Victory Road was a success for TNA, if only because they were able to get through it without any major problems, beginning the process of cementing themselves as a genuine alternative to the WWE. But that process would take a major leap forward the following month at Turning Point, thanks to one of the biggest moments in company history. It's time to take a look at one of the best nights in TNA history.
- Turning Point 2004 comes to you from the Impact Zone in Orlando, Florida, with "Iron" Mike Tenay and Don West on the call. The opening hype package focuses on the newly formed Kings of Wrestling, who are in action tonight against AJ Styles, Jeff Hardy and "Macho Man" Randy Savage. The work of Kevin Nash, Scott Hall and Jeff Jarrett is pretty cringeworthy, even at it's best, and this video failed miserably to get me excited to see them wrestle later on. Their faux Elvis gimmick is also f***ing terrible.
- Our opening contest is a rematch from Victory Road, as Team Canada challenge for the NWA tag belts against 3 Live Kru, who now have Ron Killings in place of Konnan. No disrespect to Konnan, but Killings makes this match so much better than last month's effort, as his ridiculous athleticism makes him so much fun to watch. Bobby Roode gets a bit of a mini-match with Killings during the bout, and the two have exceptional chemistry, and they manage to get the crowd into it. After being on the shelf for several months following a stabbing incident, Johnny Devine returns to help Team Canada regain the titles by bashing BG James with a hockey stick. This was much better than I expected and a fine way to open the show, thanks to Killings, who was treated so well in TNA in comparison to his WWE run, and remains super underrated as a worker.
- In six man tag team action, heels Kid Kash, Frankie Kazarian and Michael Shane team up to take on Sonjay Dutt, Sonny Siaki and Hector Garza. This match was set up by a Piper's Pit segment last month that saw the heels attack Piper's guest, Jimmy Snuka. Most of the match is spent with the heels wearing down Dutt, and it definitely starts to get a little dull at points. When he is able to make the hot tag though, the action is ridiculously good, as he pairs up with Siaki for some terrific double team offense before Garza ends it with his corkscrew moonsault.
- The third match of the night is a Serengeti Survival match, which is essentially just a normal hardcore match but you can win by pinfall, submission or slamming your opponent into thumbtacks. The namesake for the match and poster boy for the event, Monty Brown, is taking on Abyss, and this was a definite upgrade over the Monster's Ball match from last month. Brown and Abyss take lumps out of each other with big power moves, before Brown slams Abyss onto the tacks with the Alpha Bomb, an Alabama slam. The effect isn't perfect, as Abyss only barely caught the tacks and he took a tack bump last month so it seemed a bit redundant, but everything leading up to that point was very entertaining.
- In the most skippable match on the card, Pat Kenney teams with Johnny B. Badd to take on the New York Connection, with Jacqueline as special referee. Again, this feud started at Victory Road after Glenn Gilbertti and Johnny Swinger assisted Trinity to defeat Jacqueline in her TNA debut, and this match is build on Moore getting revenge. She eventually does by body slamming Gilbertti, who is pinned by Badd with the TKO. The finish was fun but everything before that was totally forgettable.
- Diamond Dallas Page and Raven were engaged in a pretty heated feud during early 1998 during DDP's ascent to the main event scene in WCW, and face off in a singles match here. After sitting for about 2 years on the sideline thanks to a neck injury, Page has gotten into great shape and seems highly motivated for this match, putting in about as good of a performance as you could expect of a man pushing 50. They brawl in the crowd for a bit before exchanging finisher kickouts, and then Erik Watts gets involved. He assists Page by fighting off Raven's hooded cohorts, before betraying DDP in a very obvious swerve. Somehow, Page gets the win anyway, hitting the Diamond Cutter to put down Raven. This match was enjoyable and both men did well despite their physical limitations, telling an engaging story, albeit with a very strange ending, I have no clue why they booked Watts to look like such a dolt, or why he even turned heel in the first place.
