BRM Reviews the 6/29/2022 Dynamite: Blood & Guts (BAD!)

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Big Red Machine
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BRM Reviews the 6/29/2022 Dynamite: Blood & Guts (BAD!)

Post by Big Red Machine » Jun 30th, '22, 14:49

Is anyone else’s audio choppy, or is it just me?

Taz is on commentary instead of JR tonight, which should make for a much more enjoyable show. Unfortunately, they told us that Ross would be back for the main event.

Some woman we’ve never seen before is getting a TBS Title shot. In kayfabe, I bet Athena has to be wondering if signing with AEW was really the right move at this point.

ORANGE CASSIDY vs. ETHAN PAGE (w/Dan Lambert)- 5.5/10
Tony Schiavone claimed that Orange Cassidy vs. Will Ospreay was a “five-star match,” so I guess no one has told him that ******3/4 is the new *****.
Best Friends came out to ringside with OC, but Dan Lambert demanded that they be sent to the back because they don’t have valid manager’s licenses in Michigan, whose commission is apparently quite strict on such things. Well, the rules are the rules… and holy sh*t the referee actually followed them and sent Best Friends to the back!
We started off with the usual clown sh*t from Orange Cassidy, and it kept popping up throughout. Otherwise, this was standard spotty fair with a heel manager at ringside.

TONY SCHIAVONE INTERVIEWS CHRISTIAN CAGE- bad
He’s supposed to be wrestling next, but he’s not dressed to wrestle. He has apparently been ordered to apologize for the mean things he said about Jungle Boy’s deceased father. I don’t think anyone ever asked MJF to apologize for what he said about Brian Pillman Jr.’s dead father. Or any of the other heinous things he has said. Or any of the heinous things anyone else has said, so this feels a little odd.
So Christian comes out and predictably “apologizes” by telling Jungle Boy “I’m sorry your whole family isn’t dead.” At this point it feels like they have just reassigned the gimmick of saying heinous, line-crossing things from MJF to Christian, which doesn’t work because it makes it feel like he’s saying these things because that’s the gimmick. With MJF, it either actually feels believable, or at least feels believable that MJF is personally crossing a line for the sheer enjoyment of being able to be such a dick.
Then Christian explains to us why he is dressed in street clothes, even though we were told he “requested a match tonight” (and there is already an opponent waiting for him in the ring). He reveals that “I requested a match tonight, but it wasn’t for me.” Then, with a new, heelish entrance (completely with pyro) out came Luchasaurus.
This is kind of sh*t is so dumb and so annoying. The announcers were clearly under the impression that Christian would be wrestling, as was the opponent (Serpentico), and yet Luchasaurus was allowed to come in and wrestle instead. That leaves us with three possibilities of what happened:
1. Christian asked for a match and was granted it, then unilaterally decided to substitute his friend in in instead, and management was too cowardly to try to insist that the agreed upon match take place. That’s not a good look on its own, but it’s even worse because their cowardice results in Serpentico being put at an unfair disadvantage because he prepared for one opponent and is being forced to face another.
2. The same as above, except instead of cowardice, management’s inaction stems from apathy, which is not what you want from the people whose job it is to ensure fair play.
3.Despite supposedly being furious at Christian for the terrible things he said, management aided him in this deception, to the point of deceiving both their own announcers and the opponent, which would make management heels.
And the worst part of this is that based on the available evidence, #3 is by far the most likely, because every time this match was mentioned, the announcers never said “Christian Cage vs. Serpentico” or even “Christian Cage will be in action.” They always said that he had “requested a match.”
Making this even more frustrating is that I’m sure the reason for the above was so that, if asked, Tony Khan could proudly say that they didn’t false advertise, to which I have two things to say. Firstly, yes you did. It’s not a situation where it matters, but don’t pretend that telling us that Christian has “requested a match” isn’t supposed to make people think that he will be wrestling.
Secondly, while I’m sure Tony’s desire to not falsely advertise comes from a good place, that (or purely the desire to not falsely advertise in and of itself) is not an excuse for making bad choices! If you want to get your surprise moment with Luchasaurus here and you also don’t want to specifically advertise a match and then not deliver, you need to either come up with a way to do that where you don’t make management into heels, or you go back to the drawing board and come up with a completely different segment for these guys this week!

SERPENTICO vs. LUCHASAURUS (w/Christian Cage)- no rating, fine squash
Because Luchasaurus is a heel now, his gear is almost all Black (I think his mask is technically a very dark green). Christian is also dressed all in black. It’s nice when the world works in metaphor.
This went about fifteen seconds, which was all it needed. Luchasaurus won with a nerve hold version of Jungle Boy’s Snare Trap.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- groan
Christian ordered Luchasaurus to beat Seprentico up some more after the match, because they’re evil. They’ll need to have a really good reason for Christian convincing Luchasaurus to turn on his best friend.

