Nineteen

Loved loved loved that theater piece before the main. It's showtime..... Thank you, Sting.

That closing was wonderful. Cody, Rock, and Roman were all killing it for their roles. I like how Rock has this entitlement of where his family is that he just gets to walk on in and Roman siding with him for the glory. Or maybe Roman knows Cody had him last year and this isn't an in his prime Rock so he's got the better chance. I love all these little unspokens here. If I can quibble though... wow, The Rock knows what wikipedia is. It is literally that tree against a new graphic...tree. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anoaʻi_family#Anoaʻi_family_tree

Really great episode. The crowd totally wants to get behind Swerve but are we forgetting he cheated in the first match and broke into Hanger's home to threaten his family? 3 way should be lit though. Totally missed it until I saw the screenshot but the graphic for Big Business read "Bo$$ton." When AEW launched my wish list for talent to be there was Claudio, FTR, and her.... can't believe I actually got all of them. BCC vs. CMLL guys was loads of fun. Claudio vs. smaller flippy dudes is one of the best versions of Claudio. If the Bucks don't end the Revolution match with "I'm sorry, I love you," what are we even doing? Also, I popped for it being the EVP trigger now.

I'm not 100% convinced that Cody challenges Seth instead. That promo made it sound like he wasn't going for Seth instead but that he was just waiting. Maybe sitting on the title shot until Summerslam I'm thinking too that man, Priest having MitB is like an afterthought to an afterthought these days

Okay..... It totally should have been Roller Cod-ster's moment at 'mania But I popped huge for Dwayne....

Figured it would be Darby vs. Sting for the last match but.... there's still plenty of time to establish a decent build for why the Bucks want this match but with so much time out wondering if this is a smoke screen for something else. Hanger, Swerve, and Wardlow is a nice run of challengers for Joe after he gets past Hook. I'm pretty excited for that match next week too. Shout out to Hook's Bat Signal too, I hope that's a regular thing. "That sounds Italian," Toni Storm forever, my dudes. I get they wanted to do something for Brodie but uhhh... Preston and Anna both turned their backs on Dark Order. Why not just go with Silver and Reynolds? I felt weird seeing Julia in that kind of big match too. House of Black feels like the kind of stable that shouldn't be teaming with anyone outside of it (I'll give a pass to Julia and Skye since there's at least a story there).

If we don't get E&C vs. the Hardys in a Hardy Compound match, we have failed as a species.

Swerve is up 2-0 on Hangman and he said that this is far from over. With the Acclaimed and BBG going after Cole's group Hangman needs... something so I'm okay with getting round 3 already. Cole really hit that "heel making solid points" promo given Max's history. Don't know if I want a retread of UE now UK holding all the belts but this is a pretty cool faction with some great matches lined up. DEONNA!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Swerve was part of a fucked up submission on the table spot. Saraya gets to say it's her house again. Darby/Takeshita was... holy smokes, AEW rules.

That happened too he took his hiatus after DoN 2022

If one is a available I will be ordering one. Don't quite get putting Hangman in there as a red herring for The Devil. What I like about this storyline is how many enemies Max has made over the years but too many suspects makes it distracting. The fake out on the goon squad surrounding Joe was cool though. Glad Switchblade is still alive points-wise, feels like Swerve is the favorite out of the Wednesday bracket though, this might be his tourney to win at this point. Really great main event and nice payoff to Adam Co...plenad (can we just call him Edge) mercing Wayne. Not that Wayne's mom has a valid reason to side with Christian but to turn against Copeland. Unless she sees that Christian is taking a genuine interest in Wayne (which... he has...) Only problem with these round robins is someone's gotta eat some falls and it's a shame Mark Briscoe has this. At least with 10 man fields in the G1 you have a match or two for someone to get a nice shine win but with the smaller 5 man groupings it's like... okay, you know who's out and who has a sliver of a chance left.

Am I the only one who read that as deliberately disingenuous? How much thicker could he have laid it on? That certainly was one of the more interesting routes they could have taken there, especially with the whole "everyone is glad I'm back line." Won't be tuning into Raw regularly again but that certainly was unexpected from the Muffin Man. Um... rest of the show...... R-Truth knowing the "goths" weakness of powdered snacks I've never hated anything in wrestling more than Tozawa's stupid dance and New Day's reaction to it. Tag scramble was fun, nice showing for the Creeds. Really loved Sami and Drew's segment backstage, loving Sami as this conscience of the locker room these days, some of the best babyface work out of WWE in a really long time. On the flip side, Orton and Jey felt a little.... quick, like Orton is one who is known to forgive easily.

Wasn't this more or less Mass Transit?

Thought it was a pretty middling show. The gals stole the show. Bayley taking the bullet for Kairi was really interesting given what it seems like all this is building too. I'm not the biggest fan of Bianca but thought she should have pinned Bayley based on how this match came about. Iyo falling out of the sky with a trash can over her feels like it has great meme potential. Thought it was odd Miz had to cheat in that one. Wondering if it's setting up a rematch sometime where if he's gonna win he's gotta do it the right way. Really surprised by how invested they are in WALTER. I guess with years of the IC title not really meaning much and seeing it on such a great, great wrestler is just a little shock. Honestly checked out during Dragon Lee and Santos which I felt bad for since I do really like both guys. This was a great showcase for Zoe too, she's really got something. Main was.... fine. The bait and switch on the cash in was really interesting, that would have been a hell of a way to do a cash in. I liked the little fake outs for Punk all night with "WELL IF RANDY ISN'T HERE" only for..... The ending was a little anti climactic and but feels like more of the drama was on Randy and Jey than the faces vs. Judgment Day. And, the straight edge elephant in the room. Punk was one of my favorite wrestlers for a long time. I don't drink because my father is an alcoholic. I really admired him for walking out on WWE the way he did and I was really into this idea of an older and wiser Punk finishing up his career right on Wednesdays but.... After the way everything went down with him over the past year for him to end up back in a place he (rightfully) went scorched earth on... I popped in the moment but I'm just wondering... what now? What's really there for him?

LOOK OUT, HE'S GOT A MUFFIN!

Feel like I'm in the minority for how that main turned out, everyone I had over was just glued to everything. If Cole was gonna be revealed to be the devil, throwing in the towel like a callback to MJF/Cody, how the end of the show hung on just long enough that something still might have happened. MJF has all these battles going on and okay, one is down (Switchblade) but there's still Joe looming. Cole's return has a lot of questions hanging over it (was handing Jay the RoH belt an accident?). We still don't know who the devil is that could be a part of the next chapter of this story. For all the craziness that was set up it was a cool swerve (, bro) to have it just be a really excellent drama filled wrestling match. Me and a few friends are likely going to World's End and I'm pretty hyped for it.