10 Things You Only Learn Attending AEW LIVE

5. Hopefully You Won't Need A Piss

House Of Black
AEW

This one is obvious enough watching through TV, but you can pause the TV. You can pay little attention to the TV, if there's a match you don't care much about, and check your phone, make a cup of coffee, flick through the channels. When you are there, watching everything, it really becomes clear just how little downtime there is between the matches, promos and angles.

It is a relentless experience. This is both feature and bug. The energy, even if it isn't as charged as it used to be, is relentless. You do not get bored during a Dynamite taping. The two hours race by like Fénix running on the top rope. It's over in, yes, a flash of light.

But nothing registers as much as it could if AEW just slightly dialled it back. In the wins and losses promotion, the results don't linger. Little is celebrated or mourned. The wrestlers sprint to the back revealing, in the process, that this is a show. It can feel a bit more fake and without meaning than it should when time cues are more important than the effect a storyline development has on a character.

If you need a piss, word to the wise: make your apologises to the people on the row next to you as soon as a match finishes, because if you don't shake it off in time, you will miss something.

Contributor
Contributor

Michael Sidgwick is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over seven years of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by former AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and current Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!