Some Dynamite and Rampage (4/27 & 4/29)

Serena Deeb v Hikaru Shida (Philly Street Fight) (AEW Dynamite, 4/27/22)

Hot damn give me all the Serena Deeb. This wasn't quite as good as the match from last October, but it had many of the same qualities, including the primary quality of Serena Deeb being fucking awesome. She spent most of this working the leg again and Shida didn't really give a shit about selling it after a while, but Deeb was not for letting this thing go and Shida was either tapping or leaving in an ambulance. At one point she used the apron cover to wrap the leg and keep Shida pinned in the place, then she wellied her with a chair across the kneecap. They leaned into the street fight stip just enough that it never teetered into propfest territory, and all of the stuff they did do looked like it had bad intentions behind it. The kendo stick shots were filthy, none of them clean, most of them landing at awkward angles where you know they're waking up tomorrow pulling bamboo splinters from various parts of their body. Deeb has that nasty streak in her where she'll find - or make - a way to claw herself back into a fight, and this time she threw half a kilo of powder in Shida's eyes when it seemed like the latter was ready to go on a run. Shida blindly swinging the kendo stick was amusing and again Deeb took a wild shot right in the kidneys. I loved Shida bumbling and stumbling out the ring and grabbing a water bottle from a fan to clear the powder out her eyes. It was sort of goofy, sure, but you knew that with clarity came payback, and if nothing else I was interested in seeing how Deeb would shut her down again. Blocking the rolling knee with the chair was an amazing last-ditch cut-off, then she went bonkers by repeatedly smashing it down onto the same chair and that was even more amazing. I was truly hyped when she won as well and would not have expected to be this invested in a Serena Deeb match only a few days ago. I don't even know who the women's champion in AEW is but I'm hopeful and excited about seeing how Deeb will try to main them whenever the time comes. 

Darby Allin v Swerve Strickland (AEW Rampage, 4/29/22)

Nice, fun wee 10 minutes. I love Darby and knew that well enough already, but I've dug Strickland quite a bit from the few times I've watched him in AEW as well, so I was looking forward to this. Darby is certifiable and nobody in their right mind is taking bumps like this in the opening match of a B show. The suplex off the apron was right out the Shawn Michaels at Summerslam '95 playbook and he leaned into Strickland's big strikes like a maniac, the pump kick to the side of the head and the bonkers tope into the knee. Swerve is clearly an incredible athlete and moves like a cat, flipping Eddy Gordo style into a headscissors, doing a clean headspring off the fucking ring apron after clearing the top rope, really impressive stuff. I really liked the early chain wrestling as well. It was slick more than it was gritty, but something like the headlock reversal to the armdrag could come off as overly cooperative if done with less speed than it was here. I'm okay with the finish in theory even if doing it after the wild suplex was strange timing. I guess the Ricky Starks distraction gave Allin some time to recover, though. I'm not sure what Darby does next and having him be involved in a Team Taz thing is probably too much of a re-tread, but I can get behind a potential Starks/Swerve match that I assume they're working towards. 

The Serena Deeb Show

Serena Deeb v Hikaru Shida (AEW Dynamite, 10/27/21)

Well this was an awesome surprise. I haven't seen Serena Deeb in over ten years, probably since the Straight Edge Society days. I didn't even know she was in AEW - or wrestling at all - until someone suggested I watch some Serena Deeb matches. She's only 35 yet works like a 15 year veteran and I guess that's because she is. I don't remember if she was any good in WWE or not, but let me tell you she looked badass as a motherfucker here and this is easily the best AEW women's match I've watched so far. The bulk of it was built around Deeb going after Shida's leg, and while Shida never sold it like she's Macho Man Randy Savage or whatever she was at least passable. Deeb was like a Rottweiler. She was taking this poor girl's leg home with her no matter what and I loved how she had a hundred nasty ways of inflicting damage. The ring post figure-four was of course the highlight, as a ring post figure-four will tend to be, but this had extra bonus points for how Deeb used the steps to rest on while she applied it. And then there was the EXTRA extra bonus point from wearing pink and black ring attire, which Tony suggests might be a deliberate nod to the Hitman. Her roll-through half crab was super slick and worked as a legit nearfall, she hit one dragon screw thing that was more of a pull than a screw and looked like it could've detached Shida's kneecap, another dragon screw variation that I would describe as a swinging neckbreaker to the leg, a mean toehold where she tried to rotate Shida's foot a whole 180 degrees like she was opening a big jar of pickles, it was all great stuff. She was also smart about getting into position for Shida's more elaborate signature moves. I'd never seen a Shida match before and she's probably decent enough, but she seemed to be trying a few things that required a very specific setup, and Deeb set herself up for and/or reversed those things in interesting ways. I bit on about six different potential finishes down the stretch and I loved Deeb going to the eye poke and inside cradle, which I thought for certain was ending it. Judging by how many moves the commentators were name-dropping during the post-match beatdown I guess they both left a bunch of stuff on the table for future encounters (including the nasty submission that Deeb used to empty the referee's locker room), so that's pretty cool. Maybe I'll just watch ALL of the Serena Deeb? 