- Two of Scott D'Amore's best pupils face off in our next contest, which is for the X Division Championship, as champion Petey Williams takes on Chris Sabin. This is an excellent match, as you can tell that training together under Scott has given both men a ton of experience working together, and they craft a classic. Sabin is ridiculously good here, taking some incredible chances, including a dive through the crowd and a beautiful top rope suplex. The match is built around both men's finishers, the Canadian Destroyer for the champion and the Cradle Shock for the challenger, and the crowd pops big everytime each move is attempted. It seems like Sabin is just one step ahead of Petey, countering an attempted top rope Canadian Destroyer, which was absolutely never going to happen, flipping off the top rope to take down Williams before planting him with a piledriver. D'Amore gets involved for the the finish, getting Petey out of the Cradle Shock and distracting Sabin, allowing the champion to strike with a set of brass knuckles and leave with the gold. These two men may not have reached the heights that some of their compatriots in the X Division did, mostly notably AJ Styles, Samoa Joe and Christopher Daniels, but this match is definitely still worthy of a watch, it deserves more recognition.
- The second six man tag of the night is the one filled with the biggest names, as Kevin Nash, Scott Hall and NWA Champion Jeff Jarrett take on Jeff Hardy, AJ Styles and Randy Savage. Earlier in the night, Savage was thrown into the back of a limo by the Kings of Wrestling, making this a handicap match for a solid 15 minutes or so. Hardy and Styles fighting against the odds is pretty fun, they're wonderful babyfaces, but the complete lack of mobility on the part of Hall and Nash limits this one from every reaching even average status. Savage returns for the finish, pinning the near unbeatable Jarrett with a single punch and putting himself into the title picture, which is an absolute travesty. No offense to Savage, but this some absolute BS, Hardy and Styles did all the work to try and make this match entertaining and seem like complete afterthoughts by the finish, brushed aside for a man with actual star power, wrestling skill be damned. The worst part of this whole mess is that Savage didn't even wrestle that title match with Jarrett, as even he wanted no part in that match, and good for him. Technically, this is Randy's final match, so at least he went out with a win, but it does a major disservice to one of the greatest competitors in the history of the business.
- Main event time, as America's Most Wanted face off with Triple X in a Six Sides of Steel match(essentially just a normal steel cage but TNA have a six-sided ring) where the losing team must disband. Let me start by saying how great it is to see tag team wrestling get this kind of spotlight, especially considering how Vince views it. It's terrific to see TNA realizing that this feud and these four men deserved the main event spot, and they delivered an absolute war. The first half of the match is very physical, with Christopher Daniels getting busted open by the cage, before he and Skipper manage to handcuff Chris Harris to the turnbuckle. They decimate James Storm in pretty brutal fashion, with Daniels even opening him up by cutting his forehead with the key to the handcuffs, which really put him over as a absolute piece of sh**. Storm is able to make a valiant comeback, recovering the key and passing it over to the "Wildcat", and we transition into the second half of the match, which is built around high spots. The biggest one is of course the legendary cagewalk by Skipper, which was terrifying to watch but executed to perfection. That one moment is probably the reason why Impact Wrestling is still around today, and will forever hold it's place as a landmark moment in wrestling history. Less memorable is the fact that wasn't the finish or even close to it, as there's still several more big spots to go. All four men combine for a Tower of Doom superplex that almost goes horribly wrong, as Daniels flips in mid-air and comes down hard on the canvas. In a cool piece of booking, the faces handcuff Daniels to the turnbuckle, before ending this carnage by hitting the Powerplex, Triple X's own finisher. There's not much in the aftermath, which was a bit disappointing to me, as Daniels and Skipper being forced to disband feels like it deserves some reaction, and it never seems like the company really did much to follow this up for the two guys, who just went off in their own directions. Still, this is a classic match and one of the best in TNA history, a bloody war that made the company a household name.
8/10
While Turning Point is a pretty terrific show for the most part, there are two main negatives. The first is the absolute farce that is the world title scene, and the second is the running backstage sketches following two impersonators mocking Vince McMahon and Triple H. This is the type of sh** that makes TNA look like an absolute bush league, and unfortunately, it took the company a very long time to move on from their habit of signing old has-beens and firing useless shots at WWE. That being said, if you can ignore that idiocy, you'll find a plethora of wonderful wrestling on this show, highlighted by the X Division title match and the main event. That's TNA in a nutshell, folks.
Next time on Henry's Pay-Per-View Reviews: Final Resolution 2005, as AJ Styles, Petey Williams and Chris Sabin compete in a crazy Ultimate X match. See you soon.
- Henry
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