BRM Reviews the 8/11/2021 Dynamite

[Big Red Machine]

We open the show with Jim Ross telling us that “the main event tonight is one we’ve been waiting for a long time, allegedly, seemingly.”
Can we please get the senile old codger off the air before he accidentally buries anything else? Why would you even put any sort of qualifier there?!

MJF & WARDLOW PROMO- good
MJF cut a good promo on Jericho. I actually liked the callback to Wardlow’s failure to defeat Cody in a similar situation, as it was the first thing that popped into my head when Wardlow was announced as the next task.
MJF was eating an apple while cutting this promo, including talking with his mouth full, which was good heat. Schiavone followed this up by saying “mom always said ‘don’t talk with your mouth full,’ but what does that idiot know?” Did Schiavone just try to insult MJF but instead accidentally wind up calling his own mother an idiot?

Christian Cage has been named the #1 contender for the PPV on September 5th. Continuing our bad night for the announcers, Excalibur forgot the name of the PPV.

DANTE MARTIN & THE SYDAL BROTHERS vs. THE ELITE (Kenny Omega & the Young Bucks) (w/Michael Nakazawa & Brandon Cutler)- 8.5/10
Don Callis was on commentary for this match and immediately makes a math mistake. The curse continues.
Or maybe it’s just that the wrestlers are using up all of the talent tonight, because this opener was CRAZY!

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- bad
Callis interrupts a Tony Schiavone attempt to interview the Elite. Christian then interrupts Callis. Callis says Christian is outnumbered, so Christian brings out Jurassic Express.. and then we go to a very WWE-like commercial break.
When we come back from our commercial, everyone is in the ring. Tony has the mic back… and Callis immediately snatches it away from him again. Callis lets the crowd know that Christian is getting the PPV title shot, so the crowd all starts to chant “CM PUNK!” followed by “YES!’
Then Callis says there is no way that Omega would wrestle Christian in Pittsburgh, and crowd all boos, so I guess they want Christian to get a title shot, but not on PPV? That’s oddly specific.
Decent barbs were exchanged. Chrisitan eventually revealed that he talked to Tony Khan and Scott D’Amore earlier this week, and in addition to getting a shot at the AEW World Title at the PPV, he is getting a shot at the Impact title as the opening match of the first Rampage. Kenny was upset about this, and rightly so. There is no excuse for Kenny not to have been informed of an upcoming title defense! Jungle also revealed that he and Luchasaurus are getting a tag title shot next week… and the Bucks were unaware of this as well, do Tony Khan is clearly playing favorites here, which is highly inappropriate. Also, what have Jurassic Express done to earn a title shot?

There is a “we want Danhausen” sign in the front row. Tony Khan, please find a way to make this happen! AEW has so much talent that they can’t possibly justify putting him on Dynamite or Rampage, but he’ll be gone from ROH, so I won’t have to see or hear him ever!

ALEISTER BLACK PROMO- GREAT!
Cody isn’t here this week and don’t know when he’ll be back.

PLUG FOR THE RHODES NEW REALITY SHOW- can we please not promote shows that break kayfabe during the main body of the show? If you want do to it during a commercial then that’s fine, but don’t have the announcers pitch to “a special look at” it.

MIRO PROMO- good delivery, but the booking is questionable
For the first Rampage, they’re giving a title shout to Fuego del Sol. You might remember him as the guy who got destroyed by Andrade last week for not shining his shoes. Why is this total chump getting a title shot?
Also, he’s been told he’ll get an AEW contract if he beats Miro for the title, which makes sense to the point where one wonders why that isn’t standard policy for anyone not under contract who they give a title shot to.

DANIEL GARCIA & 2.0 PROMO- bad
They all came off as delusional clowns.

DARBY ALLIN (w/Sting) vs. DANIEL GARCIA (w/2.0)- 6.5/10
Holy f*ck do I want to see that sixty-minute broadway between Daniel Garcia and Wheeler YUTA that Excalibur was talking about.
Darby won a good match clean. 2.0 attacked Darby after the match, seemingly just so Sting would have an excuse to beat them up.

