AEW Dynamite Recap, Grades, & Opinion: August 22, 2020

AEW Dynamite Recap: August 22, 2020

AKA The One That Was On A Saturday

All Elite Wrestling Dynamite moved to Saturday this week due to the NBA playoffs, the same day as NXT Takeover XXX. The show featured a TNT Championship match between Cody and Mr Brodie Lee, as well as the women’s tag cup final between Ivelisse/Diamante and the Nightmare Sisters. AEW used the bulk of the show to build to later weeks rather than having multiple high profile matches. Matches like FTR vs Private Party, The Elite vs Dark Order, and Natural Nightmares/Jurassic Express vs Lucha Bros/Butcher and Blade all helped build to next weeks show. Also for tonight we’ll hear from Moxley and MJf, as well as see Darby Allin in action. Here’s how it all shook out.

Results:

• FTR def. Private Party via pinfall
• Natural Nightmares/Jurassic Express def. Lucha Bros/Butcher and Blade via pinfall
• The Elite(Kenny Omega, Young Bucks) def. Dark Order(3, 4, 5) via pinfall
• Darby Allin def. Will Hobbs via pinfall
• Women’s Tag Team Cup Tournament Final: Ivelisse/Diamante def. Nightmare Sisters via pinfall
• TNT Championship Match: Brodie Lee def. Cody via pinfall

Match of the Night: Elite vs Dark Order

The problem with having Dynamite up against a Takeover was that I was checking in and out of matches. With that being said, the Elite will hold my attention any day of the week. These six guys worked a much better match than I was expecting. There was a really weird chair shot that didn’t make much sense to me, but it didn’t take away from the match as a whole.

The match went almost exactly how you’d expect an AEW 6-man tag to go. 3, 4 and 5 did a good job of making themselves look like a threat, but everyone knew the Elite had this one in the bag. The standout part of the segment was what happened after the match. Kenny Omega brought a chair into the ring and was going to powerbomb a member of Dark Order onto it. The Bucks stopped him from doing it, but it continued the story of the Cleaner making his return. There’s a high chance the match wasn’t as good as I remembered and I only chose this because the storytelling with Omega was great.

Three Thoughts:

Mimosa Mayhem Match

Tonight Orange Cassidy was scheduled to have his first ever Dynamite interview with Tony. Cassidy was accompanied in the ring by Best Friends when Chris Jericho came out to interrupt the interview. Now there was one thing about this segment that was amazing and that was Jericho’s look. His hair looked like it hadn’t been washed in a week, he was drinking the bubbly. I loved hungover Jericho after losing to the guy who puts his hands in his pockets. Continuing on with the segment, Jericho announced the rubber match between him and Cassidy: the Mimosa Mayhem match. There will be an 80 gallon tank of bubbly and orange juice, and to win you have to either pin, submit, or throw your opponent in the tank (we all know how the match will end). The Inner Circle proceeded to waterboard Cassidy with bubbly.

I love Orange Cassidy. I recently acquired his new shirt. However, I’m so sick of this feud with Jericho. These last few months have overexposed him and less is more with Cassidy. I do like the idea of the Mimosa Mayhem match, but I hope this finally ends the saga.

MJF Suing Moxley

Both Jon Moxley and MJF gave promos tonight from backstage. While Moxley’s was good, nothing can compare to MJF’s announcement that he was suing Jon Moxley. Last week, Moxley hit the paradigm shift on MJF in the middle of the ring. This lead to a “neck injury” for MJF. He opened the promo by discussing how dictator Jon has put him in a neck brace and he won’t be able to play with his eventual children. The lawyer of MJF then started talking about how dangerous the double armed DDT was, stating that he had drawn up a contract that banned the move from the match.

This promo was amazing, which isn’t surprising because it’s MJF. I’m excited for their match at All Out and to see what they do in the next two weeks of TV before the PPV. They’ve both been killing it so far in the feud. Now to play a little fantasy booking. Jon Moxley mentioned his wife, Renee Young, in his promo on Dynamite. This could mean absolutely nothing, but with the news that Young is leaving WWE, I would love to see her get involved in this match. We’ve seen how Young did when Mox feuded with Miz a few years ago, leading to possibly one of the best moments of that year. I doubt it will happen, but I can hope.

New Champ

Welp. Cody got squashed. There isn’t much to say about the main event on Dynamite because it was pretty much a squash match. Brodie Lee won the title, which lead to a very dominating ending for the Dark Order. Cody got stretchered off after the match with Arn protecting him. Arn fought the Dark Order but that only lead to Cody ending up on the ground. The Dark Order brought Dustin and QT to the ring and laid out the Nightmare Family. Brandi of course came out to protect her husband. She is women after all and they won’t attack her. Brandi forgot about Anna Jay, however, leading to her getting chocked out. The Nightmare Family were out at ringside with the Dark Order standing tall.

This was awesome. I’ve been loving the Dark Order on Being the Elite and they finally got to do their big moment correctly. This was maybe the second or third time they’ve tried doing this but they hadn’t worked due to bad booking. Having Brodie destroy Cody and then his family was perfect booking. I’m very intrigued to see where it goes from here.

Grade: B

The show felt sort of lackluster tonight. I was expecting a very solid show going head to head with Takeover, but I ended up spending way more time watching that than I anticipated. I loved the build up throughout the night and am I excited to see where they go from here. The show truly felt like a build up show for next few weeks, including the title change. All of the tag matches lead up to the gauntlet match, Darby’s squash match leading to a match with Ricky Starks. A true build up episode if I’ve ever seen one.

One More Thing

Please never have it go head to head with a Takeover again. It crushed my soul to have to choose one over the other.