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AEW Thursday Night Thunder - 8/27/2020


Dolfan in NYC

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I'm in favor of MJF getting sonned at All Out too. It would be the type of interesting and smart development you don't see all that often.

As for Dynamite, I thought it was very promo heavy, but very good. MJF's promo went a little too long, the women's match was terrible (again, Swole is just really bad, so is Rebel), and I really don't like it when shit like Brodie buying 6 lawnmowers gets brought it. I'd rather that stuff stay in BTE land. That joke worked on BTE because Hangman wasn't going to be able to buy a riding lawnmower. When you bring it up on Dynamite you're just left thinking, "well, that's weird that he bought 6 lawnmowers." But you try and you fail at stuff, at least AEW shows they learn from those mistakes. It wasn't even a big mistake either because the rest of Brodie's promo was awesome, much like how he looked in his suit. Brodie as a super unhinged, powerful cult leader works more than him playing off of Vince McMahon's quirks.

I think I expected more from the tag gauntlet given everyone that was involved, but I liked the abrupt ending to BFs and FTR. More than that, I really love the Hangman angle. FTR duped Hangman into interfering so he wouldn't have to fight his own stablemates again. They played off of Hangman's own insecurities to get him to do what they wanted without asking for it. I think where this goes next is FTR wins the titles, Hangman thinks FTR will give him an instant rematch because they're friends and FTR will be like, nah man, we ain't friends, and they kick the shit out of him.

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1 hour ago, For Great Justice said:

I agree with the suggested idea that Mox steamroll MJF at the PPV, forcing MJF to face adversity for the first time in his life and grow a little as a character. 

I actually believe that a proper humbling by Mox will give MJF the drive to become an even more dangerous character. 

Right now, his bluster screams insecurity in the X-Pac real heat worst way.  He bullies jobbers and cannot win against ranked opposition without Wardlow or his international object ring.  You have an impressive win / loss record, but two of your victories are over Marko fucking Stunt,  Big fucking whoop, dude.  My 17 year old daughter and her stringbean arms could probably lift Marco Stunt.

MJF has none of the evil rich boy confidence that his stable mates in The Dynasty had and perhaps a decent assbeating will help put him on the path to evolving his gimmick.  He needs to go through that Will Wrestle For Food phase that DDP's gimmick went through before DDP became a world beater.

59 minutes ago, Craig H said:

the women's match was terrible (again, Swole is just really bad, so is Rebel)

Swole is legit green as grass.  I can tell by Rebel's movement that she is deliberately trying to look awkward for comedy's sake so I can give her the benefit of the doubt for now.

I felt bad for Penelope in that match last night.  She's improving by leaps and bounds but she's still not confident enough in her spots to cover for a horrible opponent like Swole.

Edited by J.T.
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It's nice that Jericho is so pumped for the show but he was at Mauro-level excitable borderline obnoxious for some of the show.

I'm still not over the novelty of getting to see Jake the Snake not just alive and well but cutting promos next to his pet monster heel on one of the biggest weekly wrestling shows.

I do want the women to be represented on the main show and get their time to shine, but unfortunately it's no accident that the best shows have been the ones most devoid of women wrestling, especially in more taxing situations where they're almost set up to fail. Just do the NJPW Young Lions and keep it basic (although that seems to be anathema to the 'let the artist play their music how they want' approach that Cody and AEW have been espousing from the beginning).

The puberty line was Moxley's usual top-shelf stuff, I like the framing of MJF not just as a chickenshit but also with an air of menace in his own right. The politician stuff is a bit arbitrary (though it does him some fun characters to play off), hopefully it gets shed when the American nation wakes up from its brush with autocratic government...ahem probably should stop there.

It's a shame the Lucha Bros are both just faces in the crowd for now, but I'm sure their time will come around soon and the pairing with Eddie Kingston keeps it interesting. Pillman looks the part, seems more built than I remember seeing him before. Garrison's more gangly green look makes him all the better in comparison.

And I am increasingly convinced that Sammy Guevara is trying to kill himself on national TV. That Twist of Fate on the chair made me think of Asuka's tweet after the brutal powerbomb to the floor where she said (paraphrasing) she was supporting herself with her neck so she didn't get hurt. It looked like Sammy did the same right there, never mind the slice upside the head. 

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Honestly, the woman's match might have been better if it was strictly Swole-Ford in a singles match. I get Rebel is trying to do a "clumsy" gimmick (though the second-rope moonsault was good), but it doesn't help that Swole and Ford are green as grass. You could still do the "shot with the crutch" ending without it being a handicap match.

 

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I overall really liked the show.  I was a particular fan of the "MJF>RNC" sign and liked Moxley outsmarting him with page 17.  I also loved how in the DO celebration everybody go to high five Brodie.  But when Silver went to do it Brodie pulled away.  I get why the lawnmowers/car stuff didn't translate well from BTE.  But I'm all about Lee trashing on poor Silver on both shows.  If it leads to Jon wising up and defecting then sign me up.

