AEW Rampage 12/31/2021

AEW Rampage 12/31/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/12/aew-rampage-holiday-bash-12252021.html

Betty White died today which has been the main talk of this New Year's.

Darby Allin vs Anthony Bowens

Max Caster did a rap bringing up Ghislane Maxwell. Darby took a nice shoulder bump into the post off the apron. AB hit a big superkick and a wild hanging roll of the dice. Bowens then put him up in an electric chair outside and banged Darby's head off the apron. Darby ended up winning this with a coffin drop and it was a fine match.

Andrade El Idolo came out then Bowens nailed Sting with a boombox. Darby then took a chain punch to the face by Max.

They did a video showing some of Hook's techniques with Taz talking over it.

Street Fight - Anna Jay and Tay Conti vs Penelope Ford and The Bunny

Penelope Ford did a moonsault off the top rope onto Tay who was on a table outside, but the table did not break. She then smashed Tay's head with a beer liquor bottle. The Bunny started bleeding hardway here and Tay got busted open too. Bunny took a hard suplex on a chair by Anna Jay and the chair did not bend much making it worse. Tay and Ford hit some nice shots on each other during the picture in picture break.

The Bunny brought some thumbtacks in and ended up getting superplexed on them. Tay took a hard double stomp with a chair on her stomach and was redder with blood than the kool-aid man is. Ford then took a wild off the apron gotch-stylve piledriver through a table. Anna Jay wrapped her arm in barbed wire and put Bunny in a sleeper to win it. This was WILD and was awesome. This was super violent and blood with 4 attractive women. This was maybe the best AEW match I've seen and was a great example of how to blow off a feud. Must see! Why was this not on Dynamite?

We had a video package on Page vs Danielson.

Lambert, Page and Sky did a splitscreen promo with Arn and Cody. As usual, Lambert said Cody is getting pushed due to Tony liking him and Arn spoke for Cody saying this was personal since Dan went after Brandi.

TNT Title - Cody Rhodes vs Ethan Page

Page pretended to sleep in the corner with the apron while Cody came in. Cody should have rushed in here like they did in the women's match but he just did the usual entrance and didn't seem to care.

Ethan did an interesting shoulder tackle off the apron onto Cody. A large portion of this got cut off by a commercial. Page's crew interfered here then Dustin Rhodes evened the score by fighting Sky. Cody got hit with a top rope powerslam for 2. Cody tried a figure four, got it reversed then ended up winning it with a couple of cross rhodes and a double underhook sitout piledriver. I didn't think this was anything too special and it dragged on after having to follow the women.

Overall thoughts: The opener was fine and the street fight was maybe the best AEW match I've ever seen. Cody's match should not have been the main here since it had no chance of following the wild women's match. I liked this show and I think the women's match was a must see.

AEW Dynamite 12/29/2021

AEW Dynamite 12/29/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/12/aew-dynamite-12222021.html

Lucha Brothers, Christian Cage and Jurassic Express vs Matt Hardy, Private Party and FTR

It went a few minutes too long but it was a fun opener.

Eddie Kingston, Santana & Ortiz vs Daniel Garcia and 2.0

This suffered a lot like the matches that follow the Young Bucks do. You see all the stunts and cool spots in the first match then the second match, which is usually lesser, has to follow it and can't. The heels got the win out of nowhere here and this wasn't too good.

The blew Jericho's run in here by putting the cam on the entrance way before Jericho came in. I thought Eddie being mad at Jericho didn't really work or make that much sense.

MJF did a promo with Wardlow and Spears. He told Wardlow that if he wins the title, he has to turn it over to him then brought in Mark Sterling to clarify that on the contract. They've been doing a slow burn on Wardlow turning on MJF and they are making it more clear.

Christian and J-E accused the Lucha Bros of "going into business for themselves" and costing them the match. J-E and Christian all looked super tall here while Rey and Schiavone looked super small. There was some kind of trickery here to pull that off and you all know how I feel about using shoot terms.

Wardlow vs Colin Delaney

I haven't seen Colin since WWECW. He looks about 10 years older and 50 pounds heavier. It's a shame his talents as an underdog face were pretty much wasted. He was destroyed here in quick fashion then Spears hit him with a chair after.

The Super Elite, Fish and Kyle O'Reilly did a promo. The Bucks were mad at Kyle for not saying hello to them and Kyle wanted time to talk to his old partners. Kyle said him and Adam had "heat" and said they need to group to survive. Kyle said Fish has his back and he will find out if Cole does too.

Dan Lambert, Scorpio Sky and Ethan Page did a promo. They ripped on Cody and Brandi, who of course had to get her TV time by coming out and talking down Dan. Dustin had to come and "hold Brandi back" in a lame angle that had Cody and Brandi's fingerprints all over it.

They did a vignette for Bryan vs Page and Excalibur looked like a 10 year old with his mask and white t-shirt on.

Thunder Rosa vs Jade Cargill

I think this went a little longer than it needed to. Jade is on some roids and clearly could beat the crap out of half the AEW roster. Rosa took a hard step kick off of a botched 2nd rope move then Rosa was smashed in the head with bottle by a masked person before she pinned by Jade. The masked person ended up being Mercedes Martinez whom I had hoped I never had to see again when she got fired from NXT. They beat up on Rosa and then Ruby Soho made the save. This wasn't a bad effort at all by the girls. The match mostly made sense with Rosa working Jade's leg and Jade trying to power out of it but Jade still has a long way to go.

CM Punk did a promo. He's back to being a face again and he cut a promo on MJF calling him a waste of time. This promo was a waste of time and didn't accomplish much.

Ricky Starks and Hobbs did a promo. Starks said Dante Martin screwed up by turning on Team Tazz and they asked if Dante really wanted a second round with Hobbs. Still no explanation on why Dante turned on Lio then Team Tazz.

They showed Sammy losing his title to Cody and Sammy did his bit with the signs through picture in picture, which the went to a full commercial. This is not what I'd want to be doing if I were in Sammy's shoes.

They had Shida do a promo on Serena Deeb, telling her to stop crying and to just challenge her again.

Brian Pillman Jr. did a promo on Malakai Black. He brought up his dad and being a second gen wrestler like always and said we would see a new version of BPJ next week. The lights went out and Black appeared and left. This promo wasn't anything special.

They announced Darby vs Bowens and Cody vs Ethan Page for Rampage and that honestly sounded better than what this card had. They did quick promos with The Acclaimed and Sting/Darby after and neither was good.

Best Friends vs Adam Cole, Bobby Fish and Kyle O'Reilly

I have no problem with AEW redoing Undisputed Era. It makes Cole seem more important and hides Fish and Kyle's weaknesses. This had the usual Orange Cassidy/Best Friends crap in it. U-E won here after the Bucks and Brandon Cutler interfered. This was the wrong match for U-E's AEW debut as they should have gone over easy. They did at least further the story of Kyle/Cole not trusting each other by Kyle accidentally kicking Cole.

