La Zona Muerta

The cool Marvel kind, not the shitty WWE kind. Well, even then.

This is not going to be an extensive review of Dynamite. I don’t have the time or, honestly, the inclination at the moment, so deflating was the end of AEW Dynasty and the ridiculous backlash to the backlash against the show. There are occasionally times where I question my wrestling fandom and while I’m not quite in those doldrums, when both AEW and NJPW, my two preferred wrestling companies of choice, aren’t firing on all cylinders, my enthusiasm is demonstrably dampened.

It’s a shame; the record (here, dear reader archived for eternity at LA ZONA MUERTA) shows I was fairly high on the build to Dynasty. AEW can survive a so so PPV; it’s fine since they have given us some of the literal best shows ever, but on nights like this, where they’re coming off of a show that was AT BEST considered divisive, they need a REAL strong Dynamite… and I’m not so sure that’s what we got. Oh, it was fine, I suppose… but they needed more than “fine” to assuage some worries.

We’ll get straight to the point… they couldn’t risk Jon Moxley doing a live promo, so they did one of the wacky Mox pretapes where he’s in the bowels of whatever building they are at with weird music playing. To be fair, this was one of his better promos during this run… less cryptic and he laid out his motivations fairly clearly. He buried the Young Bucks, which led me to a nagging “but they were clearly aligned” feeling, but this was explained shortly. This pretape rolled into a VERY brief match with Moxley and Katsuyori Shibata. “The WRESTLER?!” I cried out during his music; so moved was I to see the man who survived BRAIN REMOVAL SURGERY.

Just when the match got going… it was over; Mox poked Shibata in the eye and choked him out. Obviously you knew Shibata wasn’t going to win but the match ended VERY abruptly. Then the Bucks came out and we were rolling down the river of DAMAGE CONTROL. The Bucks are basically the exact same characters they were before they left… still the corrupt EVPs, just maybe with some puzzling sartorial choices… and they explained they supposedly took out Swerve to help their friend Hangman Adam Page… but they also want to ally themselves with the Death Riders. The emphasis on friendship summoned KENNY OMEGA and my eyes grew wide… we’re doing this here? Now? DAMAGE CONTROL. Kenny cut a wacky promo about how he had forgiven the Bucks not because he wanted to but because it was for the safety of AEW IN GENERAL (somehow he stopped himself from saying it was “best for business,” thank Gotch above, but he did slip in a “restore the feeling” which made me wanna vom) and talked about a guy he knew in high school with some poorly housebroken dogs or something. I dunno… maybe not one of Kenny’s best performances. He decided to just go fight the Bucks… which led to Kazuchika Okada appearing, presumably still aligned with the Bucks (and here’s something I never thought I’d say… wither Jungle Boy?) to counter Kenny… which led to Swerve Strickland coming out to even the odds with a chair and Swerve proclaimed it was “Buck hunting season.”

While this all made sense and other than Kenny’s goofy attempt at injecting some levity, was all largely fine… to “fix” the sour taste in the mouths of LA PUBLICA, they had to have Mox, the Bucks, Kenny, Okada and Swerve come out. In other words, except for the absence of maybe Will Ospreay and Hanger… they had to have ALL OF THE TOP GUYS IN THE COMPANY COME OUT TO SALVAGE THIS THING. DAMAGE CONTROL. I have ZERO insight, my ears are not as close to the ground as they were even a couple of years ago but if you told me this extended ECW style connect the dots twenty minute promo was the plan on Sunday, I’d laugh at you. I saw a couple of fans immediately try to do the “let them cook / oh, look at you all backtrack” victory lap type thing and I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. I think this was a clear sign of “look, we know Sunday made you unhappy so here’s all the folks you like to get you to chill out” type situation. Later, Hangman was shown looking for Swerve and Prince Nana wanted to offer SOME sort of apology, but Hanger cut him off and warned Swerve against interfering in any of his upcoming matches. BUT I THOUGHT THEY WERE FRIENDS NOW, at least according to everyone who said on Sunday that it was “obvious” that they were now aligned. *rolls eyes dramatically*

I dunno, gang. Did this opening promo into promo into promo work? It makes a tiring premise a bit more intriguing, I guess… but it’s certainly not a home run that makes another three months of Mox main event mediocrity seem palatable. I don’t really care to see Swerve and Hanger team against the Bucks (if indeed that’s where this goes… seems likely but who knows). I feel like again, we are diverting from what I and maybe a lot of people would like… Swerve and Hangman battling for the richest prize in the company. I love Ospreay as well and have no problem with him being in that top mix… maybe even champ, why not… but it really feels YET AGAIN like Hangman and Swerve are being downplayed to build up others. AEW did that last year at All In and see where THAT got them?

I may just be grumpy… maybe ny judgement can’t fully be trusted… but when AEW had done a LOT of hard work to right the ship and get back on course, a misstep feels magnified, intensified. Right now, they can’t afford a lot of mistakes, in my opinion.