BRM Reviews the 7/5/2023 Dynamite (bad)

[Big Red Machine]

MOMENTS AGO, RENEE PAQUETTE INTERVIEWED KEITH LEE & DARBY ALLIN- didn’t like it
I haven’t been able to watch the past few shows, but I’ve been reading reports, and I have no idea what Darby is talking about when he says that Lee has been moping around, crying on the apron, and the idea that Lee feels like he has been “lost in the shuffle” doesn’t really work in kayfabe.
This feels like something that was said both create tension between these semi-regular partners for this match that they are on the opposite sides of and then to later motivate Lee to set up for Darby and Lee chasing the tag titles. That would be good, except for the fact that Darby saying it here, before this match, doesn’t make any sense. If he wants to motivate Lee to help their team, he would have said it before, or saved it until the next time they teamed up, not said it right before they have to be on opposite sides.
Also, if Darby feels the need to say this to Keith Lee for whatever reason, then whatever… but why the heel did he feel the need to get Renee so that he could say it to him on camera. And if Renee hadn’t specified that Darby asked for this time to say something to Lee, this wouldn’t have been an issue. Whoever decided that that fact should be noted- whether it was someone in Creative or Renee herself- created a plot hole.

BLIND ELIMINATOR TAG TEAM TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Darby Allin & Orange Cassidy vs. Keith Lee & Shane Strickland (w/Mogul Embassy)- 5.75/10
The first spot in the match is Darby slapping Keith Lee in the face. Lee starts to charge at Darby… and the f*cking idiot director decides to cut to a shot of Orange Cassidy on the apron. This person had better not be employed by the end of this match.
And here is Orange Cassidy doing dumb comedy sh*t in this supposedly important tournament for a shot at the supposedly important tag team titles.
The spot where Darby got squished under the steps was really cool. Lee and Strickland had a miscue that might have cost them the match. Darby pinned Strickland with the Last Supper.
Keith Lee and Shane Strickland broke up last year. It is currently July, and they have not yet had a singles match.

NICK WAYNE VIDEO PACKAGE- great stuff, but the last thing AEW needs right now is more characters

JUNGLE BOY ARRIVES LATE AT THE ARENA, GETS ATTACKED BY HOOK, AND RUNS BACK TO HIS CAR AND GETS AWAY AGAIN- meh

STUPID ADAM COLE & MJF CRAP- stupid
MJF was being a bro at the gym. Cole told him not to make fun of a fat guy, but then they both made fun of Tony Schiavone.

BILLY GUNN & THE ACCLAIMED vs. THE BOLLYWOOD BOYZ & THE BLADE- squash

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- snore
Harley Cameron showed up on the KhanTron to tell us that she has made a music video that will debut next week. Billy Gunn said “I’ve got something for her, and it only comes in two words: SUCK IT!” That sentence made no sense.

CLIPS OF EDDIE KINGSTON BEATING KENTA FOR THE NJPW STRONG OPENWEIGHT TITLE- I guess Gedo really wants the champion to be doing jobs in the G1.

EDDIE KINGSTON/JON MOXLEY VIDEO PACKAGE- bad
Moxley is upset about Kingston complaining that the new generation has no respect. When has Kingston ever said that? They pulled out a clip of Kingston saying “there’s been a lot of things going on that I don’t like; that I don’t agree with.” That could refer to anything.

In hyping up Blood & Guts, Excalibur said that because the BCC only has four guys and because Kingston will be in Japan, we’ll have to wait to find out who the fifth man will be on each side. Why not just do it four on four instead?

MATT HARDY DRAWS HIS PARTNER FOR THE BLIND ELIMINATOR TOURNAMENT- Am I the only one who finds it silly that they started the tournament before they even drew all of the names? We’ve known about MJF and Adam Cole teaming together for weeks now. Did they really not draw the rest of the teams at that same time? It’s silly.
Anyway, RJ City told Matt that he would team with “Jeff.” He made Matt think it would be his brother, and only then revealed that it was actually Jeff Jarrett. You know… just to be an annoying piece of sh*t for no reason. Matt turned heel by not picking up the hopper and beating RJ to death with it.

WHEELER YUTA PROMO/VIDEO PACKAGE- very good build for the main event

CHRIS JERICHO PROMO- meh
Jericho was a total babyface here. Don Callis came out to interrupt him. They said stuff about their recent history working together that didn’t really make much sense in kayfabe (how could Callis offer Jericho a Tokyo Dome main event with Omega when Omega wasn’t the champion and the G1 hadn’t happened yet?).
Callis tried to recruit Jericho to join his Don Callis Family. Jericho had been talking about needing to make a change, so he said “maybe.” This was a bad segment, but it had a good hook at the end.

