The All Elite Wrestling Discussion Thread

[Makhai]

???

 

There were 13 matches on this card, ??? someone else.

[aXminster]

I fell asleep during the Women World's match. Gonna watch the rest in a bit but man, that was a long show.

 

Some notes:

I'm happy for Wardlow. MJF's situation looks real and it's sad to see him being unprofessional.

Thought the Hardys were losing so I guess they're staying for a minute, huh?

I did not understand the build for the TBS match. It's like when they built that chick Marina for a week, then she lost and vanished from the Earth. (and I only remembered her because she was in the video package)

House of Black vs Death Triangle: BANGER! Give me any of these guys every week and I'm happy.

The Hart Cup was very underwhelming on both sides.

Mixed Trios could very well be on Rampage and KOR vs Darby was a Dynamite match.

Women's World got me to sleep.

[milamber]

- Nese & Sterling vs HOOKhausen - Short but fun. ***

- MJF vs Wardlow - Cathartic end to one of the longest storylines. Would have been career suicide for MJF to no-show but he put over Wardlow strong. *** 1/2

- Young Bucks vs Hardys - Elvis entrance, mutton chops, Caprice Coleman! Cleverly laid out match to hide the Hardys' physical weaknesses except when Jeff sat in the corner. *** 3/4

- Anna vs Cargill © - A bit clunky but more competitive than expected. Sterling, Silver, Statlander! Jade upgrading to Stokely! ATHENA! - *** 1/4

- HOB vs Death Triangle - Fenix Jr cosplaying Penta! Lots of cool face-offs and spots. Julia Blackhart! - **** 1/2

- Cole vs Joe - Right winner for the men's side but both are capable of better. - *** 1/2

- DMD vs Ruby - Good selling from Ruby. She needed the win more. Martha's presentation was heartwarming. Nice looking belts. - *** 3/4

- ATT vs Sammy, Tay & Kaz - Entertaining blow-off. PVZ looked fine. *** 3/4

- Kyle vs Darby - Great chemistry. **** 1/4

- Deeb vs Rosa © - **** 1/2

- Anarchy in the Arena - MOTN. Boy band outfits lol. The music playing in the background twice! Crimson masks! They should have used PIP to catch more angles. - **** 3/4

- AFO was past it's used-by-date. Rush! Los Ingobernables USA. Dante vs Sky should be fun.

- Team Taz vs Lee/Swerve vs Jurassic Express © - Great despite the stupid 2 in the ring rule. Surprising result. **** 1/2

- Punk vs Hangman © - Hard match to predict but I was super invested either way. I liked that Hangman lost because he wasn't willing to tarnish the title. I think Punk will slowly turn heel and Kingston will be next Champion. MJF after that if he plays nice with TK. - **** 1/2

 

Great PPV but it was way too long. Had to pace myself more than usual. Could have saved the TBS match, Darby vs Kyle and ATT vs Sammy/Tay/Kaz for TV.

[Jaysin]

I know DoN is the Mania AEW equivalent, but the show was far, far too long. Including Hookhausen's debut, the show as almost five hours long.

 

The in ring action was great, but so much of that could have been on Dynamite instead of the ppv.

 

Jade vs Anna was trash tho. Jade has a million dollar look and is super charismatic, but good God get the belt off her. I am hyped for Athena and Stokely Hathaway debuting.

 

Martha's never ending speech was way too long.

 

Rush debuting is cool for the LI history, but his ROH title run was so boring. Maybe he'll be booked better in AEW? Either way, I hope we get Naito teaming with them ar Forbidden Door

[milamber]

Lee Moriarty's 1 year old nephew was killed in a drive-by shooting

[milamber]

- Punk & FTR vs Assclaimed was solid. Punk has terrible luck with the ropes. TANAHASHI!

- MJF with the best live worked shoot promo since Punk's Pipe Bomb. TK holding MJF to ransom like MJF did to Wardlow is prect storytelling.

- Johnny vs Miro was solid. Excellent promo from the Redeemer.

- JAS segment was fun. Blood & Guts! Hair vs Hair!

- Joe needs to make friends.

- Undisputed Elite & Hikuleo vs Matt, Darby & Jurassic Express was good.

- TBS title scene heating up.

- Wardlow vs Drake was a squash as expected. Screw your lawsuit Mark.

- TNT title scene already looking better.

- DMD & Hayter vs Storm & Ruby was good. Nice to see Ruby get revenge on Britt. Easy to see that Storm & Hayter wrestle much quicker and stiffer.