TONY SCHIAVONE INTERVIEWS SCORPIO SKY & WARDLOW- good… until the end
Wardlow managed to not sound like an asshole here, and I really liked his whole “bring every member of American Top Team that you want; I’ll treat them all like security guards” line. Then they went and ruined it by having Scorpio Sky offer to defend this TNT Title against Wardlow next week in a street fight, and Wardlow accepted. Now I’m just looking forward to about fifteen people showing up next week and stomping the sh*t out of Wardlow until Sky just pins him with his pinky.

DANHAUSEN & FTR vs. MAX CASTER & GUNN CLUB (w/Billy Gunn & Anthony Bowens)- 6/10
Teaming with Danhausen removes any integrity FTR have. The crowd was really into Danhausen, so I guess AEW must have been giving tickets away at a local crackhausen.
There was some good babyface in peril stuff. The finish saw Anthony Bowens reveal that he actually isn’t injured. While Billy Gunn had the referee distracted, he tried to hit Danhausen with a crutch, but accidentally hit Austin Gunn instead, letting Danhausen get the pin, so at least we’re breaking this pair up.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- fine
Shoving happened. In an effort to make peace and keep them apart, Billy shoved one of his kids, probably harder than he was intending. Austin and Colten were quite upset about this. This was done well, but they need to be careful here because Austin and Colten are starting to feel pretty sympathetic.

JAY LETHAL, SANTAM SINGH, & SONJAY DUTT VIDEO PACKAGE/PROMO- fine
Lethal wants an ROH TV Title shot ROH Death Before Dishonor.

AEW TBS TITLE MATCH: Jade Cargill(c) (w/Kiera Hogan & Stokely Hathaway) vs. Leila Grey- no rating, bad segment
Leyla is getting this title shot because apparently there was an open challenge. If only there were some sort of system to judge potential contenders based on their worthiness so that we wouldn’t have to resort randomess like “the first person to sign the contract gets a title shot.” Oh well. It’s too bad AEW doesn’t have anything like that.
The unworthy loser who hasn’t won a match all year got squashed by the undefeated champion. Wow. It’s almost like shouldn’t have been there with Jade to begin with.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- bad
Stokely is about to speak, but Jade snatches the mic away from him and yells at him for not giving her real competition.
Stokely then cut a promo saying that Jade gave everyone an opportunity for this title shot, but only Leila Grey took it. He says that the rest of the division- and specifically name-dropped Kris Statlander and Athena- were not overlooked; just lazy. That’s not fair. If anyone deserves criticism for laziness in this situation, it’s Tony Khan, not booking obvious title matches for weeks and weeks, and just letting champions go out there and make open challenges.
This brought out Athena and Statlander, and unlike previous weeks, post-match brawling between Athena and Jade’s faction is apparently allowed this week, because no one came out to stop them. Leila Grey turned heel by shoving Athena off the top rope, turning the tide of the brawl. Jade showed her gratitude for this by shoving Leila, apparently not wanting her in her group… and it’s hard to blame her for that because the woman is loser.

YOUNG BUCKS PROMO- didn’t like it
This was far too goofy, although I will admit that I popped huge when they said that Hirooki Goto and YOSHI-HASHI would have to beat them in a non-title match first if they wanted to earn a title shot. Hooray for logic! Just because you work for New Japan doesn’t mean you should automatically get a title shot.
Actually, a decent amount of what they said in that paragraph was essentially them stating in a kayfabe way the criticisms many people have made about the way AEW seems to assume that their audience knows who everyone in New Japan is.

On Rampage, they’re doing a twenty-man, two-ring battle royale for a title shot that I shall derisively refer to as World War 2.5. Announcing this in the usual quick Excalibur run-down before the main event might well have been the first time that they mentioned that Moxley had defeated Tanahashi to win the Interim World Title. I do not believe the women’s title match has been mentioned at all.

BLOOD & GUTS VIDEO PACKAGE- fine
I greatly appreciated Ruby Riott alluding to Claudio and Kingston’s past animosity, both because it makes things work a little better for those of us who know it without being said in a way that was inaccessible to those who don’t, but also because it reminded me that the man who Claudio is replacing (and the man who hand-picked Claudio as that replacement), Bryan Danielson, also has issues with Kingston.

