6 Ups & 3 Downs From AEW Dynamite (21 June - Review)
1. Deft, Dovetailing Closing Angle
The build to Forbidden Door was not perfect, but peaked to an awesome extent.
MJF Vs. Hiroshi Tanahashi feels like a way to advance an ongoing AEW programme, in a middling echo of last year's build, but elsewhere, the show feels red-hot.
Will Ospreay and Don Callis are up to something, and knowing the level at which AEW operates, it can't be as simple as Callis interfering on Sunday. Their interaction felt like a smokescreen for something bigger. The Hung Bucks, Eddie Kingston and Tomohiro Ishii are set to take on The Blackpool Combat Club, Shota Umino and Konosuke Takeshita. The sheer depth of history between the characters and the stylistic range positions this match as the undercard show-stealer. Given 15 minutes, it could be out of this world.
And in a great closing angle, AEW built the 10-man tag and the Bryan Danielson Vs. Kazuchika Okada main event brilliantly. Eddie Kingston emerged to announce Tomohiro Ishii as the tenth man for his strange but brilliant association with the Hung Bucks. Jon Moxley interrupted for a tense and very compelling war of words. This was so good. Moxley isn't shy about talking. In fact, when he talks, he does everything he says he's going to do. Here, he couldn't bring himself to say something. Looking deep into Eddie's soul, he knows he has lost his way. Kingston reminded him and everybody else that his hatred of Claudio Castagnoli supersedes everything, and f*ck Mox for picking Claudio over him.
The other members of the Blackpool Combat Club arrived to beat Eddie and Ishii down, after which Okada made his entrance. This was un-f*cking-real. He was received as the megastar he is, the dream match with Danielson felt enormous - again, if there's ever a time to do a "Who's the best?" storyline, it's with these two guys - and the tease of the physicality was as gloriously simple as the premise. After Wheeler YUTA was hilariously wiped out, Okada went for the Rainmaker, Bryan ducked, and bailed.
He's a hypocrite, and when he gets his head bashed in, it will be a seminal moment. That's the expectation: a seminal match. It's a ridiculously tall order, but if everything goes right, Forbidden Door II will clear every other pay-per-vew like a skyscraper.