The Official AEW Discussion Thread

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Hello, I am Jeronimoe. You might remember me as a writer of Takada and UWFi story thread.
Today the event I will write about is not historical event, but a modern one.

It is none other than AEW All Out. If you think you are a huge fan of current WWE,
this analysis might make you little uncomfortable, because there are a lot of comparison
and criticism on current WWE in this thread.

Personally I don't consider myself as a biased, and I think it is natural thing to criticize current WWE as a wrestling historian because
they are obviously making many mistakes now, but everybody has different opinion. So if you think you will get offended, you can press 'go back' button.



First match was the gimmick match between Big Swole and Britt Baker.

It had an interesting finish, and what I found more interesting was that
AEW is always trying to create new gimmick matches.

Dusty Rhodes also did when he was in charge of JCP's creative team.
As you know, Dusty managed to create so many great gimmick match concepts, such as War Games.
Well-made gimmick matches brings uniqueness and more attention to a promotion.

WWE's royal rumble would be the perfect example. It started as another battle royal that not too important,
but because of it's unique appeal that nobody knows who will enter next, the match concept itself became a huge draw.

AEW already successfully made some few gimmick matches such as Casino Battle Royale and Stampede Stadium matches,
but creating more cool gimmick matches definitely boost the brand. So, it was obviously good choice.



Second match - Bucks VS Jurassic Express

Young Bucks are not only the best tag team in the world
but also one of the best workers individually too.

They have great in ring skill and amazing psychology as well,
heir matches always breaks standard of the best tag team matches ever.

Meltzer calls them as 'modern day Midnight Express', and it is very fair comparison.
Because both of them are the best tag team of their generation that broke the common sense of
tag team matches and opened a new horizon for tag team wrestling at the time.

Lucha Saurus(A gigantic man with a green dinosaur mask), AEW is utilizing well so far.
If it was Vince, Mcmahon would have given super push to right away because of his size and special agility,
but his heat would have gassed out not too long after because fans would get tired of him quickly.

But AEW didn't give him a super push even though he is very few big men that AEW currently has,
and it made fans still strongly behind him and make us expect to have more long term story line.



Lucha Saurus reminds me Bam Bam Bigelow, very big man with special agility in ring work.
Of course Lucha is more talented that Bigelow(It is obvious because so much time has passed since his days),
Lucha is even able to deliver maneuvers like standing moonsault.

Sadly Bam Bam loved to put other workers over and that made promoters stop giving him a push he deserved,
but AEW's creative team is pretty smart, so I believe much bigger opportunity is waiting for him in the future.
 



Next match was another gimmick match that created by AEW.

There were few things that captivated my eyes.



Rey Fenix is like young Rey Mysterio or Eddie Guerrero in 1990s.
Obviously one of the the best worker in his generation.

He is definitely a diamond. If he improves his English skill, and becomes a worker
that able to carry a segment or storyline, he can possibly become a trustable main eventer.

(Which he already is in Mexico. I heard he can even talk well and carry a segment in Spanish, but I don't know Spanish language.)



Another thing that I found interesting was, AEW is building many stables in their promotion.
Most of them are not American models, but rather Japanese type of stables.

There are huge difference between American stables and Japanese stables.

Usually American stables are for heels. They gathered and gang up on people
This rule applied from Fabulous Freebirds and Four Horsemen and still continues in this days.

But in Japan, stables are not soley for heels, and every member of roster is in at least one stable.
Each stable has different philosophy and different goal. All the stables competes each other to prove
their philosophy is better and they are the better group.

AEW has both American style stables and Japanese type stables.
The former are Inner Circle and Dark Order, and most of others are following Japanese model.
This is what I like about AEW, they always try to accept other world's best system and adopt it in themselves.

If history proved us one thing, that would be nothing is new in this world. Everything seems new is recreation of old ones.

There is very good example of it, that all of you would know.



Yes. The legendary nWo itself was not an original idea too. Eric Bischoff watched some of NJPW matches,
and earned good ideas from it. Because NJPW already made some of the best promotional war storylines at the time.

It is said that there are 3 historic storylines that gave direct motives to nWo storylines. 



In 1981, the top leading star of International Wrestling Enterprise (The third best wrestling company in Japan at the time, best known for bringing rookie Andre The Giant from Europe)
'Demon of the Steel Cage' Rusher Kimura appeared in NJPW ring. Crowd went insane when they saw him.
Because Kimura kept challenging Inoki for years after years. But Inoki always had one condition.

