal Rinauro in a Quarterfinal matchup of the annual tournament. This is an event in conjunction with the Pro Wrestling RIOT promotion out of Florida. Jeff Peterson was a hardcore wrestler for IPW, who lost his battle with cancer in 2002. Since 2003, the event has been run annually, as a sixteen bracket tournament.

Larry Sweeney became a controversial figure with his departure from ROH last year, and a series of odd but apparently health related events. Hopefully, Larry’s health issues and contract situation are things of the past.

Sweeney is a complete character in the ring, playing up old school Southern Style, like a Bill Dundee or a Jerry Lawler, strutting around with the Texarkana belt. One of the announcers quipped about it being in the lineage of the Western State Heritage Title way back in the early 1990’s WCW promotion, which is a great line.

Sal’s been a fixture in the FIP promotion, and other indies over the past few years. He’s the quintessential indy veteran, who’s talent vastly eclipses his physical size, and we all know the unfortunate reality of that predicament in the world dominated by big man mentality.

As an opener, this is cool. I really never get the concept of men running around with half their tights down there legs, but if that’s your perversion, Larry provides it for you.

Solid match, solid wrestling, lots of antics to start and interspersed throughout. I swear the announcer guy sounds like Shane Douglas, but I wasn’t quite sure about that.

Hybrid Wrestling is a promotion out of Ohio, and I’ve reviewed a few DVDs for them. Their graphics are top notch, but this match has the dreaded indy lighting level of epically rotten proportions.

Champion Dave Cole takes on the Fallen Angel, Christopher Daniels.

Daniels is even more a quintessentially indy wrestler than Sal Rinauro, in terms of how long he’s toiled in the indy circuits, and how deserving he’s been for a big push. Oh well, there’s the Curry Man gimmick if he needs it. This match was likely during the time after he was fired by TNA in that brilliant suitcases gimmicked match.

What’s odd about this Championship match is that the home crowd is decidedly against Cole, so he’s a definite heel, but it’s typical modern era indy fan crapping on the guy they don’t like sort of heel heat.

What’s cool about Hybrid’s presentation is a low rent ROH style metal surround on the guard rails around the ring. Various scribbles are on the sheet metal, but they’ve got that really cool pounding on the metal display of appreciation thing going on.

Dave Cole is an odd, Canadian Champion in an Ohio promotion. He’s got that sort of technical style, but that’s not a role to play up against Daniels. I didn’t think the match worked that well, which sucks because Hybrid does have a lot to offer. Big distraction in that every time the camera panned, it went from blackened background (not too bad) to clearly showing a gymnasium background (cheesy.) The other problem here was I’ve seen this match so many times (with different opponents) on the indy level that I started looking for distractions at times.

It was good enough, but not great. I don’t mind heel champions and heel wins, but c’mon, you’ve got to protect the belt better than this, especially when Christopher Daniels is already the showcase of the match.

Which highlighted the next match, from Women Superstars Uncensored (out of NJ), featuring Mercedes Martinez against Nikki Roxx for the WSU World Title.

Martinez is reaching a point where calling her the best Women’s Champion is not just hype.

My apologies to MsChif, but Martinez is establishing a vibe of being someone who takes on all challengers, puts her belt on the line in every defense, and guts out wins like a true champion.

Nikki Roxx was Roxxie from TNA, and she’s sporting a haircut filling in after losing her hair over the summer.

This match was everything the Hybrid match wasn’t – it built the aura of a championship match, established the champion, built up a great 30 minute match, and never lost my attention.

These ladies worked body parts. The announcers put over how they worked the match, trying to neutralize each other’s strengths, trying to win, and always putting over the value of the championship. These ladies fought a match like a wrestling match, not like a spot-fest, not like a match that Shirley Doe would dislike because there’s no psychology.

Psychology abounds in a WSU title match, and there’s nothing like building up to a finish, and sensing that it’s not the finale, it’s just one more building block in the match. Trading finishers can enhance a match, but not just when they get thrown out just to get thrown out. They are meaningful when, like in this match, you’ve got storylines created from both wrestlers, and they’re both establishing their paths to victory, and both try to cross-up their opponents by finishing with a signature hold.

And, to me, seeing Mercedes Martinez going through her finishing sequence a few times, and seeing that there’s an established finish that she relies upon, especially after building the match, wearing down the opponent, and establishing her ability to withstand an onslaught, makes the finish all the more satisfying.

