wrestling / TV Reports
Pantoja’s AEW Dynamite Review 12.29.21
Image Credit: AEW
Loading...AEW New Year’s Smash
December 29th, 2021 | Daily’s Place in Jacksonville, Florida
Hey, we already had a New Year’s Smash in 2021 from AEW. This is like when WWE ran Roadblock twice in 2016. It’s not a big deal but it annoys someone like me. I’m just weird that way. Also, I associate Daily’s Place with rough times since it was AEW’s COVID home and those shows weren’t very good but it looks cool tonight.
Jim Ross got a big ovation for his return from skin cancer.
Christian Cage (7-1), Jurassic Express (13-3) and The Lucha Brothers (15-1) vs. FTR (15-4), Matt Hardy and Private Party
The Hardy Family Office unit didn’t get their record put up on screen. It feels like AEW gives us one of these each week and I’m not mad at it. I am all for an entertaining multi-man tag. We got some fun interactions here like seeing FTR mix it up with Christian or Jungle Boy match speed with the Private Party boys. In the early stages, this was mostly Jungle Boy working well with Christian. The Lucha Brothers came in and Jungle Boy kind of got in the way of one of their tandem moves. It looked like a mistake but actually played into the later stages. The idea was that the faces worked well together even though Jurassic Express are next in line for a title shot. The Lucha Brothers did their thing after a Jungle Boy heat segment, followed by Luchasaurus hitting everything moving. As the match progressed, we had some camera issues with Fénix’s dive only being seen in the background and Jungle Boy’s totally being missed. Penta upset his boys with a blind tag earlier and when he had this won, Christian blind tagged in on him. After they got into a short shoving match, FTR put Christian down with the Big Rig, which is a much lamer name than Shatter Machine. It went 12:42 and was filled with fun action. [***½]
2.0 and Daniel Garcia vs. Eddie Kingston, Santana and Ortiz
No records shown here as the heels got no entrance and the faces charged out for a fight. I question putting this on right after the opener. Another multi-man tag typically doesn’t work well after one in the opener. The faces kept up the hype pace but the issue here is that I just haven’t been able to get into many 2.0 matches. They’re good at being the annoying heels on the mic but their matches leave something to be desired, though I do like Daniel Garcia. Santana hit the Three Amigos before Ortiz took the heat during a commercial break. Almost immediately after returning, Santana got rolled up with a handful of trunks to end this in 9:50. I couldn’t really get into this as it didn’t click and the heels winning this way again is already tiring. Eddie Kingston has very few notable wins under his belt. [**]
Post-match, Garcia wanted to use the ring bell as a weapon. They took forever to set this up and they nailed it before Chris Jericho returned to fanfare and pyro despite being way late to save Santana. He and his bat ran the heels out but then Kingston got in his face about getting involved. They almost brawled by Santana and Ortiz kept them apart.
Backstage, MJF called Sting an untrained hack and said this wouldn’t happen if he worked for a more professional wrestling company but that’s a conversation for the 2024 bidding war. MJF called Punk a coward for avoiding him last week and that he’s done with him. His goal is a championship. He turned his attention to Wardlow, suggesting he stop his powerbomb symphony gimmick. Also, he brought in Smart Mark Sterling to read Wardlow’s contract that apparently says if Wardlow wins the TNT Title, he must relinquish it to MJF. This way, MJF can have both the TNT and AEW World Titles.
Jurassic Express argued with the Lucha Brothers in the back. Christian laid down the tag title challenge for next week. The Lucha Brothers accepted, dissed Christian, and suggested JE drop him.
Colin Delany (0-1) vs. Wardlow (27-3)
Stealing it from a tweet I saw but we have an ECW on Sci-Fi legend in there and also Shawn Spears at ringside. Wardlow is on a 16 match winning streak. He turned Delany inside out with a clothesline and went into the Powerbomb Symphony, hitting four in a row to a huge pop. He won in 1:24. After the bell, Spears hit Delany with a chair. [NR]
Backstage, The Young Bucks noted how awkward it was to have Kyle O’Reilly around since he hadn’t said hello or made eye contact with them. Kyle got into it with them verbally and asked to speak to Adam alone. He said they had heat but their key to surviving is to be a faction and Kyle will find out tonight if Adam has his back.
Dan Lambert and Men of the Year were in the ring to take up a lot of time. They ran down Cody Rhodes and then got to Brandi. That brought her out, which is always a problem for a promo. They ran each other down with bad jokes and Brandi threw on her fake accent. When Dan threatened her, she said, “OH YOU’RE A BLACK BELT, WELL I’M A BLACK BITCH.” Please, someone put a stop to Brandi. She’s a menace to these segments. They’re always so cringe. Dustin made the save but got blindsided for it and I didn’t like any of that.
