IN LAIMAN’S TERMS #456
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Thoughts on AEW: Dynamite – November 15th, 2023
1. Hello again everyone. I just started a new grown-up job last Wednesday, and it involved a complete schedule shift for me, so I’m adjusting to that new routine. I was barely able to stay awake through last week’s episode, and not just because most of the show after the first match had me bored, but I am feeling better this week so far.
2. We’re starting off with Orange Cassidy in his usual spot, though this time in a tag team match. They signed this match last week and it’s actually happening, so it’s good to know that sometimes they can advertise something with a popular wrestler and then it does take place when they said it would…
3. Bonus HAM for that suit, J-Rob.
4. I am curious to see how the feud will escalate between Orange and Mox, especially with the new behavior of Orange being uncharacteristically aggressive. Well, for him anyway. Speaking of which, you cut off Ricky Vaughn walking in from the outfield, not cool!
5. Full Gear looks really damn good, and the intrigue with the devil and some particular references being made. MJF calling himself the real world’s champion, the devil throwing someone through glass… It is curious.
6. Oh hey, there’s the bell. Hook and Yuta are in the ring while OC and Mox keep up that 90’s crowd brawl attitude. To quote a certain figure from the 90s about how well OC’s method of jumping Mox has turned out, maybe he had better change his strategy.
7. There was a “Yuta sucks” chant for about eight seconds there, good for him. The BCC is either face or heel, depending on which match and which segment they’re in, and I do think that dynamic is interesting.
8. Mox and Hook is a matchup I didn’t know we needed. Especially if Hook can get some of that ECW smoke from his dad.
9. Mox gunning for some HAM by doing a parody of the Apathy Kicks. OC responds with the hands in the pockets because wrestling.
10. Hot tag to Hook. Almost sounds like an alias. Hot Tag Hook. Either that or James’ gimmick once he got tired of putting sword notes in Wendy’s door.
11. Hook and Yuta go at it before Mox shows Hook the Diamond Cutter. Shoulders back, chest out. OC comes out in response with an Orange Punch that Mox completely no-sells. That leads to the Paradigm Shift, BCC win. That ending certainly happened. Only the second time Hook has lost too, though he felt like an afterthought at best in this match.
12. Mox takes the mic and tells OC that he’s a buncha nothin’. All right then. I hope OC gets the win at Full Gear, because this feud has been particularly one-sided. I don’t know what Mox destroying OC for a second time would do. I remember how it took OC like five tries to beat Adam Cole, and by the time it happened, it didn’t have much impact. I hope that’s not the case by the end here.
13. We get a sort of slo-mo walk of Team Kenny walking in, looking like they’re doing an Evolution cosplay or something. I honestly didn’t even know Sega was still a thing.
14. Next, we’ve got Tony coming out to have Swerve and Hangman in the ring without the ability to attack each other. Damn, you do one home invasion and suddenly everyone’s trying to keep you from fighting, isn’t that the way it always goes?
15. Hangman starts throwing bombs about Swerve getting fired, somehow that being his fault and not an awful company decision. Hangman keeps it up, holy shit he’s barking fire. But then he starts throwing shade at Prince Nana, oh hell no. That dance is ridiculously over, you don’t go after Nana. Nana sells it perfectly, and in a night chock full of HAM so far, he’s already the strongest contender.
16. Hangman does a mic drop but then decides nah, I got more to say. He decides on technicalities and attacks Nana because that wasn’t part of the rules. Oh, those poor security guys had just two days left until retirement. That segment felt really odd, maybe a bit tone deaf? I don’t know, it just didn’t sit right.
17. Meanwhile, backstage… ADAM! proclaims that hey, maybe Roddy is the devil. But like the Evolution we mentioned earlier tonight, it is indeed a mystery.
18. A women’s match already and not at 20 after in the second hour? Is that allowed?
19. Red Velvet’s been busy since coming back. She was gone so long that not only did the faction she was in disappear, but so did the person who ran it. Skye Blue seems to be going darker Skye Blue. Goth Sis makeup has been complemented with various colors instead of just blue above the eye. After Pastel Goth, there’s really only one place left to go, and she’ll be breaking out the Cruxshadows LPs soon enough.
