La Zona Muerta

Sometime in the last week, TNA AEW died. RIP.

At least it looked that way if you were following any sort of online discourse. Last week’s Dynamite had a bad rating, a record low for a normal time slotted episode and EVERYONE freaked out. Let’s leave aside the fact that it was the day before Thanksgiving and the only thing anyone cared about on TV was *checks notes* college basketball, whatever THAT is. Let’s conveniently forget Dynamite was live coast to coast and not on a three hour tape delay as it typically is in the West. Oh, and some people FINALLY figured out that Rampage has less than a month to go (even though that’s been clear since the new TV deal was made public); another sign of DEATH.

So anyway, AEW died, AGAIN, due to one night’s rating. Peopled were quick to blame the Continental Classic. People were quick to demand Tony Khan step down as booker. Eric Bischoff (sigh) had an interview on Ariel Helwani’s griftlord platform, saying the same. “AEW CAN’T RECOVER.” he bemoaned.

For fuck’s sake. Did we learn nothing from the Juneteenth debacle? We should all be smart enough to know by now that one bad rating is not going to get them cancelled, scupper any deals or anything else.

Last week, AEW did pretty well for Dynamite attendance. The Hammerstein shows are nearly sold out. After scaling down the Australia show to a smaller venue (THEY STILL HAVEN’T PROMOTED THAT AT ALL, THE IDIOTS), they apparently moved over 10,000 tickets for it. All In Texas is doing well in the pre sale. They had an absolutely RAUCOUS crowd last night (I didn’t see attendance figures). We sit here online, regurgitating into the ether how COLD AEW is and it’s like some twisted form of confirmation bias… the last couple weeks of TV have been very good. The plan to downsize to smaller venues seems to be working (at least somewhat). They are back to actually telling us what will be happening on future episodes of their programming. THINGS ARE GETTING BETTER, AND WE SIT HERE, IN A FETAL POSITION, WORRYING ABOUT HOW COLD EVERYTHING IS.

Cold, been excommunicated ‘cos I’m cold
My temperature’s been rated and I’m cold
Bring to me my big old sweater
Nothing more will make me better

We’re talking ourselves into thinking it’s all bad when it’s not. Last night, save maybe the battle royal, I don’t see how you could possibly bemoan the in ring wrestling, which was good to great. They actually moved the Death Riders angle forward in a logical way that FINALLY anchored it to other parts of the company. Swerve Strickland’s story moved forward. Whatever’s going on with the Acclaimed moved forward. Whatever’s happening with Top Flight (please Martin brothers, ankle that Action Andretti dork) moved forward. The Hurt Syndicate killed a bunch of dorks because Shelton was a bad loser. The endless, MJF / Adam Cole / Kyle O’Reilly love triangle thing is moving forward, if glacially. STUFF IS HAPPENING. RELAX. Jesus Christ, I bitch about AEW all the time, but I don’t sit here and actively talk myself into how bad it is. At some point, we have to break the self fulfilling shame and doom spiral, here.

Anyway, this Dynamite sucked.

OH, I KID.

Actually, the in ring stuff was all quite strong and I really enjoyed the Jay White / PAC match and the post match shenanigans, as well.

They said TUNNEL PAC couldn’t hurt you, that he wasn’t REAL… but HE SEES YOU

I mentioned obliquely last week that there had been rumblings of a four way match at World’s End with (presumably) Jon Moxley, Hangman Adam Page, Jay White and Christian with his dope-y cash in title shot thingie. It seems now (hopefully) that Orange Cassidy would be in that mix, not Christian. He attacked Mox last night and strangled him (!) with a camera cord. DEFINITELY not what we’re used to seeing with OC and I think it works. I had seen some lamenting that OC had been CAST ASIDE (that’s AEW fandom for you; everything is all or nothing, dramatic and extreme) and this clearly puts paid to that notion. Hangman, Jay and OC all hit their signature moves on Moxley and it felt good, cathartic. It was about time for the “bad guys” to show some ass.

Swerve commited CASTERCIDE as I had so fervently wished for, hitting THREE House calls on the obnoxious Max Caster and then, post match, a particularly deranged stomp from the top rope. LOVED IT. The crowd LOVED IT. The crowd loved everything, really; they were great all night. Caster’s persona is so odious at this point. This isn’t effective heel heet. It’s “cave in his skull for real, please” heat. I worry about Anthony Bowens (we’ll see if he actually gets placed in the Hurt Syndicate or not), but I genuinely can’t imagine what they are going to do to reboot Caster. I honestly did enjoy him once, pre AEW and was thrilled when Khan put him into a tag team and let them rise through matches on the late, lamented AEW Dark. I don’t know what went wrong with the Acclaimed. Adding CHEMICAL KING Billy Gunn didn’t help, that’s for sure, but Caster’s slide into unwatchability is something he can blame on no one but himself.

All of the Continental Classic matches were good to great. I hate to admit that Shelton Benjamin did great (and believe me, if he had BEAT Kyle Fletcher, this would be a much different conversation) but he lost as Kyle cheated to win (!) and then he and Don Callis got the FUCK OUT OF DODGE like thieves in the night, which was glorious. I REALLY enjoy Don Callis and the heel turn has been PERFECT for Fletcher, it’s really brought him out of his Ospreay-lite shell. Benjamin got A STERN TALKING TO from MVP and then Benjamin vented his frustrations on some convenient backstage personnel. PERHAPS HE SHOULD HAVE PLUGGED HIS FAVORITE MUFFIN BAKERY. Actually, this was all fun.

The only thing that was particularly underwhelming would have been the Dynamite Dozen Battle Royal. The only guy who got an entrance was the guy who (co) won the thing. GEE, IMAGINE THAT. At least since ROH days post (sigh) FutureShock, Cole has always got something of an extended entrance, where he holds his hands aloft and screams “ADAM COLE, BAY BAY” before his matches start. In NXT, the generic music they picked out for him and his group really, REALLY fit, so the group, including Cole, started adapting their mannerisms to the song, which is where you get the Triple H-style head turns to the music and self pointing during the “BOOM” part from. Of course, when he came to AEW, they built on this; Mikey Ruckus made a song where, quite simply, Cole could get all his stuff in and do the head turns and the pointing and they even went back and added the “BOOM.”

Basically, you had a ring of eleven men WAITING for Cole’s entrance to FINALLY, BLISSFULLY COME TO AN END.The other competitors in the battle royal couldn’t help but look a bit ridiculous as they waited patiently for Cole’s entrance to wrap up, particularly Lance Archer who’s CHARACTER clearly wanted to kill Cole, but the PERFORMER had to be a good boy and wait.

Groan.

Anyway, he and KOR will square off next week to see who fights MJF at World’s End. OH NO, FUTURESHOCK IMPLODES. At least Cole was a vaguely human Caucasian color this week. Speaking of which, MJF said something about Cole being “jaundice infested,” which certainly sounds like he must read this blog. If so, hey Max. I used to think you rock. What happened?

Look, I’m not the most positive fellow out there. Not everything about AEW right now is rainbows and light… but as always, I think there’s too much gnashing of teeth, too much panic, too much tsuris aimed at almost all the wrong places. I think that, with one or two exceptions (and some personal wishes to see certain talents elevated), AEW is doing a good job right now. We as fans don’t owe them ANYTHING, but if you’re the kind of fan who seeks out spaces like this, I think you SHOULD realize that feeding into the panic feedback loop is above you, above us. There’s no need to make the self fulfilling spiral of doom a reality. We can break the circle, and as long as AEW keeps cranking out good TV, we should.