BLOOD & GUTS MATCH: Eddie Kingston, LAX & the Blackpool Combat Club (Jon Moxley, Wheeler YUTA, & Claudio Castagnoli) vs. Jericho Appreciation Society (Chris Jericho, Sammy Guevara, Daniel Garcia, Jake Hager, Angelo Parker, & Matt Menard) (w/Tay Conti)- 6.5/10
Sammy and Claudio were the first two in and had a segment that REALLY made me want to see a singles match between them. Claudio and Hager facing off got a “WE THE PEOPLE!” chant, because the crowd just can’t stop themselves.
Just like the match at Double Or Nothing 2022, after awhile this just became them repeatedly hitting each other with stuff and bleeding. I was numb to it by about the thirty-minute mark, and then the match kept going for almost seventeen more.

The spot with Tay attacking a referee so that Ruby could stop her from entering the cage was stupid. Is that spot really worth ignoring the fact that she assaulted a referee (which should- and has in the past in AEW- resulted in a suspension)? This let people leave the cage and do sh*t on top of it. This included Sammy taking a bump off of it, and Claudio giving Jericho the big swing on top of the cage, which… makes it hurt more… how, exactly? If anything, it should make the guy doing the move more dizzy than it would make him on the ground, but wouldn’t affect the guy taking it any more than usual.
The finish saw Kingston have Jericho in the Stretch Plum on top of the cage while Claudio had Menard in a Sharpshooter up there as well, and Menard tapped out. For some reason, this upset Kingston. Why? His goal wasn’t to make Jericho quit. He already did that at Revolution. Last month he wanted to burn Jericho to death. Eddie, if you still want to hurt Jericho, just keep beating on him! You’ve shown that you don’t care if a match is going on or not. You attack these guys backstage all the time. Why are you upset?!
So Kingston is a f*cking baby, and the announcers told me that this big babyface victory I just sat through for almost forty-seven minutes really doesn’t matter to the main babyface of our story. Just great.


This was a bad show from AEW, it was a bunch of crap, and then a match that went WAAAAYY too long, because someone thinks that long=good. The War Games matches done by NXT, TNA, and ROH could get away with this kind of length (although really only NXT ever went this long), because they all had pinfalls, which makes things more exciting than just waiting for a submission, and especially when 90% of the moves being done are not submissions.
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

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Re: BRM Reviews the 6/29/2022 Dynamite: Blood & Guts (BAD!)

Post by XIV » Jul 5th, '22, 00:42

Big Red Machine wrote: Jun 30th, '22, 14:49 BLOOD & GUTS MATCH: Eddie Kingston, LAX & the Blackpool Combat Club (Jon Moxley, Wheeler YUTA, & Claudio Castagnoli) vs. Jericho Appreciation Society (Chris Jericho, Sammy Guevara, Daniel Garcia, Jake Hager, Angelo Parker, & Matt Menard) (w/Tay Conti)- 6.5/10
Sammy and Claudio were the first two in and had a segment that REALLY made me want to see a singles match between them. Claudio and Hager facing off got a “WE THE PEOPLE!” chant, because the crowd just can’t stop themselves.
Just like the match at Double Or Nothing 2022, after awhile this just became them repeatedly hitting each other with stuff and bleeding. I was numb to it by about the thirty-minute mark, and then the match kept going for almost seventeen more.

The spot with Tay attacking a referee so that Ruby could stop her from entering the cage was stupid. Is that spot really worth ignoring the fact that she assaulted a referee (which should- and has in the past in AEW- resulted in a suspension)? This let people leave the cage and do sh*t on top of it. This included Sammy taking a bump off of it, and Claudio giving Jericho the big swing on top of the cage, which… makes it hurt more… how, exactly? If anything, it should make the guy doing the move more dizzy than it would make him on the ground, but wouldn’t affect the guy taking it any more than usual.
The finish saw Kingston have Jericho in the Stretch Plum on top of the cage while Claudio had Menard in a Sharpshooter up there as well, and Menard tapped out. For some reason, this upset Kingston. Why? His goal wasn’t to make Jericho quit. He already did that at Revolution. Last month he wanted to burn Jericho to death. Eddie, if you still want to hurt Jericho, just keep beating on him! You’ve shown that you don’t care if a match is going on or not. You attack these guys backstage all the time. Why are you upset?!
So Kingston is a f*cking baby, and the announcers told me that this big babyface victory I just sat through for almost forty-seven minutes really doesn’t matter to the main babyface of our story. Just great.
It took me a while to getting around to watching Blood and Guts, mainly because I knew it would be shit, and boy was I correct.

