Ospreay vs Danielson was unbelievable as expected, looked like Danielson's shoulder might have actually been messed up at the finish since it looked a bit off.
They do payoff playing the video a little bit in the tag team match, but actually almost feel
Like they should have done this first and then explained it with the video next week. Was kind of telegraphing that Perry would come back by doing it this way.
It feels like AEW is missing the boat in not building feuds properly, especially for these massive matches. Ospreay always delivers... it feels like "one and done" matches are a waste of an opportunity. If that makes sense? Like the best rivalries last for months with multiple matches... in AEW they end up shooting themselves in the foot and hotshot nearly everything.
PPV to PPV AEW probably puts up the best match quality in the history of wrestling, with maybe the best collection of talent in the history of wrestling. But it's all limited by the booking.
It's why the PPVs are great. The roster is deep and can put on unbelieveable matches.
But week to week and month to month they struggle to tell strong stories.
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PPV to PPV AEW probably puts up the best match quality in the history of wrestling, with maybe the best collection of talent in the history of wrestling. But it's all limited by the booking.
It's why the PPVs are great. The roster is deep and can put on unbelieveable matches.
But week to week and month to month they struggle to tell strong stories.
Have to agree. But I also think they’ve improved the reasoning week to week. And building up. That was an amazing match with some
stories for the rematch. In ring stories are high, my god the last 3 matches were amazing.
That was an incredible PPV. I particularly like the post-match promo with Julia/Brody, as well as Toni Storm's absolutely fire promo before the PPV where she went more vicious and serious in full color on Thunder Rosa (and the line of "if you wanted to help, you should have stayed a social worker" was fantastic). AEW is getting better at building storylines and long-term booking. Just excellent to see.
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That was an incredible PPV. I particularly like the post-match promo with Julia/Brody. AEW is getting better at building storylines and long-term booking. Just excellent to see.
I think they are getting back to what made them successful their first couple years.
Emphasize the story telling in the ring. No 50/50 booking. The outcomes of matches actually have repercussions.
Still think they are too faction heavy. And the roster is so bloated which hurts the story telling and also guys take too much time off (you need your top talent on TV and featured every week).
To me AEW is better when they are doing more grounded and more real life type of fueds, as opposed to more the Sports Entertainment style of fueds.
but it does just drive me wild that they will land "devastating moves" and then get up like nothing happened right away.
The other thing that bugs me is the high spots where guys are just standing around waiting to catch a guy.
Not that that is AEW specific, but they are often guilty.
On the high spots thing...I blame the production TBH. You realize how good a job of this WWE actually does when you go to live events.
WWE wrestlers do this too, but their production helps mask it. AEW it's the opposite, the camera guy will just focus on the guy moving himself to get into position for a move.
It happened in the main event even last night where Samoa Joe was moving to get into position for the first Swerve Stomp, and the camera just stays on the hard cam. Where WWE generally focuses on the guy climbing the ropes at that moment so you don't see it.
In terms of the matches...I agree with you that the matches would actually feel better and even harder hitting if they sold more...but honestly it's the type of match the internet and Dave Meltzer gives 6 stars to now. So that's what youre going to see more and more of.
It just makes the whole thing look more like a gymnastics exhibition than a fight. Nothing wrong with enjoying it.
But it ruins the best part to me, which is the feeling that it is happening in the moment, unplanned and it takes a toll on the guys, that even if they're working together they get frustrated with one another and the attrition of working a program.
It reminds me of mick Foley saying wrestling is a bunch of guys hurting each other a lot to make it look like they're hurting each other a little.
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Don't like high spots in WWE or AEW. Watered down, used too much now.
I'd be delighted if both of them went back to more 90's AJPW puroresu style, mix in more Stan Hansen/Terry Gordy/Steve Williams/JBL type of hard-hitting action. Guys like Brody King and Jon Moxley should be embracing it.
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At minimum there should be someone in a position of power limiting who is allowed to work on the top rope. The Ospreay and Ricchets of this world can get up and down no problem wanting some of these other guys get up there slowly just drives me wild, or worse yet kind of unconformably helping each other up. That is the rest hold of this era.
I'm of the opinion that if it takes you more than 5 seconds to climb a turnbuckle/jump over a rope and you have to prepare for your launch, you shouldn't be doing it.
Only an absolute select few can do it today and make it look realistic - Ospreay, Ricochet, Kommander, etc.
I hate hate hate when the spot is set up and everyone congregates on the floor waiting for the jump. I hate when they give the performer tons of time to prep. It really takes away from it all.
Also, when wrestlers do things like cartwheels to attack people, it looks so dumb and fake. Only Jack Cartwheel should be doing cartwheels to attack. It looks really bad when anyone does it, I feel like I'm watching Ninja Warrior or something.
A punch, a lariat, or a quick german suplex is soooo much more believable.
This is why I got turned off from WWE/NXT. Big moves, looks fake, may as well watch gymnastics at the Olympics.
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Also, when wrestlers do things like cartwheels to attack people, it looks so dumb and fake. Only Jack Cartwheel should be doing cartwheels to attack. It looks really bad when anyone does it, I feel like I'm watching Ninja Warrior or something.
Now, a heel wrestler doing a cartwheel AWAY from his opponent to dodge a move, I can watch that all day - that #### is cocky and hilarious. Even more so if he then gets promptly knocked out afterwards too for doing that.
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I'm of the opinion that if it takes you more than 5 seconds to climb a turnbuckle/jump over a rope and you have to prepare for your launch, you shouldn't be doing it.