- Garcia vs Mox was my MOTN but I wanted another 10 minutes. LOL at Kingston almost tumbling down the ramp.

[Mootinie]

On the whole, I thought Double or Nothing was okay but that middle period was a real struggle to get through.

 

1. Wardlow vs. MJF: glorified squash, more of an angle. **

2. The Young Bucks vs. The Hardys: fine TV match, good carry job from The Bucks. Jeff looked ballooned off his tits on something. No need for this to be on PPV. **1/2

3. Jade vs. Anna: bit clunky but it was fine. Got in, did their stuff, went home. Both debuts seemed random. **

4. House of Black vs. Death Triangle: this rivalry has helped nobody but the action was perfectly acceptable. ***

5. Adam Cole vs. Samoa Joe: this tournament has been a bust and I didn't care. Judging by the audience, they didn't care either. **

6. Britt Baker vs. Ruby Soho: a foregone conclusion that Britt was winning when she came out in pink. Zero drama to this match. *

7. Mixed Trios Tag: a fine showing from VanZant on debut and some moments with Sky and Kaz were fun, but again, this feud has helped none of them. Watching Sammy G's star fall this quickly from main eventing TV has been quite something. *

8. Darby vs. Kyle: they had Darby beat Andrade just to have him lose clean here? The action was fine, they worked relatively hard but nobody cared and the booking is awful. *

9. Rosa vs. Deeb: this was more like it, a decent and competitive match here that put the champ over strong. ***

10. Anarchy In The Arena: the clear match of the night, an all-action 23 minuter that gave all 10 talents involved a chance to shine. ****

11. Three Way Tag: the teaming of Lee & Swerve helps both talents so much. Starks is top heel material, Hobbs remains underrated. It was shy of being a great match but effective enough not to wind up as a buffer between the two main event presentations. ***1/4

12. Hangman vs. Punk: the first 10 minutes were fine but the rest was a drag. I kept waiting for them to get started, they never did and then it ended. Punk is not a main event level wrestler now. Page beating himself is, and always was, a lame story. **1/4

[Mootinie]

I thought Dynamite was a great show. The only real lull moment was the Miro vs. Johnny Elite match that dragged a bit. Otherwise, it was one of the bestest, fastest two hours they've put on yet.

[Jaysin]

This whole interim world champion tournament is needlessly complicated.

 

I hate that TK seems stuck on the idea of interim champions, but they made it even more convoluted with how the champion is going to be crowned.

[djskeemask]

Nobody gonna mention that Young Bucks vs. Lucha Bros. match on Rampage?!?! Quite possibly one of the best matches I have ever seen. 15 minute spotfest!! Just one thing after another, had me cheering out loud and I was the only person in the room. :eek:

[milamber]

- Lucha Bros vs Young Bucks was my MOTN. Insane chemistry.

- Team Taz making a quick statement.

- Hogan vs Athena was good.

- Julia getting promo time in HOB is great.

- Bad timing for CM Punk and AEW.

- Dante vs Sky © was good even though they got short-changed for time.

[Makhai]

This whole interim world champion tournament is needlessly complicated.

 

I hate that TK seems stuck on the idea of interim champions, but they made it even more convoluted with how the champion is going to be crowned.

 

They're clearly doing it to get around record and ranking considerations so one very obvious worker with a poor recent record can backdoor his way into the thing and more than likely win, unless he decides to pull a Major Tom again, randomly.

 

What they've set up here, it's gotta be Punk vs. MJF III, for the unified title, with MJF's AEW career on the line, and he has to be the babyface when the bell rings. I don't see any way around it now.

[milamber]

I hope they don't make it predictable and go with Mox who has already won the title before. I can't imagine they will fast track MJF because he's got an interesting story running. Miro vs Tanahashi would be my preference and I'd be happy with either winning.

[Jaysin]

Elevation was fun on a bun this week. The Wingmen are the best job crew around and I love their ridiculous antics.

[Makhai]

I hope they don't make it predictable and go with Mox who has already won the title before. I can't imagine they will fast track MJF because he's got an interesting story running. Miro vs Tanahashi would be my preference and I'd be happy with either winning.

 

Mox already has a storyline going, he doesn't need a belt to tell it. Actually hurts the angle because if he wins the title it puts him on a step above Regal and Danielson and that would kill the whole thing. So I hope he's just the guy that's getting MJF in round 1.

