BRM Reviews the 1/13/2023 Rampage (bad, despite the main event)

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Big Red Machine
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BRM Reviews the 1/13/2023 Rampage (bad, despite the main event)

Post by Big Red Machine » Jan 16th, '23, 00:27

AEW TNT TITLE MATCH: Darby Allin(c) vs. Juice Robinson- 6.75/10
No entrances for anyone in this supposedly important title match. Excalibur claimed that Juice Robinson forfeited the IWGP US TITLE due to COVID-related travel restrictions, but that’s false. He had appendicitis and thus had to miss a title defense, so they stripped him of the title Apparently it’s Tell Your Most Ridiculous Lie Night here on Rampage, because Tony Schiavone then claimed that Juice had had “a lot of success here in AEW.” His record is 1-2, with both wins coming against jobbers.
Anyway, Darby got beaten on and had his midsection worked over, but he came back and won. The finishing sequence was very cool. Sting came out to celebrate with Darby after the match.

WILL HOBBS PROMO- meh
He said menacing things.

THE ACCLAIMED COME OUT TO CEMENT THEIR STARS ON THE HOLLYWOOD WALK OF FAME- terrible
They were very annoying. I was hoping someone would walk out and shove their faces into the wet cement like it was a birthday cake on a wrestling show. Instead, we got Gunn Club coming out and being annoying and stupid. They got their pants pulled down, the Billy shoved them into the cement, butts-first.

RENEE PAQUETTE INTERVIEWS SHANE STRICKLAND- meh
Renee asks him what the purpose of Mogul Affiliates is. Isn’t it a wrestling stable?
Swerve had new rapper friends this week who put him over. He said that they would be the violent stable to ever come to AEW.

EDDIE KINSTON & ORTIZ vs. KINGS OF THE BLACK THRONE (Brody King & Malakai Black)- no rating, stupid segment
The story of the match was that Eddie Kingston didn’t trust Ortiz, and thus he refused to tag him in. How does that make any sense? What is Eddie afraid of Ortiz doing? Attacking him from behind? It’s a lot harder for him to do that if you’re on the apron and he’s in the ring than the other way around! Ad if Kingston is afraid that Ortiz will pull his punches or something like that, then the best way to tell is Ortiz will do so is to tag him in, then watch what he does (and if necessary, scrutinize the footage later).
Eventually Kingston gets control of the match on his own. At that point Julia Hart came out, as did a chair-wielding Buddy Matthews. Kingston got the chair away from Matthews, but Julia came up from behind Kingston and tried to yank the chair away from him, so Kingston yanked back. Julia wet flying, and Ortiz then ran at Eddie and yelled at him for supposedly being about to hit a woman with a chair.
This might have worked if Ortiz hadn’t been in perfect position to see everything that happened, so thinking that Eddie was about to hit Julia with the chair is ridiculous.
Kingston and Ortiz argued. Malakai came up behind them and went for Black Mass on Ortiz, but Ortiz ducked and Eddie got hit instead. Ortiz kneed Black in the face and went for a Fisherman’s Buster, but Black blocked it and shoved him out of the ring, then pinned Kingston for the win.
Excalibur thinks that this was the House of Black’s plan all along, which only makes sense if you assume they had the ability to predict and manipulate every little action of Kingston’s and Ortiz’s. For example, what if instead of standing with his foot on the chair and staring and Buddy for ten seconds, Kingston had just punted him in the face right away and kicked the chair out of the ring. Or if Ortiz had recovered quicker than expect and saw the whole thing (although, like I said above, it looked like he saw the whole thing anyway, and his argument with Eddie felt like manufactured drama). Or what if Ortiz hadn’t ducked Black’s kick in time? Or if Eddie had managed to block it? Or if Black hadn’t been able to counter Ortiz’s finisher?
And even if they did, what does this get them? A random win? There shouldn’t be any issue between Ortiz and Kingston coming out of this because once they watch the footage, they should understand why the other acted the way he did.
After the match, Buddy restrained Ortiz while Malakai told him that he “did good,” then Buddy rolled Ortiz back into the ring. If these two were secretly in cahoots, why would Malakai say this to him in public, on camera, instead of texting him later?

LEXI INTERVIEWS JADE CARGILL (& LEILA GREY)- snore
Jade says that she is done with Red Velvet, and is now focusing on getting her fiftieth win. Who could possibly care about such a poorly-told story? When I think about where Jade was at this point last year and where she is now, it’s clear that Tony Khan didn’t just drop the ball on her. He dropped the ball, and when he tried to pick it up, he instead managed to accidentally knocked it forward, and when he finally ran to it and picked it up, instead of just holding onto it, he tried to make an ill-advised spinning throw that sailed into the crowd, resulting in the batter- who would have been out if Tony had just caught the thing in the first place, being awarded an extra base, and instead of one out and nobody on, there are now zero out with a runner at third.

