8 Match Star Ratings For AEW Full Gear 2023
3. Swerve Strickland Vs. Hangman Page - Texas Death Match
Hangman Page Vs. Swerve Strickland was, quite possibly, the most violent match in the history of North American mainstream wrestling.
It was nothing without its crucial tone and incredible sense of artistry.
It was a true Death Match, as conveyed by two instantly iconic moments of character work. Hangman Page, with his one of a kind creativity, revealed his motivation for the match. He stapled his child's finger painting into Swerve's face before opening a hole in his head. Page then drank the blood from the pouring wound, signalling his intention to kill his fellow man. In response - and this was unqualified genius, since it was so easy to look corny and unconvincing - Swerve took the staple gun to himself with eerie, head has gone body language.
The tone was set: this was a man ready to kill versus a man who refused to die.
The commitment to the violence was unbelievable. When Swerve propped a barbed wire chair between turnbuckles, Page sprinted into that thing with a diving header like the goal was open.
This was almost destined to be a classic. Even when it went "wrong", fate conspired to get it right. Deep in the match, Swerve - with a deadly facial expression in a match that was beyond immersive with its approach to character - swing a barbed-wire chair at Page's back. A stray link flew over Page's face. It looked like Page was flossing his teeth with barbed wire. It looked incredible.
In another moment, Swerve draped a rather bendy piece of wood, draped with barbed wire, across two chairs. It looked like a diminished return from the plunder deployed elsewhere - but Page dropped Swerve with such an insane flipping fallaway slam that it was destroyed on impact.
God, this was just deranged, Swerve might well have broken the Muta scale, and was clever enough to pour a bottle over his drenched face to create a waterfall effect. It looked revolting. It looked like he might actually die.
It was vile filth. Swerve executed a piledriver on the thin, sharp edge of the railing. In a moment that initially evoked a feeling of cynicism, Swerve draped a cinder block on the apron. Eurgh, not a cinder block, the sort that crumble on impact in WWE. Nope - Page just took a Death Valley driver on a brick.
Describe every sensation you've ever felt when watching a match like this - awe, fear, revulsion, excitement, disgust - and, to paraphrase Irvine Welsh, multiply it by 1000 and you're still nowhere close.
Swerve won by hanging Page with a chain after hitting him with the cinder block amid excessive interference from Brian Cage and Prince Nana. That, and the fact that it all went a bit long, rendered it less than perfect - but it was somehow better than perfect at its peak, so...
Star Rating: ★★★★★