Five episodes in and AEW continue their hot streak with another successful night of heated action. The big story coming out of this week’s Dynamite is the crowning of the first-ever AEW Tag Team Champions in SCU, as well as a selection of fantastic matches from the women’s and trios divisions. There was much more of a focus on promos this week; with Jon Moxley being given ample mic-time, a contract signing between Cody and Chris Jericho and even a small cameo from Tony Khan.
In a behind closed doors promo featuring Jon Moxley and Tony Khan, Moxley and Omega’s match was given the stipulation of an unsanctioned match. This means that not only are they free to use whatever they want but it will also not affect their win/loss records. Later in the show, Moxley cut a great promo attacking AEW for trying to put him in a box, and promised to deliver “glorious wrestling violence, the likes of which we haven’t seen in this country in decades.”
As for Kenny Omega, he teamed with The Young Bucks to take on the team of Hybrid 2.0 and ‘Superbad’ Kip Sabian. It was a fun match with Jack Evans being a particular stand-out, but the real talking point was Kenny Omega’s entrance. As it’s Halloween, Kenny came out cosplaying Sans from Undertale, accompanied by music from the game.
What was really interesting was the pre-match graphics which referenced both Kota Ibushi and New Japan Pro Wrestling. It’s hard to speculate what this could mean, but an actual reference to New Japan on an AEW show is very significant, especially as New Japan are expanding into America.
After the match, Santana and Ortiz attacked The Young Bucks whilst dressed as the show’s sponsors; Rick and Morty. Santana and Ortiz had already made their presence known when interrupting the presentation of AEW’s Tag Team Championships by attacking legendary tag-team The Rock ‘N’ Roll Express.
Cody and Chris Jericho signed their contract for the championship match at Full Gear. This was proceeded earlier in the show by a couple of segments with Cody and Tony Schiavone. These were somewhat quieter segments that allowed the show to breath a bit. When Cody did eventually arrive, Jericho, who was dressed in a pumpkin suit, cut another great promo claiming this to be the biggest match in Cody’s career.
This didn’t end in a brawl but it did end with a backstage segment of The Inner Circle attacking Dustin Rhodes in the parking lot. Rhodes’ head even left a dent in a car thanks to an attack from Jake Hager.
Hikaru Shida made her Dynamite debut against Shanna (who was also making her full AEW debut). This was a really great match. Shida was obviously the star and should become a focal point of AEW’s women’s division but Shanna also came out of the match looking just as great.
The main event was the final of The World Tag Team Championship Tournament between SCU (Frankie Kazrian and Scorpio Sky) and The Lucha Brothers (Pentagon Jr & Rey Fenix). This was a great back and forth contest with both teams getting a lot of their typical offense in. In a moment of karmic justice it was Daniels’ replacement Scorpio Sky that rolled up Fenix out of nowhere to win the match. This caught a lot of the crowd off-guard, so it wasn’t the triumphant moment we were expecting. But it was still a good moment and capped off a great tournament that had a handful of memorable matches.
The show had a lot of great moments and put an equal focus on PPV-related promos and the in-ring action. Next week is the go-home show to Full Gear so there’s sure to be some more development in the women’s and tag divisions.
What were your highlights from the show? Drop them down in the comments below.
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