AEW All Elite Wrestling #5: Road to Double or Nothing

[les Habs]

• I've been catching the occasional Being the Elite episode on YouTube and I have been pleasantly surprised. The Dark Order features heavily and Silver is really good.
• Speaking of the Dark Order, I have to say that Brodie Lee has impressed me quite a bit. Always loved him as Luke Harper and I knew he could cut a promo, but wasn't so sure of him in this role. I think he/they should feature more with some good writing.
• Still very impressed by the array of talent on the AEW roster. Problem is the writing/storylines. They don't follow some things through, some of the talent is underutilized and some of it doesn't make a lot of sense. Cody should have been/should be World Champion at this stage. Then tonight if the highlights I saw were accurate you had Pac coming out against Kingston, a feud that was supposed to be happening, and then later he's out challenging Omega.
• Shame on me, but I never really gave Frankie Kazarian the time of day. And maybe I was right, but having seen in some of the Being the Elite episodes I have to say he's really good. He should be a midcard heel challenging for a Television title type belt.
• I get putting over some of the younger talent, but having Angelico give Cody a match like that is just ridiculous. Makes Cody less credible as a top star when Angelico can handle a lot of Cody's top moves. If you want to develop Angelico work on his look and how he carries himself.

 

[xtra]

• I've been catching the occasional Being the Elite episode on YouTube and I have been pleasantly surprised. The Dark Order features heavily and Silver is really good.
• Speaking of the Dark Order, I have to say that Brodie Lee has impressed me quite a bit. Always loved him as Luke Harper and I knew he could cut a promo, but wasn't so sure of him in this role. I think he/they should feature more with some good writing.
• Still very impressed by the array of talent on the AEW roster. Problem is the writing/storylines. They don't follow some things through, some of the talent is underutilized and some of it doesn't make a lot of sense. Cody should have been/should be World Champion at this stage. Then tonight if the highlights I saw were accurate you had Pac coming out against Kingston, a feud that was supposed to be happening, and then later he's out challenging Omega.
• Shame on me, but I never really gave Frankie Kazarian the time of day. And maybe I was right, but having seen in some of the Being the Elite episodes I have to say he's really good. He should be a midcard heel challenging for a Television title type belt.
• I get putting over some of the younger talent, but having Angelico give Cody a match like that is just ridiculous. Makes Cody less credible as a top star when Angelico can handle a lot of Cody's top moves. If you want to develop Angelico work on his look and how he carries himself.

Two of your points I strongly disagree with:

the continuity in AEW is fantastic - I’m not sure where you getting this from. Their battle royal from a few weeks ago has started off so many story lines and even before that the battle royal had man call backs from previous moments.

Pac came out to get ray fenix his match cause fenix doesn’t do promos (at least I haven’t seen one). Here’s another callback/continuity to omegas rise during the tourney he didn’t face fenix cause of his injury so Pac (being the mouth piece of death triangle) came out and did the talking for fenix.

I do agree on silver being entertaining and Angelico not being good but he’s just not my kind of wrestler I guess.

Frankie idk- I do wonder if it’s Christopher Daniels that makes me not like frankies tag matches so far.

 

[CDJ]

Always been a Kaz guy

also don’t dislike Angelico for what he is- a lower mid-card guy


They need to have Omega destroy that putz Nakazawa on TV. I want to see Omega build more heat. I like this version of Omega a lot more than the other stuff I’ve seen. Not perfect but it’s legitimately good imo. I’m not familiar with his New Japan work so this is my first real major exposure to him and I was underwhelmed for awhile but I’m starting to get it


They’re beating RAW in key demos now. That’s something. Didn’t think they’d get there so quickly

 

[JackSlater]

With Brandi being pregnant I'm actually a bit interested in her angle, mainly in the sense of what they were/are planning as she will be (even more) limited.

 

[les Habs]

Thought this was fun:

Two of your points I strongly disagree with:

the continuity in AEW is fantastic - I’m not sure where you getting this from. Their battle royal from a few weeks ago has started off so many story lines and even before that the battle royal had man call backs from previous moments.

Pac came out to get ray fenix his match cause fenix doesn’t do promos (at least I haven’t seen one). Here’s another callback/continuity to omegas rise during the tourney he didn’t face fenix cause of his injury so Pac (being the mouth piece of death triangle) came out and did the talking for fenix.

I do agree on silver being entertaining and Angelico not being good but he’s just not my kind of wrestler I guess.

Frankie idk- I do wonder if it’s Christopher Daniels that makes me not like frankies tag matches so far.

