10 AEW Moments You Totally Don't Remember
9. The Dark Order Recruit Alex Reynolds Via TV Set
Crackers to watch back now, considering the Dark Order - and this is still crackers to write now - are actually good, AEW didn't know what the Dark Order actually was in 2019.
"They are spooky and maybe have powers because they can turn the lights out, but Chris Jericho can too so that's weird" wasn't a particularly great opening pitch. The promotion soon pivoted to a Scientology-adjacent repackage bang in the midst of a booking committee era in which certain internal rules were broken. This loose approach enabled the use of the dreaded invisible camera in a strange and decidedly un-Elite segment that nonetheless, to be both kind and fair, also made use the of rankings system.
The Beaver Boys, jobbers in AEW's early phase, were naturally preyed upon by the Dark Order. Idea good, execution criminal: they were recruited through a magical television set on the December 11 Dynamite. Or perhaps the Dark Order themselves were supernatural, which was strange, since they could have used mind control to actually win professional wrestling matches in the professional wrestling promotion.
The Dark Order, somehow, are great now - Mr. Brodie Lee's genuinely terrifying and funny conniption fits function to inspire genuine intimidation - and all's well that ends well.