BRM Reviews the 12/2/2022 Rampage (bad)

[Big Red Machine]

DARBY ALLIN vs. COLE KARTER (w/Nick Comoroto)- 6/10
Karter didn’t get his entrance shown. For some reason Comoroto was in the ring and Karter was outside of it. Darby destroyed Comoroto with the bat Sting gave him before Sting went to the back. Darby then dove onto Karter on the outside and beat him up before rolling him into the ring to start the match.
Despite this, Karter managed to cut Darby off and dominated the vast majority of the match before Darby made a quick comeback following Karter missing a 450 and got the win with a Coffin Drop. The match was very good, but I don’t understand why they had this nobody take so much of the match against Darby.

RENEE PAQUETTE’S INTERVIEW WITH KEITH LEE IS INTERRUPTED BY SHANE TAYLOR- okay
Taylor castigated Lee for always “leaving family behind,” including both himself and Swerve. He noted that he was the greatest ROH TV Champion of all time, and then challenged Lee to a match at Final Battle so he can get revenge on Lee for leaving ROH and thus breaking up their tag team almost six years ago. After Taylor left, Swerve showed up and smirked at Lee, and Lee asked if he could trust him.
I guess the idea here is that Swerve orchestrated this to try to guilt Lee into reforming their team, which helps it not feel as random as it felt at first. That being said, based on what we’ve seen of the Shane Taylor character, him allowing himself to be so obviously manipulated by Swerve doesn’t fit at all. If he sticks around, I hope it is as Swerve’s new and fully committed tag partner rather than being someone who Swerve fooled.

DARK ORDER VS. AFO VIDEO PACKAGE- snore
Jose actually called their group La Faccion Ingobernable, so they might be dropping all things Andrade-related for now and going in a more Rush-based direction.
The heels were cartoon heels, and the Dark Order told us how terrible this betrayal was because of a bunch of stuff that happened off-screen.

RENEE PAQUETTE INTERVIEWS THE ACCLAIMED AND BILLY GUNN- weird
Excalibur reminds us that the Acclaimed had said that they were going to offer a title shot to the second-best team in AEW on tonight’s show. Okay… so why are they out here in their street clothes getting interviewed by Renee instead of out here in their gear for their title defense?
Renee asks “what’s next for the Acclaimed?” so she’s as bad at paying attention to the goings-on in AEW as Tony Schiavone. Bowens says that they are upset about getting interrupted by Team TNA last week on Dynamite. If you were so upset about it, why didn’t you say something about it in your promo on Wednesday?
They claim it’s because Team TNA want to cut the line and get a title shot, but they say that there is a team that has been waiting for a long time who deserves a shot first. The fans all chanted for “FTR!” Instead, Gunn Club came out and claimed that they were the best tag team in the world. Then Team TNA came out and said that they were the best, and that they would prove it by defeating Private Party later tonight.
Finally FTR came out and walked right past the gaggle of heels on the ramp and shook hands with the Acclaimed. It has been so long that I no longer care about FTR challenging for the AEW World Tag Team Titles. And why should I? They’ve seemed content with the three other tag titles they have. Why the sudden change of heart after they spend most of the summer doing absolutely nothing?
Any why were those other teams even out there? The only answer I can come up with is that this was Tony’s hack way of planting the seeds for the next big title match to wind up as a four-way because he isn’t actually ready to take the belts off of the Acclaimed yet… but if that’s the case then it’s still hack booking. If that’s what you’re going to do, why not spend time actually building these teams up instead of wasting time with the Acclaimed cutting pointless promos every week and FTR defending non-AEW Titles against teams that have done nothing to earn it and pointless defenses of the completely pointless All-Atlantic Championship? If Lethal and Jarrett are going to wind up with a title shot soon, why not have them actually beat Sting and Darby at Full Gear instead of lose to them?

