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Pops & Botches: AEW Dynamite – 12.16.2020

AEW Dynamite Pops & Botches

 

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POP: Cowboy Cult

The little cowboy hats made it to week 2! Hangman is making his entrance when Silver and Reynolds come out wearing matching cowboy hats and purple bandanas. Adorable.

 

Matt Hardy seems to have dredged the lake of reincarnation, because his gimmick here is “plain ol’ professional wrestling veteran Matt Hardy”. Aside from the shiny white pants, not much sticking out. (Shiny White Pants Hardy is still due for a massive run with the strap.)

Commentary is sure to put over just how much Hangman is gelling with the Dark Order boys. D.O.’s wins are going up and benefiting from the partnership as well. I feel like, with the introduction of this Hangman seduction angle, we need more of the classic “Join the Dark Order” ads we saw during AEW’s early days. Remind new fans what exactly the Dark Order stand for. Which is…something about being your best self, I think? Your best self, but Darkly. Organizing things in the Dark. That’s it. Where is Brodie anyway? Is he injured or just busy at seminars recruiting?

We get a tease on a future angle as Matt Hardy tags himself in despite Private Party having it all wrapped up. Matt, this is a PRIVATE party, and you just invited yourself. Quite the faux pas.

MJF Y2J AEW NYT

MJF officially received his New York Times plaque for Dinner Debonair being one of the best performances of 2020. Which is…just an insane thing to write, but hey, it’s 2020. (I loved it, by the way.) More MJF/Jericho “When are they gonna kill each other” shenanigans. I hope they drag this out forever, personally.

Cody and Brandi Are Having A Baby

Pharaoh looks stoked.

Meh: Papa Cody’s Little Angel(ico)

Someone’s intro music starts. To my surprise, Cody comes out for a match next. I still almost never know who anyone is by their theme songs in AEW. I genuinely thought Abadon was coming. Perhaps to announce she intended to sacrifice the Rhodes baby to the blind Gods of old or whoever powers her evil.

My boy Angelico and his 2nd Jack Evans come out. What exactly is Angelico’s gimmick?  Is it “The Only Guy Dancing At A House Party”? Because if it is, he’s NAILING it.

I don’t know if I’ve seen Angelico take on a wrestler like Cody. It’s neat watching him put his lanky, “Handsome Gumby” frame to work. It’s a little awkward at first as the guys try to find a rhythm.

It gets going a little bit during the picture in picture, but honestly never gets great. It seems like Angelico is doing his best to wrestle a Cody match. Nice little details, like Angelico blocking the floor slap, tying Cody up in a pretzel, and Cody biting the rope to break the hold.

Ends it with a Cody Cutter after never really getting going.

Team Taz and his son who still hasn’t spoken yet (yet is the starting point of this whole feud), come out to congratulate Cody on being a father. (If Brandi got pregnant to further the storyline, kudos!

That’s how you protect the business!) They come down to beat Cody’s ass and put him on “Paternity Leave”, but are interrupted by Sting (and a delightful “It’s STING!” from Schiavone that I’m sure they won’t do every week and ruin the fun before 2021). This better result in Arn Anderson coming out of retirement to wrestle Sting in a “Who gets to be the new Rhodes Godfather” match.

Or, since it’s such a big deal to this angle, for advanced right to train Baby Rhodes to wrestle one day. Maybe by then Hook Taz will have evolved past being a mute background character.

BOTCH: LOL Miro is the most dangerous man in AEW

Tony Khan recently said in an interview that Miro needs a full rebuild to undo the damage, yet it seems like he’s doing more harm than good. Many Miro fans are saying AEW fans aren’t giving him a chance, but I think it’s more than that. I understand having to rebuild him, as WWE definitely fucked him like two dollar steak (or however that saying goes), but there are inherent differences in the respective characters he’d been given. “Bulgarian Brute” can work anywhere on the card.

Lower card Brutish heel (think like, Piston Honda in Mike Tyson’s Punchout. An early boss.). Mid card secondary title obstacle. Or massive monster champ/hard-luck babyface champ. There’s plenty of places for it to go.

His gimmick in AEW is “Friend to a guy who is good at video games, and will FIGHT YOU over it.” Miro the performer can go somewhere, but that weak ass character ain’t following him anywhere. Not to armchair book here, but I honestly think an interesting take would’ve been to debut him as a depressed loser. “I lost my job, my wife still works there, I’m just here to have something to do.”

Watch that guy lose and mope for a month and watch people freak the fuck out when he starts believing in himself again. Hell, put him up against old WWE guys and just accept the beating, and then one day Billy Gunn toys with him too much and he snaps. Boom, you have a fire feud between Billy Gunn and Miro.

