I did a preview early yesterday for this show. It ended up going almost 4 hours and I caught it late as well as watching some follow up material in the form of a post-show media scrum. I won’t get into that part but I will provide some post-show thoughts on the current AEW situation since there’s a lot of things going on here.
Best Friends and Jurassic Express vs. Hardy Family Office
Didn’t catch all of this match but figured it was going to be a mess. Jungle Boy got the win with the Snare Trap over Angelico but there was an after birth with The Butcher making his AEW return. Most of Hardy’s people ganged up on Orange Cassidy and threatened to cut his hair but a ton of people fell out of the dressing room to help out. The group got a big hug in at the end for the “give people what they want” shot. Mostly, this was pre-show filler and a last minute addition to give some of the remaining talent a chance to get some airtime.
Dan Lambert Interview
Also, on the pre-show. Lambert had Andrei Arlovski and Junior dos Santos along with Scorpio Sky and Ethan Page. They were watching from above. Didn’t really do anything but it was hinted they might. This could be turned into a major angle if done right but I don’t have the confidence in the execution, although Lambert has said all the right things from his point of view.
Miro Vs. Eddie Kingston
TNT title on the line. I was surprised at the placement of this match but honestly, it worked quite well. Crowd was super hot for this match. They loved Kingston and this turned out better than I expected. Probably, Miro’s best match in AEW since I’ve seen him. Pretty hard hitting match with Miro’s chest turning purple towards the end but I have a filling he liked it. A cheap ball shot from Miro followed up by some major kicks allowed him to retain. Miro got good heat for the ball shot as well as the referee.
Honestly, I expected Lana/CJ Perry to show up here. She still had a shot at showing up at all but this is where I would have inserted her if she signed. Actually, this worked out better because Miro looked like a real heel here for once rather than just a monster.
Jon Moxley Vs. Satoshi Kojima
A last minute match that turned out to be pretty decent. I saw Kojima’s match against Kawada for the AJPW Triple Crown to get myself more familiar with Kojima’s peak point. Match wasn’t at that level but pretty hard hitting. Moxley is basically getting to beat all the major NJPW stars on US turf since Japan has a lot of restrictions. Both guys looked pretty good and the crowd was into most of this. Moxley won with a pair of Paradigm Shifts, one in which spiked Kojima on his head. Moxley did bust his arm though and that looked legit nasty.
First surprise from the Forbidden Door side was Minoru Suzuki showing up. I’ve heard his name but never saw his stuff. Read that he was in Pancrase so he’s pretty legit. They did some stiff shots to each other but Suzuki came out on top with a pile driver of sorts. They announced Suzuki to face Moxley on Dynamite.
One quick comment here. I read one of the wrestlers mentioning how a lot of the Japanese guys still can go but weren’t featured as prominently. But they still have some name recognition and train rigorously. So far, most of the guys they’ve brought over are 50+ years ago. They don’t look bad but they’re far from their prime. I do think it’s great AEW is giving them the chance to be in front of a large crowd who are enthusiastic but it’s weird for me to see given their age.
Britt Baker Vs. Kris Statlander
Britt is still over big time but I think Kris managed to get the respect of the crowd for her feats of strength in this match. She’s still trying to figure what her move set should be as I saw her do that handstand on the turnbuckle but it didn’t last long and look too goofy. A lot of the silliness from Kris’ matches were cut out here. Heck, Orange Cassidy actually shouted at Kris to make the situation more important for her since this was her biggest night. Felt Kris came out of this bigger than before.
The Young Bucks Vs. The Lucha Bros
Tag title match in a steel cage. Truthfully, they didn’t use the cage that much outside of preventing both teams from going to the outside and no interference. I think Cutler was the only person who did anything from the outside in tossing a satchel with a boot containing thumbtacks at the end. Don Callis was at the announcing booth so he did nothing in the match.
Match went too long for my taste. It was exactly what I expected: pure chaos. No story whatsoever up until throwing the boot in. Both Lucha Bros got color and there was a few times where the match looked over. Rey Fenix got the spot of the night by doing a cross body block from the top of the cage to all three men. Then they followed up with their double team piledriver move for the win to capture their first AEW tag titles.
