The last Ruckus of October began with a video package recapping Devil's Night. Stills of Sohla Patel and newcomer Omar Littlefield winning their preshow matches gave way to short clips of what went down when the main card unfolded…
The International Players gutting out a win over the End Times before Summer Rose gave them the orders to take them out…only for the returning Wonderful Ward Brothers to stop them and almost throw them off the ramp in retribution before the Times fled
Pyotr Caviar proving to be the difference maker again in a Unified World Tag Team championships match (even a handicap one) and launching Richard Windsor into Katsuji Ootsuka to save the match and his title reign; he would pin Ootsuka to continue Team Batroc's death grip on the belts
Jacques Krieger tried to avoid it and fought well throughout, but Reggie Strong unveiled some new moves along the way to capturing the GRPL+ World Television championship to the joy of the Orlando fans
Drake Tremble got some help from Bobby Bash as he tried to help get Justice Davis into the Red, White and True - but Bash got caught and ejected from ringside; when the ref went down later, Tremble berated Ted Holland and demanded his help only for Holland to declare he was Swamp Pride and laid out Tremble before Davis rallied to win and end the Red, White and True
The semi main was a champion vs. champion grudge match that saw Karyn Tisch-Warren exercise her rematch clause and bring the Crush championship into her Women's World championship match against Cindy Monet; possibly the match of the night ensued as Karyn became the first one to kick out of the Tightrope and Cindy get to the ropes on a Circuit Breaker - but when the ref got wiped out by Karyn eating a second Tightrope Sohla Patel waffled Cindy with a belt shot to pave the way for another Circuit Breaker that got the Women's World championship back in Karyn's arms and made her the first ever double champion in the history of QCW's women's division
The main event saw Autumn Powers' Last Stand against the Revenant for the Unified World championship evolve into a no DQ match as well, and Autumn brought the plunder while the Rev brought the 7', 330 pounds and the Red Right Hand. Autumn got the Rev down to size and swarmed him with weapons before drilling him with a trashcan assisted Hazy Shade of Autumn.
The screen went black but you could hear the crowd make the three count and then…bedlam.
The crowd went nuts, the Rev slunk to the back, and gold and red pyro exploded on the stage as Autumn Powers celebrated becoming the first woman to capture the Unified World title, and the package ended with the crowd chanting her name while she lifted the Fifteen Pounds of Gold over her head and letting out a roar
From there we went to Duck Eko live in the ring, who asked us to help him welcome the NEWWWWWWWWWW Unified World Champion - Autumn Powers!
You could only hear the first few seconds of the Offspring's "Mota" before Autumn parted the Qualitron and Quality Arena erupted in a roar that shook the rafters. All that'd changed for Autumn was the Fifteen Pounds of Gold around her waist and her FINAL WOMAN shirt had a gold instead of a black background - she was still high fiving fans, spending a little more time with a small girl who'd dressed up like her for the last Ruckus before Halloween. Autumn vaulted into the ring and hit a turnbuckle to pose, setting off a baptism of gold, white and red pyro not only on the stage but above and behind her in the ring. Powers walked over to another set of turnbuckles before whipping off the Unified World title and holding it up high, causing another barrage of pyro. Autumn stood in the middle of the ring as red confetti fell from the rafters before she looked down and smiled.
The "YOU DESERVE IT! 👏 👏 👏👏👏" chants rang out loud and proud throughout Quality Arena, interrupted only by Naz attributing the win to the bump you could only get by being on his show; though it happened off camera you could hear Steve swatting at him. Autumn said she heard them but wanted to do something a little different first - talk about what they didn't deserve. They didn't deserve a Unified champ being Undead Lesnar and showing up every other month - didn't deserve a Big Spook who was just another grumpy land monster who couldn't even keep someone half their size buried - that may have been the way things were, but those dog days were over.
Because ever since she started here three plus years ago all she ever wanted to do was evolve and change QCW for the better. Most careers would have been over the moment a steel cage fell in on them, but she kept pushing and kept fighting. Most people wouldn't challenge the ghost of their past to a Best of 5 and walk out with a title, and there sure weren't a bunch of wrestlers that would gamble their entire professional futures for one more shot at a living, breathing land monster and walk out your NEW UNIFIED WORLD CHAMPION!
Once the pop from that finally died off, Autumn said the show tonight was going to be great so she didn't want to hog everybody's time, she just was really out here because she wanted to say two things that were really important.
