AEW Dynamite - January 15, 2020

[Ricky Jackson]

Come on guys, I can't even watch this week (perhaps not for several weeks due to my present sans cable, sans wi fi situation) and I still have to make the thread? 

[sek69]

People were posting in the catch all AEW thread.

 

Also I popped for them doing the Dusty-Road Warriors angle with Jericho and Mox.

[Badlittlekitten]

Dunno bout his work but The Butcher looks awesome. Finally a real mean looking fucker on the show.

[sek69]

I love how Corbin seems to be hate-watching AEW on his twitter feed.

[sek69]

I also love Page and Kenny's tag team gimmick being "drunk guy and his sober friend who has to keep apologizing for his buddy being an asshole".

[The Thread Killer]

My thoughts, for what they're worth...

- Classy move to pay respect to Rocky Johnson, as well as for JR to mention the passing of Pampero Firpo and La Parka.

- I didn't much care for the opener, but then again I hate multi-team tag matches, I can't stand Chuck Taylor and I usually get annoyed by The Young Bucks and Kenny, so I wasn't expecting to like this match.  Looks like they've stopped calling Santana and Ortiz "Proud and Powerful" which is good because that name is almost as stupid as those guys look sticking their damn tongues out all the time for no reason.  The fact that the fans were chanting "this is awesome" during this match depresses me.

- The Cody promo was really good.  I don't know why he was dressed up the way my older brother dressed during the 80's, but whatever.

- The Joey Janella promo was stupid and proves yet again (as if we needed more proof) that this guy has no clue.  His ex-girlfriend turns on him, hits him in the balls and hooks up with another guy, so his natural response is to cut a full on heel promo.  This guy is such a dork. If he actually goes over Fenix next week then that will just prove that whoever is booking this stuff has lost their mind.

- This crowd was really vocal and really hot.  Then Brandi came out.  I swear, when she was announced I heard audible groans from the crowd.  She doesn't have heel heat, people just think she's bad...as is this whole angle. You could hear a pin drop during parts of this match, when the fans had been going nuts just minutes earlier. I'd never seen Melanie Cruise wrestle before, she was excellent.  Kris Stantlander looked great too. It's a shame both of those excellent talents are bogged down in this ridiculously stupid Nightmare Collective nonsense.  The way the announcers were carrying on, you'd think Dr. Luthor was a household name in Japan on par with Inoki, or something.  This match went on WAY too long.

- Speaking of stupid crap nobody cares about...The Dark Order vignette was really lame.  Apparently "Evil Uno" has nude pictures of Tony Khan, or something.  I guess they're going to ride this horse until it dies, despite the fact pretty much everybody hates this stuff.

- Moxley vs. Guevara was pretty good. I'm souring a bit on Moxley, it feels like he's trying really hard to be Stone Cold 2.0.  Guevara has tons of potential but I think he spends way too much time preening and posing and playing to the crowd.  He has excellent moves but I don't find him very fluid.  The angle after this match was excellently done, very old school and the crowd bought into it 100%.  Good stuff.

- The 6 Man Tag was okay.  Q.T. Marshall might as well have had a sign around his neck reading "I'm here to take the loss" but whatever.  DDP is still crazy over, which I wasn't expecting. Being 63 years old and busting out moves that he didn't even do 20 years ago is pretty nuts. MJF is great, and the Butcher and The Gimp have grown on me a bit as a team.  This was a good TV match and accomplished what it was supposed to.  It would have been nice if they'd have actually caught the finish on the full screen instead of having it happen while they were showing a replay of DDP's dive.

- The Main Event was outstanding.  I don't think PAC has had a bad match since Dynamite debuted and Darby Allin continues to come across as a major star in the making. The powerbomb on the steel steps and the Coffin Drop to the outside were highlight reel worthy.  Great match, great wrestling, great finish.

