Ranking Every Major Current Wrestling Storyline From Worst To Best
3. Sting & Darby Allin Vs. Team Taz
Flawed at times, this remains at its best an excellent, resourceful and sprawling saga that has rewarded, thrilled and terrified the hardcore AEW fan.
AEW has relied too often on Sting's mystique being strong enough to form an invisible wall. The familiarity of the blocking hasn't helped Team Taz get over as gang of assassins of late, but then, this week's Dynamite corrected that: they beat the f*cking sh*t out of some merch geeks and looked awesome in the process. This was an unreal heat segment. Brian Cage looked like a monster; Ricky Starks proved he's more than even an ace technician with an immaculate drip; Hook pulled off the vicious little punk role shockingly well, given his level of experience.
It's all informed with a rich history. Even when the angles aren't fire, the story is earned and thus convincing.
Taz tried all the way back in April 2020 to wisen Darby Allin up. Feeling patronised - Taz didn't do his research - Allin spurned the advice. You don't piss off a man very prone to anger, as Allin learned at Double Or Nothing. He was annihilated by Taz's new assassin, Brian Cage, who was shortly joined by Starks.
Those two singles matches were incredible. Allin and Starks had unreal chemistry laced with animosity; Allin and Cage worked an unreal dynamic perfected for Allin's role as the underdog.
Folding in the career-long connection between Allin and Cody Rhodes, and promoting the very promising Powerhouse Hobbs, the addition of Sting created a main event-level scope. Wrestling's vigilante had returned in December to level up to the bullies, and it will all culminate at Revolution in a cinematic Street Fight.
Given Allin's brilliance under the stip, and his filmmaking background, AEW may have spent the last year building (and enriching) his career highlight.