AEW Revolution 2022 *Potential Spoilers*

[RedRooster]

15 hours ago, d-d-d-dAz said:

I think Adam Cole only ever being an NXT guy is detrimental to AEW, to be honest. I just don’t see him as a big star. AEW feels to me like it’s the big show - maybe not the biggest, but certainly top tier - and NXT is just a developmental program where most the guys don’t go on to do much.

I really don't think that matters. Brodie Lee, Malaki Black, Andrade and even Jake Hager had lackluster runs on the WWE main roster, and they still, to varying degrees, feel like big stars. Cole is clearly really popular when you look outside of these forums. I don't understand why, but I don't think there's anything detrimental about using him as a top star in AEW. Having said that, Cole hasn't exactly been on a hot streak of feuds since joining AEW, and I think this hurt the match. 

But I think AEW has a problem with Page right now, and that his next feud is absolutely pivotal. I honestly think the next best opponent for him would be Jericho - and they can tell the story of him trying to exorcise his defeat to Jericho in the first ever AEW title match. Jericho has been strong on the mic lately (granted, he's had a great person to bounce off in Eddie Kingston) and you'd have to hope would fire up the crowd, and help elevate this match. 

[Supremo]

I’m obsessed with that Punk entrance, with the old music, old gear and old mannerisms. Goosebumps on goosebumps. From the reaction it got in the arena and online I’m clearly in the minority, but I don’t care. I don’t think anything has ever catered so specifically to me as a tragic wrestling dork. Like he took it right out of my geeky little brain. God bless that man. I’m so happy he came back and is having the time of his life doing everything he’d never be allowed to do in WWE. Long may it continue.

Having now forced myself to finish the show, my main thoughts remain the same. These shows are too long, with too much going on. Even splitting it up as a TV viewer and watching it in a handful of sittings doesn’t really fix the problem because those live in the arena don’t have that privilege, so the heat still dies about two hours in, leaving the second half the show suffering massively.

I don’t know what the answer is but something needs to change. It’s like looking forward to meeting up with your best friends a few times a year, only for them to always insist on an all-you-can-eat buffet that makes you feel sick and regret coming.

[Guest]

Re the show length, I don’t think it was that bad if you don’t watch it in one sitting with the pre show. Pre show only needed the 6 man, if we Think back to when the pre show was Nackazama nonsense it’s masiviy changed days and the same length. Deffo think a cooler match, like QT vs Paul wight in December would have been better than say the Strickland signing 

[The King of Old School]

Unfortunately AEW are suffering from WWE's Wrestlemania "must get everyone on the card" look.

PPV's should be special, 4 hour events including the pre show with 8/9 matches.

I think for instance, seeing as the Rampage before the show is always at the same arena as the PPV, a few of those matches could just happen there instead of cramming them all in.

Hook/QT, Leyla/Statlander & both of the trio's matches could have easily happened on Friday.

Crowd was brilliant for the first 3 matches, died for the Womens matches, picked up at parts during Punk/MJF & Danielson/Moxley, then were back on form for the trios and main event.

 

[RedRooster]

6 minutes ago, Supremo said:

I’m obsessed with that Punk entrance, with the old music, old gear and old mannerisms. Goosebumps on goosebumps. From the reaction it got in the arena and online I’m clearly in the minority, but I don’t care. I don’t think anything has ever catered so specifically to me as a tragic wrestling dork. Like he took it right out of my geeky little brain. God bless that man. I’m so happy he came back and is having the time of his life doing everything he’d never be allowed to do in WWE. Long may it continue.

Having now forced myself to finish the show, my main thoughts remain the same. These shows are too long, with too much going on. Even splitting it up as a TV viewer and watching it in a handful of sittings doesn’t really fix the problem because those live in the arena don’t have that privilege, so the heat still dies about two hours in, leaving the second half the show suffering massively.

I don’t know what the answer is but something needs to change. It’s like looking forward to meeting up with your best friends a few times a year, only for them to always insist on an all-you-can-eat buffet that makes you feel sick and regret coming.

I agree with all of this. I don't think it's an insurmountable challenge for them, either. They have their quarterly specials, and they could utilise those shows better. They could theme the pre-PPV Dynamite/Rampage as "Road to" shows, or even make it a PPV week, in which they give away some of the bigger matches. Heck, that would probably help their ratings too. 