There's Only One Natural

Bryan Danielson v Dustin Rhodes (AEW Dynamite, 10/23/21)

I think I preferred Dustin/Punk by a little, but holy shit was this excellent. The Punk match is an interesting comparison, and I suppose an obvious one if you're a Dustin Rhodes fan. They're both kind of Dustin Rhodes dream matches, against guys who even a year ago you figured he'd probably missed the chance to stretch out with. Danielson is barely three years younger than Punk, but what made Punk/Dustin so cool is that Punk looked and worked like a man in his forties (meant in the best way possible). Danielson does not wrestle like a man in his forties. Danielson isn't trying to work his way back to his best before challenging for a title, or trying to gradually wrestle loose any ring rust. Danielson moves like he's always moved, like he's at the peak of his powers the same way he was in 2004 or 2013 or whenever else you want to argue he was at the peak of his powers. Even if Dustin is evergreen he's nowhere near his physical peak, and he wears his years and previous retirements less well than Danielson wears that distant memory of a sabbatical. What it meant was that this almost felt like a case of Dustin's ring awareness and positioning against Danielson's relentlessness. It was cool to see how Danielson would combat that size difference as well. At points he'd chop - sometimes literally - Dustin down to size, throwing kicks to the knee to set up kicks to the midsection to set up kicks to the head. In contrast, lots of Dustin's offence came through smart counters where he visibly drew Danielson in. The sidestepped tope, the powerslam where he let Danielson hit the ropes so he picked up his own momentum, the clothesline after dropping Danielson across the top rope, the lariat to counter the running knee. I'm not sure he ever put together much of an offensive run, but he picked his spots and they were all big ones. Danielson was a swarm, though. He would only be slowed, never stopped. I thought Dustin's selling in a broad sense was sensational, not so much in terms of limb selling or selling of a specific move or whatever, but of the accumulation of everything, the fight he was in and the weight of it on him -- the fuckin MAGNITUDE of it all if we can be melodramatic for a second. From the very beginning he was taking his time, not rushing into anything. Even after catching Danielson with an armdrag he was slow getting to his feet, while Danielson was already up and set and probably could've shot in to push the tempo if he really wanted to. When Danielson was peppering Dustin with shots early on it felt like a mismatch, where you figured Dustin would need to do something soon or he'd be overrun, then Danielson lowered his head a split second too early and Dustin almost savoured the moment before dropping down and hitting the big uppercut. It's just that the longer it went the greater the toll on him. After the superplex it looked like he tried to float over into a cover Barry Windham style but couldn't quite manage it, and Danielson was up first again, groggy as he was. Dustin unzipping the vest after he'd had enough of being kicked up and down the place was the perfect Lawler dropping the strap moment, though maybe you wondered if that was about all he had left. That ring positioning comes into play when Danielson has him in an armbar and Dustin can use those long legs to force the rope break, but then Danielson seizes the moment by throwing himself at Dustin and clinging to him like a limpet with the guillotine. I now wait patiently for Dustin v Eddie Kingston. 