Pretty emotional after match where Penta’s family came by and they hugged. Penta and Rey were really emotional after the match. But I am glad they won since this was the only title that would make sense to change. Also, both guys deserved it and hopefully this sets up some fresh matches for the titles.
Women’s Casino Battle Royale
Messy but the real key was the last slot with Ruby Soho making her debut. For my money’s worth, that was the best moment of the night. You could tell she was really overjoyed and overwhelmed by the crowd’s reaction. She got a pretty good pre-entry chant too so they must have been selling t-shirts beforehand.
One thing I liked was how Ruby went after a few new people like Jade Cargill. Battle Royales usually are chaotic but at least they have the potential to show a brief moment where people who never have worked before can do so. End had Ruby and Thunder Rosa team up briefly to try and get rid of Nyla. When they did, there was a nice moment where both women got to confront each other. They had a nice small exchange with Ruby kicking Thunder out. Ruby got a huge pop and hugged the ref afterwards. I’m pretty sure Ruby is pretty excited to work with Thunder Rosa.
MJF Vs. Chris Jericho
MJF trolled everyone by doing a fake Jericho entrance. Jericho came out to his band’s guitarist doing an even worse rendition of his shit song. The sound was so horrible that it started cutting. Match wasn’t bad and there were a few decent moments like MJF doing a top rope power bomb to Jericho where he sold his back as though the move hurt his lower back more than it hurt Jericho.
Wardlow tried to interfere from the Pinnacle which brought out Jake Hager. A bunch of referees tried to bring it back to the locker room. Then MJF got the pin although Jericho’s foot was on the ropes. Another referee told Aubrey he saw differently so they restarted the match. How come more matches don’t have a second referee to call a spot like that?
Whatever moment they were trying to build didn’t sell me because it looked contrive and there was no emotion for Jericho possibly having his AEW in ring career ending. They restarted the match and Jericho got the Walls of Jericho for the submission victory. I liked the match but I think the story they wanted to tell wasn’t great. The Inner Circle came in to celebrate with Jericho (and of course get air time).
Comment here is that I don’t know what they wanted to accomplish here. I hated this feud and it just dragged on. MJF should’ve been going after Jericho not the other way around. This should have been MJF’s big moment. The only hope I have is for MJF to do something else with someone else because he’s been trapped against Jericho for too long.
CM Punk Vs. Darby Allin
This was an old school match. Someone pointed out that CM Punk used the Bret Hart vs 1-2-3 Kid match as a template and even showed a comparison between the two. Nice throwback considering that Punk had a Bret Hart shirt on for Rampage. Punk controlled the pace and this felt like an old school match. Really enjoyed the slow build.
Darby hit a bunch of big crazy moves that I’m surprised Punk took since he said he wanted to avoid those. Punk honestly looks like Harry Dean Stanton from the 70s with his hair cut and face. They built this match well and it definitely was the match of the night for me. Punk looked great here and he did a lot of old school basic spots that are sorely missed in this age of wrestling.
Afterwards, Sting came down to shake Punk’s hand and Punk also waited for Darby to stand so he could shake his hand. Match was booked perfectly.
Paul Wight Vs. QT Marshall
The perennial bathroom break match. It was revealed that the show had gone on long and this match was positioned in case they needed to delete a match. I still think it was used as a breather between Punk and the main event. Nothing extravagant happened here. Some outside interference from Solos and Comorato. QT jobbed like he should. But Paul looked bad here. Moved extra slow. I personally prefer him on commentary.
Christian Vs. Kenny Omega
I’ll be honest and say that I didn’t care for this match. I liked what Christian did because he tried to build the match but I really just don’t think Kenny Omega is very good. Perhaps, it was the show going on long but there wasn’t much of a build. Christian looked like he got legit hurt on the side from the stupid table spot and had a gash on the side of his ribs and was bleeding from the mouth.
End had Kenny getting in a top rope One Winged Angel, which was a crazy move for Christian to take. The Elite came in for a beat down with Jurassic Express trying to help Christian for the save.
