AEW Double or Nothing 2022

[El-P]

7 minutes ago, KawadaSmile said:

Now that he's in AEW I expect him to just go full FMW or RINGS. Maybe both at the same time. 

That's like my beautiful dark twisted fantasy or something, as both an old RINGS & FMW fan. Give me a mix between Khosaka & Onita. Preferably in a cage in a middle of a pool.

[KawadaSmile]

Volk Han selling them ribs after being thrown into an explosive cage is money-printing madness.

[Stiva]

7 hours ago, Loss said:

Anarchy in the Arena is the damndest match I've seen in years and one of the best brawls of all time. I've watched it three times now.

Glad I’m not the only one. The whole thing got me energised in a way that a wrestling match hasn’t in years. The kind of thing you rave about to people who don’t care in the off chance they’ll watch it 

[El-P]

It's kinda crazy it took 25 years before anyone remembered the Gangstas match gimmick in ECW was a genius idea and should be done again. When they played the entire song I was like "It's gonna start again, right ?". 

[Embrodak]

I think I would be more enthusiastic about something like that Anarchy match if AEW didn’t do an absolute ton of furniture wrestling and gimmick matches. Tupelo is not Tupelo if you have multiple Tupelos in the last three years, not to mention your champ having wrested two ice cold yet insanely gratuitous death matches in his six month reign.

[strobogo]

 Punk really shit the bed in the main event. Maybe he was recently sick or has an injury, but I think it was the worst he's looked in AEW. He's always been sloppy, but that dude was fucking up the whole match and seemed to have completely gassed not even half way into the match. It actually reminded me of some of Jericho's title matches. Half the match felt like Punk curled up and Page stalling for him.

Also, lmao at literally every spot Moxley and Jericho tried to do not working the entire match.

[Jesse Ewiak]

Maybe between some wrestlers probably being lost in the shuffle because they're not all that creative and other wrestlers making questionable creative decision shows that sometimes, wrestlers being able to do whatever they want actually isn't good business, in the long run. Again, Punk being in overlong matches against low and mid-carders for months and Danielson & Moxley currently being in a faction where they have random matches against lower card guys and entertaingly squash them may be what they want to do, but perhaps, just perhaps, sometimes you need to be able to tell a wrestler, "you're doing this, because it'll make us money and it'll be good entertainment." 

[KawadaSmile]

5 hours ago, strobogo said:

 Punk really shit the bed in the main event. Maybe he was recently sick or has an injury, but I think it was the worst he's looked in AEW. He's always been sloppy, but that dude was fucking up the whole match and seemed to have completely gassed not even half way into the match. It actually reminded me of some of Jericho's title matches. Half the match felt like Punk curled up and Page stalling for him.

My take is that for some reason he decided to work half the match the same way he did against Dustin. Early on, when they took it slow but were beating the absolute shit out of each other, was when the match was good. When it picked up, it felt like Punk indeed lost all the gas he had. I have no idea why he wanted to do something difficult like the Buckshot TWICE.

[El-P]

4 hours ago, KawadaSmile said:

I have no idea why he wanted to do something difficult like the Buckshot TWICE.

Well, he wasn't supposed to. First time he fucked it up and Hangman did such a great job covering up by jumping on him that it almost looked like a planned spot. The issue is that they redid the spot, because it was a key spot in the build, and Punk would not hit it again. If that would have been the finish, yeah, I agree it would have hurt the match. As it is, it's like a matter of "Oh, I'm gonna retract a quarter star" geeky shit. Punk making fun of it in the post-show promo with FTR and the  again at the media scrub, telling Meltz he would not be giving him five stars with this one, I find actually quite refreshing. Yeah, reality sets in sometimes, and unless a match totally falls apart, it's not a big deal when the overall match is terrific, which to me it was, and the audience was not affected past about 10 seconds of it (which is factual, the crowd was hot as hell for the entire thing).

[sek69]

To me, things not going as planned all the time kinda makes it better for me in a weird way since it makes it look more realistic. Shit happens in life and everything in a wrestling match with world title stakes going perfectly makes it look more choreographed to me. Real fights have been around long enough for everyone to see sometimes things don't go as planned and it's not the end of the world.

Also Punk pretty much saved Hangman's life by hanging on to him when he slipped off the turnbuckle when they did the superplex spot. Page was heading for a nasty looking fall until Punk grabbed him and made it look like they were struggling for the move while Hangman regained his footing. 

[C.S.]

