BRM Reviews the 5/11/2022 Dynamite (shooting themselves in the foot)

[Big Red Machine]

OWEN HART FOUNDATION MEN’S TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Adam Cole vs. Dax Harwood- 8.5/10
Now the actual tournament is starting and we STILL don’t know what’s actually on the line here.
Cole won cleanly in an excellent match. That being said, I REALLY don’t want to see people going for Sharpshooters in every match when they otherwise wouldn’t do the move just because the name “Hart” is on this tournament. It makes things feel more like an artistic performance.

JEFF HARDY VS. DARBY ALLIN VIDEO PACKAGE- great
Apparently Darby asked Tony Khan is their match could be a Street Fight just because. I usually hate this sort of thing, but with these two, it works. Wrestlers should try to avoid more dangerous gimmick matches at all cost, but these guys have a reputation not for toughness (though they certainly are tough) so much as for a kind of recklessness where it works for them. Even with your Tommy Dreamer type or a deathmatch wrestler, I believe that in kayfabe they still want to preserve their body. With these two (and Darby in particular), I think they really don’t care.

CM PUNK vs. JOHN SILVER- 6.75/10
Punk comes out in a John Tavares Islanders jersey to get booed. Dude… why not come out in a John Tavares MAPLE LEAFS jersey? Wouldn’t that 1) sting more and 2) negate any change that you would initially get cheered when fans just see the logo on the front? And, of course, why is Punk doing this at all? He’s normally a babyface, but all of a sudden he’s doing things to purposely antagonize the crowd. Why? It feels fake.
Alternatively, if, as Excalibur later suggested, the idea here was that Punk was “making a peace offering” to the crowd by wearing an Islanders jersey and Islanders colors on his tights, why did no one get him a CURRENT player’s jersey, to reduce any chance of the fans thinking that he is taunting them with the jersey of their homegrown star who left for more money?
And if the idea was Punk trying to “make peace” with the crowd, why was he booked against someone who would be a hometown favorite? The lack of communication here between some combination of the wrestlers, the booker, and the announcers is criminally negligent.
Some members of the Dark Order came out with Silver to support him, including Anna Jay, who normally isn’t with their big assemblage of geeks backstage. Colt Cabana was, notably, not one of them.
Adam Page was on commentary for this match. The match was very good, but going 50-50 with a clown like Silver is not a good way to build Punk up for his title shot. Punk won with the Buckshot Lariat, which angered Adam Page. Why is this disrespectful, but doing Owen’s move in the earlier match is a tribute?

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- Page angrily stormed to the ring and they got nose to nose. Punk got a microphone at some point and asked Page if he was angry, and said that Page seems to be taking things too personally, whereas to Punk “it’s just business.”
Punk said that he used to wake up every morning and ask himself if he was a good person, but this morning he instead asked himself “are you the champ?” “And my answer was ‘yes.’” Punk said that he would destroy Page at the PPV like he destroyed his “boy” John Silver tonight, and insisted that Page would shake his hand after their title match. Punk put his hand out for a handshake now, and Page flipped him off and left. Punk was happy.
Segments like this are why I get so frustrated with AEW. Punk’s promo here was AMAZING. If you’re going to turn CM Punk heel in 2022, the ideas Punk expressed here was the perfect storyline with which to do it. Unfortunately, there are two HUGE problems with it:
1. It comes completely out of nowhere.
WHY did Punk change this question he has been asking himself? Something (or series of things) has to happen to drive Punk to the point where being the champion becomes more important to him than being a good person. What has changed between last week and this week? NOTHING! Punk’s change in attitude has come about not as a result of things we have seen, but because the booker decided it was time to flip the switch in his head, and that is bad storytelling. Characters need to develop, not magically change whenever the storyteller needs them to.
If you want to do this story, you need to set it up with Punk getting screwed in a title match or two and getting screwed in a #1 contendership match or two over the course of the previous six to nine months. Punk wants the title, but he also wants to be a good person. If you’re going to tell this story, you need to put him in situations that make him conclude that being a good person is an impediment to him winning the title.

2. This dynamite doesn’t match the storyline we have seen play out on TV.
Keen observers might have noted that I left a line out of Punk’s comments to Page, which was Punk prefacing his comment about how he destroyed Silver by saying noting that last week, Page had said he was going to destroy Punk, and completely out of nowhere says that he won’t shake Punk’s hand. That RUINS this, because it’s hard to be angry at Punk for being a dick to Page if Page is a dick to Punk first. Furthermore, if Punk is the heel, then him doing things to make Page angry in the hopes that Page will make a mistake in their title match because he is blinded by rage is a heel tactic, as he’s trying to essentially circumvent facing Page at Page’s best. Here, Punk is still doing that, but it’s hard to see Punk as a heel if his dickishness is a response to Page’s, so neither of them is likable.

