AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 10/16/19

What Worked

ER: Scorpio Sky's shoe getting thrown back to him was pretty funny

ER: The inclusion of squash matches is a good thing. Not everything needs to be a workrate classic, and LAX deserve to look strong as hell.

ER: A lot of stuff looked bad in the Omega/Moxley tag match, but I thought the structure was good and served its purpose very well, and they hit all of the moments that needed to hit. Nearly every single transition strike in the match looked horrible; none of these guys can throw a halfway decent kick to the stomach or reasonably get their opponent into position for anything. Hangman Page routinely looks terrible doing everything. He has this weird way of throwing his whole body into everything he does, while also looking like he is putting absolutely nothing behind anything he does. However, his bullet tope looked fantastic, and came late in the match so it actually left an impression. I think it was good to have Moxley attack and walk out on Pac after Pac threw the weapons out (and seemingly grabbed a barbed write bat...BY the barbed wire?), and again, the big moments hit well.

ER: Hell yeah, Darby Allin taking his geek show stunts into the big time and he should be a mega star. Jericho matches are much more interesting ever since he realized he shouldn't try to keep up with younger, faster opponents. Here he lets Darby do all of his amazing flash, and is there to hit him when he lands. Darby takes one of the crazier bumps past the ringpost that I've seen, but saying "Darby did a crazy bump I haven't seen" is pretty form letter Darby match review at this point. Hands behind back Darby is still just as crazy now as the first time I saw it. It feels insanely dangerous, and here he is just a fearless lunatic. That tope con hilo with taped hands is just shut it down levels of absurdly dangerous (and even more dangerous when Jericho catches dives as if his hands were also tied behind his back), and every bump Darby takes feels like broken bones and a neck injury waiting to happen. The match ends when a Honda Sales Consultant runs in and KOs Darby, but Darby's performance here felt BIG. As long as he doesn't die, he will be HUGE.


What Didn't Work

ER: SCU got jumped with a pretty weak beat down, somebody missed their cue and left Fenix standing there pretending to be setting up a piledriver for too long, and it lead to a Chuck Taylor match. That's a cursed series of events. I did think a lot of the match was laid out well enough, but there was some lousy execution throughout. At one point Taylor makes no contact on a double stomp, right into making no contact on an elbow. When the match ends on a blown spot, that's just the sweetest icing.

ER: I like the video where Cody is playing a depressed dad sitting at the kitchen table doing his taxes. And then DDP casually appears and slips in and out of a Dusty impression but in a weird way where he does a Dusty voice for a couple words and then a normal voice, like he's typing a sentence with random capitalization.

ER: That women's singles match was rough. Both of them looked completely lost at several points, terrible at setting up offense for each other, one of the worst collar and elbows I've seen. These two seemed almost constantly confused at what the other was going to be doing next. I liked Baker blocking a small package and hitting a fisherman's neckbreaker, but Riho even ruined that by no knowing when to get into position for the next move, so just sat there seated and making a dazed face, frozen in time. The went to the your move/my move well really early, so much dazed selling into immediately being the one getting a nearfall. Fans were crazy into it, but at this point I have to assume they will literally be into anything that involves people running back and forth and hitting moves they recognize.

ER: The disconnected floating body match graphics are still bad. Why do they float? Why do they all float down her in AEW?

ER: Lucha Bros. tag felt like it went way too long, had several spots missed by the cameras (Fenix did what looked like a spectacular dive, and half of it was completely missed), and a typical sluggish Pentagon performance. Pentagon is a shtick wrestler who doesn't actually know any shtick. He's so brutal. Jungle Boy is still really sloppy, always seems like there is way to much foot shuffling before hitting a so so flip spot. Marko Stunt is now in prime time, and he clearly has breakout star potential. I don't care if his wrestling doesn't move the needle for me, he connects with people, and will take a beating. The follow through on his dive was really nice, and he moves with more charisma than anyone else in the match.

ER: Jesus, Jericho, catch a dive.