Performance Review – AEW Dynamite (11/18/20)

Overall Evaluation and Achieved Goals

There was a good NWA Women’s Title match and whatnot but Kenny/Mox on 12/2 is the big thing AEW is moving towards and until then we’re telling side-stories with The Fam, Team Taz, and The Inner Circle. There might be one too many factions, but factions can give a young company and roster purpose and things to do. This won’t convert anybody, but was a well-done show.

Performance: 3.0 / 5.0 (Satisfactory)

Areas of Excellence Within Performance

Unless they’re wrestling Omega & Page on PPV, The Young Bucks against a high-flying team plucked from the small screen is the only Bucks I really enjoy these days, as it’s one of the only dynamics in the confusing world of tweener EVP Young Bucks where all the elaborate setups and showing off and FUN MOVES seem not only justified but quasi-logical. Fun introduction for Top Flight.

Jericho taking so long to get Konnan back on TNT really belongs in the Room for Improvement section, but hell yeah at Konnan being back on TNT. At long last, it is finally just canon too that K-Dawg smokes drugs.

The drama between The Fam and DEATH TRIANGLE took a few odd turns but at this point remains a more consistent and compelling “where do all these guys end up!?” scenario than the everlasting one The Elite has going.

However, I’m now more intrigued by the possibilities of superstar suit-wearing sociopath Kenny Omega than I have been by many things in professional wrestling over a long period of time.

PAC!!!!! The BASTARD. He’s back. Well he returned last week. This week he wrestled. He wrestled The Blade, and he did that thing he used to do on 205 Live where he doesn’t even try to be entertaining but it still rules – all scowling and ass-kicking but also the occasional amazing maneuver. After their staredown on the floor I think I want PAC/Butcher over PAC/Kingston.

Kidding. Kingston rules. The repeated “WHY’RE YA STARIN’ AT ME?” at PAC followed by his glee when Butcher attacked PAC from behind was phenomenal.

Thunder Rosa is the one, and I know that not because she wrestles well but because every time she shows up on Dynamite it seems like AEW is actually a step away from figuring out their women’s division. She dropped the NWA Women’s Title to Deeb here, which seems like another strange stage of wrestling negotiation, and it was real good.

Before it even began Cody & Darby Allin with Arn Anderson vs. Team Taz with Taz on commentary talking up his boys was the kind of TV main event that comes together as a result of a wrestling world I want to just rinse myself in daily. Something like that. How many more metaphors are left??

The match was fun but more notable was not only Brian Cage (ehhhhh) pinning Darby but the reveal that newcomer Will Hobbs isn’t just some nice guy and was actually listening the last few weeks as Taz made the pitch to recruit him. This was a well-executed, well-filmed, and genuinely surprising heel turn all at once – so pro wrestling.

Suggested Areas of Improvement

A contract signing and backstage attack? For Moxley/Omega? Aw. I just noted last week how cool it was that AEW could get this cooking via promos and credibility – instead of that now we’ve got tropes and mystery. One more thing AEW should borrow from the NWA in the 80s is the endless hard sell promos leading up to big events.

I’m at the point with the Young Bucks where I am with Monday Night RAW, some kind of acceptance where bitching or trying to figure it out is useless because more than anything it’s just boring and lame. Bummer.

The Inner Circle Slays Vegas was filmed differently than WWE’s on-location shots, but felt just like them too: Jericho and MJF are telling a story, but the fun didn’t hit.

Orange Cassidy vs. Kip Sabian was the most traditional Orange match in AEW yet and I am not sure if that’s a good or bad thing. It was also probably the best Kip Sabian match in AEW yet, which – I mean. Yeah.

Alright, JR – bake sale bullshit aside, dial back the the dry wit around picture-in-picture technology a little bit yeah??

My Favorite Things

3. John Silver and Anna Jay’s Promo
2. The way PAC just DEMANDED he cleanly hit that slingshot DDT on Blade
1. When Orange Cassidy double high-fived Penelope Ford when she told him to back off