AEW Five Fingers of Death 10/12 - 10/18

AEW Collision 10/14/26

Darby Allin vs Hechicero 

MD: Darby Allin pinned Hechicero in 14:10 to qualify for Clockwork Carnage after hitting two Coffin Drops on Hechicero, who was returning to the ring after both men were wiped out by a spectacular Coffin Drop from the top to the floor. Darby sold his leg during the match with Hechicero targeting it and took some of his usual big bumps. The crowd was tired but went up for the big moments and counters. **** 1/4.

So that's a review, right? I put it together quickly. It's not bad for posterity purpose. It tells you in broad strokes what happened. Darby won. Darby qualified. It was a little less than 15 minutes. It more or less had the crowd. There was a big dive at the end. Darby sold the leg. There were some counters. You look at this twenty years from now and you theoretically have some sense of what happened. You missed the show because you don't watch Collision (even after Dynamite) and you have some sense of what happened. What. You even have a quantitative sense of how good it is. 

But look at what it leaves out.

This was a qualifier match, yes. It was the last one. Darby had survived Kyle Fletcher in Paris the previous week and followed that by climbing a mountain, because of course he did. His leg was bandaged up. Hechicero smelled blood. This was his first AEW appearance since August where he lost a Continental Cup match to Nigel.  Hechicero, is of course, the CMLL Heavyweight Championship. It hasn't exactly been a satisfying reign. There was the poorly received Eddie match. There was a three way at Aniversario. It's not like he's been able to defend it on AEW TV either, despite being a Don Callis Family member.

People complained, for good reasons and bad, that this finish was not exactly up to chance. Darby's more of a draw in the main event of a PPV, even as a role player among other main eventers, than Hechicero is. Though maybe you don't elevate wrestlers without taking chances on them sometimes. But then AEW is run by a stats guy, even if he's one who's prone to sentiment like any other pro wrestling fan. 

Look at the situation though. Hechicero had a chip on his shoulder. Darby had a bum leg. We should care about the destination but only in so much as it informs the journey. We care about where they're going. We care even more about how they get there. Otherwise, what's the point of actually watching? Why not just run a simulation. The art is in how they choose to get from point A to point B and how they then execute that plan. 

And this match was incredibly artful and dramatic, even if the outcome was never entirely in doubt.

Hechicero was, as noted, like a shark smelling blood, stalking Darby to start. He didn't go right for the leg, but instead used Darby's need to protect it to twist at the arm and the neck. Darby tried to use his legs to kick back to escape one situation, but in his selling, he was slowed down enough that Hechicero was able to catch him on a leapfrog and drive him down knee first to the mat. He followed that up with a rear roll on a tapitia (then dropping Darby right on his knee) which all looked particularly brutal. It was a creative leveraging of Darby's flexibility, certainly.

The match would follow along those lines. When able, Hechicero would target the leg. That might be a reverse dragon screw with the leg dangling off the apron or just tying it up and twisting it, making sure to mock Darby and the crowd after the fact. When Darby found a way to edge back (primarily biting at the hand until his comeback later in the match), Hechicero would cut him off with more holistic and opportunistic offense. Darby couldn't capitalize further because of the leg. He'd get a jackknife pin but then would sell the leg by hopping on it losing leverage, or when he did get leverage, like after a reversal of a rear naked choke, his leg gave out after the fact, a cost/benefit decision that did not work out in his favor.

When he did finally start to come back, it was by letting Hechicero do the heavy lifting for him, he turned the conjuro spinning backbreaker into a crucifix bomb. The crowd started chanting for him after that, and he deserved it. He made it to the top for a 'rana, but only by reversing Hechicero's attempt to dangle him in a choke while sitting on the top rope. He followed that up with a Code Red, another move where he barely needed to put any pressure on his leg, and then trapped Hechicero in the apron to set up the tope and top rope coffin drop to the floor that would lead things to the finish. 

The story here was the color, variety, meanness, and adaptability of Hechicero's offense, and then how Darby's selling met the moment. It wasn't done to just check boxes. It limited his opportunities and created a cost for everything he tried to do. It impact not just what he did but how he moved, the best sort of selling. Meanwhile, Hechicero wasn't dogmatically just going after the limb, but instead meeting every moment for the possibilities available. Sometimes that meant going after something else to open the leg back up or because Darby was overly protecting it. That's a fascinating sort of pro wrestling, one where the moments truly do matter.

I did see complaints about the finish and how it was a copy of other Darby matches this year. I think the way he takes the wind out of an opponent is both opportunistic and logical and much more about the set up. How does he get them in that position in the first place? That's what's compelling more than the Coffin Drops themselves. Here it was by using Hechicero's moves as a way to position himself to hit something and then to throw his body at him when he had the chance. 

Where I do question it, however, is the need to have a pin in the first place. I'd argue that Hechicero was protected to a degree because he did beat the count and was simply ambushed on the way back in the ring, but with all the Champion vs Champion matches in AEW, they should lean into the 70s aesthetic and have some countouts or double countouts now and again. I can hear people grumbling already, but it's been so long  since this was a common part of pro wrestling, there's a chance to reframe and reclaim it. It's a tool like any other tool and in a CMLL Heavyweight Champion vs TNT Champion match, a finish where Darby just barely makes it back and and Hechicero doesn't could actually be compelling. Certainly, it'd make those finishes where both wrestlers make it back in a little more exciting to do the opposite now and again. A match like this where everyone more or less knew the winner coming in could have been a great place to switch things up and do it.

So that's the match. You could have covered the bare bones of the what like that first paragraph. You could just focus on the outcome and how many matches Darby won or lost this year and how many more you think he should have won or lost. Or you could lean into the third option and really try to immerse yourself in the art being created, in the excitement being generated, in details worth delving through. 

We've spent generations doing the one or the other, but I think everyone would be so much happier with the third.

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