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AEW COLLISION – HITS & MISSES
MARCH 16, 2024
ONTARIO, CANADA
AIRED LIVE (WOW?) ON TNT
BY DAVID BRYANT, PWTORCH CONTRIBUTOR
Commentators: Tony Schiavone, Nigel McGuiness
– Hey! Welcome to another AEW Collision Hits & Misses column, which is the best Hits & Misses column series I have ever written because when compared to all the other Hits & Misses column series I have ever written, it exists.
BRYAN DANIELSON VS. SHIBATA — MEGA-HIT
This match made the crowd lose their damn minds, which is something I am sure both Bryan Danielson and Shibata can relate to.
All inappropriate kidding aside, this match is something you should go out of your way to see, and my greatest regret is that there are no words grand enough to express how good it was. I think the best praise I can give this match is to say that I received devastating personal news right before sitting down to watch Collision, and for 20 straight minutes, this match made me forget about it.
MERCEDES MONE VIDEO PACKAGE — HIT
Replaying the highlights from Mercedes Moné’s return made her return feel important and made both Mercedes (and all the women involved in last week’s episode of Dynamite) look like stars instead of extras who mostly appear during ad breaks because a handful of their viewers are still afraid they’ll get cooties.
Side Note: While it is a shame that the ratings for Mercedes’ return were unable to match the ratings for C.M. Punk’s return, the fact that anyone thought they might is a perfect example of why Congress thinks TikTok causes brain worms.
JULIA HART vs. TRISH ADORA — HIT
Willow Nightingale and Riho had a good match on Dynamite, but this Hart vs. Adora match is closer to the kind of match I wish they’d had. Hart vs. Adora was creative, exciting, and, if you’re willing to ignore the ridiculousness of the match’s stipulation or that it was for the TBS Championship for some reason, compelling. This match was not only good enough to appear on WWE programming, it wouldn’t have looked out of place on a Stardom PPV (if their preshows had preshows with lower expectations).
Side Note: Speaking of Stardom, I just want to throw out a quick hypothesis here:
My Hypothesis:
U.S. women’s wrestling could very much have the same quality of wrestling as Stardom. It’s not like there is a magical wrestling vortex that surrounds Japan’s rings and gifts random women unearned talent. The women in Stardom look and perform like megastars because of two reasons:
(1) They are presented like megastars in an all-female promotion that has no other choice but to present them like megastars.
(2) They are trained from a young age as if they are expected to be megastars.
This intensive training, along with Stardom’s presentation of their talents, is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you took Skye Blue… To be clear, I’m not picking on Blue for a lack of talent. I’m picking her for this example because she is an AEW women’s wrestler whom I have previously stated has the right ingredients to become a megastar if AEW were to put her on a proper path toward attaining “stardom” with a lowercase “s.”
Anyway, back to my point, if you took Skye Blue, put her in a dōjō, and had her run through the fundamental basics of in-ring wrestling over and over again for hours on end, those fundamental basics of in-ring wrestling would become second nature to her because they would become muscle memory. Once that is achieved, all she needs to worry about is her in-ring storytelling. Likewise, if you took Kris Statlander and replaced whatever Macy’s-Thanksgiving-Day-Parade outfit she usually wears with an outfit that looks like it was custom-made by a world-renowned designer, she would look even better than her wrestling abilities already are. If you took Serena Deeb and gave her an entrance comparable to ReStart’s, we could have a star comparable to Stardom’s stars because Deeb already has the in-ring abilities she needs.
If AEW were to do these things, improvements to their women’s division would be vast and astounding. Don’t believe me? Watch this 3-minute and 49-second video:
Notice any familiar faces?
Look closely, and you’ll see multiple female wrestlers who are currently signed to AEW contracts this very moment, and that video makes those wrestlers look like bigger stars in 3 minutes and 49 seconds than AEW has made them look in their entire careers.
I promise you, I am not writing this rant (or any of my previous rants about AEW’s women’s division) because I dislike AEW. I am writing this because I like AEW, and I also like women’s wrestling. In my opinion, women’s wrestling is one of the most entertaining things wrestling has to offer, and I am not the only person who thinks that way. My current boyfriend loves women’s wrestling, too! In fact, one of my ex’s used to ONLY watch women’s wrestling. I literally sat in his apartment, utterly dumbfounded, as I watched him fast-forward through every part of WrestleMania 34 that did not involve women’s wrestlers.
