Steventon

Re; winning streaks - not sure if it counts but I think you can add Aries ending Joe's big ROH title run and being elevated as a top level guy as a good end result. And they played up the story of the cumulative damage and wear and tear Joe had taken over the course of his reign, which is a story someone should really run again in 2021 To add to the barbwire matches, I really liked the Onita vs Funk one for the spectacle of it. Necro vs Whitmer barbwire ring match from the ROH vs CZW fued was pretty great, as was the Homicide vs Corino one. David Starr and Janela had a shockingly good one a couple years ago on one of the Beyond Wrestlemania weekend shows. Wasn't one of the big Lawler vs Mantell matches a barbwire ring match? Maybe the first one ever?

I'm pretty sure Brodie did the cigar stub taunt before a powerbomb sometimes

What does this even mean though?

Really enjoyed the Page - Hardy angle and set up their PPV match. Was refreshing to see AEW pull off an angle like this in a few weeks rather than drag it out for 6 months. Hardy is a good name for Page to get a PPV win over, so that was all a thumbs up from me. Dark Order making the save was icing on the cake. Deeb tried, but man Riho has not been missed. -1 has more credible looking offence than her. Have to wonder if there's a reason they're doing the Shaq/Cargill tag on TV rather than PPV? Ditto for FTR/Tully vs JE. Both are much more PPV worthy than a random ladder spotfest Sting took a powerbomb, how about that. Didn't make sense for Team Taz to run every week when there was 5 of them but call out Sting when it was only 3, but whatever. This feud needs to end at the PPV already. Main event was good fun. Crazy how much better Fenix is when he's not tied to his brother. Call me bananas but I am all in on Omega vs Moxley in an absurd gimmick deathmatch. Long live FMW.

This online anywhere?

Crazy to think they basically created the womens tag belts just to keep Sasha and Bayley happy at the time. The fact the belts have been pointless ever since kind of shows they were just a vanity project

Good show. I liked pretty much everything but every match did also go a few beats too far than it should have done which is a problem when EVERY match on the show is trying to be some sort of epic. Womens tag had a lot of good action, but also a really weird layout. Who's idea was it to start with a long section with Dakota Kai getting worked over by the faces with legbars because that was no good. Gonzales is still a little green, but she's also the most exciting female prospect in wrestling and I really enjoy what she brings to the table as a powerhouse. All of her big spots were great and I thought Ember and Shotzi also busted out a lot of cool stuff. Final section was really strong and the right team won. Wasn't paying attention to Gargano vs KUSHIDA but what I saw was decent. Agree they should have put Kushida over though. Mens tag was good, and 1000% better than anything the Rascals would have done if they'd gone to Dynamite and been paired with a bunch of the similar spotfest teams. Solid structure, all their spots were cool and stood out and they brought enough personality and emotion to this to draw you in. There were like 3 spots that should have finished things though, or at the least had a partner make the save rather than a guy kick out, which was a shame. Too far into overkill but I did enjoy it on the whole. Womens triple threat was as paint by numbers as expected. They really need to get the belt off Shirai because her run has been a letdown. Let's get Gonzales crowned next Takeover. Loved the Cameron Grimes promo and the rap killed me Main event wasn't as good as the Balor vs O'Reilly matches but I am still fully onboard with this theme of ground-based matches with guys targeting unusual body parts. Some of Dunne's strikes were embarrassingly bad but they kept the stuff on the mat interesting and sold the damage and exhaustion really well. Dunne's finger break spot is usually something he does just to get a pop so it was very cool to see it actually be the story of the match. I think they went overboard at the end but still a good match on the whole. Balor has been a vanilla workrate geek his whole career but I'd agree this run has been the best he's ever had by far. Don't care about the Undisputed Era stuff. Hopefully it leads to Cole and some of these other guys getting shipped off to another brand to freshen things up

I think the problem with Darby vs Bad Boy was -again - Janela hadn't been built up at all. He might have a 10 match hot streak on Dark for all I and 99% of the audience know, but on TV he's been nothing but cannon fodder, so Darby having a competitive match with him is Darby having a competitive match with a jobber. It's quite a simple problem to fix though, just give him a few wins on Dark and reference it on TV or have him win a match the week beforehand. Otherwise he's get getting a title shot just coz he turned up to work one day.