DEATH TRIANGLE PROMO- meh
Most of this felt like a WWE segment where it was four people facing the same direction having a conversation about stuff they each already knew.

ORANGE CASSIDY, CHUCK TAYLOR, & WHEELER YUTA (w/Kris Statlander) vs. HARDY FAMILY OFFICE (Private Party & Matt Hardy) (w/Hardy Family Office)- 6/10
The announcers did a good job of pushing that getting his first win on Dynamite would be an important step up for YUTA.
We start off with clown sh*t. After that it was a decent action match, although they completely lost track of who the legal man was. The HFO used their numbers advantage to help them win.
Nyla Rose ran down to attack Statlander because they’re wrestling later. They seem to be doing that spot a lot with the women lately.

DASHA GONZALEZ INTERVIEWWS CHAVO GUERRERO JR. & ANDRADE- fine
Andrade challenges Pac to a match at all out.

LAX PROMO- fine
This feels like they’re just stalling until Cash Wheeler can return and they can resume their feud with FTR.

NYLA ROSE (w/Vickie Guerrero) vs. KRIS STATLANDER (w/Orange Cassidy)- 4.25/10
Nyla jumped the bell on Statlander. Statlander won a short match cleanly.

YOUNG BUCKS PROMO- good… until the stupid clown sh*t with Jurassic Express blocking their basketball shot and attacking them. And then whichever Buck it is shouted “THAT’S A FOUL!” and Cutler denying it afterwards, because I guess they just don’t want anyone to take them, the titles, or next week’s title match serious. Dumb pointless sh*t ruined a good promo here.

BRITT BAKER VS. RED VELVET VIDEO PACKAGE- meh

TONY SCHIAVONE INTERVIEWS DR. BRITT BAKER, DMD- terrible
Britt is supposed to be a heel, but she cuts a total babyface promo for her hometown crowd. Then Red Velvet assaults her out of nowhere.

RICKY STARKS VS. BRIAN CAGE VIDEO PACKAGE- GREAT!

IMPACT WRESTLING TAG TEAM TITLE MATCH: Doc Gallows & Karl Anderson(c) (w/Brandon Cutler) vs. the Dark Order (Evil Uno & Stu Grayson) (w/Colt Cabana)- 6.5/10
We were told that the reason that only Cabana was at ringside was because there was “dissension” in the Dark Order about whether or not letting Page get his ass kicked last week was “respecting his wishes.” That’s the sort of segment you should be putting on TV! Don’t just hope that the audience hears an announcer say it. Show; don’t tell.
Scott D’Amore was on commentary for this match. They made a point to not call TNA’s belts “world” titles.
The babyfaces jumped the bell on the heels. Kaz came out to take out Cutler. The Good Brothers retained mostly cleanly.

KAMILLE VIDEO PACKAGE/PROMO ON LEYLA HIRSCH- good

THIS TONY SCHIAVONE/Q.T. MARSHALL THING IS STILL GOING ON- bad
They pulled Tony’s kid out of the front row and started to beat him up. No security stopped them. So let me get this straight: If two trained wrestlers under contract to AEW are fighting, they’ll send out referees to break it up, but if a wrestler PULLS A FAN OUT OF THE CROWD AND ASSAULTS THE FAN, they won’t do anything? “Detail Guy” Tony Khan strikes again.
Q.T. demands that Tony apologize to him. Tony does, but they beat the kid up anyway. Eventually Big Show comes out, walking down to the ring, because it’s not like the Factory have shown a willingness to attack these innocent people.
Instead of being smart and trying to four-on-one, Marhsall threw Aaron Slow at Big Show while the others ran away, so I guess we’re getting a feud between Q.T. Marhsall and the Big Show. Meanwhile, Jon Moxley, Eddie Kingston, Lance Archer, Tay Conti, Scorpio Sky, Ethan Page, Will Hobbs, Jake Hager, Sammy Guevara, Sonny Kiss, Penelope Ford, Dustin Rhodes, Jade Cargill, Thunder Rosa, Hikaru Shida, Riho, the Acclaimed, and Big Swole are all sitting on the sidelines, not doing sh*t.

