Revisiting 00s US Indies #35

Eddie Kingston v Chris Hero (Last Man Standing Match) (IWA-MS, 9/29/07)

I'm a bit of a low voter on this. I like Kingston well enough and I'm mostly fine with Hero, but I've watched this a couple times over the years now and it's never blown me away. Some of the fighting spirit parts are kind of ropey, though they at least manage to feel like moments that are driven by a desire to get back up and kick the shit out of an opponent. Fuelled by HATRED and whatnot, as opposed to...whatever else fuels one's fighting spirit. And those parts are few and far between anyway because this is largely an alley fight. "Gritty", "seedy", "nasty"; the good stuff. There's no commentary and nobody even bothers with introductions, they just appear from a room punching and slapping each other. How long were they brawling back there to begin with? Where in the arena did they bump into each other? It could've been three minutes, it could've been an hour. Every shot lands with a thud or a whack and not a minute goes by without Hero calling Kingston a piece of shit or Eddie threatening to "fuckin kill" Hero. The chokes are violent, the eye rakes look like proper thumb in the eye trying to squish brains eye rakes, the elbows and forearms rattle teeth and the headbutts are appropriately disgusting. All the weapon shots are reckless and the bit where Hero just chucks a chair in the ring and the edge of it belts Kingston in the neck was unreal. Hero stamps repeatedly on Kingston's hands and fingers, at one point doing so while it looked like Eddie's fingers were flexed at the joints. Usually you'll have guys do that on flat fingers, obviously so it doesn't legit break those fingers (or at least offers less chance of breaking them, as you're still stamping on a person's hand after all). This time Kingston's hand was just lying curled on the mat and Hero squashed it with the sole of his boot. To hell with him being able to tie his shoelaces for a month. All of the guardrail stuff was mean and I'll always appreciate the finish of a match like this being the biggest and nastiest spot of them all. There was no anti-climax here, boys. Not my favourite match, one I'd put a few rungs below your Necro Butcher prison riots, but a badass fight all the same.