AEW has the right ideas (most of the time), but the implementation of those ideas in the booking is often SOOO bad.

TONY SCHIAVONE INTERVIEWS BRITT BAKER & PALS- decent
They push the idea that Britt is at a disadvantage because she doesn’t know who her opponent is. Britt then cut Jamie Hayter’s promo on Toni Storm for her. It was a great promo, but these two talked at each other so much that I just don’t give a sh*t. Tony pointed out that if they both win, they would face each other. Britt said that if that happened, they would have a fair match.

DANHAUSEN vs. TONY NESE (w/Mark Sterling)- no rating, bad segment
This was Danhausen’s AEW in-ring debut. So he has been under contract for THREE AND A HALF MONTHS, and hasn’t been booked in a single match.
Sterling distracted Danhausen, allowing Nese to hit a big running knee and get the pin. Mark Sterling then egged Tony on to do more damage to Dorkhausen. He promised that Nese would destroy all of the “internet meme wrestlers.” I thought these guys were supposed to be heels.
Hook came out to save Danhausen. Nese and Sterling bailed. Out-hausen offered Hook a handshake, and Hook shook it. Why? What has Danhausen done between now and last week that made Hook change his mind about teaming with him? If Danhausen had put up a good fight here and shown toughness, that would be one thing, but that didn’t happen. Did he get a fair chance here? No. But just because you got knocked out with a blindside shot doesn’t that you would have lasted any longer if it wasn’t a blindside shot.

MJF & WARDLOW HAVE A CONTRACT-SIGNING- I have never seen a promotion shoot themselves in the foot more than AEW did here.
Wardlow comes out… and he’s getting the sh*t booed out of him, because the last time AEW was in this market, they decided it’d be fun to do things meant to get the fans to cheer for the heel MJF. Oops. Who could have seen this problem coming?
There are fans in the front row dressed like MJF, and fans with a sign that said “MJF, rip our sign!” The production crew actually spotlighted these people. They’re killing MJF as a heel.
We then get a video package with Jericho narrating. This was clearly written by and is being produced by MJF… and yet they still left a line in where Jericho called MJF and asshole and only admitted that he was doing this because MJF was paying him a lot of money. Why would MJF leave that in?
We got a bunch of heel managers who have NO connection to MJF giving MJF’s side of the narrative. Taz was even billed as “MJF’s consigliere.” Barry Horrowitz made an appears to call Shawn Dean a jobber (it must be SOOO nice to have money to just throw around like that). This is the sort of dumb, goofball comedy that doesn’t need to be here. Even if it’s in-character for MJF to want it, it makes a blood feud feel less serious, and because it’s funny, it makes MJF feel a little more likable.
Also, they weren’t wrong about Wardlow assaulting “innocent” security guards.
And now here is Excalibur telling me that “inexplicably,” the fans here cheer for MJF. Also, someone clearly let Excalibur in on the John Tavares story, because now Excalibur is saying that MJF would “sign with the Maple Leafs on a moment’s notice.”
MJF is a huge babyface here, with his own personalized Islanders jersey. The fans cheer his name, and then he says “that’s a symphony, bitch!” which got a big pop.
MJF references David and Goliath, but doesn’t know that David was not a prince. Also, do you want to tell him that “salt of the Earth” is a Jesus quote, or should I?
After humiliating Wardlow with the crowd playing along, MJF then gives Wardlow his conditions:
1. Wardlow must get whipped ten times.
2. Wardlow must beat Shawn Spears in a steel cage, with MJF as the referee.
The fans cheered while MJF read out these unreasonable stipulations.
Yes, they are similar to Cody’s. They called that out. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t feed into the idea that Tony Khan’s booking is very repetitive.
Also, why would MJF want to be the referee in a match where there are no DQs. Can’t Warlow just beat him up then?
MJF also declares that if Wardlow loses to him at the PPV, Wardlow can never sign a contract with AEW. I’m glad they thought to close that loop-hole. That’s Tony Khan: 1, obvious kayfabe solutions 5,906.
Anyway, it’s time to sign the contract, but Wardlow can’t sign it because he’s handcuffed. Everyone tries to warn MJF that this is a bad idea, but he won’t listen.
The obvious (to everyone but MJF, anyway) happens… and so help me G-d, I’m watching most of the crowd boo as the babyface beats up the security so he can try to get to the big heel. He gets his hands on MJF, but Mark Sterling sacrifices himself to save MJF. MJF heads up the ramp… and instead of follow and trying to get his hands on MJF, Wardlow decides to powerbomb Sterling through a table instead. And the crowd is all booing.
With a crowd going in the proper direction, this could have been one of the greatest segments in AEW history. Just imagine how the crowd would have started buzzing when MJF demanded that they remove the cuffs from Wardlow so that he could sign the contract. But we didn’t get that, and the only reason we didn’t get it is because AEW decided that it would be fun to have this one market be their version of Bizzaro World. WWE’s problems stem from being horribly mistaken about the right way to do things. This right here was nothing more than a criminal lack of self-control.