20. I’ve never been so happy that the PPV is on a Saturday. I do not think I could stay up that late on a Sunday right now.
21. Skye Blue continues to get meaner and more aggressive. Fortunately for her, she doesn’t get instantly punched in the face and ground into the mat afterward, so it helps.
22. Is that Zack Morris sitting in the front row?
23. That roll-up reverse roll up spot goes on for about the length of an Undertaker Wrestlemania entrance, and mercifully it doesn’t end that way.
24. Skye Blue does a really nice counter into a Skyefall, though for a minute I thought it was going to work into some kind of reverse Widow’s Peak. Victoria never truly got her due.
25. These two are putting on a hell of a show, and the crowd has gotten more into it as it goes. It’s almost like if you give the women time and a chance to develop on the show, people will get more into it or something. Weird.
26. Right as I say that, Skye wins with what I think was supposed to be a Code Blue. Kris now has to defend against her and Julia, and the story is at least somewhat intriguing.
27. Miro getting mentioned on Dynamite? I support this notion. Miro should be on all the shows and twice on Sundays.
28. Once we come back, Mariah May and RJ City are waiting by a door labeled not Toni Storm. Luther answers it and not only do we get black and white when the door is opened, but now they’ve added the vintage sound quality too. I love everything about this.
29. Now for Samoa Joe, fresh off vacating a title after beating Keith Lee for it last week. Hopefully the rest of ROH goes back to being just on that show too. He’s facing some guy who doesn’t even realize Death is staring him in the face.
30. Cruz jumps off the top rope, Joe does the walkaway spot, and Cruz manages to get in a WTF face as he’s crashing to the ground. This is the HAM episode, I love it.
31. Joe continues to wanna be pals because he’s from SoCal and he’s inevitable, whatever that means, but Joe said it so it’s immediately exponentially badass.
32. It’s time for the designated “Lucha wresters put on a great match and lose” portion of the show. There’s significantly more Vaporwave in the Young Bucks’ entrance now, so that gets them a pass. A small one, but a pass nonetheless.
33. “Rancho Cucamonga Jones.” That’s a thing that was said.
34. Hey, a dropsault in there! The match is very fast, very flippy, as would be expected. In other words, it’s exactly what you thought it would be when you saw the match graphic.
35. Now even Tony’s getting in on adding Jones to things. “Northern Lights Jones” because why the hell not?
36. One of these teams has a match Saturday, the other doesn’t. The nearfalls are cool, but it’s impossible to buy them at all whatsoever.
37. Komander does his ropewalk SSP, but turns it into a ropewalk Destroyer? I think? It looked damn impressive, whatever the hell it was.
38. The Bucks suddenly hit a blatant low blow, and then utilize… the Judas Effect? Okay, that was an interesting twist. They won because of course they did, but they’re being petulant little shits. At least they still sign something for the kid.
39. The Bucks get interviewed, and of course it’s an AEW segment, so it gets interrupted. Omega confronts them about their shitty behavior, and then Jericho’s all like “but you got out of your Evolution cosplay! WTF?” The Bucks get mad at Jericho and start a shoving match and rabble rabble rabble harumph!
40. Speaking of petulant little shits, the Juniors Ass are here with the National Treasure of HAM, Juice Robinson. Their fake audio pyro is complemented by real water spitting. They win in about ten seconds. Kay. They also say words. Cardblade was the best part.
41. Wardlow gets another vignette where he’s once again completely justified. He also beats someone up. He made the unfortunate decision to exist near Wardlow. The Devil also makes a quick appearance.
42. There’s stuff around the ring, so the promised “street” in street fight that was supposed to be there instead of a wrestling ring is null and void. The brown note brings out the Family and also Brian Cage.
43. I’m gonna take it for granted that the people who know what this game is understand all these references.
44. Big Suit Paul Wight, when we could have Captain Insano. But I’m guessing the suit is also the one that the character is wearing or something. I know next to nothing about video games.
45. We’re four seconds into the match and Paul Wight has already chokeslammed Fletcher off the cage. There’s a lot of time left in this show, so it’s surprising to see him get taken out this quickly.
46. I heard Jericho went over Takeshita clean in DDT recently. I’m surprised it hasn’t been mentioned. I think Alex Pawlowski’s rant about it is still going on somewhere.
