Max Caster inflicts max punishment on Colt Cabana - AEW (YouTube)

Pops & Botches: AEW Elevation & Dark – 4.5.2021 & 4.6.2021

AEW Dark Elevation Pops & Botches

 

AEW are hard at work keeping fans entertained, on this busiest of weeks in professional wrestling. Will I tap out from the pressure of delivering this double double recap of April 5’s Elevation and April 6’s Dark? Read on to witness the battle.

Last time on Dark…

Orange Cassidy got a new old entrance song. Angélico bared his chest. Alex Reynolds made Max Caster fumble his lyrics, then paid the price. Catch up on all the March madness in our March 29/30 recap.

Elsewhere in the AEW Arcadia…

Last week’s Dynamite was everything I hoped it would be – and more! The most important development for us Dark fans is that they finally pulled the trigger on QT Marshall’s heel turn, as he revealed his Nightmare Family splinter crew of Nick Comoroto, Anthony Ogogo and Aaron Solow. This Darker Nightmare Family issued a beatdown on Cody Rhodes, Arn Anderson and the Dyna-mightier Nightmare Family OGs. This points to Big Shotty remaining face for now, which would be the best outcome. Kris Statlander also made a return! Check out the full report for more.

Being the Elite hit a milestone episode 250! They celebrated with both Dark Order and Good Brothers spending half the episode talking about their dicks. The closing montage revisited some BTE glory days while playing up the angst Young Bucks have been feeling in the face of Don Callis’ chirps. Something is brewing.

Sammy Guevara’s vlog (episode 314) continued the “extra” running joke. Baron Black rightfully declared himself “the best extra here”, then lost the BTE Championship in a worked match of Rock Paper Scissors with “The Captain” Shawn Dean. Rigga morris! Props man Charlie immediately won it off him in “the nervous game”. The highlight of the show was Sammy pulling “el granmala” out of his pocket, the most butchered Spanish of all time.

Join me for episode 4 of Monday Night Elevation.

MEH: Hangman cracks a beer

Our opening tune for this big week of wrestling is Adam Page’s twangy guitar. That’ll get ya in the mood! He’s facing WWE-lookin’ guy (who’s actually an indie guy) Bill Collier.

Big man versus cowboy equals a lot of chops. The match is a real slug-fest. Surprisingly this isn’t filmed with the Dynamite audience – it’s daytime outside and you could hear a pin drop at ringside.

Lariat, lariat, buckshot lariat, done.

MEH: Reform the infantry

Next up we have Nightmare Factory alumni Dean Alexander and Carlie Bravo. They got Varsity Blonds.

Griff Garrison and Dean Alexander lock up. Quick tag to Brian Pillman Jr. The match is fine. Pillman does his best to get the crowd into it, but there’s barely a soul there, and even on the YouTube comments there’s not much to get excited over given Wight and Schiavone’s soporific commentary.

Garrison pins Bravo for the win.

PASS: Doctor heel

“The Pink Dream” Alex Gracia dances in cheerfully to face Dr Britt Baker DMD. I got spoiled for the outcome of this match by the good folks on Discord, but is it really a spoiler when one of the competitors is 0 and 6, and the other is coming out the most acclaimed women’s match in the history of AEW?

Yeah, Gracia gets merked. DMD even cuts a promo ahead of the squash where she sarcastically dumps on Gracia and offers to start on hands-and-knees as a handicap. Of course the bell rings and she instantly puts The Pink Dream into the Lockjaw submission.

Sucks for Gracia, but it was somewhat of an entertaining promo, so I’ll give it a pass.

BOTCH: I’m flagging here…

Can Danny Limelight, The Radioactive Papi bring us our first pop of the night? He is facing Dark Order’s Preston “10” Vance.

10 goes through the motions, tossing Limelight around like he’s made of blancmange. Limelight buries a few kicks in 10’s midriff but doesn’t really pick up the pace from the rest of the show.

The whole thing feels like it’s in slow motion. I can understand if it’s already getting too hot to wrestle in the daytime down in Jacksonville, but then just record at night, guys. From this end it’s not much fun to watch a couple of guys slowly plod around while a tiny group of hungover-lookin’ jobbers trying to feign interest from the sidelines.

10 wins. I don’t care.

