La Zona Muerta

Somewhere between 45,000 and 50,000 human beings descended upon Wembley Stadium for AEW’s tentpole event All In at the end of August and, since apparently at least one security guard may have been armed with deodorant, according to a pal of mine, I’m sure at least a portion of them smelled okay. That’s certainly a relief.

What didn’t pass the smell test was four (!) matches being added to the All In pre show Saturday night. Look, I know it’s a “reward” of sorts, get everyone on the card but… only one of the matches (Persephone and Maya World for the TBS title) had been lampshaded on TV in any way. Everything else felt thrown together because it was, well, thrown together. Not a fan of that.

I don’t have to write about this, do I? This pre show garbage opportunity? Mmmmaybe the Persephone / Maya thing since that’s actually somewhat important.

A friend noted that Tony Khan likely uses “Machinehead” by Bush for All In every year because WWF ripped it off for their UK-exclusive pay per view “Insurrexion” (sic) in the year 2000. Dammit. That’s one of those observations that makes you feel dumb. Why didn’t I realize that? This is the sort of hot insight you read La Zona Muerta for, and someone else is out there, JUST GIVING IT AWAY (shoutout to my guy Stick).

The show kicked off with the most cursed announcer configuration possible; Renee Paquette, Paul White, Mick Foley and Jeff Jarrett. This felt like a message, maybe even a threat, specifically coded for maximum Casa de Convoy repulsion. They want to convince people to like, BUY this thing, right? Meanwhile, I’m looking at a WWE pay per view talking head panel from 2017. Maybe add Jerry Lawler or Booker T for one hundred percent FED CRED next time.

I’ll tell you this much for free; whomever has been coaching Persephone and Maya World through their interviews the last couple of weeks has been doing an AWFUL job; they now speak with the stilted cadence of WWE Divas (derogatory). Perse is generally decent on promos and I had been actually quite impressed with Maya up until the last week or so. Wha’ hoppen?

The audio was completely gacked for the beginning of the Buy In, but with the desk I described above, perhaps it’s for the best. AEW and audio issues; name a more iconic duo. Perhaps the most iconic duo of them all.

Show kicked off with the OPPs (I suppose Action Andretti is now an official member given the events of the last Ring of Honor pay per view) against the Rascalz (plus Lio Rush). You know, that long simmering, epic feud that’s been playing out over ALL the TV. *cough* To be slightly more fair here, Andretti and Lio have been feuding, of course, but Andretti just beat Rush so you’d like to think FEUDS CAN END. King dork (and it pains me to say that) Anthony Bowens ate the pin. I’d like to think that Samoa Joe is gonna walk in to the OPPs treehouse or wherever they live (obviously in kayfabe, they all live together) one day, look at HOOK and go “What the hell is all this?”

I refuse to give any column inches to a match featuring Harley Cameron and the Sisters of Sin. Wretched. Poor Kris Statlander.

It took thirty three minutes to solve the audio issues. And by solve I mean “fixing most of the BAD issues, but the sound was wacky all night, with people talking over VTRs, entrance music burying announcers in the mix, etc.” Later, a frustrated Renee would hit the mic in her palm and go “Audio!” Like, haven’t they run this place and wired it for sound three previous times? Yes, of course, we should be happy ANY of it works, and for the couple of things that went wrong, a MILLION things go right, but it’s frustrating over the last seven years that it’s basically the same sort of production problems, over and over and over again. Shoutout to my pal SRARS who was probably sobbing “always bring an extra mixer cable” into his hands.

For posterity’s sake, Kris Stat got the win, here.

Great, another match I refuse to write about, the ruination of my beloved Shane Taylor Promotions. They took on the Hurt Jerks, the Costco Jerks and that jerk, QT Marshall in an angle that Excalibur claimed came earlier this week on social media but really came about ROUGHLY TWELVE HOURS BEFORE THIS VERY SHOW. I realize TK is a fucking billionaire, but they literally WASTED money flying the Costco men and the unhealthy Costco child out to a country unfamiliar with chicken bakes and oversized muffins. Maybe they can be the Iceland Guys, amirite? Of course, if the Hurt Business won’t do business, then fine. THIS is the business they get to do, instead. I “love” how a certain segment of AEW fans accept this Fed-coded garbage since it’s our team and not theirs.

