Matt Hardy and the rest of his Broken family are now free of the clutches of Impact Wrestling‘s (and their owl mascot’s) talons. Hardy has filed for a trademark on his characters, which he created, but it now appears there might be a whole new bad-blood feud brewing between the Hardys and Impact.
During Thursday night’s episode of Impact, the TNA tag team titles were “teleported” to Decay (in a cheeky quasi-homage, or maybe diss, to the Hardys’ aborted Expedition of Gold). Matt Hardy had some kayfabe fun on Twitter during the episode, and also earlier in the day had some words of encouragement and solidarity for the people still on the Impact roster.
Many VALIANT Men & Women remain in the TNA trenches fighting in the #GreatWar. I may exist on another PLANE now..But FIGHT ONWARD, Soldiers.
— MATT HARDY (@MATTHARDYBRAND) March 9, 2017
In response, Anthem’s Executive Vice President Ed Nordholm tweeted some mutual respect at Matt on Friday morning.
We thank @matthardybrand for a superb performance in Broken Universe. May the seven deities guide with their Broken Brilliance left behind
— Ed Nordholm (@EdNordholm) March 10, 2017
And then a few minutes later, all hell broke loose, as Reby Sky (AKA Reby Hardy, Matt’s wife) began a tweetstorm directed at Nordholm, Jeff Jarrett, and all the rest of those in charge of the new regime over at Impact.
LMAO FUCK YOU GUYS @EdNordholm @RealJeffJarrett @IMPACTWRESTLING
MORE than happy to play this game
— Reby Hardy (@RebyHardy) March 10, 2017
Reby insinuated that just a few hours after Nordholm’s “mutual respect” tweet, Impact filed suit against Matt, or some portion of the Hardys. It’s unclear whether a lawsuit has actually been filed, or for what, but the best guesses would be trying to claim ownership of the Broken Universe or suing for some sort of breach of contract. Here is Reby’s full rant, condensed in block quote form for ease of reading [sic]:
Can we just talk about how many times Matt’s contract could have been broken due to NUMEROUS issues on TNA end and never made a fuss about shit, but MFers wanna try & come at us NOW, *after the fact*?! Don’t you have an owl to promote or some shit!? Or — I dunno — a company to “make great”? Instead of acting like the petty little bitches you are????
Speaking of petty, nice video package on TNA’s “history”: with NO visual or mention of Jeff — who gave his all for 7 YEARS — or Kurt?! But y’all sure made sure to get those two video ID shoots of Jeff Jarrett in there LMAO. But it’s “just business, brother”, right? PETTY. Everything these boys have done for the company & you wanna try & fuck us for the sake of it. Literally no other reason except YOU MAD lol
How about my husband leaving me A DAY AFTER GIVING BIRTH to make your TV tapings? That’s how dedicated this MFer was to the company. How about how the 3 highest rated TV segments of 2016 were financed by HARDYS solely to help the product & because they BELIEVED IN TNA. Or ALL THE SHIT TALKING BY JJ throughout contract negotiations & Matt was STILL THERE, professional & trying to make things work for 2017!
Oh & this the best part … these MFers trying to come after SEÑOR BENJAMIN.
LMAO I CANT.
“Señor Benjamin” — my dad, by the way — who was never paid a dime by the company & who was obviously never under contract … Not that those contract things mean anything to TNA…Until after they’re over or until 3 days before they expire, apparently. Funny thing is, everyone who ever actually had anything to do with #BROKEN Matt Hardy has our back on this.
WHAT DOES THAT SAY TO YOU?
Damn near 20% of your roster leaving in the span of a week, all citing the same reasons or none at all.
WHAT DOES THAT TELL YOU?
And then a fakeass “wishing you well” tweet from @EdNordholm, mere HOURS before threatening to sue us. SUCH A FITTING END, MAN. Seriously, you couldn’t write this shit … Well. TNA couldn’t write this shit … any writers worth a shit left too! Real cute how TNA can go radio silent for WEEKS (with exception of nonsensical drunk texts from JJ) but we get a 2 hour deadline to respond. Fuck you think this is, “Taken” ? LOL I can’t.
Good luck explaining to your talent that their pay checks are late (again) because you’re spending all your $$ suing the Hardys.
And fuck that owl.
Reby then encouraged fans to tune into Friday night’s Ring of Honor pay-per-view to find out what the whole Broken clan will be doing next. Cue up your favorite “popcorn” GIFs and dig in, everybody. It looks like there’s a bumpy ride ahead.
UPDATE: According to PWInsider, Impact sent cease-and-desist letters to ROH and their PPV distributors ahead of Friday’s 15th Anniversary PPV, warning them about airing anything relating to the Broken Hardys characters. Apparently, this decision was made by Anthem Media attempting to protect their intellectual property, and Jeff Jarrett was not involved in sending the letter.
