That Nicole Matthews/Isla Dawn match was like, really not good. The work Nicole did was fine, and she is good, but they just couldn't get any heat and Isla Dawn didn't really show a whole lot. Just on one look, she looks like she needs a lot of work on her gimmick and needs to add a lot more bells and whistles if her gimmick is that she's a witch. Maybe one reason they couldn't get heat was everyone was waiting for Io Shirai, but they barely did anything to illicit a reaction.
Michael Cole couldn't figure out is Jessie Elaban has a last name or not, didn't matter since she lost, but she has some potential as a Bayley-type character.
Rachael Ellering and Hiroyo Matsumoto was very good, might've been the best match of the first round. Nothing in the first round was mean to be great, but that one was. The two best matches were the two that told the story, the other being Karen Q and Xia Li, which I bet no one would've expected.
I didn't like that they fed Xia Brookside to Io Shirai, if Io is supposed to be who they're pulling for, then she should've gotten more of a heel to work with. Nobody really wanted to go against Xia, which they shouldn't since she is really good and really fun, and was quite a spot they put her in at her age. If they were going to put 2 faces against each other, it should've been a better match instead of a showcase for Io.
Commentary, like, still sucks.