4 Ups & 6 Downs From AEW Rampage (Nov 11)

Malakai Black is reborn; AEW sets up Full Gear matches; Tony Khan needs a chat with TNT!

by Jamie Kennedy
Jungle Boy Christian Cage
AEW

Rampage should be a condensed version of Dynamite every week.

The Friday night show needs to become more of a complement to the flagship rather than some standalone 'B' broadcast that lazily recaps some ongoing storylines via video packages. That's fine every now and then, but it's also a bit of a wasted opportunity to push things along and isn't going to grow the Rampage audience.

Tony Khan got some things right and some things wrong with this episode, but the AEW boss did try to keep some major stuff back for Friday. Seeing a marquee bout for Full Gear get laid out and announced on Rampage was awesome, and so was yet another tease for the rebirth of one Malakai Black.

On the downside, familiar problems keep popping up and stopping the weekly from focusing on a core strength of All Elite: ACTUAL PRO WRESTLING. Those picture-in-picture ad breaks are a regular pain in the t*ts, and it's on TK to find a solution here that satisfies both advertisers/the network and viewers.

Here's all the good and bad from a show that was definitely newsworthy, but lacked in some key areas.

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Lifelong wrestling, video game, music and sports obsessive who has been writing about his passions since childhood. Jamie started writing for WhatCulture in 2013, and has contributed thousands of articles and YouTube videos since then. He cut his teeth penning published pieces for top UK and European wrestling read Fighting Spirit Magazine (FSM), and also has extensive experience working within the wrestling biz as a manager and commentator for promotions like ICW on WWE Network and WCPW/Defiant since 2010. Further, Jamie also hosted the old Ministry Of Slam podcast, and has interviewed everyone from Steve Austin and Shawn Michaels to Bret Hart and Trish Stratus.