From the Wrestle Factory in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Our hosts are Mike Quackenbush and Sidney Bakabella. This was taped sometime before the whole world went to hell, as there's a live audience.
Donna Rana arrives with her luggage and introduces herself to Lucas Calhoun. She says she's heard some crazy things about CHIKARA and Calhoun says she'll have to experience it for herself. Cue the opening package.
Campeonas de Parejas The Bird and the Bee (Willow Nightingale and Solo Darling) vs. The Colony (Green Ant and Thief Ant)
Yeah, CHIKARA's tag team champions are women, so what, wanna fight about it? Willow shakes hands with the Thief before a sporty exchange. Quick tag and Willow slams Solo onto Thief. The Colony comes back with a tandem clothesline to isolate Solo. Hot tag to Willow, who outmaneuvers Thief into a spinebuster for 2. Solo returns with Daniel Bryan kicks to Green Ant, but Thief kicks her away. THe match breaks down with Willow fighting off the Colony and catching Thief with a top rope arm drag. Solo puts Thief into the Sharpshooter for the submission at 5:48. Just a straightforward exhibition, **.
Winners: The Bird and the Bee
Calhoun explains to Donna that CHIKARA hasn't had a weight class or gender division in over 15 years. Donna's mind has been properly blown.
Video package highlighting former Young Lion's Cup winners. In case you didn't know, this tourney is a big deal. Several young competitors cut Event Center promos and are absolutely adorable. The highlight is a guy named Mr. Zero, who objects to being called "Mister" becaus that's his dad.
Boomer returns backstage and is handed a contract and given a disc. Donna is just as confused as I am, so Calhoun explains that competitors earn the discs by winning matches and three wins in a row grants them a title shot.
Commercial for the official CHIKARA Action Arcade video game! It's available on Steam, but sadly not yet for Nintendo Switch.
Fake commercial for LIKEABRO. YA GOTTA WANT IT!
Video package putting over the Crucible, lead by Ophidian, as the current top heel stable in the fed.
The ring crew removes the ring ropes while Calhoun explains to Donna the rules of a No Ropes match.
Mike Quackenbush teaches some students how to grapple. Don't try this at home kids, instead pay to do it with Quack.
Special report on the upcoming Cibernetico. This is a multi-man match meant to highlight dueling factions. Team captains will be revealed soon. The history of the match is featured in a video package.
Interview with Matt Makowski. Jigsaw has been called back into action by Quakenbush to handle the Crucible, but Makowski plans on personally burning away his flesh.
Final Thoughts: This was decent. I liked having Donna Rana serve as a stand-in for new viewers who may be confused by the unique-ness that is CHIKARA. There was some fine wrestling and they did an okay job establishing the Crucible as the current bad guys running the show. I may have suggested that Episode 1 needed an appearance by the Grand Champion, but I digress. I'll probably check out a few more episodes, especially since I'm starving for non-quarantine wrestling that wasn't produced by the McMahons.