The (former?) American Dragon came out, doing his little WWE points to the sky (dunno why this bothered me; it’s not like this will be the last WWE talent doing his WWE entrance today. Far from it). IS THIS ALL IN OR IS THIS WRESTLEMANIA LONDON. Sometimes, I despair, and sometimes I wish we could have a true alternative.

Okay, Persephone and Maya World. Bless her heart, but AEW has given Maya the chance; I just don’t know that she’s ready. Persephone is; she’s a much more complete package at this point. I’m not saying NEVER with Maya; I like her! I’m just saying “not right now.”

Holy shit! I had this paragraph all composed before the finish; it can’t be any surprise that Maya was going to lose this match, but a slim figure in a hoodie interfered to cost Maya… (speaking of Fed-coded) and it was the returning Dr. Britt Baker, DMD! Everyone hates this woman for whatever silly reason, but I was VERY happy to see her return. Oh, please Jesus, don’t pitch to MICK FOLEY to talk about this, oh noooooooo.

Fortunately, we were spared Foley’s terrible opinions on women. YAY THEKLA; CUT OFF THIS TERRIBLE PANEL, PLEASE. The women are doing HEAVY lifting to save this (pre) show. OH MAN, IT MAY BE INEBRIATED THEKLA, THE BEST VERSION OF THEKLA. Mick Foley’s eyes about bugged out when Thekla did her spider walk deal in front of him, the creep. Talk about toxic.

In the back, Britt pointed out that she and Persephone have a lot in common since they both hate Thunder Rosa, which is as good of a reason as any to join forces. Can I join that club?

The Trios Royal Rumble (or whatever it’s called) kicked off with the Bang Bang Gang and the Dogs. Great. I was just saying to the honorable Mrs. Convoy yesterday when we were watching a seemingly neverending battle royal in AEW’s sister promotion RevPro, that “maybe we should retire the Rumble style match for awhile,” and here we have TWO of them on this show. I get it, get EVERYONE on the show, including the WWE cast offs.

I suppose have been dancing around it for weeks, refusing to name them and not coming right out to say it; why is it don’t I like the New Day, anyway?

Thing is, in their initial incarnation, I DID like them, even if I’ve never particularly cared for Kofi Kingston (who’s main character trait has always been ‘guy who can do cool stuff in the Royal Rumble’). I mean, I absolutely loved, LOVED Big E and Xavier, if not so hot in ring, is at least very charismatic. The original version of the New Day where the crew were upset that the crowds treated them as snotty heels, and they would whine about it? I actually thought that was a pretty fun act. It was when WWE did it’s WWE thing and gave the guys a million repetitive segments, time machines, unicorn horns, pancakes and boxes of cereal when I started to sour on them. If something works, in the grand tradition of wrestling, do it like ten thousand, eight hundred and seventy three more times until the audience REALLY GETS IT.

And then the act continued another ten plus years, anyway, after the point where they had already jumped the shark with me.

No change. Transitioning from throwing cereal at people to throwing pancakes at people AIN’T character development. I wasn’t watching when Big E suffered his career ending injury from a careless worker and I wasn’t watching when Kofi and Xavier turned heel on Big E, which, at the time was heralded the greatest heel turn ever by dummies who haven’t actually seen any non WWE wrestling, but of course no one wanted to SEE a heel New Day, and WWE didn’t follow up on it particularly well.

And then WWE lowballed Kofi and Xavier… and, to their credit, they split.

But in this environment, when the big stars split one place, there’s only one other place to go to. Obviously, AEW has to take on big stars like that, but it’s two big stars who have been running on a WWE treadmill for nearly TWENTY YEARS. Why SHOULD I be excited to see them in AEW? Why should I be excited to have to see Swerve Strickland, who should be on TOP of this promotion, have to play second fiddle to two former WWE lifers?

Back to the trios debacle. Daybreak The New Level came out. NO UNICORNS (except the unicorn in their logo, natch’*). Up until here, the battle royal had been a bit juiceless and sloppy; Bandido appeared to have been hurt at some point. Roderick Strong and Marina Shafir squared off, which was fun, but the Conglomeration overall were out so fast that it seemed like a waste of airfare. Everyone JUST STOOD THERE as they awaited the transition from pre show to SHOW show. AH, FKA New Day are called “New Level,” so you can chant New Le-vel, New Le-vel in the former “New Day Rocks” cadence. Bandido continued on with his shoulder jacked up; I dunno how smart that is, but WE HAVE SPOTS TO HIT. This is REALLY sloppy, like notably so. It came down to the (sigh) New Level and Swerve against PAC, Claudio Castagnoli and Gabe Kidd, who spent most of the match, uh… fighting a turnbuckle.