Overall thoughts: This show wasn't that great but had a lot going on. AEW has a big debut on TBS next week and the main event for it got one small vignette when it should have been the main focus. The roster is very bloated right now and because of it, we are seeing more multi-man matches and more slow burning feuds to space things out. I liked the opener here and the women's match but I didn't like the Brandi segment.

WWE 205 Live 11/19/2021

WWE 205 Live 11/19/2021

Edris Enofe vs Malik Blade

This is Enofe's debut.

Enofe won with a standing shooting star press here. Blade hit a nice high dropkick during this but it was mostly just armdrags and cradle attempts. It really wasn't bad though despite that as the attempts were quick and looked good. Neither guy is very big though and I question what they will be able to do on this brand.

Tiffany Stratton vs Amari Miller

This is Stratton's debut.

Tiffany is doing a spoiled rich girl gimmick. She did a promo bragging about how she was prettier and better than the crowd but it was kind of wooden.

Tiff did a nice handspring out of a lariat then took two wild looking kicks. Tiff ended up winning with a pin here where she actually held Miller's shoulders up. This was very basic and not too good.

Kacy Catanzaro and Kayden Carter vs Valentina Feroz and Yulisa Leon

The KC's get a special entrance through the stands. We're told Leon and Feroz are best friends who are finally teaming up. Leon and Carter had a small dance-off here and KC entered the ring over the top into a sunset flip on Leon. Feroz did a big sell on a shotgun dropkick and really bumped big all match long. The KC's won with their neckbreaker/450 combo. This really wasn't bad at all. The pace was quick and the KC's looked very comfortable leading this one.

Overall thoughts: It was only 30 minutes long and 2 of the 3 matches were perfectly acceptable here.

AEW Rampage: Holiday Bash 12/25/2021

AEW Rampage: Holiday Bash 12/25/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/12/aew-rampage-12172021.html

Jungle Boy vs Isaiah Kassidy

JB had a nice run up the ropes into a dropkick and Kassidy hit a nice tornillo dive. It started out well but then they started kicking out of the ki krusher's and poisonrana's which I didn't like. We had interference from HFO then Jurassic Express and HFO went at it. JB then hit his stf and won it.

Ricky Starks took credit for screwing over Dante Martin in his match with MJF for the Dynamite Diamond Ring. We still haven't gotten any explanation on why Dante turned on Lio Rush or Team Taz, though at this point.

Miro got a vignette where he said he will return with no flaws and said he will become champion.

Hook vs Bear Bronson

Wasn't a fan of this one at all. Hook took a sitout driver then no sold it. Bear took a hard head and arm suplex on his neck and then was choked out with the tazmission. Hook just isn't big enough to buy him throwing around Bear like that. Tony Nese was shown watching from the stands.

Bear Country is a good example of why Vince doesn't feature tag teams much. One of the members gets injured and then both are basically useless while still getting the same pay.

Eddie Kingston said he respected Daniel Garcia cheating to win. He said him, Santana and Ortiz will take on Garcia and 2.0 in a trios match.

Kris Statlander vs Leyla Hirsch

Neither girl got an entrance here. Kris looked at least a foot taller than Leyla. Kris ended up winning this with a nudo out of nowhere. Leyla was good here stiffing Kris and using her small stature to take down Kris, but she's a tough one to book. She's small so she should kind of be the face but she wrestles like a heel and just doesn't come across as a face.

Sammy and Cody (with Arn) did a splitscreen promo. Arn talked about how he's been chewing out Cody and he should be upset, then Sammy said he's mad too at being underrated. He said he would carry Cody today which I didn't like since that broke kayfabe.

TNT Title - Sammy Guevara (c) vs Cody Rhodes

The only way Sammy should really lose this is if Cody goes full heel here and wins it that way. Cody got the big entrance here, which Arn wasn't allowed to join in on. Lee Johnson and Arn's son also came out then were immediately sent back. No idea on that one.

David Crockett was out here to present the winner with the title.

Cody got rushed early with a big drop kick and some other moves then took a walk into the crowd to stall. Cody came back in and got beat up some then hit a nice Cody cutter. We had what felt like a long commercial break during the match and after, Sammy hit double jump Cody cutter. Sammy then hit a cross rhodes and landed hard on a double jump 450 to the outside. Sammy went for a running hurricanrana and was caught and thrown into the front row. Cody hit a disaster kick and Sammy sold it well, then Sammy sold a cross rhodes well. Cody blocked a 630 with his knees and won after 2 cross rhodes and a sitout double underhook piledriver. I thought this was a good match with Sammy using some of Cody's moves against him to upstage him and Cody working like a heel here against him.

While Cody winning continues that storyline, it hurts Sammy and Miro. Miro shouldn't of lost to Sammy but it looks worse since Sammy ended up just becoming a transitional champion to Cody. It didn't seem like there was a ton of planning involved with Miro losing to Sammy and this result furthers that. Meanwhile, if the plan all along was to have Sammy lose to Cody, you could have made a story out of it to make it better. Doing this on the Christmas version of Rampage also didn't make much sense since a large portion of the AEW audience probably isn't tuning in.

Overall thoughts: I liked two of the four matches and had some changes been made, I might have liked all four of them. They just did too much in the opener and Hook's offense wasn't believeable.

WWE 205 Live 12/24/2021

WWE 205 Live 12/24/2021

They gave this show 40 minutes instead of the usual 30 minutes, which gives it time for another match.

Ivy Nile vs Fallon Henley

Henley got a few shots in then was wheelbarrow suplexed. Ivy hit a nice running kick thne dodged one high kick from FH before getting another. Ivy then hit her cool looking dragon sleeper to win it. It really wasn't as much of a squash as just a short match.

Andre Chase vs Damon Kemp

Kemp is the brother of Gable Steveson and I think this is his debut. He is wearing a dirty looking copper colored jacket.

DK went under Chase's legs then picked him up and slammed him from behind before rolling him. Chase gave him rope burn between the fingers and they had plants with Chase U sweaters which they said was the student section. He spelled out his name to them with stomps. Kemp hit a nice overhead belly to belly then did an up over into a botched chaos theory german suplex. Chase pulled down Kemp's kneepad, distracting him then he hit his hamnmerlock flatliner finisher to win it.

I thought Chase was really good here doing all kinds of unlikeable heel moves and Kemp wasn't bad for his debut.

Solo Sikoa vs Ru Feng

Ru has a really cool look and Solo reminds me of Mark Hunt. Ru hit some chest kicks and knees to the gut then Solo came back with sentons. Solo spin kicked him to the gut, then uraken'd him before getting the win with a top rope splash. I liked this one. We had two big dudes going at it and it was kind of fun to see a strike based match. This would have been 10x better in Japan and I'd really like to see this one again a few years down the line when these two are better.

Overall thoughts: A fun episode with two short but decent matches.

