MLW Fusion on Thanksgiving Review - November 23, 2023

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

TJ Crawford def. Nolo Kitano

It's nice to see Crawford back on Fusion as it indicates he'll be appearing regularly going forward. He's skilled from what I've seen and is a quality addition to the midcard. The same can be said about Griffin McCoy, who popped up recently and will apparently be linked with Crawford and Tony Deppen after helping Crawford win here. I'm looking forward to seeing what they can do together. This was a solid opener.

Tiara James def. Notorious Mimi

James has gotten the vignette treatment a few times in recent months, so although she hasn't done much of note yet, it's clear MLW has high hopes for their new acquisition. Meanwhile, Mimi was signed to WWE NXT at one point as Sloane Jacobs within the past two years and was also a part of the Monster Factory documentary that came out this year on Apple TV+. There wasn't anything out of the ordinary about this, but it did give James a victory to further her momentum and I liked that she got mic time afterward. 

World Titan Federation (Matt Cardona and "Filthy" Tom Lawlor) def. The Bomaye Fight Club (MLW World Heavyweight Champion Alex Kane and Mr. Thomas)

Alexander Hammerstone returning and joining the WTF faction was the big angle at the end of Fightland, and while he didn't appear in person here, he did pop up at the beginning of the episode for a pre-taped promo explaining his actions. This was a strong main event with Kane selling a storyline injury and battling back only to come up short, though Thomas was the one who was pinned, thankfully. Cardona will challenge Kane for the MLW World Heavyweight Championship at One Shot next month, so this was the right result.

Overall Show

MLW has put out an episode of Fusion on Thanksgiving every year that I've been following the product (since 2021) and I appreciate it's not a filler clip show like other companies tend to produce. Rather, this was a pretty good show on the whole with an above-average main event. There was follow-up from last weekend's Fightland event and everything felt like it served a purpose. The only part I didn't like was that Mance Warner heavily hinted at going under a mask going forward instead of actually leaving the promotion, rendering the stipulation of his Loser Leaves MLW match with Cardona at Fightland pointless. Of course, I can't say I didn't expect that.

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