The Wrestling Thread: AEW Dynasty

[KK]

I always thought Ray Charles at WrestleMania 2 was the best rendition of America the Beautiful, but that was a good one by…whoever these two are.

…and here comes the return of Stephanie McMahon! She’s looking more and more like Dixie Carter.

And now Drew McIntyre coming out momentarily to Rowdy Piper’s old entrance theme which I’m not going to pretend to know the name of.

[Cosmo]

strawberry floating hell, I just semi-jokingly said to my brother that McIntyre would hit a Claymore and win in seconds.

[KK]

I saw online yesterday someone call Samantha Irvin the Aubrey Edwards of WWE. I think that was an insult.

One thing you can’t help but notice (and that I totally didn’t at the time) is that when you go back to the early years and listen to Lilian Garcia, is just how appalling she was when she first started and how completely different (i.e better) she was by the time she retired.

[Cosmo]

I think Irvin tries too hard, though, which wasn’t the case with Garcia.

[KK]

Irvin can come across like she’s announcing while taking a particularly difficult dump.

I have to say, the way they now go from kayfabe to ‘this is all fake, watch the documentary or interview’ is very jarring. It’s not like there’s even a distinction anymore, they just flit between the two.

What’s Blubba Ray Dudley and his podcast doing here, can barely even get up the turnbuckle.

Snoop Dog on commentary is already a riot. Fits in like a glove with the modern phenomenon of the main commentary teams on both WWE RAW and AEW Dynamite being all jokes.

[KK]

Karrion Kross, jobber to the stars.

An entertaining mess all round, that was.

I wonder when CM Punk is going to be cleared, though they’ve now got multiple potential matches on the cards for the next few months with Drew, Punk, Rollins and Priest. I think Saudi Arabia is up shortly, as is Backlash from France.

Cole: this is the biggest match in LA Knight’s career.

He literally faced Reigns for the WWE title in November.

Followed up by Pat McAfee with: do they say “yeah” in England?

[KK]

Vince McMahon's personal trainer, Michael A. Monteforte, has been posting on his Instagram today/ tonight:

Vince McMahon was unable to attend his first WrestleMania. How quickly people forget, that without his vision, there would be no Wrestling or WrestleMania. Sadly, when a person is down, the people who say they love you, turn their backs on you.

Don’t judge a Man, without getting all the facts. Things aren’t always as they appear.

[in response to someone else] You are probably a good dude, but in this particular case, “sex trafficking “ was used as a catch phrase… sad that something that serious would be used, for her own gains… if these allegations were true, why isn’t she pressing charges? She knows that her texts & everything she is about would be revealed, so she is going for the $$$ , everything she has intended to do, since setting her sights on Mr. McMahon…

I will never feel bad, because I know the truth in real time, You may feel like you are defending an innocent victim, but you should look into her past, all her life she has been a predator for men with $$, & if she was to reveal her reply to those texts, as she conveniently left out, you would see that she is far from innocent and any victim… actually the aggressor… it’s easy to believe, something that you hope would be true… just like the love letter, there is more coming out

…Assholes like you have no clue, Judging without having any proof…she claims many things, but she never reveals her reply to texts , because people would no longer view her as a victim, look into her past, this is how she lives, being a predator on men with $$

Wonder if Vince is actually watching, seething and bitter.

Crowd seems a lot livelier tonight. Maybe it’s partly down to the better weather.

Bayley been smiling repeatedly during her match. Time to send for the man.

[Cosmo]

twitter.com/dmcintyrewwe/status/1777146217396392219

Man’s doing his beat ever work.

[KK]

The Starrcade 97, Unforgiven 01 happy ending. He finished the story!

I wonder what happened to Steve Austin. At a guess I’d say he was supposed to be in that Undertaker slot.

[sawyerpip]

The Starrcade 97, Unforgiven 01 happy ending. He finished the story!

I wonder what happened to Steve Austin. At a guess I’d say he was supposed to be in that Undertaker slot.

I wonder if they were worried about overshadowing the Cody win. Having that glass shatter, the entrance and Stone Cold going up against the Rock would take a lot of the headlines.

[Johnny Ryall]

Good stuff tonight all round

[ITSMILNER]

Should have had Damien Priest cash in against Cody right at the end, could have automatically been one of the biggest heels of all time

[Return_of_the_STAR]

Without a doubt one of the greatest wrestlemania's of all time. Amazing, well done everyone.

I really expected Austin and not Taker but he that made for a great surprise.

Although it was obvious before the weekend that Drew would win and have Damian cash in on him I thought they pulled it off really well.

[Return_of_the_STAR]

twitter.com/BrandonThurston/status/1777308839492136974

Wow, Vince is pretty much gone now after another share sale. It's a shame he hasn't just handed his shares over to Steph and Shane just to keep the McMahon's with a significant shareholding (yea I know they already have their own small holdings). He doesn't need the money. What on earth is he going to do with this money other than try to prevent any cases from getting to court before he dies maybe?

[Prototype]

I absolutely loved everything about the main event.

Drew wins at Mania
Damian cashes in
Drew wins it back in Glagow

#ProtoPredicts

[Mafro]

I absolutely loved everything about the main event.

Drew wins at Mania
Damian cashes in
Drew wins it back in Glagow

#ProtoPredicts

[Cumberdanes]

Just read that Sabu no showed his Indie Wrestling Hall of Fame induction despite being present at the venue at the time of the show. Seems he took the booking and the pay but didn’t turn up.

Brett Lauderdale of GCE said,

"In the true spirit of independent wrestling, Sabu has decided to keep his deposit and no show the indie hall of fame ceremony today. He accepted the booking and took the money, but doesn’t wanna get in the elevator and come upstairs… What a legend"

[Cuttooth]

Night 1 of WrestleMania was quite so-so I felt, especially the middle three matches. I just couldn’t really take the Usos fight as being this dramatic brother vs brother blood feud that seriously when Dude Wipes is emblazoned over the ring apron and barricades. It also generally didn’t have the oomph you’d expect from a Mania, maybe because there was so much sponsorship and they kept the crowd quite dark for most of the night, which they seemed to rectify for the second night.

The Women’s World, Tag Team ladder, IC, and main event matches were all really good though.

Night 2 was something special and, recency bias aside, might be the best single WrestleMania event that I’ve watched around the time of the PPV taking place.

Rhodes vs. Reigns was a mess in the best way possible. It would have been perfect if Austin could have made an appearance but what we got was good enough.

[Return_of_the_STAR]

twitter.com/wrestletalk_tv/status/1778169869441077616

Anyone else feel that Tony Khan might be a little bit odd

[ITSMILNER]

Not really sure why AEW chose to show this footage tbh, don’t know what sort of reaction they expect from it they have uploaded this segment to the AEW YouTube channel minus the All In footage



Also, Will Ospreay taking a shot back at HHH’s comments