7 Ups & 3 Downs From AEW Revolution 2024 (Results & Review)
1. One Of The Best Spectacles In Wrestling History
How do you improve upon perfection?
AEW managed it last night.
If there was one - one - problem with the perfect, magical AEW Sting run, it was that there wasn't a great deal of drama to it. And really, that wasn't a problem. Indeed, it was part of the magic: the invulnerable ageless badass always won in the end. It was reassuring. It was a great time. It was this sense of the hero always prevails that evoked the inner child within the millennial fanbase.
Sting's Last Match was dramatic. It was dramatic on a level that was utterly terrifying.
Sting's sons, dressed as Surfer and Wolfpac Sting, helped Sting and Darby Allin beat up the Young Bucks early with some endearingly sh*te Stinger splashes (this followed a wonderful hype video in which a conflicted, sullen Stinger watched a highlight reel of his career in an empty, lonely amphitheatre). This was just lovely. Maybe the match was going to be a feel-good greatest hits formality.
Nope. It evolved into a pulsating, absolutely batsh*t insane Death match with a capital 'D'.
After panes of glass were draped across the turnbuckles and over a collection of chairs underneath the biggest ladder you'll ever see, the Tornado tag sprawled to the set. Matthew Jackson suplexed Sting off it and through two tables. This terrifying spot was just the beginning of the show.
Matthew then saved Nicholas from Darby's ladder senton. Glass shattered everywhere. Darby's back turned red in one, disgusting instant. If this sort of spot can be justified, it allowed Darby to sell and sell and sell as the main act of the show played out in the middle of the ring.
The Bucks tried to kill Sting in a long, drawn-out, agonising overkill sequence. Ricky Steamboat and Ric Flair attempted to intervene. In two shocking, transgressive moments that only enhanced a tone of sheer insanity - they wanted you to think a line had been crossed and were very effective in doing so - they were each super-kicked in the head.
Sting took a powerbomb off a ladder and through a table and popped right back up. You may have roared in your living room at this point. You weren't alone. They redid the Forbidden Door Superkick party no-sell spot. Again, you went primal here.
The great thing about AEW Sting is that, as an old legend under the paint, when it flakes, he can resemble either the ageless hero or the 64 year-old man. Both emotional extremes are struck. The Bucks hit two EVP Triggers. Both near-falls were spellbinding. You thought Sting was finished and then realised he is never finished in the space of one heartbreaking, life-affirming minute. Every wrestler goes out on their back. Sting and the Bucks mined that mythical idea and the dramatic suspense for absolutely everything.
This was a match expertly designed to make you tremble "No, no, no" before making you dislocate your shoulder with a fist pump. It wasn't the greatest match of all-time, but it sure was the most perfect.
Sting won by hitting Matthew with the Scorpion Death Drop. The hero prevailed. If you're of a certain age, you might not have felt anything like it since adolescence.
Every single emotion was evoked to an ultra-intense degree. Fear, hope, resignation, shock, euphoria. This was a masterpiece.
Thank you, Sting.