SAMOA JOE VS. JAY LETHAL & PALS VIDEO PACKAGE/PROMOS- Joe was awesome, Sanjay, Lethal, and Singh all came across like exactly the “jokers” Joe said they were.

FTW TITLE MATCH: Ricky Starks(c) vs. Jungle Boy- 6.75/10
Taz was on commentary for this match. The match was a very good match with an extremely stupid finish. Everyone’s seconds were missing from ringside. Were they banned from ringside to make sure they didn’t interfere? NOPE. Just not there.
The reason for this, of course, was because if they were there, they would have gotten in the way of the finish. Said finish saw Starks go for the FTW Title, but Shane Strickland come out to stop him. Strickland’s presence distracted the referee, who then didn’t see Jungle Boy roll Starks up and have him down for a count of about six. Jungle Boy got up to check where the referee was, which allowed Starks to get up behind him, hit his finisher and win. If Christian or Luchasaurus were out here, they would have stopped Starks from using the title belt well before Strickland got there, and if Hobbs was a ringside, he would have stopped Strickland from stopping Starks from using the title.
You could have had them be barred from ringside from the beginning (it’s not like Tony Khan hasn’t done that for random matches in the past), or- even better- had them at ringside and then do a spot that leads to them all getting ejected two minutes in. But not. AEW chose to do nothing, and just have them not be at ringside for their partners’ big match tonight even though they are usually at ringside with them for no f*cking reason… which once again exposes the fact that the actual reason they’re not there is that they would have gotten in the way of the booker’s planned finish, damaging suspension of disbelief by rubbing in our faces that the characters have no agency.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- passable, if what came before it hadn’t been forced
The partners came to ringside. Christian and Luchasaurus were upset with Strickland. Keith Lee came out to back Strickland up.

JERICHO APPRECIATION SOCIETY “VICTORY SPEECH”- bad segment
They say mean things about Eddie Kingston, LAX, and Long Island. Garcia really doesn’t work for me in this role. He feels like he is someone trying to play a character. They are interrupted by Jon Moxley. It took me quite a while to remember why Moxley would be out here. For those who didn’t remember, Excalibur was kind enough to explain it:
“Remember how close Jon Moxley and Eddie Kingston are. You know it’s got to be weighing on Moxley to see Kingston have that fireball thrown in his eyes; be repeatedly put to this numbers disadvantage by the Jericho Appreciation Society.”
Yes, it weighed so heavily on Moxley’s conscience, seeing his friend repeatedly beaten down due to a numbers disadvantage week after week that he… never once made any effort to help him. But now he’s out here to confront the people who did that to his friend week after week. I’ve heard of a “friendship of convenience, but all of Kingston’s friendships seems to be friendships of plot convenience.
The rest of the Blackpool Combat Club come out, too. The heels point out that it’s still five vs. four… at which point Eddie Kingston and LAX come through the crowd behind the Jericho Appreciation Society, and it’s now six-on-five (Regal was counted before, but made no move to join the impending fight). The fight started and the babyfaces beat the heels up. Hager tried to pull Jericho to safety, but Regal got a punch in on Jericho, and apparently this ten-second brawl was enough revenge, because Moxley’s music played again and the babyfaces made no move to pursue the heels. I guess three seconds of choking was enough revenge or Kingston for a fireball to the face.
Yes, there is something to the idea of the heels being given a taste of their own medicine in the form of an out-numbered beat-down, but that only works if there was some reason that it hasn’t happened until now (like the babyfaces being guys who didn’t like each other and only how have realized the necessity of putting their differences aside to deal with these heels). In this situation- as it so often is in AEW- the only reason Moxley and his friends didn’t come to Kingston and LAX’s aid at any point until now was because that would interfere with the booker’s plans for this big moment.

THUNDER ROSA VS. SERENA DEEB VIDEO PACKAGE- good

OWEN HART FOUNDATION WOMEN’S TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Jamie Hayter vs. Toni Storm- 6.75/10
The story of this match was Hayter working over Storm’s back, but Toni managed to make a small opener for herself, hit her Piledriver, and get the win.