Of course I’m not kidding.

Hey, everyone here is a former WWE talent but Gabe Kidd. Cool cool. KOFI IS ALREADY DOING A FEET DIDN’T TOUCH THE FLOOR THING ON HIS FIRST DAY IN. JUST LIKE THE ROYAL RUMBLE. DO YOU GET IT. IT’S THE COOL ROYAL RUMBLE GUY FROM WWE.

It’s too early in the morning to be this annoyed.

Obviously “New Level” and Swerve won the trios titles. Not my jam and I thought the match was overall pretty sloppy. The mask of certain AEW fans as being WWE enjoyers slips that much more and I wonder how many more WWE references I get to set through today. I already lived through the Stamfordization of one company I enjoyed, and it’s happening all over again.

Next was the Divine Dominion and the Brawling Birds. This was a relatively quick, hard hitting affair. I don’t think the outcome was ever in doubt; the Birds picked up the titles. I think that’s a good water level for them. I’d like to see Lena Kross break off and do her own thing.

Time for Nigel McGuinness and Jon Moxley. Nigel ASSURES us “it’s coming home,” but no, that’s for someone else, daddy. Two fingers up to Renee, extolling the virtues of Jon Moxley. Shouldn’t she recuse herself from Moxley matches? I wonder if you did a custom, bespoke search for the word ‘recuse’ here at La Zona Muerta or anywhere else I have ever written a word about wrestling, how many times have I suggested this? I have friends who ASSURE me Nigel is here to get ‘bag murdered’ so let’s see what happens in this CLASH of Les Thatcher grads. British, Brotosh, Britoish… but why doesn’t Nigel use THE TRICKS? USE THE TRICKS, NIGEL. As opposed to the Tricks, Mox unraveled some of Nigel’s boot tape and Nigel used the fine, technical hold of GRINDING THE TAPE INTO MOX’S MOUTH AND EYES. BEST OF BRITISH. Tower of London! Crossface trade! NOW, we’re getting somewhere. They got to a rather tepid forearm exchange, but Nigel finally hit the Les Kellett lariat, which looked great. Moxley tried the same, but Nigel wrecked him with another lariat. GREAT transition from Mox with the Bulldog choke, but Nigel DUG HIS CHIN into Mox’ forearm to break the hold and shift into the London Dungeon. Mox was able to reverse eventually into a ankle lock, but Nigel clinched up for a great nearfall, and then another great nearfall with a European clutch. Nigel submitted to the ankle lock with a very (perhaps overly) dramatic one inch away attempt to reach the ropes. Well, it was a mostly fine match, even if the route here was fairly pointless. I take that back; I reckon the point is keeping Moxley happy. Huh, neither boot removal nor bag murder; NIGEL AND HIS CAREER HAVE BEEN SPARED.

Next, the three way with Kyle Fletcher, Kazuchika Okada and Konosuke Takeshita, the match that would be better if it were just any two of the men I just mentioned, instead. Not that this match hasn’t been well built or anything; it’s just three ways, even with the best wrestlers, aren’t always the best foot forward, what with the built in nap time for the third man at any given point. I have to say, unfortunately, that the Okada / Takeshita stuff playing out as it did over the end of 2025 and beginning of 2026 robbed me of a lot of the enthusiasm I had for all this, and coupling that with the realization that THIS is Takeshita’s absolute final level in AEW… I don’t quite have the excitement I ought to do. I don’t want to take anything away from this match or the men in it, especially that big, pink jerk Kyle Fletcher, who has leveled up his game tremendously to go from a wrestler I didn’t rate to a wrestler I am waiting for to take his place at the top of the promotion, but I’m just giving you my true feelings, as always. No point to any of this if I don’t.