The American Dragon is Still Very Decent

Bryan Danielson v Minoru Suzuki (AEW Rampage - The Buy In, 10/15/21)

This was pretty good in about the stupidest way possible. Suzuki's whole bit was long in the tooth for me a while back and every time I've watched him over the last few years the less I really care about it, but he's settled into a touring formula that really works for him (and the vast majority of his audiences). If nothing else I like wrestlers making stupid faces, so there's that too. You can tell this is the type of match Danielson left WWE to have and I'm not sure he threw more than five strikes there that landed harder than the lightest one here. Look, I'm over the modern strike exchange. "You hit me while I stand here and then I'll hit you while you stand there, and we'll both do it as hard as possible" is not in the least bit compelling to me at this point. Yes, I am a miserable grouch. But I guess Danielson's history of having his brains scrambled gave this an edge that most modern strike exchanges don't really have, and from a character standpoint I buy him engaging in this sort of sadism just to prove a point. From a character standpoint you obviously buy Suzuki engaging in it. "It's their character!" is an argument you can use to explain away all sorts of dumb shit in wrestling, but this is literally Minoru Suzuki now. He's a crackpot and for better or worse it's what he does. They certainly took the jaw off each other and Danielson's sell of that first big forearm was phenomenal, so I suppose rote 2020s strike exchanges is something else I can add to the list of things Bryan Danielson will make tolerable in the year 2022. When they got to the grappling I loved it. Clearly Danielson's stylistic preference is to work some approximation of modern New Japan, but this was a reminder of how amazing he'd be at working UWF or Battlarts or even 2010s IWRG matches (Battlarts might be too high on the scrambled brains scale). All of the struggles over holds, the joint manipulation, the way they milked escapes, these were two guys who knew they could stretch out without needing to hold the other's hand. I'll also say that this never felt like it went 20 minutes, which is impressive because I've seen similar matches go 12 and could swear they went 30. 

Bryan Danielson v Bobby Fish (AEW Dynamite, 10/16/21)

A very different affair. It was really good and for the most part I thought Danielson was great in it. Fish was a mean wee bastard and went after the leg in pretty nasty ways, as seems to be his wont in AEW. Danielson didn't sell it HUGE and a few years ago I'd have wanted him to really draw attention to it, if for no reason other than him being really good at that sort of thing. But that part wasn't what impressed me anyway; it was that this match took place not but 24 hours after Danielson and Suzuki obliterated each other and Danielson wasn't about to let you forget that he was banged up. He started much slower than he had in every other match before this, could never quite get anything going, then in an awesome bit on the floor he tried to hoist Fish onto his shoulders to roll him back in the ring and was visibly struggling to even manage it. This was a guy who'd played 120 minutes against a team of bastards the night before, who'd been kicked up and down the pitch, who was now being thrown into a high-intensity training session the next day even though the sport scientist pleaded with the head coach to rest him and the head coach wouldn't listen so the sport scientist was the one copping all the shit as usual and you could tell Danielson was struggling. When he manages to get a foothold he does it by going after Fish's leg and we get some nice revenge spots of him wrapping it around the post. Finish is tremendous. They're both fighting over the kneebar close to the ropes, both down-kicking each other in the face, then Danielson reels off about five and Fish has to cover up before he loses all his teeth through his wee gumshield. Danielson gets up, drags him away from the ropes, and sinks into a truly vile heel hook that about dislocates Fish's patella on the way down. Just an amazing "enough of this shit" moment from a guy who plainly had had enough. 

Kingston v Garcia

Eddie Kingston v Daniel Garcia (AEW Rampage, 22/4/22)

