This is the first of a series of mini-shows held in the Wrestle Factory, Chikara’s training school in Philadelphia.  They more or less replaced the local shows that Chikara used to run under the banner “Wrestling Is Fun”.  WIF was, at least in part, a device to let Chikara run shows during the period when the company itself was supposedly shut down (since it was supposedly a separate company), and with that storyline completed, it’s served its purpose.  In 2015, with so many tournament matches to get through, pretty much everything had to be classified as an official show.  This one was chucked in as a bonus if you bought “Aniversario”, the major show that took place the next night.  It does have some material that’s important to storylines, though, which is why I’m not skipping past it.

When and where: It’s 23 May 2015.   As mentioned, we’re in the Wrestle Factory – more accurately, the new Wrestle Factory, because they’ve just relocated.  It’s small, but there’s lighting, there’s a proper entrance set, and the walls are lined with banners for the ten Challenge of the Immortals teams.

1.  Amasis v. Missile Assault Ant

The back story: Nothing in particular.  Missile Assault Ant walked out on the rest of the Colony: Xtreme Force at the start of the year, and he’s been in a slump ever since.  He’s still using their music and his Colony-parody gimmick, because he has nothing else, but the ring announcer confirms that he has indeed quit the group.

The match:  Amasis pins him clean with a 450 splash in a brisk 6:47, though Missile does control a fair part of the match.  Pretty basic, and a little awkward at moments.  Kevin Condron (of whom more later) hassles Missile as he goes backstage.

The upshot: Amasis now has two Grand Championship points, and can earn a title shot in his next singles match.  And Missile starts being sucked into Condron’s orbit (of which, again, more later).

2.  The Snake Pit (Ophidian & Argus) v The Colony (Fire Ant & Worker Ant).

The back story: The rookie Argus was a surprise pick for Ophidian’s Snake Pit team in the Challenge of the Immortals tournament; but since Ophidian is a trainer at the Wrestle Factory, presumably he knows what he’s doing.  All four wrestlers are tecnicos, and there’s no particular issue between them (even though the Ants are members of the Battle Hive, led by Ophidian’s longtime partner Amasis).

The match: Argus holds his own in technical exchanges with the Colony, but (presumably deliberately) messes up a double team.  Ophidian doesn’t handle that well, and yells at him, which leads to the Colony isolating him.  He gets the hot tag to Ophidian… and it gets a bit shapeless for several minutes as the match just sort of keeps going.  Fire Ant escapes Argus’s ankle lock, but a couple of minutes later he lands badly on the ankle, and Argus rolls him up for the clean pin in 19:00.  Upset win for the rookie.  The teams shake hands afterwards.

The upshot: A bit odd, even in hindsight.  Obviously it shows that Argus can hang with the top guys, but since the Colony are so popular, the match seems calculated to get him respect rather than full-blooded cheers.  But Argus is an enigmatic, slightly distant character (he doesn’t speak, and when he writes online, he keeps making weird references to eyes and watching), so maybe that’s the reaction they wanted.  Even so, 19 minutes is a bit much.

3.  Kevin Condron v. Mark Angelosetti

The back story: Condron’s back story is fairly complicated, and it actually matters for this segment, so let’s recap.  He started as Kid Cyclone, a Wrestle Factory trainees who enthusiastically joined the fight against the Flood.  He defied orders by leading a group of trainees against the Flood leader Deucalion, and got them killed.  (An unusual feature of seasons 13 and 14 is that several characters are written out by actually dying, which is basically Chikara rejecting any pretence of realism and laying down its own rules for its own universe.  Mike Quackenbush is a firm believer that seeing professional wrestling solely through the lens of sport is limiting, and that you can do so much more with it once you embrace its complete lack of realism and are willing to do stories with magic and time travel and so on.  This is fine, but it’s also fair to say that there’s a degree of inconsistency in how other characters respond to these deaths, with some – like Condron – treating them as actual deaths, and others seeming to respond as if they’d witnessed a particularly serious stretcher job.)

Ducking his own responsibility, Condron decided that he was the victim of an uncaring promotion that drafted him as cannon fodder.  But there’s a degree of truth to that, because another trainee was indeed killed by the Flood while helping Icarus.  At any rate, Condron is now very bitter about Chikara.  He unmasked as a show of disrespect for Chikara’s lucha tradition, and is assembling a stable of (what he sees as) kindred spirits – i.e., Flood cannon fodder like Volgar and Missile Assault Ant.   Meanwhile, in his first two matches, he refused to properly wrestle, and tried to win through cheap tricks.  It worked the first time, but it backfired badly the second.  Condron is also a rampant egomanic, and insists on being billed as “Killer” Kevin Condron, though his classmates in the Wrestle Factory apparently called him “Snowflake”.

