AEW Just Did a Better Classic WWF Show than WWE Can

[HMARK Center]

Ok, I could also say "WCW Show" or a few other companies, but this is the age of clickbait, sue me.

But seriously, in the fallout of Full Gear they put on a show that included a few squash matches and a number of promos...but they didn't drag the show down at all.

Why? For the reason I keep on saying over and over again: the squashes and the promos felt like they mattered. If anything, this felt like a vintage 1998 WWF Raw show for a few reasons.

First off, none of the promos went 20 minutes, felt overly scripted, got a bunch of poorly written jokes shoehorned in, or served as unbearable recaps of whatever happened on the last show. Instead, almost everything was done with forward momentum in mind, and everything served a purpose for whatever angles each wrestler was involved in. Plus, no "opening promo parade turns into a main event tag team match", which is always a bonus.

Like, in a weird way the best example was the three-way match tonight: Spears nearly won but Janela continued their feud and cost him, Avalon took the pin because that's his role, and Allin took the win and uses it as momentum to go after Moxley, who issued an open challenge earlier in the night. Everything's connected, things don't just exist in separate bubbles, the whole show is a living ecosystem where different feuds and wrestlers interact and can pop up at any given time, and in one segment you got multiple things accomplished. That's the type of booking that made the Attitude Era work, not over the top sex and sleaze, it was the feeling of "Oh, I need to watch even what feels like a filler midcard match because it might be setting up something for down the line or for next week's episode."

Dynamite has thrived so far on being a show with a lot of quality wrestling on it, which in a weird way almost detracted a bit from Full Gear (e.g. people's main criticism of the show being that the middle matches of Janela/Spears, the tag title match, and Riho/Sakura might have felt like "they could've just been done on Dynamite"...a small critique, sure, but a legitimate one), but this week they showed they can do a more promo-heavy episode and not make it feel like you're wasting your time, and THEN also deliver on some solid action by giving us the PAC/Page rubber match and the tag main event. Well done, you "killing the business" hacks!

[Fade is a CodyCryBaby]

I liked this post as soon as I saw the comparison to 1998. I love the crux that that kind of energy is what so many fans speak of when the Attitude Era is brought up. Agreed on all fronts.

I love that the wrestling world is rich, and if people love Impact or WWE, awesome. AEW and how they delivered today is what I have been waiting for, for what feels like so, so long.

[Celgress]

I feel like Pro Wrestling matters again. The energy of tonight's show was off the chart, love it.

[Xxcjb01xX [PIECE OF: SH-]]

Said it in the main, everyone on the card mattered, in one show they set up so much.

- Moxley killing Kenny's friend and laying out an open challenge
- Allin killing Avalon and accepting the challenge
- Spears being cost a win and Janela continuing the feud with him
- Allie cutting a promo and getting killed by Kong rekindling the Brandi Feud
- Nyla Rose getting back on the show and killing someone
- Jurassic Express getting Luchasaurus back and Dark Order FINALLY clicking super well and getting promo time
- Page getting overconfident and PAC getting his rubber match win
- MJF and Jericho having an amazing promo exchange leading to Cody coming out despite not being cleared and getting some hits in and getting laid out by the debuting now muscle for MJF in Wardlow
- PNP and Te Bucks fighting, The Bucks getting the bad end of it in the end but Private Party out of mutual respect for the Bucks making the save and setting up a match, also Orange Cassidy was there
- Jericho finally losing and having his ego shattered and further setting up Scorpio Sky as a fast rising star and probably the next challenger for the title

It did so much in one show for so much talent, it was so badly needed, and it shows you can do SO MUCH in two hours and do it perfectly

AEW is f***ing amazing right now, and next week is gonna be AMAZING.

[Perd]

I said last week, this is how wrestling is supposed to feel. Since AEW started on TNT, they’ve gave me that feeling more than WWE could over the course of years.

[eJm]

Honest to God, and hear me out here, my biggest annoyance with Dynamite is nothing to do with the content or any of the talent or even production but the fact that WWE could pull off a show like this weekly ridiculously easily. Building characters and making stuff flow across the show used to be the thing that made them the biggest thing going and helped them beat WCW.

Like, if things didn’t feel as stationary on the main roster (NXT can buck these trends a lot), there wouldn’t even be a need for AEW as much.

[Mozenrath]

Nov 14, 2019 3:02:58 GMT -5 eJm said:

Honest to God, and hear me out here, my biggest annoyance with Dynamite is nothing to do with the content or any of the talent or even production but the fact that WWE could pull off a show like this weekly ridiculously easily. Building characters and making stuff flow across the show used to be the thing that made them the biggest thing going and helped them beat WCW.

Like, if things didn’t feel as stationary on the main roster (NXT can buck these trends a lot), there wouldn’t even be a need for AEW as much.

I feel like even if WWE was great right now, there would still be a place for AEW. WWE is just so damn big and ponderous and it just can't be agile even in better hands than 2019 Vince's. AEW is a fun size for a company, the de facto second biggest in the US, and honestly, probably the world right now, with only NJPW as a possible contender there. It's big enough to pull some big things out of its sleeve, but small enough to where change can be pretty rapid.

[eJm]

Nov 14, 2019 3:25:53 GMT -5 Mozenrath said:

Nov 14, 2019 3:02:58 GMT -5 eJm said:

Honest to God, and hear me out here, my biggest annoyance with Dynamite is nothing to do with the content or any of the talent or even production but the fact that WWE could pull off a show like this weekly ridiculously easily. Building characters and making stuff flow across the show used to be the thing that made them the biggest thing going and helped them beat WCW.