This was the business. Kingston might be one of my three favourite guys in the company and Garcia might be one of my five favourite, despite me having seen all of about three matches with him in it. Eddie was a surly menace and I thought Garcia going after his stomach was an awesome bit of work. The transition spot on the ring steps was great and I like how Eddie took it right in the hip bone, then Garcia was dropping knees to the gut and ribcage, throwing strikes to the midsection to cut Kingston off, just going after him like he was trying to make deep inhalation an arduous process. There was one part where Eddie got to the ropes off a submission and Garcia milked the full five count before releasing, but Kingston kept selling the hold the whole time, shouting "get him off me!" through gritted teeth. Usually when someone gets to the ropes they'll just sort of stop selling the pain from the hold they're in, like the ropes themselves provide a mythical healing quality that leaves one impervious to pain, even if the applicant of the hold hasn't actually released it straight away. Kingston felt every second of this though, and his attention to vulnerability endears him even further to us all. He was also the most scrappy imaginable, how he'd throw strikes from his knees or back, sometimes just chopping Garcia in the thigh because it was there to be chopped and he couldn't reach his chest. A bit of it rubbed off on Garcia, who at one point fought fire with fire and started biting Kingston in the forehead (to which Kingston responded by trying to bite his ear off). They worked some hierarchy into the strike exchanges and I dug how Kingston sold one chop like it about caved his chest in, before inevitably caving in Garcia's because that young laddie is not about to be out-chopping Eddie Kingston at this juncture in their lives. 

CM Grapplin' Punk

CM Punk v Daniel Garcia (AEW Rampage, 10/8/21)

What a great wee bout. If you'd told me six months ago that CM Punk would end up being my favourite wrestler in the world in the year 2022 I would have respectfully told you that you were on a nonsense. But it's almost absurd how giddy I, a grown man, get for CM Punk right now. He is ridiculously fun and I thought he was sensational in this. Just a total chef's kiss of a performance, one that was loaded with little moments that resonate completely with a dipshit who geeks out for the sort of stuff I geek out for. If Punk had just been home sitting on his arse for the last seven years this would've had a cool young shooter stepping to the veteran dynamic, but since he went and messed around in an octagon for a minute there it had an even cooler young shooter stepping to the veteran shooter dynamic (even if his MMA record would suggest Punk was never much of a shooter). There were lots of neat moments that highlighted the experience gap, and I thought Tazz and Jericho were both great on commentary at pointing them out. Things like Garcia taking a few seconds to bask in gaining an advantage rather than actually following up on it, which allowed Punk to sidestep a corner dropkick, or when Garcia threw on the Sharpshooter but didn't drag Punk away from the ropes before it, which we see the reverse of later when Punk makes sure to pull Garcia into a favourable position before applying the Anaconda Vice. Garcia worked like a dude with a chip on his shoulder and Punk doing "these kids today don't know anything about respect" is a hoot, particularly when you think about CM Punk at Daniel Garcia's age. There was a great bit where Garcia was trying to grab something on the mat, maybe a kneebar or an armbar, each time Punk would try to sit up and Garcia would dismissively facepalm him back to the mat, and by the third time he did it you could see that Punk was going to box his ears in. That he wound up doing it with Mongolian chops was as random as it was awesome. Everything with the leg ruled and I thought Punk's selling was brilliant in an understated sort of way. He wasn't big and dramatic with it but you never forgot it was bothering him, and more than a couple times he had to switch up his attack to account for it. I watched this last night and I wish I could remember a few more specifics, but there were a couple moments that I know I thought were awesome. Also Garcia busted out the ring post figure-four and that right away is cause for celebration. Loved the Pepsi Twist, loved the big dive in how ungraceful it looked ("I need to hit three people here so why do a fancy flip when I can just throw myself on top of them as awkwardly as possible?") and loved the finish. Subbing out the GTS for the piledriver so it meant he wouldn't need to hit anyone in the skull with a bad knee was a great touch, and I like that the Vice is treated as a match-winner that doesn't need any build. 

Is 2020s CM Punk PEAK CM Punk?

CM Punk v Dustin Rhodes (AEW Dynamite, 4/20/22)

