Casey

I don’t know that anyone here would actually hate or love anything based off potential fan reactions. That seems incredibly weird to me, and not something any of us would do.

I love you guys but I’m still gonna talk about how much Jack Perry sucks even if it ruins your high or whatever in return, I’ll continue to read the anti-Punk posts whenever they pop up and not care, because that’s how this should be. Enjoy what you enjoy, who cares.

look I just hate the angle because main event Jack Perry is an unearned huge glowup, and is only near as over as he is, and in this spot, because Punk did a little light choking in England. For all the talk of fragile egos for one person, it’s funny that All Out or All In was never brought up for storyline purposes while Punk was still there, but the minute he’s gone they’re off to the races to try and cash in on it. I’m fine with the Bucks being shitbag heels abusing their EVP status, but the minute you bring real life drama into all of this when the real pay off is now unobtainable when it previously wasn’t, I’m going to get annoyed. Whatever, at least Swerve is champion even if he’s going to take a backseat to more Elite bullshit. Ospreay is going to keep being awesome, even if the International title isn’t what he should be chasing (unless the plan is to unify it with the World title and keep the Continental and TNT titles). Mina/Mariah/Toni continues to be good, and Deeb/Toni will rule obviously. I really want Megan Bayne to Mone’s heater, and for the Statlander turn to be a red herring when it’s actually Stokely turning on them both to introduce Bayne and join up with Mone.

pre-Bucks heel turn this was literally you, every show thread, bitching about how Adam Cole or the Bucks or whoever and what they’re involved in. Now you’re in the position we were in, and you’re seeing people being negative and don’t like it because you’re enjoying it. God forbid some of us who have been super positive, to the point that other people here mock it, about AEW for five years now are starting to see some flaws. Swerve will be fine, yeah, but this is the equivalent of Cody winning the title at WrestleMania and then the next night he wrestles a 20 minute match and a segment for his next challenger is announced for next week. And then in the main event segment, the Bloodline beat up Adam Pearce or something. WWE fans would rage that the focus isn’t on your new World champion who just spent a year (two actually) chasing that title.

Yeah I mean I’m not arguing the fact that owner getting beat up isn’t a classic trope or anything, but I don’t think this is going to lead to TK being on TV any more than he ever was. We aren’t going to get TV vignettes of him building a team or something. It’s not too hard to imagine FTR coming out to cut a promo and bigging him up and they’re proxies for him or whatever. Or Omega implores the babyface locker room to not take this shit lying down before he gets beat up/kicked out. Multiple ways they can go and none involve TK being an on screen character. I think if anyone is immediately jumping to “Tony Khan is going to be an on-air character now/will be a heel/whatever” then you’re letting decades of WWE trauma slip in. Again, I hate the angle, mainly cuz of the Bucks and Perry and the lack of focus last night on Swerve’s big moment on Sunday, but I don’t think this is veering towards how WWE or whoever in the past would do it. TK is not built to walk tall, and if he had any interest in being an on-air character past what he’s done thus far it would have happened already I’d imagine.

I hate the angle as much as the next guy, but whoever is saying it’s a great way to write TK off TV is dumb as fuck because I can count on one hand the amount of times he’s been on screen in a meaningful way over the past 5 years. I also don’t think, and haven’t seen anyone seriously suggest it, that they’re going to bring him back as a heel authority figure. All of that was done just to get heat on the New Elite, and “put them in charge”, until they’re dispatched of eventually by a group of people. Next week will feed more into this “get as much heel heat as possible onto them” scenario, with either beating down or kicking Omega out of the building or whatever in his hometown. Shad Khan isn’t going to look at that angle and say shit. You think he’s out here reading Reddit comments and the Observer or something? This company is valued at $2b 5 years into its life, the fuck does he care about if us nerds don’t like that his son got tombstoned by a shitty heel tag team?

the fucking NFL has an article up about TK taking the tombstone. What in the world. https://www.nfl.com/news/jaguars-tony-khan-takes-punch-piledriver-on-aew-dynamite-show

Dasha got released.

first Black World champion in AEW curtain jerks the show with a match, with only a segment announced (for next week!) to make his DoN title match official, the IWGP champion is the semi-show closer… but the show ender is the third rate Elite beating up Tony Khan. Jack Perry is a main event level guy now, based off… getting put into a chokehold backstage by a bigger star, over a year ago. This fuckin’ sucks.

It’s working out pretty well for them, since every currently available Fallout game is experiencing either its all-time player count or just more active than they’ve been in years. It’ll be real shitty if the next-gen update wipes progress and makes you start a new game, though. Apparently that’s what happened with Skyrim and the Anniversary edition.

X-Men characters are rumored to be in the next season of What If, so it makes sense. I think Storm specifically, if I’m remembering right?

days late, but this is the second PPV in a row I didn’t buy because I’ve been down on AEW for a bit. But they hooked me back in with pulling the trigger on Swerve. I was scared they wouldn’t, but then I remembered what company this was. I don’t feel like Ospreay/Danielson is the best match I’ve ever seen, but it’s way wayyyy up there on the list. Danielson is obviously one of the GOATs, but it’s really incredible how far Ospreay has come when he was a junior. Ospreay/Swerve is going to hit like fucking CRACK if they do it at All In. Only other things I have to add: the Jericho match wasn’t the worst in company history, or even close. It wasn’t great or anything, but let’s not lie to ourselves here. And we also can’t ignore the fact that HOOK just… isn’t that great, honestly. He needs NXT, or something like it. Working double digit TV matches a year isn’t going to get him where he needs to be, IMO. Jericho sucks, and this whole meta “Punk was like this backstage” gimmick is fucking stupid. It’s one of the things bringing me down on AEW - now that the bad man is gone, they start doing stuff they should’ve been doing a long time ago (Bucks & Hangman going heel are the main culprits). Toni at the presser saying if you want to watch cinema go watch a fucking movie is how I feel about WWE right now. They’ve only got my attention because of Punk and a few other things, but this over reliance on “omg this is cinema” and stupid shit like that clouds fan perception of what’s really going on.

@Matt D Appreciate the burner account, that makes things easier for me. I’ve got this weekend off so plenty of time between now and next weekend to watch that. For you, I’ve got… more indie women’s wrestling. But from a few years ago. It’s Mercedes Martinez and Kylie Rae in a no ropes submission match. I’ve always been a big supporter of Mercedes - criminally underrated in the larger women’s scene anlongside the previously watched Nicole Matthews - and Kylie Rae is one of those What If questions for early AEW. Again, not sure of what I’m supposed to be giving you every month since you’re more cultured than I am, but I figure somewhat current indie women’s wrestling might be a small blindspot for you.

I’ve been binging the Blacklist on Netflix, up to S9 already. Boy, they really drag out the Liz/Red story as far as they can, over the shark, and then a little bit further huh? This S8 finale is just a huge info dump, likely because it’s Megan Boone’s last episode I believe. Still fun stuff though, and a real treat to see James Spader just hamming it up and being fucking awesome every episode. Sidenote, but the Tom story was ended too soon, and Liz/Ressler doesn’t feel earned at all the few times it does happen. Samara being shuttered away a few seasons ago SUCKED, too. Aram is just so whiny now, and that’s horrible because he was one of my favorite characters.

The rumor was that he was fired from The Witcher for being physically and emotionally abusive to other staff, so who knows. Jeff Sneider says that was the case on X-Men ‘97 as well.