This review was commissioned by Dan Vacura over on my Ko-fi account.
I can’t help but feel that a much better match is buried beneath this one. This is a fairly historic match with it being Homicide’s first shot at Samoa Joe’s ROH World Title, a rivalry and a chase that will follow him until the very end of his first run with the company. There’s several narrative elements at play here: Joe being a newly christened World Champion, Homicide trying to take the title as a more sympathetic figure based on his promo starting the show, and Low Ki on the outside furthering the tension between himself and Joe. It requires a lot of finesse to make all those things gel together, and it’s a finesse that I don’t think this match demonstrates.
It’s a structural issue for the most part. The early exchanges are well executed enough, but start to feel perfunctory until Homicide kicks into a high gear with a real gross power move that drops Joe head first into canvas. It’s such a sudden spike in intensity that Joe responds by escalating as well–bashing Homicide into the barricades and kicking his face off with one of the earliest Ole! Kicks. Joe kicks Homicide into the barricade so hard that it warps the metal and cuts open the side of Homicide’s head. In a better match, this should lead into a longer heat segment with Joe thrashing the challenger, maybe working over the cut, and all leading to Low Ki’s appearance to light the fuse on that big final rally against Joe.
The trouble is that Homicide seems far more preoccupied with getting some of his bigger spots in than letting this emotion settle in. Despite eating a real brutal sequence of suplexes, he’s making an early comeback real soon that climaxes in a big diving blockbuster through a table on the outside. Yeah, it looks sick, but it feels like such an intrusion on something much meatier. There’s barely any time for the heat on Homicide to breathe, it barely lasts long enough to draw sympathy at all. One might invoke the idea of the Steamboat rule here, but my problem is just how much success Homicide has in these early comebacks. It transforms the bout into something far more back and forth, which I feel robs the potency of Low Ki’s part in the match.
By the time Ki’s encouraging Homicide to make his comeback and take that belt, it feels almost like a bit of a waste. Homicide’s doing fine against Joe and that final burst feels a lot more muted given that it’s not much of a change from how things had been going. In fact, it’s really Joe that sort of takes the cake performance-wise in the final stretch, really doing some wonderful wounded monster selling to get over Homicide’s chances.
That being said, the dedication to just doing cool spots does lead to many cool spots happening here. Homicide’s a naturally great bumper and while I wouldn’t rank this among Joe’s best efforts, he’s credible enough in the time he is given to dominate things as a real serious bruiser. It’s even his selling in the last minutes that lend a little more gravitas to a somewhat misshapen affair on the whole. Pacing-wise too, they at least peak at the right moment. The avalanche Muscle Buster looks devastating and gross to this day, and it’s a fitting way to get across the idea that Homicide really pushed Joe a little further than he might have expected.
Could have been better, would be better in the future.
Rating: ***1/2