AEW Dynamite 12/22/2021

AEW Dynamite 12/22/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/12/aew-winter-is-coming-12152021.html

Adam Cole vs Orange Cassidy

I didn't like this one. This had the usual OC shenanigans which I'm no fan of. Cole and his crew have done a bunch of bad stuff to OC and the Best Friends and OC wasn't real mad about it here.  Best Friends and The Elite brawled here. Kyle O'Reilly made his AEW debut by costing OC the match. It would have been better if they did this last week when everyone was watching than this show which has less hype behind it. They teased dissension with Cole/Fish/O'Reilly and the Young Bucks.

They announced Page vs Danielson 2 on their TBS debut which makes sense. Page then did an interview with Schiavone which Danielson interrupted. Bryan accused him of stalling in their match and said he wants judges in their rematch. Page agreed but wanted no time limit instead. Judges have been done before, but they never ended up being used and probably won't be here since it's a lame ending.

The Pinnacle did a promo. MJF was critical of Wardlow and blamed Punk for it. I didn't have any problems with it.

Wardlow vs "Captain" Shawn Dean

Wardlow powerbombed him four times for an easy win. They announced the rankings would reset at the end of the year.

Dan Lambert, Scorpio Sky and Ethan Page did a promo from the stands. He was using shoot terms again and I'm no fan of that. Dan said Tony Khan plays favorites with the EVP's and said Cody is bigger dick than he is.

Britt Baker did a promo with her crew and Tony. She said Riho is out of her league and said "you'll shoot your eye out, kid" to her.

They did a nice little package on Owen Hart and gave us a little more info on the Owen Hart Tournament.

I did not watch the Soho match.

Serena Deeb said Shida didn't beat her for real yet and she would come at her again and again.

Malakai Black vs Griff Garrison

Griff charged at Black to start which was cool and got high kicked for it. Griff got a nice tope in and had his leg kicked a bunch of times before losing to a single leg crab. Black hit a spin kick on Pillman after in a good segment. Griff looked good here as he usually does.

Matt Hardy and Private Party then Junrassic Express did promos on each other. Hardy said JE are the #1 Contenders, but if they take out JE, then they will lose their #1 contendership.

Sting, CM Punk and Darby Allin vs MJF and FTR

Sting had Punk style facepaint on and Punk had mid-90's Sting facepaint on, which was a nice touch. Darby dyed his hair pink and had pink Sting facepaint on. I thought this was a good example of why size/looks matters in wrestling. Sting would not have been as over if he had the body that Punk does. The heels stalled early and Darby hit a nasty bullet tope on all of them. Darby got tossed over the top and bumped his head hard off the apron. Darby also hit a very nice crossbody knocking him and one of FTR over the top. MJF disappeared for most of the match and finally came in near the end to try and get the cheap win on Sting but took an awful header onto the floor. Sting then did dive off the top to the floor. Dax pushed MJF out of the way and took the faces finishes to end the match. This went long but had some good moments.

Overall thoughts: The less storyline-intensive AEW shows are, the more I tend to like them. I didn't like the OC/Cole match and I didn't like the Dan Lambert promo, but the rest of the show was fine.

AEW Rampage 12/17/2021

AEW Rampage 12/17/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/12/aew-rampage-12102021.html

A whole lot of people didn't make Dynamite this week due to the Page/Danielson one hour draw so they are making up for it here with multi-man tags.

“The Infamous” Bobby Fish & The Super Elite (Adam Cole, Matt Jackson, Nick Jackson) vs Orange Cassidy, Rocky Romero, & The Best Friends (Chuck Taylor & Trent)

This was the usual Best Friends comedy and you know the Bucks and Cole have no problem getting in on that. The Best Friends partner Wheeler Yuta got kicked in the nuts last week by Cole and the Best Friends could have cared less here as Orange was kissing Cole and goofing off. I spent the first part of this trying to figure out who Trent Baretta resembles most now. A less tan Frankie Kazarian? A thinner Miro? A darker Cesaro? Brandon Cutler with hair? All of the above? Who knows. Fish drove Trent hard with a top rope falcon arrow and Trent got the win over Bobby Fish with a Peach Sunrise because reasons. Cole's value continues to drop by the appearance.

Dan Lambert promo

I hated this. He used tons of shoot terms and broke kayfabe in a promo on how much he hates Tony Khan, who really should never even be mentioned on this show.

Cody got his own special entrance here through the middle tunnel with fireworks because he's an egomaniac. Him and Lambert kept taking the mic from each other then Cody got beat up by Page and Scorpio Sky. Dustin Rhodes tried to make the save and then Sammy Guevarra had to make his own save. He hit a cool double jump cutter to clear out the heels.

Submission match - Tay Conti vs Penelope Ford

Believe it or not, I liked this. This was a submission match and both girls tried to do submissions the whole match which made total sense. The girls brought some intensity and Page/Danielson should have looked a lot more like this did. This was the women so it did have some sloppiness, but I actually enjoyed this more than most of the AEW stuff I've seen. Tay got the win here then got dropped with a nice brass knuckles shot.

Owen Hart Tournament

We were promised more info on this tonight after they failed to announce any information about it on Wednesday. They gave us one graphic that lasted like 5 seconds and didn't tell us any new information. What's the big secret?

Eddie Kingston, Ortiz, Santana & The Lucha Brothers (Penta El Zero Miedo & Rey Fenix) vs 2point0 (Jeff Parker & Matt Lee), Daniel Garcia, & The Acclaimed (Anthony Bowens & Max Caster)

They did a promo before this with everyone involved and Mark Henry's beard looks so bad. Fenix did an ode to Dante Martin here with a frogsplash knee to Garcia's face. They didn't have much time for this and it was really rushed with everyone trying to get stuff in. To make matters worse, it also had to go through a commercial. Garcia won out of nowhere with a pin on Kingston with a pull of the tights. Jurassic Express made the save for the faces after.

Overall thoughts: The women were really the only redeemable thing on this show as it had a lot of the usual AEW lowlights with botches, comedy and kayfabe being broken.

AEW Dynamite 12/15/2021 Winter is Coming

AEW Dynamite 12/15/2021 Winter is Coming

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/12/aew-dynamite-1282021.html

AEW World Title - Hangman Adam Page vs Bryan Danielson

Page should have been suspended for this for hitting Bryan last week. The story going into this was that Bryan was beating up on Page's friends. Was Page mad? He sure didn't wrestle like he was as they had a slow technical match which further hurt the weak story. It was clear they were going long since this was the first match and since they started off slow. It went the full 60 minutes and while they did put out the effort, it wasn't a fantastic match. Page bled a bunch and they overdid it with multiple apron moves. Page also came off the top a few times for some big dives including a high moonsault from the top to the floor.

Matt Sydal vs Wardlow

Wardlow won here as he should have in a quick squash. Shawn Spears was out here directing traffic for Wardlow, trying to get him to hurry up which seems to be going somewhere. This was a bathroom break match after the draw.

Tay Conti and Penelope Ford did dueling promos. It really wasn't anything special and Tay has a heavy accent.

They did a neat little video with Malakai Black inducting possibly Brody King into his group by black misting him.

