SPOTLIGHTED PODCAST ALERT (YOUR ARTICLE BEGINS A FEW INCHES DOWN)...
Coming off a solid episode of Dynamite last week, consistency is the key to continue the build to Grand Slam Australia and the weeks and months to come. Let’s see if they were able to make it two weeks of good programming!
HITS
A STORY THREAD THROUGHOUT THE SHOW
Whether you like the Death Riders storyline with Copeland and Jay White or not, it’s just good television to have a story continue throughout a two hour show. Too often, AEW will run a segment involving the top of the card early in the show and you never hear from the participants again. It’s a positive step that they continued a narrative so fans who are interested in that story won’t turn off the show because they know there is more to come.
The show-ending segment did a good job setting the stage for Grand Slam Australia as well as Revolution.
HANGMAN AND MJF
After weeks of teasing tension between the two, it boiled over bigtime on this show! It seems like they quickly aborted the Jeff Jarrett angle and moved quickly to this one and that was a great decision.
By the way, Worst. Security Guards. Ever! — MJF and Hangman had a great pull-apart brawl to start their feud and they had a lot of physicality due to the inept security where nine other men were unable to keep them separate. Stormtroopers indeed!
And how about that fan who stupidly gave his drink to MJF after the brawl? Come on man! You knew you’d be wearing that beer! The fan seemed to love being a part of the show though as you could see him high-fiving his friends afterwards.
I also loved MJF talking trash after the fight in the crowd and Hangman immediately running out to get him. This could be a great program and I’m hoping they have something special planned moving forward because both guys showed impressive intensity throughout this segment. Well done all around.
QUICK HITS
– Quick and painful for Platinum Max. I’m glad this gimmick does not give us 50/50 matches and are swift beatdowns to give wrestlers like Hangman Page some momentum.
– I love the nuance in the storytelling for Swerve. Prince Nana is making sense telling him not to take these feuds personally and focus on regaining his championship. Swerve makes sense explaining he doesn’t want a repeat of what happened with Hangman. I love this.
– Samoa Joe matches are fun in a non-sports entertainment way!
– I could take or leave Chris Jericho at this point, but watching the Bad Apple side-eye Renee throughout their interview brought me joy!
– The Hurt Syndicate and the Gunns had a great match. Despite it going on for a while, the Syndicate still looked pretty dominant and they are setting up some legitimate teams to go after them moving forward.
ARTICLE CONTINUED BELOW…
Check out the latest episode of the Wade Keller Pro Wrestling Post-show covering the latest episode of Dynamite: CLICK HERE (or search “wade Keller” on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or any other iOS or Android app to subscribe free)
MISSES
GIVE US A REASON TO CARE
I think wrestlers like Bandido are very talented and can bring a lot to the table. However, AEW continues to do a poor job in giving fans a reason to care about certain guys. What is Bandido all about? We’ve only seen some corny wild west vignettes with him in recent months. I don’t understand why they don’t give us a sitdown interview to get to know the guy. If he struggles with English, give us subtitles. Fans will get behind wrestlers if you give them a reason to.
You can add Megan Bayne to that list as well. Let’s learn something about her so she doesn’t have to stand there with her arms out not saying a word every week.
While this episode wasn’t quite as good as last week’s, I thought it did a good job setting up this weekend’s show as well as moving forward with other storylines for the coming weeks and Revolution.
Don’t forget to check out the weekly free podcast I’m part of, “The All Elite Conversation Club” that typically drops on Fridays the PWTorch Dailycast lineup. Joel Dehnel and I have a great time breaking down all things AEW! Search “pwtorch” on your podcast app to subscribe. Send questions and comments to allelitecc@gmail.com.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.