AEW Dynamite
April 5th, 2023
Long Island, New York
AEW World Champion: MJF (since 11/19/22)
AEW World Tag Team Champions: The Gunn Club (since 2/8/23)
AEW Women’s World Champion: Jamie Hayter (since 11/19/22)
AEW TNT Champion: Powerhouse Hobbs (since 3/8/23)
AEW International Champion: Orange Cassidy (since 10/12/22)
AEW TBS Champion: Jade Cargill (since 1/5/22)
Commentators - Excalibur, Tony Schiavone, & Taz
1) Juice Robinson vs. Ricky Starks
I’m gonna be completely honest, I saw that this was up first and continued working on some music, only to turn around and see Jay White in the damn ring helping Juice assault Starks. Everyone knows I’m drained on anything Bullet Club related and Juice in AEW does nothing for me, and I’m top of that I’m not necessarily a massive Jay White fan. HOWEVER, a surprise Jay White debut instead of a 12 minute Juice match on dynamite? I’ll get riled up over that. Awesome, unique way to start the show that definitely breaks the formula that AEW normally uses. Jay & Juice too sweet and commentators are openly referring to this as Bullet Club which is interesting to me considering White is no longer under contract to NJPW and neither is Juice.
Backstage, Chris Jericho has an interview about Adam Cole. Keith Lee walks up and says he’s had battles with Adam Cole in the past, but he has respect for him. Jericho doesn’t and he challenges him to a match next week to teach him a lesson in respect.
2) House of Black (Malakai Black, Brody King, & Buddy Matthews) (c) (w/ Julia Hart) vs. Best Friends (Orange Cassidy, Chuck Taylor, & Trent?) - AEW Trios Title Match
Decent little match here. They don’t run too long and we get signature OC/Best Friends stuff which Dynamite wouldn’t feel the same without. These two teams on paper are the perfect foil for one another gimmick wise. In ring, it’s fine. They run through stuff, the best part for me is Brody King. The way they built toward Trent hitting a piledriver on him was great. Buddy pins Chuck in the end to retain.
Match rating - **3/4
In a pre-tape, Christian Cage is staring at us as Luchasaurus walks up out of some smoke with some crazy new mask on.
3) Jamie Hayter (c) (w/ Britt Baker) vs. Riho - AEW Women’s World Championship Match
This will always be a great match. Jamie is the best women’s wrestler in the world and Riho is the Rey Mysterio of AEW. Everyone loves her and she’s phenomenal fighting from underneath, especially against a brute like Jamie. It was a little tough because both women are babyface now, but it was still a very good back & forth match and easily the best match on this show. Jamie retains after a couple of ripcord lariats.
Match rating - ***1/2
The Outcasts are backstage after Jamie’s celebration. Ruby Soho says that she better not get too comfortable with that title because one of the three is coming for it soon. Saraya plugs their shirt and Renee sends it back to the ring.
BACK ON THE STAGE AND MATT MENARD & ANGELO PARKER ARE HERE. After we find out what makes Daddy Magic’s nipples hard, The Acclaimed interrupts. Amazing reaction for them. Ang & Menard are still trying to get The Acclaimed to join JAS so they got them an 8 man tag together for Rampage. They do the scissor me bit and yeahhhh!
It’s MJF DAY. They show clips of him earlier in the day getting the key to Long Island. We cut back to the arena and MJF comes out and does a full fledged performance with a band backing him. I thought we were gonna get out easy and only get singing from him instead of a long winded promo, but I was wrong. The singing was lowkey so much better. He tells a story about some teacher who doubted his wrestling dream and calls her a stupid bitch. He says any kid out there watching should know they can do anything in life if they work hard, but the one thing no one can do is be MJF. On his way back up the ramp, Jungle Boy is disguised as a member of the band. He attacks MJF and they get pulled apart as Sammy Guevara comes out for the next match.
4) Sammy Guevara vs. Komander
Guevara poses with MJF’s World Championship at the top of the ramp before coming to the ring. He’s coming off a victory over Konosuke Takeshita on Rampage. An unfortunate occurrence followed by another unfortunate occurrence here as he defeats Komander in a match that was very much a Sammy match. They do stuff, most of it doesn’t make sense, but Komander isn’t able to fully go off so it’s less fun than most of his matches as this is more about him bumping around for Guevara. Darby Allin is in the rafters looking on and the cameras show him. They’re hyping up this pillars four way very well, even though I’m not sold on it as a PPV main event level match. Guevara wins with his finisher thing.
Match rating - **1/2
4) HOOK vs. Ethan Page (w/ Matt Hardy) - FTW Title Match
HOOK is HOOK and is cool. He retains in under two minutes and for some reason they are running this back again on Rampage on Friday.
Backstage or in a pre-tape, Nigel McGuinness & Tony Khan with some help from Adam Cole announce the return of All In with AEW’s debut in the UK at WEMBLEY FUCKING STADIUM ON AUGUST 27th. Unbelievable.
5) Jon Moxley, Claudio Castagnoli, & Wheeler Yuta (w/ Bryan Danielson) vs. SOME JOBBERS
Minute or so long squash and it rocks. BCC stands tall and Danielson cuts a promo on why he realigned with BCC and how much he loves each of his stablemates.. even Yuta who is in his words “a little shit” .. Danielson goes on to say there are no other real professionals in AEW and no other real wrestlers in the building besides them. HANGMAN PAGE COMES DOWN TO CHALLENGE THIS AND GOES RIGHT INTO THE FIRING SQUAD. Mox, Claudio, & Yuta beat him down. Danielson screams that he’s an amateur. Danielson says he has no friends and is not a pro wrestler. God damn this rules. Danielson then pulls out a screwdriver and jams it into the face/eye of Page. Crazy ass segment and this heel BCC run continues to deliver.
6) The Gunn Club (c) vs. FTR - AEW World Tag Team Title Match
This was just a bad.. bad match. Thank god the Gunn’s title reign is over and thank god FTR finally has those titles back, but good grief, this sucked. FTR gave them way more than they deserved. I was unable to bite on any of the nearfalls. It just felt clunky and full of good ideas with bad, not smooth execution. Whatever. It’s over. FTR wins like we all hoped and assumed. Get the Gunn’s off my tv for the next.. however long. FTR celebrates to close the show and are joined by Mark Briscoe <3
Match rating - *3/4