Hikaru Shida vs Serena Deeb

They blew a Lou Thesz press to start. Deeb spent most of the match alternating between working the knee and neck. Shida ended up getting the win though here. If I had to watch any of the AEW women, it's Deeb.

The Varsity Blonds did a promo about Julia Hart who was misted last week. Griff Garrison wanted a piece of Black but Pillman was trying to talk him out of it, then they teased dissension over it. I think Pillman and Griff should have switched roles here.

Dynamite Diamond Ring Match - MJF vs Dante Martin

Dante's booking made very little sense last week and we will see what happens here. My guess is that Team Tazz costs him the match. MJF did a promo here on Punk and really ripped into him by making fun of his promo last week and his endless matches with lower card talent. He called him the new Ryback as an insult, but Ryback was pretty good.

Dante did a rolling thunder into a 450 knee to the face which had to hurt. Dante climbed up to the top and was pushed off to the barricade outside. Dante also botched a springboard SSP where he knee'd MJF and banged his face off the ramp. Dante threw some horrible corner punches here between some nice flips. Dante botched another moonsault and Ricky Starks came out to cost Dante the match. I'm glad they followed up on the Team Taz/Dante stuff from last week but we got no explanation on what Dante turning on Team Taz was about. Dante continues to show that he can do cool stuff, but not much else.

FTR came out to celebrate with MJF then Sting and Darby jumped all of them. They got outnumbered and CM Punk came out to clear them off. They announced a trios match between them next week.

They teased an Owen Hart Tournament announcement which never happened here and the big surprises we were told about also didn't happen here.

Overall thoughts: The lack of surprises/announcements were disappointing here since they were promised. Page/Danielson took up the majority of the time here and they didn't have a lot of time to do comedy or make booking mistakes so the show benefited. It was fine but this was the weakest of the big tv specials so far.

AEW Rampage 12/10/2021

AEW Rampage 12/10/2021

This was the first Rampage I've seen in a little while.

Lucha Bros vs FTR - This was pretty much just one Rey Fenix spot after another with very little wrestling. At least Rey can hit his spots. It flowed fine and all, just it was all spots.

Hook vs Fuego del Sol - Hook's debut was pretty good. I would have knocked a minute off of it but his offense looked good and he has a cool look. If he was only a few inches taller and about 40 pounds heavier he could really be something.

I didn't like the promo leading into the main and I don't cover intergender matches. Trent's new hairstyle makes him looked like a tan Jon Moxley.

Wheeler Yuta vs Adam Cole - This was fine. It was mostly just there for filler and it's not exactly how I would want to close a 10PM show. I enjoyed Cole kicking Yuta in the nuts after. 

Overall thoughts: What I saw of this wasn't bad at all.

 

AEW Dynamite 12/8/2021

AEW Dynamite 12/8/2021

 

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/12/aew-dynamite-1212021.html
 

CM Punk Promo

This was just a weird segment with CM Punk cutting a heel promo on Long Island because MJF is from there and the crowd likes him. I have no idea how the non-New York fans were supposed to respond to this. The segment went way too long and got the show off to a bad start.
 

Dynamite Diamond Battle Royale

Why didn't they have qualifying for this or something to explain who got in and why? Wardlow was buried here just like he was last year and Jay Lethal was buried too here. This was a mess with Dante swerving Team Taz after swerving his new friend Lio Rush last week and Punk going from heel to face after one segment. MJF and Dante Martin were the last two survivors and will compete for the diamond ring next week.

 

The Dante swerve makes less sense the more you research it. You see, the battle royale wasn't even announced until 12/1, which was after Dante turned on Lio(11/24). So Dante would have to have advanced information about the battle royale and about who was in it(if Team Taz isn't in it, the plan fails). Dante would also have to be betting here that neither he or Team Taz gets eliminated, or else the whole plan fails and the plan has to assume that Lio Rush essentially threw the match.
 

Jurassic Express and The Varsity Blonds vs The Acclaimed and 2.0

It was fine for what it was with the faces getting the win in a quick multi-man match. Eddie Kingston got involved. JB getting knocked off the apron was funny and Bowens kicked Pillman right in the face. Griff's dive was nice.

We had an AEW production screw up as Eddie Kingston did a promo into a camera that nobody heard.

Tully Blanchard is back to being FTR's manager after Vicki took over for their Mexico trip. No explanation was given for it.
 

The Young Bucks vs Chuck Taylor and Rocky Romero

This sucked with the usual stupid Young Bucks spots and Chuck Taylor wrestling with sunglasses on. Why was Matt Jackson not DQ'd for pulling the ref down? The Bucks won here which was expected. Wheeler Yuta got involved after and was beaten up, then Trent's mom Sue drove him in via minivan and Trent cleared house. Was Trent stuck in traffic or something while Yuta was getting destroyed? Trent now has a buzz haircut. We are now 3 for 3 by the way with all of the matches so far having shenanigans in them.

Ruby Soho was interrupted by Penelope Ford and the Bunny and then ended up getting beaten up by them and Vicki Guerrero.

Cody Rhodes announced he would take Sammy Guevara's open challenge for the TNT title then Ethan Page and Scorpion Sky complained about this while in the stands.
 

Jamie Hayter vs Riho

Hayter forgot to catch Riho on a dive and she landed hard from the top to the floor. This wasn't bad but they did too much here and kicked out of stuff they shouldn't of. Rebel tried to get involved to make it 4v4 on matches with shenanigans in it. Jamie took a hard looking crucifix bomb from the top and a shining wizard for the Riho win.

The Lucha Brothers will fight FTR on Rampage. They actually mean it this time, not like last time. Hook also debuts on Rampage against Fuego del Sol.

The Varsity Blonds were interviewed. The lights went out and Malakai Black misted her then left.
 

Bryan Danielson vs John Silver

A match with an obvious result that was slow and went too long. Danielson went to beat up on Silver after and Page stopped it. Wasn't Page supposed to be suspended if he touched Danielson before the match?

Overall thoughts: Not a good one here. The first two segments were confusing and made no sense. We had shenanigans in almost every match, some classic AEW screwups and they did very little to build up to what should be a big show next week.

AEW Dynamite 12/1/2021

AEW Dynamite 12/1/2021

 

Bryan Danielson vs Alan Angels

This was to put over that Bryan is now a heel. I don't support Bryan being a heel right now. I'm not buying it whatsoever and the crowd clearly would rather have him be a face. I still don't get the whole logic behind Angels having a mask(while having a normal name) and then getting umasked by his partner in a random match. Let some heel beat him in a mask vs hair match instead.
 

CM Punk vs Lee Moriarty

MJF saying, "Why has this match lasted this long?" pretty much sums this up. This was just time filler and Lee did some very generic babyface stuff here. 

Orange Cassidy/Adam Cole segment

This made no sense and was totally stupid. OC had to see the Bucks coming in and it made no sense for Cole not to nail OC when he had his hands in his pockets.
 

Wardlow vs AC Adams

Wardlow has 6 more losses than Austin Gunn does at the time of this match. Let that sink in. More filler.
 

