AEW Dynamite Thread 2024

[HarmonicGenerator]

I like how Orange Cassidy has started giving out friendship bracelets to a kid in the front row during his entrance. Wholesome good guy activity.

[Infinity Land]

2 hours ago, BrodyGraham said:

I know we've seen him in tracksuits and stuff in the vignettes he does from home, but have we ever seen PAC in anything but Full Gear when he's in an arena or an 'official' AEW setting.

I love the idea that tiny pants and kick pads are his work uniform and he wears them from when he leaves the house/hotel until he gets back and then he'll put on his slacks and Fred Perry top.

Even the AEW announcement press conference I'm pretty sure he was the only person in ring attire.

He's class.

He was which would lead to the Full Gear PPV name as the press conference led to the recurring bit on BTE of Hangman having to get 'Full Gear' ready for Double or Nothing*

*In retrospect an early sign of how on the fly AEW booking would be. The match never happening due to creative differences. Leading to the first official AEW sanctioned match happening on a UK indie shown on youtube as a make good. With Hangman entering the Casino Battle Royale instead.

[Tim Healys Chutney Spoon]

5 hours ago, Supremo said:

Yep. A man who should never wear a shirt.

It’s no wonder people have been inclined to give him a cape. He’s literally Clark Kent.

 

He looks like a geek you see in CEX or a tech shop.

[LaGoosh]

Look at this man. Give him the belt. Give him all the belts. Forever.

 

[JLM]

Dynamite 18/09/22 

Could not agree more with the criticisms of the running order! It actually took me multiple attempts to watch the episode, because the first time I put it on I saw this opener and decided to do something else. It's incredibly frustrating when they have multiple angles involving their top stars that I'm thoroughly invested in at the moment that would all be great hooks to use to start an episode. Last week's opening was fantastic! The recap/aftermath of the Danielson attack with a chilling promo from Mox, immediately followed up with Darby rolling into the arena ready to face him. Front loaded the show with significant, important shit and set the tone for the episode. 

I don't even mind opening the show with a match generally. I fondly remember when OC opening the show meant we'd be getting an International title banger and another chapter of "can OC's weary body survive one more defense?". There was a story we were invested in, the matches were always excellent and there was the real danger that his amazing run could come to an end. This had none of that. This program they're in is just NOTHING. No stakes, no interest, mostly played for comedy and not succeeding at that either. Utterly insane to dedicate the first 25 minutes of the show to this.
 

I also wish they'd stop taking OC for granted. His bulletproof popularity is a curse. People will always be happy to see him and he'll be one of the most beloved performers on the roster regardless of what shit you saddle him with, but that's no excuse to squander him like this. 

Huge fan of the battle for Wheeler Yuta's soul. As I mentioned before, for all the chat about the horrors of the plastic bag, I found Yuta's reaction at All Out to be the most affecting bit of that angle. I'm rooting for the boy and am very disappointed in Claudio in particular for trying to mess with his head. So glad they recapped his excellent performance from Collision too. All too often still feels like the shows outside of Dynamite exist in a separate reality, would love to see more continuity like this, especially when they have these big over-arching stories going on with lots of people involved. 

Hook sure did kill that jobber and walk past Roddy a couple of times. What a build. 

Private Party promo was tremendous! So often when a lower card act gets jumped or taken out in service of a top of the card angle they just get forgotten about.  When they had their trios match with Komander against the jobbers on Collision a few days later I assumed that was going to happen here. So great to hear them all pissed off and fired up. I had definitely been underrating Kassidy. The Hardys/Brother Zay act was such a turn off for me that the stink stayed on him, then when Private Party came back and just settled into lower card mediocrity it didn't do much to change that. However, he is consistently a highlight of any silly Rampage match he's thrown into, he is a great underdog/competitive squash guy, he is naturally funny and charismatic *and* he delivered a really good serious promo here with tons of fire and venom. Poor Komander caught a stray in this promo though. "We'll find somebody" for the trios titles shot. Ouch. 

I love the "and defending" bit of Christian's new moniker. What a dick. Wonder if Penelope Ford will come back as part of this Sabian/Patriarchy business. 

Mariah/Sakazaki stuff was better on this episode. I like that Mariah was as much of an arse to Deeb as she is to everyone else. They're both heels but they have no reason to get along and I'm glad they didn't. Solid heat for the attack on Sakazaki. She's a very sympathetic babyface filler defense until Mina returns. 

Bryan/Nige video was outstanding stuff, though it portrayed Nigel as more of a babyface than he's been in his promos. 

