Every AEW Title Reign Ranked From Worst To Best
7. Hikaru Shida - Women's Title
To what extent can AEW be excused for its hardly committed approach to women's wrestling?
Incredibly, since the recognised global leader in sports entertainment only stopped objectifying women five years ago, there is in the US a dearth of female talent proportionate to the men who were always booked and booked far more prominently. Booked, too, in the inter-gender boom that, irrespective of where one stands on a complex issue, was certainly used by some promoters to shoehorn a man into a women's match. There is much talent in that all but frozen U.S. indy scene, but that talent is not TV ready.
Some adapt quicker than others - the AEW men's undercard is very uneven in that regard - and much of the best and most experienced talents were signed by WWE amid panic of its lax grip on the monopoly.
The division and the discourse surrounding it is not so much a mess as a toxic f*cking dump, at this point; in virtually any field, structures are in place to not overwhelm the inexperienced. Training schemes. Academies. Courses. When AEW does it, in the Deadly Draw or on Dark, it's considered an insult.
Criticised in a vacuum, in the narrower context of the fiction, it's not good enough: Shida gets infinitesimal TV time, and it would be very generous to state that a rivalry with Nyla Rose is "simmering". It's the next big match, but we know this not through a story but by process of elimination.
Shida's title win was great - a gutsy, physical war that made thrilling use of the Double Or Nothing set - as was her only major defence opposite Penelope Ford. That match was creative and snug and crackled with personality and electricity alike.
AEW has had nearly three months to manufacture a rivalry between Shida and a major heel threat - and they are more than capable of overlapping stories, so this could have been achieved while also booking Shida Vs. Ford at Fyter Fest - but they haven't.