They could even introduce more PPVs, and reduce the impact on your wallet by allowing the purchase of a "year pass" or something. 

If they actually do address this problem, pretty much every PPV they run would end up being in contention to be an all-time classic. 

 

[LaGoosh]

14 minutes ago, Supremo said:

I don’t know what the answer is but something needs to change. It’s like looking forward to meeting up with your best friends a few times a year, only for them to always insist on an all-you-can-eat buffet that makes you feel sick and regret coming.

It's a weird thing to complain about having too much amazing content in one show but you're right. As they only do four PPV's a year it always feels like they try to make them MEGA events packed to the brim with EPIC matches. Realistically, I think they should probably do six PPV's a year rather than four. They easily have the talent and storylines to do this. Then it's just a simple case of keeping the shows at three hours max and pacing the matches a bit better. Buy-In included there were 12 matches on Sunday night. Almost all of them were very good. At least five of them would have been perfect to have held over to the following Dynamite and Rampage. 

EDIT: looks like we all had the same thought at the same time.

Edited March 8, 2022 by LaGoosh

[DavidB6937]

You can bitch and moan about these shows being too long but they're still shorter than that time Bret Hart hit Vince with a chair.

[Supremo]

Yeah, I feel almost a dickhead complaining about so many amazing wrestlers having so many amazing matches on one night but it's too much to stomach in one sitting. You can't have that crazy six-man on the Buy-In, then that bonkers Young Bucks match, and then three more hours of wrestling. Everyone doesn't have to to be on every show.

Let's focus on what really matters though. Regal, Danielson and Moxley forming the Double Hard Bastards has the most potential of anything ever. Glorious.

But yeah, CM Punk winning the Owen Hart tournament and then giving Bret a huge hug? I'd cry my fucking eyes out.

[Factotum]

To be honest AEW PPVs being long doesn't bother me as they're few and far between. It feels like a special show.

They probably could cut some of it out, but I have no issue with it, especially when most of the events deliver.

[Infinity Land]

FTR, The Acclaimed, Lance Archer, Men of the Year (wrestling), Daniel Garcia, PnP, Deeb, Ruby Soho are probably some people that have been pushed to some extent in the recent past that would be deserving of a PPV appearance. Didn't include Dante Martin since he's back to Top Flight and Shida since they only just returned from injury. Plus there are a few others.

The one thing you can't say is they tried to cram everyone on the show.

[Supremo]

I think part of the problem is also the style. Everyone having the freedom to all try and have the best match of the night sounds like a great thing, and it’s certainly preferable to WWE forcing everyone to have an average, forgettable match to protect the main event, but four star sprint after four star sprint is exhausting after a few hours.

[BomberPat]

14 hours ago, jazzygeofferz said:

Britt countering Rosa's attempt at the lockjaw by biting when nobody tries to do that whenever she applies it was stupid.

My take on this is that it's like how Foley described the Mandible Claw, back when it was actually sold as a vicious nerve-hold rather than "oh no, a stinky sock in your mouth", apparently as explained by Dr. Sam Sheppard, that if applied properly, you trap the nerves under the tongue and prevent the recipient for biting down on your hand. It's kayfabe nonsense, but it sounds plausible. So Thunder Rosa knows how to apply it properly, in such a way that her opponent can't bite her, because she's a dentist and understands the mechanics of it all. Thunder Rosa, meanwhile, isn't a dentist, so wasn't able to do it as successfully.

And that makes sense - I'm never a big fan of the "use another wrestler's finish" spots, because finisher psychology is pretty tenuous at best. If a move is winning every match for one wrestler, why wouldn't every wrestler start using that move? If you establish that it works for that one wrestler because there's a knack to it that only they have figured out, you're going some way to answer that question. 

47 minutes ago, Supremo said:

I’m obsessed with that Punk entrance, with the old music, old gear and old mannerisms. Goosebumps on goosebumps. From the reaction it got in the arena and online I’m clearly in the minority, but I don’t care.

I think a lot of the online reaction has been overthinking nonsense, to be honest. I saw people saying that the crowd expected to be able to sing along to Cult of Personality and were robbed of that, when just watching the show makes it clear that wasn't the case - that was the whole reason they had MJF troll the audience with it, to give them that moment, and then it was played again when Punk won anyway. I watched with my girlfriend, who has never seen Punk in ROH, and she just asked something like, "is this his old music, then?". The announcers flat out told everyone that it was a throwback to the CM Punk of old.

