About that other gruesome Swerve Strickland death match...

This is a script for a video on my YouTube channel. You can find the full video Here.

Over the past few days there's been a ton of talk about the Swerve vs Hangman match from Full Gear. Did they go too far? Was it justified and not in a Tony Khan tweet way? This year Swerve has become one of the wrestlers I most look forward to seeing on my TV. Not just for his in ring style, but his whole attitude. That walk to the ring with his hands in his pockets like he'd rather be anywhere else, like Orange Cassidy but with evil behind his eyes. The guy just exudes final boss villain, and that might be what was missing before.

Some quick thoughts on the match from this past Sunday, honestly I'm partial to a violent match if the story fits it, and Swerve has been so evil, and Hangman was so out for revenge that to me at least, it felt fitting that these two would go beyond extreme. It's certainly going to be one of the most memorable matches when 2023 is done, but did you know it's not the first match like this Swerve has had? Swerve also had one of the more memorable matches of 2017, though it aired then it was actually taped the year prior. That time Swerve was under a mask as Killshot, against a familiar foe in Lucha Underground. Also a little note, Swerve actually referenced his former gimmick on one of his kneepads with crosshairs on them. It's also worth noting that Swerve was no stranger to hardcore wrestling, being a former CZW champion. He even competed in CZW's signature match type, the Cage of Death.

If you're not familiar, Lucha Underground was a rather unique wrestling show that aired on the El Rey network between 2014 and 2018. It was a very melodramatic take on mixing lucha libre with almost soap opera style drama, with characters being killed off and even raised from the dead on the regular. It famously featured well known indie stars of the time playing completely different characters that were exclusive to the show. For example Ricochet, Santos Escobar, Jeff Cobb, and Thunder Rosa are among many others who went on to achieve fame elsewhere after playing characters on the show. Added to them Swerve as Killshot, and his opponent in the Hell of War match we'll get into now, Dante also known as AR Fox. It's also worth noting that Lucha Underground also introduced many US fans to the likes of Pentagon Jr and Rey Fenix who also both went on to bigger promotions.

The story going in to the match we're here for is that Dante Fox and Killshot served together in the US military. Killshot had left Dante for dead in battle, and he was now back for revenge. This flavoured the stipulations for their two out of three falls match. Fall one would be first blood rules, fall two would be no DQ, and fall three is essentially an ambulance match where one man has to be placed in a military vehicle, known here as a medical evac match.

Before we get into that match, I want to share with you a quote I read from Swerve talking about the mindset that a wrestler has when coming up with ideas for a death match. In a 2018 interview for Uproxx, AR Fox noted that once had was told they would be having a death match, he was more than happy, and spent as much time as he could coming up with ideas, as did Strickland. Swerve, clarifying Fox's statement says "The funny thing is, when we would come ideas (sic), and put them together, it’s stuff we want to take. It’s never stuff we want to give. I was like, “I’m willing to go through this.” And then he would come up with, “He’s willing to go through this, well, I’m willing to go through this.” And the trust factor with that between us two is just like unparalleled, man." I'm sure you've seen a wrestler in a match construct some assemblage of weapons like a stack of chairs or tables or something, only for the weapons to be used on themselves before, well thats kind of a similar principle. Also crucially, it seems that Swerve and Fox had control over what they would or wouldn't do, and I assume he and Hangman would have had the same.

While the match begins with very flashy lucha style wrestling, it doesn't take long for things to escalate as the two start fighting with a ladder and a chair outside the ring. I also at this point want you to know that I listened to half an hour of painful Matt Striker commentary for this video, where he goes off topic about Dantes Inferno and other tenuous tangents, so thats worth a like no? No, never mind it was worth a shot. It's also rather weird that he keeps questioning how we will know is Killshot is bleeding or not because he is wearing a mask. It's almost like he couldn't bleed from anywhere else, which spoiler alert, he will later on. Speaking of blood too, the canvas for this match might be the dirtiest I've ever seen, and I've seen all death match shows before such as GCW's Planet Death events.