Sting and Darby Allin vs The Gunn Club

This is a battle of undefeated tag teams. Billy's cobra clutch bomb on Darby was really nice and Darby's two topes were awesome. This was stupid though. Colten beat everyone for over a year just to lose a random tv tag match. Stuff like this just buries the ranking system and undefeated streaks. It also just confirmed that the despite their record, the Gunn Club are just goofs. Awful booking that I guess you have to be a Booker of the Year to understand.

The Lio Rush/Team Tazz segment didn't work and neither did the Rosa/Jade segment. Not that I'm going to watch it, but letting Rosa be a commentator when she speaks in Spanish half the time doesn't make a lot of sense.

 

Kris Statlander vs Ruby Soho

I enjoyed Tazz's version of Ruby's theme. The armdrag sequence was sloppy. Ruby had a wild surprised face to a kickout here and they dropped each other on their heads a few times before Ruby won.

Atlanta Street Fight - Andrade El Idolo vs Cody Rhodes

Cody's back was seriously peeling here. This started out well and ended up being okay, though it went a little longer than it needed to. I thought some of the moves with the chairs were stupid as it probably hurt the person doing them as much as the person receiving them. AEW of course had to stick in some comedy here with a golden shovel and sledgehammer. I was really surprised by the flaming table spot but wasn't surprised by Brandi of course having to get her tv time in.

Overall thoughts: This show was mostly filler with the main event being the only thing that was really of note.

CMLL 11/16/2021 - Fugaz, Mistico and Star Jr. vs Dragon Rojo Jr., Euforia and Templario

 CMLL 11/16/2021 - Fugaz, Mistico and Star Jr. vs Dragon Rojo Jr., Euforia and Templario

I was not a fan of this one. The heels basically 3v1'd the faces for most of the first fall with the faces and ref doing absolutely nothing about it but watching. The faces got the win in the 2nd and just went straight into spots in the 3rd. There was a really contrived Star Jr./Templario top rope hurricanrana spot here. Mistico then slipped when trying to go up top and had to redo the spot to hit another contrived top rope spanish fly on Rojo. Fugaz got pretty much nothing in here and I honestly had even forgotten that he was in the match at times.

WWE NXT 2.0 10/19/2021

WWE NXT 2.0 10/19/2021

 

I saw a lot of last week's show but not really enough to review it. 

I liked the opening segment with Hayes, Williams, Gargano and Lumis. Williams is good on the mic and Hayes was decent here too. I really like the teaming of Gargano and Lumis. It's a total oddball couple that should lead to some fun segments.

Andre Chase vs Odyssey Jones

Totally fine short match here. Chase wrestled well for what his character is supposed to be and Jones was fine but he could have been better.

The Creed Brothers vs Imperium

Dirty finish aside, I really liked this. The Creed Brothers looked great throwing around their opponents and I probably enjoyed this more than any other Imperium match. Many nice suplexes here. Man do I want a Steiner Brothers vs Creed Brothers match so bad. I didn't like the Creed's losing here but at least there was a reason to it. 

 

I'm not a fan of Legado del Fantasma promos. I'm definitely not the target audience for it and naturally it doesn't do much for me.

Cora Jade vs Elektra Lopez

This was a quick upset and there's not too much more to say about it.

Io Shirai vs Jacy Jayne vs Persia Pirotta - Winner spins the Halloween Havoc Wheel

You know the deal with three ways. They do a couple of three person spots then it eventually becomes a 1v1. This is what happened here. Jayne had a bad suicide dive botch but Perisa hit a nice stiff boot and a nice stiff powerbomb on Io.

I liked the Solo Sikoa outdoor training video. Using the street light as a punching bad was cool.

The Jiro/Kushida segment wasn't bad.

Tony D'Angelo vs Ru Feng

Ru's got a cool look and it's kind of a shame he's going to do a cold debut job here. You know how I feel about those - pretty much should only be done if you have no plan whatsoever for someone. This was a lot shorter than Tony's debut squash and probably for the better. Ru looked fine here.

I really like Tony's quick interview after. Good stuff.

We then went to Duke's Poker Room with Duke Hudson. I like skits and always approve of those. He's coming into his character a little bit more here, but it's not a smash hit yet.

Jensen got taken out by Legado del Fantasma before his match and I liked Escobar playing the air guitar.

Legado del Fantasma vs Josh Briggs and Brooks Jensen

The finishing stretch was pretty good with Jensen probably having his best outing yet.

Winner gets to be the host of Halloween Havoc - LA Knight vs Grayson Waller

Hey LA, doesn't do the job. This was a short one and wasn't exactly the match Waller needed. Good to see LA get the win though. He should be on Halloween Havoc though and not hosting it.

Bron Breakker and Tomasso Ciampa vs The Grizzled Young Veterans

I'm not a fan of the feuding partners take down regular tag teams story and that's what was done here. People who don't like each other and never teamed together shouldn't be able to take down partners who do. I don't love the GYV's, but no team really deserves that. They did a nice follow through with the story of Bron promising to watch Ciampa's back and failing when Ciampa went for a tag and Bron wasn't there. Ciampa then mentioned it and slapped him before they got the win.

Overall thoughts: Some good and some bad here. I liked the skits/video segments especially Tony D's, I liked the Creed Brothers match and I thought the Jones/Chase match was fine. The show is doing what it is supposed to be doing, but I didn't like the feuding partners taking down the tag team story in the main and the women's three way wasn't too good.

AEW Dynamite 10/16/2021

AEW Dynamite 10/16/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/10/aew-dynamite-2nd-anniversary-1062021.html

Dante Martin vs Malakai Black

This was fine.

Inner Circle promo

A lot of Lambert's Crew vs Inner Circle feud has been happening on Rampage. I haven't been watching Rampage and a lot of others haven't either and that hurt some of the effectiveness of this.

Lucha Bros vs Los Super Rana's

When I suggested that that the mystery men might be The Conquistadors, I was joking. AEW wasn't though. I think a lot of people were expecting actual luchadores here and they were probably disappointed by it. FTR ended up being the people under the masks. Why exactly? I don't know. They ended up winning here too. This was bad and didn't make much sense.

Lio Rush said he would be Dante Martin's new partner. Darius Martin should really be concerned about his future in AEW.

The Elite vs The Dark Order

Your partner is stuck in a boston crab and you kiss the guy putting it on him to mock him when your partner could theoretically submit and lose the match while you do this. That was stupid as was the Brandon Cutler bit after. There were two dudes in purple shirts in the front row who could have easily beat up everyone in this match.
Nightmare Family segment

Cody getting slapped always gets a pop from me. I liked this segment though there was a lack of Arn lighting things on fire this week.

MJF segment

Didn't think much of it, but I think a Sting vs MJF feud would be pretty good.
 

Kiera Hogan vs Penelope Ford

I felt like the commercial took up a lot of this one. Kiera's shotgun dropkick was nice.

Adam Page promo

I didn't have much of a problem with this except for the cowboy shit stuff. It's not a good phrase to try and build a promo around.

