8 Ups & 2 Downs From AEW Dynamite: Fyter Fest Night 2 (Jul 8)

Wrestling, bloody hell.

by Michael Sidgwick
Orange Cassidy Fyter Fest
AEW

Night one of AEW Fyter Fest 2020 was fantastic.

MJF and Wardlow Vs. Jurassic Express was a symphony of a professional wrestling TV show segment. An electrifying match - a seamless hybrid of a banger and a hoss fight - it developed the legacy rivalry between MJF and Jungle Boy and elegantly furthered the tensions between the heel tandem. That legacy rivalry demands improvement and escalation with each beat to earn itself, and their work was even better than Double Or Nothing's undercard show-stealer.

With one incredible spot and an even more impressive match, Hikaru Shida and Penelope Ford battered, with the force of a lunging knee strike, the fading take that Kenny Omega doesn't know what he is doing. Cody Vs. Jake Hager was the best possible version of itself: an immaculately paced and told story of savvy vs. brute strength in which Cody fulfilled his own remit for the TNT Championship. This was a superb bell-to-bell performance. Santana and Ortiz Vs. Private Party, the lowlight of the show, was still a lot of fun.

Tony Khan again waved his baton throughout a main event segment that distilled the joy that is AEW Dynamite in 2020. The Best Friends' entrance was as hilarious as it was sweet, the closing stretch of the match was white hot, and the post-match angle was sumptuously deft. FTR cut a tag team in half, much less the ring, with a tremendous heel tactic at once clear in its intent and open to misinterpretation, furthering an intoxicating episodic storyline. Storylines plural, actually.

As for night two...?

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Contributor
Contributor

Michael Sidgwick is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over seven years of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by former AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and current Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!