wrestling / TV Reports
St-Pierre’s AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door Review
Image Credit: AEW
Loading...We are LIVE from the DRAFT KINGS~! United Center in Chicago, IL. Also, thanks to Bleacher Report for somehow being unable to take my money to watch the show live tonight. Maybe they can do a Top 10 list on effective e-commerce practices.
Your hosts are Excalibur, Taz, and in a nice surprise, Kevin Kelly.
Chris Jericho, Sammy Guevara, & Minoru Suzuki vs. Wheeler Yuta, Shota Umino, & Eddie Kingston
This is one of those matches where you know what to expect, and you’re completely satisfied when those expectations are met. You’re not going to see much in the way of pure lucha or airborne madness, but you will see carnage and a sense of danger that many trios matches don’t promise. Don’t get me wrong, with Sammy and Wheeler Yuta in the mix, there will be some flying, but we’re not talking about an all-out spotfest. The beauty in this match was a little more personal.
In lieu of spots, we got something more memorable. The slightly odd mix of personalities alone propelled this match to something different than your standard trios affair. Eddie Kingston and Minoru Suzuki’s exchanges were obviously electric. Chris Jericho continued his in-ring career renaissance by having a genuinely fantastic rapport with Shota Umino. Wheeler Yuta was a little less-than focused on, sure, but you never got the sense it was for the worst. He’s had his star-making performances and isn’t in need of another, even if it would be great. Tonight was Shooter’s turn, and thanks to Jericho’s selfless psychology, Umino got to look like the star of the match. I am always impressed by AEW’s in-ring storytelling when it comes to getting new wrestlers over, whether it’s Yuta, Konosuke Takeshita, or Dante Martin. The crowd is always willing to give someone a chance to be fair, but it’s a testament to the mountain of talent in the promotion that they are rarely let down. You can add Shota Umino to that list and I hope he gets some shine on Dynamite or Rampage here soon to build off of it.
We got all the trios tropes here too. Dive trains, the opening exchanges, and a furious finishing sequence. But it was all done so well because it never lost sight of who was doing what, meaning we got new tweaks on existing formulas. You don’t see Minoru Suzuki in this sort of environment, but when he gets there, he brings that aura with him and injects it into a match that normally isn’t given that kind of quirk. Jericho and Kingston were at each other’s throats, Sammy Guevara was loathsome, and the babyfaces fought from behind as wonderfully as they always do. This match was simple in that way, but the people in it turned it from a run-of-the-mill opener to a totally unique match. That’s kind of what this show should be all about, right? It also just so happens that it was quite damn exciting. ***3/4
Winner Takes All for the ROH & IWGP Tag Titles: FTR (c) vs. Jeff Cobb & The Great O’Khan (c) vs. Roppongi Vice
One of the most surprising stories of 2022 has been FTR’s babyface run. It was never a question as to whether they could be effective babyfaces, but the level to which they’ve risen since has completely blown past my expectations. Their match with The Briscoes in ROH was one of the year’s highlights and the fact that they damn near topped it against The Young Bucks four nights later is in itself a worldly achievement. I was a huge fan by the time they’d landed in the company as heels, but it feels like they’ve leveled up considerably since, and not in a way I’d expected having seen their career to this point. That’s not even mentioning the shockingly outstanding singles work of Dax Harwood, but there’s only so much time in a day.
While the booking was done very pointedly to give FTR more ammo as good guys, I still came away from this match feeling that all three teams had overachieved to create something great. Roppongi Vice’s inclusion in this match on paper felt a little pointless, but you cannot underestimate just how important they were to the pacing here. They earned it through and through. Trent Beretta is always going to be criminally underrated (even if it’s still weird to see him without hair) when it comes to getting his ass kicked, but the way they almost aided Cash Wheeler in the first half of the match as extensions to his babyface-in-peril fight really made this match something unique. It’s almost like a less spot-heavy version of the Takeover match that FTR had with DIY and the Authors of Pain. They had big bad monsters to slay, and at times, RPG Vice and FTR put their egos aside and teamed up to do it. This was woven in more subtly though, and felt a little more fleshed out. I especially loved Beretta helping them with the Powerplex, only for Cash to still try and steal the pin. It’s little spots like that that make FTR one of the most psychologically powerful acts in the industry.