For the first few minutes of the match, the two have a rather good athletic hardcore match, but things get extreme when Fox goes into a closet and brings out a pane of glass. If you watch a GCW show, you'll often see the referee or ring crew help with the construction of insane configurations of weapons, but Fox threatens now AEW referee Rick Knox to make him assist in setting up the glass pane. After a back and forth, Dante throws Killshot though the glass, drawing blood from his back, arms and even hands, winning the first fall.

Getting into fall two, and bear in mind the there is now shattered glass all over the ring, Dante continues with an insane looking Spanish Fly through a chair, then a beautiful 450 into Killshot laid across a ladder. In the process Dante seemed to cut his hand on the glass in the ring. Throughout this match the lucha influence is not forgotten which might well take some out of the drama, but for others might enhance this as a wrestling match.

Killshot once he regains control pulls out a barbed wire board, which Matt Striker calls the ancient aztec torture rack. AAAAGH just talk properly man. By this point Fox is bleeding and even has shards of glass stuck in his beard, but Killshot powerbombs him through the barbed wire board and follows up with a cradle driver in the glass to win the second fall. Killshot didn't just even the odds, but he shredded Fox's back in the process, leaving us with the ambulance match final fall.

So now we get to the medical evac fall, an early highlight being Killshot hitting a death valley driver from Brets rope to the stretcher on the floor, leaving a rather awful looking bloodstain that Striker calls a piece of flesh. The stretcher takes further punishment when Killshot hits a double stomp to Fox on it. From here we build to the finish, as the camera shows us a pane of glass in a wooden frame that is blocking the stretchers path, so you know we're going to see it used fairly soon. To be fair to Matt Striker, he hammers in the point that this was placed there as the command of Lucha Underground's in character promoter Dario Cueto out of sheer bloodthirstyness.

The two men fight their way up to the perch where the temple's Mariachi band usually plays, and Fox chokes Killshot with a cable. Killshot reaches for a bottle on the floor and blasts Fox with it, leading to him crashing off the platform through the glass before hitting the floor. Screw this dude by the way for smiling throughout it, taking the drama away like Paul London when Vince was about to blow his limo up. After this insane fall, Killshot loads Fox into the military vehicle and is declared the winner. I only hope that ambulance doesn't swerve when it drives.

Speaking in another 2018 interview this time with ESPN, Swerve noted how proud he was of the match and how it turned out. "That match came off exactly how we both envisioned it. We couldn't have done it any better. To me, that whole story between me and Fox culminated the perfect way." He also noted "I wanted to make a statement that no one could outperform me," For this reason it was especially cool to see AR Fox arrive in AEW this year, and even have two matches with Swerve. It was unfortunate that their team got cut off the way it did, as it would have been interesting to see what the former Killshot and Dante Fox could have done together as well as being opponents.

Watching this match back for the first time since it first aired, it is indeed still brutal and violent, but in many different ways. The staples, the barbed wire, while some of these weapons were in both matches, I'm very grateful that glass wasn't involved at Full Gear like it was in Lucha Underground. What is very perplexing though, is how Swerve was at an NFL game the day after like it was nothing. The bottom line is Swerve came out of the Full Gear match looking like a big time player. I've already predicted that he will soon get a shot at MJF now Jay White is in the rear view mirror, and he may well be the man to dethrone MJF.

Let me know what your thoughts are in the comments, thank you for your time, and if you liked this video please consider clicking like or even subscribing.

Sources:

The Lucha Underground match: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FRULNwtpAY

Uproxx interview: https://uproxx.com/prowrestling/killshot-dante-fox-lucha-underground-hell-of-war-match-interview/

Swerve ESPN Interview: https://www.espn.com/wwe/story/_/id/23865806/evolve-shane-strickland-one-most-demand-stars-independent-wrestling