Overall, the Cody promo, the Mox/Guevara match and following angle, the 6 Man Tag and the excellent Main Event combined to make this a very good episode of Dynamite.  I'm still not sure why they're so hell bent on pushing Brandi's stupid stable down our throats when you can clearly tell by the crowd reaction that it's not popular with the fans.  Well, I know why they're doing it, but somebody needs to reign Brandi in.  People loved to hate on Triple H being married to Steph and pushing himself all over TV 20 years ago, and they were right to do it.  It was bad for him to do then, and it's bad for Brandi to do it now.  Cody loves his wife, and that's great.  But the fans don't, or at least not this damn angle.  The Dark Order vignette and the Janella promo were cringe worthy, but there was still a lot more good than bad on this episode.  Especially if you're the type of fan who would enjoy matches like the opener.  Biggest compliment I can give this show is that the two hours flew by.

[C.S.]

My thoughts:

- Santana and Ortiz were easily the best team in the match, followed by The Young Bucks. The Omega-Page team is pointless filler to give them something to do, even if they did win. Best Friends are "just there" for me. The match itself was a rasslin' movez flip fest, which does nothing for me. Only Santana-Ortiz and Bucks came close to making their flips mean anything and pulling them out at the right time. J.R. burying the lack of rules in the tag division - both here and elsewhere - may be valid, but it's an awful look for the show.

- Cody's Miami Vice get-up was great and his promo was even better.

- Joey Janela is a geek and now he looks like a homeless bum too. Never realized how bad his teeth were. Quick, someone page Britt Baker!

- The women's tag was nothing special, but Satlander and Mel can carry this division. Brandi would be fine in a managerial role and without this Dungeon of Doom bullshit gimmick.

- Dark Order is dogshit, period.

- Moxley-Guevera wasn't bad. The post-match angle with the spike to the eye was the real star there.

- Alcoholism isn't a great angle, so I have no idea WTF they're doing with drunken Adam Page and sober Kenny Omega. It feels very odd and disconnected. 

- Six-man tag with MJF and DDP was fun, but I got distracted during it. I love the look of Butcher, Blade, and Bunny. There's something there.

- I had a raging headache so I skipped the PAC match. As exciting and explosive as Darby is, I don't think the youngster is quite polished enough to carry an uncharismatic 205 castoff just yet. When you hear the rumors of Tony Khan regretting signing some of those big contracts, PAC has to be one of the guys he's thinking of. (So is Shawn Spears. As much as I've defended the guy in the past, even I have to admit that it hasn't worked at all. Maybe he should've come in as the crowd-pleasing "10" character or some variation that wouldn't get him sued instead of the heel who does sloppy chairshots? I dunno.)

Overall, I thought the show was slightly underwhelming. Again, maybe it was my headache. The set and graphics were fucking amazing though, and I loved the promos and angles. We needed more of that and less rasslin', flips, and movez. I'm not looking for Raw with 20-minute insomnia-curing promos, but AEW hasn't quite that happy medium between in-ring and character work yet IMO.

[southofheavy]

Watching it on DVR now. Nodded out during the opener and woke up for Cody's promo. Excellent stuff. 

That women's tag? No thanks. All this talk of Statlander being great and I'm not seeing it. I know what she was going for with that backflip thing off the apron, but they blew that horribly and I don't think its possible to actually nail it. It's a lame MOVEZ move, anyway. 

[SirEdger]

Looks like they taped both this week and next week's episode of AEW Dark after tonight's show but no clue which match will go where. I know that Taz will be on commentary for both and former LAX member Diamante worked those tapings.

[MoS]

Dynamite airs early Thursday mornings here; I could watch live last year but I've had some work this year so I catch up on it later. 

- The Elite are treated on TV as bigger stars than they are, but they absolutely are over huge to the live crowds and that makes their matches hot. I liked the atoryline progression with Page and the Elite as well. That's a slow build that's being done well. 

- I honestly did not like Cody making inside references about old-school heels and being appreciated by a minute section of old-school wrestlers and others. I understand that 2020 is a very different time from the Monday Night Wars and the AEW core fanbase is familiar with these terms, but I am never a fan of doing this shit on TV. It's Russo-esque worked shoot bullcrap. Apart from that bit, though, Cody cut another excellent promo. I like how he is not portraying himself as just plucky, but also as smart and intelligent. Modern wrestling has too many faces that are plain stupid. He does not need to be another Sting. 