On 5/31/2022 at 1:25 AM, PeteF3 said:

While I agree that that match could have fit in fine on the Buy-In, Kyle had injured Sting on Dynamite a few weeks ago, so it wasn't exactly lacking build or a story.

I'd normally criticize having a mega-dork like KoR injure Sting, but it was apparently a legit injury, so...

In any case, having said dorkus maximus win the match after injuring the guy's partner is ass-backward.

Maybe it's building to the tag match that the cool painted guys win, or even Sting vs. KoR, which Sting will win, but why? 

I don't think anyone's clamoring for more of this feud.

[sek69]

Speaking of injuries, both Jeff Hardy (who was banged up from the Darby match despite the cut and paste sites clickbaiting that it was his other issues cropping up) and Adam Cole are out of the 10 man tag on Dynamite, replaced by Darby and Hikuleo respectively. 

[KawadaSmile]

5 hours ago, El-P said:

Well, he wasn't supposed to. First time he fucked it up and Hangman did such a great job covering up by jumping on him that it almost looked like a planned spot. The issue is that they redid the spot, because it was a key spot in the build, and Punk would not hit it again. If that would have been the finish, yeah, I agree it would have hurt the match. As it is, it's like a matter of "Oh, I'm gonna retract a quarter star" geeky shit. Punk making fun of it in the post-show promo with FTR and the  again at the media scrub, telling Meltz he would not be giving him five stars with this one, I find actually quite refreshing. Yeah, reality sets in sometimes, and unless a match totally falls apart, it's not a big deal when the overall match is terrific, which to me it was, and the audience was not affected past about 10 seconds of it (which is factual, the crowd was hot as hell for the entire thing).

My issue is that the first time was great. Ended up being a subversion of the tired finisher stealing trope. It managed to make Punk look like a prick, because he was trying something out of his depth just to fuck with Page, and it made Hangman look cool because he wasn't getting hit by his own shitq. And then some minutes later Punk goes for it again, and then Page has to stand there just to make sure it hit this time... I wasn't very pleased. Both are experienced enough to know they don't need that to make the match work.

I did like Punk countering the Buckshot by just taking some steps forward, tho. Felt "logical". And the superplex spot had me nervous. It felt like Punk was going to give Page the meanest brainbuster.

[Embrodak]

10 hours ago, Jesse Ewiak said:

Maybe between some wrestlers probably being lost in the shuffle because they're not all that creative and other wrestlers making questionable creative decision shows that sometimes, wrestlers being able to do whatever they want actually isn't good business, in the long run. Again, Punk being in overlong matches against low and mid-carders for months and Danielson & Moxley currently being in a faction where they have random matches against lower card guys and entertaingly squash them may be what they want to do, but perhaps, just perhaps, sometimes you need to be able to tell a wrestler, "you're doing this, because it'll make us money and it'll be good entertainment." 

Punk is making a killing on merch sales and just had one of the best feuds in the history of the company with MJF, so I think he’s mostly been doing the right thing. Agreed that he didn’t need to have so many matches against jobbers, but seven years of ring rust is probably intimidating. *Completely* agreed on BD running around with Mox, though, that shit is such a misuse, especially coming off the heels of BD ascending to becoming basically the greatest World of Sport heel of all time and a perpetually credible title contender.

[Timbo Slice]

Again, what makes people think Bryan didn’t ask for the role he’s in currently? He seems to have autonomy over basically everything he wants to do, so there’s a good chance he wanted to go this route for now. Plenty of time for him to have the title run everyone thinks he should have. 

[Big Pete]

On 6/1/2022 at 1:08 AM, The Thread Killer said:

I don't understand.  The world doesn't make sense to me anymore.  I watched that match. I thought it was okay. At first I appreciated the fact that they seemed to be going more Tupelo Concession Stand Brawl and less ECW arena brawl, so I was enjoying it to a degree.  But then they pulled out the ladders, and the tables, and the barbed wire, and I became disenchanted. And then Jake Hager was involved in choking out Bryan Danielson, and I became upset. Bryan Danielson should be wrestling technical classics in the Main Event of PPV's, and Jake Hager should be appearing at the auto show and charging $5 for his autograph, and then getting depressed when nobody wants an autograph and more people line up to see Virgil than him. 

You're not alone.

