AEW Five Fingers of Death 9/16 - 9/22

ROH 9/19/24

Dustin Rhodes/Sammy Guevara vs Alex Reynolds/Evil Uno

MD: This was a Proving Ground match and was touted to me as the Dark Order going full Larry stalling. And that's not quite what this is. When Larry stalled, it was to build up heat for the first bit of contact in the match, ramping up the pressure and getting under the skin of the fans. What people often don't understand about him, having just heard the stories or working off decades' old memories, was that when it was time for that first bit of contact, he was super high energy and paid off all the build. 

This was a different flavor to stalling. Here, it was about the Proving Ground time limit and all about the Dark Order running out the clock to get a title shot. That's the unique wrinkle of the ROH eliminators. I've seen a bunch of these in the last year or two and while there might be moments down a stretch where someone just tries to stay alive or even lock in a hold, I don't think I've seen one where the heels tried to avoid contact from the get go and do everything they could to just pass the time. Obviously that, too, gets under the skin of the fans because they want to see action, but in some ways it's better (in the eyes of the fans) and in some ways it's worse. It's more underhanded and craven since there's a goal behind it but it's also a little bit clever and purposeful as opposed to Zbyszko just being as obviously irritating as possible. In both cases, there's mind games at play too, so that bit's a wash.

To me, this isn't deconstructing pro wrestling but is instead leaning hard into the rules and the norms. It's not tearing it down but building on the inherent logic. I don't think you'd want to see it in every match but like I said, this was one of the first time I've seen it out of dozens and dozens. And it worked. It was different. It was interesting. It presented a unique challenge for Dustin and Sammy and they had to be as aggressive as possible just to force the Dark Order to engage. That in and of itself, opened them up to make mistakes and fall into traps, especially with Silver on the floor running (literal) interference. So when they did go over in the end, paying off a lot of the things that had been teased but denied due to the avoidance by the Dark Order (like the dives) and going deep with things like Dustin's very unexpected Shining Wizard, it meant all the more. Not only did they beat the Dark Order, but they also beat the passage of time as well. That was a good double triumph to set up the 6-on-2 beatdown to end the show. I still haven't seen that pristine and perfect stalling performance I want in 2024 where one gives one's self totally up to the spirit of it all, but this was an enjoyable TV match cousin to such a thing.

AEW Collision 9/21/24

Dustin Rhodes/Sammy Guevara vs Mike Bennett/Matt Taven (Bunkhouse Brawl)

MD: Everyone's focused on the blood and Taven's bumps into the chair, but there was some very smart stuff here. Taven and Bennett are from MA (though admittedly Boston, or, you know, Carver, and Springfield aren't exactly the same) so not only did Dustin and Sammy come out in the local hockey team's shirts (with new tandem music), but they were also in their street clothes while the Kingdom were in their wrestling gear. Somehow that made them seem less genuine and more heelish. 

The big thing, however, was that they made sure all of the tables and plunder was set up pre-match. This started the show (after whatever ROH matches they taped or dark matches they had) and they had the luxury of having everything ready. It meant that Dustin's dive off the stage through a table with his bulldog or Sammy's cutter out of nowhere through a table didn't need any set up. They were brisk and sudden and shocking. Then, during the commercial break when things calm down a bit as the TV format forces, they were able to set up another table or two. Barring having a Fonzie or Nana out there, this was a really effective way to prevent the match being a quarter setting things up. 

That made everything else easier. The heel transitions/cutoffs were good (Dustin getting reversed into his own set up in the corner, Sammy getting tagged by a chair on his dive, the double superkick as Dustin charged up the ramp with a taser). Likewise the comeback spots: Dustin's double groin claw, Sammy turning the Dirty Deeds into his GTH, worked just right. The high spots were memorable, those brutal landings on chairs, including Taven's after they hit the Doomsday Device over the top and he errantly landed on one on the ramp, Sammy going off the ladder. And all the weapons fit in, the chairs, the belt, the cowbell, the barbed wire Shattered Dreams. It was definitely a lot of stuff, but the Kingdom and Dustin knew what they were doing and Sammy added that extra bit of energy and panache. I'm not sure how this will stack up against everything else this year, but you can't say it's not another notch in the belt of Dustin and another great Fight Without Honor from the Kingdom.  

Darby Allin vs Evil Uno

MD: With Danielson at home selling the injury, there was definitely a worry of a sort of overwhelming NWO-esque doom and gloom with Mox and company. The combination of Yuta's very existence and the fire he's showing mid-way through his matches and Private Party foolishly but bravely standing up for themselves is pushing back against that, giving what Mox is doing the sort of traction to push off against that he himself is saying he's providing to Zay and Quen. Darby's front and center for Grand Slam, however, and while we've seen him act in contrast to Mox and physically stand up to him up til now, the backstage promo leading up to the Uno match and then the match itself took things to an entirely different level.

It's war. For this to work, it can't be Mox running through everyone as they try to act sportsmanlike. People can't just play the 1985 Jumbo card as Choshu came in infecting everyone and everything around him with violence. They have to be Tenryu and meet the violence head on. And Darby not only fought with that level of intensity here, but he also forced it out of Uno. Even if Darby manages to triumph over him and keep his title shot, Mox isn't just going away. You don't make a statement with a turn like that and just go back into the woodworks and have another fishing trip. The darkness is here to stay and the dark intensity and violent passion is the thing that can make AEW stand out. It's not the grisly excessiveness of Hangman vs Swerve from All Out, not every week, but it's a Hansen-ian impulse of wrestlers pushing each other to the absolute limit week in and week out. What that looks like, what those limits are, how it all plays out, the different mix of alchemy when you have fliers and technicians and brawlers, when you have luchadores and disciples of the territories and walkers of the King's Road all clashing against one another... well, that's what's going to make it interesting. 

And it was interesting here. Uno took every advantage, but more than that, he wrestled like a man infected, like a feral beast, throwing his hefty frame into Darby from every angle. He was an out of control locomotion. Sometimes it worked, sometimes he crashed and burned, but he kept coming. Darby, in turn, fought as he always did, but instead of just throwing his own body at Uno, he ripped at the mask and bit at the skull. There's so much interesting to be mined here. Just as Uno threw himself with wild abandon to rise to the level Darby inspired in him, Darby made his own potential mistake, choosing to use Moxley's bulldog choke to prove a point instead of something of his own that might have more easily won the day. You push people this far, and much like Darby's facepaint, you see all the skeletons in the closet of their soul. It's the most fascinating, most human element you can distill in pro wrestling.

There's a change in the air. You can all but taste it watching the show over the last few weeks. Something is lurking in the hearts of the combatants. Something is awakening within them. Jon Moxley opened Pandora's Box and if they can fully tap into this energy found within, maybe this company can find a comparative advantage that no one else can match. TK, if our old DVDVR decoder rings are still working and you're picking up on the signal, this is the noise. Play it loud, play it hard, embrace it. Ride the wave and it'll take us all as far as we can possibly go. 

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AEW Five Fingers of Death 7/15 - 7/28

AEW Rampage 7/26/24

Royal Rampage

MD: Let me try to cover a lot of ground quickly. I wrote recently about the difference between plot and story. The only bits in this one I'd actively call "plot" along those lines would be Darby winning in general to set up the Grand Slam title match and Hangman coming out to eliminate Jarrett. There was a ton of story though.

To confuse matters further, I'd break down the story here into explicit story and implicit story. Implicit story is everyone working together to eliminate the Butcher because  he's known to be a beast in battle royales. It's Darby going right after Brody because Brody eliminated him at a prior one. It's character driven, history driven, not necessarily something to set up further matches (though it could be). It's the fact that these characters live together in a shared universe and are fully formed and fleshed out. That comes into play in a setting like this.

More explicit story would be the rivalry between the Conglomeration and the Kingdom or the backstage segment between Kip Sabian and Nick Wayne that set up their interaction here. So there were smaller stories, larger stories, a bit of plot, and then a baseline of wrestlers and characters dipping in and out. Sometimes it was for a brief burst of entertainment like with Menard or Cutler. Sometimes it was to play into that Forbidden Door feeling of a few months ago like with Lio Rush or Mortos. Or it was steak and sizzle in one like the opening stretch with Claudio and Komander.

The simple fact of the matter is that a lot of the blue check or old carny criticisms of AEW when it comes to plot and story (implicit and explicit) are either lies or fully ignorant from people who don't watch the product. Sometimes I think that it might be that these people existed in a 90s world where there were multi-month feuds with partners that were married to one another on house shows town after town after town and AEW is instead a TV product. That's probably giving them too much faith though. I don't see how you can watch something like this match and not see a plethora of character, story, and plot. Every AEW Battle Royale is like this.

ROH Death Before Dishonor 7/26/24

Dustin Rhodes/Ross Von Erich/Marshall Von Erich vs Dark Order (Evil Uno/Alex Reynolds/John Silver)

MD: I'm still getting a sense of the Von Erichs. At times they seem moderately generic, as if they've traveled around so much that they haven't really been able to specialize. They've been working since 2012 but only have ~130 matches in Cagematch (the comparison point is Nick Wayne or Billie Starkz who have double or quadruple that respectively). You'll see Ross do something like a slingblade and kind of go "Ehh" on the idea that maybe he should be leaning harder into who and what they are and who and what makes them stand out against others. Then sometimes, I'm certain that Marshall, despite the size, is sort of the Bobby Fulton of the two, the more charismatic and theatrical, and Ross is really more the Tommy Rogers, hitting stuff sharp and clean. Then you have a match like this where they both get a face-in-peril bit and I just need to see some more. Thankfully, I've got another match coming up after this one.
 