Unsurprisingly, this was largely great when it wasn’t suffering from three way tropes, Takeshita giving Okada his own Rainmaker, Fletcher hitting Takeshita’s Raging Fire on Takeshita. The match check came to a SCREECHING HALT with SCREWDRIVER DRAMA. Oy. Takeshita used his GERMAN SUPLEX THESIS to best effect. Don Callis on commentary was a KING OF MEN, chiding Takeshita both for picking up the screwdriver (“What a degenerate!”) and then for not using it (“That’s mental weakness!”). Some excellent physical bickering from Okada and Fletcher over who got to pin Takeshita. NAP TIME FOR THE RAINMAKER. Takeshita hit a DISGUSTING Blue Thunder Bomb on Fletcher, but Fletcher retaliated with the DANGEROUS~! corner brainbuster… only to EAT a Rainmaker from… the Rainmaker… for the one, two, three. Okada PICKED Fletcher to cover, here, an important point to note, since both Fletch and Big Take were wiped out. A humbled, frustrated Fletcher FORCED HIMSELF to RAISE OKADA’S HAND. Obviously that will pay off down the line somewhere. Great stuff, but I don’t know if I will remember this at the end of the year when it’s time for best of the year voting; we shall see.

Fantastic, our SECOND battle royale / Rumble / get everybody on the goddamned show match of the day. See, this is why I don’t have a wrestling promotion, but what I would do while Maxwell Jacob Friedman and Andrade and all these other dopes battle it out, would be to have Kyle come out, angry as hell, have him split someone’s fucking skull open and win the whole damn thing. Battle of the GROIN THRUSTS, and there’s a sentence I never thought I would type. This MJF / Andrade stuff is SO not for me. Young Nick Wayne came out of nowhere and NAILED Andrade with a poisonrana on the floor. Jesus, Tony Schiavone really needs to cool it with his ANDRADE LUST. Speedball Mike Bailey and, well, he did his thang. Incredible athlete with incredibly gross feet. At least this year, it was fairly well timed; I think last year’s Men’s gauntlet may still be going. Tomasso (“I love Bobbies as much as I love cops”) Ciampa was next, soon followed by Chris (“Hey, I presumably also love cops except when they are arresting me or my wife”) Jericho. Jericho tried milking the crowd for a showdown for MJF, and hit The Embarasser The Walls of Jericho.** Big Mark Davis hit the ring next and piledrove everyone. My beautiful boy Komander was next, even if dopey Justin Roberts and the stupid crowd thought he was Mistico. Guess that gazumps Mistico having made that flight, huh? ME MUERO Mistico was next. Oh, how we laughed at the mistake. *cough* Danny Garcia attacked before Mistico even got to the ring. Everyone wanted to do lucha spots with Mistico, and who could blame them? Komander and Mistico (don’t tell Justin Roberts, he might be seeing double) got to do A GOOD LUCHA THING, specifically to get the crowd to do the dopey WWE “lucha, lucha” chant. Christ alive. Speedball hit Garcia IN THE DAMNED SPINE with Ultima Weapon (the Shooting Star kneedrop). Jungle Jack Perry and his cursed theme song was next. The wife pointed out that the battle royale entrants seemed to be predicated upon what songs the crowd would sing along with, and she may have a point. “THIS CROWD IS BRILLIANT, MAGGLE!” We got some Jack Perry / Mark Davis stuff, but I don’t think the crowd knew that there was a THING between those combatants. Nick Wayne spiked both himself and Jack Perry with a not quite all the way Canadian Destroyer. MJF kicked Wayne low and Andrade snuck in for the extremely anti-climatic pin. No Ilja Dragunov debut, by the way, which I think everyone had basically expected, up to and including myself. Yes, it was better than last year’s, and Nick Wayne had a couple of cool moments. Shrug.

Oh boy, speaking of WWE (I guess that’s the theme of this show), it’s time for Edge and Christian, the supposed greatest tag team of their generation (they weren’t even the best tag team on the TV show they teamed on) against the Young Bucks, who really ARE the greatest tag team of their generation, and possibly ANY generation (and that’s ME saying that). Nice entrance package for the Bucks, reminding us all of EXACTLY who they are.

“On this day, I see sports entertainment, I only watch WWE. A bitter place, I paid money, just to come to sing.”

Ahem.

Christian walked out, to no fanfare. Chuckle.