- This week has to be make or break for the Nightmare Collective, doesn't it? Tony Khan says every week that they are listening to the fans. Well, as TTK pointed out, this entire match died in front of what was otherwise a very hot crowd. NXT airs much later here and I haven't seen it yet so I don't know what the cross-programming was, but I would have absolutely switched over if I had the option. If viewers tune out in droves, I hope they kill this stupid angle. Just make Brandi Cody's babyface manager against MJF. And I find it amusing that the Nightmate Collective and Dark Order segments are almost always booked back-to-back. Like there are trying to get rid of all the unpopular parts of the show in one go.

-  MJF is great. DDP looked good. Can't wait for MJF to respond to Cody. 

- Mox-Guevera was good, but the spotlight was obviously on the post-match, which was absolutely brilliant. Because I am also a fan of bad puns, I loved Jericho's subsequent backstage promo as well. Jericho is doing a brilliant job of maintaining his heat and cred as the world champ while often showing ass and making others look great. Given the fact that in the last couple of years, he has got multiple angles and matches over in multiple promotions, can an argument be made for him to be one of the GOATs? It's something that would have never entered my mind 3 years ago, but as I have said multiple times, he is having the run of his life. 

- PAC-Allin was excellent. Mox is best when used in short bursts, so I liked the fact that he did not get another interview today, but got a brief moment where he kicked open the ambulance with an eye-patch on and told PAC to shut it. It helped end the episode on a great note, which means the damage done by the Nightmare Collective was contained at least. 

- I would also like to point out one of the little things AEW does that helped them this episode. They have always made a point of having faces rush to save fellow faces from heel beatdowns, something WWE doesn't really care about. When no one came out to Mox's aid, the commentators pointed that out and talked about how one of the disadvantages of being a lone wolf like Mox is you won't have any allies in situations like this. It made the angle feel bigger and more important. They have also used it to get over the Elite's story with Page. Again, a little thing, but little things do add up. 

[Blehschmidt]

9 hours ago, C.S. said:

When you hear the rumors of Tony Khan regretting signing some of those big contracts, PAC has to be one of the guys he's thinking of.

Give it up dude. Everyone else seems to be enjoying Pac's work but you. I agree with you 100% on Spears though.

 

As for the show:

I really dug the opening tag match, but I enjoy that PWG style shit and like everyone involved (except Omega)

Cody promo was awesome as always, Janela promo not so much.

The Nightmare Collective needs to die immediately. No one knows or cares who Luther is, Kong is obviously about done, the Mel chick is fine and can join the Dark Order, and Brandi can go back to managing Cody because no one is buying this shit.

Shida and Statlander deserved so much better than being stuck in that garbage.

Mox/Guevara was fine for what it was, but I felt like Sammy took a bit too much of the match. But since it was all building to the post match, whatever. Post match was great.

6 man tag was there. Like Thread Killer stated, QT Marshall being there to get pinned was ridiculously obvious. Didn't expect the DDP floor dive!

Loved Pac/Allin, two of my favorites in the company.

Overall, not a bad episode, but the Nightmare Collective has GOT to go.

[The Thread Killer]

7 hours ago, MoS said:

I honestly did not like Cody making inside references about old-school heels and being appreciated by a minute section of old-school wrestlers and others. I understand that 2020 is a very different time from the Monday Night Wars and the AEW core fanbase is familiar with these terms, but I am never a fan of doing this shit on TV. It's Russo-esque worked shoot bullcrap.

You're 100% right. I had actually meant to mention that in my post, but I forgot.  Cody is great and he's an outstanding promo.  I think he is probably the best all around worker in AEW right now, he is clearly the ace of this promotion on several different levels.  His promo last night was excellent, but that one line was really stupid, and unnecessary.  I would assume he was referring to the fact that Jim Cornette and other old school guys have been gushing about MJF and how old school he is, but I really hate stupid "shoot" comments and inside references in promos.  It's not edgy, it's just stupid and pointless.