POP: Swole picks up the pace

Big Swole, please, shake this party up for us! She’s got jobber-entranced Jazmin Allure.

Swole takes Allure to the mat and chains together some holds and throws. Swole escalates the violence, thwacking Allure into the railings a few times before bringing her back into the ring. Allure hits a string of hits and a dropkick, then it’s Swole with a slam and Texas Cloverleaf submission for the win.

By tonight’s low standards, this was a pop.

POP: Naka saves us from mediocrity

Michael “MT” Nakazawa is also back to fight tonight. His opponent is Vary Morales.

Naka is still in his polo and khakis, wearing a headset. Morales is far less patient than Mike Magnum last week, almost immediately using the cable to choke out Kenny Omega’s assistant, then wipe him out with a tilt-a-whirl headscissors takedown and top rope armdrag. Morales even gets to do some ropewalking! It’s great to see the guy get to really show off what he can do without having to job hard for some midcarders who need the W.

Naka gets Morales into the Hentai Slide, then chokes out our Mexican metaler with a cable that was conveniently left in the ring by ref Rick Knox. Morales escapes to hit a couple more aerial maneuvers, then Naka finishes him off with a brutal spear and laptop to the head.

Finally, a solidly entertaining match.

POP: Everybody dies

Next up is “The Murderhawk Monster” Lance Archer versus “The Empbruh” Baron Black. Black already got squashed backstage. Archer’s entrance is basically just him dragging “the best extra here” down the ramp.

Black’s not one to back down, though. Once he gets up and the bell rings he tries to hit the monster with a few chops and shoulder blocks. Archer brings some star power to the evening, clobbering Black then spiking the ringside camera, staring us YouTube fans right in the face. It probably helps to have Jake “The Snake” Roberts on commentary with his raspy voice putting the talent over.

Chokeslam, then Lance Archer’s back-to-front crucifix powerbomb, the Blackout! Black, out.

Jake the Snake cuts some more promo in the ring, then hands off to Archer who rambles on a bit too long about Sting, but it’s probably hard to know when to stop when there ain’t much audience there to give you feedback.

POP: Aniki has elevated the division

Next up Ryo Mizunami continues working her way through all the women’s talent. Tesha Price is here, and she gets an entrance too!

The opening lockup is really deep. Price escapes to the ropes, then Aniki comes back with a massive shoulder block and a couple of slams. Price hits a drop-toe hold and tries some hair pulling, but is quickly brought back into the middle for a chop-off. Which, of course, Mizunami wins.

Wight has finally figured out how to sell the overblown windups now, putting Mizunami over as a party girl, with moves from “the disco club”… I mean, this dude born 1972 talks like he was born in 1952 but maybe it’s a South Carolina thing, I ain’t judgin’. It’s a marginally better spin on our Aniki than the last couple weeks of no-selling from the big guy.

Price plays up some crazy lady gimmick, biting Mizunami’s arm and screaming like Abadon is after her. Mizunami comes back with a couple more slams and some leg drops.

Both competitors get some near falls, both cry out in frustration, and ultimately it’s Mizunami who takes it after a thundering spear. Awesome match.

POP: Gimme more Max

What’s “Platinum” Max Caster got for us today? Well, first Colt Cabana gets an entrance, showing off a nice Brodie Lee-inspired ring jacket. Max Caster: “let me spit something”. Also Max Caster: proceeds to flub his lyrics again. Anthony Bowens helpful pulls out his “The Acclaimed have arrived” catchphrase and inverted V hand symbol… and naturally Caster comes out with double Vs which he then turns into bunny ears for Bowens. I’m cackling. Even when he fails, he rules. These guys will be massive faces someday. Everyone loves The Acclaimed!

Cabana goes backstage to fish out Evil Uno as his muscle to balance out Bowens, then shoves Caster to the mat. Caster is full of beans this week, rolling in and out of near falls with Cabana. The crowd is into it too, chanting for the Dark Order comedy hero.

Caster gets stiff into some forearms, Cabana flings the rapper to the corner and follows with a flying apple, then a splash. Bowens tosses a chain over the ring at Uno in a clever distraction move, then slides the boom box in so Caster can trip Cabana onto it. The move doesn’t quite connect but Cabana sells it like he was brained anyway and Caster picks up another win.