Anyway, the promo. Miro’s been fined for attacking people. He is wearing a hoodie made of those colored dots on paper. The Hoodie gets a Pop.

 

Eddie Kingston

Eddie Kingston is here! He lists the people he dislikes in the crowd. He’s hear to address his enemies.  Number 1, GOD! (AEW is recycling WWE storylines. Kingston versus GOD 2021!). Calls a Pac a pussy for hurting his neck. Lance Archer is a big goofy bastard. This summons Archer. This summons Butcher and Blade (and Bunny!) This summons Fenix and Penta! Who will be summoned next?

IT’S PAC! (Who, in this ring with so many other people, appears to be the size of an Elf on the Shelf). Clusterfuck beatdowns from Death Quadrangle on the Kingston family. Archer’s about to go for a chokeslam when PAC kicks Kingston in the face. This pisses off Archer that he stole his victim.

I really hate only summarizing what happened, but what am I supposed to say about this? They have these “I’m gonna cut a promo” domino run-in dealies every week. Sometimes there’s nothing more to say than, “This is a thing that happened, setting up another that may also happen.”

The Saddest Rhodes

Dustin chastises Uno for the “Seven” dig last week. Says Seven was a bad idea years ago, and it’s a bad idea this week! Dustin legits looks like he’s about to cry as he cuts a promo that he is NOT the 3rd most important Rhodes…he’ll be the 4th soon.

Actually, with Pharaoh, he might be 5th. Plus, Dustin loves his wife and daughter, whom he of course puts before himself, which makes him…OH MY GOD HE IS SEVEN AFTERALL.

POP I guess: 12 Man Tag-aroonie

 Best Friends/Varsity Blondes/Top Flight join forces to take on the Inner Circle

Starts out Pillman vs. Jericho, the commentators note this is the first they’ve ever met in the ring and that Jericho knew Pillman Sr. very well. Pillman chops the shit out of Jericho. He vaults to the top turnbuckle and very impressively, almost fucks up, holds himself long enough to adjust, and nails a crossbody. Tags in Griff Garrison. Jericho tags in Sammy. Lot ‘o Chops.

Griff tags in Dante from Top Flight and the pace picks up. JR gives Sammy some great praise saying he sees shades of Eddie Guerrero. Sammy does a SICK stomp to the back of Dante’s head. Blind tag to Darius. Tags Darius back in. BFF and Santana Ortiz  are all in the ring meeting for the first time since the parking lot brawl. Bedlam. 6 WAY HUG.

This is another match I’m having trouble rubbing two cares together. Did Inner Circle do something to these guys I don’t recall? I swear all I remember is their inner IC turmoil from the last few weeks.

Not helping things at all, but the crowd is DEAD SILENT for most of this. On the plus side, I mean, everybody looks good doing what they’re doing. Commentary puts Pillman and Griff over big time, Top Flight get their spots in, the Best Friends hug. It’s all there, but just kinda…why?

Big Nose Britt

Thunder Rosa is here to talk some shit on Britt Baker, DMD. Shit like, “She has a big nose”. Damn. Britt attacks with some weird pseudo Trumpy stuff, “You don’t belong here, you’re not welcome here. Also, you’re ugly.” Are they doing this intentionally?

Racist dentist Britt Baker DMD might have something I wouldn’t have expected to like, but this is totally out of left field.

On the other hand, I guess it makes kinda sense. Dentists do tend to prefer things white.

 

POP: Rapping Kazarian F

BOTCH: Everything Except Rapping Kazarian F

The Acclaimed are out as the latest wrestling act to involve freestyling on their way to the ring. (What’s up!) He rhymed SCU with SVU. Take a fucking seat, Jay Z, we got a new king of Rhyme.

While the beat is still fresh Frankie K grabs the mic and…is… is Kazarian?…my god he is, KAZARIAN IS RAPPING?!?! Rap is Crap lives on on TNT 22 years later! He points out there gold chains asking, “Are you the acclaimed or are you Men on a Mission!” Kazarian is dropping fucking fire and I will buy that album 5x.

We get to the match and lose all momentum. I don’t know what’s up, but I am just not feeling this show tonight. Did I eat too big a dinner or something? Nothing is really grabbing me. I’ve only been watching for an hour (I don’t think I’ve watched all of Dynamite live since the first few eps. I’m just usually busy from 8-10) and I feel like I’ve been watching one of WWE’s 3 hour Bataan Raw Death Marches.

Anyway, out of sheer jealousy of Kazarian bodying them on the mic, Acclaimed use their boombox to interfere on CD and get their 8th consecutive win and their first Dynamite win. They continue freestyling in the general direction of the Young Bucks to challenge them to a match. The Acclaimed guy also ends his promo with “And that’s a mic drop!” And then proceeds to not actually drop his mic. Boo.

