La Zona Muerta

Forgive the “lateness” of the column this week, please (pretty please with sugar on top) as AEW only went and AVOIDED THE BIG FOUR OR THE FINAL COUNTDOWN or whatever it’s called and placed Collision on Thursday. COWARDS.

You know, Mrs. Convoy enjoys ROUNDBALL (how dare she; didn’t she get the memo that the only good sports are FAKE sports) but not of the college variety. She was forced by workmates to fill out a March Madness bracket and so every so often, I hear her wail from the couch “SHOOT THE FUCKING BALL FOR CHRIST’S SAKE” so it may be that the level of college play wasn’t QUITE up to her rigorous standards. I get it; I’ve been going through the motions and watching WRESTLING that isn’t up to my rigorous standards for YEARS.

I’ve seen (and heard) a lot of positive feedback for the Dynamite portion of the AEW double header (it’s Thursday afternoon as I put virtual pen to electronic paper so I haven’t seen Coliz yet) (Editor Convoy from the far flung future of Friday, here; I probably needn’t have bothered waiting for Collision). I… I dunno. I didn’t hate Dynamite or anything, but it was paced strangely. I joked elsewhere that it felt like Monday Night Dynamite and, despite the joke, I sort of have to stand by that. The opening segment was like a tortuously intertwined nest of wires lurking in the back of your junk drawer, incorporating some botched (?) pyro, the return of Chris Jericho, Kenny Omega and Maxwell Jacob Friedman doing a contract signing (and Speedball Mike Bailey getting involved, because, in one of my least favorite wrestling tropes ever, THERE WAS APPARENTLY NO MAIN EVENT SIGNED) and Will Ospreay doing a big swear as he attacked Jon Moxley. That’s a lot of balls to keep in the air and I don’t know how effective this all was.

The return of Jericho… I don’t know if I have any great takes here, any sharp witticisms. I’m not a fan, he’s apparently married to a seditionist and the last time he was on TV he was borderline embarrassing. Whataya want from me? Is this “return” gonna DAMAGE AEW? Nah. If anything, the best argument for his return is probably simply a perception one; better to keep him pissing out of the tent flap than pissing in, to use a crudeism. In other words, the perception hit AEW would have suffered if Jericho limped out at the Royal Rumble and everyone bowed to him and pretended they were lifelong fans… I think keeping him around, for what is probably obscene pay (and who knows, maybe a job after he decides to remove the boots) is PROBABLY worth it. I definitely think AEW would treat a Jericho retirement run of a helluva lot more respect, care and seriousness than the other place would (see Bill Goldberg, John Cena and AJ Styles, to name but three recent retirements). The John Cena retirement is the easiest lay up there has ever been… and WWE fucking whiffed it. Would they have done better with Jericho? I tend to doubt it. I have been watching (and enjoying, for the most part) Jericho for roughly 30 years. In that time… he never really had a generational rival. X-Pac? I mean… maybe… for a minute in WCW… but no. Juventud Guerrera? No. In WWE he was always an upper mid card gate keeper who would flirt with the main event. He became undisputed champion there probably not due to any great proclivity or anything like that but more owing to the fact that they needed the belts on a heel for guys like the Rock and Stone Cold to beat. He has this reputation for transforming himself with every return and… I dunno. I think that rep is WAY overblown. Is there a functional difference between his current persona and the “Painmaker” gimmick he came up with (a spikey leather coat and some Clockwork Orange ‘Droog’ facepaint)? When he wrestles on occasion as Lionheart Chris Jericho, is there much of a difference besides him coming out to White Zombie and doing the (vastly superior) Liontamer as opposed to the Walls of Jericho? That’s all surface stuff, all pretty much the same, these days. Lest us not forget that since he got over an off the cuff phrase (“a l’il bit o’ the bubbly”) randomly, he immediately started trademarking anything that would fall out of his mouth in a desperate plea for relevance. “I’m the Demo God!” “I’m the Ocho / Le Champion!” “GFY!” “I’m a wizard!” “I… am a learning tree!” etc., etc., ad nauseum, ad infinitum. I’m not seeing the… you know, the innovation.