Bonus content: Colt Cabana’s mom also released a diss rap!

POP: A good, old-fashioned Dark squash

Our next match is an 8 man extravaganza – Matt Hardy’s guys versus random jobber guys! Let’s go! For the Hardys we have The Butcher, The Blade, The Bunny and Private Party. Representing the Tuesday Night Dark All Stars? Adam Priest, Occult Pro Wrestling Star RYZIN, D3 and Fuego del Sol.

Money shot on this entrance: Marc Quen with his new multi-colored haircut doing the Butcher Walk!

Once the obligatory intro scuffle is over, D3 gets splattered into a centurion-colored smear on the ground. Del Sol with the hot tag! He takes out both of Private Party before B&B come in to ruin his day and execute their finisher.

Yo, Priest and Ryzin didn’t even get to tag in! What a thorough beating.

Ryzin didn’t take the week off, though, check this awesome cinematic promo:

BOTCH: Wrestlers talking

Next up we have a new segment called Showcase. It’s basically Paul Wight interviewing guys. The first guy is John Silver. It’s… meh. It’s like listening to a podcast, which if I wanted to listen to a podcast I’d just listen to a podcast. Promos are staple in pro wrestling television. Packages are a fine way to build hype for stars that people may not know much about. But interviews? Eh. Guess I’m not a hardcore enough fan to give a shit.

POP: Angels puts up a fight

I’m a bit skeptical of Matt Hardy’s vow to take out the Dark Order one by one, since AEW have buried this angle twice (most memorably with Nightmare Family, whose brewing Dark Order feud was abruptly ended when Cody Rhodes won back the TNT title from Brodie Lee). I’ll buy it when we actually get more than 3 matches in a “Faction X versus Dark Order” program.

Still, both Alan “5” Angels and Matt Hardy are working to put this over as a legit feud – they both released promos over Easter to build for the match.

Angels gets first blood, but Hardy is kayfabe way too powerful to face Dark Order’s second littlest member. Hardy takes about 10 minutes hyping the crowd up for the Twist of Fate, and the only thing I can think of is how this announce team doesn’t comment on that pageantry while complaining about Ryo Mizunami doing the same damn thing.

Anyway, Angels escapes the finisher and hits some kicks and aerial maneuvers before Hardy finishes him off with his new submission: The Leech. Hardy cuts a solid promo to close. Dark Order and Darby Allin: both on the Hardy Hit List.

BOTCH: All ego, seen it all before

Earlier in the night Matt and Mike Sydal cut a promo on Scorpio Sky who teamed up with Ethan Page in a boring post-match angle from last week. So far Ethan Page has done nothing for me in AEW, and Scorpio Sky hasn’t been interesting since last year, but who knows, perhaps as team they’ll be better than the sum of their parts?

Sky and Matt to open. It deteriorates into a 4-way brawl pretty quick. Page and Sky isolate Mike and attack his knee in the heeliest way possible. Limb punishment isn’t really the most original of heel maneuvers, but Mike sells the pain, and Matt gets a chance to tag in and smash some stiff roundhouses and spinning heel kicks into the heads of the baddies.

Mike tags back in, then Page continues attacking the knee before setting up his Ego’s Edge crucifix power bomb finisher. It’s less awesome than Lance Archer’s crucifix power bomb finisher. Page is living in this FTR-style limbo of having a bunch of traditional heel moves but not enough character behind them for me to care. Sky is being pulled down for the ride.

This was a pretty mediocre episode of Elevation. There were some peaks with Nakazawa, Mizunami and Caster, but there were a lot more valleys. Not sure if it was just filming during the daytime that threw people off, but I hope they get it sorted by next week.

Let’s hit our magic fast forward button and cue up episode 83 of the veteran B-show.

Dim the lights, it’s time for Dark.

POP: Quietly becoming a Hopkins mark

Kicking off the show we have a trios match. Stu Grayson, Evil Uno and Alex Reynolds will represent Dark Order versus the jobber crew of Jake St Patrick, Sage Scott and Chandler Hopkins.

Hopkins gets suplexed by Grayson and sells it like a boss. He can barely find his feet as Reynolds continues the punishment, then pops out with a surprise roundhouse. He follows up with a missed shoulder tackle, charging straight into the steel ring post. This Texan is explosive and entertaining in his jobbing.