Anyway, this worked really well. The underlying story was that the Dark Order kept taking Dustin out from the floor, primarily Alex Reynolds, who is great at playing a trolling shitheel which is probably something he should stick with as he's a competent and hard-working babyface but not one that stands out on the roster. That meant that the Von Erichs had to wrestle from a 3 vs 2 deficit. It also meant that the fans were denied Dustin (other than the opening brawling) until it was time for the hot tag. The fans could relate to the IDEA of the Von Erichs, but they're still building up familiarity with Ross and Marshall as individual entities (just like I am, I guess). Dustin they know as well as any wrestler in the world. Very smart layout, but then that's one of the hallmarks of Reynolds/Silver. They're the only guys I've ever seen that can make controlled chaos consistently compelling.

Once Dustin did come in, everything broke down in a satisfying way with Dustin hitting his big stuff on everyone before the numbers overwhelmed him. I bought the kickout on the wombo combo as he's tall enough that they couldn't hit it exactly the way they wanted to. Then it all built to the claws and shattered dreams and the ref being just out of position at exactly the right time, and this was all really satisfying in the end. I don't know if Dustin and the Von Erichs will just have the titles for the residency or what, but this is much more of what I want out of a six-man tag, using the extra players to lean harder into ideas like double heat and isolation on the floor instead of just maximizing the number of possible spots.

AEW Battle of the Belts 7/27/24

Dustin Rhodes/Ross Von Erich/Marshall Von Erich vs Roderick Strong/Matt Taven/Mike Bennett

MD: A big feel-good, celebratory title win in front of the home crowd at the residency, the sort of thing that was all but destroyed in mainstream wrestling in the 2010s. This stayed grounded for the most part until the end and then went over the top with bells and whistles for the last couple of minutes.

In general, it was a little more of a standard shine/heat/comeback than the Dark Order match which started with brawling and went into double heat instead. There were similar themes though. Here, things broke down on the floor at the end of the shine and led to Dustin being taken out by a pile-driver leaving things 3 on 2 and letting the Kingdom press their advantage. It's a good model and they can definitely continue to run with it over the next few weeks so long as they can find ways to believably take Dustin out of the matches. Then they can start inverting and tweaking and seeing how that looks like. With just two data points, we'll call it coincidence for now.

I liked the point of transition with Bennett hitting his bounce back shot on the apron before the pile driver and then Strong sealing the deal with a backbreaker. There wasn't necessarily that same anticipation for Dustin on the hot tag (as he was taken out but not repeatedly like in the Dark Order match), but the Kingdom fed for him like pros; it's what they're best at. No one in wrestling can take a nut shot quite like Matt Taven; it's his best quality other than the fact he's still throwing punches instead of forearms. Then the finish maybe got a little silly with the cowbell hitting this time (it missed in the Dark Order match) and all the interference, but when you're going to send everyone home happy, sometimes you can get away with that. Great to see Dustin with a belt again, and yes, 91 WCW and the York Foundation as six-man champs is a sweet spot for my youthful wrestling watching, so I absolutely want them to lean more into that aesthetic than the spot-heavy Elite idea of trios tags.

AEW Collision 7/20/24

Darby Allin vs The Beast Mortos

MD: Playing catch up here. There's story and there's plot and then there's purpose. Usually, if you look at a match through the lens of purpose, the other things come into focus. What was this one trying to accomplish? It was the first televised match for the residency so it was setting the (somewhat literal) stage for that in tone and look and feel. It was Darby's first singles match since March and had to heat him up to a degree for Blood and Guts and for all other things to come. He's in a slightly different spot now. Despite being a ragdoll who can sell and sell and sell and then come back, he may have to be presented as more of a force and take more of his matches in a post-Sting (and soon to be Post-Danielson) world. He's more of the face of the company now. That meant he ended up taking closer to half of the match here, more than you might expect.

Then you had Mortos. He needed to be heated up a bit for his ROH match as he's going to be a player there and kept strong enough to put over Hologram on the 27th on Collision to make that meaningful. I had previously thought that he shouldn't be doing the top rope press slam and the spinning dive in every match, that these should be held back a bit because they stand out so much against everything else happening (which says a lot!) but since he needs to be used to put over others right now and can't be fully protected, it's one way to keep him strong and formidable. I think maybe it sacrifices potential growth in the long run but there are a lot of short term goals where he fits perfectly and keeping him spectacular in every match helps it feel special. It just comes at a cost and that should never, ever be forgotten or minimized. Even here, Darby won by hitting the crucifix bomb off the top and it was a bit of a banana peel protecting Mortos even if he ate the coffin drop and was pinned cleanly. The other thing about him that maybe I've discounted, is that he's wider than he is tall. I see him as a Killswitch like monster, but he's really not. He's more of a LA Park and that changes the dynamic somewhat.

AEW Dynamite 7/24/24

Blood and Guts

MD: I'm kidding. I'm not going to review blood and guts too. This is already enough words. I'll just say this. Next year, I would very much like the people in the match to watch the first few War Games and try to figure out what made those special and tap into that instead. No plunder. No big set pieces. No crazy bumps. Blood, guts, crazy selling instead. It would stand out against the competition. It would stand out against Anarchy in the Arena. It doesn't have to be all the time. It could just be once. Just try it. This is established now. There's nothing to lose.

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2023 Ongoing MOTY List: Dark Order vs. Blackpool Combat Club

 

6. Stu Grayson/Evil Uno/Hangman Page vs. Jon Moxley/Claudio Castagnoli/Wheeler Yuta AEW Dynamite 3/15

ER: AEW is often at its best when it hits the level of a 4th match of the night trios from the middle of a 2003 NOAH show, and that's what this felt like to me. Everything hummed and flowed like the best NOAH trios, and almost everyone hit like they were wrestling in a NOAH trios. Evil Uno works like an old fat All Japan undercarder who's having a big night anyway, so it only makes this even better. He's like old ass Mighty Inoue or Mitsuo Momota breaking out of old man comedy and coming alive and showing everyone that he's still the guy they might have seen on a 1979 IWE show. But the big story of this very cool match is Stu Grayson. 

Stu Grayson is a guy who I haven't had an active thought about at any point of my pro wrestling fandom. It's a name I relearn every time I see a Stu Grayson match and then it just as quickly drifts away, just out of reach. Like a night's dream you're trying to recollect, the more you attempt to recall the name Stu Grayson, the farther away you feel from catching it. Except Stu Grayson exists beyond that plane of waking life, as you never once get the urge to actually recall your memory of That Time You Watched A Stu Grayson Match Because You Were Home On A Wednesday. How many Stu Grayson matches could I have actually watched. Half a dozen? A full dozen? I am no longer a religious weekly watcher of TV wrestling, while also being a person who constantly watches wrestling, including a lot of AEW and WWE. I am a pro wrestling Hardcore Viewer while simultaneously being the elusive Casual Fan that has been lusted after demographically for literal decades. And that is the reason why I have probably seen eight Stu Grayson matches. Without remembering any Stu Grayson matches. Maybe those matches were all actually John Silver or Raymond Row matches. 

But in this match, this Stu Grayson Match, I found his excellent babyface energy captivating. He really started connecting with me when he took a cool fast bump through the ropes to the floor, and the BCC did a sick group piledriver on the floor as The Thing to kick off their big heat on him. I thought the Combat Club were awesome at making quick tags so that every member could inflict their own personal constant damage, tagging in to suplex and hit and kick and uppercut Grayson. The heat was all really well done and the action was seamless, giving Grayson time to credibly sell while also believably not leaving him spaces for a comeback. When he did make a one move comeback - with a huge running knee straight into Moxley's mouth - it was a huge hot tag moment. A well built and well timed hot tag is always a thing to be celebrated, but I loved how they used the hot tag as the means to build up to another run towards the finish, not as the actual run to the finish itself. Uno had a big senton atomico and all of the quick hit car crash action perfectly cleared the ring for Moxley and Page...which was just a way to quickly settle things down into the run towards the real finish, as Yuta took out Hangman with the ring bell. 

Despite being an early-AEW supporter of Evil Uno - one of the guys who consistently made the What Worked side of that first year or so of AEW Workrate Reports - I wouldn't ever call myself a Dark Order Guy. And yet here I was, completely losing it thinking that Uno and Grayson could plausibly pin Jon Moxley. Their entire finish run, from Grayson's flip dive over the ringpost, to all of their chained together offense and double teams, all made me actually think - and be excited for -  Uno and Grayson were actually taking out Jon Moxley. The Fatality nearfall was huge, and Yuta's best moments of the match were him saving Mox from that finish and then running over to pull Uno off the apron to stop the tag and ice the momentum. Stu Grayson makes the great looking finish look like an even greater finish. It's cool seeing him hit 450s and big ranas and dives with real distance, but I love how he Athletically Eats Shit taking Claudio's pop up uppercut. This was NOAH trios perfection, and if I manage to forget about Stu Grayson again in a couple days, it is likely merely the signs of my advanced brain rot and not anything that is the fault of Stu Grayson's ability.  

