PROGRESS Wrestling returned after a longer break than usual this past Sunday for Chapter 151: Heavy Metal, headlined by a Steel Cage match for the PROGRESS World Championship between the recently restored Cara Noir, and the champion, the man who made “The Swan’s” life misery for over a year, Spike Trivet. This was promised to be the final battle between the two men, but based on how things went down, I wouldn’t be so sure.
This was certainly a show that happened.
First gripe: The show started around forty-five minutes late. This is only thirty minutes late on BritWres time, and I understand having issues with the cage but this wasn’t ideal, especially with the pacing of the show as I will be getting on to. The delay meant that we were still outside when the UK-wide emergency alarm test triggered on everyone’s phone, which would have been funny during the show, but alas.
Out came Simon Miller to host the show. Simon having fun with the crowd is a part of the charm of PROGRESS I guess, and a lot of the time it works but when the show is late as it is, and you have two video packages before the first match, then you should probably limit this ever so slightly. This is maybe a minor thing to most people, and that’s fine, but this and the combination of what was to come just made this show feel so long.
Announcements
We got the first of the two video packages, which was a hype video. Nothing to see here. The next one is where things get noteworthy. Nigel McGuinness appears on the screen from “the English Countryside” to talk about next month’s Super Strong Style 16 tournament, which he will be overseeing as well as refereeing the tournament final. He announces the returning Mark Haskins as the first entrant. Haskins was one of the top stars in the promotion during the peak of PROGRESS and the BritWres boom but hasn’t appeared for them since 2019. He’s a solid, if at this stage unspectacular addition to any independent promotion.
Lio Rush vs. Leon Slater vs. Danny Black vs. Robbie X
The show began with a fatal four-way match between Lio Rush, Leon Slater, Danny Black, and Robbie X, who was in as an unannounced replacement for Eddie Kingston, who is of course out with a hernia. This was everything you would expect from these four and was just a lot of fun. Multi-person matches can be tough, and of course, the three British wrestlers will have been in the ring together countless times, but it was not lost on me that Lio had been in the ring with all three of his opponents before as well, and the chemistry was noticeable. This was very good, and at just 8:28, was the only thing on the show that would have been improved by being longer. I’ve said this a lot, but Leon Slater is that guy. His rise over the last year has been incredible to watch and at just eighteen years old, he has so far he can still go. His corner dive was perhaps the most impressive I’ve ever seen it in this match. He picked up the win with his Swanton 450, another move that is so impressive. He had a staredown with Black after the match, definitely teasing something more down the line.
This next segment….
Bullit Promo
Bullit (yes, spelled with an I), enforcer of Spike Trivet stormed to the ring, rather unfortunately for the fan behind me who ended up on a collision course with the heavyweight whilst returning to his seat. The fan in question got a shove, and his drink ended up on the fan in front of me. If it got me, this review, specifically of this segment, would be even more strongly worded than it already is. I will preface this by saying that Bullit is someone that has a lot of potential as a menacing heel and could see PROGRESS doing a lot with, but this segment just wasn’t for me,
Bullit and Miller had some handbags (British slang for a situation in which two people seem angry and threatening but do not actually fight) as Bullit demanded the microphone. Nothing here was necessary for around ten crew members to enter the ring, but they did and they paid for it. Bullit took out all of them until he had Miller alone and cornered. One female crew member appeared between them looking honestly petrified. Bullit grabbed her, again demanding the mic, saying he would release her. This led to about thirty seconds of “you let go first” “no give me the mic first” dialogue. Painful. Miller gave in, gave him the microphone, and to the surprise of absolutely nobody, chokeslammed her anyway. He then cut a promo, not on Cara Noir ahead of the night’s main event, but on Big Damo. This is because Dominatus Regnum, the faction of Bullit, Spike Trivet, and the Smokin’ Aces, Nick Riley and Charlie Sterling, take on the team of Big Damo and Axel Tischer, who are going by SanitY again, and the PROGRESS Tag Team Champions Sunshine Machine (TK Cooper and Chuck Mambo). He said that after this tag match, which is coming up this weekend in Manchester, that a singles clash is inevitable. One of his lines early in the promo was “I’ve got eight minutes on the run sheet” referring to the crowd chants overpowering him. This is counterproductive for a couple of reasons, not only because it was an unscheduled segment in the context of the show, so why are you mentioning the run sheet, but also this felt like twenty minutes, and you mean to tell me it was only eight???? This was not a great segment and completely irrelevant to the majority of the crowd who won’t be at the Manchester show. A waste of time in a show already behind schedule. It could have been a social media video.
