By Matt Klink (@klinkmatt)

August 31, 2019

This wasn’t free. This wasn’t a reminder that All Elite Wrestling exists. This wasn’t a charity event.

AEW All Out was the second MAJOR story driven show and is the last glimpse we’ll get before they go full-time on TNT (starting October 2nd). The Wednesday Night Wars will commence in October but it was clear this weekend that the WWE (and more accurate to the brand, NXT and NXT UK) and AEW will put up their dukes and get down to it (thanks Pat Benetar).

So how did AEW fair? Pretty good. Not amazing! Definitely not terrible. And to be honest, AEW didn’t even win the day (against NXT UK and their TakeOver event in Cardiff).

Lets dissect a few quick chunks that were amazing leaps in the right direction and some moves that can’t be forgotten (for the sake of improvement).

All Out Negative Takes

Production

This HAS to take a step up. No more long waits for replays. No more Excalibur hemming and hawing through a simple match call. No more foibles in the graphics. No more crappy entrance videos. AND NO MORE MISSED SPOTS ON A LIVE BROADCAST I SPENT $60 ON!

If you didn’t notice the missed spots, it was poor angles and untimely camera changes that resulted in missing MAJOR aerial attacks. Maybe you hate “Spot Fests”, but there is no way to redeem missing the spots altogether.

That’s the easy stuff for AEW to fix and ultimately we should be looking for better wrestling and performances rather than production. So I’ll leave it at that and give AEW the benefit of the doubt that this will be fixed with more practice.

Old Guys

I’m fine with never seeing Arn Anderson again, but there he was. Landing his finisher, the Spine Buster, on Shawn Spears was cute, but it shouldn’t be a highlight we hold near and dear to our hearts.

Instead, the moment should have been a spectacular stunt by Cody Rhodes (who is feuding with Spears) or Spears himself. Giving the big moment to Arn feels more like giving a dog the bone compared to hunkering down and being creative with your finish.

Helping Spears in the same match was Tully Blanchard. Yup, the same Tully Blanchard who obviously is more than familiar with Arn. Tully even hinted at a future story because of his perplexed and contorted look he had, watching Anderson waddle away.

Tully wasn’t the problem, so don’t get me wrong. It’s just that this brand talks about being something new and different and seeing Arn Anderson roll down the ramp is old WWE hack.

Don’t rely on hack material to get you through the night. Get your talent over. Get your wrestling over. Then you’ll get your brand over.

Booking

Speaking of Cody and Spears…why isn’t Spears winning this match?

As the brand of AEW starts to grow, the roster will be in need of creating new stars. Like the kind of stars that jump ship from their old boss (VKM) to work with a cool new boss (Cody Rhodes). Kinda like…I dunno…half of the viewers of AEW that are looking for the same fresh start as Spears.

Spears is the heel, I know…but he should have been the victor in this match. Cody is made and he’s at the point now where his involvement helps build the names around him. Build those names to greater heights and his championship reigns in the future can mean more when he defeats more worthy opponents. Opposed to just knocking down no-name after no-name.

And yes, this is a different situation, when comparing it to Jericho and the AEW Heavyweight Championship, if only because that title was on the line and Hangman was the opponent. But more on that later.

First Half of the Card

Take Out Pac and Kenny Omega and the first half of the Pay-Per-View would be found on the Kickoff Show of any WWE programming. Maybe not even there when you consider the fun matches 205 Live gives us and the odd New Day placement.

I’ve struggled to even remember who won what match, which should not be the case. Whether it was because the matches were forgettable or the wrestlers themselves weren’t given the proper stage.

Taking a step backwards into my last point (of letting Spears win to build the roster), AEW is in desperate need of better stories to create interest. A lot of these performers will do better to tell us who they are once October rolls around. That being said, maybe cut the card a bit so this doesn’t become a problem.

How does NXT UK solve the problem of not having a load of superstars at their disposal? They make a shorter card and provide more realistic match lengths. Heck, NXT (Classic) has been doing that since their first TakeOver event. And every single TakeOver event is uber watchable (meaning I don’t look for bathroom break matches or run into wrestling exhaustion.) So maybe pivot away from quantity and inch closer to quality.

All Out was a long Show. And a lot of these matches went 5 minutes (at least) too long.

Positives from AEW All Out

Tag Team Wrestling

With LAX joining the ranks, AEW has cornered the market on modern tag team wrestling.

The Young Bucks and Lucha Bros gave us an amazing ladder match (that got a twinge gimmicky with the matching spot maneuvers). That would’ve been fine and dandy. But with LAX crashing that celebration of Tag Teams, we were shown how important it is to keep that ball rolling. They couldn’t just hope for the Young Bucks to make it all work, they had to make a bold move that cemented the talent level and got their fan base more excited.

On top of that, a brand with zero tag titles was able to triple up the amount of tag matches the WWE serves up on a monthly basis. They weren’t all great, but we got some kooky gimmicks, good technical styles, some lucha tagging AND WE HAD OUR FIRST HEEL ESTABLISHED!!!! Yay!

Major strides can still be made, but tag team wrestling is a priority for AEW and we should be thrilled that some brand cares about it.

Jericho winning the AEW Heavyweight Championship

It would be hypocritical for me to complain about Hangman Page being in the main event. His involvement was a great way to keep the rest of the “Elite” to stay occupied and far away from the title belt, but it also helped establish another main event contender (as I mentioned previously, should be a top priority).

PLUS! Hangman didn’t win!

Why is that good? Well…Page did not have a perfect match. Nothing has to be perfect, but I think I can demand a bit more from my event performers in a show I threw $60 at. Dropping Jericho twice and repeating the same Buck Shot Lariat 4(?) times was enough for me to hope he would lose.

And again, he did!

Chris Jericho can now reign as the Heavyweight Champ and hold the rest of the roster at arms length from the gold plated sweetness. The rest of the roster can pursue this jerk (that I love) and Chris can continue to prove that he can anger a crowd no matter where he goes to wrestle.

And trust me, the chase is much better than the triumphant heel. Especially in a brand new company. It’s easier to write and AEW needs that while they work to expand their roster.

And…I mean…come on? It’s Chris Jericho!

Some Story

There wasn’t much to talk about in regards to story going in, but we have some story coming out!

Jack Evans and Angelico made a devilish move! We have Women’s Championship number one contenders! Kenny Omega appears stuck in a rut. LAX has some answering to do!

All great things that will get me to ensure I’m gonna have a tough decision to make on Wednesdays!

Moving on for AEW

AEW has some work to do with their Women’s division (come on…don’t deny it) and they need some names beyond “The Elite” that can hold a title, and the big moments of PPV’s can’t be Arn Anderson and LAX next time.

And I know some of the easy retorts to any of my negative comments could come back to the WWE falling under similar traps (too long of shows, bad stories, too many old guys), but I think that’s what we all want less of.

We have seen improvements over the last several months. I wanted AEW to stop mentioning the WWE: they did. We needed a strong main event: It had a big fight feel. Now that I want a bigger/more reliable roster…I figure they know they need that too.

The best thought I’ve had since the show finished? That I’m excited for October 2nd and I’ll be tuned to TNT.