Hot damn, let’s get right to it. Many months ago, I booked a show for a band (Shake The Baby Till The Love Comes Out) that I’m friends with who were booking a tour. Nico told me they needed to fill March 4 in Boston and if I could help that would be great. So I was able to book a show for us, them and another band at O’Briens in Allston. Then, Revolution was booked. I know the go-home and fallout shows are usually the better episodes and considering how the go-home show was awesome and the PPV was AWESOME, I was looking forward to this episode. I was annoyed that I had a show to play. But then came Wednesday morning, and my dear friend Brian texts me to say “WATCH FREE THE DELETE RIGHT NOW” and I knew….I feel that the wrestling gods have smiled upon me and us all with this visual of the Young Bucks and Matt Hardy. From that moment on, I went dark on social media again, avoiding most all spoilers. I did see something about Jake Roberts and I’ve seen things confirming Matt Hardy to AEW but beyond that I have no idea what I am about to witness from last night’s Dynamite. OK, that’s the setup. Let’s knock ’em down now.
As they show some of the highlights from Revolution, I am reminded by the fact that the tag team match between the Young Bucks and Kenny and Adam was the very best tag team match I have ever seen in my entire life of watching wrestling. The whole PPV was so awesome, but the last match was tops. I was stoked to see Mox pull off the eye patch at a the end for the big “f*ck You” reveal for Le (former) Champion. The legit cut on Mox forehead looks badass, a cut that I was convinced on Saturday was a blood packet from the way the eye patch (apparently) held the blood in. It was so f*cked when I realized he actually had a nasty gash on his face.
Wow, this crowd is HOT for Mox tonight. The belt looks cool as f*ck on his shoulder. The crowd starts screaming “YOU DESERVE IT” at him and he looks choked up. Man, shots FIRED as Mox says that AEW stands for PROFESSIONAL WRESTLING (as opposed to sports entertainment). This guy is a premiere babyface as he puts over the fans, saying that this belt belongs to all of us. God damn, this is a totally unscripted and unreleased promo. You can feel it. He calls out the Inner Circle and Jericho walks onto Dynamite for the first time without the title. The production guys have finally understood the correct spot to fade Judas for the crowd to finish singing the song to Jericho. Jericho starts out by saying “First of all, I don’t need that belt to be Le Champion” and they start chanting “YES YOU DO” and I popped. Oh f*ck, Jericho just referred to Mox as the Lunatic Fringe! This f*cking rules to get a promo off between Jericho and Mox. Jericho tells the crowd that Moxley’s era “sucks ass” and they start chanting “YOU SUCK ASS” at Jericho. I might be at my edge for tolerating the f*cking crowd hijacking the show, though… Jericho is such an assh*le. Apparently the stipulation he is pushing for his match tonight is that if Moxley can walk away at the end of the night then Chris Jericho will banish himself from AEW for 60 days (aka Fozzy is going on tour). Wow, cool opening segment.
SCU and Colt Cabana vs Dark Order is the first match? Oh good grief. OK, well, SCU still look like dickheads. Out comes Colt, looking…like Colt. They go to pic-in-pic and SCU and Colt are just doing endless crowd work, getting the audience to love them. I have had the thought before, but now as I’m looking at Cabana it is clear: he looks like MJF’s uncle. Colt is really hamming up the TV time and I don’t blame him. Back from commercial and the Dark Order come out, Jim Ross really leaning into and asking about “Who is the Exalted One? Is he or she even a real person or is this all a bunch of BS?”
Stu Greyson and Colt Cabana start out and Colt is really pretty fun to watch do his thing. He is very smooth and he is very fun to watch. I’d like to see him and Orange Cassidy have a classic match together. I’ll tell you, every single time SCU does a set of triple tandem tag moves I’m totally into them but it’s all the other sh*t they do in between the moves that bothers me I guess. The match eventually devolves into Daniels taking the beating, hanging out in the Dark Order corner. Now, to self analyze the Dark Order for a moment, I am starting to wonder if I like the Dark Order because of the potential they have to be awesome, or if I am just into it to go against the grain? I know to a point I have been sustained by the idea of Matt Hardy being involved but as I’m watching this right now I am wondering if I actually like it or not. Colt ends up pulling out a few of his moves, ending with his Superman pin which was pretty cool and Colt gets a win for his first match in AEW. After the match Evil Uno flips out on the mic and says “THIS ISN’T HOW THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO GO” and makes some reference to the Exalted One being displeased. OK.