Well I don't see every episode of Dynamite of the PPVs, but I stand by the continuity statement. Plenty of storylines end way too quickly and/or seem to lack a strong finality if you ask me. Perhaps they'll be revisiting some of them in the future, I don't know, but for now I'd like to see a good portion of storylines carried out to what I would call a more sensible conclusion. And it's sad because I think they had a lot of great storylines that could have carried on for notably longer than they did.

It wasn't even as much about Kazarian in the ring as it was out of the ring. I think he's hilarious and I just never gave him enough of a chance in the past or I simply missed it. As I've said before, my biggest concern for AEW was going to be a lack of talent, but I think they have a lot of great talent on the roster.

 

[BostonBob]

Just a heads up to AEW fans in Canada - today's Holiday Bash show airs on TSN2 at 10:30 pm Eastern instead of the regular 8 pm Eastern timeslot.

 

[Guardian17]

 

[WingsMJN2965]

AEW is running ads re-enacting scenes from A Christmas Story and... It's bad.

 

[JackSlater]

AEW is running ads re-enacting scenes from A Christmas Story and... It's bad.

For all the talk AEW did about how it would be different from WWE, a lot of it is bad 2010s WWE style crap. Sometimes it is pulled off better though. Then again, sometimes not.

 

[WingsMJN2965]

For all the talk AEW did about how it would be different from WWE, a lot of it is bad 2010s WWE style crap. Sometimes it is pulled off better though. Then again, sometimes not.

I guess it gets their name out there but... They kinda just come off like a bunch of nerds.

 

[GKJ]

Who are the types of people under the age 40 who are most likely to latch on to wrestling though? It's comic book nerds and gamers. Often they are one in the same. A lot of these wrestlers are playing video games like all the time and doing twitch streams. In both companies.

They do significantly deviate from WWE in that they actually give you finishes to matches, they don't bait-and-switch, and they actually promote their lineups since they don't decide 2 days before the show airs.

 

[CDJ]

I imagine we’re getting a tribute show this week and then eventually a Dark Order face turn

 

[les Habs]

I imagine we’re getting a tribute show this week and then eventually a Dark Order face turn

I'm curious about that, the latter part of your post (not that I wouldn't love a tribute as Harper/Lee was a top 3-5 guy for me when it comes to current wrestlers). I think the Dark Order storyline and concept has/had a lot of potential and has realized some of it. It's weird though because it works for me in terms of being a serious angle, but it also works as a humorous angle. I just wonder if they give the reigns to somebody else. Hardy comes to mind, but that wouldn't be serious enough for me. Actually Page would be interesting, or maybe have them leaderless and see if it helps continue to push guys like Silver or Reynolds.

 

[BigFatCat999]

AEW is crushing this show, I'm crying and smiling at the same time

 

[TD Charlie]

AEW is crushing this show, I'm crying and smiling at the same time

it’s been very entertaining and powerful. Start to finish

 

[sabremike]

This is the point where I just lost it:

#ExaltedInHeaven

 

[BigFatCat999]

This is the point where I just lost it:
View attachment 381124
#ExaltedToHeaven

Oh God damnit, now I'm crying again.

 

[hockey20000]

great show i am very impressed.

 

[BigFatCat999]

Oh f***ing aye. Now I'm sobbing

 

[Sheppy]

What a f***ing beautiful show. Absolutely amazing. I lost it a few times during the show, but it was beautiful.

 

[ColePens]

Cried so much tonight. Great night.

 

[BigFatCat999]

What a f***ing beautiful show. Absolutely amazing. I lost it a few times during the show, but it was beautiful.

The end got me. Having his son place his boots in the ring. If wrestling is about emotions, they got it.

 

[GKJ]

That was a great show with a better ending. Not that I thought it wouldn’t be but I was curious how they would present this, I’m sure they never expected to have to present a tribute show of one of their top stars after only 14 months - Brodie only there for 9 of them but it felt longer now.

 

[ColePens]

That was a great show with a better ending. Not that I thought it wouldn’t be but I was curious how they would present this, I’m sure they never expected to have to present a tribute show of one of their top stars after only 14 months - Brodie only there for 9 of them but it felt longer now.

I think what AEW does so well, that makes us believe they have been there longer, is that they don't hide the past like WWE. Nobody tried to ignore he was a character in WWE or even before that. And it made his presence so much better.

And man... tonight was brilliant. EVERYTHING I love about wrestling. Heels pushing their character within reason and getting beat up for it. Faces doing great things. It was just so pure. The callbacks were amazing. Everyone made sure Dark Order felt big. A++++

Not just saying this in the moment, but one of the greatest television shows I've ever seen. I didn't want to turn a single time. Every minute I was so emotionally connected.

 

[BigFatCat999]

Rumor is they are retiring the current design of the TNT championship and giving it to Brodie's kid. If well done.