BRM Reviews the 10/14/2020 Dynamite (One-Year Anniversary)

[Big Red Machine]

Someone has moved an arcade down to ringside so that Kip Sabian and Penelope Ford can play video games instead of pay attention to the wrestling. Yes, really. If Sabian just wants to play video games and not pay attention to the wrestling, why did he bring this machine out here? Why not play video games in the back where there is less of a chance of your expensive arcade machine being destroyed?


AEW WORLD TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: FTR(c) (w/Tully Blanchard) vs. Best Friends)- 7/10
Trent was the babyface in peril. At one point he went head-first into Kip’s arcade machine, breaking it… and apparently in AEW, someone has to go head-first into an arcade machine before the referee can start counting anyone out, because there was no count-out before that, but as soon as that happened, Rick Knox started counting.
Kip was upset about the machine being broken, and ordered Penelope to “go get him.” She ran to the back, and thankfully the match ended before Rusev could run out and cause a DQ. The actual finish was a belt-shot by FTR. The execution on it was excellent.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- Yup. Miro came out and attacked Best Friends because Trent accidentally broke his idiot friends’ arcade machine. F*ck this stupid childish bullsh*t.

SEAN MALUTA & ? vs. KIP SABIAN & MIRO (w/Penelope Ford)- squash
This was a fine squash, but it just makes me wonder they have put Rusev with this goof Kip Sabian instead of just letting him be a badass killer?

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- This arcade console was apparently Kip Sabian’s “most prized possession.” Oh. That would have been nice for us to know before it was destroyed. Also, what sort of moron brings a prized and also easily destroyable possession to a wrestling show?
Rusev also cut a promo. He, too, is angry about this. Rusev feels like he has no agency now. He’s basically Kip Sabian’s sidekick. These promos had good intensity, but I just can’t get into these characters.

LANCE ARCHER IS BEATING MOXLEY UP BACKSTAGE- bad
For the past five months Archer has just gone around assaulting random people. And every time I’ve asked why AEW has done nothing to curtail this. Well tonight, they finally did. Some road agents showed up and told Archer to back off… and the big bad, crazy, violent “muderhawk monster” did just that. That was bad on its own, but it also opens up this can of worms that is a great example of one of the flaws in AEW’s booking.
Unless you’re doing a heel authority figure angle, a wrestling promotion is supposed to be a babyface. The powers that be in the promotion are supposed to care about things like ensuring fair play, making sure fans don’t feel cheated, and taking steps to ensure the safety of their employees. As I noted before, Archer has been running around attacking nobodies for months and AEW has done nothing about it… but now that he attacks Moxley, all of a sudden we have road agents dispatched to break it up? Why is Jon Moxley’s health worth protecting but that of the other random people Archer has assaulted hasn’t been?
Yes, AEW has more invested in Moxley (and particularly tonight, where they want him and Archer to be able to wrestle in the main event, and they are certainly allowed to protect their investment, but the fact that they only take steps to get involved when they have something to lose makes it seem like AEW doesn’t care about their employees other than their ability to make them money, and that’s not how you want a wrestling promotion to be portrayed.
This is yet another failure on AEW’s part to connect the dots in the big picture of their universe; to see how the implications of one segment affect another, and how all of that affects the way the promotion comes off. Time and again in AEW, they have made the promotion seem callous and corrupt. MJF had a solid point that he had a great record but wasn’t given a title shot. No one said anything to Brandi about assaulting people during her Nightmare Collective phase, and nothing has been done about Allie cheating to ensure that she got to be Brandi’s partner in the women’s tag team tournament. The only match in the promotion’s history that didn’t affect someone’s record was a match where company golden goose and EVP Kenny Omega was facing Jon Moxley with a stipulation that played to Moxley’s strengths much more than Kenny’s. They don’t give a sh*t when Lance Archer goes around assaulting people, but the moment Archer puts his hands on someone the company cares about or it puts a match the company cares about in jeopardy, now we have to send people in to stop him. All of these things combine to paint the picture of a horribly corrupt wrestling promotion, and that makes the people kayfabe running- most of whom are supposed to be babyfaces- come off like heels.

MJF, WARLDLOW & INNER CIRCLE SEGMENT- terrible
MJF has gotten Sammy Guevara one of those jackets from the other week, but it’s too big. Jericho demands that Sammy put it on, despite Sammy’s complaints. Who could possibly care about any of this?
They prattle on some more, putting each other over even though we all know they’re not sincere, and occasionally getting into dumb arguments to create forced tension. MJF mentioned Animal Planet, and Jericho got annoyed and told him he hates Animal Planet. Who could possibly care?
MJF claims that he might want to join the Inner Circle. Jericho invites him to a steak dinner next week. Why next week? Why not just go out tomorrow?
They acted as if this steak dinner were a match. This was stupid, goofy bullsh*t. The only part of this that didn’t suck was the brief moments of Wardlow and Hager having a stare-down at the end.

TONY SCHIAVONE AND DR. BRITT BAKER, DMD GET MASSAGES- dumb
We get the standard Britt yelling a Rebel/Reba which hasn’t been funny in months because it’s the same joke over and over again. Then Britt sat up and started to cut a real promo, but that was quickly set aside so she could scream in terror because she thought Schiavone was naked. Then we cut to her encouraging Schiavone to get his chest waxed. We had another cut to Britt being a clown while talking up her return for tonight. We are now almost forty-five minutes into the big anniversary episode of Dynamite and at least half of it has been goofage.

