The saga of All Elite Wrestling being run by the Elite continues with this week’s episode of Dynamite and apparently, news broke that Eddie Kingston may have suffered an injury during a New Japan show last week and his status for the show is as questionable as my waning interest in the current direction of this promotion. This show continues to confound me and… well, you know what? I’ll save my thoughts for after the break, because there’s also a bit of an announcement regarding future content as it relates to the wrestling side of things.
So, let’s get the big mystery out of the way. Darby Allin made his big return from foot injury to help out Daniel Bryan Danielson and Fuck The Revival against the Elite, implying that he’ll be subbing for the injured Eddie (wish him all the best, by the way) and so you’ll have one guy willing to do crazy shit to make up for pushing back Everett. If anyone was wondering what Darby was going to do after Sting, it’s apparently going to be more of the same before being shuffled back to the lower end of the mid-card until they find something for him to do, which baffles me because what can’t you find something for Darby Allin to do that’s actually meaningful?
Once again, the Elite’s heel gimmick comes across as a joke more than anything. It’s a poor man’s nWo tribute act being played out be pre-schoolers. I’ve seen poor man nWo tribute acts before in WCW and WWE; they sucked there too. I didn’t need to see it here.
Speaking of things I don’t need to see, HOOK makes his big return and challenges Chris Jericho to a rematch for the fake FTW title. Jericho says no, but offers a qualifier and Shibata decides to be the other guy in said qualifier. It’s HOOK going after his gimmick belt once again and trying to get some kind of “rub” from beating Chris Jericho so he can go back to being a non-entity going forward. At this point, I don’t feel so bad for Ricky Starks, who might not have a clue on why he’s not on TV, but it has to be a better fate than being lost in the shuffle. And there’s a lot of that around here lately.
We have the contract signing between Willow and Mercedes for their Double Or Nothing TBS title match… I notice that Mercedes is front and center on the Double Or Nothing banner on the AEW Youtube page, as if she’s some big selling point for this thing, but so far, everything she’s done has been the equivalent of watching paint dry… no, actually, I tell a lie. Watching paint dry would actually be more entertaining than watching Mercedes cut weak-ass promos. She at least went through a table, but good lord, what the fuck was the point of signing the former Sasha Banks if THIS is the best she can give you?
There was a six-man match that saw IWGP World Champion Jon Moxley pin ROH TV Champion Kyle Fletcher… who is coming across as such a total fucking geek getting beat by everyone that it makes me wonder how this is supposed to sell me on Ring Of Honor, which you can only watch via Honor Club subscription, which defeats the purpose of having a TV champion on a show with no TV. I mean, it’s a fucking six-man. There wasn’t anyone else on that team for ol’ Mox to pin besides the other fucking champion.
And speaking of champions getting boned, we have your reigning AEW World Champion in Swerve Strickland, beloved by the masses, being treated like just another guy. He has a competitive match against a guy who has no business being in a competitive match against the WORLD CHAMPION on a nothing show in a nothing match. And then after said match, Swerve gets beat up against to build up a match against Christian Cage, a guy who is a tremendous heel performer and on one of the best runs of his entire career… but him vs. Swerve for the title is not a big selling point for this PPV.
When this show was over, I was tired. I was perhaps thinking too much and not just enjoying the show. Just enjoy the good wrestling. Have fun with the good Okada/Harwood main event match. Just enjoy the Swerve/Brian Cage match that actually wasn’t so bad for a midcard match. Why do you have to be so hard on this show? I’m hard because I care. And when I care about something, I want something more than the bare minimum. Right now, AEW is doing the bare minimum and expecting people to like it. But you know what? You’re right. I care too much. I’d probably be better off not caring about the show and just enjoy shit.
Good idea… so, with that said, I am done with this show.
I’m skipping this year’s Double Or Nothing, I’ll post musings for last year’s Double Or Nothing show next week, maybe the AEW video game review will pop up along the way, and then I’m giving this AEW thing a rest. I’ll probably prep some musings for the PPVs I missed last year, but that’s about the extent of my AEW viewing until they put out something that’s actually compelling. Excellent professional wrestling is all well and good, but AEW is no longer the only ones doing excellent pro wrestling; you can get that anywhere and everywhere these days. I’m getting my fair share of good wrestling from IMPACT of all shows!
You need something more and that “more” isn’t rehashing the same tired WWE tropes from five to ten years ago when people were giving up on that show. Simple truth is that this show isn’t what it used to be… I wish I could turn back the clock and watch episodes of Dynamite where Chris Jericho was selling bottles of “the bubbly” or Jim Ross was having a conniption fit over the Dippin’ Dots cart getting abused. Hell, I’m almost regretting sour on those Codyverse bits… almost. Those were fun times… this is anything but. I actually feel quite bored watching these shows and that is the absolute last thing I would’ve expected to feel about the AEW product as a whole.
Sorry, Tony, but you need more than a neck brace to fix your company. You need new creative. You need a fresh approach. You need a fresh perspective. You need someone else to book this thing. You need someone who has a feel for what the audience is looking for. At this point, you’re pretty much turning into Vince McMahon without the indiscretions; a man stuck in his ways for so long because it’s worked before and therefore, it must work now. It isn’t.
Quite simply, AEW needs an enema.
dtm666 