She couldn't have done it without the fans - the ones she could see, the ones at home she could feel, hell, even if they were so quiet that all they did was like all her Instagram posts, she was honored to be champion for them because they helped make her a Triple Crown winner and put her in this position today. She could never thank them enough for that.
She took being the first female Unified World champion seriously. More seriously than anything else she'd ever done. So male, female, immortal, meta-human, whatthehell ever - if the day came when someone could beat her for this, she'd put the belt around their waist and shake their hand herself. But until that day came she'd defend against anyone who deserved it. Because even more than being the Final Woman now, she was the Unified champion of the World….and she wasn't running from jack [BLEEP]!
A steely-eyed Autumn tossed the mic as "Mota" hit the PA again and she left the ring, doling out some more fist bumps and fives to those in the good seats. Powers got to the midway point of the ramp and raised up the Unified title up once more –
– and that's when "Roar" suddenly filtered out over the PA – and out came International Lotus. The camera got a good look of Autumn's "WTF?!" face turning into a stinkeye as first Scott Warren-Tisch, then Sohla Patel and Karyn Tisch-Warren power walked down the ramp and ignored the new Unified World champion entirely.
After all, as Naz pointed out as they got into the ring, Autumn wasn't the only new World champion in town after Sunday. The notorious KTW was out to defend her Crush championship but had used Sohla and Scott to regain the Women's World championship at Devil's Night, and as her threat of becoming the first ever double champion in women's division history had come true maybe you could forgive her shit eating grin as she slowly thrust both of her singles titles in the air and set off some gold and white pyro in the Arena. Powers shook her head and headed to the back while Karyn alternated belts to use as mirrors and bathed in her own good looks and greatness.
This got cut off by the arrival of Fiona Fogg, who got a better than usual reaction from the Quality Controllers simply by going up against Lotus and the vainglorious Karyn, the former Catch Hell Wrestling League Women's champion hoping to pull a mild upset and stop Tisch-Warren's titles reigns before it could even really get started.
| • Karyn Tisch-Warren [c, International Lotus] ds. Fiona Fogg to retain the Crush championship • | That did not happen. In actuality, the opposite of that happened.
Karyn rushed Fiona at the bell and laid her out; after a few basic moves Tisch-Warren elevated her offense to the backbreaker spam that she's made her name off of ever since she's made her way to QCW. Fiona rallied to get a few shots in but Tisch-Warren polished off Fogg in a little over five minutes to the surprise of the announce, with her Spare Me powerbomb backbreaker setting up the Circuit Breaker that tapped Fiona out. **
KTW nudged the heat checked Fogg out of the ring before Scott and Sohla came back into the ring and handed Karyn her titles. The usually mouthy Karyn stood proud and quiet while the announce put over that love her or hate her, Tisch-Warren was making history as the first double champion ever in the women's division.
From there we went TOTHEBACK~!, where Julius Duquesne III brought on his guest, Justice Davis. The crowd popped as the Battle Ground Battler came on the set, looking focused and intense as usual. Davis nodded at JD3, who said that Justice not only won his PPV debut Sunday night, he got the Red, White and True dissolved in the process. Davis allowed himself a small smile at that before some off screen clapping interrupted the moment.
Justice tensed up but then let loose an actual grin as Mason "Razorblade" Savage walked up and gave him some dap. Davis asked Savage how he was doing, and Savage said pretty good - but not as good as the man who shut up Drake Tremble once and for all. Razorblade admitted it was an accomplishment he'd love to have on his resume, but if it was going to go to someone else, then he was damn sure glad it was JD. JD3 noticed the easy vibes and camaraderie between them, saying maybe with a slot recently opening up in the tag division that maybe they were going to fill it?
The crowd liked that idea, and Davis and Savage started audibly complimenting each other before saying that might be a thing that could happen – before a voice off screen said that it was going to happen tonight.
Davis and Savage looked over to see the International Players walking into frame, and JD3 backed up to allow them into the increasingly crowded interview. Lucius Patton and Benjamin Valentino said their hellos with Valentino saying he knew Justice was going to wrap up Drake after the way he helped he and his brother win a six man last week. Sweet Lu took over, noting that they had just come back from Commissioner Holmes’ office and come to them with a proposition to main event tonight’s show if they were up for it.
The Players…Razorblade…and Justice, of course…against Beauty and the Beast Mode and Team Batroc.