The United Empire definitely felt a little less fluid compared to their rivals, but they played their role to a tee. Great O’Khan is one of those wrestlers that is really hard to nail down in terms of style and ability, but it’s undeniable that his work made for some interesting heat. He feels like a clumsy marauder in contrast to Jeff Cobb’s strength and technique, and while I don’t know that they would have a great match with lesser tandems, the story told here made sure they both fit. When you have a three-way in any type of context, you really need three separate identities to make the match work and overcome some of the hurdles the stipulation presents. That was done expertly here and with the added flair of the Dax Harwood injury angle and some fine late-match mayhem, we’ve got ourselves a second straight winner on this card. ***3/4
Tony is backstage with Juice Robinson and Jay White. Juice still claims to be US Champ and in case you forgot, he is Rock Hard. Jay White says he’s gonna win tonight. Groundbreaking business here.
AEW All-Atlantic Title: PAC vs. Miro vs. Malakai Black vs. Clark Connors
When it comes to psychology, this match had a lot of similar qualities to the trios opener. Clark Connors was the proverbial sore thumb in this match, and through sheer will and effort, he came out of this match with a lot more clout than he had going in. His ongoing struggle with Miro was easily the most amusing part of the bout, as he got his ass kicked so damn often by the guy that you just knew, when he got the big bit of offense on him, the crowd was going to go crazy. And sure enough, when he speared the Bulgarian through the table outside, the crowd was chanting Clark’s name and seemed to get behind him, even if only for a moment. I don’t think the guy is going to be a fixture of AEW TV or anything on the back of this, but you’d have to think it’s an early career highlight for him. He rose to the occasion and the crowd’s roar only sealed the deal for him.
Otherwise, there wasn’t a whole lot to this match other than the usually great action. And that’s not a bad thing; that’s kind of how these multi-man matches are going to work, ya know? A lot of scrambling around and action sequences. Nothing wrong with that. My main issue here is trying to understand the All-Atlantic Title and what purpose it’s going to serve. They had a more-than-optimal uppercard belt in the TNT Title, but AEW has unfortunately pissed away a lot of its prestige this year with the title mostly being on a DOA feud between an unlikable Sammy Guevara and charisma vacuum Scorpio Sky. I doubt ol’ TK sees this belt as a replacement, but I guess we’re gonna have to see as time wears on. It’s a pretty swank looking belt at least. At any rate, it’s hard to come up with a belt that PAC shouldn’t hold at some point. This was a damn good match with a little more story than you often see in 4-way affairs, so even with my booking apprehensions, I’m not about to complain about how we got there. ***1/2
The Young Bucks & El Phantasmo vs. Shingo Takagi, Darby Allin, & Sting
While not a story-based matchup like its predecessors, this match was hands down the most fun I’ve had watching a match so far tonight. And listen, I’ve reviewed a trillion Young Bucks matches over the years. With very few exceptions, they’ve all generally been glowing and an exercise in finding different ways to say the same things about how good they are at wrestling. This is not an exception to that rule. The way they blended their signature style with the signature spots of Sting has to be seen to be believed, because it made for a match that glued a smile to my face during its entire duration.
Sting really is a wonder. You have to understand how thoroughly mediocre he was in TNA and how terrible they were at making Sting a commodity to truly understand how marvelous his AEW run has been. The man is in his 60s, keeps his t-shirt on, looks tired every single time he wrestles, yet never once has had a disappointing performance. Compare that to the years and years of forced main events he had to endure in TNA, where no one ever really got over or remembered anything anyone did for the longest time. He’s consistently one of the best parts of AEW’s midcard action, and this might have been his crowning achievement in the company so far. I can’t believe I’m glowing so much over a match that featured both The Young Bucks and Sting together, but it worked so much better than I even thought it would. And I’d probably follow the Young Bucks into hell if they asked.