Absolutely LOVED the BCC/Private Party stuff. Particularly like the idea that they didn't attack Private Party just because they happened to be in the ring last week, but because they identified their lack of drive and direction. Totally in keeping with Mox's current vision for rebuilding AEW. Always love a villain who has a point. His methods are extreme and can't be condoned but he was not wrong in anything he said. This felt like a massive win for Private Party even though they got destroyed. Shafir looked like a total bad ass for the entire thing too, can't express enough how much I love this role for her. Claudio's chokebreaker is going to look so devastating on poor Yuta. All capped off with a triumphant hero moment and statement of intent and the people chanting "Darby". Absolute home run segment. 

Good little vignette for Jack Perry. Always a fan of little reminders/recaps for key characters who aren't featured on the episode. Not something AEW always remember to do so was happy to see it. 

No surprise at all that Mortos gave Ricochet his best AEW match so far. The man does not miss, and if you're a high flyer he is guaranteed to make you better. God I love Mortos. What an amazing run he's had since April, frequently the star of any multiman match he's added to, and having singles belters against Rey Fenix, Darby, Hologram, Claudio, Takeshita and now Ricochet. That's not even counting the crackers he's had in ROH that only the maniacs watched against Komander, Mark Briscoe and Blake Christian. He even made me interested in an AR Fox singles match. So much great stuff still to do as well. Off the top of my head I want singles matches against Ospreay, Lio Rush, Kyle O'Reilly, Orange Cassidy, Buddy Matthews. I also hold out hope that Bandido will return to us one day and that would be a banger as well. 

I nearly started applauding on my couch when Double J said he wasn't letting Hangman lay a finger on Tony Schiavone. Too fucking right. Hangman trying to convince himself that he'll get the catharsis he needs if he just continues on this path of endless vengeance is brilliant. As others have said, it's the best character in the business. Phenomenal stuff. Intrigued to see what he does to get rid of Satnam Singh. Feel like there's scope for it to be something really fucked up. 
 
Again thought Ricochet sounded better than I remember him in the backstage bit with Ospreay. He's never going to be a great promo but this was perfectly acceptable delivery. 

Main event was a belter. It's almost standard that AEW can throw out these insane star studded multiman crackers on TV every week now, but I really loved this one. The Takeshita/Ospreay tension, the Okada/Ospreay tease, more tasters of Okada/Takeshita, great heroic moments for Fletcher, Ospreay and Fletcher using the Aussie Open finish. Lots of great action but also very well laid out to keep all the stories within it ticking over. Also the sequence with Ospreay trying to fight both Bucks was some real martial arts movie shit, and the Bucks' double stomp/rebound into sit out powerbomb on Ospreay was a thing of beauty. Cracking match. 

Lots of stuff to like on this show. Not perfect, but the stuff that needs to be hitting the most is all doing that for me. Hook/Roddy is a cold feud, Mariah May is still nowhere near where she needs to be as champion (though this week was better than the past few shows), the Jericho/Cassidy match and its position on the show are unforgiveable. However, the big interwoven Mox/Darby/Yuta and everyone else story is excellent, the Hangman story is wonderful, Mortos killed it yet again and I enjoyed the main event and am interested in all of the various potential directions with all six guys involved. 
 

Edited September 23, 2024 by JLM

[The King of Old School]

Has Mortos won a match yet?

[Chili]

29 minutes ago, The King of Old School said:

Has Mortos won a match yet?

Yes, but nothing massively highlighted on TV. At the moment he's a roadblock for bigger faces to overcome essentially, and he's very good at it.

[The King of Old School]

He's obviously very good, but really difficult to get invested in him when he loses against anyone of any name value.

Hoping he gets to beat someone of decent value soon as he has real potential to go far from what I have seen.

[HarmonicGenerator]

51 minutes ago, Chili said:

Yes, but nothing massively highlighted on TV. At the moment he's a roadblock for bigger faces to overcome essentially, and he's very good at it.

They mention him having pinned Mark Briscoe most times he appears, it’s more highlighted than a lot of wins even if he hasn’t managed anything like it again yet.

[LaGoosh]

1 hour ago, The King of Old School said:

Has Mortos won a match yet?

He won a tag match on Rampage and a 10 men tag on Collision this week. His singles record is...not great.

They need to get him and Rush as a full time team asap. "The Beast and The Bull". Strap them up and they will instantly breath new life into the tag division. It'll be gold dust.

