All in all, this was a great show. If I had a douchebag rating scale (and I am a douche), then I would teeter the grade between B+ and A- with me leaning towards the former.
This show was definitely better than Fyter Fest and Fight For The Fallen, mostly due to the fact that those two events didn’t feel like they had a strong sense of purpose other than to remind people that AEW is here.
However, I’m not a fan of AEW going long and ending nearly at midnight. I noticed that the company did the same thing at Fight For The Fallen and I wasn’t a fan of Cody simply brushing it off (transcript courtesy of ringsidenews.com):
“So I guess the way we look at it is that we have all these guys and all these girls that we’ve signed. We don’t wanna do one-minute matches — we believe in them. We want guys to go out there and play their music, that’s why we hired them. We’re not going to teach you anything, that’s Dean Malenko’s job, that’s Jerry Lynn’s job.”
“So it was a little lengthy this evening, but here’s my take on it: at the end of the night nobody left. I’ll tell you the truth if anyone went to the Ring Of Honor shows that The Bullet Club or The Elite was on at the end of the night, that’s what started all of this. Us being in there going ‘what do we do? how do we send them home happy?'” Whether Marty [Scrull] sings or Kenny says something, we came up with 1,000 things, but that genuine feeling is a genuine connection with the people it’s not even a marketing tactic, man. AEW was everyone who was in the arena tonight.”
Here’s the thing, not every match needs to be some back-and-forth technical, counter or flippy flop fest. One-minute matches can serve a purpose storytelling wise if done correctly. The reason this issue really annoyed me last night was due to coming off of NXT UK and New Japan’s Royal Quest shows earlier in the day. Hopefully Cody and company understand that less is more.
I don’t get The Dark Order and I’m not sensing anyone else is either. There match with Best Friends was fine, but I haven’t connected with these guys because I don’t know who they are. I’ve been able to catch more of ‘The Road To’ series leading up to AEW – which was really good BTW – and while I haven’t seen every episode, the ones I’ve watched never explained exactly who they are.
If it was explained, then a simple video package before the match-up should’ve replayed to remind the fans of who these guys are. I made a joke to a friend that they come across as some weird fetish sex cult. That’s what happens when you present creepy guys with no backstory surrounding them. The Dark Order can wrestle, but its 2019, everyone can wrestle now. I need defined and intriguing characters. This is all I ask.
Chris Jericho winning the world title didn’t surprise me. Jericho is a name and the company is wise on trying to use his name to get an audience familiar with his work. I’m indifferent on the result however.
While I understand the business reasoning behind putting the title on Jericho, the guy just isn’t the wrestler he was 10 years ago. Character wise, Jericho is doing a fantastic job as a heel; however, I feel having someone young and filled with promise should've been the first champion. I'm gonna be bold and say that MJF is the guy to pull the trigger on. The guy is the complete package when it comes to being a wrestler and giving him the World title would've been a breath of fresh air. This is no disrespect to Chris Jericho as the guy is a wrestling legend.
However, I don’t feel it was the right call to give Adam “Hangman” Page the title either. He needs more time to connect with the fans. So I don’t hate the decision on putting the title on Jericho. It’s just a shoulder shrug for me right now.
Best match for me goes to the Ladder match with The Lucha Bros and The Young Bucks. This was insane and I hope Nick Jackson is ok after that hard bump through the tables. I will say that my biggest criticism is the selling of some moves.
That Super Canadian Destroyer should’ve killed Matt Jackson (Not literally of course), but yet, it didn’t take long for Matt to get back up and perform another stunt like move. Moves like this take away my suspension of disbelief. If we’re going to do crazy shit then please sell the hell out of it. This is the company that’s billing themselves as a legitimate sport (like New Japan Pro Wrestling), so selling should be crucial. Again, loved the match but I just wish the selling was stronger.
Very happy with Santana & Ortiz coming to AEW. If you have no idea who these guys are then trust me, this is a top-notch tag team that can not only go inside the ring, but cut strong promos as well. I’m loving AEW’s tag team division at the moment.
Storytelling wise, Cody Rhodes vs. Shawn Spears was the best match of the show, though there are certain things I don’t agree with. For one, Spears should’ve won. He no longer feels like a credible main event threat. Even if Spears won by nefarious means, build up momentum for the former WWE star and then have Cody finally defeat him months later.
Also, I wasn’t big on Arm Anderson nailing a spinebuster onto Spears. It was a cool moment, but it did make Spears look like a chump. This isn’t the end of the world for Spears as he can be rebuilt, but I just feel that the company went the wrong direction here somewhat. Still, a great match that I was most looking forward to thanks to the strong build coming in.
Pac and Omega was very good, but the lack of storyline coming in kind of ruined it. Also, it didn’t feel like these two left 2
nd gear. I won’t harp on the match too much since it was very last minute. I do like the finish of PAC defeating Kenny Omega via submission. I look forward to an eventual rematch and I like the story they are telling with Kenny Omega at the moment.
Everything else on the show ranged from solid to good. The Triple Threat Cracker Barrel match was crazy fun and I loved it. Overall, this wasn’t a show that blew me away, but it was still a damn good effort and I look forward to the premiere on October 2
nd.