Well, All Out was a thing... and setting aside the fact that a couple big things happened here, this was a pretty fun and entertaining show and I look forward to their next PPV outing.
With that said... well, more after the break.
Jon Moxley defeated Japanese legend Satoshi Kojima in another fun little case of two medium-sized fuckers beating the fuck out of each other... and then Minuro Suzuki showed, traded slaps with Mox, before choking him out and hitting him with a piledriver. Well, that's another New Japan rematch in AEW... and on Dynamite no less. Excellent.
AEW Women's Champion Dr. Britt Baker DMD defeated Kris Statlander via lockjaw submission to retain the title. There was a "This Is Awesome" chant here and usually the AEW crowd doesn't just give that chant to anything, but this was merely okay at best. There were a couple of cool spots off the top here and there, but this was merely fine. And after two matches of two [blank] fuckers beating the fuck out of each other, being fine is perfectly fine.
The Lucha Bros defeated AEW World Tag Team Champions The Young Bucks in a steel cage match to win the titles. Nothing I say can do this match justice. Fucking great match, which shouldn't be a surprise whenever these four gents get together. Not to mention that it's nice to see a cage match that doesn't have a billion run-ins to defeat the whole point of a cage match.
Ruby Soho - the former Ruby Riott - wins the Casino Battle Royale match thing to win a Women's Championship match. It is the usual battle royal stuff, although there was a dueling chant at one point between "We want Tessa" and "No we don't". That was funny. All that aside, good move on the part of Ruby, as people were chanting her name long before the countdown for the Joker card began, so hopefully, she gets a nice good run out of this.
There was a Jericho countdown clock to open the next match and then we got Jericho's Last Match on the Khan-Tron - for lack of a better term - which brings out MJF in a rob. That was a good rib. Then one of the Fozzy guitarists plays Jericho's music while the crowd sings the lyrics, which is a unique entrance.
So the match between Jericho and MJF is fine until the run-in from Wardlow and Jake Hager allowing Max to hit Jericho with Floyd, followed by a Judas Effect for the pin... except Jericho's foot was on the ropes and ref Aubrey didn't see it. One of the other refs begins to inform Aubrey of her shitty reffing in noticing the leg, which prompts both of them to restart the match and that allows Jericho to beat MJF via liontamer submission. As such, Jericho doesn't have to retire to commentary... he could if he wanted to, but he doesn't have to. Fun match for what it was and while you could've gone either way with this, I'm glad to see Le Champion get a win over MJF. That's what you get for opening a shitty crypto-coin, you lousy bastard.
CM Punk defeated Darby Allin in his first professional wrestling match in seven years and didn't look like he missed a beat. Sure, he was tired at times, but he's tired all the time. In any case, I thought this was a really good match. Darby did his stuff and Punk kept up. Nice back and forth. And then Sting shows up to shake hands with Punk, who later extends a hand to Darby that gets accepted. This was all about Punk, but Darby got just as much shine out of this as well and from my vantage point, came off better in defeat than he would've been had he won. Punk needed the win here more. Darby will be just fine.
Paul Wight squashed QT Marshall in a short match. This was long enough to get the former Big Show to do all his stuff and kill QT at the end... though I question why this happened now rather than sooner. Are we doing buffer matches now?
AEW World Champion Kenny Omega defeated Christian Cage via top-rope one-winged angle to retain the title. Hell of a main event, even if the end result was never in doubt. Then the Elite showed up to beat up Christian, Jungle Boy and Luchasaurus come out to get beat up, Kenny runs his mouth, which brings out ADAM COLE to tease a confrontation with Kenny, but superkicks Jungle Boy, which then prompts BRYAN DANIELSON to come up out and he joins up with Christian and the Jurassic Boys to clear out the Elite and that's how you end a show,
So let me re-iterate what I said at the beginning; All Out was a fun show, very entertaining, and it got me excited for their Full Gear PPV in November. Watching this show a second time - which I rarely do - I can safely say that All Out is perhaps the best PPV I saw in the past ten years. All the matches were good to great, everybody busted their asses to put on good work, the pacing was smooth, there was never a moment where the show dragged, the commentary was spot on, and the pay offs were satisfying. And despite being a near four-hour show, I was able to sit through this one from beginning to end without ever missing a beat. I can't say that about a lot of wrestling shows.
And then you have the debuts. Ruby Soho got a great reaction and is off to a fine start. Adam Cole is back into the fold with the Elite. And then you got Bryan Danielson topping off the night, not missing a beat, and pretty much giving AEW a shot in the arm. When you combine these moments with what has been a sublime series of matches - and yes, I'm even counting the battle royale and PW vs QT matches - you've got the makings of a truly excellent professional wrestling show on the mainstream.
All Out lived up to its moniker. It went all out... and it delivered in spades.
Kudos.
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