Reviews by Dave
By David E Houston II
Show air date: November 24, 2021
AEW returned to their number one market, Chicago, and went heavy on Chicago-based talent and used some new faces on tv going into the Thanksgiving holiday.
Punk Owned the First 30 Min of the Show
CM Punk came out for his match with QT Marshall–a battle of old ROH guys-but first had to body Maxwell Jacob Friedman on the mic. MJF started with his normal cheapness, Punk turned it up a notch, to his credit, MJF got his shit together and matched him at first but Punk closed out the whole segment with his best promo work to date in AEW.
He then beat Marshall in a solid match. Punk owned the first 30 min of the show. The commentary team was doing a great job of selling Punk still working off ring rust.
I loved the backstage segment with Eddie Kingston being interrupted having a snack by 2point0 and Daniel Garcia. Kingston was his normal great self and a scuffle broke out.
The Gunn Club defeated Bear Country
The Gun Club–Billy and Colton Gunn–beat Bear Country–Bronson and Boulder–in a short, okay TV match. Nice seeing some new faces on TV.
The angle after with Sting and Darby Allin was very good. Hell of a collision with Allin and Austin Gunn (who is on an apology tour for reckless social media talk).
Dante Martin signed with Team Taz to the shock of his advisor Lio Rush!
Thunder Rosa defeated Jamie Hayter
Thunder Rosa beat Jamie Hayter to advance in the TBS Championship Tournament. Started off alright but got a lot better as it went along. Some sloppy outside interference by Hayter’s associate Women’s champion Dr. Britt Baker, DMD ultimately cost her the match.
A completely useless segment with “Le MAGAion” Chris Jericho and 2point0. Khan must really love Jericho because that didn’t do jack for anyone.
Bryan Danielson defeated Colt Cabana
Hometown guy Colt Cabana of the Dark Order (DO) probably wanted to get some revenge for the beating “American Dragon” Bryan Danielson gave his man Evil Uno last week or just wanted to look good at home but Danielson kicked the shit out of him. Dragon then chews up the Chicago crowd and lays down a challenge to any DO members from Atlanta to face him next week when Dynamite is in ATL.
World champion–and DO ally–Hangman Page came out. I didn’t like it. The execution was fine but it didn’t make him look good, challenging Danielson to a match after Danielson just had one. Felt like they did too much.
Main Event: FTR, Malakai Black, and Andrade El Idolo defeated Death Triangle and Cody Rhodes
The main event saw Death Triangle (PAC, Rey Fenix, Penta) team with Cody Rhodes to face their mutual foes of FTR (Dax Harwood and Cash Wheeler), Malakai Black, and Andrade El Idolo. Very entertaining, fast-paced match with a lot of great action. Fans throwing Cody’s weight belt back was some reckless bullshit.
The action was great but there were a lot of subtle things to watch. Rhodes’ inability to work well with his teammates led to a couple of instances of friendly fire. FTR and Tully Blanchard are menacing but not really attacking Arn Anderson (notice they seemed to want to talk, not fight). Black sprays PAC in the face with his Kabuki-like black mist, setting Andrade to get the pin with his hammerlock DDT.
Yeah, I rolled my eyes a couple of times but this was a good show for the most part.
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