Coming up, Becky Lynch has some harsh words for Ric Flair, The Man felt personally disrespected
by Charlotte Flair and were top Ring of Honor guys backstage at AEW last night?
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R Truth video punishment, not because it’s good, but because you’ll want to be able
to say you were there when the whitest thing ever occurred.
Survivor Series is just around the corner which means WWE is hotting up the hype from
tepid to lukewarm. Gimme a yes please.
One of the only feuds with a smidgen of interest in it for the show is Raw Women’s Champion
Becky Lynch vs Smackdown Women’s Champ Charlotte Flair, mostly because the two might be airing
their dirty laundry in order to drum up interest in the match.
After the world’s most awkward swap meet and subsequent reported backstage bust up,
Becky cut a promo on Raw about Chaz which drew a response from daddy Richard Flair as
Oli spoke about in yesterday’s news.
The Man was not going to let the Old Man talk to her that way, she told Ariel Helwani on
the MMA hour podcast:
“Look, I saw that tweet.” “I wrote out a response that would’ve
been quite biting, and I deleted it and I let it go because I think it’s really sad.
This a legend at one point. This legend, a 16 World Champion Ric Flair, is now jealous
of me.”
“And he’s now trying to use me to get clout, to promote whatever he has going on
next because he’s dug himself into a bit of a hole with other things. So I kind of
just was like ‘ah, let me let him out of it because it’s kind of sad’, you know?
It’s kind of sad.”
Oof, pity the true enemy of all wrestlers. Somewhere Ric Flair is withering away like
Pennywise at the end of IT.
OR IS HE?! Because he’s still alive and tweeting, firing back with the quote and a
screencap of a WrestleTalk.com article by our very own Tempest, hey Tempest, about him
selling The Man trademark to WWE.
It’s Man vs Old Man who used to be The Man over who is The Man and who legally owns
The Man. MAN.
Then Rebecca Lynch fresh from the kill, turned her attention to the next generation: Charlotte.
Lynch told Helwani what went down on the day of the now infamous belt swap saying:
““There was a plan in place that was supposed to go one way and if it went one way, everyone
would have had a moment and it would have been great. I, in the back, said, ‘this
isn’t going to happen, she’s going to do something else.’ She did exactly what
I said she was going to do.”
“Sometimes things can happen out there and people can get carried away in the moment,
but I knew she was going to purposefully disrespect me, so I processed it a lot quicker and was
able to hold it together until I got backstage and then I lost it a little. I lost it. Verbally.”
Before Oli gets into the review of AEW Dynamite here’s an interesting bit of news from backstage
last night: according to Fightful Select The Briscoes were set to be backstage.
After the news surfaced that Ring of Honor would be letting all of their talent out of
their contracts the wrestling community braced itself for an influx of great talent to other
promotions, which kicked off at Full Gear as Jay Lethal made his debut with the company.
The Briscoe brothers being backstage at the show could signal them being in talks with
Tony Khan about working for AEW, but as they didn’t appear on the show its not exactly
any kind of confirmation, but interesting that moves seem to already be being made to
hoover up that ROH talent! Now over to Oli with a review of last night’s
Dynamite! Dynamite cold opened on Kenny Omega backstage
with the Elite. He admitted he lost, that Hangman did well, and that there’s things
he’s gotta fix. He asked the Elite to hold down the fort while he’s gone, which Adam
Cole answered, no worries Cleaner. Kenny said he wasn’t talking to him. He was talking
to the Bucks. It’s such long storytelling, hard complex storytelling in your face.
Even better was one line I missed the significance of on first watch. Thank you, Reddit. At the
start of the promo, Kenny said he hadn’t had a chance to watch the Full Gear match
back yet. Meaning he hasn’t seen the Bucks choose Hangman over him.
Oh my god, it’s just raging, hardcore storytelling. Stepfamily, fake estate agent storytelling.
The main show opened on Hangman Page’s AEW title celebration with the Dark Order in the
ring to loud ‘You Deserve It’ chants - which Page stopped, saying he didn’t deserve it.
He earned it! I loved Page’s word choice throughout this
promo. He then said his next ‘responsibility’ is Bryan Danielson. Responsibility, earned
it - there’s such a deep babyface sense of duty. Ha, duty.
This brought out the American Dragon, who said congratulations to Page, shook his hand
in congratulations, and then turned heel. Wait, what?
Danielson suddenly got really, really mean. He said he’s disappointed it’s not Kenny
Omega standing in front of him. That they should be having their match right now, he
wrestled the very next night after winning the title at WrestleMania. But of course Virginia,
Page’s home state where they were here, boos hard work.