HIKARU SHIDA VS. PENELOPE FORD & THE BUNNY VIDEO PACKAGE- The Bunny was pretty great here, and Shida was fine, but when they announced that Shida’s Regina Di Wave Championship would be on the line, I lost the little bit of interest that I had. It’s a random belt in a random company, and we all know it won’t change hands, so what does this match actually do for anyone?

PRIVATE PARTY (w/Matty Hardy) vs. JEFF JARRETT & JAY LETHAL (w/Sonjay Dutt & Satnam Singh)- 4/10
Jim Ross went out of his way to remind us all that Jeff Jarett is very old. Lethal and Jarrett won with a combination Stroke/Lethal Injection double-team that looked terrible.

RENEE PAQUETTE’S SIT-DOWN INTERVIEW WITH SARAYA- TERRIBLE!
She talked about how proud she was for “all of the women,” but especially Britt Baker for the way “she helped me” in their match (YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO PRETEND IT’S REAL!), and Jamie Hayter for winning the title, making no acknowledgement of the fact that Hayter cheated. Also, Saraya is coming for the belt now, too.

ATHENA vs. DANI MO- no rating, good squash
This was Athena showing off her new heel attitude. She assaulted Dani Mo after the match as well. The announcers teased that she might wind up fined or suspended again if she kept it up. Because that definitely leads to fines and suspensions in AEW.

JUICE ROBINSON VIDEO PACKAGE/PROMO- bad
He came off like a total cartoon. He wants a shot at the ROH TV Title at Final Battle. You won’t be surprised to learn that despite having won zero matches in AEW, he will be getting that shot.

MARK HENRY INTERVIEWS THE PEOPLE IN THE MAIN EVENT- bad
They were all clowns. The babyfaces asked if they were allowed to bring axes to the ring, but Mark Henry said “absolutely not.” Why not, Mark? Sting and Jericho bring baseball bats to the ring. Is an axe really that much worse?

Excalibur announced that FTR vs. the Acclaimed for the tag titles has been made official for Dynamite, so get ready for a DQ.

DARBY ALLIN PROMO- bad
He says that he’s spent the “past few weeks settling some personal scores,” but now that he’s done with that, the most important thing for him is to win back the TNT Title. YOU LOST THE BELT EIGHTEEN MONTHS AGO! If it was so important, why didn’t you try to get it back at any point between then and “the past few weeks?”
Anyway, he says that Joe indicated he was willing to accept this challenge if Wardlow were barred from ringside. Darby will not only allow that, but he’ll have Sting barred from ringside as well so that it will be one on one. The last three times Darby has told Sting to stay in the back, Darby has gotten screwed. I guess he just doesn’t learn.

Excalibur told us that Juice Robinson has officially signed with AEW. This promotion will get a lot more focused (and thus better) when Shad Kahn forces Tony to learn that this is a business, not a charity.

LUMBERJACK MATCH FOR THE AEW ALL-ATLANTIC TITLE: Orange Cassidy(c) vs. Q.T. Marshall-5/10
Ethan Page demanded that Matt Hardy and Private Party put the boots to OC, but they refused. He does realize that controlling someone’s contract doesn’t make them your slave, right? Also, if you’re standing right there and want it done so badly, JUST DO IT YOURSELF! Page then ordered Matt to the back. Again… he’s not a slave. There is no reason that Matt had to leave.
They did Lumberjack match stuff. At one point Excalibur claimed we had seen Q.T. give Danhausen a Piledriver on the steps. I have no memory of this, and I’m sure Danhausen getting piledriven is something I would have watched several times.
The match was relatively dull. Kip Sabian came out to try to screw OC out of the title for some reason, but OC won the match about thirty seconds later.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- snore
Orange Cassidy attacked Kip Sabian. Then all of the lumberjacks started fighting for no reason. Then the house of Black showed up to beat up all of the lumberjacks, because that’s definitely something that will help them accomplish whatever their evil goal is and not something they are being booked to do because Tony wants to have them on TV but doesn’t want them wrestling yet.

A typically bad episode of Rampage, showcasing AEW’s typically bad booking.