[Kamran]

Grand Slam card:

 

Road to Grand Slam:

 

Edited September 25, 2024 by Kamran

[Supremo]

Great show.

Excellent job making a half empty building look really impressive. They’ve become experts at this.

Fun, lovely opener. Nothing too mad, nobody crushed their own skull in, but some of that liquid wrestling was an absolute delight and it was just really nice to see McGuinness get this moment. I’m clearly a horrible person because I originally thought Nigel shouted, “FUCK YOU!” before tapping. Really nice touch that he actually said, “thank you.” I trust Nigel to completely flip the bit now, pretending he always loved Bryan, taking every opportunity to praise him at the commentary desk. “Can I just shock you? I love digging for clams.”

Tony Khan has a lot of flaws, and is a spineless whopper of a boss, but then he does stuff like this and you remember how ridiculously great it is that a hardcore fan has so much money so as to make these lovely moments happen. Sting gets his big retirement. Owen Hart’s family gets to celebrate his legacy in an environment they’re comfortable in. Nigel McGuinness gets his last hurrah. Fair play, Tony. Like Sam Beckett in Quantum Leap. Leaping from dark moment to dark moment. Putting right what once went wrong.

Fun match between HOOK and Roddy. Best HOOK has looked in ages. Strong might be the most underrated wrestler in the business. What are we even doing keeping this Undisputed Kingdom thing going. MJF has already returned and turned heel! Just call it a day. I don’t even know how you bring Adam Cole back at this point, everyone and everything has moved on so much.

Nice moment with the HOOK and Taz. Glad to see the back of the FTW Title.

A complete belter of a Tag Title match. This is an even funnier image in retrospect.

“Fancy having an absolute ripper, lads?”

”Yeah, go on. Why not?”

But where the fuck have these Young Bucks been all year?! Kenny’s in Japan training for a return, isn’t he? It’s like when the Landlord comes round and you pretend you live in the cleanest, tidiest house imaginable. The Cleaner, indeed. Young Bucks hear Kenny is coming back, so actually start trying again. Phenomenal stuff. Maybe they could actually drag something half decent out of modern-day Kota Ibushi*.

*Nah.

Reminder though; as if the expectations weren’t high enough already, Ospreay vs. Ricochet has now got to follow this. Bonkers.

MVP! Holy shit! Finally! With any luck he knocked out Chris Jericho as soon as he entered the arena and we never see him again.

Fun women’s match. Maybe I’ve written Mariah May off too soon. She’s felt a bit like Wardlow or Hangman, where they didn’t know what to do with them once they’d told their big story, but she’s slowly putting it back together. Plus; Willow appearance! Makes everything better.

Motivated Moxley is the scariest man alive. Fantastic main event. Darby’s the best. It might not be his time just yet, but he is absolutely raising that World Title at some point in the next year.

Shit, though. This is it, isn’t it? It’s over.

This is Jon Moxley on October 12th, walking into Bryan Danielson’s hometown, killing him, taking his belt and retiring him. Wrestledream? Wrestlenightmare!

If nothing else, once Mox is raising the belt and smashing Bryan to smithereens like he’s Milky in This is England, at least Nigel McGuinness and Eddie Kingston can run in and make the save. Maybe the real Championships were the friends we made along the way.

TLDR; Brilliant show, let down by a severe lack of The Beast Mortos.

Edited September 26, 2024 by Supremo

[Guest]

6 hours ago, Supremo said:

I’m clearly a horrible person because I originally thought Nigel shouted, “FUCK YOU!” before tapping. Really nice touch that he actually said, “thank you.”

I was absolutely certain that is exactly what he said and JR just missed it/covered for it.

[digforvictory]

Really fun show I thought and yeah they did a great job making the arena look packed. I mean I think it was still about 8k which is very big by Dynamite standards and I thought they were a good crowd too, loud and into almost everything. 

The idea of Mox being the one to retire Danielson from full time wrestling is a scenario i'd have hated a month ago, but this recent heel turn has completely invigorated Moxley and you can tell he's into this story. He's miles better now than he has been for years.

Heel Mox going on a reign of terror as World Champ with nobody able to stop him until a certain Mad King returns? Oh i'd love to see that.

Edited September 26, 2024 by digforvictory

[DavidB6937]

Yeah gotta give them credit. Everyone had their working boots on last night and really felt like an excellent show from start to finish. Can't really think of anything that bothered me too much. Well, until I saw a video of TK doing the CEO dance. That's enough to set anyone off.