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Earlier this week, Jessika Havok sat down with PWInsider.com to discuss this Saturday's Impact Wrestling Bound for Glory PPV, where she'll be competing in the Pick Your Shot Gauntlet Battle Royal. During our discussion, Havok discussed taking part in the unique Undead Realm storyline earlier this year and the energy of the company's female roster. Transcription by Billy Krotchsen.
Mike Johnson: Now obviously, one of the things that you've had the opportunity to do over the last year or so is a lot of very unique cinematic vignettes and a lot of cinematic interactions with Rosemary and Kiera Hogan and Jim Mitchell and things of that nature. Obviously these things push creativity and push all sorts of unique storytelling, what's it like to be involved in the creation of that and the execution of that compared to what fans who consider the normal inside the ring action? How unique is all that and what's that creative give and take like versus the creation of a normal match like we'd see at a Bound For Glory or an Impact episode versus entering the Undead Realm where things are just upside down and all sorts of chaos is happening?
Havok: So the Undead Realm is one of the coolest, like you say, most unique things I've ever gotten to do in my career. Before I came back to Impact Wrestling, I watched the product obviously and I've known Rosemary for a long time, I've known Su Yung for a long time, so watching how amazing that is and then getting to be part of it was honestly a dream come true to me. I mean, you can look at me and tell that the Undead Realm is totally for Havok. It obviously can't be put together like a regular match. One of the things that I enjoy most about it is that it is more of a cinematic, movie style...like a fight, rather than a wrestling match and it was really cool and really surreal to get to be a part of that. I know that there are fans that aren't really into it, they're like "Oh this is wrestling", whatever but there's a ton more fans that are, and it was really cool to get to be part of the Undead Realm and have this fight with Su Yung where we were banished to the Undead Wasteland, which is a place I feel my character is derived from. I'm a huge Mad Max fan, and when I first started wrestling and first started using the gas mask no one was doing it, that's kind of where I got some of my inspiration, so it was really cool to be part of that.
Mike Johnson: So one thing that we can't overlook is that there is a demon wedding coming. So as someone who's experienced in the Undead Realm, obviously you can't give everything away but thoughts on Johnny Bravo and Rosemary's unique coupling and what exactly are we looking forward to when pro wrestling has it's first ever demon wedding?
Mike Johnson: You mentioned being the face of the Women's Division. When you've got such a great, competitive locker room with so many strong personalities, does it push you harder as a performer? Does it make it a situation where everyone's more competitive and a little bit more cutthroat behind the scenes and on-camera? How cohesive is it when you have that many talented people all vying to be the best at what they do? To me, the best part of pro wrestling is - there's that camaraderie, but at the same time, you want everyone to do great but you also want to be at the top of that pyramid. So what's the experience been like as the company has kinda reconfigured and grown this locker room?
Havok: So, it's interesting that you bring that up, and usually - especially in the wrestling business - and as I've said before, this is my 17th year in, the business can be very political and very cutthroat. However, our Knockouts locker room is...I couldn't ask for a better morale and...it's very positive, and while it is competitive, it's friendly competition. I feel like our locker room, we do a really good job at building each other up as opposed to tearing each other down. Obviously, we all want the same thing, we want to be the face of the company, we want to be the champion and do great things, and what you see on TV, with characters and things like that, it's nice to be able to say I'm really proud to be a part of a locker room where these women are for each other, rather than themselves. So my experience so far coming back has been pretty positive with that. There's literally no negativity and no attitude with anyone in the locker room and up until it's time to go on to that stage and wrestle, we are there for each other and we're just helping build each other up. As far as the competitiveness, the division and the talent that we have with all the girls - Jordynne Grace and Deonna Purrazo put on one of the best female wrestling matches that I've ever seen at Slammiversary. It was amazing and watching it made me be like, "You know what? I'm going to bust my ***, I want to be just as good," and I feel like we have such a good, positive locker room with that, where we...I feel everybody's on the same page as far as that goes.
The complete conversation can be heard now at www.PWInsiderElite.com as part of Bound for Glory week!
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