13 Match Star Ratings For AEW Double Or Nothing 2022
3. Anarchy In The Arena
Iconic, creative, authentic, wild violence.
This was crafted with such loving detail, but its greatest accomplishment is that it didn't feel remotely crafted. It felt unhinged, and real, and like the production was fortunate to capture the blood-drenched chaos of it all.
It started with Wild Thing playing on a loop over the PA in a neat ECW tribute, and in a great, characterful moment, Chris Jericho severed the sound. That he would show such hypocritical disdain for a song overstaying its welcome was terrific, deluded heel work. There were overtly fun moments early - it was best described as a Memphis territory x Dramatic Dream Team fight - before it evolved into a uniquely AEW plunder brawl worked and filmed with the promotion's unparalleled excellence. The image of a bloody Eddie Kingston looking somehow authentically murderous as he stalked the aisle with a gas can was iconic. That cinematic visual could have sold a sh*t-load of magazine covers in a bygone halcyon age.
The various, ultra-violent spots were superb - piledrivers onto steel steps, plunges through barbed wire tables, splashes launched from ladders - but the way in which it captured a fight falling apart was more impressive than any of the crazed stunts. Kingston and Garcia's intense, hateful backstage brawl embodied the carnage to perfection. The super-dramatic finishing sequence boasted one of the closest near-falls you're ever likely to see.
Even a not ideal sequence simply worked in a match that had no right to click as well as it did. Sports entertainment aficionado Chris Jericho stupidly attempted to apply the Liontamer to Jon Moxley on a flimsy compressed sawdust table.
It inevitably collapsed, but it scanned nonetheless as a WWE parody spot and thus worked beautifully in the context of the philosophical battle dynamic, even if it was an accident.
Star Rating: ★★★★¾