For me if you're going to have a wild brawl then you ought to commit to it and put all the typical wrestling stunts to the side. Instead you've got guys going through tables, guys taking piledrivers on steel steps and just the usual chicagnary all the while the commentators are yucking it up on commentary. It really wasn't until 20 minutes in when it was down to Moxley/Danielson - Jericho/Hager that I could finally bite into it. I thought the finish was laid out and actually enjoyed that it was Danielson that took the fall. I couldn't have cared less if it was Ortiz, with Danielson it doesn't sit well.

Granted like you I had issues with the casting too. I just can't take 2.0 seriously in this environment and didn't care to watch them stand toe to toe with Eddie who is supposed to be a killer. The only time I cared about Eddie in that match was when he arrived with a can of gasoline.

However, I can accept that fans LOVED the match and like Stadium Stampede it'll go down as one of the most memorable matches of 2022. That's fine but like a critically acclaimed movie, you can walk away from it and not consider it the greatest thing you've seen.

[strobogo]

More than ECW, I was getting heavy Nasty Boys/PE/Harlem Heat plunderfests vibes. If only they had done split screens. But that kind of match seems like it would suck in the arena because unless they're in your area, you're missing 75% of the action

[Jmare007]

I'm way more upset about Danielson not being booked for Dynamite (and it seems Rampage too) than anything involving him at DoN. I think we should've gotten an confrontation with Eddie before the Blood and Guts announcement. I guess the "drama" will be if Dragon actually joins the team for the cage match but him missing this week on TV doesn't sit right with me.

[Embrodak]

11 hours ago, Timbo Slice said:

Again, what makes people think Bryan didn’t ask for the role he’s in currently? He seems to have autonomy over basically everything he wants to do, so there’s a good chance he wanted to go this route for now. Plenty of time for him to have the title run everyone thinks he should have. 

Did you notice the post was saying that Tony should have told Danielson that it was a bad idea and they’re not doing that

[NintendoLogic]

I finally succumbed to the hype and watched AITA, and to say it greatly exceeded my expectations would be an understatement. More than ECW or Memphis, it felt like the best possible WarGames match to me. You had the wild bloody brawling and multiple intersecting storylines without the constraints imposed by the cage and staggered entrances. There was even a possible callback to the 1992 WarGames with the use of the turnbuckle hook as a weapon. There was also a bit of New Japan elimination match psychology with Santana and Ortiz sacrificing themselves to take 2.0 out of commission. The plunder spots felt organic and not overly contrived for the most part, which I greatly appreciated. I also popped for Jericho instantly becoming the biggest heel in the arena by smashing the soundboard to cut off Wild Thing. I'm not sure how I'd rate it as a wrestling match, but it was an incredible spectacle that left me thoroughly (sports) entertained.

[Matt D]

In case you're curious about the Segunda Caida thoughts: Phil covered a few things over at the Ringer and I covered 3 matches over at SC, including 1000 words on the main.

[Timbo Slice]

11 hours ago, Embrodak said:

Did you notice the post was saying that Tony should have told Danielson that it was a bad idea and they’re not doing that

Except Tony is letting the vets call their own shots, or at the very least, letting them heavily influence how they want to participate in the shows. That’s how it’s been basically since the start. Considering what Bryan has done, I’d rather he do what HE wants rather than what we want. Because it’s pretty clear that he’s been doing great at whatever he wants to do. Just because he’s not constantly having 60-minute TV epics doesn’t mean he’s not enjoyable.

[Embrodak]

16 hours ago, Timbo Slice said:

Except Tony is letting the vets call their own shots, or at the very least, letting them heavily influence how they want to participate in the shows. That’s how it’s been basically since the start. Considering what Bryan has done, I’d rather he do what HE wants rather than what we want. Because it’s pretty clear that he’s been doing great at whatever he wants to do. Just because he’s not constantly having 60-minute TV epics doesn’t mean he’s not enjoyable.

I mean for me, the fact that this is what he’s doing is proof that being a veteran doesn’t keep you from having bad and counterproductive ideas. I don’t want people just doing whatever they want, I want a Booker with some actual experience and a more thorough follow through than Tony typically comes with.

[sek69]

The argument that Tony is letting the veterans do whatever stupid shit they want seems to fly in the face of the fact he took full control of the booking *because* the EVPs were doing whatever the fuck they they want to the point of the famous not-yet-over Dark Order beatdown show closing angle.  I think it's far more likely that between AEW, the Jaguars trying to pull themselves out of the sewer, Fullham returning to the Premier League, and whatever the hell he's trying to do with ROH, he's reached the point where even Adderall isn't enough anymore. 

[Jimmy Redman]

I did watch the PPV, I've just been down with COVID since then, and to be honest the show didn't whip me up into my usual frenzy.