2023 MOTY MASTER LIST

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AEW Five Fingers of Death 12/11 - 12/17 Part 1

ROH 12/14/23

Eddie Kingston vs. Evil Uno

MD: I can think of two big Uno singles matches in the last year or two, vs Moxley and vs Danielson. I wrote up the Danielson one and I thought while it was appropriate to the burgeoning heel turn and the build in the Page title program, it didn't make use of what makes Uno special. The Mox match has Uno's bloody face plastered into my mind, but I don't remember it too much past that (bloody face and pile drivers. I remember pile drivers); that's a problem with AEW, of course. It's like an interview question where you answer "I care too much" or "I try too hard." There are good matches on a week by week basis and it's very hard for too much to get mythologized. I'm not sure the answer to that question but part of me kind of wishes Evil Uno vs Jon Moxley did stand out more in my mind.

This had more going for it along those lines. It was a chance to showcase Uno close to home. It was on ROH so there were not major constraints when it came to hitting time marks for overall length or commercials. Eddie's in weird spot being in the tournament and the title almost being in limbo but there's a certain comforting structure to these matches. Here, Uno was the clear babyface. They were able to match up well given their similar size and body types, with Eddie basing a bit for Uno. The early babyface advantage disappeared when Eddie took a page out of Joe's book and just walked away from a chop on the outside to the post. That let him tear at the arm a bit to get some heat and build Uno back up for the hand-the-leg-to-the-ref neckbreaker spot, which a Chikara guy like Kingston was going to be selfless enough to take, and with a great facial expression too. Subsequently, Eddie let Uno really stretch in front of the home crowd; he often plays vulnerable but here he was playing vulnerable champ against the hometown hero. But to put Eddie away, you have to do more and more and take risks of your own; Uno took one risk too many and opened him up to the Uraken. Eddie gave him a ton here, but then here on Honor Club and here on the top of the mountain, he has the luxury to do so.

ROH Final Battle 12/15/23

Eddie Kingston vs. Anthony Henry

MD: Another day, another "Mad Ace" Proving Ground match. It's 2023, right? Emotional investment about finishes is a weird thing. Sometimes there's a wrestler you really don't want to see in a prominent spot and you hope that maybe they don't get put over. More often, you get happy when someone you think deserves it goes over. Sometimes it's the match itself, something that draws you in so much that you feel like it can only end a certain way. It's wrestling and we wouldn't watch if we didn't care. Sometimes we can be clinical or cynical but when something brings us to the point of being so emotionally invested that we care about who wins, then it's in some ways even more special than the sort of investment we had when we were kids and didn't know how it all worked. It has to be to break past those those walls.

I guess what I'm trying to say here is that I really want Eddie to somehow win the C2. I am emotionally invested. I'm emotionally invested for what he himself has invested into it, for his story through the tournament, even just to avoid the heartbreak of the guy losing everything because he reached for the skies. But really, as much as anything else, it's because I want to see these ROH proving ground matches and title matches continue. I like this Eddie! He's different than the guy I usually get. I like that guy too but what makes that guy special makes this guy special and unique too. Eddie's big enough to be both.

Here, he came out cautious, professional, poised. Henry got the first shot in and unleashed just about everything he had. He knew just how dangerous his opponent was. He targeted Eddie's neck and strung together a bunch of credible, dynamic offense. Here's the thing with our pal Eddie though. You chip away at him. You get him down to his knees. You open him up. Well, he's just so damn punchable, right? You lose focus because you just want to stop and hit him. Henry sure did. If he stayed on the neck, hit and moved, hit bigger and bigger offense, maybe he'd wear him down enough. Maybe he'd even beat the clock. He had to start throwing strikes though. People say that Eddie's strength is that he can take damage, take and take and take until he can hit you out of nowhere, but he also makes himself a hell of a target. Once Henry started fighting him on his level, it really, truly was just a matter of time. So yes, emotional investment, because I'm not ready for this Eddie to go yet. I feel like we just met him!

Athena vs. Billie Starkz

MD: I'm going to go from emotional to clinical here, sorry. I already gushed about Athena (and Billie) a few weeks ago. Let's do this the old way, a nice tight paragraph talking about structure. This thing was put together so well. Athena went for the magic forearm. Billie ducked and hit her own, taking advantage. She pressed like someone with something to prove (and boy did she ever) right up until she took it too far and got caught on the dive. Athena started dismantling her as they cycled into the heat, bloodying her up and leaning on her. The hopespots escalated, starting with a few gut shots, then fighting on the apron, and then a roll up. All were cut off quickly. She finally kicked up and out of the corner and strung together a move or two, only to get taken out by the facemask, which set up golden, glorious moment of true comeback a minute or two later as she tore it off. From there the match just got bigger and bigger, which huge spots and set pieces and drama. That escalation doesn't resonate quite the same way without the way they built things through the first half though. People are going to remember those big spots and the ref bump and the finishing stretch, but it took the setting of the stage to create the atmosphere for payoffs. Here, they did an amazing job with it.

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AEW Five Fingers of Death (and Friends): 10/17 - 10/23

AEW Dark 10/18

MD: Eddie was our only guy this week and he was on Dark, so I figured I'd just do the whole show. It's been a little over a year now since I've been watching AEW. One interesting thing about the promotion relative to other ones over the years is that different people from different generations get very different things out of it. Punk and Danielson coming back drew me in. Kingston and Dustin and Darby, among others, kept my interest, but on a week to week basis, it was the webshows that really worked for me. If Dynamite feels like crash TV with original ROH style dream matches, and Rampage feels a bit like late 91-early 92 WCW Saturday Night with a Dangerous Alliance match and a few midcard matches, Elevation and Dark feel like WCW syndi shows. Squashes and a few midcard matches. It's one of those things people of my generational tolerated for years, maybe grumbled about, but ultimately had no idea how good we had it.

In an ecosystem like what I described above, squashes are a amazing, right? Guys like Naylor have been so good at highlighting them and why they were special over the years, but they highlight moves, characters, give the announcers room to breathe. They're not exhausting like sprints can be. They're pro-wrestling comfort food while giving wrestlers the ability to really express who they are. You can tell a story in them or not depending on what you're trying to achieve. All the talk about how wrestlers are wasted not being on TV is irritating, to say the least. The nature of AEW's roster is that people get rotated on and off to keep things fresh. Someone like Ruby Soho coming out to her theme on Elevation gets the fresh and excited crowds going. Emi Sakura is the MVP, having hard-hitting entertaining tag after entertaining tag with partners that can vibe with her act and opponents that are better off for getting reps with her. It's the perfect place for Dalton Castle and Danhausen and Brandon Cutler and the Wingmen, giving the crowd extra value for their ticket and helping to keep acts over. It lets them try out new talent or new tweaks upon a gimmick. I was excited when Deeb, for instance, finished up her title match programs and was interacting with people like Emi and Skye Blue again.

The problem, as much as fans being small-minded, is AEW not doing enough to use the shows to build to everything else going on. There was a patch back six months ago where if someone was going to have a match on Dynamite or Rampage they'd often get featured on Elevation, and they did some things, like building to the ROH PPV with Dark and Elevation, but in general, it's underutilized. I don't know a single person who watches the webshows and feels like they're not valuable or worth watching though, no matter how much griping you get from the people who don't watch (the most worthless griping of all). This was an especially star-studded episode given they were in Canada and it was taped before a live Rampage, but don't sleep on the studio Darks either. Studio wrestling is great given that with AEW we get all sorts of variety. You may not want it as your only wrestling but as part of the whole, it balances things out.

Hikaru Shida vs Vanessa Kraven

MD: I've been giving a lot of thought about 'aces' lately. I think it's due to watching a ton of Inoki over the last year. It could be because I want to watch some Big Daddy and make some calls for myself soon. Don't hold me for that. One aspect that I think is important in an ace is to leverage the cachet you have with the crowd to find ways to highlight what makes your opponent unique. Shida absolutely did that here, making full use of Kraven's size and strength. This was not at all the same sort of match that she would have had with someone smaller or with a different background. Some of that was leaping into the catch on the outside off the chair and eating that samoan drop on the apron (which then, thanks to the AEW house style, she could use later in the match to escape the Samoan drop and set up the finishing stretch). Some of it was the struggle for the falcon arrow, barely getting her over, and then letting her kick out of it. The creativity and imagination and care that went into how she laid this out was definitely appreciated however.

Dark Order (Evil Uno/John Silver/Alex Reynolds/10) vs Tyler Tirva/Shane Hawke/Zak Patterson/Jordano)

MD: Again, we get the freedom of the web shows here. They're not trying to hit any major time marks. They're not worried about picture-in-picture commercial breaks. This was in Canada. This was about showcasing Uno, as well it should have been. It's one of those things AEW does best and that we spent decades getting denied due to weird piques of spite "up north." Though some of this was diluted by Taz poking Jose the Assistant on commentary, but certainly not for the live crowd.