Only an absolute select few can do it today and make it look realistic - Ospreay, Ricochet, Kommander, etc.
I hate hate hate when the spot is set up and everyone congregates on the floor waiting for the jump. I hate when they give the performer tons of time to prep. It really takes away from it all.
Also, when wrestlers do things like cartwheels to attack people, it looks so dumb and fake. Only Jack Cartwheel should be doing cartwheels to attack. It looks really bad when anyone does it, I feel like I'm watching Ninja Warrior or something.
A punch, a lariat, or a quick german suplex is soooo much more believable.
This is why I got turned off from WWE/NXT. Big moves, looks fake, may as well watch gymnastics at the Olympics.
Ok, that's it, time for an old man rant, and here it comes.
Moves don't look devastating because of the move, they look devastating because of the psychology of the move and the sell.
Someday I'll find the excellent clip of Heyman talking about this on Austin's podcast. Basically it was around the use of the sleeper, its execution, its sell, and the star that uses it protecting it. Its a really good dissertation into wrestling psychology.
Wrestlers don't know how to sell, finishing moves have become irrelevant because people are kicking out of them multiple times and showing no ill effects.
In my day (here it comes), in Stampede Wrestling a sleeper was a devastating looking move, because people rarely got out of them, and not only that, but after the match, the wrestler applying the sleeper had to wake up his victim or as Ed Whalen would intone, brain damage could occur.
Lariats used to look absolutely devastating because wrestlers not only knew how to take the move to devastating effects but sell afterwards. Look at JBL's clothesline from hell.
Also punches and chops have become a parody, nobody knows how to do them, and nobody knows how to sell them.
I remember going to the dome with a buddy and we saw the ultimate warrior in his pre tv days. And he reared back and threw the phoniest looking punch ever, and even though his opponent tried to fix it by going down, the mystique of a 6'7 guy with huge muscles throwing a punch that didn't look like it would kill a guy took you right out of the illusion of pro wrestling.
We've gone so far in wrestling because nobody is teaching people the psychology of the sell, and the protection of big moves that they are meaningless.
If I'm a main event guy, and I'm booked in a match with a mid card or even a main event guy at a TV taping, and the suggestion comes up that he kicks out of my finisher to get him over, I'm going to protect my finishing move and say f-no, its lazy booking. Or if I'm working with some ya ya and hit my finishing move on the floor and he pops up no worse for wear, then I'm punching him full on in the face.
A PPV or feud blowoff is a different thing, but if they say, you're going to hit 20 back suplexes and your finish and he's going to kick out, then your going to hit your finishing move again and he's going to kick out, then he's going to beat you with a small package, I'm never using my finishing move again after the match because its now a poo move.
You can make any move look devastating if your partner sells it, the reason why we have more and more high risk moves and injuries from them is because things like the DDT, and sleepers, and other devastating moves have been rendered from devastating moves to set up moves for stupidity.
Also wrestlers have decided to do gag comedy with moves that make them a joke. I absolutely hate chest chops because they're executed so weakly, and wrestlers think its funny to no sell them. There's a way to no sell that works and shows a wrestler is tough, but the only way to do it is to actually hit the chop or punch or whatever seriously so the no seller looks like an enranged psycho.
the other ridiculous thing though is wrestlers that pick soft looking signature moves as their finisher. The people's elbow, the five knuckle shuffle, the Hogan leg drop, the worm. All stupid finishers or signature moves, unless you make it clear that the move right before is the finisher. The leg drop, teh rock bottom, etc.
But then that leg drop better look like its literally going to put the person in a 4 hour coma.
Rant off.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
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Some people still do some of that stuff well but too many don't.
Gunthier's chops look menacing (and probably actually hurt like hell), and they get sold well generally too.
But then you have Eddie Kingston's "Machine Gun Chops" that honestly look about as vigorous as if you were trying to burp a baby.
And in the end this stuff existed in the 80's and 90's too, just in different ways.
In the end though the biggest problem is just the psychology of the sell throughout a match. You need to look sore, tired, and out of energy by the end of the match. By the end of the match any motion or movement should look laboured and things should take longer, unless it's one of those acts of desperation.
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Kingston's chops are an homage to Kenta Kobashi. If there's anywhere to use them and get a pop, it's AEW. I'd say it's fine for his move set.
No selling and making it look like Cirque du Soleil rather than combat sports is what really hurts the product these days. I get that performers are safer than they used to be, but I wish the style would shift back to the basics. Even Cena's Five Moves of Doom was easy to deliver and sell. Hulk Hogan made a career out of big boots and leg drops, and with the right character and match momentum, those can drive the same crowd reaction the same way a 540 somersault flip off the turnbuckle can.
Wrestling itself is built on a bunch of silly principles (Irish whips being one) but if you sell it well, and actually act like it hurts then it's fine.
All the flips and stuff are fine to an extent...as long as you're actually selling it well and it makes the move look like it it's actually even more impactful (I think about Sol Ruca's finisher here, or even just a 450 Splash).
But the flips for the sake of flips are overkill for sure. Even Ospreay and Ricochet are guilty of it at times, when they do their tumbling routines.
I'm always going to believe that an Asai moonsault or a Shooting Star Press or Ospreay's twisty-720-flip'o'rama-lighting-harbringer-of-doom splash are infinitely more dangerous than a boring ol' regular plancha from the top rope.
I don't really seen a huge discernable change between both those machine gun chops. Did Kobashi do it better? Sure. But so has Kingston in other matches too (he's just less consistent). Here's a better YouTube link for a bigger sample:
Either way, this is a move set that gets a pop from the crowd.
