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THE FUN HOUSE MIRROR ISSUE 18

Welcome back to the Fun House Mirror, where we look at a reality television show that wants to look like a MMA show but often looks like a bad pro wrestling show, and we look at a reality television show that wants to look like a MMA show but sometimes comes off like a good pro wrestling show.

Another busy week for the Fun House Mirror as on live television the UFC presented The Ultimate Fighter finale on Spike.

Even though Dana tried to erase Tito Ortis' presence from the show on the last episode, in the finale we are right back to Team Liddell versus Team Ortis with no mention of Franklin.

The card started out with a match up from season 11 as Rich Antonito goes toe to toe with Jamie Yager.  Jamie was quite the black sheep of the Ultimate Fighter house, but despite his best efforts to get a "grudge" fight against James Hammortree, Clayton McKinney, or Kyacey Uscola, (all people who Jamie trained with on Team Ortis/Franklin), Jamie gets a Team Liddell fighter who was actually friendly with Jamie during the season.

And, it's kind of symbolic of the "bad booking" of this season that you start the show off with a fight with no heat behind it.

The first round shows that while Jamie has an advantage in the stand up game, it is not that big of an advantage as Rich escapes the round unscathed.  Jamie still looks fresh after the first round and was able to avoid Rich's ground game.

However, in round two, similar to as in round two of his fight against Josh Bryant, Jamie started slowing down and gassing out.  Within two minutes of the end of the round Jamie was getting desperate for a way to reverse his sinking fortunes and even went for a double leg take down on Rich.  This proved fatal as Rich took control on the ground, took Jamie's back, got double leg hooks in, flattened Jamie out, and then started raining fists at Jamie's head.  Although most of the damage was absorbed by Jamie's afro, Jamie was not able to defend so the referee stopped the fight by TKO.

Fortunately, Jamie looked fine after the match.  Also, Chuck Liddell looked pretty good in the crowd after the match, just one week after being knocked out.

The next match has nothing to do with this season's show, Spencer Fisher versus Dennis Siver.

The first round has Silver bleeding hardway over his right eye after an inadvertent head butt, but Siver is able to persevere and finish the round.

Round two, as with round one, is a kick boxing match with neither man willing in to engage his opponent on the ground.

Round three, same song, different verse.

Dennis Siver wins by unanimous decision, probably because of better kicks.

Next up, Season one alumni Chris "The Crippler" Leban versus Aaron Simpson.   Chris is a striker with knockout power and a hard chin and Aaron is touted as a highly ranked grappler.

Chris was also the black sheep of the house, like Jamie Yager, in the first season.

Round one is a definite step up from the previous fight as both Chris and Aaron mix up their attacks with wrestling and striking.  Chris takes several shots to the chin which doesn't bother him at all.  Aaron gets several take downs but Chris escapes to his feet each time quickly.

In the second round Aaron starts slowing down which played right into Chris' strengths.  After much slugging and counter slugging Chris finally breaks down Aaron's defenses and punches Aaron out.  Aaron runs off balance half way across the ring after being hit so the referee calls for a TKO.

Chris cuts a pro wrestling promo afterwards saying that he wanted to avenge his friend Ed Herman's loss to Aaron and hopes that Ed gets a rematch.

Season three alumni Matt Hammel takes on season two alumni Keith Jardine is up next. 

But, before that they do a promo for Brock Lesner versus Shane Carwin.  One thing that really stands out is that Lesner has no neck at all compared to Carwin.

Matt Hammel looks a lot like a cross between the late Davey Boy Smith and Brian Christopher.

Round one is mostly a boxing match with Jardine frustrating Hammel with his unorthodox style and frequent stance changes.

The second round has tons of fireworks as Hammel first punches Jardine hard enough to knock his mouth piece out.  Then Jardine inadvertently pokes Hammel in the eye and gets a point deduction.  Then Hammel gets Jardine in trouble and nearly leaves Jardine's face a crimson mask.

At the start of round 3 Jardine is already bleeding before the round starts.  Jardine is able to finish the fight even though he is bleeding like a stuck pig.

Matt wins by majority decision 29-27, 29-27, 28-28.

The main event is next, Court McGee versus Kris McCray.  Court comes out to CSNY's Ohio.  I would have popped big for Weird Al Yankovic's Amish Paradise, or even Neil Young's Needle and the Damage Done, but still good choice by Court.

Franklin is in McCray's corner so I don't get the lack of respect.  Rich's left arm is heavily taped after being broken in his fight against Chuck Liddell.

The first round is mostly fasted paced with Court getting the better of the take downs but McCray managing escapes.  McCray did take a lot of punishment while down so I would give round one to McGee.

In the second round Court kicks it into high gear.  He gets a take down and then transitions to full mount.  Kris is able to finally break free without taking too much damage but had to carry Court's weight for over a minute.  Court then scores another take down and takes Kris' back.  Kris is not able to defend against a neck crank and taps out.

Your winner and The Ultimate Fighter Season 11 winner Court McGee!

In close up we see that Chuck still has a mouse under his eye where he was knocked out by Franklin the week before.

We then get a dark match were season ten alumni and Homicide look-a-like James McSweeney takes on Travis Browne.  In this fight Brown catches McSweeney with a punch and then gets on top for some ground and pound and stays on top for several minutes until he is able to pound McSweeney out for the win.

So, my predictions go 2-0 and The Minority Report takes the last train out of town to terrorize the next regional promotion.

Will they show up to terrorize NXT?

Probably not, but we do have Cody Rhodes versus Lucky Cannon on this weeks episode, and we get to find out what Striker thought about being physically assaulted by Cody.

Let's roll the tape.

We are started out in the ring with a new person, Ashley Valence, "the new member of the announcing team".  Okay, big problem.  We needed fewer people, like zero announcers, not more.