This was surprisingly complete, with Reynolds getting some shine to start (useful given that he plays FIP a lot), a tease of Uno early only for him to get swarmed, some heat on Silver (including eating a huge gutwrench), and everything set up to combine the big Dark Order spots and all of Uno's signature spots mixed with all of his showmanship. They could have just had Dark Order run through these guys but they gave it enough substance to make Uno's spots mean just a little more.

Eddie Kingston/Ortiz vs Mo Jabari/Jake O'Reilly

MD: Just a stylized mauling. Jabari and O'Reilly might get one shot in but they sure wouldn't get two in a row. Ortiz knows this is his moment to come into his own and showcase his own identity and he's been doing that with the Rick Rude or the crotch chop before the veg-o-matic or the tiger style (which, now that I think about it, may not be his own identity at all). Those crossfaces in the corner were nasty though, and Eddie's chops sounded as good as they ever did. The anger management angle for Kingston made sense in the Sammy match; I'm not sure if it's totally believable moving forward, but the Pac match it seems to be building to should be fun at least.

Best Friends (Orange Cassidy/Chuck Taylor/Trent) vs Kobe Durst/Steven Mainz/Jessie V

MD: This was a straight up crowdpleasing squash on the heels of the Cassidy/PAC main event one day earlier. Occasionally they'll run these where guys can just do whatever and they don't even give the enhancement talent a hope. It was pretty brutal with Trent not quite getting all of the flip into a spinebuster (and he save the same sort of shrug that Silver got when he tried to suplex two guys at once). The Sole Food into the Half and Half looked great though. Cassidy then came in and punched everyone. I'm not sure if it's Keith Mitchell retiring or what but they don't seem to time the hug nearly as well as they used to. Anyway, this was never going to be much but it was fine for what it was.

Ari Davari vs Brandon Cutler

MD: Like I said, people watch AEW for different reasons. There are some people who are thoroughly into the Elite, to the point of having Omega avatars and whatever else. I don't have a ton of time for any of them for reasons no one needs to hear right now, but I do think Cutler's been one of the bright spots of the company over the last month. He's a guy who throws himself entirely in the act, who's unafraid to do anything necessary. He cares so much that the fans care, and as the only bastion of the Elite remaining, they care just a little bit more. You put him up against a guy like Avalon (like we'll see this week) or Danhausen or Serpentico and you get a fun comedy match, but if you put him against an actual wrestler like Davari, and you get a kind of interesting, contrast-laden match, where he can work from underneath. Here, Davari threw a lot of simple, driving shots, credible stuff that put over his annoyance of the entire situation. Cutler would comeback with fun 80s offense but Davari would cut him off by going for the eyes or with Kiss' help or through something just as conniving that sort of defies hierarchy and highlights how offended he is that he has to lower himself to wrestle Cutler. It made for a pretty fun match. I would have rather Hook had to go through all of the Trustbusters first before getting Davari, though part of that was just beacuse I wanted to see Hook vs Slim J (who is the new 5th finger if Punk isn't coming back, by the way).

Willow Nightingale vs Seleziya Sparx

MD: In a lot of ways this was an inversion of the Shida match. Willow still wanted to give some shine to the local, even if she was working heel, but she made her work for it and chip away, not going down easily, leaning hard into her size. It's hard for a babyface with a size advantage to know just how much to give while still showing the right amount of vulnerability, especially given the hierarchical difference here, but I think she nailed it. Willow has great emotive reactions in her selling, able to switch between ebullience, exhaustion, and aggression. All of Sparx' stuff looked pretty good, even some of the overwrought things like how she vaulted over the turnbuckle to hit a running kick. That's the sort of thing that is maybe a bit much but you can't fault it if the kick looks good. Jody Threat got a lot of attention last week, but Sparx should get some as well.

QT Marshall vs Dante Martin

MD: A year ago, when I first encountered him, I thought QT should wrestle more like a manager. He's capable of a lot of things (including missing a 450) but just because he can, doesn't necessarily mean he should. That said, for a lot of this period, AEW's needed credible mid-card heels to eat losses. Having the Trustbusters now help a little bit, but that's really been the Factory and the Wingmen, and Lethal, and as such, it does make sense for QT to stretch his wings a bit more. He's good at it and especially good at engaging with his opponent and the audience. They were all over him, despite having sat through all of the previous matches and even if no one necessarily bought a ticket for him, they all had a seemingly great time getting on his case and it'll be, consciously or subconsciously, part of their enduring good feeling about the night in the months and years to come.
 
Dante, in the meantime, probably through no choice of his own as he'd rather be teaming with his brother, has had a lot of ring time to improve. I thought he was already pretty far along in the singles match with Black last October, but his expressiveness and interactions with the crowd have developed since then. He's a great seller on top of his ability to seemingly freeze time as he flips around the ring and soars through the air. He's a case where the sum is greater than any specific part, as his flipping rana into the ring here would be the most spectacular thing in almost any other match in the world but felt almost subdued alongside his huge dive to the outside and stuttering splash to avoid the cutter. The finishing stretch worked to protect QT in loss but still felt like an accomplishment for Dante. Definitely the sort of match that Dusty would have been proud to call the Moo Match of the Week on WCW Prime in 1995 even if maybe it wouldn't make a comp tape for the year.

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AEW Five Fingers of Death Week of 11/15-11/21

AEW Dynamite 11/17

Bryan Danielson vs. Evil Uno

PAS: It was fun to watch Danielson turn full heel with a very well done mic segment to do it, and he was a total dick in the match with Uno. I thought the early parts of this felt a little off, like their timing was a bit skipped. It picked up near the end with Danielson being really vicious, telling the crowd he was going to kick Uno's fucking head in, and then unloading with some really nasty stomps to the temple and the double flex triangle. Uno had some moments, I liked the slaps and the violence party, but he was there to be a foil and was great at that. 

MD: They covered a lot of ground here. This got over Danielson's heel act immediately as he pushed Edwards right from the get go with the "I've got til five" act. Then, instead of starting a chop fest with Uno, he just slapped him across the face. There was a lot of that, Danielson goading Uno and Uno responding with violence, but a lack of control that would cost him in the end. I don't know how many other big moments he's going to get in his AEW career (I could see at least one more if O'Reilly comes in) but he milked the chants and that one moment on the apron before he went up to the top for as much as he could. My favorite bit of this was probably his too, when he kept walking up and planting Danielson on the face with kicks. The spinning forearm from Danielson was amazing and seemed to parallel the big shot from Suzuki onto him a few weeks ago. Each member of the Dark Order brings something unique to the table, so it should be fun to watch Danielson mow through them.


AEW Rampage 11/19

Darby Allin vs. Billy Gunn 

ER: Darby Allin vs. way larger opponent is always a great match, and Billy Gunn is the largest guy on the AEW roster. Billy Gunn is maybe the wildest guy from the 1993 WWF roster to be this active in 2021, but Gunn is basically a better version of the wrestler he was in 1999. He's a great stooge and can stall in fun smug ways, and as AEW's Giant he absolutely runs over Darby for the first 80% of this match, and it rules. He launches Darby way into the air on a backdrop and brutally oles him into the guardrail on a fast Darby tope. During the commercial break he drags Darby around by the neck scruff and tosses him by his rib tape, then punches him right in the jaw in the center of the ring. Gunn really knew how to milk the build to the comeback that every single person in attendance knew was coming (Billy Gunn isn't pinning Darby Allin on TV while Sting watches), and it made Darby's comeback kick so much ass. 

Darby starts by hitting a Coffin Drop into Gunn's two dumb sons, then just assaults Billy with everything that makes Darby so great. But what was maybe most impressive about the finish, was just how good Billy Gunn has gotten about occupying himself while waiting to take offense, and how good he's gotten at getting into position for offense. Gunn sets up all of Darby's coolest stuff really well, and had a bunch of logical sells to get him into position for whatever was coming next. He sells the flipping stunner by stumbling, pitching forward and stopping himself from face planting by settling into a drunken 3 point stance, which sets up Darby's Code Red. Gunn flips the Code Red so that he lands in position to get stuck by the Coffin Drop, kicks out at 1 and then drags his body away from the corner, only to get nailed by another Drop mid-crawl. Gunn was never this good at acting his way through anyone's comeback, and now I want to see Billy Gunn working some lucha matches with other near 60 year olds. 

MD: I'm not going to try to follow Eric move-for-move on this one, but I will point out a few things. Depending on where you look on the internet, you get wildly varying reactions. Obviously, you get some people who saw this as a disappointing joke after the Malenko/Guerrero stuff in Darby vs MJF and then you get someone like Dutch Mantel who thought Gunn led young Darby by the nose through one believable sequence after the other but that obviously the wrong person won. This is probably why someone shouldn't go out onto the internet.

Anyway, Gunn is a dinosaur, big and old, and he's outlived all the other dinosaurs and now finds himself in a world of small mammals, with Darby as one of the smallest, most tenacious, most dangerous mammals of all. Gunn took his time, was smart in his hefts and throws and shots and cutoffs, treated Darby as Darby and not just some random opponent. I love how he managed the picture-in-picture commercial break which is always the most problematic part of a Dynamite or a Rampage. Usually that's where they bury the heat which provides structural issues but he slowed it down even more and worked the crowd and just grinded it out in a way that put more fuel onto things. 