Bobby Fish vs Bryan Danielson

This was fine but I imagine it lost a bunch of viewers.

 

Overall thoughts: Not a huge line-up here as this was on a Saturday and no one was going to watch it. The FTR thing was really bad here and hurt the show.

MLW Fightland 10/7/2021

MLW Fightland 10/7/2021

The set-up looks really nice here and had they put a few more mats down over the floor it would have been even better. The ring was a little small though.

MLW World Middlweight Title - Myron Reed vs Tajiri vs Aramis vs Arez

As expected, this was basically just a spotfest. The luchadores weren't that great here and most of their stuff did not look smooth. The crowd liked to see Tajiri win and it was fun to see the green mist.

They had a halftime panel show where they talked about WWE possibly selling. I really hope the reason for this is that Vice forced it or something because this makes MLW look bad by talking about bigger promotions.

MLW World Title vs MLW National Openweight Title - Jacob Fatu vs Alexander Hammerstone

Hammerstone won here with a TKO. I wasn't a big fan of this one. They really didn't sell much at all and they didn't work much of a story. They just did cool moves and that's not my thing. Fatu losing is big news and I'm curious as to where he goes from here.

Overall thoughts: This was a different show than MLW usually puts on. The video quality and overall look was good, but a lot of the promos and hype that MLW usually does to make things more exciting was missing here. I didn't like talk show panel segment and really don't get the logic behind it.

AEW Dynamite 2nd Anniversary 10/6/2021

AEW Dynamite 2nd Anniversary 10/6/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/09/aew-dynamite-9292021.html

8 Man Tag

This was awkward without any entrances and running an injury angle in the first match is maybe a wrestling first. The Bucks and Kenny are better in multi-man matches because they can't do as much and they don't have to sell as much. The Luchasaurus powerbomb botch was bad. I'm still not a fan of doing long opening matches. People need time to warm up and get going, not to get everything in the first match.

CM Punk promo

This wasn't good and felt rushed.

Arn Anderson segment with Cody Rhodes

This was interesting. I popped for Cody getting slapped and was hoping he'd slap Brandi too. I think the gimmick of Arn lighting fires around random people's houses then slapping them could work.
 

Sammy Guevarra vs Bobby Fish

Sammy took a bunch of nasty bumps here. I've never really been a big Bobby Fish fan and am not particularly angry at him losing on his debut like so many other AEW wrestlers have. Maybe they could do something with Bobby and Adam Cole.

Paige Van Zant used to be good looking, but her gear tonight was not flattering at all.
 

Women's title announcement

AEW doesn't have enough good talent for their main women's title yet alone a secondary one.
 

Darby Allin vs Nick Comoroto

This happened on a Dark episode last year before they officially signed Nick. He lost, which I was against as I thought it looked silly. Nothing changed here and Nick lost even faster this time. And worse, most of the match was cut off by commercial.

 

Hikaru Shida vs Serena Deeb

I skipped a lot of this. I'm really curious if Shida's trophy was a work or not. I liked Deeb nailing her with it. Not a bad angle.

Lio Rush did a promo and wants to manage Dante Martin. I was a big fan of Lio's work in MLW. Lio is still wrestling so I don't know why he's in a managerial role. This should help out Dante though as he doesn't have any personality yet.
 

Ladder Match

 

I'm really over ladder matches. I just feel like everything that can be done has been done and they just don't interest me that much anymore. It has nothing to do with any promotion in particular. Adam Page was the mystery man and he and Pac took an awful bump off the ladder. Andrade took an awful bump onto the ladder. We've been told the plan is for Page to win the title and since they had no other way to get him there, they did it this way with the ladder match.

Overall thoughts: It wasn't a great show. It had some lowlights to it and I've seen better and worse.

WWE NXT 2.0 10/6/2021

WWE NXT 2.0 10/6/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/09/wwe-nxt-20-9282021.html

I will just post some overall thoughts here.

 

The crowd clearly has some plants in there to help lead with the chants and stuff. It's working though and it makes sense to help get some newbies over.

The show was pretty good overall. If you are looking for the old NXT with the focus being on high rated matches each week, you won't enjoy this. But this is exactly what developmental needs to be. They've got a bunch of new people out there. They are giving them promo time, angles and gimmicks to work with and they are getting more comfortable with them by the week. It's only been a few weeks but people are already digging the Creed Brothers, Breakker and D'Angelo and it's hard not to call that a success.

 

Gacy's gimmick is starting to pick up some steam. It still needs some tuning but WWE clearly has some faith in him and this might just work. Tony D'Angelo was green but worked the crowd well and the crowd loved him. His match tonight was a perfect example of what you can get away with if the people like you. Bron Breakker did fine in his promo with Ciampa and I'm really excited to see if they have him beat Ciampa. He probably shouldn't as there's more legs to it if he chases him. Von Wagner is not working so far, but this is developmental and that's why he is there. He really would be aided by a mask or face paint as it's going to be tough for him due to his unusual face. Jensen is growing into his character and if he and Briggs can keep getting time, they should be okay.

I'm really enjoying this show and I think it's a major improvement over the old NXT. It has become my favorite show of the week.

AEW Dynamite 9/29/2021

AEW Dynamite 9/29/2021

Adam Cole vs Jungle Boy

It was going well then they did the hurricanrana to the outside which they didn't sell much. Then they did a panama sunrise that was kicked out of. That ruined what was a decent match. Kicking out of canadian destroyers in the opener? Really?

The Elite Segment

Wasn't a fan of this one at all. This was goofy and Danielson shouldn't have been involved with it. This would have been crapped all over if it was done by WWE.

Andrade/Lucha Bros Segment

This was hard to understand and made the AAA titles look bad.

Dante Martin and Matt Sydal vs Cody Rhodes and Lee Johnson

As usual, Cody gets the big entrance and Lee gets nothing. Brandi wasted no time here in wanting to get back on screen. Dante gave himself a tombstone here in a classic AEW botch and then everyone did their flips during the commercial break. Dante took a vertebreaker, kicked out then came off the top 20 seconds later. This was AEW at its worst.

I don't really know what to say about the Arn promo. If the goal was to put over Arn and bury Cody, I guess they accomplished that. Odd for AEW to have Arn glorifying shooting people when they dedicated a show to being anti-gun violence.

Jon Moxley, Eddie Kingston and Darby Allin vs Bear Country and Anthony Greene

Wasn't a fan of this one at all. Bear Country hasn't been on Dynamite in months and Greene hasn't been on Dynamite period. Instead of some hype videos to make these guys look important, they got made to look like jobbers. I did not like Bear Country getting thrown around here at all. Greene was never treated this bad on 205 Live, which is really saying something.

16 man tag match

I get that this was supposed to be a Brodie Lee tribute and I'm just going to leave it at that.

Hey Lio Rush is back. He'll probably be retired by the next Dynamite.

Tay Conti and Anna Jay vs Penelope Ford and The Bunny

Busy night for AEW Botches here as Tay Conti took a random bump to the outside that pretty much killed the match.