It's kind of nuts how this never happened until now. They were together in WWE for a decent while, yet I don't think they ever actually matched up. Still I'm not sure it would've been as good before, which is maybe a little crazy in and of itself considering Punk has only wrestled about 15 matches in eight years. It started fairly respectful, a pair of grizzled vets squaring off for the first time, two guys who clearly like the idea of wrestling each other. I mean you know Punk would've been giddy as fuck for something like Dustin v Bunkhouse Buck when he was 16. They even did maybe the slowest parity stand-off in AEW history, and any time a parity stand-off spot doesn't feel dumb you know you're in for something special. They introduce the first part of the duelling limb work early when Dustin goes after Punk's arm, then Dustin spills to the floor with a matured blend of his missed crossbody bump. Dustin's leg selling is awesome from then on out, just the right balance of expressive yet restrained, where you know it's a real problem but he isn't oscillating from crushed to bits in a bear trap to fuck it I can do this rope running exchange I'll be fine. The match also gets a bit more tetchy as it goes, and we get the first glimpse of it with Dustin kicking at Punk's arm to create some distance and Punk looking at the camera like "he should not have done that." Punk gets frustrated when he can't put Dustin away and ups the surliness with the stomp and headbutt to the verrrrry low abdomen, then he even does a mocking little Goldust pose. Dustin would try and make inroads by going for Punk's arm again and some of the body part selling was outstanding. I loved not just how those injured body parts would prevent them from hitting certain moves, but how targeting the knee or arm would always provide advantages for whoever chose to take them at the time. There was a great sequence in particular where Dustin is on the apron and Punk kicks the leg away (and Dustin takes a nasty back bump on the hardest part of the ring), then Dustin comes back with a drop-down arm-wringer and Punk goes shoulder-first into the apron. Dustin does the 10 count punches in the corner and flips Punk the double bird, I'm guessing because he saw that little Goldust bit earlier (would assume Punk is now blocked on all social media platforms), but then when he jumps down he jars the knee again and Punk immediately capitalises. By the time they're slapping each other across the face while locked in the figure-four you know you're no longer watching a mere gentleman's contest. And it's rare that you get a satisfying payoff to a match built around limb work so obviously I thought the finish was great. This is an interesting comparison to the early Punk matches, at least in terms of his demeanour and mood. In the Darby match he looked ecstatic to be back, even if he had some ring rust. Now he's got some of the old attitude back and I guess has his eyes on the cowboy fella. This also might be the most CM Punk working as Bret Hart match yet, judging by that twitter video of Bret v Goldust, and CM Punk working as Bret Hart is just about the coolest thing going right now. And that's really not something I thought I would be saying in the year 2022. 

Some Stuff from AEW All Out '21

Miro v Eddie Kingston 

This was badass as fuck. By god what an Eddie Kingston performance. Excalibur basically says it outright on commentary anyway, but this was clearly Kingston doing 90s All Japan, just not in the corny way with him hitting yer big Orange Crush Bombs and Burning Hammers. He wears his influences on his sleeve right next to his heart and this was him doing Kawada if Kawada one day decided he wanted to EMOTE like Kobashi. The strikes, the selling, the comebacks - those that failed and those that were successful - were all magic, had perfect timing and he had pretty much everyone on strings the whole match. Lots of amazing little moments from him as well, like when Miro booted him in the face and Kingston started blinking away tears like his nose was broken. The little delayed staggers after getting rocked, the struggle over moves, just great. I'm honestly neither here nor there on Miro and I don't recall ever having much of a stance on him one way or the other, but this was as surly as I've ever seen him and he was basically the perfect foil for a man who would die on his sword. Thought the finish with the exposed turnbuckle stuff and desperation low blow came off great. Kingston honest to god might be better now than he was 15 years ago.

Young Bucks v Lucha Brothers (Cage Match)

Well this was certainly something. Look, you know it'll never totally be my jam, but for some reason I want to persevere with the stuff I generally don't like because I'm actually really enjoying everything else. And this was what it was. I am not the audience they're trying to appeal to and it feels like the audience they ARE trying to appeal to went home thrilled, so fair fucks to them for collaring that corner of the market. The second half I mostly quite liked, in fact. I mean it was a tag team cage match from 2021 and not 1981 so I was probably never going to LOVE it, but I already knew that so at least I wasn't likely to be disappointed. First half was more or less a series of one team doing a bunch of cool things followed by the other team doing the same, and there were no real transitions and it was sort of obvious that they were bouncing momentum back and forth because that's how they'd rehearsed the exchanges, but the stuff they were actually doing was mostly impressive. Like, I was a gymnast in my prime and fancied myself as quite a good one but I'll be fucked if I could pull off most of this shit so they have my deepest respect that I'm sure all four of them covet. But, you know, just like...do a proper transition maybe once or something. In the second half they dropped the pace and I thought it was way better for it, but then of course I would think that because I'm old and set in my ways. I'll level with you, I kind of loved the stupid thumbtack shoe. Then Penta got his Arena Mexico on and bled like fuck and Fenix had his mask all torn up and obviously that will resonate with a thing such as I. Revenge shots came off well and I dug Matt gettin' some colour to even things up. Fenix with the dive off the cage was loony toon but then the twenty superkick bit was maybe the worst thing I've ever seen and I once saw a man get kicked in the head by a horse but then the finish felt like a fucking gigantic moment and so we take the good with the dooky, as my grandmother would say. I enjoyed some of this, even if I wouldn't say I enjoyed it in totality.