It's 100% telling that the crowd went from goofing on Gunn's kids with a Danhausen-inspired chant (and Gunn was great at stopping what he was doing, turning the match around and reacting to that instead of just moving on) to cheering for Darby to come back. That's a testament to Darby and to Gunn, because on paper, a modern crowd is more often than not going to want to get itself over than giving in and buying into a match. Darby choosing to take basically his first, best opportunity for offense in the match and use it to drop onto the Gunn kids instead of attacking Billy is completely in character for him. The fact that it took two coffin drops to take Gunn out tracked with the lack of damage Gunn had taken so far. I can't speak for the rest of you, but I know Eric and I would be on board for a featured Gunn Club vs. Darby/Sting/Paul Wight match. Someone has to give them their first loss as a trios after all.

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AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 9/23/20

What Worked

-Evil Uno/Hangman eeks onto the top side here just because I still like what Uno brings to AEW. Page has several cool bits of offense and then other things he should drop entirely. Things like his moonsault off the apron that rarely connects, offense like that just looks silly with his character. It's that Silas Young thing where he looks like James Gammon and is a real man, then goes out and wrestles like a bad Chris Sabin clone. Page needs to drop the flips and just focus on cool fallaway slams and big lariats, because those things work well within his character AND are moves that look good. I really liked the fallaway slam where he held a bridge, not an easy thing to do. Uno is someone in AEW who makes little things look good, but here he also gets to splat Page with a huge cannonball off the top. The match wasn't perfect, but Uno made Page's offense look good (Page makes stuff look good, but Uno helped with some things), so this landed up top.

-Uno was selling his head and neck around ringside during the Lee/Cassidy match and that rules.

-Cassidy/Brodie was a good use of bullshit that leaves the door open for Cassidy to get some kind of cage match revenge. I dug Lee knocking Cassidy's block off after the hands went in the pockets, but I am a fan of the hands in pockets spots. His dive that was caught by the Dark Order was a cool trick, and they managed to all impressively scatter at the right time to make it look like Cassidy actually got the worst of Lee's dive. Lee has a few too many goofy twists and turns to his offense still, but he's great at barreling into Cassidy with falling lariats and big boots, and I loved that grounded side headlock he worked during the commercial break (also hit a great elbowdrop during the break, shame some of his coolest stuff was during the break). Cassidy's comeback was good and I liked the way they worked in him dealing with the Dark Order (lots of fun work with him dodging interference in between hitting dives), dealing with them leading to him getting blown up. Run this back, throw them in a cage, give me a Cassidy pockets dive off the top of the cage.

-I like a good "look we WANT to fight you guys, but that wouldn't be fair to YOU because of how beat up you are" and FTR pulled off that attitude well.

-You know? Just keep matching up Thunder Rosa and Ivelisse every week. There have been plenty of AEW women's matches that are just actually bad, so it's way way way more interesting to just have two women in there who look and act like they genuinely hate each other. Having unprofessional looking exchanges is an upgrade over having bad looking rehearsed exchanges. There was plenty of stuff here that was out of sync (including a hilarious moment where Tony and JR are talking about how perfectly in sync Shida and Ivelisse were, as Ivelisse's timing was clearly off on two things in a row), but I'll take a couple out of sync moments if you give me some stiff punches and kicks. Every time Ivelisse and Rosa were in there together was noteworthy and the hate bled through the screen. Ivelisse mounted her and looked like she would have punched her right in the nose if Rosa didn't know how to cover up and buck her off, and it added a sick "what will happen next?" element to things. I dug Shida suplexing Ivelisse boots first into Diamante's face (with Rosa hitting slingshot knees after), and later Shida running across the ring to stop a hot tag by hitting a flying knee to Diamante on the apron. It didn't totally matter much as the finishing stretch fell apart a bit, but the falling apart was some of the best stuff here. Pure hate and actual emotion are things we don't get enough of in wrestling, so I celebrate this unprofessionalism and welcome it to my television.

22. Eddie Kingston vs. Jon Moxley

ER: It's cruel of AEW to make us wait two months for another Kings(ton) Road match in prime time, because of course King is going to deliver. I could watch Kingston sell chops all day, love watching him take a hit and see his muscle memory go to respond with a hit, only for the pain to hit mid throw. Gimme more of Kingston duck walking away holding his chest. You never get rote exchanges with King, the strikes are always mixed up and broken up with unexpected kicks. Kingston hits a lariat and  takes it to the floor, goes after Moxley's ear, yanks his waistband into an elbow to the back, dumps him into the timekeeper's table, and we get a nice tour of the AEW floor. King eats a vertical suplex and they both whip each other into the barricades. I love Kingston faces after he takes a suplex. We get too many idiotic facial reactions in wrestling, Kingston's reactions are the only ones that feel honest. These two kept it close and always punished lag, like Kingston headbutting Moxley off the top after Moxley left space between an elbow, or Moxley powering through a lariat after Kingston gloated a wee bit. We get some big moves, like Mox hitting a piledriver, or Kingston taking a big German suplex before dropping Mox with a backdrop, but there's never the feeling of moving from spot to spot. Kingston matches always feel like a strike battle broken up by occasional bigger moves, but everything is glued together with chops and headbutts and elbows. The sudden finish was awesome, with Moxley blocking a backfist and just pouncing on Kingston, dropping him to his knees with his weight while applying a sleeper that turns into a sick side headlock. Kingston is a man who knows how to make a side headlock look like a finish, turning purple and spitting, and Mox did his part by really hooking that chin. It's almost like Kingston needs to be wrestling on TV more.

PAS: All Japan Eddie Kingston isn't my favorite version of Eddie Kingston, although I love all versions. We are far enough removed from that era, that matches paying tribute to it don't seem as trite, and Kingston does that tribute stuff better than anyone. He understands that what made those matches great were timing and reaction and not just moves, and his reactions to getting hit were even cooler then the nastiness of the shots. Moxley had some cool little moments too, this wasn't just a Kingston showcase. I loved how he sold the downward elbows like he got a muscle cramp, and I really felt like he was excited to be working this kind of match and that excitement was contagious. I wish such a big chunk of this match wasn't in picture in picture, it's better then not getting it all, but they should time things better so your main event doesn't get chopped up. I thought the finish was really cool, no need for a bunch of near falls, that quick bulldog choke felt like an ending. Too bad it took COVID to slot Kingston in the main event where he belongs, but hopefully they realize he belongs there now, and a title rematch between these too - with a big build up - is the most exciting thing AEW could do right now.


What Didn't Work

-Opening tag was a real slog, not at all the kind of debut that made Miro looked like an asset. Miro looked fine in the match (although I couldn't stop laughing at JR fawning over his quads the whole time), but it went way too long, and it was easily the slowest paced match that Janela or Kiss have been involved with in AEW. Some nice individual moments (Kiss took a nice bump to the floor after Janela got shoved into him), but this whole thing felt sleepy.

-Jericho has made some pretty uninteresting on paper matches into interesting or even really good matches, but getting something good out of Private Party might be his greatest task. The promo didn't hit me, but I'll hold out hope.


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AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 8/12/20

What Worked

-Opening tag was fine, although it drifted too far it overly cute move combos, but I think Evil Uno's performance was strong and he kept this thing together. Dark Order beat the bandanas off of Young Bucks, and some of their double teams were nice and sly. The best was Uno doing a blind tag without Matt Jackson noticing, and when Matt went to leapfrog over Stu Grayson, Uno caught him in midair from behind and dumped him with a German. That spot could have come off real manufactured but all parts of it looked smooth. Nick took a nice bump through the ropes to the floor, Matt did a big flip dive off the stage (past literally every member of DO, oh well), Grayson walked over Uno's head to hit a rana, and the winning pin by the Bucks was handled really well, with Grayson believably diving in just a split second too late with the save. Match could have used less cuteness and more direct tag formula, but Uno is really good, good enough to hold something like this together.

-Parts of the in ring segment with FTR, Young Bucks, Arn, Tully, and the Rock n Rolls felt like one of those HHH segments where he would have Flair out to tearfully yell about how HHH doesn't everything Flair did, but better. But it was also a chance to hear Arn talk, Tully talk, get a glimpse at Ricky's awesome outfit (he looked like an old Navajo woman wearing ice blue Converse and a sequined jacket), and see Ricky take a freaking stuff piledriver. That stuff is a win.

-Every person they have used to bump around locker rooms for Lance Archer has been golden. This is the best use of Archer, just throwing guys into walls and ceilings while Jake the Snake talks to the camera.