I'm sure it's been asked before, but anyone know what the % of viewership for Dark is? Is it even 5% of the TV audience? I know it's cannon and it serves a purpose, but if they're going to use wins on that for storyline purposes then then REALLY need to recap it on Dynamite

That would actually make some sense and result in something more interesting than the current PPV match. The big problem obviously though is that Santana & Ortiz haven't won a match on TV in over 6 months.

Love that Darby and Janela went out and had a no smokes and mirrors, no frills, no props, no crazy bumps, honest to goodness good TV match that was competitive without going overboard. Is Moxley the best promo guy in the business today? He kills it every time he speaks. Lee Johnson is one of the better young prospects they have who's been sat on Dark so good to see him get a win on TV. 2 weeks ago Jericho & MJF win the rights to be the Inner Circle tag team. Then last week they win the Battle Royale, which also had the 2 other Inner Circle teams. Then this week they book Santana & Ortiz getting a title shot, just because. The Bucks and the booking of this tag team division is so dumb dumb dumb. Glad they are pulling the trigger on the Sammy stuff though. John Silver is a national treasure, really hoping he gets his girl with Adam Page when he saves him from Matt Hardy's 30% They are doing the damnest to drag out everything Sting related as much as possible. In hindsight, signing to him to a full-time contract was a really dumb idea. It's becoming a meme how often Sting comes out and does nothing. Main event was good shit until the tedious interference finish. Archer doing his rope-walk moonsault 20 minutes into a hate-filled brawl was also incredibly out of place. I enjoyed the match a lot but the Bullet Club bullshit leaves a bad taste in the mouth and already feels stale as hell.

Surprised at GYV over Ciampa/Thatcher. Weird to think they're left off the Takeover card but I'm not against it Cameron Grimes just cut a promo about investing in Gamestop stock and Dogecoin. What a fucking world. I guess atleast it's only 3-4 weeks behind the times rather than 3-4 years so thats something

As someone who hasn't watched joshi in a very long time, who is Maki Itoh and why is there so much hype around her in particular?

Jericho/MJF getting a tag title shot makes the most sense in terms of booking, though I have no interest in that match. More Inner Circle strife... I'm not completely bored of it yet but it's a waste of the other guys in this faction to just be background characters (and that's the story!) Adam Page was the 4th best guy in his match All the build up of the wedding segment for that? Woof Kingston carried Archer to another good match and it looks like they are setting him up as Omega's next title challenger. Makes sense but again but can't say I have any interest in that match Hopefully Darby vs Janella is better than their PWG match from a few years back Main event kind of sucked outside one or two flashes from Fenix. The Good Brothers are no good, let's move this along. KENTA attacking Moxley - Not a fan of AEW using their main event to put over New Japan's 4th most important singles belt, though if KENTA is going to become a semi-regular fixture in AEW then I can live with it. I am in the crowd who'd much rather AEW be separate from New Japan and carve out their own identity, but looks like old wounds must have healed and a working relationship is going ahead.

This is going to be another absurd hot take most rational people will disagree with, but I think I'd respect Bliss more if she didn't try as hard with this material and just phoned it in. WWE has too many good little soldiers willing to go along with whatever nonsense they give them. Let's see some more push-back on this garbage.