Razorblade said that if that was the opposition, you know he was in – Davis piggybacked on the idea in short order, saying that in just the past week alone he had whipped some End Times ass and shut down the Red, White and True once and for all…so if the tag champs or their partners didn’t know about Justice Davis they were going to find out the hard way tonight when the main event went down. The babyfaces walked off the set confidently while JD3 teed up a commercial break.
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We went back to the desk after the break to the desk, where Steve and Naz talked about how the Red, White and True was no longer in business thanks to Justice Davis but also in part thanks to Ted Holland – and then they got interrupted by a vaguely familiar voice.
The man with the dyed blonde hair was kind enough to reintroduce himself - he was Evan O'Neill, the man who put the Evergreen Wrestling League on the map and was still the only double Triple Crown winner that place had ever known. But quite frankly, between G+ and Scotty Holmes their money wasn't long enough, so he came to QCW only to find an off duty Hot Topic cashier holding onto what he had worked so hard to build and a bunch of Florida mouth breathers lapping it up. Truth be told, he was looking forward to embarrassing that chick from Scott Pilgrim - but he knew he had to work his way up the ladder and again show the dorks in the cheap seats that Evan O'Neill would be putting the quality back into Quality Championship Wrestling whether these rubes liked it or not.
So he was here lowering himself to be in Parts Unknown to get his win streak started by issuing an open challenge to anybody in the back, and if Autumn wanted to save everyone some time she could come on out & lose the Unified title to him.
There was silence for a while, but when music hit the PA to break it up it wasn't "Mota"...it was "This Town Ain't Big Enough For the Both of Us", much to only Naz's chagrin.
As Steve pointed out in a kinder way on the broadcast, no one really cares one way or another about Evan O'Neill returning to the Quality Arena – now "Dark Mirror" Beckett Carpenter, on the other hand, that was the sort of return the people could get behind.
| • "Dark Mirror" Beckett Carpenter d. Evan O'Neill • | O'Neill held his own for the first couple of minutes before catching the wrong end of an alley-oop Codebreaker from the former Unified World Tag Team and World TV champion. Carpenter put on a showcase for the rest of the lopsided bout, helping hasten O'Neill's bedtime with a flurry of hammer and anvil elbows before closing the (off) book on him with their signature Look Inward. **
After replays, we saw Carpenter take a series of bows to the fan base before stepping over Evan and heading to the back. Steve put over Beckett's full recovery from the unsanctioned match they'd won at AnIIIversary, then Naz annoying Steve at the desk was suddenly broken up by a video package that showed some highlights from, of all things, Cold As Hell '21. We got to see the beginning of the long-standing rivalry between Serge Batroc and Razorblade, Naz winning the Worldwide Leader tournament, and in one of the Modern Era's most infamous moments the Storybookers collapsing the steel cage on Autumn Powers and the future Dark Mirror. Stills of each moment showed, and in order the letters X X and V flashed over them before the QCW logo popped up & things faded to black.
When it was over, Duck Eko was in the ring to make the intros for the next match.
| • "Swamp Pride" Ted Holland d. "Great American" Bobby Bash • | As you saw in the opening video package, Justice Davis officially ended the Red, White and True at the PPV with Ted Holland tired of playing Drake Tremble's fall guy for nearly a year. While Holland was done as a follower, Bobby Bash stood by Tremble online over the past week and the Quality Social chirping eventually led us to the former tag partners fighting here.
Bash attacked Holland before the bell and spent the opening minutes alternately beating Ted down and yelling at him that he'd ruined everything. Holland managed to hit some punches before Bash snatched him up in a biel and tossed him between the ropes before following up on the outside and tossing him into the barricade. Bash seized Holland again but Ted locked on a sleeper hold that Bobby couldn't shake, nearly rendering a man 60 pounds heavier than him unconscious. Holland slipped out the back and shoved Bash into the post before sliding into the ring under the bottom rope.
A disoriented and slightly bloodied Bash was able to get in the ring at 8 but Holland swarmed him when he got in the ring and kept up the pressure for the rest of the match. A fired up Ted laid in thigh kicks to hobble Bash, then chop blocked him a few times until he was off his feet. With Bash staggered, Holland hit a flying DDT off the second rope to drive him to his knees, then a second one to lay Bobby out cold and win the fight to a decent pop from the Quality Controllers. **
Holland got his hand raised but Drake Tremble ran down the ramp to put a damper on things. Tremble went after his former protege - and Holland folded him up like a K/4 offsuit with a right hand that left Drake on the canvas barely moving. Even Ted looked a little surprised at how well his uppercut did before running to the ropes and celebrating, the crowd cheering him for the first time in his QCW tenure. Steve put over the new and improved Swamp Pride before teeing up a commercial break.