I criticise WWE a lot for switching characters based on what the story requires. This babyface
is the champion, meaning so-and-so needs to be heel now to feud with them. It’s backwards
storytelling. Character should drive plot, not vice versa.
But as surprising as Danielson being a dickhead is, I don’t think it’s actually a heel
turn. It’s more of a heel reveal. He’s never presented himself as a face since he
debuted, we just cheered him as such. In fact, he’s been a bit of a kayfabe prick throughout
- arguably arrogantly beating every opponent with a different move.
This was one of those rare feats of being totally shocking, yet always there in plain
sight. He got shots in at Page’s confidence, they had a brawl, Danielson cockily beat Evil
Uno in the following match, and then promised to kick in the heads of every member of the
Dark Order. And as next week is in Chicago, he called out Colt Cabana.
What do you think of Danielson’s heel turn? Let me know in the comments down below.
2.0 and Daniel Garcia interrupted Eddie Kingston backstage, presumably setting up his next
program. As good as the Ishii and Orange Cassidy vs
Butcher and The Blade match was next, this wasn’t how I would’ve first used The Stone
Pitbull. He’s the Never Openweight Champion. Considered one of the toughest characters
in wrestling. One of the most consistent in-ring performers of all time. But nothing can escape
the pull of the Matt Hardy and Orange Cassidy feud.
In the Nyla Rose vs Shida match next, there was a sign in the crowd that read: ‘Book
More than 1 women’s match on TV’. That might be one of the first AEW-critical signs
I’ve ever seen on Dynamite. And I agree. Especially with this match being so good.
Nyla Cannonballed onto a chair and Vickie Guerrero got taken out with a kendo stick,
but Serena Deeb interference ultimately cost Shida the win.
Not content with one promo on this show, having a post-Full Gear interview aired earlier,
MJF came to the ring with Shawn Spears and Warldow to talk about how he’s the most
complete wrestler on the planet and how he’s going to start a bidding war in 2024. He started
talking about the world championship, because there’s nobody back there on his level…
When CM Punk’s music hit. Peak behind the curtain. I watch Dynamite
every Thursday morning at about 6am all alone in my front room to write these reviews. It’s
very rare for me to actually shout out loud at that time in the morning, because the rest
of the block of flats, and my girlfriend in the other room - yeah, I’ve got a girlfriend!
- are all asleep. But when Punk came out, which meant the dream
feud with MJF is here, I legit shouted ‘here we f’ing go’.
Just like the Kingston feud, the promo battles are just as much a draw as the actual match.
So geniously, MJF introduced himself with a handshake after they soaked up the heat,
which Punk rejected, turned around and left, laughing - without saying a word. MJF has
just spent the last month trolling Darby Allin. Well here’s the Troll Master. And next week
they’re in Chicago. Let’s f’ing go! Speaking of Darby, he set up a match with
the Gunn Club, who I forgot were heels now. With the Young Bucks not cleared, Adam Cole
and Bobby Fish will face Jurassic Express on Rampage.
Dante Martin and Lio Rush won a really good tag match against The Acclaimed. Martin and
Rush are terrific, but right now I’ve only got eyes for Anthony Bowens, who has significantly
stepped up his game recently. Team Taz reminded Dante of their offer to
join them afterwards, promising all the success that comes with joining their faction, which
is… getting beaten by Sting. And a belt the company doesn’t recognise.
Cody Rhodes, PAC and The Lucha Bros will take on Malakai Black, Andrade and FTR next week
in a huge 8 man tag. And the main event saw Jay Lethal’s in-ring
debut against Sammy Guevarra for the TNT title. Just a suggestion, I would’ve had a video
package putting over who Lethal is - same with Ishii too - on this episode to either
educate or remind viewers who he is. The match itself, however, did a lot of the
education for them. Both Lethal and Guevarra were fantastic, building a realistic story
around Sammy’s injured ribs - which almost got the match called off at one point. Guevarra
fought through the pain, and missing a swanton bomb to the outside through a table, though
to win. The Inner Circle celebrated with him and endorsed Jay too, helping him get over
despite losing his first match. Hopefully this means a more focused, prominent run for
Sammy as TNT champion now. What did you think of Dynamite? Let me know
in the comments. 65% of you voted for Bryan Danielson turned heel?! On our poll on a pole
match on the community tab. This was an excellent post-pay-per-view episode,
almost acting as a new series opener: Omega is out, Lethal and Ishii are in, Punk and
MJF is happening, and Danielson is a heel now. I’m trying to reserve full marks for
the shows that have all-time memorable moments, so by AEW’s standards, this is a measly
very, very, very high 4 out of 5. It’s Survivor Series this weekend, so check
out the 10 biggest rumors for
the show...