Now, is that the opinion of every wrestling fan? Of course not! However, every wrestling fan doesn’t share my lifelong love of Kevin Owens, Eddie Kingston, and Shane Taylor’s wrestling style, but those of us who do like that particular wrestling style are catered to, and we are catered to well. Women’s wrestling fans deserve that kind of catering, too.
This past Wednesday felt like the potential start of a possible change in how AEW presents women’s wrestling. I teared up watching Mercedes Mone’s debut, not because it was Mercedes Moné (that part was nice, though), but because it felt like the beginning of AEW finally taking women’s wrestling as seriously as they take men’s wrestling.
Please, Tony Khan, Mercedes Moné, Random Janitor, anyone who is willing to listen — do not let this opportunity pass you by. Do not make the same mistakes with Mercedes Moné that you made with Adam Copeland. If, in five months, Mercedes Moné is literally not featured on one of the company’s biggest PPVs, and then, to make matters worse, the blow-off match to one of her biggest feuds takes place on an “untitled” episode Dynamite (no offense to Christian Cage or Adam Copeland), I will not be okay, and I will not feel catered to unless AEW’s idea of catering is arsenic.
In conclusion, Mercedes Moné’s bit debut is AEW’s chance to prove to those of us who have lost faith in their creative direction that we are wrong and should be ashamed of ourselves. Please prove me wrong. I have never wanted to be wrong more. This is the only thing I can think of that I would be thrilled to feel ashamed about.
Second Side Note: If you do decide to check out the Danielson vs. Shibata match, please stick around for the Hart vs. Adora match that follows, and if you do decide to stick around, don’t just watch it; watch it with an open mind. You might surprise yourself.
HARLEY CAMERON IS A THIEF — HIT
Harley Cameron was not the focal point of Lexi Nair’s interview with Zak Knight, but she stole it like a Beagle Boy diving into Scrooge’s money bin. How is AEW not doing more with this woman? She is comedy gold.
DANIEL GARCIA vs. LEE MORIARTY — MINOR-HIT
This wasn’t good, but it wasn’t great, which feels like the tagline for Lee Moriarty’s entire run in AEW (which, much like Snitsky, is not his fault.)
DARBY ALLIN’S DEATH DROP RECAP — HIT
Next, we were graced with a recap of Darby Allin trying to kill himself by jumping off of a ladder and through a pane of glass. I guess if you’re going to let someone attempt suicide on live TV, you should get the most out of it. Because of this, I support replaying Allin’s ridiculously dangerous stunts as often as possible.
ALLOWING DARBY ALLIN TO PERFORM THAT RIDICULOUSLY DANGEROUS STUNT — FOREVER A MISS
Also, why did Darby Allin need to be “injured” by Jay White so he could climb Mount Everest? It isn’t like they’re trying to keep Darby Allin’s upcoming visit to the world’s largest open-air graveyard a secret.
PAC VS. MAN I DIDN’T KNOW STILL WORKED FOR AEW — HIT
Pac vs. Aaron Solo was good for what it was, but what it was wasn’t much. This was basically Pac’s welcome-back party, and Solo had the unfortunate job of yelling “Surprise!” when the lights turned on.
PAC’S POST-MATCH PROMO — MINOR-MISS
As a fan of Pac, I wish he’d given us more of a definitive mission statement. Instead, this promo sounded like what I imagine an AI machine thinks a professional wrestler’s promo is supposed to sound like, and that’s why we had the writer’s strike.
BRYAN DANIELSON PROMO — HIT
Bryan Danielson cut a promo while performing yoga that was so hot his blood vessels looked like they were trying to escape his neck.
CLAUDIO CASTAGNOLI vs. LANCE ARCHER — MINOR-MISS
This match was cut short thanks to a disqualification from The Righteous, who interrupted this segment mid-match. (This match-interruption should not be confused with that one time Swerve Strickland got held back by half of the locker room because he wanted to *checks notes* not interrupt a match.)
RUBY SOHO & ANGELO PARKER INTERVIEW — HIT
I enjoy any segment that features Ruby Soho, plus Soho’s lashes were so luscious it looked like her eyeballs were trying to fly off her face. (This is why Latisse is only available via a prescription.)
