sek69

A great show. Long of course, but that's how AEW rolls, so its expected. Thekla vs all of Stardom has been my favorite feud of the year by miles. My only quibble is I would have had Maya win, but the post match seemed to telegraph that she's going to be the one who finally beats Athena for the title.

So I just signed up with the myAEW deal (with the assistance of a VPN), and I have to say it's really nice. They have the weekly TVs, PPVs, ROH TVs and PPVs, and a a collection of indy feds. It's like the wrestling section of Triller but AEW centric.

Another solid Dynamite, Harley doing a Supergirl cosplay was both amusing and gimmick appropriate (not to mention it was some nice corporate synergy). As much as I'm enjoying things, I have to agree with brother @MoS about the Don Callis Family. I'm all for them being the Evil Heel Supergroup, but it seems like all they are doing is recycling the "guy in the group who's obviously about to break off from the group but everyone has to act like It's Fine" bit.

I've been watching the show, and it's not bad as a TV show, but the problem is the roster comes off as a bunch of has-beens or never-was types. They just put people out there as if the TV audience knows who they are, and even a sicko like me who's somewhat aware of names on the indies has no idea who the hell most of these people are. It's funny how people (rightly) bust TK's balls over AEW having too many belts, but at least they have like a million people on the roster. The NWA has the World/National/TV/Jr Heavy titles, World/US tag team titles, and women's World/TV titles and they have like maybe two dozen people. (To be fair, at least it seems like Billy pays his people decently as opposed to whatever it is TNA is doing)

Man, they've stretched this Cody/Gunther/Sami thing well beyond its sell by date. Sami should have fully turned heel months ago, and Gunther should have won the belt at the PLE in Italy. Now everyone involved in this comes off lesser than they did going in.

It seems like they are setting up Brock coming back to fuck over Oba in the finals to set up their rubber match. It's crazy to me that they had Goldberg-in-WCW lightning in a bottle and they have already beaten him once and it's looking like they are setting up beating him ago.

I wonder if Vince tries to come back to WWE when the Grant case is settled. Obviously he has the balls/lack of self awareness to attempt it, but how would the company react?

WWE/Vince's team was trying to push this into arbitration from the start based on the wording of her employment contract, so I get the feeling her team must have felt there was a good enough chance that was going to be the ruling so they are going along with it.

Also I feel bad for Tate Wilder having to do a "crazy risk taker" gimmick in a world where Darby Allin exists.

Naraku in NXT has been surprisingly great so far, nice to see him get to prove that it was the booking that was killing him with the HOT nonsense.

For sure, the really great video package before the mask match had his fingerprints all over it.

Pretty much everyone has said Taker is one of the bookers there. I suppose you can argue the percentages of who does what, but him being in the room doesn't seem up for debate at this point.

It should be mentioned that AAA's goal was always to be the Mexican version of WWE, they just never had the budget to pull it off. Being bought by WWE is more them achieving their goal more than anything. CMLL was always the promotion for traditional lucha, and AAA was the promotion for Sports Entertainment with a flavor of lucha. Also by all accounts, Taker really is booking AAA. Yes, his politics suck, but he seems to have a knack for this. Not to mention his politics are probably not much different from practically every other wrestling booker ever not named Tony Khan.

I think Mercedes is a better fit for the TBS title match, since she wouldn't be winning the Owen unless TK threw out whatever plan he had going into it. Plus it would make sense story wise since the TBS title was one of the 47 million belts she had before she left.

Crazy to think the Undertaker has a legit shot at Booker of the Year, his work in AAA has been top notch. I suppose it shouldn't be that surprising a Texas guy knows ball when it comes to lucha, but it's been a hell of a run.

That was fucking tremendous, all hail Ludwig Kaiser the lucha superhero of Mexico!

The Grande Americanos are having a great Mascara contra Mascara match, with blood and mask ripping, no lame WWE shit here. We even had Pimpi getting involved.

Also don't get me wrong, everyone should 100% kick the tires when contracts come up to make sure they are getting paid their worth. It just seems like it would take a absolutely stupid money offer for FTR to jump ship and TKO clearly isn't in the market for those at the moment.

I seem to recall something like that, but wrestlers say that all the time. Just like everyone says they are going to retire before 50, and the closer they get it becomes "well, we'll play it by ear".

Observer site has a story up about FTR's option year coming up in 2027 and WWE having "preliminary interest". The story also mentions FTR looking to get paid closer to the level of the top guys in AEW, which they surely deserve, but I can't see this as anything other than them smartly playing the game to get the maximum payout. I can't imagine two guys who literally bleed tag team wrestling wanting to go back to WWE, especially after they just nuked their tag division.

Yeah this may be the best one they've done so far. C&C/FTR, Will/Joe, Mox/Kyle. and MJF/Darby were all great and Takeshita/Okada was an all timer. Athena/Mina was good (the crowd was meh because Athena is seldom on AEW TV and Mina usually loses), and the 4 way women's title match was good once it got going, and we finally got Stat/Shida to brawl after dragging it out for no obvious reason.

He doesn't always go full speed these days, but when he does he's still top level in the world.

Takeshita/Okada followed that up with one oft he greatest matches I've ever seen, holy shit.

That was fucking crazy, and of all the people involved I wasn't expecting Big Stoke to take the flaming table bump.

Opening with FTR vs Cope/Cage, they aren't fucking around tonight.