WrestlingFigs > Wrestling News Posts > JOE BABINSACK REVIEWS THE BEST OF HEARTBREAK EXPRESS DVD
JOE BABINSACK REVIEWS THE BEST OF HEARTBREAK EXPRESS DVD
  • 08/17/2008 (5:57:19 pm)
  • Georgiann Makropoulos

……

BEST OF THE HEARTBREAK EXPRESS VOLUME 1
DVD
$12 ($10 for the DVD and $2 for Shipping)
Mail to Sean Pascoe, PO Box 1423, Dunedin, Florida 34698
(and don’t forget to include your address!)
Reviewed by Joe Babinsack
 
I finally got to see the Heartbreak Express in action, with footage of their best matches of 2007.
 
It was certainly worth the wait.
 
HBX is one of the best indy level tag teams around, and of course, since the big leagues don’t care much for tag team action, it makes them one of the best in the world. (Somehow I’d love to see the HBX up against the Briscoes. Why hasn’t that happened?)
 
If you haven’t seen Sensational Sean and Fabulous Phil, they do a pretty strong version of the classic heel team -- strongly reminiscent of the Midnight Express, but with more character, a greater base of hardcore action, and usually with a hot chick instead of James Cornette as their manager.
 
Somehow, that’s a trade-off that you just have to settle for!
 
Sean is the guy who’s going to remind you of Playboy Buddy Rose or Adrian Adonis. Phil’s the one that looks like a younger Dennis Condrey, and talks like him too -- as in, not all that much.
 
But Sean is a great promo. He can talk in the ring, or in the locker room. He can be serious and deadly, and can whip out a one-liner like few can do. He can scream and yell, or can scream with a high-pitch voice that makes you cringe.
 
And how about that point where he’s digging a broken cane into the throat of Murphy (of Black Market) and shrilly announces “I want to kill him!”
Or that post bloodbath moment, in the locker room, where he screeching admits that he never had respect for the Lifeguards, but now he admits that they gave the HBX the hardest fight of anyone …ever!!
 
The only concern I had with the DVD is that it’s chock full of bloodbaths and blow-offs, and it doesn’t really feature the HBX at their very best, as tag team technicians who can really go, and don’t need all the gimmicks and blood to get them over.
 
But then again, blood is what sells, and if you’re buying, the stock market is bullish.
 
Just don’t complain to me that the HBX isn’t all that great, because all they’re doing is bleeding and doing garbage matches. Just like the idiots who see Bruno Sammartino on YouTube and think that they’ve seen it all, keep in mind that you’re seeing the final matches in series, and the emotionally charged blow-offs, and in those scenarios, no one should be looking for technical masterpieces.
 
Just brawls, guts and plunder.

So what’s on the DVD?

HBX vs The Lifeguards from Tifton, Georgia
 
Ok, after all the build up, here’s the opener, which is pretty much old-school heel and pretty-boy face tag team at it’s best. I’m sure Sean didn’t appreciate the “Shamu” chant, but then again, veteran heels always get the cheers in the end.


HBX vs Christopher Street Connection
This is a “San Francisco Street Fight Match” from UXW in Orlando
Sean says that the UXW is well represented in this match, as they feature weapons and blood. I’m not so much into that, but if you are -- go for it.
 
CSC is a throw-back effeminate team, but they pull out all the stops.
 
There’s a sequence that gets gory and cringe worthy, as Phil and a CSC guy go at it in a shower-room. At first, it looks like a bathroom, and guys bleeding all over each other in a bathroom doesn’t seem all that wonderful, but the elbow off the built-in bench shows just how far these guys are going to take the violence.
 
One thing this match shows is just how great the HBX is at selling.

HBX vs Double Deuce
 
This is an “Anything Goes Match” for the NWA Florida Tag Team Titles from Sanford, Florida. It was also the main event of the last NWA Florida promotion.
 
I didn’t really know Double Deuce going into this, but coming out, they prove themselves in and out of the ring with the HBX.
 
Speaking of Florida, Sean does a nice Dusty Rhodes impersonation as if in a bullrope match, with the awesome “crimson mask” if I can throw in a Gordon Solie-ism to boot.

HBX vs Black Market in the now infamous Christmas Tree Death Match from United 1
On one hand, this was rather short.
 
On the other hand, I really don’t want to contemplate such a match going long!
 
All guys are busted wide in this one (which is a redundancy for this DVD.)
 
Having the weapons lined up under a small Christmas tree on a table is a nice touch … in a strange sort of way. Seeing Sean beaten about with a plastic Santa is a weird sense of irony, indeed. And he does a great job with the Christmas Tree, and the aforementioned sequence with the cane is priceless.
 
Who wins? Who loses? Watch it and find out. We all win when the blood flows.
 

HBX vs Vordell Walker and Dagon Briggs for the World 1 Tag Team Titles
 
This is another “Anything Goes Street Fight” but it’s from Savannah, Georgia
 
Sean says he almost went to jail on this one, because the local coppers got involved. I can believe it. I can believe it.
 
Vordell and Dagon are tough guys, and this match highlights the brutality of the HBX. That, you need to believe as well.

HBX vs Joey Machete & Steve Madison in a Barbed Wire Death Match (Savannah, GA)
 
Machete is an HBX nemesis, and another tough talented guy. Madison is a capable replacement for Murphy, but this ain’t really Black Market without that big guy kicking Sean’s “You’re just jealous” signage.
 
Anyway, barbed wire death matches have got to be a great thing no matter who’s doing the shredding.

Highlights of HBX vs The Lifeguards in the Avon Park Massacre
 
Obviously from Avon Park, Florida. Nice way to set up the main event here. And it’s that sort of details and planning that set HBX apart from the rest of the pack.
 
Let’s be honest, when I saw the Lifeguards all over this DVD, I thought it to be a joke. Because we’ve got a pretty boy and a backup who come out to the Baywatch theme.
 
Let me tell you, by the time you watch this DVD, you won’t be joking about the Lifeguards.
 
But then again, building up your opponents is rule one of professional wrestling. Not that the WWE subscribes to that notion!

HBX vs The Lifeguards in a Steel Cage Match from United 2
 
Here’s where Sean does an even more resplendent Dusty Rhodes imitation, with the white hair, and the same body type -- it’s just that Dusty never screamed so much -- at such a high pitch.
 
But the match is awesome for it’s brutality and spectacular for the talent it took to play it out. Sean says it’s “Quite possibly THE bloodiest match we have ever been involved in..NOT FOR THE WEAK AT HEART!!!
You may have seen worse, but were those tapes really legal?
 
Give Sean and Phil a moment of your time and send them some dough. This DVD is the best tag team stuff out there, and these guys have earned every single penny that you want to send to them.
 
Oh yeah, there’s no announcers to mess up the action. Let me tell you that now.
 
Joe Babinsack can be reached at [email protected]. Lot’s of good stuff on the horizon, and I may be moving to Ellwood City -- ironically named for one of the inventors of barbed wire. How’s that for hardcore?!? Bang! Bang!
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