Shellacked

In back-to-back "Inside Scoop" vlogs on the UCW website, Eli Black challenged longtime foe Axel to one final battle, and Axel all but begged Eli to stop the shit-talk and come at him ... NOW. The result of this hubbub is UCW's latest release [#364], in which the company's top two stars and best wrestlers have a second go-around one on one. The result is a character-defining and history-making showdown.

The 33-minute match is everything I wanted it to be. Partly it reifies my personal ideal in wrestling fantasy: the male catfight--beyond fighting to win, to fighting to deface and destroy. Axel and Eli want less to submit the other guy than to fuck him up for good. It's never more a catfight than when the two have each other by the hair and tug and grimace like ninth-grade bitches after phys ed. (See the third picture above.)

And in oil, no less! Eli, who made "no oil wrestling" a proviso in his UCW contract, admits up front that it does "rile him up" (he knows because he violated the stipulation two months ago, in an oil match against Johnny Deep--but, then, who wouldn't cross a line for Johnny?). Besides, Eli likes the way the oil makes his washboard abs "sparkle." In a typical burst of ego, he asks Axel whether the thought of lean taut muscle slathered in olive oil turns him on. It's a tease and a taunt, as if these two bobcats weren't already poised to sink tooth and claw into each other.

This is a realization of the hypothetical match that's given UCW fans blueballs for over two years, ever since Eli first strutted onto Axel's mat like it was his own. The collision is spectacular and immensely satisfying, I must say. I loved every shimmering minute of it.