BRM Reviews the 1/27/2023 Rampage

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Big Red Machine
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BRM Reviews the 1/27/2023 Rampage

Post by Big Red Machine » Feb 1st, '23, 00:09

ADAM PAGE vs. WHEELER YUTA- 7/10
Ross, Jericho, and Schiavone all quickly got on my nerves on commentary during this match. I don’t think that they said one useful thing between the three of them, and if they did, it certainly wasn’t something that Excalibur wouldn’t have said on his own.
I spent months listening to Tony Schiavone accuse the Jericho Appreciation Society of “systematic cheating,” and now here is Wheeler YUTA just grabbing Page and biting him, and Jericho rightly calls for YUTA to be disqualified, and Schiavone (and the other babyface announcers) say nothing. They won’t even admit that it was an illegal move.
And what is even the point of that stupid f*cking spot that Moxley and now YUTA do, anyway? To show me how intense they are? Other people do that by firing up and throwing punches. These guys are supposed to be babyfaces Why did they pick a fire-up spot that is completely illegal? And why did no one tell them to stop doing it?
Page won with the Death Rider because that “sends Jon Moxley a message.” Whatever. I don’t understand what message he could possibly feel the need to send to Moxley that he hasn’t told him verbally in the fifty-seven promos these two have cut on each other over the course of this feud.

ACTION ANDRETTI & RICKY STARKS PROMO FROM AFTER DYNAMITE- good
They both say that the heels needed a baseball bat in order to beat them. Starks wants another match against Jericho to prove this.

EDDIE KINGSTON PROMO- good promo, bad story
He has decided to stop fighting and let his demons win, so he’s turning heel and joining the House of Black. Turning Eddie heel is a bad idea. They’re pissing money away by not building to Kingston vs. MJF for the world title on PPV.

SATNAM SINGH, JAY LETHAL, & JEFF JARRETT (w/Sonjay Dutt) vs. BEST FRIENDS & DANHAUSEN (w/Orange Cassidy)- 4/10
Apparently that Paul Walter Houser guy doesn’t give enough of a sh*t about his Golden Globe to contact the authorities to try to get it back. Dorkhausen brought an ukulele to the ring with him, which Satnam Singh snapped. I nearly flew into a rage when Excalibur claimed that Danhausen had been “a big part of the ROH locker room through the years.” He was barely even there for a year!
This was boring. The babyfaces tried to cheat more than the heels did, so their loss at the hands of the heels cheating felt like poetic justice. Singh has been in the company for well over a year now and has been appearing on TV for over nine months, and they still don’t trust him to put people down safely.
Tony Schiavone’s gleeful exclamation of “I HATE SONJAY DUTT!” when Dutt ate an Orange Punch was extremely off-putting because of how selective Schiavone is in his outrage based on who is breaking a rule.

RENEE PAQUETTE’S INTERVIEW WITH RUBY SOHO AFTER DYNAMITE IS INTERRUPTED BY DR. BRITT BAKER, DMD- bad
Ruby told Britt that she didn’t need or want her help. That part was good. The bad part was Britt saying that there was a clear division in the locker room” and that Ruby needed to “grow a spine and pick a side.” The idea that there are now two sides in the locker room because two people decided to make an arbitrary distinction is ridiculous. Or am I supposed to believe that they have already hooked up with Marina Shafir and Athena, too? Are Tay Conti and Anna Jay at odds now?
Even more ridiculous is the idea that there was any doubt what side Ruby Soho was on. She came out to save Willow from the beat-down that started this whole dumb thing! And don’t tell me that that’s just Dr. Baker being a heel! Right after they were done, Excalibur said that there was “quite a bit of intrigue” over “where the loyalties of Ruby Soho lie.”

WILL HOBBS vs. TONY MUDD- squash

TOP FLIGHT PROMO/VIDEO PACKAGE- They use their big win over the Young Bucks and their victory in that silly trios battle royale last month to claim that they and A.R. Fox deserve a shot at the Trios Titles. They is vaguely passable build for such pointless belts, but this really feels like a waste of Top Flight getting a huge win over the Bucks in the two-on-two tag team matches where both teams have made their names.

RENEE PAQUETTE’S INTERVIEW WITH DUSTIN RHODES IS INTERRUPTED BY MOGUL AFFILIATES- meh
Dustin talks about having had a very rough month. I have no idea what he’s talking about. But he’s ready to get back to work, so that’s good. Swerve insulted the whole Rhodes family. Said that Dustin was old and that Cody “ain’t sh*t,” before starting to move on to Dusty, at which point Dustin interrupted him and hold him not to talk about Dusty. Everyone was angry at each other. This whole thing felt forced. I don’t buy that Shane Strickland gives enough of a sh*t about old-ass Dustin Rhodes to want to pick a fight with him.

MAIN EVENT VIDEO PACKAGE- snore
It was the same one from when this match was announced, with only Hayter getting to talk. How is anyone supposed to give a sh*t about Emi Sakura?

LEXI NAIR’S INTERVIEW JADE CARGILL IS INTERRUPTED BY THE FORMER BADDIES- snore
Red Velvet says that Jade is mean to everyone, and that Leila Grey only hangs out with her because she has no self-esteem. Velvet said that she was the first one to lose to Jade, but she will be the first one to beat her.
This is another one of those things that leaves me so frustrated with AEW. As I have documented since it began, this story of the other Baddies breaking away from Jade felt completely out of nowhere, and has been told quite poorly. After hearing this promo, I would be shocked to learn that the decision to do this story and break them up was made for any reason other than that they didn’t have anyone better for Jade to beat and thus they thought it would be cool if the first person she beat was also the fiftieth.
Tony Khan and his defenders love to talk about AEW’s “long-term storytelling,” but it feels to me like their definition of “long-term storytelling” is merely something where they can show you the end point and then point to an event far in the past and say “that’s where this started,” and miss the fact that you have to actually TELL THE STORY THROUGHOUT MOST OF THAT TIME. I’m not you have to mention it every week, but you do, occasionally, have to have touchstone moments to remind people of the story and you need to show emotions building up over time before they boil over.

Joe vs. Darby on Dynamite is apparently now no holds barred.

AEW WOMEN’S WORLD TITLE ELIMINATOR MATCH: AEW Women’s World Champion Jaymie Hayter(w/Dr. Britt Baker, DMD & Rebel) vs. Emi Sakura (w/her Royal Court)- 7.5/10
The last time we saw Emi Sakura, she was a Freddie Mercury impersonator. Now she is apparently a queen with her own “royal court.” There was no explanation for why this change happened.
Hayter failed to miss a moonsault, but Sakura just continued on with the planned roll-up spot, not selling at all. The crowd booed at this. Other than that, the match was exciting, but I have been given no reason to care about Sakura, and Hayter is an unlikable person who I am apparently supposed to like based on how the crowd and announcers react to her, so I just didn’t care about the outcome.

Jericho told us that part of the reason the fans love Jamie Hayter so much is that “you can tell: she is throwing some live rounds in there.” You know… as opposed to all of the other strikes, which are fake? Is it really that hard to not expose the business when you’re on commentary? And this is a taped show! There is no reason they couldn’t have edited that off!

This was a better episode of Rampage than usual, just based off the strength of the wrestling.
Hold #712: ARM BAR!

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