Match was very much Edge and Christian pretending to be these old school wrestlers so they are slowing things down with HOLDS type of an affair. Not bad, exactly, but I think, on a stadium show, maybe it’s okay to be a touch… spectacular? Cage, at one point, hit a Twist of Fate, and then Cage and Edge hit a 3D, and my eyes saw the roof of my skull, since I have a removed brain, Katsuyori Shibata-style. FUCK OFF Do more Hardys spots next! I love callbacks to 2003! Edge got the GOOGLY EYES, signaling for the spear, the deadly, match ending spear, but that actually meant “time for the Bucks to get the shine.” There was a spot where the Bucks hit the BTE trigger on Christian, and Edge allegedly broke it up but the camera angle didn’t, uh… support that, so they did it again and Christian kicked out. Combo spear and Unprettier for two. And then, uh… Christian hit a spear of his own and they just sorta won out of nowhere right when I was typing a joke about how you knew it wasn’t the finish because Christian hit it. What a crappy finish.

The Motor City Machine Guns, who everyone has been up in arms about not being on TV, came out. That won’t be a good match, either, so be careful what you wish for. Oh boy, and then FTR’s music hit. SOMEONE SAVE THE SHOW. NOW THE NEW DAY LEVEL. The only non WWE people here are the fucking Bucks. Am I supposed to take this as some sort of sign that tag team wrestling in AEW is alive and RED HOT? No matter who wins, I LOSE.

I obviously don’t want anyone to be hurt, even those wrestlers I don’t like. I have enough respect for even performers I don’t care for as they are risking their health for me, but I need Darby Allin and Kevin Knight to do some CRAZY shit in this here falls count anywhere deal.

Tony Schiavone was very taken by Kevin Knight’s Fly Girls entrance dancers, perhaps remembering the Nitro Girls of days gone by. Darbs and The Jet got the assignment; they immediately did aerial battle with crazy jumps and weapons. The wife was screaming about how the falls count anywhere aspect didn’t seem to be very important… especially compared to that insane match at the golf course earlier this year. Man, that ruled. The Don Callis Family hit the ring and boy, Darby took a bump so dumb, I don’t even want to write about it. HIJO DEL STING came out to make the semi-save but got promptly put through a table. Now, I guess the match is Darby versus Brian Cage, since I haven’t seen Kevin Knight in like at least five minutes. Papa del Steven Borden appeared next, but I like old man Sting, so it’s fine. Maybe Sting came to finally kill Alex Shelley for transgressions from two promotions ago? Steve Borden Junior convinced his pop NOT to do a dumb, risky ladder spot, which I appreciated. WHAT HAPPENED TO KEVIN KNIGHT. Oh, there he is, as he and Darby took it to the entrance ramp. FINALLY. My wife’s bloodlust started to cool (or was it flare) as both men ascended the entrance scaffolding. Jesus, I screamed out loud on the presumably gimmicked Coffin Drop. You could see the Styrofoam on the replay but it was still scary. Knight was being stretchered out… and Darby hit another Coffin Drop on him anyway (neat little bit of reciprocity there) for the win. Fun little deal, pretty much exactly what it should have been, and TNT Champion is a perfect level for Darby, a good way to have car crash silliness on TV every week. Also hopeful for Knight that this means he’s losing up, as it were.