Stuff I hated on this show: - Goldberg gassing 30 seconds into a 2 minute match - The awful handcuff finish to the LMS match. Even if they hadn't botched it I think it would have been a really cheap - Jillian Hall and Alica Fox being dubbed 'legends' - Naomi can land on her back and not be eliminated because of the 'both feet' rule. So dumb. You know someone thought they were really clever for thinking up that spot too - All this effort into Charlotte vs Lacey for what will probably be a dreadful Wrestlemania match, and they barely had any contact in the Rumble - Charlotte laughing off being eliminated, what peak HHH shit that was - Jerry Lawler literally laughing his ass off at Nikki Cross's return - The 24/7 title stuff - Tamina and Nia doing the exact same routine they do every Rumble - Orton returning at the end was so predictable after the injury angle - Mustafa Ali and numerous other mid-carders being made to look like geeks - All the Omos interference stuff - if there's no rule about people not interfering in the Rumble, then why doesn't everyone have someone doing this? Also, is this guy going to actually wrestle or we just heating up a bodyguard for no pay-off? I think I know the answer - Otis not even lasting a minute - Hurricane Helms is now an annual 'surprise' return Thank you for listening

Of course they have fragile part-time-at-best retired-10-years-ago veteran Edge outlast everyone and win. This had to have been the most miserable Royal Rumble show of all time. Atleast Belair won.

Women's #30 is a real fart as well This may be a #HotTake, but they really don't have enough female talent to do a full 30 women Royal Rumble. Every year they are going to be padded out with NXT girls and 'legends'. Rather than try to run a female version of all their big gimmicks for gender parity I'd much rather them come up with a fresh, unique gimmick that they could give to the women. 2 Rumbles on 1 show is so bloated and kind of tiring to watch. Ditto for the Chambers and WarGames. Would rather them do a yearly Evolution PPV with something new and original on it.

Good to know. Did all the older stuff get re-posted anywhere or was it taken down for copyright? Was trying to find some of those great Chico Che matches around 2010 - 2013 but looks like they're gone for good.

Might be asking a dirt old question here but what happened to Black Terry Jr? He still recording shows? I noticed his youtube channel went ages ago, along with so much great content, did he set up shop somewhere else? Would be a tragedy if so much great lucha was lost to the annals of time

Skipped a lot of this but man Kingston vs Archer was good shit TV wrestling. Eddie brought another awesome showing here and carried Archer to probably the best match he's had in AEW. Great chops and 'chopping the big man down' stuff. Chokeslam on the apron was pretty nuts, maybe if anything too nuts for it's placement in the match and for a TV opener. Also the ripcord chokeslam has to be one of the most pointless set-ups for a move imaginable. Still, good shit, and I really liked that they had a proper dastardly heel finish that didn't come across cheap. I enjoyed Jungle Boy vs Harwood too but it dragged a bit towards the end. Have to wonder if they are setting up a stipulation match between these 2 teams for the PPV with that angle after the match, I would be down for that. Just hope it doesn't turn into a scramble with all these other teams who got involved. I did get a good laugh out of Jericho finishing his match with a perfect Lionsault and smirk. Cody vs Shaq does nothing for me.

Anyone know what the background for this Reginald guy is? Is he a wrestler or an athlete from another sport?

God bless Brodie Jr and John Silver, all the Dark Order stuff was hilarious. They seem to be continuing this sad cowboy millennial thing with Page, but I think he'd be much better as a guy leading a faction than as this big singles star they think he'll be. Good grief, this Darby vs Team Taz fued needs to be over already. I love Darby and Taz but it's been 9 months now, let's move both sides on. I'm assuming some sort of cinematic street fight between the sides is up next, that would allow Sting to get more involved physically.

I liked the main event but I'm not sure which was dumber, Ciampa jamming his own leg in the rigging or the DDT across the ref's back

Is Alexa Bliss the most over-pushed female worker of all time? Charlotte is up there too, but she atleast can go in the ring. Bliss is objectively bad, especially relative to how many better workers they have under contract. Her entire WWE career feels like she's there because she can do cooky faces and Vince just watched Suicide Squad.