AEW Dynamite Episode 12, live from Corpus Christi, proved that when it comes to in-ring storytelling, work rate, and excitement, AEW earns the title “elite.” However, when it comes to angles, particularly the more “sports entertainment” angles, this company still has a long way to go.
Let’s look at one of the major stories of the evening — Chris Jericho vs. Jungle Boy aka Jungle Jack Perry. The conceit here was simple. Jericho had one last contractual match for 2019. The winless Jungle Boy challenges him to a match. Jericho laughs and says Jungle Boy can’t last 10 minutes in the ring with him. Jungle Boy takes that bet, and there’s the drama of the match. And the result? A red hot crowd that lived and died with everything that happened in the ring. Jungle Boy got over with the audience, and AEW has a new star poised for greatness.
Everything about this was simple and effective. It played on AEW’s rankings system, and the company’s focus on wins and losses. It gave Jungle Boy, whose been on the losing end of every match, a chance to not only showcase his talent, but the audience got to emotionally connect with him. On the flip side, Chris Jericho further cemented his role as the arrogant and sometimes buffoonish champion, and got his time to put over his feud with Jon Moxley.
Let’s look another example, which has more layers to it. Cody Rhodes got beat last week by his arch rival MJF’s anarchists for hire, The Butcher and The Blade. The main reason is Cody allowed his opponents to chose his partner. This resulted in them choosing backstage producer/enhancement talent QT Marshall. After the loss the insanely popular Darby Allin came out and said he’d team with Cody … as long as he could get a rematch from their Fyter Fest bout which ended in a draw. The two worked together perfectly, and through their win we’ve now got a barn burner of a match for the New Year’s Day show. Again, simple, effective. Cody is a step closer to MJF. Darby reinserts himself into the main event. Butcher and The Blade look strong in defeat.
But for every one of these simple and effective stories we get The Nightmare Collective. I can appreciate Brandi Rhodes not going down the road of least resistance and being “evil. corporate Brandi.” The comparisons to Stephanie McMahon would’ve been unstoppable. However, this incarnation ain’t it. Despite Brandi explaining what The Nightmare Collective does … I still have no idea what they do. It’s this weird mystical spooky bad guy faction that has Kong cutting people’s hair, smelling it and being filled with either an orgasmic energy, or somehow absorbing the essence of her victim. Yeah, I’m literally guessing at this point. Then there’s Melanie Cruz who’s a recruit for the group … but hasn’t done anything yet. Oh and there’s the mysterious bald guy who is NOT the following: Gangrel, Vampiro, Raven, or Billy Corgan. Nothing is explain. Nothing makes sense. Oh yeah, and they’re way too similar to The Dark Order (more on them later).
So you’ve got this whacky storyline, and now you’re connecting it to one of the hottest wrestlers in the company — Kris Statlander. No, please don’t. Let Statlander, who is the best thing to happen to the AEW Women’s Division, get ready for her title shot. Oh, by the way, why has it been WEEKS since we’ve seen Riho? I know not everyone is supposed to be on the show every week, but you have got to be transparent about the whereabouts of your champion. Let her win, and then let The Collective came after her the following week. Don’t have The Collective overshadow her match with Riho, and her potential win. Spoilers: It already has. People are talking more about how bad The Collective is, and not about how great Kris Statlander and Britt Baker were in the ring together.
Then there was the main event. SCU and The Young Bucks tore it up and tore it down. I would’ve loved to have seen this match end in a draw, and we go to a Best 2 out of 3 falls in Jacksonville. That would’ve been so awesome. However, I’m still very happy with the result. I love watching The Bucks in AEW because they wrestle with such fire, speed, and tenacity. The spot where Nick Jackson does a double standing springboard and then ranas Scorpio Sky? CHEF’S KISS. Perfection. Kazarian, somehow and someway, gets better in the ring every single damn time I see him. Everything here worked to perfection. Was the crowd stunned at the finish? Oh you bet! And I like that. It wasn’t predictable.
Then came The Dark Order. I understand the logic here. SCU will get The Lucha Brothers, while The Bucks tangle with The Dark Order. However, the main event of this show was not the place to do it. And I hate being that guy comparing NXT and AEW, but let’s face facts. NXT ends with Rhea Ripley winning the belt, and having a massive locker room and audience clearing celebration in the ring. It was very cool. AEW has all its top guys getting beaten up by the spooky heels — mostly local enhancement dudes — working for The Dark Order. HUH? If you gave me The Dark Order stalking The Bucks, tempting them to join them because they can’t “win the big one” and give it some time to grow — that makes all the sense. But to have this group, which has finally started rehabilitating from its awful debut, skyrocketed right to the main event and wiping out EVERYONE, that’s just bad storytelling. Also, can we talk about how they could’ve put Jon Silver and Alex Reynolds into that group in a much more logical, and surprising way? Just having them show up was a missed opportunity.
And that’s all the internet is talking about. Two bad angles with two eerily (pun intended) similar groups. They’re not talking about Kenny Omega and Hangman Page vs. The Lucha Brothers which was an absolutely awesome match. Or how Sammy Guevara and Jericho making fun of Picture-in-Picture was brilliant. Or how we might finally be getting a Luchasaurus vs. Jake Hager match? Or maybe let’s talk about how the crowd was red hot again for the show? Or the two matches I mentioned at the top of the column.
AEW Dynamite Episode 12 was a really good episode of wrestling despite these two glaring bad angles. AEW needs to be cognizant of what brought them to the dance — great in-ring work, and simple yet effective sport and reality based storytelling. Leave the spooky shit for Halloween, and focus on building new stars, and creating hot angles.
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