AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 9/2/20

What Worked

-I tuned in late and missed a Chuck Taylor match. That works.

-The 8 man tag was fine, I guess. I would rather see most of these guys in an 8 man rather than in a traditional tag, so that's a plus. You'd think some of the spot set up would be a little less meh, but a lot of the stuff looked good. I thought this was a good Isiah Kassidy performance, really dug his middle rope springboard rana and thought he was slick at getting up for some pretty complicated double teams, and his partner Quen bumped big for a Jungle Boy lariat. Kazarian's springboard legdrop still lands well, Luchasaurus still looks like a goof doing anything, but this was fine.

-Loved Jericho/Janela, with Jericho beating the blood out of Janela while Cassidy looked on. Janela stood in there and took his beating to put over someone else's match, and Jericho really stiffed him up. Janela looked good in a multiman last week, but I like him getting roughed up by short knees and hard punches even more. Jericho was really clonking him in the temple with big fists, then worked over a cut with more punches as Janela bled. Hell yeah.

-Kingston came out and immediately out-talked and ran right over Taz and Jake Roberts. The in ring schmozz after was entertaining, tons of guys took painful bumps over the top and off the apron to the floor, Shawn Spears was throwing potatoes, Kingston was weirdly paired off with Billy Gunn for a long time, and it kind of lost steam after coming back from break. Still, a fun schmozz, and Brian Cage is a goof for going after Kingston with a flimsy superkick. This guy ran you down, and you run up to fight him with a bad superkick? What a goof.

What Didn't Work 

-Omega/Page/FTR came off like guys who being naught because they drink beerz and say swearz. They all came off like dinks. It didn't make me more interested in whatever wrestling they're building to.

-I didn't even realize Serena Deeb was even wrestling, so it was cool to see her, even if she looks more like Selina Majors/Bambi now. Thunder Rosa is someone with strong execution, who always needs to get her shit in, so you knew that whatever story is being told in the first half of a match will not matter at all. So I really liked the pre-commercial part of the match, dug Deeb slamming Rosa's knee into the mat and dropping her with a neckbreaker over the middle rope. A lot of Rosa's stuff looked good, but a match worked around Rosa selling a leg would have been much more interesting that Rosa roaring back like Deeb hadn't ever been in control. Her dropkick to Deeb's chest in the ropes looked good, she had a hard backfist, dug the battles over a backslide, and the Thunder Driver looked painful. But I can never get into her matches where she takes moves until it's time for her moves.

-Can't call that go home segment with Moxley beating up Mark Sterling. I don't know if I've heard a quieter AEW crowd. I would have called MJF bloodying up Moxley afterwards a win, but AEW already has done WAY cooler bloody builds for TWO other matches on this PPV. You aren't going to beat the blood that has been spilled between Hardy and Sammy, and this MJF segment played almost exactly like Jericho beating up and bloodying Janela not one hour before. Except Jericho wasn't yelling like a doofus into the camera. Bloody angles are cool! But this just came off like them building every singles match nearly exactly the same. MJF is a much better wrestler than a talker. The talking just doesn't come off naturally for me.