9 Match Star Ratings For AEW Revolution 2021
6. Hikaru Shida Vs. Ryo Mizunami - AEW Women's Championship Match
Where the main card opener seemed to formulate the precise number of near-falls needed to create unreal drama without overdoing it, this match overdid it by the finish. The excess and the odd awkward moment could not however undermine the sheer effort and strength of the storytelling.
This was Hikaru Shida's best AEW performance, and what a perfect time to unleash it: deep amid calls for her to lose the Women's Championship to virtually anybody in the Eliminator tournament. That tournament instead functioned to get her over as a doyen at long last.
It was her best performance because as creative a performer as she is, her strikes can often look faint. They...decidedly did not in this match. This was stiff - so stiff as to be wince-inducing at times - a match in which Shida, with a certain glee, revelled in the challenge of an ascendent monster who haunted her early years. This told the story of Shida abandoning her division ambassador role and proving herself worthy of the gold and the woman who deemed her too soft to carry it. She sold this new side of herself as if she had been desperate to unleash it for a while, and it was thrilling - the perfect response to her tame effort opposite Nyla Rose at Full Gear.
Some of the bombs thrown here were more impressive than the show-closing fireworks, and those strikes were disturbing in the final third. And for that, of course, read: awesome.
Fire versus strength in a cracking if slightly repetitive war, those near-falls had the good manners to look convincing, at least. Shida looked like she'd imploded Mizunami's face at one point.
Star Rating: ★★★★