Sex Machine Gun

I mean, I'd love every bit of bullshit callbacks to early 90s WCW but I'd love it in the same way I love watching a Neil Breen film.

Never heard of Girl on Cinema before like, thirty minutes ago. Listening to her review of Bucks/Inner Circle from the PPV now and I gotta say I'm like 90% of the way with this person. I understand people thinking it's a Cornette-ish gimmick but I would counter that maybe similar complaints from different sectors and generations (a guy in his 60s, a guy in his 30s, and a lady who sounds about 20) would indicate actual problems. Other videos have presented stuff which sounds relentlessly negative but some glimmers of acknowledging quality exist. All in all it sounds like a younger fan who exists in a weird liminal zone where you want old school but don't care about kayfabe while not understanding fully why old school worked and... you get the point. It's a mishmash of opinions with little consistency though I remain mostly in agreement with a lot of her commentary.

I think the "Christian is showing heel tendencies" stuff is coming from how he wouldn't shake Kenny's hand. Honestly, he has little reason not to do so, but after rewatching that segment the lack of a handshake is the only thing he does that isn't 100% face.

Yeesh, this sort of blindsided my positive feelings because it reminds me how overstuffed the roster is right now. Darby survived the elbowdrop to hell from the PPV, is Cage dead? Hell, Starks didn't even get fucked up too much and didn't appear either. As I've typed I'm okay with it because earlier in this same thread I was bemoaning the appearances of other people who really shouldn't have been okay after the abuse they would have theoretically taken at the PPV. Taz could have cut a sixty second promo maybe that told the audience how his people are doing in the aftermath since he was obviously not involved in the street fight.

Nice of Tony to roll in a somewhat environmentally responsible supercar in the form of an i8, if so. (pretty sure that's what was shown on Sunday, didn't see the previous appearance of it)

I'm scared to see a Spin the Wheel, Make the Deal callback segment because this promotion would actually do that. At the very least they'll have Jake wearing a COAL MINER'S GLOVE~ and be all "REMEMBER THIS, STING?" Then Darby Allin sets it on fire before eating it or something.

So, uh, we gonna have this Vince pettiness tournament or what? To stay on topic, a tournament is what Tony Khan would want. Maybe a battle royal in the form of a single poll with a bunch of options, aw yeah, that's the stuff.

Promos being interrupted is bad enough, but the perpetual booking of postmatch angles is what kills people the most on this show every week. No one is allowed to just have some heat and let it sit for a while, there has to be SOMETHING afterward which is intended to ratchet up the excitement but just ends up making very few people look genuinely strong week-to-week. I had an identical experience, after the Darby match was over I asked aloud to myself "what the fuck is left?" Then the graphic appeared for the War Council and I had the best of suspicions that it being the closer for the show meant a big angle. Never would have guessed it would be THAT big of an angle but it was delicious.

I was afraid someone was going to say this. Yes, Dark Order exists, but the Inner Circle becoming a big time babyface stable might be a first for this company I think. People who have consistently been presented as important, as stars since the promotion started... as faces? (Fred Sanford chest clutching) Page is the only dude associated with the Dark Order who isn't presented as a bit of a joke so I'm not counting it. There have been babyface trios but no real stables. I love the ending angle even more the next day. It was a LOT of story progress in ten minutes but worth the result and honestly this was how it needed to be done since MJF as part of the Inner Circle has never made sense to me once and killed the momentum I thought he had going last summer. Now he gets to be a regular promo guy again and repair the damage done. Weird to think his theme song is called "Judas" but they (un?)intentionally had a big slab of Christ-like imagery carrying Jericho from the ring to the stage for the powerbomb. EDIT DUE TO NEW DISCUSSION: It's difficult to despise Kenny the most on the show when the Bucks exist. Strangely, that match at the PPV might be my favorite of Kenny's. Not like I've seen a lot of his stuff outside of AEW, but still. I've seen the "seven star match" and a couple of other big matches from Japan. The guy is shit on the microphone, very little he says is intimidating or believable. In terms of ring work he's a tremendous athlete and at least he's in great shape (unlike the Bucks). Problem is it comes off to me as Dolph Ziggler with a bigger moveset, just bam-bam-bam with little selling or psychology, flying to the next spot as quickly as possible. All this said, I don't mind him as champion thanks to Don Callis and the Good Brothers being involved. If he was on his own it'd be fucking insufferable.

Now let us never speak of the poof pyro again. Please. I'm begging them. Kind of on the same tip, I really didn't dig Moxley being involved with anything at all tonight. Dude was fucking murdered even disregarding the letdown ending at Revolution. He might be made out of sturdier material than Darby Allin after being handcuffed, bludgeoned, and lacerated to pieces.

Good gravy was that final segment a rollercoaster. While I enjoyed it they really need to stop trying to stuff more shit into a bag than will fit. You could have stretched all that out way more. Darby Allin is, according to wrestling physics, made from adamantium.

We didn't need two segments to explain the farty pyro botch. Callis is trying his best to sell this but we really need to forget it happened.

Tony should get extra on his PO for how much he's had to leave the commentary table. I'm very on board with a Christian/Omega feud. Never thought I'd say that but him interrupting the presumptive Christian Cage interview segment is highly intriguing.