So anyway, he’s back, and like it or not, AEW viewers have to deal with it. My hope is that he doesn’t choke up too much TV time. Don’t take any more young guys under your wing. No more lame factions. NO MORE TEAMING WITH SAMMY GUEVARA. Lord. Assuming this IS a final run (and who knows, maybe he has some different thoughts than you or I might have about that), I really and truly don’t know who you plug him in with. Like I said before, he doesn’t really have any generational rival. What, Edge? No, thanks. Hangman Adam Page, especially since he can’t challenge for the title any longer? Maybe. There IS some history there, the first two people to fight over the AEW Heavyweight Title. Let’s say we pick All In and Wembley (a l’il bit o’ the Wembley) as a hypothetical endpoint. Do we want four and a half months of build to a retirement match with Hanger? I dunno. His last match can’t be Lance Storm or with DR. LUTHER.

Annyway, Dynamite started off with some hiccupping pyro interrupting Tony Schiavone in ring as he was announcing the Kenny / MJF contract signing. I’ve seen a lot of debate as to whether

1. if the pyro was a standard AEW production glitch or something to do with FINAL JERICHO BYE BYE (you can’t put it past him that his final form has some kind of Spinal Tap-ian disaster aura)
2. if the crowd actually popped for Jericho

They absolutely did, and they sang the (few) words of Judas that they knew. I think the “lack” of reaction or however you’d want to frame it comes down to AEW’s seven year quest to never mic a venue correctly and then Jericho REALLY trying too hard to milk the return. “C’mon baby! Give me that FOURTH round of cheering!” Perhaps anticlimactically, he milked the crowd past the point of dryness, said a mere “I’m home,” and went off to hug his dad. Oooookay.

Ohh, the new catchphrase / trademark / whatever, by the way is the “Cornerstone.” He is going to apparently bill himself as the Cornerstone and while I don’t really WANT TO hand it to him, I have to admit his presence in the beginning was very much that (although you could argue he was immediately supplanted when Jon Moxley came in). Welcome to AEW, Chris Jericho; hope WE survive the experience.

Before the big CONTRACT SIGNAGE, Will Ospreay smashed Jon Moxley in the nebulous backstage area into some mysterious barrels. Wheeler YUTA was like “leave my dad alone!” and got his shit kicked in, too. This was fine, but my Spidey-sense is tingling; I’m a little concerned that we are doing the “babyface loses himself in his thirst for revenge” arc that Hangman Page just completed last year but hopefully that’s not where this goes. Right now, it seems to be a real “this is super personal for Ospreay, but just business for Moxley” deal, which doesn’t really set my soul on fire, but YMMV.

Next, it was FINALLY time for Kenny and his heaving bosom to sign a contract. OH GOD, JUST HAVE WRESTLING. MJF also appeared. The end. Honestly, this wasn’t much of anything. Kenny cut the same promo he did last week; takes a god to beat a devil and etc. He mentioned the hair plugs because, well, I guess everyone mentions the hair plugs, now. MJF got very, VERY serious (after referring to Kenny’s “boyfriend,” Kota Ibushi in what to me felt like a derogatory manner, but others thought felt was like a warm, inclusive manner. From the low hanging fruit picking wrestling heel. Cough) and leaned in. “Should I tell them the *big secret*, Kenny?” I was, for a moment, VERY nervous that he was going to hang a winding down life clock on Kenny, the same way Bryan Danielson did to himself, which really robbed me of any joy of the last six months of the American Dragon’s career. The BIG SECRET?

Kenny has diverticulitis.

Um.

Yes?

Since Kenny’s return, he’s had the secret TUM TUM weakness. SHOOT THE CORE, like in Gradius. I’ve talked about it here a ton. Drawn an amusing cartoon about it.

Yes, a repeat, I’m sorry

But now, Kenny’s guts could, according to MJF, LITERALLY EXPLODE.

Okay.

If this is priming the pump for writing Kenny off yet again, I’m gonna be pissed. As it stands, Kenny WINNING at Dynasty is about the only reason to tune in. Kenny’s weakness now being his secret, DOUBLE weakness is not really the enticement RJ City big Tony Khan seems to think it is. Maybe they could, like strap some squibs to Ken’s gut and MJF and punch him there, and gore and viscera can burst forth.

Here’s a story they could tell. Kenny Omega, the best wrestler of this modern age, is tired of MJF’s bullshit, and is coming to get his title back. MJF, conniving heel, is scared and tries to come up with ways to keep his title. You could argue “but that’s exactly what they’re doing” and I’d shake my head at you. The story is now Chekhov’s Intestinal Tract. WILL KENNY’S GUTS EXPLODE?! Fifty forty dollars, please.

