#LAWTAKE - AEW DYNAMITE 4/17/24
It’s Wednesday night so you know what that means!… it’s AEW Dynamite live from Indiana. The go home show for AEW Dynasty this Sunday and one can hope this show really excites the masses to purchase this weekend. Let’s get down to business..
All is right in AEW Land when Jon Moxley is given microphone and camera time.
Of all the guys who have came and went with this company, this felt like the true “We Are AEW” promo this company much needed after weeks of debauchery, without flat out saying “We Are AEW.”
The new IWGP World Champion has a point to prove against the Don Callis Family for attacking Danielson on Collision - so Will Hobbs come on down.
An IWC darling, Powerhouse Hobbs, gets put in a sink or swim moment next Wednesday in Jacksonville in the main event of Dynamite. Random as shit but they gotta sell next week you figure.
I actually would have loved for this match to be on the Dynasty card, swapped entirely with the FTW Title. Hobbs won’t win, but he will look good trying.
Another Mercedes promo. CRINGE. Still another month away from her actually wrestling, which will be over two months come the time of DoN in Vegas.
Mercedes hasn’t felt natural in AEW, to me, yet.. despite what most will say. She comes across like a Prom Queen heel but she’s still being pushed as a babyface. NEXT.
The TNT Champ Adam Copeland is here and the crowd is hype. I’m still on the side of yay for Copeland being a regular fixture in AEW.
I am also ecstatic that Christian Cage feud is a thing of the past… until Christian reappears again.
The backstage “attack” on Willow?? That was amateur. We really could’ve skipped that whole sequence and let these two team together to take on House of Bleh but instead Copeland went at it solo in a 2-on-1 effort.
Copeland vs Brody King one-on-one down the line will probably be even better.
Willow stormed out with a bad shoulder and all and still got busy, or attempted to until Julia nailed her with a chain behind the referees back and then slapped on her Hartless submission.
Hartless is still one of my favorite and the best submissions in all of AEW but Julia is as lukewarm as can be.
Even with the visual submission over Willow tonight, I still think Willow gets the W on Sunday whether Statlander admits to attacking her and Mercedes or not.
Also, how did Willow NOT see who attacked her? For a company with plenty camera footage for weaker attacks, it’s remarkable Willow can’t pinpoint this one particular detail.
Mercedes came out to make the save for some good reason. She wanted to wave the steel chair around Willow to remind her of what Willow was doing to her. She dropped the chair and waved then shook hands with Edgeland. Cool story.
Mercedes Mone is making us all moane and groane.
Renee get hotter and hotter as the weeks go by. That woman is stylin!
Samoa Joe with the sit down promo served its purpose. Nothing much else to it but a reminder that Swerve is a choke artist, and the best ending lines to that promo came from Joe. Right then and there I believe Swerve wins on Sunday.
FTR got their promo time cut short so the EliteVP’s could announce Sunday is a Ladder match for the AEW Tag Titles.
Another ladder match, another Young Bucks match. I still don’t see that match being in the Top 3 candidates of MOTN.
Every time Okada speaks English it pops me.
Tony Khan with a pointless cameo looking like a background character from The Office while he sits at gorilla.
The Bucks ring gear is terrible. The shirtless movie theatre usher garments is insane.
Daniel Garcia is having a WWE 2000’s popular jobber character resurgence type of run right now. Think Al Snow perhaps.
I really wish Garcia would have ended up in the BCC instead of Yuta.
A dope P-I-P commercial of Swerve during this six man tag… I really liked that. More of that.
When Penta hits the ring, I know it’s a fact he won’t win that match.
The Bucks using the mic and shit talking during a match should be a normal routine for the EVP’s. I laughed out loud.
Pac sold being knocked off the top turnbuckle like he had just got hit with the same time keeper hammer he uses. The delayed, disappearing selling of that move from Pac allowed Garcia to eat the pin from the Elite & I think that dragged the fun of this match down. Pac loses Sunday regardless.
Up next we’re all in the Jerichoverse! Yay!
A lot of people I read were not liking the Jericho/Hook segment from #AEWDynamite tonight. Fair assessment.
The Taz push down & Hook taking 5 minutes to do anything about it was lame. He didn’t even do anything he just barked at Jericho after the fact.
Hook looks and talks like an alley of Roger Klotz from the show Doug.
At the least, Jericho trolled us with the Jerichoverse line & his explanation of this Learning Tree group. I’m more intrigued about who he includes in said faction & will it matter six months from now?