Then Adam Cole came out to his music after Kenny did a post-match speech. They swerved everyone here in having Adam Cole come to the Elite’s side, but they explained how he’s their best friend (All Friends Wrestling, indeed). But it did position him as a top guy right out the gate, even though he did get a massive pop upon arrival.
As Kenny was about to finish up the PPV, the Ride of the Valkyries started and the place erupted because Bryan Danielson entered with his version of the song. People went bonkers, chanting “YES!” as he entered the ring and went to the face side, pointing to Kenny Omega, who scrambled off while the heels got beaten up. Kenny singled out one of the Bucks and started delivering a shit ton of kicks to the delight of the fans who shouted out “YES!” each time he hit. He gave the guy a super drop kick to clear the ring as he hugged the other face group, which ended the show.
Final Thoughts
This probably was the biggest PPV in AEW history. You could tell everyone was super fired up, the crowd was into everything (almost), although they started to die towards the end just because this thing nearly went 4 hours. But what AEW did here was really fire on all 4 cylinders so to speak and put out their best foot.
Some people weren’t there but made appearances like Andrade, Malakai Black, etc. But they did get small interview segments to promote the rest of this coming week.
The way I looked at this PPV wasn’t so much as a show but a clear message: we’re the #1 wrestling promotion. The booking was close to flawless in terms of the winners and match ordering. There wasn’t too many after births but the things that did happen made sense. Somethings I didn’t care for like certain matches in terms of what they were. But the results were what people wanted and I think that’s the message.
More importantly, you could see how people like Kojima, Suzuki, Ruby, Adam Cole and Bryan Danielson all were super happy and motivated. There was a lot of positive energy from the audience and it came off well. CM Punk’s match said hey this is what I was doing in Ring of Honor. We can do something like that here and actually bring real wrestling back.
The downside is that they pushed out a ton of debuts. It ended up working because they made the last two debuts into a mega storyline. I definitely was expecting Bryan Danielson factored into the main event but in seeing Adam Cole I was pretty confused at first. I think a lot of people were just expecting Bryan Danielson so when Adam Cole’s new music played, it was huge but not what people might have hoped for. The swerve actually worked though because of how he was positioned. That allowed Bryan Danielson’s entrance make the audience go beyond bonkers.
Now, that the major cats are out of the bag, where can AEW go from here? While they have the talent to pull off good wrestling, I see matches with Kenny and the Bucks and think that those are sloppy and not great. Punk might not introduce a style that people want as I read some people commenting that he looked old and slow out there. But he’s showing how to do a properly paced match with modern moves integrated.
But the whole time the idea of Punk and Bryan being with AEW have been the biggest things and it’s been the lead up that might be better than the end product. Meaning that the mega surprises that people have been anticipated are here and in action. So what can come afterwards?
People are talking about Bray Wyatt and there’s always the possibility of Ric Flair. Also, there are others that can show up. But the people that fans wanted the most are now in AEW and this almost seemed like Tony Khan flexing his muscles after McMahon delivered Becky Lynch and Brock Lesnar on Summerslam. McMahon can still pull out the Rock and possibly even Batista I’m certain.
But the point isn’t about having a set of cards that one can draw upon; it’s the strategy in how they’re used. Tony Khan’s strategy has been getting these big names, tossing a hint via dirt sheets and then building upon rumors. Once the person makes their debut, the pop diminishes and it’s up to the talent to sustain that momentum. Right now, the talent get 6 matches for Dynamite and 3 for Rampage. The rest go to Dark. And even then not everyone is featured. Some aren’t even seen for months. So what happens to people like a Sonny Kiss, Kip, etc. who aren’t anchored somewhere but have been around since the beginning? Are they doomed to walk the Dark match streak until eternity? Even WCW from 96-97 made better use of their talent in getting a ton of them featured and I think they had a much bigger and better roster.
So again, this was a Christmas gift because of the “surprises” but you can’t get Christmas every day. Eventually, you run out of space or need a new strategy in this situation.