Big Swole vs Leva Bates and well, let me just say, Big Swole’s finisher is called “Dirty Dancing” and it’s like a wind up clothesline that looks f*cking AWESOME. I say that because her match with Bates lasts about three minutes, even including a brief interference from Peter Avalon and Swole getting hit with a book by Bates who, frankly, looks terrified to be in a wrestling ring period. Anywho, Bates hit a backstabber but Swole just powerbombed her and then hit that clothesline and it was over. This all happened with Britt Baker trolling Tony Ski-A-Vone on commentary and I am a huge fan of the character of Britt Baker for sure. She brought Tony a Starbucks just to keep the joke going.
Recap of Cody and MJF and I would like to do my best to avoid sh*tting all over his new neck tattoo, but my suspicions were just confirmed when he comes out in a suit with a jacket and that tattoo looks sh*tty, specifically with the colors in context of a suit. As I was just writing that about the neck tat Jim Ross just said “…he’s gonna regret that…” and I chuckled. I don’t know. The real problem is that the tat is so distracting. Back from commercial and it seems like Cody just said something that really riled the fans up because they are HOT for him. Cody cuts a nasty promo on MJF, demands that he come out and address him to his face and say that he beat Cody fair and square (Why, though?) and suddenly some horrendous music hits and out walks…..Jake the f*cking Snake? What the ever living f*ck am I watching?
Jake starts cutting a promo on Cody, calling him a bitch for crying about MJF. Is he a heel or a motivator? Also whats up with he left side of Jake’s head being shaved while the rest of his hair is grown out and dyed brown? Am I tripping right now? Jake says “all hail almighty Caesar” like an asshole. Jakes voice is unlistenable to me. I think he is claiming to represent someone who is coming here to represent the Dark Side. “I will be on the outside of the ring when my client faces you”. He keeps referring to Cody as Cesar and I’m f*cking into it! Jake ends with “I always say ‘you never turn your back on someone who you fear or respect’”…as he turns his back on Cody and throws his mic into the air. Badass. Jesus, Jake is so good that I went from distracted by his hair and turned off by his voice to drawn in and completely captivated within minutes. Jake is possibly my favorite promo historically, and by god, he hasn’t lost a step. Cody looks dumbfounded and then they quickly cut to a recap video of Orange Cassidy and Pac from Saturday, which was awesome, but they just cut to it QUICK. When we return from the recap video Best Friends’ music was already playing and Cody was nowhere in sight in the ring. Weird.
I must admit, I just don’t care about Chuck Taylor. JJ from this site/PTW podcast often tells me how f*cking funny Chuckie is and while I take JJ at his word, I haven’t turned that corner with him yet. Maybe I’ll like him more when I inevitably go back and start watching all the episodes of BTE from the beginning. It’s too bad that Taylor is such a general turn off for me because I just don’t care about this match, despite being a really big fan on the Bastard. I find myself having an easier time focusing on the match when Pac is in complete control and throwing Chuckles into the guard rails, then rolling in the ring to restart the count and then resume kicking ass outside the ring. One of the best spots in the whole match is one when Pac hops in the ring from the top turnbuckle and Chuck went for a dropkick and totally f*cking whiffed. Chuck Taylor just did some crazy move where he tied Pac up in the corner and then hit him with a type of piledriver. Pac ends up winning with the Brutalizer and then Trent and Cassidy come into the ring to stand up to Pac who is joined by the Lucha Bros, who immediately double superkick Cassidy in the head and then the three just kick the sh*t out of the other three for a while before Pac grabs the mic and announces that these guys are now a crew called Death Triangle. I’m very supportive of this. “NOBODY IS SAFE”. Yup.
Wait, a Shawn Spears vignette? He is still looking for a tag team partner? Oh god, who cares. If this was WWE they would put Matt Hardy as his partner just to kill the business. Uh, they are running an actual contest to find a new partner for this guy? Ugh, pass.
