AEW Dynamite Thread 2024

[mim731]

Bit deflated by the Okada debut. Not sure why, or what I expected but sticking him with The Bucks just feels lazy. I appreciate it's logical (and perhaps my reaction is not), and sets up feuds with Omega and Kingston, but I think I was hoping for something a bit more interesting for him. 

[RedRooster]

11 minutes ago, The Gaffer said:

Still think the Buck's current character work is the drizzling shits. Proper fans-cosplaying-at-the-controls stuff. Same ballpark as Rollins. 

 

This is a BRILLIANT comparison - I'd not even considered it, but I couldn't agree more. 

[DavidB6937]

I did find the Okada thing a little underwhelming but, if I'm honest, I'm not sure what they could've done to make me care that much. The close association between NJPW/AEW, as fun as it can be for Forbidden Door etc, does mean that there's a big loss in terms of the 'surprise' element and things feeling fresh. So yeah, I just don't actually care that much at the moment.

Obviously match wise I'm sure things will be good enough - as we've seen with Ospreay - but in terms of someone just turning up, it doesn't have much to it

[LaGoosh]

Yeah Okada has turned up on AEW TV enough that him turning up now doesn't really feel like a big deal. 

I'm in two minds about the current Bucks gimmick. I'm enjoying it but at the same time they play everything so wink wink nudge nudge that you can't really buy into it as a believable gimmick.

[Infinity Land]

The Okada debut was spoiled for quite a while now. One of the problems with being terminally online. News he was signed. Initial speculation he would be part of Big Business. Then for the last week or so everyone in the know was saying expect him at the Georgia tapings.

The pairing with the Bucks could be decent. Coming in as a heel rather than coasting on his reputation gives him a direction. A first feud with Eddie that sees him draped in gold. Omega and OC down the line. Getting the dynamic between him and the Bucks will be important. Young boy on BTE bits were funny glimpses into his real life persona, but he needs to be presented as a Boss and not a glorified lackey. They need to avoid the trap Takeshita fell into standing in the background while Callis hogs the spotlight.

Jericho's just leeching onto everyone he can. As he keeps having these CMLL match ups. There is a direction I would be interested in seeing. I just doubt he'd go there. Build to a hair v. hair/mask match with someone at Forbidden Door or a big show in CMLL/AEW. Have him lose and disappear, or at least forced into reinventing himself by stripping him of the look he's been sporting for 5 years.

[DavidB6937]

13 minutes ago, Infinity Land said:

The Okada debut was spoiled for quite a while now. One of the problems with being terminally online. News he was signed. Initial speculation he would be part of Big Business. Then for the last week or so everyone in the know was saying expect him at the Georgia tapings.

Thing is even if it wasn't spoiled, I'd still just be a bit "oh cool" and middling about it. It's a shame as unexpected people turning up can be one of the high points of a wrestling show, and someone like Okada should illicit a pretty crazy reaction but I just feel it's all been a bit watered down by the crossovers. Pros and cons of all of it really.

[mim731]

28 minutes ago, Infinity Land said:

Jericho. There is a direction I would be interested in seeing. Have him lose and disappear.

This is closer to what I'd like to see. 

[thatvinylgeek]

This might just be me...but also to the mainstream AEW fan, Okada might not BE that big of a deal. They are always told he is something special when he appears, but he hasn't really backed it up with any true Okada worthy performances in the promotion. He had the tag, and then the match with Bryan which was billed as the greatest thing ever, but then fell a bit flat even before the injury at the end.

The guy is amazing, I know he's amazing, YOU know he's amazing, but the people who have only seen him in AEW have yet to really see it, and I'm not sure having him as a heel off the bat is the right way to demonstrate it either.

Whereas with Ospreay, each time he has been brought in has had highlight reel matches that immediately make people take notice (whether you are in to his stuff or not).

Edited March 7 by thatvinylgeek
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[Supremo]

Shockingly good show. Considering their usual pattern of failing to capitalise on the momentum of big pay per views and putting on some of their worst shows coming out of them, this was great. New directions, loads of stuff to get excited about. Big thumbs up.

The new set and graphics probably helped keep everything feeling fresh and exciting. They looked gorgeous. A huge improvement on what we had previously.

Convinced that opening segment was some type of wind up though. Three months of returning to the AEW glory days of 2021, proper pro-wrestling again, only to do an opening promo morphing into a fucking impromptu, “can they co-exist,” tag match? What the fuck is this?! Wednesday Night Raw?! Hopefully an aberration. Thankfully, the show returned to its usual (brilliant) beats for the rest of the show, so I’ll let them off this time.

I laughed out loud at Mother Wayne’s, “MOTHER,” T-shirt. The most pro-wrestling T-shirt of all time. Gloriously rubbish. Christian continues to be the best. Running through the arena, stealing the car, still raising the title out of the window as he drove off. Top tier prick.

Kyle O’Rielly still dressing like a scruffy student and looking in desperate need of a shower, but he at least looked like he slept a bit between the pay per view and Dynamite. Progress is progress.