SCORPIO SKY VS. FRANKIE KAZARIAN VIDEO PACKAGE/ SCORPIO SKY PROMO- fine
It’s funny how Dan Lambert and Ethan Page are suddenly not there with Sky now that he’s supposed to be a babyface, even though they’re still a unit.

LEXI’S INTERVIEW WITH FRANKIE KAZARIAN IS INTERRUPTED BY SAMMY GUEVARA & TAY CONTI- meh
Sammy tried to get Kaz to not trust Sky. Kaz told him to go away. This seemed to exist just for the purpose of getting Sammy and Tay on the show.

A match has been booked pitting “the reunited Death Triangle” against Butcher, Blade, and someone else… because why would you book them against the guys they’re feuding with when you can book them against a trio of jobbers to the stars. That would be silly.

ANYTHING GOES OWEN HART FOUNDATION MEN’S TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Jeff Hardy (w/Matt Hardy) vs. Darby Allin (w/Sting)- 8/10
Ross claimed that this was “one of the best matches we’ve ever seen here on Dynamite.” This was not even close to true, but the match certainly lived up to my expectation. They just threw their bodies at each other, and hoped they didn’t miss. I really despised the finish, though, which Jeff taking a Coffin Drop and kicking out right into a pin. They did this same finish with Cody, and I hated it then, too. If a finisher is going to matter, you shouldn’t be able to recover enough to not just kick out, but to b able to lock in a hold while doing so.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- the Undisputed Elite came out and had a stare-down with the babyfaces. Adam Cole will face Jeff in the Owen Hart Tournament semifinals. The announcers once again pushed Bucks vs. Hardys.


This was another one of those episodes of Dynamite that drives me nuts because while the wrestling is great, so many of AEW’s glaring flaws are on display and just ruin what should have been a great show. Every day I wake up and I mourn what the wrestling business could have been if Gabe Sapolsky had had rich friends or a rich dad. Instead, we got Jeff Jarrett and Tony Khan.

[Thelone]

OWEN HART FOUNDATION MEN’S TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Adam Cole vs. Dax Harwood- 8.5/10
Now the actual tournament is starting and we STILL don’t know what’s actually on the line here.
Cole won cleanly in an excellent match. That being said, I REALLY don’t want to see people going for Sharpshooters in every match when they otherwise wouldn’t do the move just because the name “Hart” is on this tournament. It makes things feel more like an artistic performance.

I really think Khan only sees the short term effects of whatever he does, whether it's the 500th GAME-CHANGING signing or buying a dead promotion for an absurd amount or the totally-not-made-up independant study about bots or the Owen deal in this case. He only saw the lame "TAKE THAT!!!" at WWE and easy clout, but doesn't want/feel the need to put in the work to make those tournaments memorable or even just fun. Deep down, we most likely have yet another two #1 contender's tournaments, but they just happen to have Owen Hart's name slapped on them and thanks to creative freedumb, the only thing wrestlers themselves can come up with is references/tributes to the Harts (hi Stalker Harwood).

Owen's widow doesn't want anything to do with WWE for a perfectly valid and understandable reason, but I'm genuinely wondering if she's starting to regret latching Owen's name onto this half-assed thing, especially after a particular spot in the main event. I mean, nothing screams "celebrating Owen Hart" more than jumping from a high place and hoping for the best, right?

[Big Red Machine]

OWEN HART FOUNDATION MEN’S TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Adam Cole vs. Dax Harwood- 8.5/10
Now the actual tournament is starting and we STILL don’t know what’s actually on the line here.
Cole won cleanly in an excellent match. That being said, I REALLY don’t want to see people going for Sharpshooters in every match when they otherwise wouldn’t do the move just because the name “Hart” is on this tournament. It makes things feel more like an artistic performance.

I really think Khan only sees the short term effects of whatever he does, whether it's the 500th GAME-CHANGING signing or buying a dead promotion for an absurd amount or the totally-not-made-up independant study about bots or the Owen deal in this case. He only saw the lame "TAKE THAT!!!" at WWE and easy clout, but doesn't want/feel the need to put in the work to make those tournaments memorable or even just fun. Deep down, we most likely have yet another two #1 contender's tournaments, but they just happen to have Owen Hart's name slapped on them and thanks to creative freedumb, the only thing wrestlers themselves can come up with is references/tributes to the Harts (hi Stalker Harwood).

This is probably accurate.

Owen's widow doesn't want anything to do with WWE for a perfectly valid and understandable reason, but I'm genuinely wondering if she's starting to regret latching Owen's name onto this half-assed thing, especially after a particular spot in the main event. I mean, nothing screams "celebrating Owen Hart" more than jumping from a high place and hoping for the best, right?

Yeah, that probably wasn't the best thing to do in a tournament named after Owen, or with Martha right there.