Next, probably the best built (except for this week; they would have been better off with a video package, instead) match on the show; Mercedes Moné versus Willow Nightingale. Willow NEEDS this win here, needs a good match and the stamp of beating Mercedes so she can be a a star on that level. Obviously Willow IS a star and probably the most popular woman in the company, but she needs to get past this foe to be forever cemented as being on Moné’s level and not a choke artist. Excalibur started to explain (presumably) that Nigel McGuinness had to go to the local medical facility instead of the announce desk, but had to cut himself off from talking over Willow’s VTR. Willow herself came out, wearing boob guns (!), which immediately malfunctioned because of course they did. “WHAT IS SHE WEARING,” growled a certain nearby person who hates both smiling and positivity. As always, the biggest threat to Mercedes, dating back to her Sasha days, remains herself as she took a brutal looking face first faceplant on the apron. Can’t say she won’t bump for her opponents, that’s for sure. Oh hey, Nigel made it after all, in a wheelchair. Does that mean he looks Wonderful Tonight?*** Tony Schiavone mentioned something about Fox News? I dunno, I think he meant Fox Sports? I want to go back in time and ban CIMA from (presumably) inventing the Meteora. Moné unsurprisingly had a cut pouring blood down her face, possibly a broken nose. NO MORE EDDY GUERRERO SPOTS, I WARNED EVERYONE. NO MORE. Mercedes took some TOUGH shots in this and Willow, with her presumably real injury, just had to kinda use one arm to hurk Mercedes around. Willow hit a one woman SPANISH FLY (that’s the FLUX CAPACITOR, dawg) towards the denouement and one hundred percent dropped Mercedes on her head with a Death Valley driver. That’s one thing that bugs me about Willow a bit… Her whole deal is she’s this big, powerful woman, but sometimes her power seems to not be enough for the power spots she favors doing. Willow had to try it a couple times and Mercedes helped cover for that, but she finally hit a slightly awkward moonsault for a near fall. Willow took a FACE FIRST bump into an exposed turnbuckle into Mercedes’ own awkward move, the Money Maker, for a VERY close nearfall. Quid pro pro for the beginning of the match, I guess? A ref bump, are you kidding me? UGH. I was ready to tell you this had probably been the second best match on the show so far. Moné worked Willow’s allegedly broken hand / wrist on the outside. They needed a ref bump for that? Willow got a visual pinfall, but Aubrey Edwards was too shaken up to count to three. Is Mercedes winning this? Ack, buckle bomb into the exposed buckle. Can’t fib; I was a bit scared on that one. They’ve missed the peak, here; crowd is quiet. Why did I have to see the cameraman’s entire, tortuous journey from one side of the ring to another as Mercedes put on her submission. Er, that’s it, Mercedes won. Boy, what a crummy finish and I genuinely think that was the wrong person to win. Is it because of the hand? Mercedes being denied the ACTUAL main women’s title was a good motivator for the character but whatever. I enjoyed the match until the ref bump. Your mileage… kilometerage? may vary.

Hey, this show is motoring along. Anti-shoutout to the two pundits**** this week who were giggling like schoolchildren about big, bad TK making this show overlong. You both look like the petulant children you are.

YAY, IT’S WILL OSPREAY’S MUM, the only real babyface around here, narrating a package about Ospreay set to “Baba O’Reilly” for some reason. She’s great. Ospreay was flanked by the United Empire (including the somewhat overrated Callum Newman in a neat bit of continuity from the RevPro show yesterday, which may well play into the finish), and walked past his friends and foes, Michael Oku (!), Ricochet, Swerve (!!), Mark Davis and Kyle Fletcher (!!!)… and his wife Alex Windsor (that got me choked up a bit)… and Jon Moxley (!!!!) handed him a British flag. Wow, that was a helluva lead up to his actual entrance.

Kenny’s package (ooh er, missus) was narrated by a Japanese person, likely someone associated with the Final Fantasy franchise, if I had to guess. Maybe Capcom, I dunno. I don’t really play the video games Big Ken does. Oh, OH! I get what we’re going for here; My Hero Academia, duh.

Be the hero, one more time. PA LUUS UL LU TO RA.

Kenny came out with the greatest cornermen in the game, the Young Bucks, plus Michael Nakazawa and Brandon Cutler. Cutler versus HENARE, let’s go.

Okay, I’m calm.

One more time, Cleaner. One more time. How we got here wasn’t good, but this will be.

Kenny was pretty well looking. I think Kenny is likely less healthy than he ought to be but probably not as bad as it has been made out to be on television. Regardless of his general health level, he can still turn it on when he has to… and he turned it the fuck ON, here. The match ratcheted into second gear when Omega bonked Ospreay with a monitor after a… sigh… goddamned ref bump (again? TWO IN A ROW?)… and KILLED Ospreay with a brutal-ass powerbomb into a table that DIDN’T BREAK. Ospreay, bleeding and desperate, beat the ten count but immediately ate a V-Trigger for his trouble as Kenny grew more and more deranged. Kenny worked Ospreay’s neck, hitting a Dragon suplex and a missile dropkick to the vertebrae like it was NOTHING. The only thing bad I could really say about all this is that Kenny started taking so much of the match, it was making it apparent who would win. Ospreay hit a completely desperate Hidden Blade to cut Kenny off, and now Kenny was bleeding profusely as well. Ospreay got the shine (if you could call it that) with a variety of nasty kicks and strikes. We were well into the drama portion of the match, but I don’t mean that in a pejorative sense. Both men just started throwing bombs, here, and while Wembley was pulling for Ospreay, they weren’t exactly not supportive of Omega. The dynamic AEW tried so hard to cultivate didn’t really come to pass, for better or worse (and just reminds me that the build was dumb and misjudged). Kenny hit the Tiger Driver ’91 (safely, you fiends) and One Winged Angel…