Scott and St Patrick take turns beating up Grayson, then Uno comes in to clean house. Reynolds pins Hopkins for the win.

POP: Hollywood Hunk interlude

Ryan Nemeth and Cezar Bononi cut a fantastic promo. Nemeth wants to create a stable of sexy folk (what happened to Pretty Peter Avalon?) and he wants JD Drake as his wingman. Drake plays the befuddled blue collar guy, while Bononi just stands there looking like a daddy and Nemeth grins awkwardly. It’s the best.

MEH: Team Taz back in purgatory

Now in action we have Team Taz with Hook. They’re facing what appears to be another bunch of Nightmare Factory alumni – Brick Aldridge, Justin Law and Hayden Backlund. I wish these guys would pick a gimmick to make them easier to tell apart.

Cage and Law to start. Cage sends him bouncing back to the corner. Aldridge in next, and Cage slaps him silly. Hobbs tags in to loose some punches and a big ol’ spinebuster. Starks and Backlund go at it for a while, then Starks hits the Rochambeau and offers the corpse up to Cage to Drillclaw for the win.

Taz and Excalibur are still trying to sell the idea of tension on the team between Cage and Starks, but really this is a story that would’ve worked better as “show, don’t tell”. The more they talk about the tension, the less I buy it. I guess this is the downside of having a faction leader on commentary, he tends to oversell his own team’s stuff.

The match was okay, it was a squash.

FINE: Jurassic filler

Jurassic Express are getting a warm-up ahead of Bear Country on Dynamite. They’re facing Rex Lawless and Dean Alexander.

Jungle Boy and Alexander have a slick exchange as we wait for the smoke from the pyro to clear. Luchasaurus joins the fun with big man Lawless. Two seconds later Lawless is limp on the ground.

Jurassic Express seem to be getting the squash bookings lately, same sorta stuff Team Taz was having for a few months prior to the Sting bout. I don’t mind it too much because they really wring the maximum fun out of the tiny segments, but it’d be nice to actually get to see them go once in a while.

POP: Hunk on fire

Fuego del Sol is coming to the ring with Sammy Guevara vlog buddies Griff Garrison and Marko Stunt. He’s facing Ryan Nemeth with JD Drake. Amusingly, the vlog squad leave del Sol hanging while our unsexy blue collar hero attends to his bud at ringside.

Nemeth is such a jackass. He spends first few minutes trash talking, then finds himself caught up in del Sol’s lucha offense. “Ow, ow, ow, I was winning, I was winning, I know I was!” His running commentary on himself is even funnier than Excalibur and Taz talking nonsense. Good value wrestler, this one.

Nemeth plucks del Sol out of the air as he attempts a Tornado DDT then tosses him over the top ropes onto the concrete. Ouch! Nemeth does some strutting and dancing and I think he might be my new favorite.

Del Sol hits a beast of an enziguri, but Nemeth catches him with a dropkick, then it’s the Rude Awakening finisher for the win.

POP: Butcher goes solo

Serpentico’s nemesis Jon Cruz is here to take a loss to big Butch.

The Butcher sure looks scary when he comes in as a solo star, staring straight into the hard cam, no Butcher Walk to be seen. He clobbers poor Cruz harder than Luther clobbers Serpentico.

He wins with the Filet Mignon. Brutal.

FINE: Just, fine

Sisters Ashlex Vox and Delmi Exo have united this week to bring their Sea Stars tag team to AEW. They are facing synthpop jobbers Vertvixen and Jazmin Allure.

Vox and Allure have a quick exchange, but this match gets serious when Exo and Vixen start wailing on each other. The work is a bit scruffy, but they’re constantly talking in the ring, which gives the fight the air of a legitimate beef. Vixen hits a Michinoku Driver that definitely should’ve been a three count, but the ref stops counting at two, which just pisses Vixen off more. I love the trash talk.

Vox hits a senton finisher and gets the win for her team, but the real star here was Vertvixen.

🚨 ACHTUNG, ACHTUNG, NEW ACCLAIMED MV 🚨

There is a new Acclaimed MV. “This goes out to Hangman, in the ring you can’t hang, man.” Who rhymes Hangman with hang, man? The biggest heel, that’s who. What a dick.