CM Punk v Darby Allin

This is the sort of thing that probably isn't a five star match in the traditional sense, but for what I figure they were going for and the circumstances under which they wrestled it, I thought it was pretty much perfect. And even in the traditional sense of "is this a great wrestling match?" I honestly thought it was superb. Like, one of the three or four best matches I've watched so far. Both guys ruled. What I like most about what I've seen in this Punk run so far is that, even though he's one of the guys most responsible for the predominant wrestling style in America right now, he wrestles very differently from just about everyone else in the company. Most of the AEW roster wrestle some stylistic approximation - or evolution? - of what 2005 CM Punk was doing, but 2021/22 CM Punk had been retired for seven years and had a whole bunch of miles on the clock even before then, and he wrestled this match like a 40-something-year-old from 1995, forget 2005. He slowed down the pace because how the hell was he supposed to know if he had the engine to go long on a PPV yet, especially against a maniac like Allin? A fuckin abdominal stretch?! In 2021 AEW? Awesome. Then there were the little things that he's always been good at, like when he threw Darby into the corner so hard that he landed face down on the mat himself (and Darby's ring post bump is GOAT tier). The grin when he realised Darby's spine might be mangled, then immediately going for the bow and arrow. There were points as well where Darby would string together some offence and Punk would sort of huddle in the corner like "boy they were not hitting this hard in 2014 WWE, not even Ryback who didn't know how not to." I don't know if it was intentional or not but even the way he took that flip Stunner from Darby made him look like a guy who wasn't used to eating flip Stunners from tiny wildmen, how he landed almost flat on his stomach rather than how everyone else I've seen take it would. That's a 2021 move and Punk's still going off 2014 fumes. I guess that's pretty META~, but what is AEW if not meta and I really wouldn't be surprised if he did it on purpose. Know yer audience and all that. The GTS has also never looked better and the first one was all Darby leaning face-first into and falling dead weight through the ropes, but I loved Punk reacting like he really would've preferred for the wee fella to have landed in the ring so he could've put a cap on this thing. I'm hyped to watch Danielson stretch out and be the American Dragon again, but I think I'm more excited about watching Punk work as the one-time indie revolutionary who's been dropped into a future he's almost out of place in despite helping create it to begin with.

The American Dragon v The Best Bout Machine

Kenny Omega v Bryan Danielson (AEW Dynamite, 9/22/21)

I thought this was shockingly great, and I know there'll be some people reading that thinking I sound ridiculous. "How could you be shocked that this was great? Unless by SHOCKINGLY you mean you thought it was twelve stars rather than seven or whatever we're at now." I mean maybe it shouldn't shock me, but I know what I like and by all accounts this didn't sound like it would be that. So maybe it was the low-ish expectations. Either way I'll be fucked if I wasn't into it basically all the way through. It's probably the most I've ever enjoyed Omega - and I really mean ever - and I thought he more than held up his end. Most people will see the suggestion that he might not have as ludicrous, but if you're asking me if I'd rather watch them work a Bryan Danielson match or a Kenny Omega match then I'm picking the former all day, and there are a whole bunch of people I'd rather see opposite Bryan Danielson in a Bryan Danielson match than Kenny Omega. Actually I don't even think it was a Bryan Danielson match - in the way I'd usually think of a Bryan Danielson match - or at least it wasn't by the end. But none of that was what shocked me anyway. I've seen scrubs look good in a Bryan Danielson match or just generally against Bryan Danielson and Omega is better than, like, Delirious or someone. Prolly. The most shocking part is that I enjoyed Omega during the Bryan Danielson bits AND the Kenny Omega bits, and Kenny Omega Dream Match Epic is not something I'm desperate to watch at this stage of the game. To be honest, judging by the reaction for the first lock-up they could've worked any match and they'd have had people on strings, but they knew their audience to a tee and in the end gave them what they came to see, and they came to see Dream Match Epic. 