✨
We came back from the break to a minor surprise – Commissioner Holmes, sitting on his desk in his office getting beamed out to the Arena and all of us couch jockeys. Holmes thanked us for making Devil’s Night another sold out PPV that continued QCW’s evolution of being the premier home of independent wrestling in North America, and said that Quality Championship Wrestling didn’t have such a thing as a reverse gear. Next month would see QCW make its return to Puerto Rico for the first time in nearly 40 years, but even that wasn’t why he was popping up on Ruckus: it was to announce the return of the Unified Contendership Challenge.
It would begin next week with a 10 team battle royale, with the first two eliminated participants costing their team a spot in a single elimination tournament that would start two weeks from now – the rest of the battle royale would determine the seeds of the tournament that would play out on every single Ruckus in November until the finals happened on December 1st. He encouraged us to check QCW’s website next Wednesday right before Unleashed to find out the 10 teams participating in the UCC before throwing things to Duck in the ring for the second title match of the night.
| • "Superfine" Reggie Strong [c] d. Hawk Carter to retain the GRPL+ World Television championship 1️⃣ • | Successful maiden voyage for Strong as he began his title reign with a showcase win over QCW's resident cowboy. Of note during this was Jacques Krieger and S. Mark Starr coming out on the ramp to watch the fight; also, along the way to his victory Reggie gave a Quality Arena debut to the Superfine Stomp he unveiled on Sunday on his way to the title victory. After that, Fine and Dandy and thanks for playing, Hawk. **
After replays, Strong waved Krieger down to the ring so that they could pick up where Devil's Night left off – but Starr held up an arm to block Krieger from advancing. After Starr whispered something to him, both men turned on their heels and headed to the back while Strong celebrated with the Quality Controllers who were chanting "Reggie!" repeatedly.
From there we went TOTHEBACK~!, where Enya Face hadn't teleported into Quality Arena - she was in the backstage area to welcome her guests at this time: Beauty and the Beast Mode and the Unified World Tag Team champions Team Batroc.
Roy Fade, Pierce Moore, Serge Batroc and Pyotr Caviar came out to booing from the audience. It will shock you to learn none of them seemed to care. Enya asked them about the main event and "These Hands" spoke first, Roy Fade asking if he should worry about the never gonna be, the has been he worshipped or the chumps he and Pierce had already beaten. Moore added that between their greatness and teaming with the champs, the main event was all but over already - they just had to go out and win it. Serge looked at them before laughing and nodding, saying that while he couldn't stop the Challenge from happening…well, if Roy or Pierce could win the match (and Serge pivoted to staring down Pierce before saying that such a win would impress certain young ladies) that such good teamwork would mean Beauty and the Beast Mode could skip to the front of the line and get the next shot at the Unified World Tag Team championships.
Pierce smiled slowly before saying that was all the motivation he and Roy needed. All four men shook hands, and Enya mentioned that they were out to win the main event in just a few moments before setting up our last commercial break tonight.
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| • the End Times (w/Summer Rose) dco. the Wonderful Ward Brothers • | Technically, a match happened here, but it maybe lasted a minute and a half.
The End Times continued their bizarre and frightening rise to prominence in QCW's tag scene by throwing the Wards off the stage about a month and a half ago; when they tried to replicate the feat on the International Players at the PPV the Wards came back from those injuries to beat the End Times ' asses.
That also played out here, with the still pissed off Wards jumping the End Times in the lower level as they made their way to the ring. Danny Castle and Dr. Martin Williams fought Jason and Rich towards the ring and the match technically started, but a couple of minutes later the ref had hit a 10 count that nobody involved gave a rat's ass about – and they were still brawling, so much so that Quality Force security had to come out to keep them off each other with the faithful firing up "Let them fight!" chants as they swore at each other.