But, above all, I believe the real star in this match was El Phantasmo. I have limited exposure to him thanks to my equally limited NJPW viewing habits, but man alive was he the best campy, doofy, hammed up heel tonight. The way he showed ass for Sting and sold for him should be shown to wrestling schools worldwide. He came into this match as kind of a sixth wheel in a lot of ways, but even with Sting being his usually great self, I came away the most impressed with El Phantasmo. He kept up during the hectic closing stretch, but made himself available to get his ass kicked when needed. I loved the commentary putting over his kickout of the Pumping Bomber as well in advance of his first G1 appearance. Really, from top to bottom this was a rousing success and my clear pick for Match of the Night so far. AEW has been a little wacky lately, but the fun factor their matches can produce remains unmatched. This weirdo trios match is a perfect example why, and perhaps the biggest overachiever of the entire Forbidden Door saga. ****
We get the official announcement of the Grand Slam shows at Arthur Ashe again this year. Yay!
Tony talks with Shota Umino backstage. Chris Jericho and 2point0 interrupt him and say that Shota earned their respect, but Jericho blows a fireball at him. I bet Red Shoes still wouldn’t DQ him.
AEW Women’s Title: Thunder Rosa (c) vs. Toni Storm
Oh boy. You have to be talented in a stunted, far-side kind of way to make Toni Storm look like she’s only been at the Performance Center for six months, but by golly, Thunder Rosa accomplished that with aplomb. I’ll be honest and say outright that I thought this match was awful and one of the worst AEW has ever presented on any sort of meaningful stage. I can appreciate that I’m likely being harsh, but I cannot understand how anyone can look at the great wrestling we’re getting on this PPV and tell me this match has any remote right to be alongside it. It really comes down to the fact that I think Thunder Rosa is a bad professional wrestler and actively harmful to a women’s division that continues to be AEW’s lowlight.
Listen, there’s a ton of great women’s wrestling out there. I’m not one of those guys that thinks they’re inherently inferior to their penised counterparts. It’s just frustrating to me that AEW can have such incredible wrestling up and down the card, but every time they trot the women out there, it brings the whole show down. And they have legitimately talented women in their ranks, so it’s not like their roster is what holds them back. Toni Storm, for instance. Serena Deeb. Athena. Mercedes Martinez. I’d even say they’re doing a heck of a job with Jade Cargill, even if she’s not a great worker or anything. Willow Nightingale looks like a true future star every time I see her. Kris Statlander is a very underrated hand in the division, as well. It’s the women they choose to spotlight that makes it so mind numbing to think about. And I’ll be sympathetic to AEW and say that I really do understand the impulse to give Thunder Rosa this belt. She and Britt had a miracle of a Lights Out match in 2021 and the people kind of like her. I didn’t really care for the cage match that won her the belt, but it was of a similar ilk and I don’t begrudge anyone for liking it. I understand why people are attracted to the idea of Thunder Rosa. But her performances outside of that smoke and mirrors environment consistently show to me that she has not progressed nearly as much from her Kobra Moon origins as some like to think.
I don’t know if it’s on purpose to make things look “real”, but if I never see Thunder Rosa sandbag her opponents’ suplexes again, it’ll still be too soon. It’s one thing to look like crap against someone like Marina Shafir. But when you’re out there with a legitimately talented pro wrestler like Toni Storm and you can’t even bother to take her moves, what purpose are you even serving? It’s just such schlocky, amateur hour BS that Toni attempts that suplex like a total pro on the apron, only for Rosa to do everything but superglue her feet to it and do a nice little back somersault instead. If you don’t wanna take the move, I’d think the easiest course of action is to nix the spot before you do it. Now you both look bad because you didn’t want to take a bump that I can only assume you’d agreed to take. What happens when your opponent tears their bicep or triceps because you can’t bend your knees and jump for them like literally every other pro wrestler in your company? Is it because she’s being difficult or is it because she’s not very good? I can’t say truthfully, but it drives me nuts. Maybe she’s the nicest person in the world who just isn’t good at her job. But neither case helps anyone when the lights come on and I have no desire to pay $50 to watch it.
