Monday, August 3, 2020

AEW Dynamite (July 1st and 8th, 2020): Fyter Fest 2020


Full disclaimer: I had these written back in July shortly after the shows took place, but because of the self-imposed moratorium in regards to wrestling-related material, they were obviously not posted until now. So if there is no reference to anything that came afterwards (title changes and whatnots), that's why... and the same goes for tomorrow's Fight For The Fallen.

With July over and done, the moratorium is lifted and we begin the week recapping a couple big Dynamite shows, continue with a general follow-up post on Wednesday, do this week's episode, and eventually follow up with some thoughts on this past weekend's big Talk-N-Shop-A-Mania show.



So, for the sake of simplicity, both shows will be covered on this post and will be separated as such.

Night One
July 1st, 2020

Night One features guest commentary from Le Champion Chris Jericho wearing Don Cherry's jacket. And once again proves how good he is in the role, making a point to put over the talent while also keeping his devious edge. Sadly, Orange Cassidy had to ruin it by showing up and doing nothing later on and so... but hey, it's something to build to that match "next week".

Luchasaurus and Jungle Jack Boy Perry Man defeated MJF and Wardlow in which the dinosaur pinned the big guy not named MJF, who remains undefeated in singles. Fun little opening match.

AEW Women's Champion Hikaru Shida defeated Penelope Ford to retain the title in a more than perfectly acceptable little wrestling match. Shida is fine and Ford is also solid too. Fun time here.

TNT Champion CODY - sporting an old-school Great American Bash styled T-Shirt as a jab at WWE for using the name for a 2-part NXT special event that would've been funny if the shows had beaten NXT in the ratings but didn't - defeated Jake Hager via rollup to retain the title.

Private Party defeated Santana & Ortiz in a perfectly acceptable little tag team match. This somehow earns them a title shot for the following night, which probably wouldn't have happened if not for the next piece of business.

Taz and Brian Cage come out to cut a promo on Mox, who wouldn't make the show due to living with his corona-striken wife and didn't want to risk an outbreak like that sloppy shop in McSportsEntertainment... which relates to WWE's lackluster corona testing.  Taz claims Mox was suffering from the chickenshits and was looking for the Machine beating him at Fight For The Fallen, which immediately follows Fyter Fest in two weeks. Good stuff from Taz here.

AEW World Tag Team Champions Kenny Omega & Hangman Page defeated Best Friends to retain the titles. And then the FTR guys gave the champs beer, only for Kenny to do the thing where Klingons spill drinks onto the floor and this pissed off the FTR guys as well as Hangman, prompting the Bucks to show up and that's how we end Night One. I'd imagine if this were a WWE show, we'd have Steve Austin show up and give Kenny a Stunner for good measure and all the alcoholics share in a beer bash or something.

Oh, by the way, the champs defend the titles against Private Party on Night 2... not quite an equal substitution for Mox vs. Cage.

Night Two
July 8th, 2020

AEW World Tag Team Champions Kenny Omega & Hangman Page defeated Private Party to retain the tag titles in a pretty solid tag match. This may have been Private Party's best match to date, as their usual bits have been toned down somewhat and I got something a little more watchable. Usually not my cup of tea, but they did good here, so kudos for that.

The MurderHawk Machine Gimmick Thing Lance Archer - why can't he just be the MurderHawk? - defeated Joey Janella in a brutal asskicking contest. Rather than a random job guy, Archer beat up your requisite gay wrestler Sonny Kiss... which says how much of a good job they've done with the guy when the best I could come up with is "requisite gay wrestler" and not much more than that. Maybe give him something more than that, folks. Other than that, this was a fine back-and-forth and Janella is good at taking a beating from bigger dudes. Would like to see him win something now and then, but given his purpose here - give Archer a name to kill - this was fine.

Taz and Brian Cage comes out and since there's no World title match, Taz pulls out his old FTW Championship belt from the ECW days - yes, that is the very same custom belt he had made for himself back in ECW, but not the original that was just a repurposed title belt with FTW stickers on it - and gives it to Brian Cage. I've got to be honest, here. When Tony Khan tweeted that Taz was making an announcement that would shock the industry, a re-introduction of an old gimmick belt is the furthest thing from my mind in terms of shocking announcements - dude will be going full Dixie Carter by this point, making announcements for announcements for announcements. That said, this was another fine promo from Taz and I'm anticipating this match even more that's already happened by the time you read this.

The Butcher, The Blade, and the Lucha Bros defeated Fuck The Revival and The Young Fucks after one of the Fucks accidentally superkicked one of the Fuck The Revival guys and that resulted in a crazy finish. It's been a good long while, but I'm happy to see Lucha Bros back in action and in full force because those guys are awesome. This match was awesome. Lots of crazy shit, lots of fun shit, all sorts of good shit. And then the Fucks and Fuck The Revival shake hands and possibly pass on corona to each other.

Big Swole drives 3.5 hours to get served suspension papers for kidnapping Britt Baker. I wasn't aware that transporting someone to the garbage dumpster constitute a kidnapping... TK really is going full Dixie... NEVER go full Dixie. Despite this, Big Swole manages to sneak later and toss the papers back at Dr. Baker, supposedly breaking her nose. Gotta be honest here, this is the most I've enjoyed a women's feud in forever and is probably more memorable than five years worth of #LOLWomensRevolution or whatever they're calling it now. Britt Baker is fantastic here and I'm actually growing to like Big Swole. That's a win in my book.

Nyla Rose beats two women in a handicap squash match and then declares she's getting an anonymous manager... okie-dookie.

Le Dark Order (Colt Cabana, Mr. Brodie Lee & Stu Grayson) defeated SCU (Christopher Daniels, Frankie Kazarian & Scorpio Sky) in an action-packed romp that featured Brodie killing Daniels with a lariat and letting Colt pin the dude for the win. There, you see? Brodie's not a bad guy; he let Colt have this one. Could be interesting.

And in the main event by proxy, Le Champion Chris Jericho defeated Orange Cassidy in what Jericho called the greatest match of his career. I suspect a heavy dose of hyper hyper hyperbole in that statement, but this was perhaps Orange's best match in his career without fail. Good main event where the finish was almost never in doubt, with a couple moments along the way that made you question the possibility of... well, that was a thing.

And that's Night Two. For the most part, a much better show than Night One, but as a whole, both shows were pretty solid shows and had this been a PPV card, it'd be something I could watch on a single night.

Tomorrow is Fight For The Fallen...

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