This is fucking awful. The sound of the arena or... something else is overpowering everything. Why are they purposefully being bad? Oh, it just cut out. Like a switch got flipped. The fuck is happening? At least I get to see Hangman on a zero turn lawnmower.

What the fuck is going on with this audio? I thought they'd fix it during commercial but it's downright deliberate at this point.

I fully expect there to be an underwhelming explanation on Dynamite when their best route is to ignore it entirely. STOP CATERING TO PEOPLE WHO ARE ALREADY WATCHING. I guaran-goddamn-tee that there will be some smarky bullshit that will pop some people here (somehow) but be ultimately garbage. I don't want some celebrity-laden crap to bring in casual fans but there are other ways. I won't be surprised if Dynamite opens with a promo about how underwhelming the explosion was. Because WE'RE ON THE INTERNETS LOLZ Trash.

This guy gets it. My issue was the lack of Koko talk.

Oh shit, I thought that was her in the ringside scrub seats but my stream wasn't of the best resolution. Can we all just admit that this 2021 show prompted a discussion of goddamn Greg Valentine matches from thirty plus years ago and that's a terrible sign even in this *extremely* apologetic forum?

No one's mentioned (for understandable reasons) that the Singapore Cane being used in the main event was... different. Like it was a real one that wasn't meant to shatter or bend for visual purposes over someone. Much darker wood, and looked super stiff. Between that and what appeared to be a majority of legitimate barbed wire might be why I actually got into a deathmatch a little for once.

Hey, here's a positive: I loved Team Taz showing up to their cinematic street fight in a candy green BMW i8. They've never conferred that kind of glamorous image to Team Taz where they're rolling around in mid-engined two seaters but I like the contrast between that and their hard-nosed portrayal. Why not have the toughest also be the most extravagant?

An angle they really should pursue which just came to me and I don't think I've seen anyone explore it yet: Why wouldn't Kenny have made the 30 minute explosion weak if he's the one who designed it? If I have yet to put away an opponent by that point, then I'm still going to be in danger when this shit blows. I know, I'll make it weak so it doesn't hurt me and I have better chances of keeping my belt! Ah fuck, disregard, I just realized that if that was going to be the intent they wouldn't have done their best to beat cheeks and keep Moxley in the blast area. Am I the only one who wants them to just ignore it entirely and never show any replays? Moxley was fucked up in that match from the barbed wire and the bat and the interference and gone for a while and if you didn't see it then you missed out and let's move on. What about Eddie Kingston? Who's that? ... every idea I have to fix this runs into a wall in the forms of if you actually saw it live, how the commentary sold it, how Kingston sold it, the Moxley mic work postshow, the Khan explanations... (brain circuits short out)

Just remembered the ridiculous MJF "suck it" spot. Someone HAD to have blown their timing on that, I can't conceive that sequence went as planned because it was dogshit. It didn't just make MJF look like a goof but the Bucks never sell anything and yet one of them (can't remember who) was laying on the mat and selling during that nonsense. Man, if I'd started posting here eight, nine months ago I would have sounded like the biggest MJF mark that ever marked. They ruined him, and considering his age it's possibly the biggest tragedy of AEW so far. AND ANOTHER THING, fuck, why do things keep popping into my head? I want this company to succeed, goddammit! You had the heels in the preshow match flipping the bird like it was required for them to keep breathing. Then in the opener of the show proper the heels do a bunch of middle finger displays and spots. I don't remember it any more beyond that but it shows how little coordination is going on between these matches. Too many fuckin' motifs get repeated or spoiled before their time. I wouldn't be this critical if I didn't want AEW to become a legit #1 competitive promotion. WWE is so full of bullshit that it's expected and almost redundant to point out the stupid junk but this feels different, like it HAS to work or the entire business goes under and is reduced to some kind of late 19th century form where it's intensely localized and the carniest of carny shit.

The true irony is that I enjoyed watching the show even if I disliked a majority of it, but ascribe that to being in a chatroom as it aired and having at least a virtual group atmosphere. Watching chicken shit with others will almost always give you the emotional chicken salad response. I couldn't even count how many times a shit PPV was still enjoyable because it was at a sports bar with other fans who I regularly saw. Had I been isolated without the online aspect, or had swung the expensive (at least on SeatGeek) ticket price to see it in person? I'd be way less forgiving. The event as a whole gets a C+ as I watched it with others. It's a little better than average, but not by much. I would have said that before the farty pyro ending too. Even if the ending had gone as imagined I wouldn't have put it above a B-. My issues lie in the match order and lack of cohesion where shit happens in matches early in the show that should be something later. I cited a couple already but another was one of the Bucks doing an overhand strike/chop flurry to get the crowd hyped in the opener. THAT'S WHAT STING IS DOING LATER DON'T DO IT NOW

There's probably some other bullshit that can be found elsewhere, but all that's on the WWE.com website is that tonight will be a CELEBRATION OF THE ALMIGHTY! Of course, how they phrase it is "what will Shelton Benjamin and Cedric Alexander have in store for the celebration?" as if there'll be some dissension. Please, no dissension. Let them all be in lockstep until Summer at least.

Holy shit, this PPV name has been around for this long? (walks into traffic)