And if that was it, maybe I could look past it. I once saw a Junkyard Dog vs. King Kong Bundy match that popped me, for Christ’s sake. I don’t need every match to be a Kenta Kobashi epic. But it’s not just the sandbagging. It’s tons of other small, basic things that puzzle me. For instance, Thunder Rosa couldn’t keep up with the early routine grappling exchanges, as Toni quite clearly had to wait for Rosa to get to her feet before doing the next spot. Maybe that’s a Toni problem, but given I haven’t really had to see her stare slack-jawed at many other women in opening exchanges, I think I know the deal there. She runs the ropes with such force that Kelly Kelly thinks she’s bad at it. She zombies from move to move with a pacing and lack of fluidity that will likely make Ric Flair’s last match next month look like an El Hijo del Vikingo match.
So let’s be real with ourselves for a minute here. Really, what does Thunder Rosa offer? Cool entrance outfits? Is she a daredevil of some sort? Did this match tell any kind of story? Did Toni Storm at least get over in defeat like Clark Connors or Shota Umino? Who benefits from bad matches at the top of the division? I just don’t get it, man. I want AEW to be consistently great, but their inability to properly showcase their women’s roster and hitch their wagon to terrible workers like this continues to harm the quality of their events. At least Jade has charisma, ya know? And let’s be honest, we don’t have the pandemic to blame for any of this anymore. It’s bad wrestlers having bad wrestling matches while much better wrestlers collect their checks at home and in catering. It’s just going to be a blind spot for AEW until something changes, which is a shame, because the potential is there for it to be the total opposite. *
IWGP US Title: Will Ospreay (c) vs. Orange Cassidy
While I completely understand the initial mindset of people disappointed by this match’s inclusion on the show, the sheer quality of it goes to show that maybe that apprehension was a little premature. This match did such a fabulous job of encompassing what makes both men so appealing in their own ways. Orange Cassidy’s silliness does turn some off to his matches, but I find that a hard argument to stomach in this particular instance. He used that chicanery to flumox Will Ospreay and make him easy picking for his trademark maneuvers, and they even used the slow-mo Kawada Kicks as a psychology callback as the match wore on. That’s great pro wrestling and if you’re so serious about it that you can’t see both the fun and the intelligence in that, then maybe you’re watching the wrong product. Or maybe we have different taste, but I like thinking I’m right more than being pragmatic about it.
And it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that Will Ospreay was a total superstar in this match. I’ve adored this guy since he was some unknown tall guy in 2015’s BOLA, and watching him go from plucky babyface beating Jimmy Havoc in PROGRESS to a bonafide top-of-class heel pro wrestler is incredible evolution. He is so good at mixing that high octane wrestling with his loathsome in-ring character, and he was a tremendous natural foil for uber-babyface Orange Cassidy here. They didn’t do a whole lot of long-form storytelling, but they didn’t need it. When you have such easily defined roles with such talented people, you can get away with just about anything.
