4 Ups & 5 Downs From AEW Dynamite (July 26 - Review)

Ups...

4. Very Good Opener (If Too Ambitious)

Orange Cassidy and AR Fox missed the peak by a couple of minutes.

The match had to go slightly longer than the 10 minute undercard back and forth most expected, since the story demanded it. In a plot twist that made a degree of sense of his repeated title shots in spite of a terrible win/loss record, Fox had to over-deliver and unexpectedly take Orange to his limit to get the heel turn over. It had to feel like Fox was never going to get a better opportunity or come closer for the journeyman veteran to snap, but the fans drifted out of the match two minutes or so before the finish.

They weren't to know the post-match angle, obviously, so for the last drawn-out stretch, they just didn't take the challenger seriously. The action was very good before the false finishes began to loop.

Both men deceived the other with their distinctive attack patterns, creating a unique back and forth and decent level of drama. In one excellent spot in particular, Fox flattened Cassidy with a step-up moonsault to the outside. In a cute detail, Cassidy was caught unaware to an extent that he literally walked into it.

In the post-match, Fox snapped, broke the pair of sunglasses gifted to him and beat up Orange before, in a frankly piss-poor spot of acting, expressing remorse. Darby Allin, who Fox had taken in as a young and homeless aspiring wrestler, emerged on the scene to remonstrate with him.

This angle - hardly Wembley-sized - was to be continued...