3 hours ago, Blehschmidt said:

Give it up dude. Everyone else seems to be enjoying Pac's work but you. I agree with you 100% on Spears though.

He's not wrong, @C.S..  I usually agree with you more often than not, and even if I don't, I can generally at least see your side of an argument.  But you're way off base on this.  Firstly, Pac is not a "205 Live castoff." That implies he couldn't cut it on 205 Live and got released or something. (TJ Perkins would be somebody I considered a 205 castoff.) Pac had what is probably still the most impressive Cruiserweight Championship reign since WWE brought the title back.  His matches with Austin Aries probably represented the high point for that entire division in terms of profile and match quality.  He had actual quality matches on Main Roster PPV's and held that title for six or seven months, (aside from the 5 day loss to Tozawa.)  They didn't "cast him off" he walked out on them after losing to Enzo and sat out for a year to get out from underneath his WWE contract.  Once he ended up in AEW he's been nothing short of outstanding and has delivered every single time.  His matches with Page and Omega have been excellent and that Main Event last night was great. I can't see why anybody who looks at Pac objectively would think that Tony Khan would regret signing him.  All you have to do is watch last night's match.  If he can continue to deliver matches like that, I can't imagine why AEW would be anything but happy about having him on the roster.

[goodhelmet]

I couldn't post during the show last night but enjoyed the show. 

 

I enjoyed the opening tag. It was a spotfest... but a fun spotfest and I love the setup to whatever Adam Page is going to do. Since he seems to be getting more over, I would actually have Kenny Omega turn and have Page as the face.

Cody's promo was great. 

I think face Cody and hell Brandi is so dumb. everyone knows they are married. She should be in his corner and helping the faces, not playing Stephanie McMahon. Starting to dislike the entire direction of the women's division because of this nonsense.

I enjoyed Moxley-Guevara. 

The 6 man tag was fun. Some good old school hiding the foreign object play going on. My roommate who hasn't seen DDP in 20+ years was shocked at how good he looked for being 60 years old. 

The main event was fun and Darby is awesome. This may be my favorite PAC match so far. I still hate his angry, evil hobbit character but I think he worked well with Darby. 

 

AEW remains an easy to watch 2 hour wrestling show. the biggest obstacle they have is that nothing seems can't miss. If I miss a week of AEW, I don't ever feel like I missed out. If I was booking this show, my main goal is to make this a can't miss wrestling show. I don't see them doing that right now. 

[C.S.]

@The Thread Killer Fair enough on PAC's 205 run. With that said, all of his matches with Aries blend together in my mind and none of them felt special to me. To be fair though, they were all on the pre-show, where nothing feels special or gets enough time, so I won't hold that against PAC or Aries (who I also think is an overrated geek).

I still stand by what I said: If Tony Khan signed PAC to big money and if Tony Khan regrets some of those big money deals, I have to think he's regretting the PAC deal. I'm not saying he doesn't want PAC on the roster. I'm sure he does. I'm not saying PAC doesn't fill a role. I'm sure he does. But paying huge money for someone like PAC, who is never realistically going to be a major draw for the company and whose ceiling is probably gatekeeper with a future token World Title reign thrown in, is not exactly the ideal use of presumably limited funds.

To me, guys like MJF, Sammy Guevara, and Darby Allin already feel like much bigger deals and stars than PAC while probably getting paid a lot less. If I'm Khan and I did pay a bundle for PAC or even Spears, I would absolutely regret it when there's only so much money to go around.

Am I wrong? I don't think I am. 

Anyway, I wrote a lengthy post on the entire episode, and you and @Blehschmidt focused only on the one sentence I wrote about PAC. Is it possible you two have a blind spot toward him, just you think I do in the opposite direction? 

[Log]

Damn, DDP’s ribs still haven’t healed. 