He will have a match only when NJPW hold the event and NJPW takes everything in charge.

Of course IWE's creative team refused that condition, so the match never happened in reality.
but after IWE folded, Kimura showed himself in NJPW ring for real, and announced
official 1:1 match challenged to Inoki. Of course Japanese crowd went nuts about it.



In 1986, even bigger star appeared in NJPW ring.

'Black haired Robespierre (Means that he is a revolutionist)' Akira Maeda showed himself on NJPW with his UWF army.
UWF was the hottest promotion in Japan at the time. They emphasized shoot aspect and demonstrated their pro wrestling as real shoot fighting.

Not only Akira Maeda was agile in the ring and his kicks were sharp, but his charisma and star appeal was insanely good.
If older and traditional generation supported Inoki, Younger generation supported Maeda.

Even though Inoki built himself as 'the world's best fighting champion' at the time by defeating Martial Artists,
Inoki knew Maeda is not only younger and bigger, but has very skilled kicks and well known for super hot temper.

So Inoki sent 'the best police man(A wrestler beats other wrestlers who does not obey the rules, for real)' at the time,
Andre The Giant to screw Maeda and beat him in the ring to make him look poor. But Maeda surprisingly knocked Andre down
with sharp kicks, and Andre forfeited the match.



And the most famous and direct motive of nWo is Nobuhiko Takada's challenge on NJPW in 1995.
But I will talk about this match later when I explain about women's title match in All Out.

Sorry for boring and long history lesson. lol XD

My point is, not only storyline, but true revolution is created
when bookers reinvented good old traits and tweaked them into their modern culture.

What AEW is doing these days are same. They accepted Japan's best systems and adopted it into new traits for western pro wrestling.

That's main difference between Cody & AEW's bookers and Vince & HHH.

Vince & HHH only stayed in USA. What they know is American pro wrestling and sports entertainment.
Even HHH, his knowledge is more broad than Vince, but it is limited to US indy promotions.



But Cody and Omega, they worked in Japan and Mexico as wrestlers and
managed to find out some of the best traits of the worldwide best promotions.

It's huge advantage. They have much more broad and open sight in pro wrestling.

I can even show you prove about it. When AEW is created, Cody and Omega tried to start
something complete new and different in USA. They adopted NJPW and AAA's best systems
and mixed them with Amercian hardcore fan's taste They managed to create some new good standard.

In the other hand, Vince's preparation for newly war was going back to the past.
He hired Eric Bischoff and Paul Heyman. It was because Monday Night War was
the most creative era in pro wrestling history in Mcmahon's knowledge.

Vince does not know or intentionally ignores the fact that pro wrestling is evolved strongly since then.

Maybe it is because Vince lived in monopoly for like 20 years, long enough years to stop reinventing himself.
He also got much older and became a senior citizen. All of these combined, Vince became out of touch.



One thing that captivated my eyes was Sonny Kiss's flamboyant gimmick.
I am a supporter of sexual diversities and I am very against ****phobic, but
in wrestling wise, I don't think he can ever get over.

Flamboyant gimmick worked well in conservative era. Gorgeous George was the best draw in his era
and he drew mega heat. Adrian Street from UK also managed to draw huge heat with flamboyant gimmick.

But key of success for this gimmick was, being a disgraceful gay in conservative era.



Gorgeous George and Adrian Street were all super heels that hated by people.
People wanted to see them get beat and lose. But time has passed, people's mind is changed.

General public no longer try to kill heel flamboyant gimmick wrestlers anymore
People became much more generous about sexual diversities and they get offended
when gay people are portrayed as a mockery.

In the other hand, flamboyant gimmick as a babyface never got over in pro wrestling history.

Orlando Jordan did bi-sexual gimmick in TNA but didn't get over. You might argue that Jordan was not charismatic enough.



Aron Rex, A.K.A Damien Sandow in WWE, tried to revive Gorgeous George gimmick in TNA.

It was right after TNA made 'Broken' Matt Hardy gimmick into a diamond.
So people didn't abandon hope on Aron's new gimmick.

But it failed miserably, even though Aron was amazingly charismatic and skilled very much at acting.

Crowd just don't know how to react to flamboyant gimmick in this era.
Maybe it is possible for Sonny to draw some decent reaction from indy shows,
but it is hard for me to imagine he becomes a main eventer in main stream promotion.

It is already pretty long post, so I will continue tomorrow. Thank you for reading very long post.
Btw, I will update my Takada and UWFi thread very soon as well.

Please look forward to these. Happy days, my friends!