…and Ospreay kicked out of to a fucking MASSIVE pop. Bless him; the pop was so big, it knocked the commentary out for a second, granting us A MOMENT OF RESPITE. Ospreay hit a FUCKING DISGUSTING Tiger Driver of his own that should really have been the finish, given the severity of the move and the way Kenny took it. Kenny sold as though his left arm short circuited. He started spamming V-Triggers and Ospreay absorbed them… to hit a One Winged Angel of his own… and Ken kicked out at ONE. LET’S FUCKING GO. Ospreay hit the Stormbreaker, and Ken kicked out at ONE… but it was the Hidden Blade to the FACE that won the day.

Match was excellent, even if I didn’t love the build, even if I didn’t love the outcome. Omega is SO generous; he killed Ospreay throughout the match, but when it was his turn to get crushed, he made it look like he was being DISMANTLED. Would that all top stars were like this. Probably the match of the year, let’s face it.

Grumpy overall notes from a cynical jerk: Bryan Danielson on commentary is a detriment. I GET IT, he’s office, so he’s TK’s voice out there, explaining and OVER explaining the storylines and repeating the points the other commentators already made. Four man booth? Try a NO man booth, cripes. Fire everyone and have it be Don Callis and Ian Riccaboni, I dunno. How about Taz and Excalibur get some hybrid of RoH and Dark where they can dick around, you have Ian and Don on Dynamite and Tony and Nigel on Collision until Tony decides he’s done? Four man booth was ROTTEN this evening. The very WWE-ish content and the ACCEPTANCE of same from certain fans who clearly just want GOOD WWE is a real bummer. There were a lot of spots that probably shouldn’t have been repeated from match to match (a ref bump in the two top matches?) and A LOT of standing around waiting for the next guy to come along during the battle royale parts. Everyone standing around for a full half minute at the beginning of the show… man, AEW needs a bad cop on production to call that shit out, to keep it from happening.

Things that tickled the cynical jerks in Casa de Convoy: Marina EATING a backbreaker from Roddy, the BOOB GUN MALFUNCTION, the Ospreay video package, Mercedes killing herself on the apron FOR THE LOVE OF THE GAME, old man Sting being talked off the ladder, Don Callis’ wonderful commentary and probably a number of other things I’ll recall on the morrow.

So. Final verdict. Was All In a great show? Nah. Was it at least a good show? It was fine, certainly a (mostly) pleasant way to spend a Sunday afternoon. The top third of the show was VERY strong: the Darby / Kevin Knight thing was fun, the Mercedes / Willow match was at least three quarters good, and the main event was excellent; I’m sure the main will have people retroactively saying this was an all timer of a show because that’s always how these things go. Both battles royale (man, get a load of that grammar) had a couple of cute moments, even if I didn’t exactly love them. The DENTIST is back. The New Whatever are here. I still stand behind AEW needing a bit of a creative shake up after this, I’m still worried about ex WWE people jamming up the show, but we got here, we made it and we made it past it. IT CAME HOME, and now it’s up to AEW to make sure that they don’t drop the ball this Autumn.

Now to watch absolutely fucking ZERO wrestling for the next couple’a days. I’m all strung out.

* I am reliably informed that the animals in the logo are RAMS and not unicorns so it is I who has been impaled ‘pon a unicorn horn. May I be force fed pancakes in recompense

** The best kind of joke, one for an extremely limited audience

*** Another joke for an audience of slightly greater than one but not much greater

**** To be “fair,” it was probably more than just two, but I’m thinking of two in particular, and these guys were being dipshits about it. I’m sure they thought they were real cute. You think Tony’s more powerful than the stadium curfew, you twits? I fucking HATE this idea that Tony is strongarming WBD and his pay per view partners and the venues and everyone else SIMPLY BECAUSE HE WANTS TO GIVE US OUR MONEY’S WORTH. The guy giving us MORE wrestling shouldn’t be a problem if you ACTUALLY LIKE WRESTLING. WHAT A PIECE OF GARBAGE TONY KHAN IS FOR GIVING ME MORE AND NOT LESS