All of the early build was great. They laced into each other and both of them had welts on chests, bruises on foreheads, scrapes on elbows, burns on backs, all the signs of something in which a pair of guys smashed each other to bits. It might've only been the idea or just the CONCEPT of Bryan Danielson getting to stretch out and be Bryan Danielson again that got me, but when he was bending Omega's wrist and stomping it into the mat it really did feel like the shackles had been cast off. Omega was a fun shithead through all of it and when it was his turn to dish out some damage he did it like he meant it. If the first half was the Bryan Danielson part of the match and the second half was the Kenny Omega part then I at least thought they segued from one to the other pretty seamlessly. I don't even remember a point where I thought "okay now we're in Omega's lane," but if it happened with the stuff on the ramp then they sure picked a hell of a transition for it. The Snapdragon was nuts but goodness christ that V-Trigger was fucking bonkers. He about launched himself from halfway up the ramp, downhill, and it looked like he fully caved in Danielson's temple. Just an unreal spot that I rewound half a dozen times. Danielson's selling after that was predictably amazing and I really loved Omega juuuust about accepting the count out only for his ego to take over and opt for the decisive victory instead. You know a man who calls himself the Best Bout Machine is meta enough that he'd realise a count out would cost him at least half a star. The buckle bomb was absolutely ludicrous and I thought he was for yeeting Danielson clean over the post. The biggest compliment I can pay to the last 10 minutes is that there were probably transitions that I'd usually find ropey, or kickouts that I'd usually find silly, or STUFF that I'd usually find excessive, but they really had me hooked and I was fully immersed in the moment. Like, I had a music teacher in high school who would say that music was both the best and worst thing that ever happened to her. It was her career, her life, her passion and the thing she enjoyed more than anything else in the world. But it sort of ruined a bunch of other things for her, like movies and television, because she'd be watching something and all she could think about was the musical score, the chords, all that other stuff that I don't understand because I am not and have never been a musician. Well pro wrestling is not my life or my career, but it is my passion, watching and talking and writing about it, and it's hard for me to just "turn off my brain" when it's there in front of me now because I can't help but think of all the nerdy carry on like selling and transitions and whatever else knocks about our heads as doofus wrestling fans on the internet. And as corny as it sounds, I just kind of...switched off for a while and didn't give a shit about any of that. It wasn't intentional, wasn't something I consciously made a decision to do, I just didn't think about it. For that to happen when watching one guy I think is great but have no real personal affinity for and another guy I quite often actively dread watching, that's kind of cool as fuck. Three and a half stars. 

A Great Chuck Taylor Match!

Santana & Ortiz v Chuck Taylor & Trent (Parking Lot Brawl) (AEW Dynamite, 9/16/20)