Next week on Dynamite, we’re jumping right to a gimmick match (Texas Torando Tag) in the barely-a-feud that is AEW’s first big “homegrown” star, Darby Allin, and the legendary Sting taking on 2.0, two guys who have made a career out of being loudmouthed clowns, and really only ever got over in CHIKARA, and that was almost a decade ago.

SINGLES MATCH IN WHICH IF CHRIS JERICHO LOSES OR IF ANYONE INTERFERES ON HIS BEHALF, HE WON’T GET ANOTHER MATCH AGAINST MJF: Chris Jericho vs. Wardlow (w/MJF)- 7/10
Why is MJF the fifth labor? Don’t have you have to complete all of the labors in order to get the thing you want? Shouldn’t MJF be the match after he completes all five labors?
Wardlow kicked out of an early Codebreaker at 1, but instead of selling it as “LOW HOW TOUGH AND SCARY WARDLOW IS!” Ross sold it as Jericho has been too broken down by this series of matches that he couldn’t get over quickly and couldn’t hold him down well. Usually the right call would be putting over the talent, but in this case I think Ross’ instincts were actually right, as he was putting over the storyline (and protecting the Codebreaker), and that’s more important here because the whole idea of this storyline is that MJF is wearing Jericho down.
Jericho was a great determined babyface, absorbing lots of punishment but never giving up. I wasn’t thrilled with him cheating to win, but at least he did it after the heels cheated first.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- meh
Shawn Spears came out and attacked Jericho. Sammy Guevara made the save to build up to their upcoming match. The babyfaces got overwhelmed three-on-two until Hager came out to make the save.
MJF then announced the stipulation for their match next week. Next week? They’re doing all of this and not even building up to a PPV match?
Anyway, the stipulation is that Jericho won’t be able to come out to his entrance music, and won’t be allowed to use the Judas Effect. Jim Ross asked “could he stack the deck even more?” Well… yes. He could add any number of other unfair things, like saying that he can use weapons but Jericho can’t, or that Jericho needs to pin him for seventeen seconds to get a pinfall, or Jericho has to wrestle with both hands tied behind his back… which begs the question of why MJF doesn’t do any of that? And don’t tell me it’s because “he wants to beat Jericho fairly” because the current stipulation is already unfair.


This evened out to decent episode of Dynamite, but I’ll give it some extra credit for being an effective go-home show for Friday’s Rampage debut while still feeling like a decently big show itself.

[cero2k]

Also, what have Jurassic Express done to earn a title shot?

#1 ranked team

DARBY ALLIN (w/Sting) vs. DANIEL GARCIA (w/2.0)- 6.5/10
Holy f*ck do I want to see that sixty-minute broadway between Daniel Garcia and Wheeler YUTA that Excalibur was talking about.
Darby won a good match clean. 2.0 attacked Darby after the match, seemingly just so Sting would have an excuse to beat them up.

https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1Rg411L7oJ

TONY SCHIAVONE INTERVIEWS DR. BRITT BAKER, DMD- terrible
Britt is supposed to be a heel, but she cuts a total babyface promo for her hometown crowd. Then Red Velvet assaults her out of nowhere.

Just because you're a heel, doesn't mean you're not someone's hometown hero.

[Big Red Machine]

Also, what have Jurassic Express done to earn a title shot?

#1 ranked team

Would have been nice if that were mentioned. Would have been even nicer if they hadn't managed to go from unranked to the #1-ranked team in a two-week span by beating two jobber teams that no one has ever heard of. Will you finally admit that these rankings are a total clusterf*ck?

TONY SCHIAVONE INTERVIEWS DR. BRITT BAKER, DMD- terrible
Britt is supposed to be a heel, but she cuts a total babyface promo for her hometown crowd. Then Red Velvet assaults her out of nowhere.

Just because you're a heel, doesn't mean you're not someone's hometown hero.

It should. Morality is not that relative.
But my issue here isn't fan behavior. A promotion can't control that. But they shouldn't have her all of a sudden be the hometown babyface cutting a hometown babyface promo when she's a heel every other week.