-Jericho/Cassidy worked, but I don't think it ever came close to capturing the lightning of their first match. The expectations were higher for this one obviously, as this one has come with 5 weeks of build, a debate, promos, a destroyed jacket, and a big 10 man tag. This match was good, but that match was unexpected and kept building into one of Dynamite's strongest main events. This one had a stipulation attached and should have felt bigger than it was. Their first match felt like a big stip match, and even though this stip was kind of silly it would have worked great had they treated it like a big deal. I liked the build of their first match, the way it started with a little comedy and kept ramping up. This maintained a similar pace throughout, and that just meant that it felt like three other matches on this same episode. Darby doing a hands in pockets Coffin Drop looked good, but it feels like we already have Darby doing the same kind of wild trust fall, there's some value in letting guys have their thing. I liked Cassidy's diving forearms and how Jericho caught him in the lion tamer off a top rope rana. But other stuff landed soft or clunky (I wish Jericho would just drop the lionsault). The distraction brawl on stage didn't look great, and Hager's big powerslam did look great even though I was disappointed with where it lead. Overall I enjoyed the match, but it just made me like their first singles more.


What Didn't Work

-I think MJF has really improved a lot in ring over the past year, and he has a lot of poise on the mic. But the material isn't already there, no matter how confidently it's delivered. It's the kind of thing that works a lot better without a weekly segment, but I have a feeling we will continue getting weekly segments, at least until the PPV in a month.

-When the Scorpio Sky/Cody Rhodes match was brought up early in the night, Jim Ross stated "Scorpio Sky and Cody could have the match of the year", which, look....it's good to have an optimistic outlook in life. Virgil or Max Moon could have won the Royal Rumble, and Scorpio Sky and Cody could have the match of the year. Blue Demon Jr. was in the best match of 2019, a thought that would have sounded completely absurd even just 5 years ago. And this was not a bad match, but at the end of the night it won't even be match of the night, let alone a match that anyone will remember at the end of the year. It was better than the Warhorse match, never for a second approached being as good as the Kingston match. Scorpio Sky's offense is too floaty to ever come off very threatening. Cody was good at making his cutter variations not only look good, but he was good at occupying himself to account for the lag in delivery. Scorpio Sky is one of those guys who always looks like he's taking a bigger bump than the person taking his move, and I typically can't stand those guys. You need to be an expert crash and burn artist like Darby to pull something like that off. Scorpio Sky hitting a big hangtime flatliner just looks like a guy taking a big uranage. It also feels weird to let Sky kick out of a Cross Rhodes. Not every dude in the fed needs to be a split second away from the title.

-Nearly every time I'm done watching an Omega/Page tag, my initial thought is always "well that was too long". I'm pretty sure every single one of them goes to 15 minutes, which isn't a lot, but it almost *always* feels too long. It's not always Omega's fault, but he's the one in there choosing to make these matches feel long. Luchasaurus is the A1 reason this thing felt too long. Every sequence he was apart of looked terrible. This guy has the worst hot tags in AEW, all ugly kick combos and people rushing to get into position for bad looking offense. His kick combos are so trash. There were fun moments, like Jungle Boy eating a snap dragon on the floor, or getting powerbombed from the ring onto Luchasaurus. But overall this wasn't good.

-Hikaru Shida isn't good. She never gets her kicks up to where they are supposed to land, she requires opponents to do all the positioning work while hanging them out to dry, and it's not getting better. She has charisma, she is pretty, but her in ring is lousy. I have seen Heather Monroe live before and thought she had great live charisma, but she really wasn't here to show any of that. She sold well for Shida, and they kept it quick.

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AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 8/5/20

What Worked

-AEW has somehow had a poor success rate with big multiman matches. I think a multiman tag with 8+ people should be pretty much a slam dunk good match. You can hide anybody you want and can work at a great pace with frequent tags. But for some reason AEW multimans just have not clicked. The opener tonight clicked. There was stuff I didn't like (I really dislike whenever a big match like this focuses on a spot that involves half or more of the participants, like an 8 man suplex or the silly 3 way spinning toe hold that ended with them all knocking heads), but much more stuff that I thought worked really well. The energy throughout was good, and I especially liked Evil Uno. He's a guy who worked countless multimans like this, so you get a sense he knew right where to be. His chain spots didn't require anyone to wait awkwardly, he took the snap dragon real well, set up double teams great (loved his sit out powerbomb), and hit that nice cannonball under Grayson's 450. Both Bucks knew how to pick their moments and Matt had some great stuff running through a bunch of guys on the floor before getting leveled by a Brodie Lee superkick. Lee also had a cool double lariat and wrecked Kenny with one on the apron (painful bump from Omega), and this was maybe the best Lee has looked in AEW. The important thing here was that everyone was pretty good about choosing their moments, and many worked in smart spots to get out of the action. Grayson flew past the ringpost to the floor and took a big apron bump, Dax Harwood left the match after doing a nasty gutbuster on his bad knee (I do not know if the injury is real, but I hope it is not. He sold it convincingly enough that it looked legit), and that lead to a really great Page comeback when he rejoined the match after taking Harwood to the back. This wasn't bogged down in any way with that comedy that tends to drag these AEW matches down, and that tight pacing kept this real strong throughout.

-Really enjoyed LAX vs. Best Friends, with things really picking up when Trent took a nasty bump on the edge of the apron, getting his legs yanked out from under him. The LAX control segment was really good, thought Santana looked really good in there. They had a real nice double team suplex, and Trent is at his best selling and bumping around. Now, the structure meant that we were building to a Chuck Taylor hot tag the whole time, which was the weakest part of the match (and I did really like his Sliced Bread, thought it looked much better than his various drivers that always see him getting into position too early). He moved through his offense quick, which looked a bit too planned (compared to how the rest of the match looked), but the home stretch had a couple of big double teams and a decent nearfall. It didn't have the result that I wanted, but I can't argue with how we got there.

-Sammy/Hardy brawl was good, Guevara looked like a real maniac. His punches were thrown with the body language of a man trying to injure someone with punches. This wasn't a set of clean punch exchanges, this was a guy jumping someone. He threw an opened chair right into Hardy's face which felt like a crazy moment in an Ian Rotten match, not something that Matt Hardy would take on TV. The twisting dive through a table was sweet icing, but Hardy's deep red gusher was all the cherry we needed on this sundae. Sick blade job, made me wonder how the hell they would top any of that in an actual match, and made me excited to see themselves top it.

-How cool was it that Ortiz javelined that sledgehammer into the windshield to end the segment? That's the kind of one take that would have made me flip out the moment the scene was cut. "You see it stick in the windshield!? Try to defeat me now, God!"

-Wasn't feeling the Cody/Cardona tag, but Reynolds and Silver won me over during the nice, long control segment over Cody. Early stuff felt a little too indy, Cody didn't totally look like he touched the ringpost in the spot where he was supposed to, but he committed to the selling enough that I eventually bought in. Silver is a shrimp but works well with his size. Silver makes up the difference by throwing hard kicks. He is a better thigh slapper than most, really hitting the mark on some very fast timing, but really his kicks look good enough that he really doesn't need the slap. His kicks to a kneeling Cody were what really got me into this. He has good aim and came in with kicks to break up pins to show more of that good timing. But while his kicks look powerful, he is still small, and I like that someone like Cody was able to just power through with a cool powerslam in spite of the damage. Cardona didn't do a ton for me (and it's hilarious that JR was talking about his big action figure collection as something that would presumably get him over) but everyone else made this work.

-I didn't actually expect the Jericho/Cassidy program to have legs. I keep finding myself surprised with every segment. They're drawing it out really well and, not worrying about making each segment more intense than the last, just convincingly pairing them off the right amount each week. I'm not sure they can top their match, but they're doing a really good job keeping it interesting.

8. Darby Allin vs. Jon Moxley

ER: I thought this was great. Unhinged Darby performances are the most consistently high end part of Dynamite since the beginning. Moxley can be a little goofy, but he can also bleed and dish a stiff beating on Allin while Allin finds a dozen different ways to crash his own body. Moxley goes right after him to start but soon Darby is crashing the way he does best, including a brutal run into the ringpost. He dies on a couple of topes, and is one of the best in wrestling at making topes look like devastating offense. He finds great ways to stay just ahead of Moxley, and the match keeps getting hotter because of it. I dug how he set up his Code Red by kicking out Moxley's knee, and I loved how he stomped all over Moxley's hand in the ringpost before coffin dropping to the floor, landing on Moxley's same hand. There is some MJF interference, but they don't let it define the match, and don't let it be the cause of the finish. What it does do, is give Moxley a great chance to blade. Matt Hardy still had the juice of the night, but Moxley's adds to this fight. I liked Darby capitalizing and was actually shocked when the coffin drop wasn't the finish, and shocked again when Darby refused to stay down after a Gotch piledriver. I wasn't expecting the match to go big match epic on me and I enjoyed that twist. The implant DDT that kept Allin down looked sick and should keep someone down. Darby is must see TV, and matches like this one make that an obvious statement.

PAS: This was really great stuff, I didn't care for either of their first two matches against each other, but this was great. Darby might be the single best wrestler in the world at structuring an underdog match, and maybe one of the best ever at it. He is actually taking less insane bumps now than he was in the indies, but the one crazy bump he took was totally awesome looking and perfectly placed. All of Darby's offense is that rare mix of flawlessly smooth and really violent looking. You can get one or the other, rarely do you get both. Eric is right about his topes, they are the most violent dives in wrestling, and really maybe the most violent since Ciclon Ramirez. There was no need for the MJF stuff, and it would help Darby more if he got his near fall due to his own actions, but it is a minor quibble. I do think they are getting a little Lucy with the Football on Darby's big win, and they really need to pull the trigger soon.