Is she going to replace Matt Striker?

After hyping up the upcoming rankings, she brings out the pros, and then gets the first match started.

M.C. Miz (who spoofed R-Truth's rap on RAW) comes out with Alex Riley.  Team Red Carpet's opponents are going to be Team South Beach, M.V.P. and "Showtime" Percy Watson.  (Note: Team South Beach should not be confused with the South Beach Party Boys which was Watson and Darren Young in FCW.)

I miss the inflatable tunnel they used when MVP was just starting out on Smackdown.

M.V.P. signals to Watson to take a deep breath and get focused as they come to the ring.

Riley starts off against M.V.P.  Last week Riley spent most of his singles matches eating stiff kicks.  Will he have a more balanced match this time?  At least he starts with a smart move by trash talking Watson into tagging in.

Percy's drop kicks are not bad but they don't make me miss Tommy Rogers'.  Maybe Watson had trouble with the move because of the thick cloud of smoke from M.V.P.'s entrance?

M.V.P. throws Alex out of the ring and The Miz starts treating him like Daniel Bryan, trash talking him and telling him that he is supposed to perform.

But, team Red Carpet gets their stuff together with some heel tactics and are soon wearing down Watson.

After several reversals of fortune The Miz catches Watson in the world's stupidest looking finishing move, the stroke (called here The Skull Crushing Finale) for the pinfall.

However, Watson got to show off some athleticism, doing a swivel hips splash from a standing position on the Miz that almost got as much hang time as Husky Harris' Senton Bomb.

Alex Riley is now 2-0 in spite of showing the athleticism of a slug.

And now, oh joy, it's time for some over produced promo packages.  How many non-wrestling segments in a row will they try to fit in?

I stand corrected.  After the package where we find out that Titus went from being a troubled youth to a college football star, we jump right into the next match, where Titus takes on Michael McGillicutty.

Last time Titus was in the ring he did his best impersonation of a mannequin.  Will he be able to show some wrasslin magic this week?

They have an inset promo with Michael who talks about talking to his mother after his first WWE win.  Didn't seem to sincere to me, so maybe Michael is planning on being a subtle heel?

Titus again shows no wrestling ability whatsoever.  His offense consists of throwing Michael around and he nearly kills Michael by botching a backdrop spot twice.

Michael perseveres and wins with the snap swinging neckbreaker.

And, just when you thought there couldn't be more wrestling on the show, we get Kaval versus Eli Cottonwood.  Normally in the real world one would expect the bigger man to beat up the smaller man.  However, in real life Eli versus Kaval would last all of one minute and consist of Kaval kicking out Eli's knees and then kicking his head in.

But, this is the WWE, so this could be the next stop on the Daniel Bryan express for Kaval.

Cottonwood absolutely sucks in the ring doing a bunch of generic big man spots.  He does to his credit eat a double stomp that Kaval delivered to Eli from the top rope while Eli was standing.

Eli wins with a god awfully ugly looking chokeslam into a front drop, so welcome to stop two on the Daniel Bryan express.

Mark Henry does show Kaval some respect as he makes his way to the back.

We then get the promo package for Lucky Cannon.  zzzz

We then promised an update on the attack by "Nexus" (the season one NXT seven) against VKM on RAW.  It did get a reaction live.  A Daniel Bryan chant.  lol.

But before that, Lay Cool has to do their thing in humiliating Kaval backstage.  They give him a t-shirt backstage that says "property of Lay Cool" and admonish him to smile more.

We then recap what happened between Cody and Striker last week.  Striker is with the announce team and is obviously not pleased. 

After reviewing the footage, Striker says he wants to put that incident in the past, which on a normal wrestling show would telegraph Striker jumping Rhodes during his match, but this is the WWE.

We then get the often teased Raw recap.  In it, the NXT seven lay out that dastardly heel Vince McMahaon to a strong babyface reaction by the crowd.  Vince is so hated as a heel that no one from the dressing room comes down to help as Vince gets a sample of the NXT greatest hits.

So, what it in the future for these seven?  I see many jobs to Hornswoggle and Santino, follow by there fortunes rising when an "established WWE star" in Shamus defects to NXT and within three weeks has them completely emasculated and singing for him in the ring.

Lucky versus Cody is next, with Cody seconded by Husky Harris and Lucky seconded by Mark Henry.

Cody tells Lucky that he is so confident that he will win that he will add the stipulation to the match that Cody must win the match within five minutes or else he loses.

With one minute gone Cody hits an excellent drop kick.  Will Watson learn from this?

Rhodes wins with one minute to go with CrossRhodes.  Lucky does get much in except for some hope spots.

Next up, the rookies "closing arguments" before the pros/universe poll for next week.  This should cause serious ear bleedage.

Alex is up first and cuts a decent heel promo, as one might expect from him.  Too bad he is green as grass in the ring.

Kaval does a decent babyface promo.  Him, like Alex goes way over the forty five second limit, but what are you going to do?

Titus doesn't need all forty five seconds to come to a confusing ending to his promo.

Micheal cuts a slightly heelish promo that ends at the buzzer.

Eli cuts a promo that, as he correctly points out, means nothing.

Watson cuts a white meat baby face promo, oh yeah.

Lucky cuts a similar promo to Watson only without much charisma.

Husky Harris is last and instead of a promo, he relays a message from Cody Rhodes to Matt Striker by delivering a clubbering forearm and a fat man's flying senton bomb.

I don't know what the pay off is going to be for the Rhodes versus Striker feud.  If this was a "real" show, Husky would be kicked off the show.  Very puzzling.

So, an action filled show to counter the UFC's ultimate finale.  Both shows were thumbs up in my book.

But, next week we are down to just one show :(  Will WWE stop trying now that they have no competition?  Tune in next week.