MJF did a promo and referenced the cringe 4 pillars meme, which compares some of AEW's young talent with All Japan's 4 Pillars of Heaven from the 90's. Not a fan at all. Those guys aren't on that level and it's just going to give people more ammunition against them. MJF mentioned Darby's relative dying during a promo. Orton did something like that with Eddie Guerrero's death a long time ago and that was not received well, yet I have a feeling Dave Meltzer will give it a pass this time. MJF is bringing himself down with these stunts and is becoming more reliant on it by the week.

Not a fan of Bryan Danielson being on Rampage. AEW's been trying but it is clearly the second show and wasting Bryan on it is a mistake.

Miro vs Sammy Guevarra

The SSP counter spot was a cool idea but they botched it. Miro overbumped here and took way too much offense for his character. Putting Sammy over him was a really bad call since Miro was doing well and since this wasn't that well built, but at least it helped out Sammy. They cut away from Sammy's victory celebration too fast also.

Overall thoughts: This was indy garbage and a total 180 from last week. We had a couple of classic AEW botches here, bad Japanese references, a couple of burials and a lame MJF promo.

WWE NXT 2.0 9/28/2021

WWE NXT 2.0 9/28/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/09/wwe-nxt-20-9212021.html

B-Fab vs Elektra Lopez was really bad. It's developmental, so it's fine if its bad, but B-Fab has a long way to go. She's comfortable as a personality though and that's more important. Lopez is a weird hire to me as she does not look like the usual WWE hire. My guess is its because of her ethnicity.

Xyon Quinn beat Oney Lorcan. Quinn's name is awful, maybe the worst yet, but he has a good look and he gets how to do his moves and sell them. We'll have to see what he can offer on the mic, but this was a good debut for him. You have to feel bad for Oney though. He wasn't the most featured guy, but he has to be concerned that he will be part of the next batch of releases.

Grayson Waller's package was at least some attempt to give him some backstory. I've liked Waller since he debuted since he can talk and has some personality.

I liked the segment with the four tag teams. Carmelo Hayes came across well and Briggs and Jensen did too. The tag titles have been MIA since the re-branding of NXT, and they returned here.

Io Shirai and Zoey Stark beat Gigi Dolan and Jacy Jayne. Toxic Attraction continues to look like a main roster level act and Stark had a good showing here as well. I actually enjoyed this a little. I feel bad for Io though as her stock isn't improving.

Bron Breakker and Ciampa did a quick segment which was good and continues to build to a match sometime down the line.

I really liked Boa vs Andre Chase. Chase didn't show anything at all before his gimmick but he is doing well with this gimmick. I really buy it. I loved him messing around with Mei Ying. I'd love to see them continue with this and it'd be cool if the mist that Chase took made him start acting all strange and dressing weird. That'd be something unique.

Strong vs Walker was fine and the Diamond Mine are really coming together. I'm sad the Creed Brothers didn't wrestle tonight.

I really liked the Lashing Out segment. Lash Legend is super comfortable on the mic already and has some personality, and this was her first real chance to do something. She hit this out of the park. I would love for this segment to be some kind of weekly recap or insider on what's going on in NXT. It could be a cool way to build up some feuds and show off some of the personalities. This girl is not going to be in NXT long.

I didn't see all of O'Reilly vs Ridge Holland but I thought Ridge had another decent showing. Von Wagner coming out to help O'Reilly was a way to get him involved in the show again. It was weird how he was essentially in the main event on the first night and hasn't wrestled since.

I still think Tony D'Angelo should cool it off with the obvious mob tropes, but the character is growing on me and if they work with it, he will go places.

I had little interest in the main and skipped most of it. I'm not into either girl. Raquel's top ripped during this and she had to hold it together.

Overall thoughts: Another good episode of NXT. I really like the direction this show is going and this show is exactly what a developmental show should be. I'm happy to be along for the ride and I'm really excited to see what things are going to be like 3-6 months down the line.

AEW Grand Slam 9/22/2021

AEW Grand Slam 9/22/2021

Kenny Omega vs Bryan Danielson

Putting Omega vs Danielson on first was a bad idea. This match was supposed to be this giant dream match yet it was the opener without any packages or anything to make it a bigger deal.

They telegraphed that this would be a draw early when JR mentioned it. Not smart at all as few would have thought that would have been the outcome otherwise. Time limit draws are tough to sell because 99% of matches don't have the time announced. If they did, when you do a draw and the time starts running out, it becomes less obvious as to what the finish will be. But when you just mention it out of the blue like they did here, it telegraphs the result.

The crowd was very hot for this here but the match didn't have any  particular story. You can tell a lot of stories with the time limit but they didn't do them here. They didn't do the usual Omega match here, which is a good thing. Instead of doing Omega's "work a body part > forget about it > do big moves for 2.999's", they just opted to go to the chops and the strikes which are hard to screw up.

I didn't like the commercial here as it always takes you out of the match. I also didn't like the kick out of the release top rope dragon suplex much like I didn't when Omega did the top rope dragon with Okada a few years ago. This was one of the better matches Omega was involved in but not even close to Danielson's best match this year.

CM Punk promo

I didn't like him saying "How do you follow that?". Because how are people supposed to follow a 30 minute match with top rope dragon suplex kick outs?

MJF vs Brian Pillman Jr.

Pillman did a pretty good job here but the commercial messed this up and the ending was out of nowhere.

Cody Rhodes vs Malakai Black

Of course Brandi has to make her "big return" for this one. A big thank you to NYC for coming out strong and booing Cody. I'm shocked Cody allowed a commercial to go on during his match. I'm glad AEW finally did the right thing here and allowed a heel to get a win in their first big match for a change.

Sting and Darby Allin vs FTR

I actually really liked this. Sting looked great for his age and was really moving well here. I don't know if FTR were the right team to take this loss, but this was fun. I also liked Sting changing up the face paint a bit for this.

Ruby Soho vs Britt Baker

The commercial hurt this one. It felt like their match time got shortened due to something else running too long. Ruby took a nasty air raid crash from the top for 2 which of course was kicked out of. This should not have gone on last.

WWE NXT 2.0 9/21/2021

WWE NXT 2.0 9/21/2021

Last week's show is here: https://prowresblog.blogspot.com/2021/09/wwe-nxt-20-9142021.html

I will just give some quick thoughts here.

I thought this was a pretty good show. They featured a lot of the newer development guys on it and had a bunch of packages that further helped explain who these people are. I wish more promotions would do video packages and just in general show what various wrestlers do at various places and situations to help get their characters over.

I thought the opening promo with Ciampa introducing the younger guys took a little long. Kushida/Strong was a short match with a lot of interference, but I think it did what it was supposed to do here. I'm not sure what purpose the Cruiserweight title serves at the moment though and I'm curious as to who is left to fight for it. 

It was good to see Kay Lee Ray on TV and they even gave her opponent, Amar Miller, a little promo time which is good for her. 