This is another match that my dear beloved internet wrestling friends told me I would probably like. I have no use whatsoever for Chuck Taylor, haven't watched anything involving Trent Baretta in about 10 years, and I'm pretty sure the only time I've seen Santana and Ortiz was during that stadium match where one of them tried to drown Matt Hardy in a swimming pool. I also didn't have a clue about the feud leading up to this point (something about Trent's ma or whatever), so I was sort of apathetic going in, and yet in the end I thought it was stupid great. Like, easily the most I've ever enjoyed Chuck Taylor, and I guess Trent Baretta and the LAX into the bargain (the latter through lack of exposure more than anything). There was pretty much no nonsense in this and I appreciated that they just went for violence straight out the gate. At one point the Best Friends had Ortiz under the hood of a car and they were hitting somersault sentons, and the way Ortiz's leg was sticking out it looked like they were trying to stuff a cadaver in - fittingly enough - the trunk of a car. Basically everything looked brutal, from the overt lunacy like Trent getting powerbombed on the roof of one of the cars, to the more subtle nastiness like Santana getting his forehead split open by being thrown into a wing mirror. Trent was actually a maniac in this, taking a face-first slingshot into the bottom of a truck, blading his arm after spearing someone through a door, sliding down a windshield leaving bloody streaks, then taking a truly ludicrous double powerbomb through that windshield where his back got cut to pieces. There was even a bit where he smashed a plank of wood over Ortiz's back and a piece of it flew up and hit him in the eye. When you're having one of those days you're just having one of those days. The Chuck Taylor wheelie bin suplex is also is one of the only times I've seen a spot involving a wheelie bin in a wrestling match that felt properly brutal. I don't know what the deal is with Orange Cassidy appearing out the trunk at the end. Probably some daft shit that I'll give them the benefit of the doubt on and say fit with the feud, but I feel like the less I think about Orange Cassidy the easier my life is. That said, if you're going to do a comedy spot in a match that had been fully about the violence up until then, they at least reeled it back in when Cassidy immediately smashed Santana in the ear with a chain-wrapped fist. And the Strong Zero through the wood in the truck bed felt like a suitable finish to a match even containing this much wildness. Parking lot brawls are sort of a rarity, great ones even more so, but this one might be the best ever. Which is staggering considering William Regal v Fit Finlay and John Cena v Eddie Guerrero were things that happened, and neither of those had Chuck Taylor in them. 

Whiskey & Wrestling Gets All Elite

I don't think I've written a single word about AEW on this thing up until now. To be fair, I've watched about as many minutes of AEW as I have written words about it, so that'll be why. But my brother has a subscription to that Fite TV thing and in a very cool turn of events I can simply steal it from him and have access to basically every bit of AEW television. There are plenty of wrestlers in AEW that I don't really care about and those are the folk I won't watch much of as I jump into this, but there also now plenty of wrestlers I do care about and I'll watch stuff and write about some of it. I might even try my hand at some of those wrestlers I don't usually like and we'll see what's what. Eventually my plan is to basically pick up from the All Out PPV last September (Punk's debut match) and go through stuff chronologically until the present day. I imagine that idea will be dropped before its completion, but it's at least useful to have goals in life. Before then I've just been jumping around catching up with stuff that either sounds interesting or that other people who have similar preferences have talked up. It's mostly the Darby Allin stuff. 

Jon Moxley v Darby Allin (AEW Dynamite, 11/20/19) 

This is one I've been meaning to watch for a while now (about two and a half years, I guess). I think basically every person I regularly talk to about wrestling who has a decent idea of what I like has told me I would enjoy this, and sure enough they were very correct. This is actually one of my favourite Moxley performances and I thought he looked - if you'll excuse the pun - dynamite. Thought he managed to look vulnerable enough while still coming across as tough, gave Allin plenty and got surly as a bastard when necessary. Allin catching him with the surprise tope at the beginning ruled and nobody has a better tope in current day American wrestling than Darby Allin. Every tope in WWE these days looks full on dog muck because guys are obviously told to lead with their hands, so it looks like a diving shove and it quite frankly spits in the face of Ciclon Ramirez and Sangre Chicana who would tope someone with the crown of the head directly into somewhere between chest and chin and send the recipient several rows deep and into a pensioner's lap. Darby does not lead with his hands and just torpedoes folk at a hunner miles an hour, as it should be. At another point he flies off the top with a crossbody and I love that he just bounced clean off Moxley, who braced for contact and went full Colossus in metal form. Also loved Darby biting and stomping on Moxley's fingers, a couple times as a sort of desperation cut off spot to prevent Moxley from almost certainly dropping him on his skull. When Moxley put Allin in the body bag Darby brought to the ring I got a wee bit worried because I thought for sure he was going to powerbomb him or some nonsense, and even for a fella who routinely takes bumps with his hands literally tied behind his back a body bag powerbomb seemed more dangerous than it was worth. Ultimately he didn't do anything of the sort and I figured Darby was escaping without taking a potential crippling, but then Moxley went and absolutely fucking obliterated him with one of the wildest top rope DDTs I've ever seen. Darby is certifiable and this was great.