Luckily, they got away with having the best match of the night and one of AEW’s best all year. Both men’s timing on when to hit their signature spots is expert so even if this was a 10 minute exhibition, it would have been impressive. Orange has such a hold on his persona that he milks every bit of schtick he can until he knows the crowd would explode at his comeback. He fires up at exactly the right time, and it’s because of that that the crowd thought, several times, that this man was going to hold a New Japan title. It’s Orange’s appeal down to the letter, but when you have someone with even better timing in there in Ospreay? You have a recipe for a classic. Ospreay’s fluidity was perfect here, because it was essentially playing Cassidy at his own game. You can be fast and furious, but you have to be one special guy if you can come at Ospreay with that and win. And Ospreay won, but it wasn’t without a bitch of a fight from Orange Cassidy. And that, in a nutshell, is why this match was so great. It was pro wrestling at its most simple. Two wrestlers with different strengths combining those advantages and creating magic because of it. ****1/2
Aussie Open and Ospreay beat Orange down more after the match, but Roppongi Vice comes to save the day. The numbers game gives them hell pretty quickly though. Music starts up and good goddamn if it isn’t KATSUYORI SHIBATA. Shibata takes out Aussie Open and beats the crap out of Will Ospreay before his minions make the save. That might have been the coolest thing we’ll see all night. Wow. And to add to it, Orange Cassidy puts his shades on Shibata while Pixies play us out. What a segment.
Zack Sabre Jr. vs. Claudio Castagnoli
This match was everything I wanted and approximately three times more. It was a very simple affair in most ways, as it pit the debuting Claudio’s strength against Zack Sabre’s cunning. That’s not the first or last time a match like that will be worked with either man involved, so it wasn’t exactly novel in that way. But I feel it’s also worth mentioning that there are no men better at exhibiting strength or cunning in wrestling than Claudio Castagnoli and Zack Sabre Jr respectively.
I am not going to say that this was Match of the Year or anything, but it was one of the more interesting bouts I’ve seen so far in 2022. I have watched a lot of Zack Sabre Jr. matches and a prevailing theme in many of them is how much he tends to lord over his opponents when he’s on the mat. That’s not a complaint, but he does have the tendency to eat people up in order to have the matches he has. It’s just how it goes and it makes for some awesome, awesome content. You cannot do that against Claudio. But what you can do is chip away at Claudio’s armor and build your style around the fact that you can’t just wrestle him to the mat and have your way with him.
The former Cesaro is such an incredibly rounded pro wrestler that it’s not just his strength that prevents Zack from progressing either. He can wrestle with the best of them. So Zack had a lot of issues getting his way with Claudio, and that made this match an intriguing struggle. Zack did tons of small things to invest for later in the match. He moved out of the way of the uppercuts, leading Claudio into rough landings. He took advantage of Claudio losing himself in the crowd, telegraphing his big moves. He had to do all these things cerebrally because Claudio was capable of doing things like pulling ZSJ up during a triangle choke and walking up ring steps with him. Not many men present that threat, so to see Zack try to solve the puzzle – even unsuccessfully – was a great way to keep the match fresh as it wore on.
And then, you had the expected counters and exchanging of holds. This wasn’t revolutionary or anything you haven’t seen before, but the urgency made sense. Zack was finally having success and to get that win, he had to pick up the pace. Except Claudio Castagnoli is a human horse, and that normal pro wrestling shit doesn’t fly with him. Even so, the Ricola Bomb counter into the European Clutch was absolutely astounding, and I could have done with another few minutes of that kind of rasslin’ to put this match over the top. But how could you even have a nitpick about a match like this? The surprise delivered, the match delivered, and now we go into Blood and Guts with more intrigue than we would have if Danielson was here. And we’re STILL gonna see Dragon vs. Sabre at some point. That’s like, a win/win/win/win. ****
IWGP World Heavyweight Title: Jay White (c) vs. Adam Cole vs. Adam Page vs. Kazuchika Okada
This is one of those matches that, from the outside, looked like it had all the trimmings of a great match… yet when you put the microscope to it, a lot of it felt hollow. A lot of it, in my opinion, has to do with this match being a four-way. I understand why AEW and New Japan would want this match to be multi-man. You have a lot of main eventers, only so few matches on the show. It’s hard to tell fans that Hangman Page isn’t going to be on the card, or that Okada won’t be there. It would be an even harder pill to swallow if New Japan’s biggest championship was absent from the card. So I get it. And with all the incredible talent these four men possess, you’d imagine that this match would be a total showstealer on that alone. It just never got there, and that was before the maginificently mangled finish, which I can’t really harp on given that the Adam Cole injury seemed to have forced their hand, and I don’t wanna judge anyone’s abilities over something like that.