I didn't see much of Dante Chen's match but it was that they gave him something to do before it started by beating the other guy up outside. Whether it was good, bad or neither, it at least gives him some character which will help people to figure out who he is supposed to be.

Andre Chase got a new gimmick here and did well in his skit. He's been around for a while but had no real character and this is at least something for him to do.

Joe Gacy got a new gimmick here. I don't know where they were going with it and we will have to give it time to see where it plays out. It's still better than what he was doing before which was having matches on 205 Live that nobody saw.

I missed the women's match, but Odyssey Jones got to show off a bit and seems like he is headed in the right direction. His gear is absolutely awful though.

I liked the Toxic Attraction promo and Mandy Rose looks like a completely different person with dyed hair. I also loved Jiro's segment as it really got over his unique persona.

I thought the main was decent with Bron Breakker and Ridge Holland having a nice showing. The crowd really got into it and that was the best I had seen Ridge look so far. Bron's already pretty over and seems like he is on the fast track to success. I'm already a fan, but it is a shame he can't be Rex Steiner.

Overall thoughts: A good show that was much better than anything AEW Dark ever did. Not everything was a hit - Von Wagner's promo and Tony D'Angelo's segment, but they are just beginning with these gimmicks and we will have to see where things are in a few months. There was a ton of stuff going on here at a very fast pace and I like the direction of the new NXT. Even the wacky colors didn't seem as bad as before.

WWE NXT 2.0 9/14/2021

WWE NXT 2.0 9/14/2021

This was one of the most bizarre episodes of wrestling I've ever seen.

A lot of people crapped on NXT and I don't know why. People online want smaller wrestlers and they want indy style matches. NXT gave that yet that audience completely rejected it for AEW. I don't really blame Vince for deciding to go in a new direction since the target audience actively turned down NXT for the shiny new toy in AEW. Even though NXT was dull at times and did need a change, I did like it and it's weird to see that version of NXT completely disappear. If NXT was off-air for a while and came back like this, it'd be different story. But it's shocking and  weird when everything changes so fast.

I didn't think much of the new color scheme when I saw it. I figured it was just a logo, but the lighting and set up are just as bad and really do come across as some 1990's game show. Completely out of touch and out of style.

The names on this show were stupid. They are all FCW style names that sound like they were created from a robot. I can't believe nobody backstage tried to stop those names before they were used.

Of the new debuts, Bron Breakker looked really good though why he is not using the Steiner name when he is a Steiner is something only WWE would do. He hasn't been in development for long but he looks like he is ready. Brooks Jensen wasn't too good but it's early and we will see what happens. Von Wagner is still really green and I really hope he can talk because I don't think this is going to work out otherwise. Someone in the chat said he looked like a mini-Khali and they weren't wrong.

The Creed Brothers are now on their 2nd or 3rd match and look like great prospects and potentially a new Steiner Brothers. I'm really excited to see what happens with them.

They showed a vignette for Tony D'Angelo and he's doing a mafia gimmick. It was as un-subtle as it gets and was cringeworthy.

LA Knight lost twice on this show. This dude is the total package yet they love to job him out for no apparent reason. I have no idea what they are doing at all with this guy and hopefully he is just in some kind of weird holding pattern before he gets put on the main roster.

The wedding was stupid with a bunch of shenanigans. At least it happened though. Too many wrestling weddings don't actually end up completing and it's good to see the fans actually getting what was promised. Don't even get me started on the zombie ref.

Overall thoughts: It was great to see some new faces but this show feels really out of touch. It's bad enough that I honestly will be surprised if this show isn't cancelled by the end of the year.
 

AEW All Out 2021 9/5/2021 Review

AEW All Out 2021 9/5/2021 Review

 

Miro vs Eddie Kingston

Some hard shots from Miro in this one. You have to give it to Eddie. He loses constantly yet doesn't really suffer from it, but he's gotta get a big win soon.

Moxley vs Kojima

You could tell a large portion of the crowd had no idea who Kojima was. I liked this one, but one of AEW's younger wrestlers should have been in this spot.

It looks like The Jon Moxley Japanese Trial Series continues on with Minoru Suzuki. I'm sure it excites a lot of internet fans, but I don't know how much the average person cares. I didn't like the forearm battle at the end.

Britt Baker vs Kris Statlander

This went a lot longer than it should have. Why did this not end after the Panama Sunrise? Why do so many wrestlers insist on making the Canadian Destroyer a mid-match move? AEW has to come up with someone else besides Thunder Rosa for Britt and they need to come up with it soon.
 

Young Bucks vs Lucha Bros

As usual, the Bucks did way too much here and it went too long. The Lucha Bro's winning was the wrong call. The Bucks have been the champs for a long time and are kind of the aces of the tag division. They should have lost at the end of a long feud and this one just feels out of the blue almost.
 

Chris Jericho vs MJF

CM Punk vs Darby Allin

I want to put these two matches together because their situations were similar. As I said  many months ago, it's hard to follow long drawn out matches with big spots like the cage match. You can't really do more and when you were going at the pace they were, everything that follows feels so much slower. That's what happened here in both matches. Jericho/MJF never had a chance in trying to follow the Bucks' match and I'm surprised no one saw that coming. But the problem really came in the next match...

So let's get onto Punk vs Darby. I didn't like Punk's long tights with matching shin protectors. It's just too much color and comes across as a child's outfit.

Darby was the wrong call here for the match they needed. He showed up Punk, which is a major problem as Punk did not come cheap and I think there's less interest in seeing him again after this one. Had they just stuck someone like Ethan Page, Scorpio Sky, MJF or some other heels, they could have gotten a little in before losing and Punk would have just been able to look good in a short match. As I said in the Jericho match, this one also suffered from the Bucks' match and some of the other stuff on the card. Punk was never the guy to do big spots and spectacular moves and it's just hard to look good when you are following guys that do. Punk didn't exactly look thrilled either, but big credit to Darby for looking like he deserved to be there.

QT Marshall vs Big Show

What was that outfit that Show was wearing? This was one of those diva bathroom break matches to get you ready for the main.

Kenny Omega vs Christian Cage

The crowd was tired out by the time this came around. It was clear to me that Kenny is not 100% as he took it pretty easy here. Christian however, did not. This dude literally is outworking everyone and is putting out 110% effort. He really deserves some kind of award for his efforts this year.

Adam Cole should not have debuted here. I'd be pissed if I made my big debut only for Bryan Danielson to make his seconds later. AEW has a big problem right now with the roster being too large. Think of how many people didn't make this card for various reasons(some of which weren't AEW's fault) - Page, Archer, Cody, Pac, Black, Brian Cage, Santana and Ortiz, Sammy Guevara, Ethan Page and Scorpio Sky and almost all of the women would have missed if it wasn't for the battle royale. And this was a close to 5 hour show. Someone's getting the short end of the stick here.

Overall thoughts: Too long of a show with too many big moves and big spots for me, but AEW is looking good now with multiple big name signings. If AEW doesn't get a monster ratings boost this week, something is seriously wrong.