5 Ups & 4 Downs From AEW Dynamite (January 31 - Results & Review)

1. A Strong Sit-Down

In the high point of the show, Darby Allin and Sting and Ricky Starks and Big Bill sat down to promote their match next week. This was excellent, even if the dialogue was very much in that pro wrestling mode of exposition. It's never subtle is it, this "I'm laying out our history for the benefit of the audience we don't trust to remember" stuff.

Boil it all down, and a conversation in wrestling rarely feels natural. Some are just better at it than others, and this was bloody good. Darby accused Ricky of using AEW as a stepping stone, using that as additional motivation to take the tag team titles from him. Sting looked Big Bill up and down and questioned whether or not he's a killer. They did a very good job of building the tension and making it feel as though it could combust, not that it would purely because that's how these things go. The frustratingly uneven Starks was absolutely superb here.

Sometimes too aloof, he was dialled-in emotionally. This was the right kind of awkward, and when he stopped himself from dropping an F-bomb, after Darby excused him of being an excuse merchant, you could believe it. On that, though: it's a bit weird how Darby, sometimes guilty of worked shoot b*llocks, went after Ricky's rep as the guy forever on the cusp of success. In the fictional world of AEW, as Tag Team champion, he's literally on top of the world. Again, this feels endemic to wrestling, something that is done without pause to consider that it shouldn't be. The lines are too blurred to see the old point.

Sting held Darby back and built the match as a serious deal with his low, well-earned gravitas before quietly retreating, leaving fans wanting for the confrontation like the old master he is. A really well-paced bit of business, this is a simple tap-in of a formula, provided the wrestler is gifted enough at promos - and since the roster is vastly under-utilised in that regard, it should be the norm. More in-ring promos wouldn't go amiss, either.

Build an Okerlund position!