Game Changer Wrestling: Nick Gage Invitational 2
I guess regular readers of Severed Cinema gathered with my review of Game Changer Wrestling: Zandig’s Tournament of Survival 1 back in June 2020 (read review here), I have a big massive gore-covered lump of love for Death Match Wrestling. I’ve watched grappling on and off since the early days of cable TV in the UK, catching old WWF programmes and South West Championship Wrestling.
It was South West that kind of planted the seeds for trash and smash garbage styles in my head from an early age. Watching the enormous, Abdullah the Butcher drive forks into opponents’ heads whilst his own cranium was awash with blood did something to a young horror adoring child. Then there were the Sheep Herders, later to become the cruddy WWF pop tools, The Bushwackers. The Sheep Herders broke legs and set fire to people. I was a kid, I believed in it all!! So I got a huge thirst for matches where people bled and screamed.
In later years as the WWF became the WWE, the product diluted. ECW who commanded a mastery of low budget violence in a small company, folded. I watched TNA for a few years because I really prefer the smaller places. You get unpredictable feuds, you get violence, you get a warm fuzzy family feeling which has been lost in the bigger giant corporations (I kind of put recent arrival, AEW into that as well because, though they have a long way to go, they are unfortunately not developing much originality).
I discovered Combat Zone Wrestling many years ago after reading a review for a PPV in a mag and bought a couple of cheap copied DVDs. I was hooked. Here was drama, here was unpredictability. And here was a brother (and some sister) hoods. Wrestlers put trust in one another. The timing must be so dead on, otherwise accidents happen and careers end. As CZW became my drug for many years, I discovered other companies, smaller and where comrades battled and ended the evenings being stitched up in the back, all for a minor gathering of loyal fans. A lot of wrestlers simply start their careers in these places or pass through as guests. Many others stay in these worlds and live there ‘til they take early retirements. This isn’t no quick punch and grind down UFC stuff, this is night after nights of long matches where you are hit with light tubes, bricks, barbed wire, glass doors, and you aren’t doing a ‘blade’ job. The camera and people clearly see wounds split open on your body and head as the shit hits you!!! A few times matches end quicker than planned as an incident occurs where too much blood is pumping out, or someone’s spine hits the edge of something sharp. H20, IWA, OPW, Milestone Wrestling, ICW, hold regular Death Match events among standard wrestling shows.
Then there’s Game Changer Wrestling. GCW. A place that one of the long-term legends of this scene, Nick Gage, made his home. Nick began his long career in the early stages of CZW, and is, I think, the last man standing from those days. He spent some years away, however, in prison, for robbery and then parole jumping. Upon returning to the outside, he was hot property on the indie scenes and finally settled in GCW.
Which is why Game Changer Wrestling: Nick Gage Invitational 2 is his second named tournament and his début at this annual series. The first one, he had been arrested again so he could not attend. This time ‘round however, he’s mad, bad, and brutal. Nick is the first guy you see, walking through a rowdy gathering of folks chanting, “Nick fuckin’ Gage!” followed by his totally redundant manager.
The crowd are mainly a mass of tattooed men and women wearing wrestling/metal/punk or horror t-shirts and screaming loudly. “Them fuckin’ piece of shit cops couldn’t stop me from making this one!” he addresses his loyal rabid followers for a few minutes, clearly happy to be with them. He mentions how they all sent him letters whilst he was inside and it helped him keep going.
Match one has the overly muscular and small, Shlak, taking on one of the most decorated in trophy’s and such guys in the business, Matt Tremont, a.k.a. The Bulldozer. Last time I saw Shlak, he was being hung from the ceiling by hooks through his flesh, seriously. This time ‘round, he is involved in a no rope barbed wire death match. Basically, the ring ropes are barbed wire and there happens to be a few weapons laying around the place. I don’t know why they bother barbing all four corners, because usually there’s a point near the beginning where one of the competitors use wire cutters to wipe out one side. Same here. Both big men take a lot of bumps. It’s overall a short but satisfying introduction to the tournament.
What makes GCW different to some of the others, is the inclusion of hi-flyers. These are wrestlers who can cheat gravity and do some mad acrobatic moves, plus also destroy their bodies in glass and shit. Match two has Mexico’s, Miedo Extremo take on G-Raver, who comes out wearing a super cool, Hills Run Red, half mask plus A Serbian Film t-shirt. Barbed wire boards, cinder blocks — it’s all in the ring. “Welcome to professional death match wrestling,” says the commentator after witnessing some slick move sets, “These guys can go.” They can also take a few light tubes across their heads as well. Moments later there’s shattered glass all over the place. The show stopping moment comes as G-Raver dives from the ring, is caught mid-flight by a weed whacker, and then lands heavily through a barbed wire board. Insane! And that’s only a third of the way into their battle!
Keep in mind, the winners progress to a second round against other winners until we have two survivors annihilating one another to conclude. Post apocalypse looking Markus Crane faces Japan’s Daisuke Masaoka, and again we have a nice mix of grappling, high flying, holds, and smashed glass over bodies. “Oh! What the fuck!” yells Markus as a light tube doesn’t shatter. So, he uses extra force and achieves his goal. The backwards and forwards combat is good. Both men work well together and the fans are satisfied.
In one of the best matches, Nick Gage and Ciclope go absolutely hell on earth at each other to finish round one of the tournament. This spills out into the crowd, to the back door, then back into the ring. At first Ciclope destroys Nick for the better part of six or so minutes, then it turns around. More traditional weapons such as ladders and chairs are used, but then also a fishing pole as Ciclope is pulled around hooked through his mouth.
Taking a breather, though not in violence, we have an absolute blaster of a match between Joey Janela – he who took the highest bump of the year in my previous GCW review off the top of a building, versus Teddy Hart. Yes, Teddy is part of the infamous Hart family, but a disgraced member. He has a lengthy record of arrests, including sexual assault, DUI, drug possession, strangling some guy, and violence. Oh, and his girlfriend disappeared. Aside from all that, Teddy is a great worker when his mind is set, and this match proves it. Joey is a fall guy, great wrestler but created to take bumps and brutal beat downs. He has passed through so many companies such as Major League, CZW, Pro Wrestling Guerilla, and currently hangs around AEW. This is such an entertaining well-structured match, aside from Teddy clearly getting mad when Joey blows a couple of spots here and there.
The two semi-final matches are all out wars, bodies are broken, blood is spilled, and the commentators scream for more as do the crowds. When the grand finale arrives, and two men face one another surrounded by a greatest hits of Death Match destruction, it’s old school versus new school which is a logical conclusion to this event.
Game Changer Wrestling: Nick Gage Invitational 2 is a blast, it’s just manic. No one got seriously hurt this time around (in the previous Zandig TOS I reviewed, we had a near broken back, and a severe ankle injury). Believe me, we can witness some really nasty stuff in these tournaments. It began Nick Gage’s revival to underground stardom which continued onwards.
GCW, like a few others isn’t backyard wrestling shit (though they did hold a couple of bigger variations on that theme). You get the brawlers, the mad bastards, and the technical wrestlers on the indie scene all getting involved and bloody. Basically, they are all professional and take more risks than the mainstream for a cult following. Many are close friends having worked together for many years and they all put on one hell of a show each and every time.
Produced by: Brett Lauderdale, Danny Demanto | Music by: Various | Cast: Nick Gage, Matt Tremont, Shlak, Teddy Hart, Joey Janela, G-Raver, Miedo Extremo, Markus Crane, Ciclope, Daisuke Masaoka | Year: 2017 | Country: USA | Language: English | Colour: Colour | Runtime: 2hr 40 min
Studio: Game Changer Wrestling
