5 Ups & 5 Downs For AEW Collision (Dec 2 - Results & Review)

1. No Stakes Filler

AEW Collision El Hijo del Vikingo Kip Sabian
AEW

El Hijo del Vikingo is obviously one of the most athletic, impressive high-flyers in the world, and Kip Sabian is another personal favourite of your writer. And while their match on Collision was absolutely fine, it just felt a little lazy from Tony Khan.

Some have questioned Khan for how he has too much of a penchant for putting on matches just for the sake of putting on matches, with no storyline, no emotional investment, and no reason for an audience to care bar for the fact that, yes, the wrestling on display is good-to-great. With the Continental Classic, that in itself allows for contests to take place without any heated rivalries or prolonged stories at play; instead, what would be cold match-ups are justified under the banner of a tournament and the will to win said tourney.

On this week's AEW Collision, Claudio Castagnoli vs. Brody King, Abadon vs. Keira Hogan, Andrade El Idolo vs. Daniel Garcia, the Kingdom vs. Iron Savages, House of Black vs. Christopher Daniels & Matt Sydal, and Bryan Danielson vs. Eddie Kingston were all largely bouts that had no personal stakes to them and weren't part of some brewing rivalry. And that's fine, particularly when three of those contests took place as part of the Continental Classic.

With that in mind, though, did we really need the addition of a no stakes match between El Hijo del Vikingo and Kip Sabian? No, not at all. This served solely as filler designed to pop the crowd with a few high spots and also eat up one of Collision's picture-in-picture breaks.

To the surprise of nobody, Vikingo got the win after hitting his 630, but could this eight minutes of bell time have been used better elsewhere? Absolutely. Hey, maybe we could've got a second women's match or Kiera Hogan and Abadon could've got more than four minutes?

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Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks/Saints, Jamie Hayter, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is co-host of the Fearless in Devotion podcast, which won the Club Podcast of the Year gong at the 2024 FSA Awards.