What Didn't Work

-It feels cheap putting Swole/Reba here, since Reba is hardly a wrestler and the match was designed to be a Swole demolition. It wasn't meant to be great, and it wasn't. But it wasn't bad, and they gave the whole segment the right amount of time. The rest of the show is all up top! I feel like a real heel putting this here. The show does need segments that aren't just workrate match after workrate match, but it probably would have worked much better in between the opener and the Inner Circle tag. Also, it is a bizarre choice that amid all the "put more women on TV" talk, they put women on TV for a total of 3 minutes.


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AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 7/29/20

What Worked

-The visual of Stu Grayson's huge tope con hilo past the turnbuckle, hitting the cameraman on the way down (and running right at the cameraman) was awesome.

-Couldn't be much less interested in Zack Ryder as a new AEW recruit, but at least Ryder showed up ON THE GAS. I am more excited for hulked up juice god Ryder than Woo Woo Woo Ryder.

-This show needed Darby in the main event, because this was a real 2 hour drag if you were looking for good wrestling. This was a quick, under 10 minute sprint with a hot pace, totally unnecessary (but fun) weapons, and some classic Darby crash tests. The whole thing starts with Darby doing the Coffin Drop off the entrance tron, so this rules from go. Any match based around Darby dying is going to be cool, so crashing with a Coffin Drop, eating a powerbomb, a German, a nasty spill to the apron, it's all great. Starks and Cage had decent chemistry as a team, but I like Cage a ton more as "guy throwing two men around at once" than "guy going up easily for everyone's suplexes", and luckily we got a bit more of the former. Darby's late match comeback to save Moxley was great, there were a couple good nearfalls, and the finish was fantastic. You give me Darby smashing tacks into Ricky Starks' back by dropping in off the top rope and planting that deck on his back, and that's a finish I'll be into. Starks' sell was awesome, left leg stuck out straight and lifted off the ground while being pinned, shaking like he had spinal damage or like a man who just got his back tacked for the first time. Thank god for Darby tonight. That's a guy you get the ball to with seconds on the clock.


What Didn't Work

-Dang, that opening 10 men sucked, and it had zero excuse to suck. A 10 man given enough time should be the highest hit rate match out there. Any match with 6+ people where at least four of the participants are capable, should be a guaranteed good match. But this was just a sloppy, unfunny, poorly timed mess. People stood around awkwardly, waiting to take offense, missing offense, or just not doing anything. The dive train started well with a cool tope con hilo from Chuck Taylor (who appears to have lost some of his added quarantine weight), but then a long stint with Marko Stunt getting tossed back and forth between Hager and Luchasaurus while everyone just watched. There was a lot of "just watched" in this and it blew. Any time they tried to string a moves chain together it fell apart by the second move, everyone moving at a completely different pace than everyone else.

-I really love the idea of Cody vs. Top Indy Guys, and I have to accept that most of them are not going to touch Cody/Kingston...but I'd like to think that most of them will be better than Cody/Warhorse. I've never been much of a Warhorse guy, the whole thing comes off forced an unnatural, and let me tell you: if something comes off forced and unnatural on small scale indy shows, it is going to look downright bush on a big league presentation. Warhorse looked like a guy who won a sweepstakes, not a guy who earned his shot at the champ. Cody really busted his ass to make him look good, but it's a two way street. Warhorse throws a nice clothesline, and that's about it. Cody is good at taking lariats, and Warhorse had a big running one and a nice flat foot standing one that looked really impactful. Amusingly, JR called him "offensively minded" in a match where up to that point he had only thrown clotheslines and some stomps. Cody did a good job setting Warhorse to shine, Warhorse just didn't shine. His timing was a step earlier than Cody's, and it pulled back the curtain too much on a lot of his rehearsed pins or missed strikes. There were several times where he was already reversing the move he was set to reverse, while Cody had barely started the move. Grabbing a small package off a figure 4 attempt is a smart nearfall, but it looks bad when you're showing your reversal hand before Cody is even in position. Later, he committed to a missed double stomp off the top after seeing that Cody was 8 feet away from where he was stomping. It wasn't a blind leap, he watched Cody move, then leaped into a double stomp to the mat as if a person was there. There's debuting on national TV the way Eddie Kingston debuted, and there's debuting on national TV the way Warhorse did. This was Dancin' Homer debuting in Capital City. We've set each end of our Cody vs. The Indies bar.

-Man has Omega's stock fallen. The tag match was not a long match, but it felt like a long match. That's never good. Omega looks more and more like a broken man in tags like this, but this thing was mildly cursed beyond Omega. There were unfortunate hiccups that you can't really blame on anyone, yet take a match down anyway. Little things like the ref getting in the way of a Page clothesline, requiring Page to completely stop his momentum before continuing the spot as planned. Grayson doesn't always hit with his stuff, but I appreciate a lot of the stuff he goes for. The slingshot senton to the apron didn't fully connect, but it's something that is crazy enough that I want him to keep trying to make it look better. I like Uno's AEW work and dug him here, thought he took the snap dragon like a beast, loved Page wrecking Grayson with a lariat, but this never quite came together as a match.

-I was curious to see some more Diamante after her match last week, even though I was not into her match last week, but now I think I'm good for awhile. She did not look good throughout much of this. Every Shida singles match always has to have these really bad strike exchange sections, always looking like the most brutal slap play. For all I know those shots sting like hell, but I have yet to see a Shida vs. Opponent strike exchange that actually looked ready for prime time. Several of Diamante's chops hit hard, a couple things looked good, but I'm still waiting on an AEW singles match where the participants actually have chemistry.

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AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 3/4/20

What Worked

-AEW should utilize the 8 man format more, because the opening match was a very fun use of several guys I don't really love. Colt Cabana was given the spotlight in his debut, getting the opening run, playing hammy apron guy, and then getting the finish run hot tag. But everyone else really held this together and made good use of the 10 minute runtime. Evil Uno is a goof but his plays to his role well, and Dark Order feel appropriately represented with him directing traffic. Their group beatdowns and orchestrated attacks are good enough, and they all bump well. Cabana at least had a nice pair of back elbows and nice headscissors, but SCU had a really polished performance. Kazarian was the standout with a great fiery hot tag (probably my favorite section of the match) with him running in hard on everything, hitting an especially impressive straight arm lariat and a great flying forearm. There was a cool stacked attack with Daniels hitting a slingshot elbow, Kazarian hitting a slingshot legdrop, and Scorpio hitting a slingshot splash, cool old man Kaientai stuff. There was weirdness, like SCU's Lambda Lambda Lambda rap entrance, or John Silver/Alex Reynolds being under masks for some reason but still referred to as John Silver and Alex Reynolds. But who cares because Stu Grayson looked like he crushed his shoulder taking a Cassandro bump straight into the ringpost. Well timed, nicely paced multiman.

-Big Swole squash was what it should have been, and the wind up punch finish should be played in every single hype package and commercial.

-Great Hager squash, started easy with a couple nice slams from Hager, but jumped up a level with a nice QT comeback before getting put down. QT is a fun job match babyface in the same vein as Bob Cook, where he'll throw a couple nice worked punches in before getting absolutely worked over. That's a good guy to have on a roster. Post match big brawl was good too, and while Hangman's drinking gimmick is as dumb, and his clothes scream "Guy who hangs around rodeos but can't ride a horse", he at least hit Hager with a big clothesline and Hager bumped it on the leg of a chair.

-Main event was a great segment, and another superstar performance from Darby Allin. Moxley got taken out and strangled in the concession area, so Darby was left to defend himself in a handicap match against Jericho and Guevara. The latter are great at stalling and delaying a beating, allowing openings for comebacks by cockiness, and Darby is obviously someone who is going to be great at quick comebacks. Guevara bumps all over for the cause, Darby hits the Coffin Drop onto all of the Inner Circle, really flattens Guevara with a senton, and topes right into a Judas Effect. You knew he'd be great at being outnumbered, and he didn't disappoint.


What Didn't Work

-Opening segment felt like an absolute eternity to me. The scars looks like cool Jack Pierce monster makeup, but this felt way more like a dragged out Raw opening segment than the typically more efficient AEW promo segments.

-That was too much of a Chuck Taylor match and somehow not much of a PAC match. PAC just went 32 minutes with Omega, he did not need to give a big rub to Chuck Taylor the next week with several close nearfalls.

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AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 11/13/19

This is a little late, because Eric's DVR didn't record the show and I was slacking on digging into another AEW show after finding the last one I did such a chore. This show really improved the pacing problems plaguing the last show I watched, and this was overall a really easy watch.

What Worked

-I complained that every match seemed to be worked in exactly the same 2.9 near fall workrate style,  but this show actually had variety. I loved that they opened up with an actual squash match. Nakazawa tossing away the oil and jumping Moxley to avenge his training partner was a cool moment, and it was even better that Moxley ran through him and didn't work a bunch of near falls with a comedy guy.

