NWA PowerrrSurge Review - October 19, 2021

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Jeremiah Plunkett def. Heartthrob Jaden

Plunkett has primarily been positioned as an enhancement guy on the show, so this afforded him a chance to pick up a rare singles win. He's perfectly fine, but I don't think viewers haven't been given a real reason to care about him up to this point. Thus, I found myself more impressed by Jaden, who had more of an aura about him. The match was solid. Unless Plunkett is going to be involved in something meaningful going forward, I'm not sure what purpose this was supposed to serve.

Thom Latimer def. Tim Storm

This stemmed from Strictly Business' attack on Storm and Nick Aldis a few weeks ago, not to mention all the history Latimer has with Strictly Business from over the years. They were also involved in that great Brawl in the Lou at NWA 73. Thus, I expected this to be longer and to be treated like a bigger deal, but what we got was a fairly basic bout that never left first gear. It ended before it had the chance to really get going, so that was disappointing. There wasn't anything technically wrong with it, but it could have been more and should have saved for an episode with a formal audience in attendance.

NWA World Women's Champion Kamille def. "Legit" Leyla Hirsch

(From my NWA EmPowerrr review...) I was excited for this coming into the event, but I didn't know it'd be the barn burner it ended up being, especially without much build and uncertainty surrounding the outcome. This was fantastic. There was a significant size difference between the two, yet they mastered the David vs. Goliath dynamic perfectly with Hirsch giving Kamille everything she had and Kamille playing her role as the dominant heel remarkably well. Hirsch made you believe she had a chance to take the title, only to just barely fall short. This was the best match I've seen either woman have. Kamille is coming along nicely and Hirsch can be a real star for AEW if booked properly. I enjoyed every second of this.

Overall Show

There wasn't anyone in attendance for the first two matches as they were referred to as "spotlight" matches. Of course, Kamille vs. Hirsch was a replay from EmPowerrr, but I had no complaints about re-watching that as it was honestly one of my favorite bouts all year and I'd love to see them run it back at some point. In addition to all of that, we heard from Crimson, who confirmed he'll be facing Jax Dane in a Steel Cage match at By Any Means Necessary, we got highlights of a random Nick Aldis match from a promotion called PTW in Poland against a man named Gracjan Korpo, and Billy Corgan discussed the current happenings in the NWA and noted that By Any Means Necessary will be airing over two episodes of Powerrr in November. We also found out that next week will be the EmPowerrred edition. There wasn't anything on this episode I'd recommend going out of your way to watch, but it moved some stuff forward and they filled the time well. Jaden vs. Plunkett felt pretty pointless, though.