Go2Sleep

Megan's not actually that big, the majority of the AEW women's division is just tiny.

Yeah, one of the most insidious aspects of Vince having a monopoly for so long is that it permanently ingrained the idea that tag teams should only exist to break up and set one of the two up for a singles push.

Darby/Mox doesn't need the belt. Let Darby do a Sting entrance to be the decisive guy to fend off all the interference and call it a day.

Jet Speed vs. Hurt Syndicate is a great matchup on paper, but the setup was way too similar to Hangman/Mox. Not sure why you wouldn't just have them and Briscoe run 'em off in that spot. The trios match was really good. Good to see Ibushi have a strong match too. It's been sad to see him so washed, but he turned back the clock a little here. That bump on the high angle German and the avalanche tiger driver looked great. I feel like there was a huge missed opportunity with Mercedes hitting Toni with the cake, given the famous meme of her WWE vs. AEW run.

God I hope Luchasaurus can get back, because a team with him and Mortos that is some kind of Money Inc/FoF mash-up is my new ultimate fantasy booking.

You have the two matches you mentioned that were face/face, plus Hurt Syndicate who are tweeners that everyone is much more into than Dustin/Sammy. It also helps that Mercedes and Okada are in the same boat where crowds are mostly "we're happy to play along with you being a heel, but we really love you." Another great little moment in AITA was Willow's reaction when Bodies started playing.

The old-ass ECW carnies would be wise to play the two against each other for the biggest payday.

AEW is basically ROH grit and grinding their way to the big stage. Black and gold NXT was great, but that clearly had a hard ceiling. WWE buying WCW set the wrestling world back literal decades, and it's nice to see us finally coming out of the dark ages.

I disagree with this, I thought it was pretty effective considering she doesn't have a lot of name recognition. Quick beatdown of an established name, then a flashy pose that made her look dangerous but also kinda hot and it was so quick and smooth, you can tell she's probably pretty good in the ring which is the biggest sell you need in AEW. Basically came across like a much better version of The Bunny. Excited to see what she can do. The women really stole the show overall. Toni/Mercedes feels big time, and Anna and Harley really don't believe in putting their hands up. With Hangman going over in the Owen being somewhat of a surprise and having no obvious direction for Swerve and Ospreay, I was kind of wondering if they would weasel into a 4-way. It would get around the problem of not having the most compelling guys at the top of the card for the biggest show. If you're not going to put Toni/Mercedes in the main event spot, a 4-way elimination match where Mox goes out first and you have Swerve, Hanger, and Will going nuts for 30 minutes seems like a better fit for the moment. If TK finally has the balls to do a women's main, then this isn't as important and you can run Swerve/Will vs The Bucks or Claudio/Yuta.

Did a re-watch of Okada/Speedball, and it was top-shelf. It had the vibe of a Dean Malenko CW title defense on an NWO-era show. No excessive finishers and kickouts, just a lot of smooth wrestling and counter-wrestling, well-timed high spots, and a perfect tempo to keep the crowd engaged without over-stepping its bounds on the card. Way lower stakes than the main, way less spectacle than AITA, but a perfect fit on the card and a MOTYC in its own right.

Pretty stacked card with a lot of guys fresh off big PPV matches. Wouldn't at all be surprised to see Fletcher take the TNT belt.

AITA was really good. I don't know that they needed to let Bodies loop 3 times, but otherwise it was a perfect blend of comedy and violence. The Bucks were great stooging in their Continental Army getup, and I'm So Excited getting a music spot was great. Willow getting padlocked to the ring post through her gauged ear did not get enough focus. Swerve's staple gun-fu is always a blast, and the staple to the tongue was some fresh cringe. Briscoe driving the ambulance back to lock up the DRs and leave the stooging Bucks to get theirs was a good layout. The OWA through an exploding table being an afterthought was hilarious. Hanger/Ospreay was great as expected, and didn't seem to run excessively long, refreshingly simple even. I liked the touch with each trying to finish with a move from their biggest rival, showing what they've learned through their epic battles. Hanger winning is cool and somewhat unexpected. Big question is what does Ospreay do at All In now?

Big agree with this. It's too bad the heel Stat/Stoke partnership didn't go anywhere, but if they had to scrap it, I'm glad they aren't just pretending it didn't happen. Kinda feel like it could pay off with Stat eating a chair shot from one of the male Death Riders in AITA that re-awakens that sympathy from Willow. Would work best if Willow then breaks something over the same person's head/puts them through a table/whatever that gives her team the win.

Briscoe/Ricochet in a stretcher match feels like a "spin the wheel make the deal" kind of thing, but both guys have top level character work and are more than willing to take crazy bumps, so I expect it could be a quiet show-stealer. Only match I'm not interested in is the tag titles. The MJF/HS angle just needs to get where it's going, and it took a step backwards on Dynamite. The Outrunners match showed that Shelton and Bobby need to be in there with guys who push the pace, and Dustin is definitely not that. In fact, he's probably the worst type of dance partner for the Syndicate. Too big to be thrown around, too slow to hit credible offense. CRU would've been a much better fit here. Beyond that, it looks like a killer show. Hanger and Ospreay are signaling that they're going full epic, AITA is always fun, Hayter/Mercedes is a good pairing, FTR vs. Nigel/Garcia is much better suited to deliver the type of story they're going for with the tag title match, the aforementioned stretcher match, Speedball/Okada is a foregone conclusion but could be a lot of fun if Okada isn't in "mail it in" mode. Lots to look forward to.