[cero2k]

Would have been nice if that were mentioned. Would have been even nicer if they hadn't managed to go from unranked to the #1-ranked team in a two-week span by beating two jobber teams that no one has ever heard of. Will you finally admit that these rankings are a total clusterf*ck?

they were ranked last week at 4 and picked up two wins in between and some people dropped. I'm ok with that, I have no necessity to do math and try to disprove AEW.

It should. Morality is not that relative.
But my issue here isn't fan behavior. A promotion can't control that. But they shouldn't have her all of a sudden be the hometown babyface cutting a hometown babyface promo when she's a heel every other week.

She's hasn't been that immoral, she's just a dick. So cut a heel promo knowingly that it's gonna get cheers? that is just backwards thinking and it's gonna earn you a bad looking product.

[Big Red Machine]

Would have been nice if that were mentioned. Would have been even nicer if they hadn't managed to go from unranked to the #1-ranked team in a two-week span by beating two jobber teams that no one has ever heard of. Will you finally admit that these rankings are a total clusterf*ck?

they were ranked last week at 4 and picked up two wins in between and some people dropped. I'm ok with that, I have no necessity to do math and try to disprove AEW.

Why is this any different than when WWE tries to sell us kayfabe bullsh*t?

It should. Morality is not that relative.
But my issue here isn't fan behavior. A promotion can't control that. But they shouldn't have her all of a sudden be the hometown babyface cutting a hometown babyface promo when she's a heel every other week.

She's hasn't been that immoral, she's just a dick. So cut a heel promo knowingly that it's gonna get cheers? that is just backwards thinking and it's gonna earn you a bad looking product.

She's done some immoral things (having Rebel cheat for her), but the solution to the problem is simply to no't put her on TV in situation where she's going to get cheered. Let her wrestle a dark match, and for TV you do a pre-tape of her cutting a heel promo or doing something dastardly. You certainly don't have her come out and be a beacon of hope.

[cero2k]

Why is this any different than when WWE tries to sell us kayfabe bullsh*t?

What case in particular? winking dolls or the believe that old man Goldberg can still go? We're talking about a huuuge range of things here

She's done some immoral things (having Rebel cheat for her), but the solution to the problem is simply to no't put her on TV in situation where she's going to get cheered. Let her wrestle a dark match, and for TV you do a pre-tape of her cutting a heel promo or doing something dastardly. You certainly don't have her come out and be a beacon of hope.

So not present your biggest ticket seller and fan favorite for a particular town to that town because of an archaic necessity to keep good and evil separate and not treat your fans and wrestlers as humans. This is why you're not a promoter

[Big Red Machine]

Why is this any different than when WWE tries to sell us kayfabe bullsh*t?

What case in particular? winking dolls or the believe that old man Goldberg can still go? We're talking about a huuuge range of things here

I mean any time WWE thinks that they can just tell us that a title is "prestigious" and we'll swallow it no matter how poorly they book the champion, or that someone is a "worthy" challenger when we never see them win, or how someone was supposedly "very game" when they lost in two minutes. Basically, any time WWE just tells us something and expects us to believe it rather than putting in the work to actual show it.

She's done some immoral things (having Rebel cheat for her), but the solution to the problem is simply to no't put her on TV in situation where she's going to get cheered. Let her wrestle a dark match, and for TV you do a pre-tape of her cutting a heel promo or doing something dastardly. You certainly don't have her come out and be a beacon of hope.

So not present your biggest ticket seller and fan favorite for a particular town to that town because of an archaic necessity to keep good and evil separate and not treat your fans and wrestlers as humans. This is why you're not a promoter

Just because someone is a top ticket seller doesn't mean they're a babyface. People can react to Britt how they want, but the promotion should have a direction they want to push her in. If you REALLY want to fly in the face of that then you have to frame it the way Bryan did during his eco-heel run where when he was in Seattle he would put the crowd over for being the ones who "get it." But that's not what AEW did here. They had her come out a cut a promo that Jerry Lawler or Carlos Colon would cut as the babyface representative of the people. That's not Britt's gimmick.

You talk about not being "human," but I disagree completely. People have a certain constitution to them about what lines they will and won't cross that doesn't change as easily as it seems to when what someone is doing feels like it is being dictated by the needs of a wrestling show.