 

BOTCH: The Gentle Knees

So all night the crowd energy has been a problem. Then again, sound mixing is such a frequent problem for Dynamite, it may not even be the crowd but just the levels. Regardless, this match suffered the most for it all night. Mock WWE all you want for their forced piped in audience noises, it makes a difference.  In this match, we’re getting a lot of very ginger soft strikes accompanied by their front row coworkers contemplating to Woo or not to Woo.

Commentary reminds us that Ivellise and Diamante of course won the AEW women’s tag cup. Which is good, because I forgot that was a thing. I hate overly criticizing any particular performer, but Ivellise and Diamante have been the low-points for me on just about every match they appear on.

The slams are nice, the submissions look good, but they have the weakest striking on cable TV wrestling right now. There are several knee strikes from Diamante in this match that have all the impact of holding a phone to your ear. “Hey Deeb! Ringringring! Pretend my knee is a phone for a second! And now pretend the phone hurt you! FUN!” I’m almost certainly nitpicking, but it’s a small detail that drags down a match that already has plenty of problems.

Big Swole gets the submission, bringing out Nyla Rose for a brief scrum.

POP: Kenny Omega vs. Joey Janela NO DQ

I believe my beloved Cleaner Gals are staying a foursome for now! Again, fingers crossed they keep multiplying until they can make up the entire front row and surround the ring. CLEANER GALS LUMBERJACK MATCH GIVE THE PEOPLE (me) WHAT THEY WANT!

In the middle of Omega’s over the top entrance, Janela brings him back to reality with a trash can to the face. Good ol’ Junkyard Janela is always a fun change of pace. Callis demands Schiavone hand over his headset, as only Callis can call this match! Schiavone tells him to kiss his ass and the crowd pops huge.

Callis proceeds to grab a mic and call the match from ringside, even handing Omega a mic to CALL HIS OWN MATCH. (I’m actually super curious if this has ever been done before, because it worked great.

Highlights include:

  • Omega: “Gotcha by your little piggie tails!”
  • Ross: (Commenting on Callis’ Canadian accent) “AgaYnst him? Huh. It’s aBOOt time I guess.”
  • Omega requesting Remsburg hold the mic while he does a trashcan assisted moonsault.

It all works surprisingly well and makes Omega/Callis look like the biggest dickweeds in the world. Janela is great in his role as well. He’s a lower mid-card guy that is ALWAYS a threat and puts on a great match with whomever he challenges.

BOTCH: Please Stop Setting Up Matches Like This Every Week

Pac and the Luchies come out. Pac says they have unfinished business (I honestly don’t recall this at all, but okay). Rey Fenix is finally getting his #1 contender shot he won weeks ago, and Tony Khan has already signed the contract for a Fenix/Omega match on the final Dynamite of the year, December 30th.

Ok…there are two possibilities here.  Either I’m a big dumb asshole with a poor memory (which is VERY possible), or AEW does a lot of minor detail callbacks assuming everybody remembers them.

In the case of Rey Fenix: that #1 contender slot was won by Rey in late October, but relinquished to his brother Penta due to injury. So, roughly eight weeks ago, and only trotted out now with a single sentence explainer by a guy who wasn’t even around then.

What about Pac and Omega’s “unfinished business”? Some brief research shows me that their last encounter was a 30 minute Iron Match in February of this year. This does actually ring some bells as to their feud at the time prior to Covid, resulting in Pac’s exile from the company.

SO…to give any context to this entire segment, and with only 2-3 sentences to inform me, I am supposed to recall entirely on my own as a viewer:

  • A minor 1 week injury from 2 months ago.
  • A forfeited #1 contender slot that hasn’t been addressed since.
  • A feud from 10 months ago that hasn’t been addressed since.

Look, I know I’m not the best wrestling fan in the world because I don’t subject myself to 5 hours of AEW programming in between 6 hours of Indies and “however long the department of weights and measures says IMPACT is these days” every single week.

But this is a LOT to ask people to remember. Is it bothering anyone else? If I was a new viewer I’d expect not to know everything happening. But I have the receipts in the form of this column! I write a couple thousand words on this show every week, and I barely recall some of this.

Is it too much to ask for every match setup to not be, “Kenny Omega, you tied my shoes together and made me lose a match four business quarters ago, and I was so affected by it I NEVER BROUGHT IT UP AGAIN…UNTIL RIGHT NOW! SEE YOU NEXT WEEK!”

This was  a rough one for me, guy. I feel as low as a 3rd ranked Rhodes.

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