 

The way I'd book this is TK decides against firing him and instead freezes him out. So MJF gets front row seats to the TNT Hockey Games, he gets camera time, and you buy adspace in the New York and LA markets for Smackdown and have MJF cut promos on WWE guys with the ads being formatted like political ads "this ad was paid for by someone Better Than You" and you let the internet spread them around. Finally you have MJF buy the front row tickets, until TK has enough and cuts the promo on MJF, turns heel.

 

He books MJF in a 3v1 match against Jurassic Express and Christian. If MJF wins he gets into the Tournament, and if he can win the title, he gets his extension, if he loses, he's the janitor for the next year. Christian turns on Jungle Boy, MJF beats Luchasauras 1v1, TK has an aneurism. MJF tells the fans that he's gonna win the title, and then walk out to WWE and throw it in the trash on FOX television. But he'll make sure Cody gets to touch it first. Cuz he's a mark for it.

 

MJF is made the last seed and the bracket has him having to wrestle Mox in R1, Miro in R2, and Wardlow in the final. Writes itself from there. By the time he's facing off with Punk he'd be the biggest babyface in wrestling since Punk going into Summerslam. If you do it all right, you'd have MJF vs. Punk with Punk in the Cena role.

[Mootinie]

I'm pretty sure Hiroshi Tanahashi is winning the interim championship just because Tony Khan planned to do Punk vs. Tanahashi. I think he will still do that match and then he'll just carry on with whatever he had originally outlined for Punk in July.

[Derek B]

I've got a feeling that Eddie Kingston is going to win the interim belt.... after everything he's gone through in his career, he finally wins the big one..... but not really. He's only a placeholder, a guy pretending to be champion while the real champion is sitting at home avoiding a fight until he feels better. Eddie could get so much mileage out of promos like that and when Punk comes back... Kingston loses. He becomes a little footnote in AEW history, the guy who was never really champion, a nearly was.... which is still a step up from a never-been. But we'd all know. He was there, he was our champ for a while and we all knew it, he'd make us feel it. And by then (a few months at least) it would be time for Punk to be back... and he immdiately loses to MJF, who has had whatever his storyline is play out and it's probably been awesome cos he's an awesome performer. I'd dig that

[Jaysin]

Eddie Kingston would be amazing, especially with his built in feud with Punk.

[Makhai]

Eddie Kingston would be amazing, especially with his built in feud with Punk.

 

I'd be totally fine with this, but he's earmarked for Jericho for a least Blood & Guts, so I don't even think he's gonna make the field.

[djskeemask]

So disappointed I didn't get tickets for Forbidden Door. I'm only a few hours from Chicago. Haven't been to an AEW event live yet. This show is shaping up to be a classic. Even more so in my mind because I am also a huge fan of NJPW. Crowning a new world champ and introducing the new international belt. Soooooooooooooo excited to see Will Ospreay and Aaron Henare appear in AEW on Dynamite tonight. I'm a huge fan of United Empire. Would rather have seen Jeff Cobb and Great O-Khan instead of Aussie Open, but as far as I'm caught up, JC and GOK are Tag Champs in Japan so I'm sure their priority is being there in Japan. Those of you are that are not familiar with Will Ospreay, take notice. He is an amazing performer. He plays the conceited, cocky role very well as well. Possibly equal to or better than MJF.

[djskeemask]

Whooooo....Toni Storm and Marina Shafir in the ring at the same time. Neither are the most talented but both are probably, currently, the most attractive, at least in my eyes.

[Jaysin]

Toni Storm is incredibly talented.

 

Also, Jeff Cobb and Okhan aren't tag champions. Lame ass Chase Owens is champion with Fale.

[djskeemask]

Toni Storm is incredibly talented.

 

Also, Jeff Cobb and Okhan aren't tag champions. Lame ass Chase Owens is champion with Fale.

 

Spoiler alert...lol...Now that you mention that though, I think I did read about that. Haven't watched it yet. Chase Owens is complete garbage and Fale has gone the farthest on the least amount of talent. I mean, Owens' trademark move is raking the back and Fale's is the "massage parlor" which is him and whoever he is tagging with standing on their opponent.

I haven't really seen much of Toni Storm in action, so I will believe you because she always ends up being a main eventer in every save of TEW that I have signed her.

[Jaysin]

If you're over a month behind on something, it's not a spoiler at this point

[djskeemask]

If you're over a month behind on something, it's not a spoiler at this point

 

lol...fair enough. I have been pretty busy. I'm diabetic and went to the hospital with ketoacidosis for about a week. Also a few personal matters to deal with. So it probably has been that long since I've caught up with New Japan. It's easier with AEW cause it's on regular TV twice a week.