Agreed that this segment was really bad, although I'm not as worried about that particular doomsday booking scenario. The biggest problem was it felt like they were building to *something* and then it just trailed off into nothing. MVP and MJF have been riding the tweener line nicely for this angle, but it felt like they were forcing a full heel act to try build heat for Dustin and Sammy who, I'm sorry, are a horrible act right now in AEW. Dustin cutting the same "fired up" promo he's been doing for the last 4 years and Sammy clearly in "be a good boy and don't rock the boat" mode is so grating. Plus the match is going to be terrible. Dustin is too big to get thrown around and too slow to hit credible offense and Sammy is not a sympathetic babyface. CRU vs HS would've been a fun match with the weasely heels trying to get anything to stick and maybe even engendering some sympathy as the match goes on. Dustin and Sammy should not be on a ppv. A couple other less bad, but weird, things were the Russo-ish end to the women's match and making a big deal out of Hanger/Ospreay as the main. I was really hoping we'd get the trivia note of Willow and Marina being the first women to main event an AEW ppv, plus it just feels wrong to stick AITA in the middle of a show, no matter how much of a fuck finish they're planning for it, or how obviously good Hanger/Ospreay will be. I liked the wild brawl at the end and Toni calling out Mina's entrance music was hilarious.

I've been on the Kyle Fletcher bandwagon for a while now (and still am despite this upcoming criticism), but has anyone else noticed that he leg slaps so hard his own leg bleeds in almost every match?

If that's what she's going for, TK should chip in with a fitting theme song. I'm far from an expert on what constitutes 60s/70s British counter culture music, but there has to be a good wrestling theme from Pink Floyd or Zeppelin or something. Edit: It's "Burn" by Deep Purple. Get on it,Tony.

MJF and Sterling taking over HS and reducing the original members to menial tasks would have some really bad undertones. If they aren't gonna play it straight, MJF is the one who should be getting out-smarted.

I forgot to comment on last week's Collision, which I thought was an ideal weekly TV show for AEW. Bowens and Takeshita/Alexander took care of business quickly, which left room for Speedball/Dralistico to be the quiet show stealer, and Ricochet/Angelico landed somewhere in between. The main got some time and had some blood to stand out despite the non-finish, but it effectively set up a future angle like Willow/Stat. Perfect pacing. Anyway, Beach Break was a fine bigger Clash style show, which is totally fine to run once in a while. Opening tag was fun with some good fake outs on Ospreay and Hangman falling apart. The women's 4-way was good with some extra chaos at the end. Good to see Mina back and I'm excited to see what Thekla can bring. Not sure what's going on with MJF and HS, but there is some intrigue there. Shelton lined up to superkick MJF if Lashley gave the thumbs down and quickly switching gears was a good touch. Main event wasn't that great, but the attitude style set up for AITA was good. Not super excited for Gabe Kidd, but if he's just there to eat damage instead of Okada, then whatever.

Didn't Curt Hawkins have a big losing streak in WWE that at least raised his profile from "who" to "a guy on TV regularly?" More recently, Harley Cameron, which is a surprising overlook by this thread.

Only comparison I think is way off is Finlay/Eddie which is obviously more of lower-card workrate match. Roddy Strong vs. Wheeler Yuta is probably more apt. And yes, I think the answer is sprinkle in like 2-3 of these kind of matches while still allowing for some longer matches every week. The goal isn't to kill the workrate vibe of AEW, it's to make the matches that do go long feel more special and meaningful for the wrestlers involved. Also, there's nothing that says a short match has to be bad. Given the general quality of AEW's roster, I don't see why that would be the case very often. The fact that "short" equals "bad" or "squash" in peoples' minds is a big part of the problem (and this is not unique to AEW, this goes all the way back to when Raw went 3 hours).

Of all the people who don't need to be going 10 minutes, 2025 Rhino is at the top of the list. Maybe he could've gored Kip Sabian first, but that was exactly the kind of match I'm looking for on my weekly shows. Not everything needs to be 5* Okada/Knight was pretty good despite falling into the trap of being longer than the story required. Okada mixed up his TV formula and let his heel personality shine through. Knight is a super athlete with a decent amount of physical charisma despite not establishing much on-screen personality yet. Speedball as the Steamboat-level pure babyface is working for me. I'd love to see Jet Speed vs. FTR down the line. I think every match had a really good finish.

You could probably get a better opponent for Benoit, and hopefully the Harlem Heat match was a 2-minute squash, but honestly, I'd love a show like this. Finlay/Eddie and the lucha 6-man could use some time, but everything else sounds really fun if kept under 5 minutes. The other thing is WCW had tons of workrate banger ppvs from this time frame (Starrcade from this month wasn't one of them, but nevertheless) that weren't 6 hour arms-races because how do you make your ppvs feel more special than your weekly shows when the weekly shows are filled with 10+ minute competitive workrate matches? AEW has been getting a little better about this lately, but the main reason a lot of their shows feel repetitive is that if everything is a workrate match, nothing is. One thing I will say I love about AEW's format is they vary their overruns enough that you can't clock the finish of the main.

If AEW could replace Marina Shafir with Shayna Baszler and gaslight the fans that she was always in the Death Riders, they could do a lot more with that role. AEW's women's roster is really deep now to the point where someone the caliber of Deonna Purrazzo has trouble getting on TV, but I think Dakota Kai and Kacy Catanzaro would be really good fits without needing to take over the division. Alternatively, merge the TBS/World title and bring on the women's tag titles.

I know people have calcified opinions on the Bucks, but that was a damn good match with Knight and Speedball. All the action was smooth and they had the right balance of the faces getting good moments, but the Bucks just being in the right spots more often to sell the experience advantage.