Session Moth Martina vs. LA Taylor
Up next was Session Moth Martina vs LA Taylor of the Lana Austin Experience and after the faction consisting of Taylor, Skye Smitson, and the Women’s Champion Lana Austin attacked the Moth during her entrance, it looked like we might not be getting a match which in the context of the show would not have been a bad thing, but we did and it was fine. It only went five minutes and made Taylor look very strong in victory over a well-established name in what was her first singles match with the company. The Cornwall native has a very impressive and intimidating presence and at just three years of in ring experience, a lot of that being during the pandemic, she is someone with huge upside not only for PROGRESS but for women’s wrestling as a whole down the line and is worth keeping an eye on.
Up next was a promo video for the WxW show taking place after night one of Super Strong Style 16, May 27 at The Dome in London (which is an excellent video). So far the show has Maggot vs Leyton Buzzard and Trish Adora vs Charlie Morgan confirmed. Among the other names announced for the show are Shigehiro Irie and Michael Oku. Next, we had another announcement for the aforementioned tournament, again Nigel McGuinness appears from the countryside and announces the first-ever PROGRESS World Champion, Nathan Cruz.
Sunshine Machine Promo
The PROGRESS Tag Team Champions Sunshine Machine (TK Cooper and Chuck Mambo) came out for a promo. There wasn’t much to this other than setting up a ladder match with the Smokin’ Aces for Super Strong Style 16 weekend. This was fairly long though, which has become a theme on this show. Sunshine Machine are good talkers who can always get a crowd behind them though.
Charles Crowley vs. Mike Bird
Up next was the first of the show’s three birds, as Mike Bird came out to battle the Spectacular God, Charles Crowley. Bird is a very good technical wrestler and Crowley is a good wrestler who excels with his character work and comedy. With all of that said, there was no reason for this to go seventeen minutes. Because of this, everything felt stretched out with Crowley’s comedy antics at the beginning of the match starting off well but getting old eventually, this just…was a match that happened. Crowley got the win with a rollup. He got the mic and I guess among other things mentioned that as the God of all Creatures, he would have his eyes on the two birds in the main event.
Nigel came back to the screen to tell us that Tate Mayfairs will be in Super Strong Style 16. We also found out that after night two of the tournament, he’d be doing a magic show.
We are at the intermission. This is now ninety minutes into the show and there has been a little over thirty minutes of wrestling. I turned to my friend during the last match and said “this feels like a Raw” and these numbers back up my theory. This is categorically not what I watch independent wrestling for.
Ricky Knight Jr. Promo
The first match back from intermission – wait there is ANOTHER promo. Ricky Knight Jr. came out to announce that he is setting an Open Challenge for his Atlas Championship at the Manchester show, again something of little benefit to the London crowd in attendance. This event is being run in conjunction with the For The Love of Wrestling convention with many of the industry’s top stars as well as legends in attendance so the possibilities are endless. I hope it’s Goldberg (Edit: It was not Goldberg). He also revealed a new look championship belt, stating it no longer stood for a weight division but for the “baddest man in British Wrestling”. This was cool, but, again, was not necessary for this show.
Millie McKenzie vs. Skye Smitson
Up next was Millie McKenzie vs the Lana Austin Experience’s Skye Smitson. A good match with Millie getting the win in 11:08 to set up an upcoming championship match against Austin down the line. Millie wrestles Miyu Yamashita in a thirty-minute Ironwoman match for the EVE Championship so could we see her holding two of the most prestigious women’s championships in the UK in the coming weeks? Not if Rhio has anything to do with it, as she cut a promo from home after the match, reminding Lana Austin that she has the key from winning the Thunderbastard match, meaning that she can cash in on Lana for a championship match at any time. She is from Manchester (well, Preston) so that’s certainly something to keep in mind at the next show.