KYLE O’REILLY VS. BRYAN KEITH — HIT
Kyle O’Reilly, sporting the look of a kicked puppy, defeated Bryan Keith as he should have because he was re-debuting. While I consider this match a hit due to its contents, it also went on a little too long, much like my columns.
THUNDER ROSA & DEONNA PURRAZZO INTERVIEW — MINOR-HIT
This segment is a good example of how AEW can help its female stars by simply changing their wardrobes. Thunder Rosa spent this entire interview sporting makeup that looked like Madonna’s 1998 VMA fiasco (Rosa wore it better.), and Deonna Purrazzo cosplayed as the Ghost-of—Sears-Catalogs-Past.
Both of these women are outstanding talents who have an outstanding body of work, including working in Japan, and AEW should always strive to present them as such.
HOUSE OF BLACK VS. THE INFANTRY — MISS
I’m not giving this match a miss because the House of Black lost to The Infantry. That WAS indeed shocking, and the result denies us one more FTR vs. House of Black match-up, but still, the ending didn’t bother me. I was far more bothered by the execution of this match.
For starters, this match began with a brutal beatdown of The Infantry, which resulted in the referee asking The Infantry, “Can you stand?” The Infantry said yes, and the referee rang the bell before either of the competitors made it to their feet. Can you imagine if this were the standard for literally any other sport?
*Beatdown occurs*
Referee: You good to go?
Totally Devastated Athlete: I have got two broken wrists, a collapsed lung, and a cracked skull.
Referee: Yes, but are your legs working?
*nose pinch*
Despite AEW’s referee’s having worse judgment than my 8-year-old niece in a candy store, I was still able to get into this match until its action became marred by multiple botches that included a near faceplant off the top rope. Then, just as I was starting to suspend my disbelief again, the referee chose to look the other way while Brody King drove Shawn Dean’s neck into the announce table. (Do AEW referees suffer from profound hearing loss, and if so, why do they still not respond to audience members as they literally try to direct their attention to the announce desk.)
The worst thing about this bullsh— is that AEW rarely does upsets like this, and had this match been better executed, it could have been a classic moment that elevated the Infantry to new heights. Instead, it felt like a compelling case for why AEW’s referees could be replaced by emus, and no one would notice except the zoo.
ADAM COPELAND THREATENS MURDER — MINOR-MISS
While I was pleased to learn that Adam Copeland’s suitcase did not contain Spike Dudley’s luggage, I was dismayed to learn it contained Abyss’s luggage.
Side Note: (Remember that time Abyss used Janice to kill off RVD, and it looked exactly as dumb as you’d expect it to? Pepperidge-harm remembers: https://youtu.be/mRl62AFFO5w?si=D-3iy_158InvwN1Y&t=261)
FINAL THOUGHTS
Bryan Danielson vs. Shibata is a four to four-and-a-half-star match you should go out of your way to see. Julia Hart vs. Trish Adora is a solid match that you should check out if you have the time; however, the rest of this show felt a little bit like this…
DAVID’S DODGY MATCH RECOMMENDATIONS:
Match of the Night: Bryan Danielson vs. Shibata
Second Best Match: Julia Hart vs. Trish Adora
Third Best Match: Kyle O’Reilly vs. Bryan Keith
SHOW GRADE: C
Thank you all for reading. I truly appreciate it. And as always, I’m still working on my sign-off, but until next week, remember, holding a door open for someone isn’t just the polite thing to do; it is also the international gesture for “get the f— out.”
(David Bryant’s endless vanity can be found on his “Artist Formerly Known as Twitter” account @IamDavidBryant; David Bryant’s immaturity can be found on his Instagram account @IamDavidBryant, and David Bryant’s Threads account is threadbare and also located @IamDavidBryant because David Bryant sucks at usernames. David is a published author, circus artist, drag promoter, male pageant winner, unrenowned musician, sloppy figure skater, and the inventor of the world’s first underwater raincoat. Less impressively, he studied screenwriting at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.)
RECOMMENDED NEXT: AEW COLLISION RESULTS (3/16): Danielson vs. Shibata, Julia Hart vs. Adora, Claudio vs. Archer, O’Reilly vs. Bryan Keith
OR CHECK THIS OUT AT PROWRESTLING.NET: AEW Collision results (3/16): Powell’s review of Bryan Danielson vs. Katsuyori Shibata, Julia Hart vs. Trish Adora for the TBS Title, Kyle O’Reilly vs. Bryan Keith
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