POP: Comfort food

We got some more women’s action – Madi Wrenkowski and Vipress versus KiLynn King and Red Velvet.

King and Wrenkowski get straight into it with some locks and tough takedowns. Wrenkowski retreats to Vipress, who promptly gets double-teamed by the faces. Velvet hits a flurry of kicks, but a distraction maneuver gets her tangled up in the wrong corner.

King with the hot tag! She has a nicely choregraphed kick and block exchange with Wrenkowski then hits a Kingdom Falls on Vipress to help Velvet get the pin.

BOTCH: Bring back comedy Drake

Seeing as JD Drake is facing Darby Allin on Dynamite, this probably won’t be the night Baron Black gets a win.

Unfortunately this match is a bit of a return to Drake’s tedious first few matches that featured a whole lot of standing around. I know Black can do more than this, but now I know Drake can too, it’s disappointing to see more of this.

Not even Ryan Nemeth talking shit on the side can save this one. Drake gets his win.

POP: Spots spots spots

Mudshow meets lucha, “The Concrete Rose” Sonny Kiss and “The Bad Boy” Joey Janela are here to face KC Navarro and Aaron Frye. Navarro doesn’t get an entrance, but it doesn’t stop him from dancing to Sonny and Joey’s Miami Vice theme tune.

Kiss immediately Matrix-escapes the first hits from our jobbers. Navarro gets squashed by Janela who then drags him over to his own corner to tag Frye in. Cute gimmick. Janela is a real crowd-pleaser, even when there’s no crowd to please. For his next trick, both he and Kiss hit a sequence of half-assed, belly-flop splashes on the writhing Frye. It’s hilarious.

Navarro gets Death Valley Driven into the mat, then rolls off like a cartoon character who can’t find his feet. This is some Chandler Hopkins level OTT selling, and I love it.

These guys, it feels like there’s no real in-ring storytelling, it’s just lurching from one random-ass spot to the next, but when all the spots are funny, it sort of doesn’t matter, I think? Still working for me, in any case.

Janela gets the pin for the Jersey boys.

POP: Blink

Here’s a weird match-up, Matt Sydal meets “The Starving Artist” Mike Magnum.

Sydal knocks the big man down with a bunch of low kicks, then a high kick, then a Lightning Spiral finisher, and holy shit it’s over.

As far as squashes go, it was a good one. But I would say that, wouldn’t I? Shameless Sydal stan, is me.

UH: I guess this is just a promo segment?

In what is likely to be another squash, Matt Hardy is meeting Vary Morales. Talk about running up the score.

Hardy arrives with the whole damn crew of The Butcher, The Blade and The Bunny, plus Marc Quen and Isiah Kassidy of Private Party. Darby Allin is in the rafters. Damn. Morales is in the big time!

Morales connects with one dropkick. The rest is just a platform to sell Hardy’s new The Leech finisher. Hardy cuts a promo and teases a hardcore match with Allin.

POP: Angélico, still sexy

Main event time, it’s TH2 versus Bear Country.

Angélico and Bear Bronson get all técnico with the opening exchange. Head lock, waist lock, shoulder block, cuckoo clock. I sound like a Praga Khan song. Jack Evans tags in and calls out Bear Boulder. Who immediately throws him out of the ring. Evans bravely eats the full double-stacked bear offense.

Angélico makes a small comeback, but the bears have this through and through. Not a very exciting match, but seeing Angélico topless reminded me of last week’s promo, so I’ll give him a residual pop for that one.

This Dark wasn’t the greatest Dark of all time, but it was comfortable. I do like that they’re trying to fit a bit more promos and storyline segments into the flow, it keeps things interesting.

The main roster must be off on vacation lately, because we are getting a bunch more midcard in Dynamite this week. Keep your eyes peeled for JD Drake versus Darby Allin, Bear Country versus Jurassic Express, Tay Conti versus The Bunny and Max Caster versus Adam Page, bay bay! Stay tuned to Steel Ring Post for all your AEW recaps. Wrestlemania week might even inspire some content from our wearied WWE writers too! Do drop by the Discord to let the guys know how much you miss them! I’ll be back next week with more AEW YouTube recaps.

     

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