On Sunday April 20th, CHIKARA Pro made their return to the New Alhambra (ECW) Arena in Philadelphia for the first time since the amazing three night King of Trios tournament. This night promised the CHIKARA return of Claudio Castagnoli and the much anticipated rematch for the Campeonatos De Parejas (tag team championship). The night opened with ring announcer Nick Papagiorgio being interrupted by the former Equinox, Vin Gerard. He's had his problems lately with ant superstars, The Colony. After bringing out his associate Bull Pain and talking some trash, Soldier and Fire Ant hit the ring and we had an impromptu match on our hands. Well, maybe not "match" so much as "two fights going on at once."

This one was a hard one to follow because there were a lot of things going on at once and, when the dust settled, Bull Pain got his team disqualified after using a bat on Soldier Ant, much to the chagrin of Colony fans and PETA members everywhere. After doing some more damage to the ants, a group of wrestlers including Incoherence, Shane Storm and others came out to help, and Director of Fun, Leonard F. Chikarason, suspended Bull Pain for 30 days for sucking...err, for using excessive violence. I wanted to see more of The Colony but this was pretty much just a glorified beatdown.

After that we began our scheduled matches, with muscled monster Hydra taking on the one and only Chuck Taylor. This match was great and about as funny as you'd imagine, with Hydra using his super strength to overpower Chuck, and Chuck somehow being able to slam the many tons of Hydra. Oh, and Hydra choked on a grenade and the ref had to administer the Heimlich. In the end, Chuck pulled off the win with the Omega Driver/Awful Waffle (awesome), yelled at some kids in the crowd and left victorious.

Next up we had the 8-Bit Luchadore Player Uno taking on the remaining half of the Olsen Twins, Jimmy Olsen. This match was good too, with back and forth action, innovative moves from both guys and, of course, that tricky Pause button on Uno's ring gear coming in to play. In the end though, Jimmy pulled off a victory. Following that was Tim Donst against that vile Ophidian. Donst came to the ring accompanied by Neo Solar Temple members Crossbones and the awesome UltraMantis Black, who sadly didn't grace us with any words of widsom. This match was kind of slow at times with a lot of reversals and rest holds, I think because Donst has the whole amateur wrestler thing going on. But the main story of the match was that the Temple members were trying to get him to cheat and he wouldn't buy it. Eventually while Crossbones had the ref distracted, UltraMantis pushed Ophidian off the top rope and Tim was able to pick up the win.

But that's not the last we'd see of The Osirian Portal, because up next it was the Funky Pharoah Amasis taking on 2007 Young Lions Cup winner Helios. This was a fast paced, high impact match that served a good purpose after the previous match, which was slower and ground-based. Action inside and out of the ring, high flying dives and anything else these two could think of provided an entertaining bout. After an awesome shooting star press, Helios picked up the victory. At this point there was an intermission, but we were informed that Eddie Kingston still hadn't arrived and wouldn't be competing. Boo. No Backfist to the Future for me tonight.

After the intermission the show came back with a bang, with the team of Mitch Ryder, Shayne Hawke, "Sweet and Sour" Larry Sweeney, and Robbie Ellis taking on Mike Quackenbush, Shane Storm, Cheech, and Cloudy. This match was awesom,e and the crowd was totally into it. Much chanting for the 64 year old Robbie Ellis, who wrestled better than I or Chris Masters could ever hope to. This was an exciting match, with the team of Sweeney and Company taking many opportunites to get in some cheap shots on whoever was in the ring with them at the time. As you could imagine, this eventually broke into anarchy, with a big brawl on the outside concluding with Robbie Ellis jumping from the second rope to the group of wrestlers outside. Wow. This left Larry Sweeney in the ring with Traffic Regulator Shane Storm, and sadly the Sweet and Sour One succumbed to That Japanese Move! and was pinned for the three count. After the match, some heated words were exchanged between Mitch Ryder and Larry Sweeney. Ryder was mad that Sweeney had lost the match for their team, and Sweeney was mad that his team was seemingly nowhere to be found when he needed help.

Up next was supposed to be Eddie Kingston and Sabian against King of Trios winners, Lince Dorado and El Pantera. Since Kingston was a no-show, it was decided that it would be a singles match, with a coin flip determining who Sabian would face. El Pantera was decided as the competitor and we had ourselves a match. This was kind of a simple match compared to the madness we had just witnessed but it wasn't bad. El Pantera's mask unintentionally came off briefly during the match, but fortunately he was facing the other way so his secret is still safe with me. Sabian ended up picking up the victory and a small retaliation for Pantera and Dorado beating BLKOUT in the Trios finals.

Following that, we had the match I was most excited to see, Claudio Castagnoli taking on "Big Rig" Brodie Lee. These two guys both measure in at around 6 foot 7 and are great in the ring. I saw this awesome big guy showdown as a good way to balance the big guy shitfest that is Big Show vs Great Khali which is happening at WWE Backlash. This match in no way disappointed. Many many stiff chops and forearms. Even more Swiss uppercuts and "HEYYY"s. Sadly no dancing from Claudio though. After brawling outside of the ring, the action returned to the ring and while Claudio attempted his bicycle kick, Brodie pulled the ref in front of him and the ref was out. Claudio then locked Brodie in the most insane Big Swing I've ever seen. After unsuccessfully attempting the Ricola Bomb earlier in the match, Claudio finally hit it and as a new ref came to count the three, the other ref came to and called for the bell. Claudio was assumed to be the winner, but the first referee called for a disqualification because he was kicked. So Brodie was your winner by DQ.

Finally, we had our main event, with special ring announcer Louden Noxious of Kaiju Big Battel fame! This was the rematch between former champions FIST (Icarus and Gran Akuma) taking on current champions Incoherence (Delirious and Hallowicked). You know you're in for a treat when at the beginning of the match, clear as a bell, Delirious points to Icarus and says "Tonight, I'm gonna make you poop your pants!". The crowd loved it and even Icarus seemed to be fighting back a smile. Incoherence seemed to get the advantage early on but Hallowicked ran into some trouble and unfortunately fell to a fanny pack-wearing Icarus and his FANNY PACK SPLASH OF DOOM. Luckily this is a best of three falls match and they've only lost the first fall. More trouble for Incoherence during the second fall. Icarus and is fanny pack go to ringside and grab the ring bell. In the ring, though, Hallowicked took the bell and was caught by the ref. Hallowicked played innocent but rang the bell, which send Delirious into a frenzy and eventually lead to Incoherence taking the second fall.

Interesting side note: While Icarus was getting the bell, an old lady behind me who had been yelling for him to take off the fanny pack, yelled "Take off the bag asshole!!" Icarus glanced over and the woman's friend said something along the lines of "Uh oh, he's mad now," to which she responded, "I don't give a shit!" So back to the match and the third and deciding fall. Hallowicked ran into some more trouble in the form of Akuma and Icarus with that dang bag again. After a few misfires from FIST, Delirious hit his splash and Incoherence won the third fall, retaining their titles. Overall, while not as good as King of Trios, this was a great show. Very entertaining. I can't wait for May 18th when CHIKARA returns to Philly.