A video package aired to hype Danielson/Hangman II.
AEW TBS Title Tournament Semi-Finals: Jade Cargill (21-0) vs. Thunder Rosa (39-4)
X-23 gear for Thunder Rosa. Right off the bat, you could tell that this was going to be the toughest test for Jade so far. Rosa came in with a plan, going after the leg and trying to chop her bigger opponent down to size. That including kicking away at her legs on the outside as well. Jade could wallop Rosa with anything she did but Rosa managed to fight back at every turn and showed no quit. You could see that Jade is still not comfortable in long matches just yet but Rosa was guiding her and making sure this worked well enough. Jade rocked her with a pump kick just before a commercial break. Returning, Rosa came close a few times and used several submissions but Jade survived. Then, someone in a mask and hoodie attacked her, setting up Jaded to end this in 11:22. Solid enough with a fine story told. [**¾]
Rosa attacked Jade after the bell until the masked woman got back in the ring, revealing herself to be Mercedes Martinez. She and Jade put the boots to Thunder Rosa until Ruby Soho ran out with a pipe to send them packing. A Martinez/Cargill pairing could be good, especially with Martinez leading the way for her.
We got an interesting recap of Kris Statlander beating Leyla Hirsch last week and how Leyla wanted no part of it. Maybe she’s going heel soon.
A vignette aired to hype Riho vs. Britt Baker in a few weeks.
CM Punk walked out, making his Daily’s Place debut. He cut a passionate promo about being there, being happy that Jim Ross is back, and even bringing up Brodie Lee. The rest of this was pretty generic as he dissed MJF for being a coward and said that he was ready to move from him as well and become champion. He got in a good zinger when he called MJF a bigger waste of Khan money than Tim Tebow, though I would’ve preferred an Urban Meyer reference there instead. Punk finished by saying that if they’re both on the path to a title, he’ll be happy to ruin his title hopes.
Ricky Starks had a promo about Dante Martin messing up by turning on Team Taz and how Powerhouse Hobbs will put him in his place. I like these guys but what they’re doing with Dante is pretty confusing to me.
Sammy Guevara came out for his lame Love, Actually gimmick with the cue cards. The signs were about his title reign and didn’t really mean much.
Hikaru Shida got vignette time to basically agree with Serena Deeb that this is far from over.
Brian “Cancel #CancelCulture” Pillman Jr. was interviewed in the ring by Tony Schiavone, saying that what happened to Griff Garrison has really scarred him. Next week, he wants Malakai Black because his memory is somewhat fuzzy due to the mist. Malakai showed up on the ramp and then disappeared again. What an odd segment.
RAMPAGE NEW YEAR’S SMASH!
· Cody Rhodes defends the TNT Title against Ethan Page
· Darby Allin vs. Anthony Bowens
· A Technique by Taz segment involving Hook’s Redrum
· Street Fight: TayJay vs. The Bunny and Penelope Ford (heard great things about this)
DYNAMITE NEXT WEEK!
· Hangman Page vs. Bryan Danielson II for the World Title
· Jade Cargill vs. Ruby Soho in the TBS Title Tournament Finals
· Malakai Black vs. Brian Pillman Jr.
· Jurassic Express vs. The Lucha Brothers for the Tag Team Titles
Adam Cole, Bobby Fish and Kyle O’Reilly (0-0) vs. Best Friends (26-11) and Orange Cassidy (40-8-1)
AHHH FISH AND O’REILLY CAME OUT TOGETHER TO THE REDRAGON THEME, DID THE POSE, AND HAD THEIR TEAM NAME ON THE TRON! MY GOD. They did the damn Undisputed Era pose to. I’m crying in the club rn. You just knew this would be good. Both teams have tremendous chemistry as units and that showed here. I liked some of the fun moments like Fish being aggressive and OC responding with his soft kicks to annoy him. The faces held serve for a bit early until the heels turned it around heading into commercial and isolated Chuck. Returning, commentary announced that TNT gave permission to overrun if they need it for the last show on the network. That’s a cool little touch. Even after Chuck tagged out, reDRagon remained in control. Cole had Panama Sunrise on the aisle cut off and then Chuck took out reDRagon with a somersault plancha, followed by Trent spearing Cole and OC adding a diving DDT inside. Cole survived it all though. Brandon Cutler got involved and was taken out before the Young Bucks superkicked Best Friends. That left Chuck to fall to Chasing the Dragon after 14:48. Kyle O’Reilly goes from jobbing to Von Wagner to winning the Dynamite main event in his debut. A really fun main event. [***½]
The Bucks stood with Cole on the stage as reDRagon celebrated and the teams seemed to be arguing with each other.