Here’s the real problem. Let’s say Kenny loses. Let’s put aside alienating fans, pissing off Canadians, etc. What’s next? MJF and Darby Allin? That’s… fine… but feels more like a TV special and not a pay per view main. Kyle Fletcher? We don’t know how hurt he is. Swerve Strickland? Maybe, but they should only pull the trigger on THAT if Swerve is winning. If the intention is truly to keep MJF champion until All In, it’s gonna be a long, boring four months. Kenny winning immediately freshens up the title picture, and gives us hope of Omega / Ospreay for the title at Wembley.

We’ll see.

Anyway, MJF goaded Kenny, knowing that Kenny couldn’t fight him due to a “no physicality” clause. So Kenny’s little, Canadian pal, Speedball Mike Bailey, came out to *checks notes* cut a promo for Kenny. “Kenny is great! Kenny isn’t afraid of you!” Sigh. This set up the brave Canadian hero, Bailey, fighting evil American MJF in the apparently non existent until the twenty five minute mark main event. Dynamite felt like a drag, at this point.

The reason Kenny was shirtless in ring was the fact that this segment rolled into Kenny and friends versus the Demand. The action was good, and when it was Kenny versus Ricochet, it was great. Not much to say; Kenny’s guts, ticking time bomb that they are, remained intact. Kenny and Ricochet had lots of chemistry; this was fun.

Edge and Christian arrived, brandishing chairs. Christian threatened to brain Renee Paquette. If only.

Then. THEN. It was already time for the Bastard PAC versus the Aerial Assassin, Will Ospreay. I was SALIVATING.

Instead of steak, I got hamburger. And not good hamburger. Out two days and just on the edge of “hurry up and brown this off or throw it out” hamburger.

PAC comes out. Snarling, intense. Great. Ospreay comes out. Smiling, doing his thing. PAC immediately runs over and delivers a DISGUSTING brainbuster on the ramp. HELL YEAH LET’S GO.

But then, something happened. Doctors SWARMED. “Will! Are you okay?”

“Aaaaaarrrrgggh my neck!”

“Will! Try not to move!”

“JUST GIVE ME A SEC BRUV MY NECK UUUHHHHHHHH.”

“Will. WILL!”

“UNHNHHHH.”

“Are you okay?!”

Repeat as needed.

This went on for what felt like forever. I said it went for five minutes on a forum. “Um, actually, it was two,” I was told. Okay…? IT FELT LIKE FIVE. Is that better? That isn’t GOOD, is it? A dumb, repetitive thing going so long that it felt longer? Will struggled (semi) valiantly as the doctor tried to hold him back. “COLBY, NO! THIS ISN’T LIKE YOU!” “ANNIE, ARE YOU OKAY?” Finally, GRASPING HIS NECK (its hurt, you see), Will dramatically ENTERED THE RING and the match began. Will couldn’t do much BECAUSE OF HIS WEAKNESS, HIS NECK. Every time he would fire up, OH NO, HIS NECK. He managed to like kick PAC or something, and Tony Schiavone proclaimed “his neck is hurt but his LEGS are fine!” Um. I think your neck is kinda sort part of making the legs AND EVERYTHING ELSE work. PAC worked the neck a lot. The match was interrupted by two commercial breaks (could they have done one of the breaks during the doctor part, maybe. This food is terrible, and such small portions!) and had a hard time finding any flow. Finally, the last two minutes of the match were really good, a series of counters and strikes. PAC put Ospreay in the punishing Brutalizer hold and I thought for a hot second “wow, maybe they will do a ref stoppage, here. I could live with that” but of course, Will used valiant ring awareness to roll PAC up in the style of, I dunno, Darby Allin, to name a name, sort of braving the brutality (ho ho) of the hold until he could stack PAC up.

Er, that’s it.

Look, I saw a lot of praise for this match. Critics I like and respect loved it. If YOU loved it, that’s not an indictment on YOU. I, as always, am talking about ME. I thought this was terrible, sports entertain-y, am dram HORSESHIT. We KNOW Will’s surgically repaired neck is going to be a storytelling component of his matches going forward (well, at least his matches in America. We’ll see if that’s the case when he returns tonight to New Japan. Actually no, I won’t see, because Caleb Newman is not the GREAT WHITE HOPE so many seem to believe and I can’t be bothered). We had a taste of this when Ospreay had that match with Blake Christian so many seemed to dislike; I thought that was a great example of working Ospreay’s neck without bashing the audience over the head with THE NECK IS THE WEAKNESS horseshit.

This match? Not so much.

And, to top it off, we now have TWO parallel stories in AEW where the best wrestler in the world has a not so secret weak spot. TWO. That might be the worst part; both guys have this crippling weakness that has to be super spotlighted? Again, this was the last entire six months of Bryan Danielson’s career! WE’VE DONE THIS. IF they are so INFIRMED, why is a doctor clearing them? What wrestler DOESN’T have a bad neck? WE GET IT.

