Sunday, June 27th, 2010 – 3pm
Hooligan’s, 13920 N I-35, Live Oak, TX

ACW is a glorious independent promotion run out of Texas that takes its Women’s Wrestling very seriously. I’ve been fortunate enough to attend two of their live shows, including the First Annual Queen of Queens Tournament held last year which saw Daizee Haze steal the crown from the nigh unstoppable Sara Del Rey. The show also featured an epic non-tourney match between then SHIMMER Champ MsChif and more mischievous than usual Nikki Roxx. I highly recommend the DVD to all fans of real women’s Professional Wrestling.

Now, as awesome as last year’s tournament was, this upcoming Sunday’s event looks to be even awesomerer. The level of talent has been elevated and the stakes have been raised as the ACW American Joshi Title, currently held by Rachel Summerlyn, will be defended throughout the night at Hooligan’s in Live Oak, TX (just outside of San Antonio). The first round of matches are as follows:

Portia Perez vs Daizee Haze

This is a rematch from the first round of last year’s tournament which Haze won decisively on her way to becoming the 1st QoQ Tournament winner. Later, however, it was Portia Perez that became the first American Joshi Champion. The fact that Perez will now have Ninja backup in the building might make her the favorite here to advance. After all, the Win-Loss record for the Canadian Ninjas this past year has been pretty staggering and the shenanigans they pulled to get those wins are actually legal in ACW.

MsChif vs Athena

Everyone knows, loves, and fears MsChif the former, dominant, SHIMMER Champion and current NWA Champion. Athena on the other hand is one of the best kept secrets in women’s wrestling. She’s immensely talented, athletic, charismatic, and nearly as much of a goddess as she claims to be. I’m very much looking forward to seeing what she can do against a veteran as established as MsChif.

Nicole Matthews vs Sara Del Rey

This first time ever match is easily the biggest of the first round. Death Rey is better than and in the past year Nicole has firmly established herself as one of Americanadia’s top female grapplers, capturing SHIMMER gold and decapitating fools left and right. The subtext here is that while Dangerous Rey takes many of her cues from Puroresu legend Kawada Toshiaki, Nicole “The Lariat” Matthews has a few similarities his rival Stan Hansen. When their male counterparts met it resulted in one of the most intense matches in wrestling history. Clearly one can expect similar sparks to fly here, especially if Nicole finds a bullrope.

Daffney vs Rachel Summerlyn (c) – ACW American Joshi Title Match

Daffney’s primary joys in life are her cat, corsets, and beating Rachel Summerlyn to a pulp. Rachel has sort of taken that personally. What you saw SHIMMER is just a taste of how brutal this, now nation wide, feud has been. I’m hoping Rachel finally aims for the head and puts down the Zombie Joshi, but I’m not sure what will be left of either for the second round.

And after all those great matches, there will still be 3 more featuring the best talent in North America. Will we see MsChif get a piece of redemption for her devastating loss to Portia and Nicole on SHIMMER Vol. 29? Will Del Rey and Summerlyn rekindle their feud and put on another mat classic? Will the finale feature a Canadian Ninja vs Canadian Ninja fight to the death?!

On top of the tournament action there’s Rachel’s bubbly better-half Jessica James challenging Mr. Robert Evans for ACW’s U-30 (Under 30) title. Lady Poison and her Gothtourage will be looking for more poison kiss victims in an 8 person tag, and there’s even one match with just two dude’s fighting each other….for people into that sort of thing.

This will be awesome and you should be excited to read the results I’ll be sending to Diva-Dirt.com, and anxiously anticipating the DVD release. But don’t take my hundreds of words for it, check out the awesome interview reel for it, featuring highlights from last year’s tournament, the Ninjas talking smack, and Death Rey kicking some dude in the head:

Sunday Afternoon, June 27th, 2010 Hooligan’s, 13920 N I-35, Live Oak, TX

Doors: 2:15pm
Pre-show Match: 2:30pm
Bell time: 3pm

$15 – Reserved Front Row
$10 – General Admission

Anarchy Championship Wrestling Main Site
Anarchy Televised: ACW Youtube Channel
ACW Twitter

Wrestling. YAY!

ACW – Perevans (Portia Perez and Robert Evans) vs Rachel and Jessica’s Excellent Tag Team
ACW – Lady Poison vs Lillie Mae vs Rachel Summerlyn vs Nicole Matthews
ACW – Jessica James vs Athena
AJPW – Kawada Toshiaki vs Stan “The Lariat” Hansen

Scale: 1-10 with 10 being The Impact Players (Great), 5 being Team Canada (Good), and 1 being The Un-Americans (Fast Forward). NC is for matches that can’t be fairly scored, i.e. extremely short matches, squash matches, etc.

Tenille vs. Malia Hosaka - 6/10
I’ve found all of Malia’s singles matches in SHIMMER so far to be really superb, and this was another strong outing. Tenille more than held her own against the veteran, a theme that reappears throughout the DVD.