47. There’s a milk crate being used as a weapon, which I would say is the “stepping on a LEGO” projectile equivalent. That’s as nasty as getting sliced by Cardblade.
48. I think Tony and Excalibur read Hustle’s columns back in the day, because as Kota rides into the ring area on a bike, they’re excited about THE BICYCLE!
49. Meanwhile, Hobbs powerslams Paul Wight onto a car and he crashes to the concrete. Credit to him for taking that bump to really put over Hobbs.
50. This is a typical anarchy/stampede/weapons match in AEW, except I’m guessing the weapons and props are all connected to the game. There’s also now a skid in the ring, which thank JBL it’s not a wooden one. Anyone who has ever been stuck with a splinter from one of those would probably rather take Paul Wight’s previous bump.
51. Now they’ve mentioned the Jericho/Takeshita match. You’d think that might’ve come up sooner, but who knows?
52. Getting slammed onto the skid is gonna hurt “like the dickens” because Taz is also a grandmother from the south in the 80s. Which I say with the utmost respect.
53. Kenny got out a fuckin’ bottle. I hope Fletcher doesn’t get the Bossman/Holly pitcher shatter from ’99. That looked… not fun.
54. Takeshita leaps off the beer cooler but gets countered with a fire extinguisher. I can at least say the cameras seem to be keeping up with the simultaneous action better than they have in other recent similar matches.
55. Brian Cage just suplexed Kenny Omega over the ropes, out of the ring, and into tables on the outside. He’s cut open, and that looked devastating. Looked like he hit his head between the tables, oof.
56. Jericho challenges Hobbs to a chair duel. Naturally, Jericho wins. Why wouldn’t he? He gets spinebustered for his trouble though, which Jericho kicks out of. Of course! They called the Mark Henry slam he did earlier “the World’s Most Dangerous Slam” which evokes the memory of another name from that era. Not the crossover/homage I was expecting.
57. Hobbs gets up from a Judas Effect, but unlike the one earlier tonight, I buy that one. They duct-tape him to the ring ropes, which works out a lot better than the time they couldn’t keep the tape on Kenny a little while back. They even put it over his mouth because someone’s kink is working its way into the show, I’m sure.
58. Omega goes V-Trigger crazy, and gets the One-Winged Angel and the pin on Brian Cage, because that’s the reason he was put into the match. The match was chaotic, but not overly chaotic or hard to follow. I’m sure people who knew the references got more out of it than I did. I’m disappointed it didn’t end with Hobbs slamming and pinning Paul Wight, but I suppose Hobbs taking him out of the match is a considerable consolation prize.
59. MJF doing a talk gets the main event spot, and I’m looking forward to seeing how they progress the story.
60. Since I gave J-Rob’s suit a bonus HAM, Max’s also has to get one, with extra icing because it’s purple. Purple always gets extra from me.
61. MJF connects his vulnerability with people getting hurt, which is so tragic. He apologizes to the Acclaimed since THEY GOT CAUGHT UP IN TTTTTTHHHHHHE… CROSSFIYAH!!!
62. I wonder if the huge signing they mentioned happening at Full Gear is also the person under the Devil mask? Or would that be too obvious?
63. Jay White comes out to remind him that Max is the villain. He’s still accusing MJF of being the devil, because he is quite adept at being two completely different places at the same time. And he knows that you know that he knows that I know that you know that we know that he knows that we all know… get ’em.
64. Shenanigans ensue as Juice and the Juniors attack. He gets the left hand, the 3:10 to Yuma, the Bladerunner, and now would be a good time for Joe to back up those alleged friend claims.
65. Nope, there he is, staring angrily thinking about how he is Samoa Joe and could use those Juniors Ass as toothpicks, but MJF didn’t do an askie, so nope.
66. This was one of the better go-home shows AEW has done this year, though its tone felt a little all over the place. I’m sure Full Gear is going to be excellent, so that’s something too.
Jon Cruz, his reaction to Joe’s walkaway made me legit laugh out loud.
2023 Semi-Finalists:
MJF/Adam Cole
Toni Storm
Juice Robinson
Roderick Strong/Neck Strong
Christian Cage
Ruby Soho