[Blehschmidt]

58 minutes ago, C.S. said:

@The Thread Killer Fair enough on PAC's 205 run. With that said, all of his matches with Aries blend together in my mind and none of them felt special to me. To be fair though, they were all on the pre-show, where nothing feels special or gets enough time, so I won't hold that against PAC or Aries (who I also think is an overrated geek).

I still stand by what I said: If Tony Khan signed PAC to big money and if Tony Khan regrets some of those big money deals, I have to think he's regretting the PAC deal. I'm not saying he doesn't want PAC on the roster. I'm sure he does. I'm not saying PAC doesn't fill a role. I'm sure he does. But paying huge money for someone like PAC, who is never realistically going to be a major draw for the company and whose ceiling is probably gatekeeper with a future token World Title reign thrown in, is not exactly the ideal use of presumably limited funds.

To me, guys like MJF, Sammy Guevara, and Darby Allin already feel like much bigger deals and stars than PAC while probably getting paid a lot less. If I'm Khan and I did pay a bundle for PAC or even Spears, I would absolutely regret it when there's only so much money to go around.

Am I wrong? I don't think I am. 

Anyway, I wrote a lengthy post on the entire episode, and you and @Blehschmidt focused only on the one sentence I wrote about PAC. Is it possible you two have a blind spot toward him, just you think I do in the opposite direction? 

I didn't feel the need to comment on the rest of your post, because other than having differing opinions on the opener (which really comes down to whether you like the style) I was pretty much in agreeance with you on the content of the episode.

I like PAC, but I wouldn't rate him in my Fave 5 or anything like that. I just don't understand this visceral hatred you put in this thread literally every single time he is on TV. There are certainly things to nitpick with the AEW product, but I don't see at any point where he has been part of those things. Obviously you don't like the guy, that's cool. I just don't get making statements like Tony Khan must regret signing him, when he's done nothing but put on good matches. It's not like he's been involved in the segments or angles that are bombing, he hasn't injured anyone, and I can't think they are paying him Jericho money in the first place.

[SirEdger]

I seem to be the only one here so far who's totally been on-board with the Dark Order stuff in the past 2 months or so. Ever since, they started airing those vignettes, I now understand their motivations and what they're all about. My main concern, however, is who will be revealed as "The Exalted One" as they could set themselves for massive disappointment if the choice is underwhelming. I personally think that Kevin Sullivan would be perfect in that spot.

[The Thread Killer]

30 minutes ago, Log said:

Damn, DDP’s ribs still haven’t healed. 

That's exactly what I thought when he peeled off his shirt last night and I saw his ribs were taped up.  I thought "Damn, Savage attacked him with that crutch 23 years ago!  His ribs are taking even longer to heal than Iron Mike Sharpe's forearm or Bob Orton's arm!"

[The Thread Killer]

9 hours ago, MoS said:

This week has to be make or break for the Nightmare Collective, doesn't it? Tony Khan says every week that they are listening to the fans. Well, as TTK pointed out, this entire match died in front of what was otherwise a very hot crowd. NXT airs much later here and I haven't seen it yet so I don't know what the cross-programming was, but I would have absolutely switched over if I had the option. If viewers tune out in droves, I hope they kill this stupid angle.

I'm in a similar boat here in Canada.  We get Dynamite live on TSN, but NXT doesn't air until the commercial free replay on the WWE Network feed at 10:00 pm EST on the following night, which is how I usually see it. In Canada we don't have the option of changing the channel and switching to NXT.  If we did, I sure as hell would have changed the channel during that Women's match and I might not have ended up switching back. Actually truth be told, NXT has been so good since moving to the USA Network that I'd probably end up watching that live and recording Dynamite on my PVR so I could watch the good stuff and FF through the Brandi Rhodes/Dark Order/Joey Janella bits. Unless Mauro Ranallo was driving me insane. Which he probably would be.

[The Thread Killer]

1 hour ago, C.S. said:

I wrote a lengthy post on the entire episode, and you and @Blehschmidt focused only on the one sentence I wrote about PAC. Is it possible you two have a blind spot toward him, just you think I do in the opposite direction? 