Like, if things didn’t feel as stationary on the main roster (NXT can buck these trends a lot), there wouldn’t even be a need for AEW as much.

I feel like even if WWE was great right now, there would still be a place for AEW. WWE is just so damn big and ponderous and it just can't be agile even in better hands than 2019 Vince's. AEW is a fun size for a company, the de facto second biggest in the US, and honestly, probably the world right now, with only NJPW as a possible contender there. It's big enough to pull some big things out of its sleeve, but small enough to where change can be pretty rapid.

Oh sure, I meant it more in the general satisfaction with the product. Regardless of that, an alternative is better for the industry then not.

[chrom]

Its amazing how good they are.

Nothing feels like filler, the matches each serve purpose and when they do promos they get to the point instead of dragging on and on. Each show has flown by whilst an average WWE show feels like it lasts longer than Wrestlemania at times

[FinalGwen]

I think the living ecosystem point is a great way to put it, and the one aspect of the Attitude Era that deserve to have been brought back. Everything mattering, and the crossovers between feuds... It just gives everything more weight, and it's what led to some of the best feuds of the 90s.

[héad.casé]

I've loved AEW from the start. Watching Double or Nothing, I knew nothing about Riho, Darby Allin, Shida, or Nyla Rose. Now I look forward to watching them every week. They took people I never saw or heard of before and now i'm a huge fan.

Hell I know about Kenny Omega, but had never seen any of his work before. Now I know why people were calling him the best wrestler in the world a year or so ago. They don't have stupid buzzwords that are repeated over and over again, promos are natural, in ring work isn't restricted - AEW is my new promotion of choice.

[HMARK Center]

Nov 14, 2019 16:52:51 GMT -5 FinalGwen said:

I think the living ecosystem point is a great way to put it, and the one aspect of the Attitude Era that deserve to have been brought back. Everything mattering, and the crossovers between feuds... It just gives everything more weight, and it's what led to some of the best feuds of the 90s.

Right; if on a given episode of the show you get a seemingly random match, but it leads to each participant's respective rivals trying to interfere or something, then you've managed to further two storylines in one segment. You can't do that every time, obviously, and don't want to overly rely on run-ins or dirty finishes, but the principle is an important one, that just because Wrestler A is facing Wrestler B, it doesn't mean that his/her rival Wrestler C isn't still relevant to the proceedings, nor that Wrestler D, who's feuding with B, suddenly fell off the face of the Earth. As a viewer it gets me to think "Oh, I'd better pay attention, something might happen to further those storylines during this match."

[eJm]

Nov 15, 2019 6:48:02 GMT -5 HMARK Center said:

Nov 14, 2019 16:52:51 GMT -5 FinalGwen said:

I think the living ecosystem point is a great way to put it, and the one aspect of the Attitude Era that deserve to have been brought back. Everything mattering, and the crossovers between feuds... It just gives everything more weight, and it's what led to some of the best feuds of the 90s.

Right; if on a given episode of the show you get a seemingly random match, but it leads to each participant's respective rivals trying to interfere or something, then you've managed to further two storylines in one segment. You can't do that every time, obviously, and don't want to overly on run-ins or dirty finishes, but the principle is an important one, that just because Wrestler A is facing Wrestler B, it doesn't mean that his/her rival Wrestler C isn't still relevant to the proceedings, nor that Wrestler D, who's feuding with B, suddenly fell off the face of the Earth. As a viewer it gets me to think "Oh, I'd better pay attention, something might happen to further those storylines during this match."

The Spears/Allin/Avalon was actually a really good example of this working out well all around.

Spears and Allin have history so they were of course going to face off.
Avalon got the crowd to laugh because of his actions and pushes his own storyline of not being able to get anywhere in AEW, especially as a Librarian
Janela runs in because, well, Spears and Blanchard piledrove his head on the floor so yeah, I'd be pissed too
Janela brawling with Spears didn't affect the match itself because, well, it was a 3 way and there's no DQs
Allin went over Avalon and got his moves in to dazzle the crowd
Allin then references the Moxley challenge from earlier, putting him over as someone willing to fight Moxley and hyping up their match next week.

So that's about 5 different angles coming from one segment, some that not as important but can be referenced in later episodes and one major one for next week in Allin/Moxley.

That's not to say they can do it every single week but the fact they pulled it off and that well, I can only give them props.

[Bub (BLM)]

"Opening promo parade" is the absolute best way I have ever heard that WWE trope described.

[Can you afford to pay me, Gah]

AEW has been doing the one thing WWE hasn't for me in years when it comes to Raw and Smackdown. That is feeling it emotionally. Like giving me a reason to care about what is happening. The promos have been outstanding from Cody, to Jericho, MJF, Moxley and it goes on. The way they make things matter. Even with the squash matches it was used to set up something bigger. I love that. The way the proves come off less scripted makes me feel it as a viewer and makes me care about what is going on. The WWE has for years lacked that. I think about this, how much we talked about Cody's promo last week and how everyone talked about how amazing it was and it was that. I think about the WWE in comparison and ask myself when was the last time they had a promo like that where I felt the emotion and I knew I was watching something special as it was happening. It hard to come up with a recent answer for that.

Than the video promo from Jericho and co was comedy in wrestling at it's best that didn't need poop humor to be funny which seems that what the WWE seems to need. Than this week the whole Jericho and MJF more of that comedy that was entertaining was wasn't again 10 yr style humor. When it comes to telling the story, AEW been acing that part in the story telling.