But what really made this match was the announcers mentioning 30 minutes, and realizing how quickly that 30 minutes went by while I was in rapt attention to the ring work.

After his match, a change in pace was in order.

Jimmy Jacobs and Ryan Boz do that immensely with an “I Quit” match.

Too much blood? Too much violence? Too much of a bad thing?

Well, the nice thing is that one match out of six is a change of pace, and there were enough creativity in the match to keep me from just cringing at the bloodletting.

Did I mention blood?

Cheese graters are passé, but used. The fork or spike was so Abdullah the Butcher inspired that I was marking out. There was the requisite Jimmy Jacobs dive over the ringpost – done twice because the table didn’t break the first time! But the spot fest mentality wasn’t here. It was an I Quit match of the traditional sort.

The one weakness was the lack of a backstory in the announcing, and while I know Jacobs well, and have seen Boz from time to time, I just didn’t know how we got here and what it all meant and really, who I should be rooting for.

Boz is a big thick guy, not overly muscled but a powerhouse type. Jacobs is the quintessential indy type wrestler, a bit better conditioned but better known by his ROH days – and he’s looking to be in the Age of the Fall era.

Problem is that small guy/big guy without storyline lacks the enhancement of the story.

But AAW Wrestling seems interesting, filmed at the Berwyn Eagles (home of SHIMMER at times) in Chicago or the environs. I’ll definitely be looking for some review copies from the promotion.

CHIKARA is no stranger to me, and the three-way Trios match features what the Eastern PA promotion is all about – a fusion of styles, lucha-libre based, with an emphasis on creativity, characters and quickness.

The heel team is Vin Gerard, STIGMA and Chuck “why does he have green hair?” Taylor. The face team is Jigsaw, Helios and Equinox (Jimmy Olsen?) and the sort of tweener team is Hallowicked, Fire Ant & Arik Cannon.

It would take hundreds of words to explain the whole CHIKARA promotion, but better than me telling you about it would be you watching this match and ordering DVDS and really enjoying this product.

The Mexican wrestling base can be hit or miss. A hit when they do the dive spots, and definitely a hit when a fast sequence of crisp and creative moves are administered. A miss when those sequences seem like they’re being done in slow motion.

Helios came across like a great performer, and Hallowicked is the guy seemingly groomed for greatness, but all these guys can really work the style, and who can complain about Ultra Mantis Black on the mike? At least I believe that was him in the beginning.

More spotfest than psychology, to say the least, but the key consideration with CHIKARA is the focus on characters, and there is definitely a sampler involved here, a taste that should entice you to want to watch more.

The main event slot is the Full Impact Pro Heavyweight Championship. It features Champion Erick Stevens against Go Shiozaki of the Pro Wrestling NOAH promotion.

This is a decidedly Japanese influenced match, albeit one with the Heart Break Enterprises at ringside (Sensational Sean and Fabulous Phil) who of course would get involved. (I’m not quite sure what was worse, Sweeney’s but in the opener or Sean Davis with his shirt on in the closer.)

This was the hard hitting match, albeit not so far removed from the WSU Title Match.

Erick Stevens should be destined for bigger and better things. Go Shiozaki did grab the NOAH World Belt on his return from his American tour, and like the awesome announce team of Prazak and Leonard explained, this match and this title was vital to the success of Shiozaki’s stint.

I also loved how Prazak/Leonard explained how HBX made a deal with Sweet & Sour Incorporated to represent Shiozaki in FIP. Of course those guys did work for both promotions at the time, but those little things are important with the announcing. Not that this is the only reason why that pair is the best of the best!

The emphasis of the match was wearing each other down, trying to prevent the power moves in the end.

Stevens shows fire and power and his look and feel are just so old school and so alien to the ROH spot-fest mid-card style, that I wish he’d go further. It was awesome to have the dueling chants from this Florida based promotion. It’s the sort of indy atmosphere that puts over the industry – “Let’s go Erick!” “GO!” at various parts of the match  – shows the level of appreciation the fans bestow on the wrestlers.

Appreciation is what I have for the match and the efforts. FIP is one of the unsung promotions of the indy world, with a distinctive old school style and a feel like GCW or St. Louis or older region which brought in top name talents and displayed that talent without reservation.

The only thing I can say to wrap up this long review is this: I can’t wait for Volume Two!!!

Joe Babinsack can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it . Looking for more insight into indy wrestling? Check out my book Pro Wrestling Intellectual at www.amazon.com.