No, it's more that I agreed with pretty much everything else you wrote so I had nothing to add to that.

[The Thread Killer]

39 minutes ago, SirEdger said:

I seem to be the only one here so far who's totally been on-board with the Dark Order stuff in the past 2 months or so. Ever since, they started airing those vignettes, I now understand their motivations and what they're all about. My main concern, however, is who will be revealed as "The Exalted One" as they could set themselves for massive disappointment if the choice is underwhelming. I personally think that Kevin Sullivan would be perfect in that spot.

Here's the problem with The Dark Order, though.  The two main members are Evil Uno and Stu Grayson, neither of whom are exactly Main Event level guys, nor will they ever be, nor should they be. They've already added Reynolds and Silver, who (with all due respect) were pretty much enhancement guys.  The rest of the "members" of The Dark Order are nameless guys in masks who may or may not be capable of throwing a punch and hitting their intended target.

During last night's vignette they implied they were trying to recruit Adam Page or Moxley. They've already tried and failed to recruit Christopher Daniels. Let's be real here.  Unless the AEW booking committee has totally lost their shit, there is no way in hell they would (or should) let any of their top guys get anywhere near this crap. They implied that they wanted to recruit Brendan Cutler and I'm sure they will...he'll fit right in and I have no doubt QT Marshall will be right behind him.  You're going to end up with a faction that will make the old NWO B-Team look like The Dangerous Alliance in comparison.  I don't know who they're planning on revealing as "The Exalted One" but it really shouldn't be anyone of any importance, because they're going to end up getting stuck in the dumbest Pro Wrestling angle in recent memory.  If it is Kevin Sullivan, I have no doubt that in no time he will be reminiscing fondly about his robe wearing days as "The Taskmaster" as the leader of The Dungeon of Doom. I read that The Young Bucks are the ones booking this garbage, and if it's true then I can only believe they're sticking with it out of pure stubbornness.

I am not one of the people who think the sky is falling or that this angle will be the death of AEW or anything hysterical like that.  Like I said last night, AEW is producing more good stuff than bad stuff, and nobody is perfect all the time.  They're allowed to produce crap.  I just don't get their unwillingness to see that it's crap.  We keep hearing the mantra that AEW "listens to the fans" and in some cases that might be true...however in this case and the case of The Nightmare Collective, it is most definitely NOT true.

[sek69]

The great thing about DDP is he always had an older looking face so now that he is old he doesn't look that much different than he did in his WCW days.  I know Dave can't say anything positive without the "OMG PAID BY AEW" dummies piling on, but he's spot on about it really is nice to see AEW not doing the WWE route of bringing in legends just to humiliate them.

[sek69]

1 hour ago, The Thread Killer said:

I don't know who they're planning on revealing as "The Exalted One" but it really shouldn't be anyone of any importance, because they're going to end up getting stuck in the dumbest Pro Wrestling angle in recent memory.  If it is Kevin Sullivan, I have no doubt that in no time he will be reminiscing fondly about his robe wearing days as "The Taskmaster" as the leader of The Dungeon of Doom. I read that The Young Bucks are the ones booking this garbage, and if it's true then I can only believe they're sticking with it out of pure stubbornness.

Considering what he's doing on his Youtube channel and the timing of his contract ending, it seems like it's lining up to possibly be Matt Hardy. 

[SirEdger]

Hmm....you might be onto something. And if  you're right about the Young Bucks behind that angle, it would make sense.

[The Thread Killer]

3 hours ago, sek69 said:

Considering what he's doing on his Youtube channel and the timing of his contract ending, it seems like it's lining up to possibly be Matt Hardy. 

Okay, if it does end up being Matt Hardy - especially in his "broken" persona - I will officially walk back everything negative I have said about this angle.  The whole Broken Universe is so happily goofy and over-the-top that The Dark Order would fit right in.  We wouldn't be expected to take them or the angle "seriously" if it was Broken Matt Hardy, so I could fully buy into that idea as a fan.