AEW TNT TITLE MATCH: Cody Rhodes(c) (w/Brandi Rhodes & Arn Anderson) vs. Orange Cassidy- 6.75/10
Orange Cassidy stood around doing nothing while Cody circled him. He finally tried to lock up with OC but OC ducked under it. Cody… the bell has already rung! There is nothing wrong with getting behind the guy and attacking him from behind. If you care more about retaining your title than you do about OC’s goofiness, you should just attack him!
OC puts his hands in his pockets so Cody shoves him and the glasses come off and that means that OC cares now, so he locks up with Cody. Of you want to claim that this is “storytelling,” you first have to be able to explain to my satisfaction why Orange Cassidy cared enough to come out and essentially announce himself as a challenger for this title last week, but now that the time for the match has come, he didn’t care until Cody knocked his sunglasses off.
Stuff happened, and we got back from commercial, and OC now cares so much that he’s throwing those stupid, weak, farcical shin-kicks. Again… how does this fit in with the “story” of OC caring/not caring?
John Silver from the Dark Order came out to try to steal the title. The rest of the Dork Order were in the crowd. Orange Cassidy stopped Silver from interfering, then referees came and ejected the entire Dork Order from ringside. OC gave the belt to Arn, and the match continued.
Once the crap was done with, they started to have a good wrestling match, with Cody working over OC’s leg. Cody show-boated a bit. The finish saw OC roll Cody up with a Mouse Trap but time expired at two. I bet OC wishes he hadn’t wasted so much time at the beginning, huh?
Darby Allin was shown watching this match from the crowd. Darby, of course, went to a time-limit draw with Cody at the first official AEW event. That was seventeen months ago. Dynamite is now a year old. And I have to ask the following question: Who in AEW is a bigger star today than they were then? I thought about it for a while, and the only names I came up with were Orange Cassidy, Britt Baker, Big Swole, and MAYBE Sammy Guevara (and the first two of those are clowns, and Swole is a lower-midcarder at best). Everyone else feels like they are at the same level they were than they were one year ago/their debut, or are even worse off. That’s not a good thing at all.

ALEX MARVEZ INTERVIEWS JAKE ROBERTS & LANCE ARCHER- Jon Moxley attacks and they are pulled apart.

TONY SCHIAVONE INTERVIEWS MATT HARDY- He’s healthy and cleared to return to the ring. Matt was the interrupted by a video of Sammy Guevara burning his pictures. Sammy cuts a promo revealing that he attacked Matt Hardy, which was a mystery I had totally forgotten about. Throwing in the “it was me all along!” reference was not something he should have done in a serious promo. Other than that, this promo was good, but I feel like this feud was over already and now they’re going back to it again. I am definitely sympathetic to the bookers due to the various circumstances that have interrupted this feud, but I just don’t care anymore. I already got my nice babyface pay-off. Let Sammy go do something else.

DRAWING TO DETERMINE THE FOUR TEAMS WHO WILL COMPETE NEXT WEEK FOR A TAG TITLE SHOT AT FULL GEAR- horrible
Do you know what’d be really cool? If we had some sort of way to determine who should compete for this title shot based on merit rather than random chance. You know… like a ranking system, or perhaps by keeping track of the various teams’ wins and losses. Too bad we don’t have anything like that in AEW.
The four teams are Private Party, Alex Reynolds & John Silver, The Butcher & The Blade, and the Young Bucks. So one undercard babyface team, one undercard heel team, a pair of clowns, and team we’re supposed to want to see face FTR.
The teams all come to the ring. The Bucks, who we have been told are so angry at FTR that the mere mention of them has caused the Bucks to snap and assault innocent people because they are supposedly so blinded by their rage… walk to the ring and calmly offer FTR a handshake.
FTR accept and we get the big stare-down, and the other three teams just stand there, completely ignored. Then the Bucks attacks attack the other teams because… um… because we wanted to do a schmoz, okay? Stop asking questions and enjoy our flips and superkicks!
Speaking of Superkicks, this schmoz ended when the Bucks and Private Party decided to just have a stare-down instead of throwing punches. We got a handshake… and then the Bucks superkicked Private Party, making them look like idiots because everyone in the world saw this coming other than them.

AEW WOMEN’S TITLE MATCH: Hikaru Shida(c) vs. Big Swole- 6/10
Where the hell did this match come from?
Poor Shida botched her half of the stereo kip-ups spot. Other than that, the match was fine for the time it got, but the time it got wasn’t that much. Shida won clean.

SHAWN SPEARS VIDEO PACKAGE/PROMO ON SCORPIO SKY- meh

NO DISQUALIFICATIONS MATCH FOR THE AEW WORLD TITLE: Jon Moxley(c) vs. Lance Archer (w/Jake Roberts)- 7.5/10
Eddie Kingston was on commentary for this match. It was very satisfying to hear him mock the announcers every time they said something obvious and tried to pass it off as profound.
Archer came out wearing this goofy helmet with a mohawk if little spikes. It looked ridiculous. Like something Shotzi Blackheart would thing was cool.
Archer and Moxley had a great brawl. Moxley won clean via roll-up.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- good, but…
Archer attacked Moxley but Kingston sent the Lucha Bros. to make the save. Kingston put Moxley over but then attacked him and cut a great promo. This was all really good, but I’m just not interested in this feud. I don’t see Kingston taking the belt off of Moxley and I don’t really want to see these two brawl because it feels like Moxley gets into a weapons brawl with pretty much everyone he faces (MJF being the big exception).



So… the one-year anniversary of Dynamite. The show, at this point, has become exactly what I was expecting from AEW and exactly what I was worried about. The wrestling was fine to very good, but there is too much comedy and the storytelling is completely sclerotic.

[cero2k]

relevant

[Big Red Machine]

relevant

G-d dammit! Even Monty Brown turns into a goof when you stick him in AEW.