This is a hot take but while I am happy to see Jake Roberts on TV some of his promos lately have been hit or miss with me.  I can't put my finger on why but while he should very much be trusted with a live mic sometimes it doesn't lead to the gold that he's used to putting out there.  And while I know people were understandably weirded out about what he did with Brandi a couple months ago I noticed for some reason he did the tongue between the fingers motion.  I don't want to know what prompted that but I think he may need a talking to when it comes to things like that.

But I believe we're in agreement that Kingston's shirt is king-sized and I just really love seeing him on TV.  I also love that while it's unfortunate what happened with NWA it did create a neat opportunity to have Thunder face Shida and get Powerr footage on there.  That's pretty damn cool.  And to @HarryArchieGus I think you were wondering about how good Rosa is.  While she wasn't much in Lucha Underground since then she's improved tremendously due to touring worldwide.  So when she started on Powerr most of us quickly realized just how good she can be.  So you're in for a treat.

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Roberts did seem to stumble and struggle a bit with his promo -- I liked what he was trying to do with comparing Team Taz to "The Flintstones," but it sounded like he completely forgot a character name and was struggling to get back on track (for some reason, I thought he was ready to call either Starks or Taz "Dino," couldn't recall the character's name, and went to Wilma as a backup).

One curiosity I noticed in recent weeks -- the announcers and others referring to Hikaru Shida by her last name only. That's something the WWE likes to pull off regularly with zero explanation, so I'm curious where this came from. A good build to the Shida-TR match and explaining to the audience who don't know or didn't watch Corgan's NWA why Thunder Rosa is a big deal as a Shida opponent. She was probably the top breakout star of NWA Power and I really hope she knocks it out of the park at All Out. 

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3 minutes ago, Jiji said:

I thought the suits were also McMahon jokes. 

I think the first suits he wore were, but now he's essentially a fashion plate. I wish I could pull off suits like that.

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Watched this on FITE app, sound was odd throughout (sped up or something since everyone's voice went up an octave). Also think it's missing some segments since it's only 94 mins long and I didn't see the hangman backstage bit. 

Good show, agreed with others that the story progression was better than the in ring. The Swole match was not pretty! 

Loving dark order and the continuing turmoil of Colt Cabana. Alan Angels getting to show some personality. Its starting to click for them now. 

Santana and Ortiz had a great promo, nice set up for the Battle Royale with Starks-All in, Cage-Archer plus Eddie Kingston and friends. 

Would have liked to see Kenny Omega tonight involved in the Hangman story. 

Sammy-Matt had plenty of blood and the right person won, but along with Dustin I'm not sure Matt, as he is now, can go-go-go the way the house style tends to demand in AEW. 

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How r ppl feeling about this Hangman-Bucks situation?  I mean Hangman wanted out of the Elite.  He's aligned himself again in greater good sort of situations eg. battling the Inner Circle at the Stampede, but he's been wary of the Bucks since the beginning.  Why would it be a shock that he'd cause them a loss here?  Again, he wanted out of the group, so why would the confident boozy asskicker (at least he was) care about crying Matt Jackson whimpering 'You're out of the Elite!!!'?  *Man, that was hilarious for all the wrong reasons.

Also, how do we all feel about said boozy asskicker being manipulated by FTR?  To me, it just makes him look weak.  What, he's like their John Silver now?  Page got over as a guy who didn't give a shit about anything but drinking beer and kicking ass.  It seems here like they're reverting him back to the pre-All Out precocious babyface chump.  Further, how are the Bucks not looked at after that angle as a pair of whiny little bitches?   It also feels silly that Omega is nowhere to be found in all of this.  Oh yeah, he's the crazy cleaner now, right?  Also, is there any question now that FTR wins the belts at All Out?  Thoughts?

Edited by HarryArchieGus
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13 hours ago, J.T. said:

You do if you are fucking sloppy.  In the US you usually don't work around a legit injury but if Chuck had suffered a real knee injury in the middle of the match, I'd expect guys as ring savvy as FTR to go after the leg as not to expose the business and still work light enough as not to further injure Chuck.

I think Chuck's knee may have been a little tweaked as FTR elected to finish with a leglock on the ground that keeps Chuck from having to move around too much on a bad wheel.  If you are FTR, you definitely don't use your normal finisher on a guy with a bum knee as you don't want Chuck absorbing the bump from that fucking elevated codebreaker.

I love love love that these guys are so legit that people bought into this. I almost don't even want to ruin the magic lol. But no, under no circumstances do you work over a legit injured body part (if said injury happens during that match). If a guy tweaks his knee and it's a partial tear (3-6 weeks out) then his opponent works on it, even gingerly, he could take the partial tear and completely tear it making the recovery time jump to 6-9 months. It's not worth the risk and majorly frowned upon. Now if a guy has a legit injury going into a match where they know the diagnosis and he's off to get surgery after the match (say like when Taker worked through a torn bicep to drop the title once), then sure it's possible they could use that for the story of the match.