-Jurassic Express vs. Dark Order was an actual honest to goodness Southern tag, with a long heat segment a fun hot tag and a hot finish. Singles match Stunt doesn't do much for me, but he is a pretty great guy getting beaten on in a tag match and I enjoyed Dark Order working him over. Luchasaurus coming in and wrecking shop was a pretty great moment, and whoever the ex-SAW guys were under the creeper masks earned their 50 bucks and catering

-I am not a big fan of Attitude Era style wisecrack mic segments, but the MJF and Jericho mic work did a way better job at that then any recent WWE iteration. The Wardlow debut went well, and Cody continues to do a great job as an old school territory babyface.

-Not sure what the point of that Darby Allin vs. Peter Avalon vs. Shawn Spears 3-way was, (why a 3-way, what is Peter Avalon) but Allin is my favorite act in this fed, and he continues to come off as a bigger star then 80% of the promotion

-LA-EX and the Bucks brawl was really fun (although having half on split screen during commercials was dumb), and they continue to make EYFBno look super strong. The sock full of baseballs is a great heel foreign object.

-Can't believe how pro-Orange Cassidy I have become in AEW. 2019 Joe Buck cruising event bathrooms is a great addition to his gimmick. Chuck Taylor really isn't Semitic enough to make a convincing Ratso Rizzo, maybe finally a good use for Colt Cabana.

-I really liked the finish of PAC vs. Hangman Page, PAC stomping an unconscious Page in the back of the head was pretty sick, as was slapping him in his finisher. Good way to convincingly end this dull feud.

-SCU seems super dated and lame, but I thought Guevara and Jericho were a really fun team, Guevara especially ruled in this, bouncing between crazy crash and burn bumps, and taunting dickish offense. No idea why they are pushing Scorpio Sky so hard, I could make a list of 25  available black highflyers who are better in the ring, more charismatic, and aren't almost 40.


What Didn't Work

-The rest of Page vs. PAC

-Good god is SCU's fake New Age Outlaws intro rap cringe worthy, I actually winced in pain. It was like watching an open mic comedian bomb at one of those side drain comedy clubs in Greenwich Village that people go to if the can't get into the Comedy Cellar.

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AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 11/6/19

What Worked:

-I love how Pac handled Orange Cassidy getting into the ring. Cassidy got into the ring while Pac was turned the other way, the crowd went wild, and Pac acted like he was the one getting the crowd hyped. That's a smart way for a heel to be paying attention to the crowd.

-"Undesirable to Un-goddamn-deniable" is a great line from Cody, good place to peak a promo

-Feels like the Jericho video is going to be contentious, but I liked it. At first I thought it was filled with nothing but bad acting and bad reads, but I got the tone the longer it went and I liked the presentation of a heel champ writing off his challenger. The stuff that was supposed to be funny (dumb eyed Jack Swagger making his "did I accidentally put two mouth guards in?" face, Guevara's "at 48 he's the youngest champ in AEW history" line) was actually funny. I could see people disagreeing on the overall tone, but I liked what they were going for.

-Women's tag was fun, with an especially fun performance from Jamie Hayter. I dug her aggression, loved her lariats, loved the way she would dispatch Riho with condescension. Riho isn't great but she has great energy, which goes a long way as an underdog babyface. Shanna felt like a pro, and Sakura really stuck the landing on all her sequences with Riho. The magistral spamming in the end could have looked like absolute trash, but instead it was a perfect combo of Riho's speed with Sakura's tight execution. Sakura's magistral looked like something that should finish a match.

-Brandon Cutler is a spitting image for young Sid Haig. He needs to lean into that more. A Spider Baby gimmick would be far more interesting than "also this other guy with kickpads". But we got a squash match! It didn't always look great, but damn an actual 2 minute match that wasn't hyper competitive bell to bell? Wild.

-Sammy Guevara really understands his role as the low ranked guy in the stable, and he bumped around in the best way in the main event. He knows how to play the athletic boob, great flunky charisma off him. Also, to say something nice about rhinestone cowboy Hangman Page - that cowpoke who does flips - he and Sammy had an awkward exchange, and I liked how Page cut the bullshit and just deadlifted Guevara off the mat and hit a great fallaway slam.

What Didn't Work:

-Every single wrestler in AEW is equally as skilled as every other wrestler in AEW. Every damn match is worked 51/49, totally equal footing until one guy wins. Trent has been exclusively a tag wrestler, but he can also go toe to toe for 15 minutes against Pac, who they're building as a top singles guy. Boris Zhukov wasn't going out there and working a hard fought 15 against Jake Roberts. There are ways to not completely kill Trent while still having Pac decisively win matches. But every match has to be an ultra competitive war, and it doesn't feel like a very effective way to build a decent hierarchy. Do they not want a hierarchy? Am I supposed to think that every person in the fed is equally talented? This is not even bringing up the weekly complaint that every match on Dynamite so far has had nearly the exact same pace. Evil Uno has been the only person to go out and try to slow things down, and I wasn't expecting to go into AEW being the "people should be taking more cues from Evil Uno" guy. The fart noise phantom kickout down the stretch was something that should not happen in a major fed.

-Private Party/Dark Order tag felt off, even though I liked elements of it. Uno's cannonball while Grayson hit the 450 was a great spot that deserved to be shown a lot from different angles, and I liked Uno doing things like crawling out of the corner to set up being used as a vault. But the match didn't add up to anything that ever felt cohesive.

-I don't totally understand Sakura's "heel Freddie Mercury" thing, and it stood out as even more weird since her partner was just being an outright heel. Like I get if Sakuraba would have come out doing her Mercury entrance, but it felt weird here. Plus Freddie Mercury wouldn't wear Chico Che vinyl bibs.

-I can't think of one, but has there been a cowboy wrestler lamer than Hangman Page?

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AEW Dynamite Workrate Report 10/23/19

What Worked

ER: Marq Quen looked fantastic in the opening tag. This guy gets unreal height on everything and connects. His shooting star was gorgeous, and he took some big spills (really flew into a Fenix german suplex, among other things). PP have some really fun double teams but it can result in a lot of waiting around. Still, Quen is a fun guy to watch. Fenix's double stomp to Quen's shoulderblades was disgusting, he also hit a great tope and I dug his ropewalk punt.

ER: Dark Order looked good and deserved a lot better than Jericho taking regular focus away from their offense. Uno is a big chubby boy and was really great at taking the innovative 2005 offense of SCU, threw some stiff shots, actually made me want to seek out some Uno matches. Grayson hit a bananas tope con giro over the ringpost, looked like he was going to fly 30 feet, also bumped around huge for Kazarian's hot tag.

ER: I am into the 8 man tag they set up, and thought the promo setting it up was great. Jericho dunking on MJF's scarf, Jericho saying "don't take one more step" several times, Cody breaking the glass door to get to Jericho, an actual great security break up, totally want to see this match.

ER: Bucks tag was really fun, built nicely, cool moments came off well. I dug Orange Cassidy's hands in pockets dive, both Bucks had some slick chain offense, Trent threw several nice suplexes (you know, maybe not "Gary Albright-esque" like Excalibur said, because that's dumb), even Taylor had a cool northern lights suplex. Bucks had a nice save on what I thought was the for sure finish, and I thought the match length was perfect for the pace.

ER: Britt Baker has been on these episodes way too damn much, but that coal/steel/iron Steelers logo ring jacket using colored molars instead of stars is damn choice. That jacket has been far and away my favorite thing about Baker.

ER: Moxley had a really nice cover in the final minute, really grapevined the legs and sunk it in.

What Didn't Work

ER: Lucha Bros. tag was far too long. Even though it was "only" 15 minutes, it was so go go go that they hit multiple points where it felt like they were doing way too much. You build a match around two teams hitting tandem chain offense, and the longer it goes the more likely it is that some of it doesn't look good. Pentagon is such a slug in these matches, completely terrible at getting into position for big offense. He almost always gets into position, he's not missing dives or anything, but he literally just walks into the spot he needs to stand, or shifts ridiculously across the mat on his back. He's not good! AEW is still somehow missing a few big spots, barely catching a nuts looking Fenix tope at the end. And I think Private Party really should have won here. Lucha Bros. do not need any kind of big wins at this point. Pentagon shitting up the ring for the past 3 years and getting louder reactions than ever kind of proves that.

ER: This fed is really cornering the market on "Guys trying elaborate ranas, slipping, and falling short of their mark". It has happened every week so far, multiple times this week.

ER: All of the teams I don't want to see are the ones advancing. SCU feel like the most 2005 tag team possible, and I wish their stable was called Bald Dudez.

ER: Omega has a lot of offense that looks like it really hurts, but it must not because Janela was always able to get back up immediately and do something that also looked like it hurt, and sometimes Omega would make funny spittle faces after being hurt, but it turns out he also isn't hurt by Janela's offense. The V Trigger that set up the finish looked extra painful, but I'm not sure why that one knocked Janela out cold but the other V Triggers just made him get up and hit suplexes.

ER: I am sure that I am the first one to say that "TV Time Remaining" is a weird way to end a match when there is still TV time remaining...

ER: We sure did see a lot of 450 splashes and shooting stars tonight. How long is that going to feel exciting? This show needed way more breathing room. It was 2 hours of constant matches, almost all of them worked at the exact same pace, almost all of them using the exact same offense. It's too fucking much.

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