In a pre-match promo, Angelosetti basically calls him a toothless keyboard warrior who can’t get it done in the ring.  He also wheels out some of the nerd-baiting stuff from his original run as a jock bully heel, and we’ll see some more of those tendencies resurfacing as the year goes on – here, though, it’s a subtle aside while the focus is on Condron’s story.

The match: Condron has learned from his mistakes, and this time he’s come to wrestle properly.  Unexpectedly, he gets the upper hand, but spends too long posing for the crowd.  Angelosetti makes a comeback, but misses a charge in the corner, and Condron pins him clean with a DDT in 7:59.  After Angelosetti is taken backstage, Condron takes the mike and calls out Volgar.  He gives Volgar a parcel, which contains a microphone.  Volgar seems shaken.  Condron tells him that he’s supposed to be the much-loved “Juke Joint” Lucas Calhoun, and not a generic henchman thug.   Condron’s efforts over the last few shows have apparently succeeded in cracking Volgar’s brainwashing, as he unmasks and hugs Condron.

The upshot: An upset win for Condron, and a solid match to boot, as it turns out that he really can hang with the established guys when he chooses to wrestle.  And his stable starts to build.  A very successful night for his character, all told.  As for Volgar, he finally gets shot of his henchman gimmick, and we’ll see him in his new/original persona on the next show.  (It’s a vast improvement.)  A very good segment in terms of advancing Condron’s long-term storyline in several dimensions.

4.  Challenge of the Immortals: United Nations v Crown & Court.

The back story: The only match on this show from the Challenge of the Immortals tournament.  The United Nations are on a middling two points, while Crown & Court languish in last place with zero – largely because Princess Kimberlee made the mistake of drafting the loveable, but perennially incompetent, Los Ice Creams.  This is a single match between the team captains, Juan Francisco de Coronado and Princess Kimberlee.

The match: They do some comedy about who is more important, an Ecuadorian aristocrat or an American princess.  Kimber is still showing vestiges of her original arrogant heel gimmick, which she’ll quietly phase out during the year.  Juan takes control with old-school heel trickery, and works on Kim’s back.  But she kicks out of two Tiger Drivers, and reverses a third to the Alligator Clutch for the clean pin in 10:44.  Good stuff, both on the character level and the actual wrestling.

The upshot: Not entirely an upset win, since Kimber was already established as the strongest member of her team, but still a big victory over an established rudo, finally getting Crown & Court off the starting blocks.  They’re still in joint last place, but hey, baby steps.  Again, the growth of Kimber personally and Crown & Court in general is a year-long arc which will be coming the foreground by the winter, and this match plays into it perfectly; it was the time to throw them a win.

5.  Blaster McMassive v. Dasher Hatfield

The back story: Blaster is one of the current tag champions, and Dasher is one of the team they beat.  They haven’t earned the points for a rematch yet.  At this point, a Blaster singles match is a rarity, but they’re about to become more common.  Dasher has two points towards a Grand Championship shot, so a win here will give him the third point that would normally allow him to challenge for the title… but it’s not quite that simple, for reasons I’ll come to.

The match: Surprisingly, Dasher controls the first part of the match, as singles wrestling seems to have the big guy off his game.  Blaster resorts to hiding behind a plant fan to break Dasher’s momentum and take control.  (“Teamwork, fella!”, says Blaster appreciatively, before shoving the fan to the ground.)  Dasher gets 2 from his Jackhammer, and Blaster decides to bail.  Dasher retrieves him and gives the fan a free shot along the way.  The referee decides to turn a blind eye.  Back in the ring, Dasher kicks out of the Black Hole Slam at 2, and reverses to a crucifix for the clean pin in 15:50.  You could argue that Blaster is really deviating a bit far here from his normal monster heel persona, but I don’t really care, because he has a ton of solo charisma as a smirking, overconfident bully, and it’s a very good first outing for him in a main event singles match.

The upshot: Dasher has the three points he needs for a title shot!  Except… he can’t claim the title shot tomorrow night, because both he and the champion are already booked in other matches.  And he can’t claim it on the next show either, because he’s already signed up to face the visiting Tommaso Ciampa.  A win over Ciampa will give him a redundant fourth point; a loss will send him back to square one before he ever gets the chance to cash in his points.  Obviously, all this is aiming to build up Dasher as a particularly strong challenger when he finally gets to the champion.

Worth getting?  It’s not exactly a starting point show, but then it’s not really intended as such.  The second half of the card is good stuff.