I don't know if it's that people are used to WWE spoonfeeding them information, or if it's just overthinking what a "casual fan" might think, but it's pretty clear what they were doing even if you didn't immediately recognise it. Ultimately, when the promotion tells you that something's a big deal, fans generally accept it as one - my go-to example is how in the Attitude Era the WWF had us convinced that blokes like Arnold Skaaland and Ernie Ladd were absolute top tier wrestling legends, because that's how they talked about them when they showed up on TV. 

 

I absolutely loved this show. Don't think there was a bad match on there, including the pre-show, while Punk/MJF and Danielson/Moxley were both absolutely phenomenal, Cole/Page exceeded expectations, all things considered, and the tag title match was fantastic. The only real downsides to me were some aspects of the ladder match, and Thunder Rosa not going over - though that's almost certainly to set her up for a win in San Antonio pretty soon, so no real complaint there. I didn't watch it all in one sitting, so no real complaints about length for me either. I don't think the crowd were even particularly burned out - they were hot for the main event, in a way that most WWE shows would be desperate for.

 

I'm usually really critical of AEW repeating spots, and there was a bit of that here - a few Tombstone Piledrivers, and at least three matches with crossface variations - but the show was good enough that I didn't even find myself annoyed by that.

I agree that the pacing of individual matches could use a bit more micro-management, but the other side of that coin is that CM Punk is showing himself to be one of the best minds in wrestling during this run - and more interesting than I think he's ever been before - and I think that's precisely because he does have the freedom to structure matches in ways that make sense to him, rather than as dictated from on-high. If we have to have a few too many mad sprints and spotfests, but in exchange we get matches structured like Punk/MJF and Danielson/Moxley, I'll take that deal every time.

Edited March 8, 2022 by BomberPat

[Loki]

Too long, too many wrestlers crammed onto the card, too many long matches and a burnt-out crowd.   I think that plus the WWE matchup of Danielson/Moxley and the Adam Cole main event, gave me a feeling of deja vu here - this felt a lot like a WWE PPV, and not a good one.

My favourite match was actually the Hardy/Sting/Andrade multi-man match - I thought that was an excellent brawl into the crowd with some cracking spots.  Pity Jeff Hardy woofed the finish though, typical Jeff.  It looked a LOT like Sting drove his forehead through a table and was legit woozy afterwards, so I hope he's ok.  I also am a big fan of Eddie Kingston and enjoyed that a lot - no need for the belly though!  Shades of Jake Roberts in Wrestling With Shadows.

I don't know if it was JUST burnout but the crowd seemed oddly subdued at times I thought they'd be rocking, like the dog collar match.  The sound mix was off a lot of the night, so it might just have been that.

AEW seems to have morphed from this outlaw but big budget wrestling alternative to an AEW/ROH/NXT tribute and I'm not sure that's so much of a good thing.  I love Regal, don't get me wrong, but he just solidifies that direction - I'd not be totally shocked if HHH turns up in a few months to point at new hirings.

I guess we're into the difficult period for any upstart federation - they've naturally burnt through the excitement of the first couple of years, they've loaded their roster up with available talent, and now they need to decide what the future is.  Personally, I think they need to take another leaf out of the WWE playbook and make the Champion the focus - and at the moment that's not happening with Page.  Make Punk the champ (though personally he leaves me cold as ever) if you're going to structure the biggest programs around him.  Have a headline pairing on each PPV poster, so it's clear what the main event is, and save some of these other matches for Dynamite main events.

 

 

[The King of Old School]

Really interesting where Punk goes now.

I'm guessing he's done with MJF even though they are 1-1, and MJF moves on to a more detailed story with Wardlow.

Are we getting "Blood and Guts" this year?

I think Punk would like to be the first winner of the OHC, then maybe move onto title contention after that. 

Hangman/Punk at All Out a year after he debuted would be a huge sell I think. Not sure what Hangman does for 6 months though.

[LaGoosh]

4 minutes ago, The King of Old School said:

Hangman/Punk at All Out a year after he debuted would be a huge sell I think. Not sure what Hangman does for 6 months though.

Stories with Jericho, Moxley, a returning Kenny Omega and Miro (and some smaller level stuff with Andrade and Malakai Black) would be more than enough to keep him busy and on top.

Edited March 8, 2022 by LaGoosh