Also there were like 4 or 5 times during The Buck's portion of the tag where Chuck forgot to sell the knee lol. Total work, and the finish being a leg lock 1) protects Best Friends who still have a blowoff with Santana & Ortiz to work and 2) gets FTR over as old school guys that will work over a body part and win without a finish if it makes sense in the context of the match.

Quick hits:

-Loved The Bucks / Hangman story advancement. Lots of ways for it to play out.

-Loved Brodie Lee's promo. The lawn mower shit was a big miss for me since I haven't seen this week's BTE. But Brodie is killing it in this role.

-Sucks the show was running long and the tables match got the shaft. Rushed match almost entirely run during a commercial. And both dudes got hard way fucked up. There's just something about Sammy & Hardy's chemistry, total bad luck every time out. Good match for what they had time to work with tho.

-Sucks they missed the Cassidy sprinting dive that destroyed the announcer set. Haven't even seen it on social media yet so they may not have even had a camera on it period. Wonder if that was a Jericho / Cassidy detail they didn't fill production in on because JR also seemed super salty about it lol.

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You can see a genuine moment of panic on Matt Hardy’s face when the table gets stuck on the apron, because he knows they’re short on time and he’s gotta get it set up for the finish.  He was all kinds of harried after that.

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5 hours ago, For Great Justice said:

I agree with the suggested idea that Mox steamroll MJF at the PPV, forcing MJF to face adversity for the first time in his life and grow a little as a character. 

That was me (though I'm not the only one to have the idea) and I'm as convinced that's the right way to go as ever. Like, almost no offense. Everything he tries backfires. Mox toys with him. Steals his scarf and wears it around the ring. Plants Wardlow on the outside with a Paradigm Shift. It's less a match than an overall celebration of Mox's general awesomeness. Maybe Mox pops a beer or two to really drive home how little he cares about MJF's "Stone Cold ripoff" horseshit. Just an absolute braining.

Edited by just drew
I was distracted earlier
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38 minutes ago, HarryArchieGus said:

How r ppl feeling about this Hangman-Bucks situation?  I mean Hangman wanted out of the Elite.  He's aligned himself again in greater good sort of situations eg. battling the Inner Circle at the Stampede, but he's been wary of the Bucks since the beginning.  Why would it be a shock that he'd cause them a loss here?  Again, he wanted out of the group, so why would the confident boozy asskicker (at least he was) care about crying Matt Jackson whimpering 'You're out of the Elite!!!'?  *Man, that was hilarious for all the wrong reasons.

Also, how do we all feel about said boozy asskicker being manipulated by FTR?  To me, it just makes him look weak.  What, he's like their John Silver now?  Page got over as a guy who didn't give a shit about anything but drinking beer and kicking ass.  It seems here like they're reverting him back to the pre-All Out precocious babyface chump.  Further, how are the Bucks not looked at after that angle as a pair of whiny little bitches?   It also feels silly that Omega is nowhere to be found in all of this.  Oh yeah, he's the crazy cleaner now, right?  Also, is there any question now that FTR wins the belts at All Out?  Thoughts?

I  get Craig's response but I also see what you're getting at.  It does seem like there may have been a logicical step to bridge the gap between the two end points.  So I hope that I don't seem condescending when giving my take on it all as I'm just going through how I see it.

Yeah, Page wanted out but Kenny didn't want him to leave.  So while Adam was leery at first as time went on he developed a friendship with Kenny.  So for Kenny's sake he hung with the Bucks and it wasn't until Stadium Stampede where the bond with the Bucks got stronger.  So while they never said it Page was fine with being back in the Elite.

Then you have FTR come in and unlike Kenny they share a common interest in beer and...well...whatever else they have an interest in (old school wrestling, cowboy shit, take your pick)  And after initial tensions both sides were fine with each other until the tag appreciation night.  Once FTR formally turned heel it was clear to me that Page was between a rock and hard place.

Now part of me kind of wishes they drug this out another month or so to let this develop better.  It would have given more time to bridge the gap and allow for FTR to get more in Adam's head.  And I feel costing the Bucks and the FTR/Omega/Page title match shouldn't have happened until the next PPV.  But with the way things are looking he'll be torn at All Out yet I can see him coming to his senses at the next PPV.  Again, sorry if this sounds like me being condescending as it's not my intent.  Considering how much I'm into this story this is just me trying to make sense of it all.

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Hangman constantly trying to hang out with FTR in BTE really helps flesh it out and it felt fine if you watched those segments. If not, I can totally see Adam coming off way too naive even for an insecure man with alcoholism. 

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It does make me wonder though.  When he makes that change whatever it will be does that mean that he stops with the storyline heavy drinking?  The broken glass was a nice yet way-too-obvious-to-me metaphor and it'll be interesting to see how this develops.

And looking back with how jaded I can be with wrestling at times I can't help but feel amazed that there's a long-term wrestling storyline that has me this invested.  Doesn't matter which company does this but man does that feel good.

Edited by NikoBaltimore
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