RENEE PAUQUETTE INTERVIEWS PAUL WALTER HAUSER- terrible
He said he loves pro wrestling. He also said “I also way bypass Stamford to go straight to Jacksonville, because in AEW, you never no what’s going to happen.”
1. Where are you coming from that you have to “by-pass Stamford” to “go straight to Jacksonville.” Those places are where near each other.
2. Unpredictability is not inherently a virtue.
3. I’ll bet you that everyone watching this new exactly who was going to win the opener. And also that this goof was about to be interrupted by Danhausen. If this guy never knows what is going to happen, then he’s a moron.
Predictably, out came Dorkhausen. He claimed that he was the #1 merchandise seller in all of AEW. Words cannot express how much I hope that’s not true. Out-hausen is upset that he was not given a physical award for this, so he wants Paul Gunther Hauser to give him his Golden Globe. The idiot (the actor, not Dork-hausen) asked the crowd if they should rename his Golden Globe for Danhausen.
Thankfully, they were interrupted by Jeff Jarrett coming out to cut a promo. That’s not a sentence you see vey often, but I was so happy to see Jeff I went to check if it was too late to invest in Global Force Wrestling.
Jeff brought Jay Lethal and Satnam Singh with him, but, unfortunately, he also brought Sonjay Dutt along. Sonjay’s appearance caused Jericho to revert to being an obnoxious cartoon, at which point I started hoping the that roof of the building would cave in.
Actor Guy started to make fun of Jeff’s looks and made fun of Jeff because “I’ve never even seen you play that guitar that you bring literally everywhere.” So what? It’s not like the Dynamic Dudes not being able to skateboard. That’s not why he brings it! He brings it to hit people with. What’s next, dude? Are you going to rag on Triple H because you haven’t seen him build anything with his sledgehammer?
Sonjay Dutt put his hands on the guy, so the guy slapped him. Lethal then punched the guy in the face, and I popped huge because I already never want to see this guy again. The Lethal and Sonjay picked him up so that Jarrett could hit him with the guitar, and I popped even bigger. While all of this was happening, Satnam Singh had Dorkhausen pinned to the corner. Satnam then brought Dorkhausen forward, while Lethal picked up the Golden Globe, and prepared to complete their babyface turn by beating Out-hausen to death with it, but Orange Cassidy and Best Friends came out to make the save. Team TNA made off with the Golden Globe, though. Maybe they’ll melt it down and make it into a gold chain.

STREET FIGHT: Ruby Soho & Willow Nightengale vs. Jericho Appreciation Society (Anna Jay & Tay-Melo)- 7.25/10
Instead of Mark Henry’s usual interview, they showed a video package for the feud, which was much better.
The babyfaces jumped the heels from behind during their entrance. They spent the match hitting each other with stuff. There was a f*cking “ECW!” chant here in 2023. They also did that stupid f*cking “sit in the chairs and punch each other” spot. I had hoped we were done with that forever, but apparently not. On the other end of the spectrum, I was pleasantly surprised the Willow didn’t stay down and sell after being the person on the bottom of a Tower of Doom spot (i.e. the person not hit with a move).
We got a big spot at the end where Willow did the big Bubba Ray Dudley Powerbomb off the ramp, through a table, but Willow overshot ad while her butt went through the table, Anna’s back hit the floor, and Jericho was upset about that “oh no! She’s missed the table!” Shouldn’t he be happy that Anna missed the tables? Isn’t the kayfabe idea that going through tables makes it hurt more, not less? (Yes, I realize that the reality is that the table makes it hurt less because it breaks your fall. My point is that Jericho is exposing that fact.)
After Ruby kicked out of a Piledriver off the apron through a table, Tay went and got a bag of thumbtacks from under the ring. The announcers all knew what was in there, and Schiavone basically said that everyone should know by this point. So much for AEW always being unpredictable, huh, dumbass?
Ruby (who had been bleeding all over the place for most of the match) fought off going into the tacks by panting her hand in them to stop herself, then threw some in Tay’s face, and hit her finisher on the tacks for the win. This was great stuff, but not good enough to save this show.

During this match, it was announced that Tony Khan has signed Orange Cassidy vs. Jay Lethal for the All-Atlantic Title for Dynamite. Last week Lethal and Jarrett cheated to try to win a match, and Tony Khan rewarded them with a title shot where their cheating would be legal. This week, their group comes out and assaults a non-wrestler… and Tony is once again rewarding them. In kayfabe, Tony Khan has TERRIBLE values.

KUSHIDA is the latest person to get a TNT Title shot without doing sh*t to earn it.


This was a bad show with a great main event. The storylines in AEW continue to stink, often feeling like ideas that the booker came up with, but didn’t bother to sit down and think through whether they actually make any sense, and the comedy makes me hate everyone involved in it.
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

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