Allison Danger vs. Kellie Skater – 7/10
“The Rate Tank” is my favorite of recent fresh to SHIMMER faces, and it’s all because of her extreme level of intensity and aggressiveness. Sitting in the crowd I felt like Danger was being pounced on by Wanderlei Silva, after he had been bitten by a werewolf¹. Tank is terrifying, in the good way. Danger was back in phenomenal wrestling shape survived the initial mauling. This is another match that played off the vet/frosh potential upset dynamic, the highpoint of which was an excellent submission sequence that had me on edge during both viewings.

Daffney & Rachel Summerlyn vs. Rain & Jetta – NC
It was reported that Daffney was dealing with a fairly serious injury coming into the SHIMMER tapings, so it was quite a pleasant surprise to see her scheduled in a match. However, the match turned out to be an extended, yet riveting, beatdown of Rachel as she desperately tried to hold her own against the IHWC. The IHWC does a good job putting the boots to her, and Rachel does a great job of garnering sympathy and making believable tag/comeback attempts. This was a nice emotional setup for a Rachel vs Daff feud (which is a continuation a long running feud from Texas’ ACW).

Ariel vs. Cat Power – 6.5/10
NCW Femmes Fatales II is the event where Cat Power made her definitive turn as a main event competitor but it’s this match that, in hindsight, began to lay the groundwork. Ariel impressed me as much as she has for the past several volumes an they both work well together to put on a solid, believable match. This really showcased how far Cat has come since her initial encounter with Ariel on SHIMMER Vol. 18. Cat brought both a Stretch Muffler and a Side Effect into her arsenal, much to my approval.

Lane & Nevaeh vs. Wesna & Melanie Cruise – 6.5/10
This was Tag Team experience vs size and strength and it’s never quite clear which is more of an advantage. Lane and Neveah are really impressive here, I can’t get enough of Lane’s kick to the head and Neveah’s Azumi Hyuga-esque running knee. Melanie didn’t get to toss the Ohio girls around as much as I expected, but the high impact finish made up for it.

Cheerleader Melissa vs. Nicole Matthews – 8.5/10
This match has everything you could possibly ask for. Cheerleader Melissa is the best in the world right now, and Nicole not only keeps up but dominates for a significant portion of the match. Nicole kicked and lariated through Melissa, and then took a some serious smashing in return. The match is epic. Props to The SHIMMER Office, as they likely had to shuffle things around due to Nicole’s fellow Canadian Ninja Portia Perez catching the swine flu before the show. When life hands you lemons, have Cheerleader Melissa beat the lemons into a pulp.

Jessie McKay vs. Sara Del Rey – 7.5/10
SDR is at the top of her game now; her wrestling and her gimmick are more engaging than they’ve ever been, which says a lot. Jessie McKay had already demonstrated with her strong vol. 25 match against Melissa that she’s decidedly not just a “cute” wrestler. Result? A fine match. The Valkyrie was in charge, but Jessie was never far out of it. She skillfully and credibly went hold for hold with one of the best. Bonus points in this match for SDR’s mockery of JMack fanboys. Sidenote: Jessie is very good, serious wrestler and some more athletic gear could help reflect this. Perhaps something from the Manami Toyota line?

LuFisto vs. Amazing Kong – 8/10
Nasty. Brutish. Short. A stiff brawl like this doesn’t need a lot of time to be great, especially between fighters like Kong and LuFisto. I could watch these two beat the crap out of each other 100 times.

Ayako Hamada vs. Mercedes Martinez – 8.5/10
This is one match that I appreciated even more on DVD, since the vol. 28 Ayako vs SDR match initially overshadowed it. As a long time Ayako fan her performance here is everything one could hope for. This was the hard hitting, high flying, power bombing Ayako that drew me into Joshi in the first place. Mercedes, of course, was an excellent first SHIMMER opponent for Ayako as their styles go hand in hand. It was a superb match that I’d love to see happen again.

MsChif vs. Nikki Roxx – 7.5/10
This is a rematch from my favorite bout of ACW’s American Joshi Queen of Queens event. There’s a significant difference due to the fact that Roxx turned rulebreaker in Texas, but kept in clean in Chicago. It still made for quite a hold for hold match that re-established Nikki’s place in the main event while also showing just how dominant a champ MsChif is. Samoa who?

Bonus Match: MsChif vs. LuFisto – 8/10
Thanks to a production malfunction Vol. 27 fans also get a chance to see the main event for the vol. 26 show, with commentary this time. The match is terrific. Hard hitting edge play wrestling lovers, this is your victory pose. Both LuFisto and MsChif get in touch with their heel side and show just how far they’ll go to win/retain the SHIMMER title.

Commentary, Inteviews, Storylines, Etc. – 9/10
In early SHIMMER volumes I thought the commentary from Dave and Allison was a bit too dry, especially considering how entertaining we knew both were. Those days are long gone as the talk on this volume was very witty, informative, and always added something to the matches.

There are several good promos on this DVD, including the hilarious Dr.’s excuse promo from P2. One of the greatest SHIMMER promos of all time occurred as Cat Power decided to taste the fear on the face of backstage correspondent Amber Gertner. You just have to see it.