I’ll put it another way. When I watch an IWGP World Title match, I’m looking for epic. I’m looking for a match like Jay White vs. Kota Ibushi, Ospreay vs. Shingo, something like that. Not that specific match, but this is a championship that has some gravity to it. Of course, it was borderline ruined by introducing the new belt last year, but you understand my point. Defending it in this four-way that only really exists as a thrown together stopgap feels a little patronizing and the laziest way to say “we had a title match” without actually doing anything of substance to back it up. No matter how much you say it, the bout simply is not going to have a big match feel. No one on planet Earth believes that Jay White, having just won the title, is going to lose it in a four-way in the semi-main. You can’t build off of that.
That’s sort of the conundrum of these joint shows. We all want these big title matches, yet when they come, we start to realize that we liked the idea of it more than the actual execution. An exception would be Jay White’s loss to Okada in Madison Square Garden. The fans there could buy into that as a true blue title match, because it was 100% conceivable for either man to walk out with the belt. It’s apples to oranges as neither White or Okada were ROH guys in a dream match scenario, but NJPW got over the hurdle of defending that title on US soil by doing something that fans could get invested in anyway. You may not be able to get away with that at Forbidden Door, so the point only goes so far, but still. There’s something of a precedent. Here, AEW gets to say they had an IWGP Title match on PPV and not a whole lot else.
Ultimately, it’s one of those things that happens. It’s a “good with the bad” scenario to have the belt defended on a dream match show like this and I recognize that. Either way, it was a bad decision to make it a four-way, because no one wants to see the IWGP World Title defended in a run-of-the-mill spotfest. This felt like a match we’d see on one of those ROH/NJPW house shows from 2017, which is definitively not a good thing. That’s just not what feels special about a title match in New Japan, and that’s kind of what you want to translate to US audiences, right? And don’t get me wrong, this was a GOOD match. It had a lot of really interesting, fluid spots and a fun build-up to the split between Adam Cole and Jay White. But this was clearly, to me, the weakest men’s match on the show so far. And in a match that features four men of such commendable skill, that’s kind of a shame. ***1/4
Interim AEW World Title: Jon Moxley vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi
In good conscience, I can’t call this Match of the Night, but I can say it’s about as vintage a Tanahashi match as you’ll ever see. Tanahashi has never been the guy who does the most or has the craziest matches. That’s just not his thing. What he excels at is simple, smart pro wrestling in a time when the art is progressively getting more complex. And if there’s anything you can call this match, it’s simple. Tanahashi tried to do what he does best; do Dragon Screws and do High Fly Flows. It’s a formula that’s seen him become one of the most decorated pro wrestlers in history. Jon Moxley did what he does best; wear guys down, beat the tar out of them, and bleed everywhere.
Really beyond that, there’s not a whole lot to say. It’s not one of either man’s best in their archives, but it didn’t have to be. It felt like a true psychological struggle between the ultimate veteran and a top guy attempting to reclaim what’s his. Tanahashi’s babyface fire was at its best here especially, as his attempts at psyching himself up felt legitimately inspiring as the crowd willed him on. It’s been so long since we’ve seen him have a singles match with a non-muzzled crowd, and it’s easy to forget what that crowd interaction can do to make Hiroshi Tanahashi – as broken down as he looked at points – the all-time great he truly is. It was just a great Tanahashi vs. Moxley match and everything that entails. ***3/4
The Jericho Appreciation Society hits the ring, and IT’S BREAKING LOOSE IN TULSA as the good guys head to the ring to even the odds. Claudio Castagnoli makes his entrance and gives Jeff Parker the Giant Swing as William Regal heads to the ring. And that’s your final build to Blood and Guts!