With the warring tag teams still trying to get at each other off screen we went to Steve at the desk, who set up some highlights for the next week of QCW TV:
⌨️ Unleashed will see Jacques Krieger return to action and 8 person intergender tag action as the Game Changers team with the Wonderful Ward Brothers to face the End Times and A World of Pain ⌨️
💫 And Ruckus next week will feature another GRPL+ World Television title defense from "Superfine" Reggie Strong as he continues down the Road to 10 💫
💫 Double champion Karyn Tisch-Warren will also defend the Crush championship 💫
💫 And the Unified Contendership Challenge will begin with a 10 team battle royale in the main event; two teams will find themselves on the outside looking in while the final survivor(s) will earn the crucial #1 seed 💫
But before that tag action next week, we have a big 8 man tag this week that is
| • the main event • |
First out were Beauty and the Beast Mode, the ascendant team of Roy Fade and Pierce Moore. These Hands and the Dashing One strutted down the ramp before stopping at the end of it, giving way to the creepy whistling before Rammstein's "Engel" brought out Team Batroc. The foursome headed into the ring with Steve throwing a fit over Serge promising Mode a titles shot earlier if they helped them get rid of their opposition while Naz of course clowned Steve, saying it reflected a championship mentality a normcore like Steve could never understand.
Naz was reaching deep into the bag of "he who has the gold makes the rules" before the arrival of the babyfaces - first Justice Davis, who soaked up the crowd pop before the International Players came out with Jupiter Jones to back them up. Jones and the Players waited for Razorblade to join them and then they hit the ring - the Players doling out some high fives to ringside fans while Davis and Savage focused their energies on staring down all opposition across from them.
After the bell rang, Roy Fade opted to start things for his side and Justice Davis did the same for his squad. Newcomer Davis held his own with These Hands for the opening minutes until Pierce Moore tried to get involved from the apron. Davis dropped the Baron of Beverly Hills and sent him to the floor - but that distraction allowed Fade to shoulder him into the heel corner and lay in some Golden Glove level body shots. Once that was done, Serge tagged himself in and piled on picking Davis apart.
The heels halved the ring on Justice, and when they came close to failing they found a way to cheap shot one of the babyfaces or outright pull them off the apron. After Fade hit a capture suplex on Davis, he tagged in Moore and they set up for their finisher, and that's where the excrement met the cooling device.
For Beauty and the Beast Mode.
As Moore went for his Fresh To Death cutter, Fade shot out of the corner with the Decision. But Davis found a way to save himself, pushing Moore off into Fade's finisher before making a diving tag to Razorblade. Savage came in the ring and started throwing shots…right up until a groggy Moore desperately held onto Savage's leg like a toddler to a parent. It wasn't the greatest offensive maneuver ever, but it bought a desperate Fade enough time to tag in Pyotr Caviar.
Welp!
Razorblade swung away from both sides of the plate before Caviar pushed him away. Steve mentioned that Pyotr had been fined $5,000 for dropping a ref last week but Savage was standing his ground against him. When Pyotr went for a Russian sickle, Razorblade dodged it and a second one before running into the ropes and landing a pump knee. Caviar was sent reeling right before he lashed out with a double overhead chop that dropped the former double champion to the mat. Caviar snarled right as the International Players came into the ring and went after him, but Caviar put those meesters right on their keesters.
And right after that, Caviar was put on his via a Justice Davis sized Olympic Slam.
The crowd understandably lost their minds as Davis stomped back to the apron and waited for the tag, yelling at Savage to get him back in. Savage rolled towards his corner and Caviar did the same. When the tags were made, everything came full circle - Davis vs. Fade.
This time Justice was punching Fade before the inverse could happen, and he even got some help when the International Players got some revenge on Batroc and Moore by pulling them off the apron and throwing hands. Caviar went for the save only to get picked off by a Razorblade tope suicida (!) that sent the beefy Tracksuit Tsar into the barricade with Savage continuing to stomp away on him once he got up.
Despite his backup getting the losing end of the equation on the outside, Fade managed to turn the tide by raking Davis' eyes to set up a Stun Gun that recoiled Davis into the center of the ring. These Hands wasted little time in dropping his kneepad and teeing up the Decision, but Davis caught the attempt with a massive upkick before cinching the former three time World TV champ up and drilling him with the Davis Driver. It took both Players and Razorblade to keep Caviar from making the save but it worked - and Justice reigned in the Quality Arena. Now that's what I call a high quality TV match. ****
| • Justice Davis, Mason "Razorblade" Savage and the International Players (w/Jupiter Jones) d. Beauty and the Beast Mode and Team Batroc • |
After replays of the restaurant quality action, Steve put over Justice's huge week of Ruckus wins and shutting down the Red, White and True at the PPV. As the credits box came up we got shots of the babyfaces each taking a turnbuckle and celebrating the win, lingering on Davis not in rah rah mode but swearing to everyone watching that he was just getting started and that by the end of the year anybody who cared about QCW that they would know his name. Steve got in a quick plug for the Unified Contendership Challenge next week before wishing us good night from the Quality Arena.