SAMOA JOE VS. CM PUNK VIDEO PACKAGE- great

RICKY STARKS VS. WILL HOBBS VIDEO PACKAGE- decent

RENEE PAQUETTE’S INTERVIEW WITH RODERICK STRONG AND THE DOCTOR IS INTERRUPTED BY ADAM COLE- didn’t like it
Roddy wants to wrestle but the doctor and Cole both advised him not to. Roddy seems to be worried that Cole is actually becoming friends with MJF, which shows that he didn’t watch the earlier video package. That was the big weakness of this. Roddy looks like an idiot, and for no reason.

BLIND ELIMINATOR TAG TEAM TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Adam Cole & MJF vs. Matt Menard & The Butcher- 4.5/10
They did some dumb comedy where MJF was trying to get Cole to cheat… and the fans all cheered and chanted along with MJF for Cole to “DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!” Cole eventually did. This is not how you be a babyface.
Comedy geek Menard and undercard schmoe The Butcher got some heat on MJF. There was also some stupid comedy about MJF wanting to do a double-clothesline.
They did more goofy bullsh*t after the match.

RENEE PAQUETTE INTERVIEWS BRITT BAKER- hated it
She can’t help but come off like a heel. Also, Britt winning the Owen Hart tournament last year has been referenced so infrequently that I can’t believe that Ruby really gives a sh*t that Britt was the first champion.

SAMMY GUEVARA & DANIEL GARCIA CONFRONT CHRIS JERICHO ABOUT SAYING THAT HE WOULD “MAYBE” JOIN DON CALLIS’ FAMILY- didn’t like
Shouldn’t the rest of the JAS be here, too?
Garcia and Sammy will be teaming together in the tournament. Jericho encourages them to win and show him that they don’t need him because they won’t be able to be with him forever. I just cannot get over Jericho suddenly acting like a total babyface. I know that the reason for it is because they’re in Canada, but that’s not a kayfabe reason for why his character has completely changed with no notice.


WOMEN’S OWEN HART FOUNDATION TOURNAMENT QUARTERFINAL MATCH: Britt Baker vs. Ruby Soho (w/the Outcasts)- 5/10 for the wrestlers, but a DUD for Tony Khan.
This should have been the main event. The combined star-power is greater, the result is less predictable, putting it in the main event will make the tournament feel more important, and will make the women’s division feel a little more important.
Just like every f*cking week for the past six months, the heels on the outside have interfered and no babyface came out to stop them, so kept interfering and they won.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- snore
Skye Blue came out to have a faceoff with Ruby Soho because she’s her opponent in the next round. I was hoping the other two Outcasts would just come back out and attack her, but it didn’t happen.

One of the matches they advertised for next week is Nick Wayne making his AEW debut against Swerve Strickland… so the guy who Darby promised himself he would protect just happens to get booked against one of Darby’s enemies in his debut. If you’re going to do this, right way to do it is to have Strickland cut a promo telling us that he wants to be Nick Wayne’s first opponent. That way it will make things between Swerve and Darby feel more person (because we all know why Strickland wants to be Wayne’s first opponent) and it will reduce the number of coincidences on the show that just happen to work out in ways that can further storylines. Storylines are better when the characters feel like they have more agency.

KENNY OMEGA vs. WHEELER YUTA- 8/10
YUTA attacked Omega from behind to start the match. The match was awesome, but no one thought that YUTA had a snowball’s chance of winning, other than maybe that one spot where Takeshita interfered.

POST-MATCH SEGMENT- ????
Claudio Castagnoli and Konosuke Takeshita attacked Omega after the match. The Young Bucks and Adam Page came out with chairs to make the save. The Bucks held Claudio so Page could bash him with a chair, but the Dark Order came out and took the chair away from Page… and the show went off the air. Oops. I don’t see what motivation the Dark Order could have for doing this that doesn’t turn them into the assholes. And if that was the point, then there was certainly a more natural and logical way to do it than to have them get involved in a feud that has nothing to do with them, to save the stablemate of two guys (Moxley and Danielson) who have spent significant periods of time torturing them for no reason.


This was another bad episode of Dynamite. The storylines continue to fly off the rails in terms of being interesting, and the matches feel like they mean less and less… which is quite the impressive feat at a time when the promotion has THREE SEPARATE SINGLE-ELIMINATION TOURNAMENTS GOING ON AT THE SAME TIME.