Swerve sit down promo was cool. It got all the points across. I just don’t know why the hell this guy is wearing eye shadow and blush around his eyes every other other week. Is he tired? Is he sponsored by a new eye shadow brand? Wtf?
In a match I for sure thought would have ended up on Dynasty or Zero Hour, neither occurred as Mariah May faced Deonna Purrazzo in our women’s segment of the night. This match was fun. Mariah is earning her keep.
I actually thought Mariah would keep her win streak in tact, instead Deonna gets a W weeks removed from her own title match and even having anything significant to do.
With a two-on-one attack from Toni & Mariah to Deonna, Thunder stormed to the ring to make the save. Deonna wasn’t a fan of that regardless and I just hope Deonna doesn’t turn heel and cost Thunder the title on Sunday as that will do neither of them good.
Thunder Rosa was so dominant in the showing against Toni tonight that my hopes for her winning on Sunday just got cut in half.
When it was all said and done, Thunder drew on Toni with lipstick. That’s just more fodder for the video package on Sunday.
Oh look a Jay White sighting & we’re getting the inevitable Trios Unification match Sunday at Dynasty. Yawn.
The Acclaimed are cooked. This isn’t 2022. This whole group has run its course. Bowens is on a life-raft for relevancy in between Caster and Gunn.
Caster is really only getting a reaction when he says something over the top or outright dumb or forgets his raps.
Billy Gunn Daddy Ass Father Cheeks looks like he has had a blast with this title run he probably would’ve never expected to have happen but it’s time to end this Amusement Park ride. I hope Sunday gives us all the first steps in that direction.
When it’s a Pockets singles match on Dynamite, chances are he’s winning. When it’s a match against a giant wrestler, you should know that giant wrestler isn’t winning too.
Shane Taylor really is getting more camera time and it’s cool to see. Lee Moriarty is loving this shit I’m sure.
A slugfest this match turned out to be, as unbelievable as it was watching Orange Cassidy try and take down the fucking giant that is Shane Taylor.
Trent stopped Chris Daniels and Matt Sydal dead in their tracks with chair shots when they tried to stop STP from kicking Pockets further. Is their singles match for Dynasty too or we are saving that? I hope the latter.
A brief promo to promote the Dynasty International Title match between the American champion Roddy Strong, member of the coldest faction to ever come out of AEW (and we have had a ton of those) and the Canadian Kyle O’Reilly. As good as that match might be, I see that being many people’s bathroom break.
At this point I really realized Ospreay and Claudio would be the main event and I was joyful. Easily a 9/10 match for me (only for a few slight botches). It’s Will Ospreay, it’s Claudio, we all knew this match quality alone would save whatever chaos this show endured.
Will Ospreay does two things when he gets in the ring - get OVER & have us the viewer saying to ourselves “this might have been _______ (whoever Ospreay faces) best match in some time.”
Ospreay avoided the Airplane Swing with the best counter I’ve ever seen anyone do to that move. A clean W over a BCC member after a Cancun Tsunami flip or whatever the fuck Excalibur called it followed by a Hidden Blade.
In true AEW fashion, this match was followed by a pointlessly recurring group beat down. While this group of Don Callis jobbers attacked Claudio, Moxley made the save and pretty much ran off everyone by himself. Talk about stooges.
Ospreay looked genuinely mad he is associated with this group and for good reason, what the bloody hell for bruv?
Faction warfare will probably be the case for DoN in Vegas in May between BCC and Don Callis Family.
Oh shit it’s a just because overrun courtesy of Tony Khan as Swerve and Joe go face to face to sell and drive home Sundays main event.
Just when I thought this feud needed a B&E from Swerve to kick it into overdrive, these two just keep fighting and fighting.
Swerve made a viral moment for himself with his flying Swerve Stomp to a gang of security on the outside all just to land face to face with Joe. It was like a scene out of Batman.
The way Joe stood tall at the end of the brawl tonight, I really might have changed my mind in regard to Swerve winning Sunday. BUT, this company is rather ice cold right now and a Swerve World Title win would be the shot of hot cocoa this company needs. Pause and no pun.
I also think Hangman returns Sunday and costs Swerve the title just to further prove Joe’s choke artist point and continue their vortex of a feud to save Swerve from midcard irrelevancy until his next World Title shot.
Overall, 8/10 Dynamite for me. More good than bad, especially after the bad bad last few weeks. Remove the black eye that was the All In footage and let the quality wrestling speak for itself.
Agree/disagree? Let me know how you feel via Twitter @ TheRingsideClub!