Alexxis Falcon vs. Nina Samuels Promo Video
Up next was a promo video hyping the match between Alexxis Falcon and Nina Samuels at Super Strong Style, as well as explaining the stipulation of the Clock Strikes Midnight Match. During the match the clock would strike midnight and, like in Cinderella I guess, the match would change. You may be in a submission match and it becomes a lumberjack match, and then a few minutes later it may become a Steel Cage Match. Although given how long it took them to build the cage later in the night, probably not the last one.
Next, another announcement. Defy and Progress will be running shows at the Electric Ballroom on August 26th, the day prior to All In, and the day that EVERY other independent company in the UK is seemingly running in London. It is Wrestlemania weekend in one day and it’s going to be a nightmare for everyone involved and I can’t wait.
Up next, Man Like Dereiss vs Callum Newman, a match I was very much looking forward to. So what do you mean it was a count out in less than two minutes?
0121 vs. CPF
Man Like Dereiss grabbed the mic and called out Maverick Mayhew, Newman’s CPF partner and manager for this match, for essentially following Newman around and causing the count out. He said if he wanted to be here then they could make it a tag match, doing a Teddy Long impression in the process. Out came the United Em- I mean 0121’s Dan Moloney to team with Dereiss. The tag match was very fun and a highlight of the show but despite that, still felt pretty long when the show was nearly three hours old including the intermission, still with a steel cage world championship match to come. The 0121 got the win in 13:37 with a Drilla Killa from Moloney followed by a 450 splash from Dereiss. Danny Black and Leon Slater came out to assist their respective factions after the match and continued their beef from earlier, certainly teasing that more is on the way between the two factions and that makes me happy as they are all very good.
PROGRESS World Championship Steel Cage Match: Spike Trivet vs Cara Noir
We reach the second of two intermissions which was in place so the steel cage could be built meaning it was time for the main event and the crowd was engrossed from the start, with both entrances setting the scene for the super fight, the final fight between “The Vulture” and “The Swan”, two birds in a cage and one would end the night as PROGRESS World Champion. Would it be Cara Noir regaining the title that he carried for so long, or would Spike Trivet, all alone and without the help of Dominatus Regnum, be able to end the story once and for all? In fact,
I’m not too sure either ending came to fruition. Before I get into the finish, I will touch on the fact that they made the babyface look incredibly dumb in this match, as Cara Noir had Trivet chained to the ropes, a call back to the 10th Anniversary Show in March of last year when Spike had Cara in the same spot. Cara began climbing the cage, got over the top, was on his way down, and after being called a coward by Trivet, climbed back into the cage to keep fighting. He could have been the champion right there. That’s a very dumb babyface. The finish though, and around halfway through the match, Cara Noir’s ankle appeared to give out, but he carried on. Evidently, it became more of a problem and the match had a rather abrupt finish at around the thirty-minute mark. The match was great prior to that though and, especially early, delivered on the level of violence fans have come to expect whenever these two meet in a ring, and especially inside a steel cage. Spike Trivet winning and retaining the title was not the finish many expected but again, we do not know if this was switched due to the ankle injury. The finish itself certainly seemed rushed though and Noir was down in the ring with an oxygen tank for a long time after the match so it certainly seems like he did an amazing job to go as far as he did and should be commended for that. He has said that there is no fracture, so that certainly appears to be a positive.
On the whole, the good stuff on this show was pretty damn good and the rest just seemed to drag, and the show as a whole was poorly paced. Unlike Chapter 150 where I could have given a long list, the only match I would recommend anyone goes out of their way to see would be the opening four-way, and it was short too so would not take much to do. By the time this is posted, PROGRESS will be ready to return in Manchester with For The Love of Progress. Looking past that, the next time PROGRESS return will be the three-night Super Strong Style 16 tournament, taking place in London between the 27th and 29th of May.
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