QT Marshall comes out with Dustin (in full gear and makeup) and Brandi (in her totally sane way of repping the Nightmare Family brand, wearing it on a shirt, not tattooing it permanently on her NECK). Picture in picture hits and Cutie is doing crowd work with apples, which is apparently what he is really into. Oh lord, I forgot that this match was against Hager. His theme song is pretty rough. Now, I know that Cutie runs a wrestling school, I know he is a family friend, I know he likes apples, but that’s it. Cutie has a very stock look and I get that he is a baby baby baby face but he looks like he could be a good heel too. Jake ends up winning with his underwhelming sleeper hold. After, Dustin comes in to break it up, which leads to PnP getting involved and beating on Dustin which drew out Cody to get involved, who ate a chair to the back from Ortiz, to which Matt Jackson comes out and superkicks PnP out of the ring and squares off with Hager, who is much bigger and just beats his ass down, THEN followed by Hangman coming down to the ring at a leisurely pace, beer in hand. “COWBOY SH*T” chants are immediate. I’m stunned by how much we all love this guy. Hangman comes to the ring, puts his beer on the ring post, clears the ring, hits Hager with a Buckshot, grabs his beer and as he goes to pound it he gives Matt Jackson a Stone Cold Steve Austin-caliber middle finger! Dynamite cuts to PIP just as Hangman, no sh*t, collects a dozen beers from the crowd and walks off to the back, smiling his ass off. I mean, this dude is the definition of “over like rover”.
Recap of the abysmal women’s title match from Revolution. I’m almost rooting for Kris Statlander after that match, but I also really don’t like the alien gimmick. I’m sorry that she had the flu (I hope she didn’t have this f*cking coronavirus that seems to be spreading) and I feel bad for both her and Nyla that they weren’t able to put on a better match because, all ribbing aside, Statlander seems to be a fairly proficient wrestler for only being in the biz three years and I feel like she could have carried Nyla where she is typically weak in matches. I really want the women’s division to succeed but it might be a reality that WWE has poached all the good women’s wrestlers that aren’t already gainfully employed at Impact or abroad.
MJF backstage vignette and he is proving why he is the baddest dude they have on the mic. He name checked all the other top talents in AEW and says how he will beat them all to take the title off Jon Moxley. He then takes off his jacket, revealing a shirt that says “I pinned Cody”. MJF goes on to say “This shirt is obnoxious, regrettable and quite frankly it’s very distracting, kinda like a neck tattoo, you know what I mean?” Yeah, man. I know what you mean.
Main event time and as Jericho’s music hits I wonder how many times have I heard this song? He spent weeks playing it on his podcast, it’s been on the normal radio and now his wrestling theme song…Justin Roberts def just announced him as Le Champion. The crowd going absolutely bonkers for Darby Allin seems to be the case now every single time. As Mox descends from the crowd he gets jumped by Hager and PnP, falling out into the concession stands while Jericho literally prances around the ring, smiling like a dickhead. Well, after a long enough beatdown, Hager puts Mox to sleep, leaving him lifeless in the back. Darby agrees to a handicap match and it gets upside down pretty quickly. The rest of the Inner Circle makes their way ringside, surrounding Allin 5 to 1. Jericho beats on Darby for a bit and then puts him in a Boston Crab, a move distinctly different than there Walls of Jericho.
After more than a minute in the hold, Darby makes it to the ropes for a break. Sammy and Chris trade off on the LAX suplex spot, tagging themselves in and passing Darby back and forth. Sammy gets so much heat from the crowd that they start chanting “F*CK YOU SAMMY” and TNT bleeps out most of that. Darby gets a little hope spot in and Jim Ross declares “Darby Allin is a brilliant competitor”. High praise from a guy who seems to hate half of the product that he calls for a living. Darby then hits Coffin Drop on Sammy for a near fall but as Darby jumps outside the ring to neutralize Jericho he dives right into a Judas Effect which puts him down for the pin. As Jericho and the Inner Circle begin celebrating their win, Mox hits the ring and attacks the Inner Circle with a chair. He kinda clears the ring but the numbers game is against him and the whole thing cumulates with Mox getting powerbombed through a table from the top of the ramp. Well, that certainly doesn’t write Jericho off TV, now does it?
OK, well, no Matt Hardy. and honestly, thats great. I would have lost my mind and it would have gotten lost in that show specifically, especially considering how much sh*t they covered in those two hours. Wow. Wrestling rules. This was a really good post-PPV episode of a televised wrestling show and while it wasn’t worth going internet dark in retrospect, I f*cking loved it. I am so grateful to have professional wrestling as a distraction from all the sh*t that happens all the other hours of the week. I wonder how long it is until Matt Hardy shows up….
Wrestling rules. F*ck the World. Party Hard.
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