Straight from the first bell, Claudio and Sammy had no fucking clue what to do, Claudio sold like Suzuki for anything Sammy did, but did occasionally hit various slams and throws, also I'd just like to mention that this kind of match does not suit Claudio at all, give me 1v1's.

This poor start set the tone for the whole clusterfuck of a match. AEW's new world champion's first order business is to get into a cage and cut various people open with forks (there was even a clear shot of Moxley blading Manard which the camera cut away from after 3 or 4 seconds). There was just too many people, not really doing anything in this match, it was just horrible, with everyone bleeding, everyone gets a piece of furniture and the heels never really got any heat, the babyfaces stayed on top the whole match, it never looked like they would lose and this helped kill a match that never really had anything going for it.

One of the worst multi-man matches I have ever seen and at nearly 50 minutes, it was just horrible and didn't have enough story to carry it through. Tony needs to stop naming Dynamites these silly names, just have gimmicks and gimmick matches without proper build, its mark booking from the "booker of the year".
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Re: BRM Reviews the 6/29/2022 Dynamite: Blood & Guts (BAD!)

Post by Big Red Machine » Jul 5th, '22, 07:14

XIV wrote: Jul 5th, '22, 00:42 There was just too many people,
And the most annoying part is that they made this same mistake in last month's big PPV brawl between these two factions, and didn't learn anything from it.
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Re: BRM Reviews the 6/29/2022 Dynamite: Blood & Guts (BAD!)

Post by XIV » Jul 5th, '22, 12:35

Big Red Machine wrote: Jul 5th, '22, 07:14
XIV wrote: Jul 5th, '22, 00:42 There was just too many people,
And the most annoying part is that they made this same mistake in last month's big PPV brawl between these two factions, and didn't learn anything from it.
Problem is AEW wide, worsened by adding NJPW talent into the equation is that everything is multi man or woman matches. Not enough 1v1. It’s hard to care about anyone when they’re in multi-man matches because people are off camera too long or laid out from a DDT for 5 minutes waiting for their next spot.

I’m hoping they can phase the NJPW out for a bit now and get back to focusing on their own stuff, because with Danielson and Punk out, MJF doing whatever he’s doing, they’re suffering on star power and need to build a couple of new guys up.

WWE just used money in the bank to put emphasis on youth, the two MITB winners were 28 and 24, it was a bit of a breakout for Street Profits (with Ford looking like he might get a push too), they’ve signed Paul. Vince is fully focused on creative now as it’s his only job… and it’s looking like he’s seeking to push youth. Everybody knows he capable when he wants to be. Look at the attitude era, Smackdown from 03-07ish.

If AEW is serious about growth beyond the same 750,000- 850,000 fans that tune in regardless, something has to change.
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Re: BRM Reviews the 6/29/2022 Dynamite: Blood & Guts (BAD!)

Post by Big Red Machine » Jul 5th, '22, 13:56

XIV wrote: Jul 5th, '22, 12:35
Big Red Machine wrote: Jul 5th, '22, 07:14
XIV wrote: Jul 5th, '22, 00:42 There was just too many people,
And the most annoying part is that they made this same mistake in last month's big PPV brawl between these two factions, and didn't learn anything from it.
Problem is AEW wide, worsened by adding NJPW talent into the equation is that everything is multi man or woman matches. Not enough 1v1. It’s hard to care about anyone when they’re in multi-man matches because people are off camera too long or laid out from a DDT for 5 minutes waiting for their next spot.
It also runs the risk of making you feel like New Japan, with too many matches whose purpose is to protect people from having to lose rather than to advance a storyline in any way or to give the winner any sort of useful boost.
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

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Re: BRM Reviews the 6/29/2022 Dynamite: Blood & Guts (BAD!)

Post by XIV » Jul 5th, '22, 14:11

Big Red Machine wrote: Jul 5th, '22, 13:56
XIV wrote: Jul 5th, '22, 12:35
Big Red Machine wrote: Jul 5th, '22, 07:14

And the most annoying part is that they made this same mistake in last month's big PPV brawl between these two factions, and didn't learn anything from it.
Problem is AEW wide, worsened by adding NJPW talent into the equation is that everything is multi man or woman matches. Not enough 1v1. It’s hard to care about anyone when they’re in multi-man matches because people are off camera too long or laid out from a DDT for 5 minutes waiting for their next spot.
It also runs the risk of making you feel like New Japan, with too many matches whose purpose is to protect people from having to lose rather than to advance a storyline in any way or to give the winner any sort of useful boost.
Exactly that.
Have A Nice Day!

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