As usual with SHIMMER all the booking decisions made sense, everyone looked good, storylines were started, moved forward, or resolved in rational manners, and I finished the DVD immediately wanting to see the next. SHIMMER really makes it look easy.

Overall Rating  – 9.0/10
This is easily one of best SHIMMER volumes so far. Every match is good and several are flat out great. You get over 3 hours of high quality wrestling, great promos, fresh matchups, and Lexie Fyfe on a stick for $15 or less. People will be talking about Matthews vs Melissa for a while, and I don’t think any serious wrestling fan should miss out on Ayako Hamada’s debut in the top promotion for female wrestling on this side of the Pacific. Buy it.

1. I was contacted by Kellie Skater. She informed me that she is actually, “more bad arse than Silva and a Werewolf combined.” I regret the error. [↩]

Rabid (1977)

Plot: A young woman develops a taste for human blood after undergoing experimental plastic surgery, and her victims turn into rabid, blood-thirsty zombies who proceed to infect others, which turns into a city-wide epidemic.

Review:

You really can’t go wrong with Cronenberg doing zombies, but on top of that there’s a Succubus played by classic adult film star Marilyn Chambers. It’s a wonderful combination which, even after 30 years, comes across as a very fresh take on the sub-genre.

Rating: 7.0/10

Trailer:

The Brood (1979)

Plot: A man tries to uncover an unconventional psychologist’s therapy techniques on his institutionalized wife, while a series of brutal attacks committed by a brood of mutant children coincides with the husband’s investigation.

Review:

Since I enjoyed Scanners and Videodrome so much I decided to check out some more, early Cronenberg. The Brood did not disappoint. While it’s more of a straightforward, classic horror film than his later work it’s still has DC’s signature odd, creepy, grotesqueness. It is very good.

Rating: 7.5/10

Trailer:

The Changeling (1980)

Plot: A man staying at a secluded historical mansion, finds his life being haunted by the presence of a spectre.

Review:

I chose to watch this after seeing it on Martin Scorcese’s Top 11 Horror Films of All Time. While it’s a fine film there’s nothing about it that really stands out. The plot is no different than the average episode of The Ghost Whisperer, and the scares are rather tame even compared to films of the same era. If you really like classic ghost stories it might be worth a viewing, otherwise just watch The Shining again.

Rating: 6.0/10

Trailer:

The Evil Dead (1981)

Plot: Five friends travel to a cabin in the woods, where they unknowingly release flesh-possessing demons.

Review:

This was absolutely brilliant and exceeded all the hype I’ve heard about it. I enjoyed it even more than part 2 as it keeps the comedy dialed down. It’s an all around excellent horror film, probably one of the best I’ve seen. I sincerely hope Raimi makes another one just like this some time.

Sidenote: One could make the argument that the Evil Dead movies are really about a violent schizophrenic who takes people to the woods and dismembers them because he’s under the delusion that they are demons.

Rating: 8.0/10

Trailer:

Seance (Korei) (2000)

Plot: A psychic housewife and her husband become burdened with a kidnapped girl who escaped her assailant.

Review:

This isn’t a horror movie, but a Coen/Park-esque happenstance crime caper that happens to have a few creepy ghosts in it. It’s fairly good for a TV movie but not near the brilliance you’d expect from Kiyoshi Kurosawa. This is a film for KK completists, like myself, but I wouldn’t suggest anyone else go out of their way to see it. You absolutely should go out of your way to see Pulse (Kairo) and Cure (Kyua) though.

Rating: 6.5/10

Clip:

Last House on the Left (2009)

Plot: After kidnapping and brutally assaulting two young women, a gang led by a prison escapee unknowingly finds refuge at a vacation home belonging the parents of one of the victims — a mother and father who devise an increasingly gruesome series of revenge tactics.

Review:

This is a gritty, intense, sad, terrifying and very well made film. It can be quite shocking but, aside from a misplaced final scene, always has a lot more going for it than just violence. The victims are easy to sympathize with,, the victims interesting, but when the roles are switched the films takes on a break neck pace that doesn’t allow for a whole lot of reflection, but keeps you on the edge of your seat.

Rating: 7.0/10

Trailer:

A Perfect Getaway (2009)

Plot: Two pairs of lovers (Zahn & Jovovich, Olyphant & Sanchez) on a Hawaiian vacation discover that psychopaths are stalking and murdering tourists on the islands.

Review:

This was not much of a horror movie, but it was a very good thriller. There’s a bit mystery, a nice twist, and a satisfying resolution to it all. The film is worth watching just for the incredible shots of Hawaii.

Rating: 7.0/10

Trailer:

The Uninvited (2009)

Plot: A scientist sends a man with extraordinary psychic powers to hunt others like him.

Review:

This is a remake of one of my favorite films and while it is not nearly as scary as A Tale of Two Sisters, it’s quite a good film of it’s own. If you go in expecting straight horror you will be disappointed, but if you go in expecting a typical evil step-parent thriller, you will be pleasantly surprised by the disturbing turns this film takes.

Rating: 7.0/10

Trailer: