March 8, 2021
Dynamite blows up Revolution during a winning week for All Elite Wrestling
When you name a pay-per-view Revolution and state that it’ll end with an explosion, in semantics alone you’re setting a high bar for the significance of what’s to follow.
All Elite Wrestling, though, had every reason to be confident going into its March 7 event, following the giant announcement of the signing of Paul “The Big Show” Wight on February 24, the even bigger Shaquille O’Neal popping in for a tag team match on March 3, and the signing of a “huge, huge star” creating even more fervour for the pay-per-view.
As it turned out, if Revolution is remembered as a bomb, that’s one step beyond what actually happened.
© All Elite Wrestling
The AEW World title bout between champion Kenny Omega and Jon Moxley, with exploding barbed wire on three sides of a ring that was ambitiously timed to blow up at the half-hour mark, went well enough until the last five minutes. In homage to the stipulation match’s pioneer, Atsushi Onita, Omega and Moxley had teased the danger of the exploding wire, thrown each other into it to at least give the appearance of damage, and dove onto wire-laden boards outside the ring before Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson arrived to kill the bout’s momentum.
Beating down Moxley for the three-count following a temerarious One Winged Angel onto a chair, the trio continued the assault until Eddie Kingston arrived with 25 seconds to go before auto-detonation. When he couldn’t revive the challenger enough to get him to leave the ring, though, Kingston lay on top of Moxley to protect him from… almost nothing. (My match rating: **)
While the explosions of Onita’s matches with Terry Funk and Hayabusa still took more than a little suspension of disbelief, they were at least asphyxiating and deafening in the outdoor setting of Kawasaki Stadium. Inside Daily’s Place in Jacksonville, Florida, however, this dramatic moment of fraternal sacrifice ended with as much peril as watching milk flood a bowl of Rice Krispies.
And yet, worse was to come.
Despite being quickly reached by an AEW official - who was not, unlike referee Bryce Remsburg, clad in an explosive suit - Kingston sold unconsciousness for less smoke than Bob Marley’s exhale. Had he realised (or, more simply, been instructed) that the bombs hadn’t gone off as intended, he could’ve played the outcome in a different way, even if it was to mock the proceedings, as Funk did in the finale of 1995’s IWA King of the Death Match tournament.
Instead, the promotion’s tough guy brawler lay there, having to take one for the team.
© All Elite Wrestling
At least there were no boos nor chants of “Refund!” from the audience two-thirds of the way through the show, even it was Jay “Christian Cage” Reso who presented himself as AEW’s mystery signee. He was last seen in the Royal Rumble match on January 31, but before that, the 47-year-old’s only bout in seven years had actually been a 60-second angle with Randy Orton in June 2020.
Though he is by no means the “huge, huge star” or “hall of fame” talent quoted by AEW in the hype for the surprise, Christian represents a popular talent who likely has as much to offer as his friend and former tag team partner, Edge, has to WWE. Still, his best singles match, against rival Randy Orton, was a show-stealer only on an Over The Limit 2011 that had John Cena versus The Miz and Jerry Lawler versus Michael Cole ahead of it in the pay-per-view pecking order (my match rating: ***3/4) so he’ll need some effective booking and a bit of luck with injuries to make this a deal both sides are happy with in two or three years’ time.
© All Elite Wrestling
On the subject of recruitment from WWE, AEW certainly took everyone by surprise by poaching Paul Wight for a role both on commentary and in the ring, as well as, I would expect, in a public relations capacity. At 49 years of age, Wight is a physical phenomenon after a ring career of a quarter-of-a-century, and as long as he doesn’t expose that AEW’s larger wrestlers aren’t really so large at all, he could prove to be a worthwhile signing overall, even at a price at which Vince McMahon sent Wight off with his blessing.
Like Christian, Wight is someone who hasn’t featured in any credible Match of the Year polls, at least in singles action, but if you need a reminder of him as a performer, it’s certainly worth going back to Judgment Day 2003 and checking out his Stretcher match with Brock Lesnar. (My match rating: ***1/4)
© All Elite Wrestling
The successful tale of another giant is something that shouldn’t be forgotten in the wake of Revolution’s bathos. In the opening segment of Dynamite on March 3, NBA legend Shaquille O’Neal and his arresting tag team partner, Jade Cargill, faced Cody Rhodes and Red Velvet. A bout between two popular teams, the build-up would have been pathetic if it had done any more than merely exist, but that didn’t stop both sides from capturing the imagination with strong if largely inexperienced performances.
Rhodes did a fine job in putting over O’Neal’s size and strength, and just about got enough from the interaction to prove to a bigger audience that he’s a pro’s pro. Red Velvet - who replaced Brandi Rhodes in the match in mid-January, after the latter announced she was pregnant - showed continued poise, and ought to be given the best opportunity to advance her skill set, and prove that she is capable of adding to top matches in the women’s division.
Even with Shaq’s fame in the mix, though, it was Cargill who predictably showed the most potential, shining in her first match of any note. With a presence to match her world class physique, Cargill carried off all of her spots fairly well, and had enough charisma to cover for those that were off the mark. In what was the appropriate finish to the bout, she pinned Velvet in front of a reported 1.16m average viewership in the U.S, almost doubling what NXT achieved on average on USA Network.
Indeed, if the last week has proven anything, it’s that the bomb wasn’t at Revolution, but on Dynamite. If AEW can develop Jade Cargill into a more rounded professional wrestler while fending off advances from other sectors of the entertainment industry, it will have the kind of star that the WWE Performance Centre was never supposed to miss.
Now would be the time for Tony Khan to invest in the very best coaches, and not the pyrotechnics that will continue to let him down.
© All Elite Wrestling
A Little Bit Of Housekeeping
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