The Anarchy match was insane and so far and away the best thing on the show. Felt super special. Chaos from the get go and mayhem at every turn. Wild Thing just continuing to play in the background over and over until Jericho wrecked the sound system was awesome. Eddie and Garcia going to the back and eventually getting trapped in a lift to kill each other unseen... only for Eddie to reappear covered in blood with a fucking petrol can ready to set a motherfucker on fire... that was pretty much the greatest visual in the history of our great sport. And I liked how Eddie dousing Bryan in petrol was the catalyst for Bryan to lash out at him and eventually lose the match and start something between him and Eddie because, well, yeah. The threat of immolation is a pretty valid beef. Whole thing ruled from start to finish.

I like the idea of the Owen Cups, and everything Owen-related, up to and including Martha Hart giving that speech and (unironically) controlling her narrative in wrestling, I guess. Plus I am super pumped for next year's PPV crowd to dress up like they're going to the races. Make it happen.

The Owen Cups in terms of wrestling, I just don't really understand what they were trying to be. What do the winners get? Who gets to enter? Is it for midcarders, stars, somewhere in between? And I guess more to my point, what ultimately was the point if they went through all that just to give Britt fucking Baker another title? They just refuse to sit her down and it is hurting everyone else in the division. And at least Charlotte is Charlotte, I really don't get anything out of Britt except for her ability to find the hard cam. I mean they do this big "redemption" angle for Ruby and bring in RANCID for her to just lose another match clean to the fucking dentist? You beat Toni Storm just to put the fucking dentist over again?

I'm pretty sure I said this exact thing after the last PPV and nothing has changed. They need to do something with the fucking women. Britt all over everything. Barely heard a peep out of Thunder Rosa since she won the belt. Jade learning on the job with the midcard title makes sense, but it also makes for foregone conclusions for title matches. It just feels like nothing is moving forward with any of them, even as they add theoretically valuable pieces like Toni, Mercedes, now Athena.

I am also the person on earth who cares the least about Cole so that doesn't help either. The more AEW becomes like late-stage NXT the less interested I am.

Also the heels wearing pink in their respective matches really telegraphed the winners and took me out of it.

The show was still 17 hours too long. Lucky for me I had to watch it in shifts. Could not care less about Kyle fucking O'Reilly. I love Jade but again, her matches are foregone conclusions and TBS Title defenses are probably best left for TV. Didn't even bother watching the Hardyz match. The Sammy Guevara match seemed pointless besides debuting Paige Van Zant in a safe environment, but again, seemed like something better suited for TV. The tag title cluster exceeded expectations, especially that late in the show, but why the fuck do they keep doing these multi-man tag title matches only for the champs to retain when they seem to be the least interesting team at any moment? And I say that as someone who loves Jungle Boy and likes the literally dinosaur more than most. Again, it seems like absolutely nothing has changed about the tag titles since the last PPV, three months ago.

Rosa vs. Serena I really liked, especially the first half when they leaned heavily into the technical stuff. It felt almost lucha title match-esqe. Wish I could have had more of it, and in a better spot.

Not really sure what to make of the main event. I liked it, it had intensity, but it also felt like it missed a higher gear. I kind of agree with the above discussion, that Punk stealing the Buckshot would have worked better if he'd tried it and fucked it up, and never did it again. It would sell the idea of him being a dick and stealing the move, but also being Old Man Punk and not being able to physically execute it. But I just generally hate finisher stealing spots. The finish itself I didn't like at all, because I fucking hate it when babyfaces are made to look like fools. Standing there staring at a foreign object with CONFLICTION~! for way too long just to turn around into a finisher and get pinned made him look stupid, not complex. But in the bigger picture, I think the time was right to end the Hangman reign and also to give Punk the belt, and I'm intrigued by what an Old Man Punk title reign looks like. Also what Hangman does next.

The MJF squash was perfect, whether or not you factor in the weird weekend stuff. They need to go nuts with Wardlow. Super not wild about the idea of continuing this worked shoot nonsense with Max once it inevitably becomes mostly a work. I feel like we're hurtling inevitably towards Tony Khan becoming a TV character, and honestly I think some small piece of AEW's soul will die when that happens. As much as we enjoy his coke-fuelled nonsense and markiness on Twitter, a significant thing AEW has going for it is the lack of on-screen authority figures, and a lack of the real life boss as a TV character. If this devolves into MJF vs. Tony I'm gonna fucking hate it.