Corporate Okada! Yes! I love it! Amazing swerve. Perfect debut, setting up tonnes of exciting directions. Okada vs. Kingston. Okada vs. Hangman. Okada vs. Omega. Hangman and Omega returning as a team against The Bucks. Okada and the Bucks in matching gear, going for the Trios Titles. You assume Santana is probably having second thoughts about leaving the promotion after watching this, seeing the obvious direction available with Okada and The Bucks against Kingston and Proud and Powerful. Swallow your pride (and power) and pick up the phone, Santana. Come home!

You wonder at what point the TKO executives are going to start asking questions though. The optics are starting to look terrible for Hunter and Shawn. Tony Khan’s bringing in Ospreay, Okada and Mercedes, compared to Triple H bringing in Shawn Spears, Brian Pillman Junior and Tama Tonga. Fucking hell, Paul. Cheapskate. You’re happy to talk about the Netflix money when you need to distract from all the Sex Trafficking. How about you actually spend some of that money and sign some big stars.

Okada and The Bucks immediately mugging for the hard camera made me smile. Bet Hunter was gutted, finally realising what a talent he let slip through his fingers! He knows about the hard cam! We could have made millions with him!

That Okada angle was almost too hot. Be careful, lads. Chris Jericho’s probably already sniffing around. Likely pitching a Jericho/Guevara/Omega Trios to face Okada and the Bucks. “Le Golden Jets.”

Speaking of Chris Jericho, heartfelt condolences to Hook, seemingly becoming Jericho’s next target. Welcome to the Vortex, pal! See the Samoa Joe match, did you Chris? Spy the cool bat signal? Smell some heat and momentum you could leech on to? Oh well, Hook. See you in four months when you’re infinitely less over. Jericho will probably do a clean job at some point, but it won’t matter at all. Nobody benefits from beating Jericho anymore. It means nothing. Guaranteed Hook will be worse off for beating Chris Jericho clean than he was losing clean to Samoa Joe.

You wonder how long this Jericho shit is going to go on. Forget banding together to form a union, the entire roster should band together to extradite Jericho. I can’t imagine it’d be that difficult. There is definitely already a, “Wetherspoons Twat,” WhatsApp group full of lads slagging him off. Ricky Starks is definitely the admin.

But yeah, if someone can miraculously find and destroy all of Jericho’s Horcruxes and finally get him to fuck off for a bit, the best route for Hook’s career revealed itself on this show. I can’t believe it didn’t occur to me before, but turning the FTW Title into a weekly Hardcore belt is a great idea. The perfect excuse to do these weekly garbage brawls. Always fun. Could do wonders for Hook.

Poor Brian Cage, being made to look like he ran straight into a guardrail like a cartoon wally. Convinced they didn’t show Hook moving out of the way because they’d have had to reveal what I imagine was a half empty arena on the side of the hard camera. Another reason why Revolution 2024 will go down as one of the best pay per views in years; the camera men could actually shoot the action and arena however they wanted, without fear of revealing tens of thousands of empty seats. That new set looked significantly smaller than the last one. Hopefully that means they can book some smaller buildings they can fill.

Great women’s match. Hopefully another attempt at rekindling the 2021 magic sees them using Riho more regularly. She’s always great, especially against powerhouses like Statlander who can chuck her about and be a good base for her offence. Next week’s match with Willow should be equally as good. Bring Nyla back!

Mark Briscoe tagging with Double J?! More skits at the farm, please.

Doing the Wardlow match so soon is interesting. An MJF run-in, maybe? How bad was his injury? And more importantly, as much as I do rate Max, I’m not sure I even want him back any time soon! It’s been nice having a proper break from that character. I wouldn’t be in a rush to bring him back. Perhaps he’s already back though. That WWE-style opening segment felt like something we were getting when MJF had booking influence.

Fantastic main event. Through gritted teeth, I hate to admit it, but Will Ospreay is going to be a huge star in the US. He’s problematic, and always has the potential to say something dumb that gets him in hot water, but there’s no denying his talent or the crowd reactions he’s getting. He’s him. Similar to RVD coming to WWE in 2001. It’s the exact same energy. Wild, crazy matches, filled with moves from the future. The promos are irrelevant. The in-ring work is so good that he’s going to make it regardless.

I heard a great description of Will the other day, which is that he’s too stupid to be anything but a great wrestler. There’s so little going on in his head that the idea of phoning it in or cynically saving his bump card is beyond him. He only has one gear, one mode, which is to earnestly give one hundred percent and put on the best match possible. It’s a spot on description. Probably won’t benefit his health in the long run, but compared to lads like Miro and Malakai Black, sulking online and going through the motions when they actually do come to work? Fuck them. Sack the lot of them and push this moron to the moon. Thrilled to be there. Willing to break his neck every single week. A guaranteed banger every time, crowds going crazy, everyone on their feet.

I don’t see any direction other than Will winning the World Title at Wembley. We’re only a week into his AEW run and he’s already undeniable.