Post finish, the Death Riders threatened to break Ospreay’s neck again. OL’ NO MATES OSPREAY was at their mercy, and Jon Moxley sort of eased up, pointed out it wasn’t personal and rolled out. UGH WHAT IS THIS.

Honestly, this pretty much took me out of the rest of the show. Again, didn’t hate it but it wasn’t what I was hoping for, let’s put it that way. MJF beat Speedball Mike Bailey (unsurprisingly), but did give him a lot. Kenny and his shirtlessness came out and did commentary that teetered wildly from boredom to putting over MJF like a king. I dunno; could just be Kenny’s general vibe; I thought it was weird. MJF worked Bailey over post match and we almost had MORE doctor time (oh god, I hate doctor angles) but Kenny made the save (the ten foot away save; what a hero) and Bailey waved the doctors off. Yay Canada.

May as well get Coliz out of the way; I think crowd fatigue drug this show down and kinda drug me down with it. There’s only really one main talking point, anyway: WHAT THE HELL DO YOU DO WITH ANTHONY BOWENS.

Look, Bowens is REALLY good. I like the guy, he’s got unique charisma, he’s well spoken, does a ton of media. Great face for the company.

I think since he got the singles “push” (not a push), the Jane’s Addiction theme, the Five Tool Player surcoat… he’s probably won less than a handful of times. Like wins you could probably count on one hand. Then… while they had something with Max Caster, delusional comedy jobber, Bowens got NOTHING. Total jobber to the stars, and while that’s not the worst fate in the world, this was a guy who won tag and trios gold! They REFUSED to break him off from chemically enhanced Bill E. Gunn, and then when they finally started heading in that direction… that went nowhere (I won’t blame Bowens or AEW for that; I guarantee a certain steroid enhanced goofball put the kibosh on looking WEAK). Then, suddenly, JERRY LYNN, of all people, is like “Max! Bowens! Reunite the Acclaimed” and they did some wacky will they won’t they stuff and then… I dunno. HOOK teased adding Bowens to the OPPs and after that hasn’t really gone anywhere, suddenly Bowens has a title eliminator with Moxley.

Maybe you send this guy to go be the king of Ring of Honor for awhile? You can’t cut bait; he’s too good to shut out, but he’s not over enough as a singles to push. He’s someone who was really hurt by not having the extra hours of AEW Dark. It’s brutal; I don’t know what the answer is.

Moxley beat him, obviously. Wasn’t a squash; Moxley is (chokes on tongue) GOOD at giving guys something when they are there to go under. Match was probably a bit too long and the crowd couldn’t have cared less, but it was good. Then, Ospreay bushwacked Moxley after the match because RARRRR YOU ALMOST BROKE MY NECK AGAIN BRUV. Ospreay held up Moxley’s Continental Title and YOU COULD HAVE HEARD A PIN DROP. It just isn’t working. They fucked everything up by having Moxley go over Konosuke Takeshita and I think people are kinda slowly realizing that.

The rest of Collision was a bit of a shrug. Do YOU think I have a BIG OPINION about “Flamboyant” Juice Robinson versus Tomasso “Weight of the Badge” Ciampa? OOOH, CHIAMPA DID A KISSY AGAIN UWU. HE DID THE CLAPPY TIME THING FROM NXT. THIS IS ALL I KNOW. Ugh. THE DOGS? No, thanks. FTR squashed Mo Gibari and MY BELOVED LONDON LIGHTNING, who, frankly, was more compelling in a silly, five minute squash than most of the other people on the show. They did set up Jamie Hayter versus Thekla, which is relevant to my interests. Like, the pay per view is basically a week away and the last Dynamite and Collision are gonna have to do some HEAVY LIFTING to get me into even BUYING DYNASTY at this point (remember, I am still under the TWO KEY protocol; the missus now has to write off on me buying future AEW PPVS). The talk of “AEW is being booked so well” right now seems a bit… off to me. Things feel a bit askew, the vibes aren’t right. Not giving us a lot to work with on that pay per view other than WILL KENNY AND OSPREAY BE OKAY.

Just feel a little sour, and AEW go home shows rarely stick the landing. They need to pace out the timing between the PPVs better (probably impossible in the current landscape). Yes, yes, AEW ALWAYS delivers on PPV. Spare me, I’ve heard it. Just not particularly excited for what they have served up this month. Flat-ski, like a brick.