That Hidden Blade finish is insane. How on Earth do you work that? Can you work it? Or is he just knocking the living shit out of people?

But yeah. My balls exploded when Danielson’s music hit. I’ve been in A&E ever since. I assume they’ve never wrestled? Cannot wait.

Edited March 7 by Supremo

[LaGoosh]

3 hours ago, RedRooster said:

It was nice to see the show open with a talking segment too, I'd like to see much more of that.

I didn't care for the opening segment at all. A promo face off leading to an impromptu "can they coexist" tag match felt like the most WWE thing they've done for awhile and I could really do without that shit personally.

[BomberPat]

1 minute ago, Supremo said:

Convinced that opening segment was some type of wind up though. Three months of returning to the AEW glory days of 2021, proper pro-wrestling again, only to do an opening promo morphing into a fucking impromptu, “can they co-exist,” tag match? What the fuck is this?! Wednesday Night Raw?! Hopefully an aberration. Thankfully, the show returned to its usual (brilliant) beats for the rest of the show, so I’ll let them off this time.

I was expecting Hangman to interrupt the promo, because it feels like we've had some variation of those three in promo segments for weeks now. That they teased a Swerve vs. Joe match happening, and then bait and switched from that to Can They Co-Exist against Matt Taven and Mike Bennett? Fucking hell, it's a miracle they didn't lose the crowd entirely there and then.

I find it really weird that Ospreay has now fought two members of the Don Callis Family - I assume that Ospreay is turning face eventually and leaving the Family, so it's weird to burn through matches pitting him against them before that happens. 

Speaking of the Don Callis Family, they and Undisputed Kingdom are both in this shit position of being heel stables completely built around their relationship to one babyface who isn't around any more - Undisputed Kingdom only exist in opposition to MJF, and have been struggling to find any relevance without him, especially with Adam Cole injured and the other people they assaulted under masks not giving a shit about them, while the entire point of the Don Callis Family is about Don replacing Kenny Omega, who's also not around. They pivoted to Jericho for a while, but that's been thankfully forgotten about, though Hook has to be wishing that Jericho was still getting knocked about by Powerhouse Hobbs now.

Depending on what Omega's timetable is for a return, I'd have put money on him having a big rematch with Ospreay, them shaking hands afterwards, Ospreay getting kicked out of the Don Callis Family for it, and then building to a run of tag matches of Omega & Ospreay against the Don Callis Family. But now you've got Okada coming in as a heel, siding with the Young Bucks, and Omega getting kicked out of The Elite? You've got a better story with a better career rival for Omega than anything the Don Callis Family can offer.

I was groaning when it looked like Okada was coming in to make the save for Eddie Kingston - they wouldn't be a good pairing, it felt like an underwhelming debut, and it risks stereotyping Eddie Kingston as the guy who's just a fanboy of every Japanese wrestler going. The turn was superb, though, and I love that grouping, so long as Okada and the Bucks are treated as equivalent acts a la Omega and the Bucks, rather than him being their lackey. 

[FLips]

Meltzer usually has some awful takes and is oblivious to the real world, and even he is asking why the fuck Tony Khan is letting one of his biggest stars go out to die on Mount Everest. 

[DavidB6937]

Man I always love the enthusiasm about AEW in reviews and then feel so deflated by the predictable WWE digs. I know I shouldn't but hey. Wish it was possible to just be positive about stuff without that.

[mim731]

40 minutes ago, Supremo said:

You wonder at what point the TKO executives are going to start asking questions though. The optics are starting to look terrible for Hunter and Shawn. Tony Khan’s bringing in Ospreay, Okada and Mercedes, compared to Triple H bringing in Shawn Spears, Brian Pillman Junior and Tama Tonga. Fucking hell, Paul. Cheapskate. You’re happy to talk about the Netflix money when you need to distract from all the Sex Trafficking. How about you actually spend some of that money and sign some big stars.

While I get your point, surely it's TKO holding the purse strings rather than Triple H in that arrangement? 

[BomberPat]

18 minutes ago, FLips said:

Meltzer usually has some awful takes and is oblivious to the real world, and even he is asking why the fuck Tony Khan is letting one of his biggest stars go out to die on Mount Everest. 

it's a bonkers thing, really. I think climbing Mount Everest is something pricks do, and assume he's just hoping Darby summits and makes it back okay so he can get some headlines out of it, but the whole thing is mental. Flat out saying on TV that Darby Allin might die and next week might be his last match, and it's a throwaway thing with Jay White, who's in the middle of a comedy midcard angle. I don't think they necessarily should be building a match around "this lad might die on a mountain, so this could be your last chance to see him", but once you've invoked that, where do you go from there?

I also find it odd that Darby came out with the Tag Titles, made a point of relinquishing it, and acknowledged that he had been asked about defending it with a new partner (I at least like this part, given that MJF and Adam Cole set a precedent for what happens to tag titles when one person can't defend them) - you'd think you'd get all of this out of the way before announcing a tournament to crown new champions?