The SmarK Rant for AEW Dynamite – 08.19.26

The SmarK Rant for AEW Dynamite – 08.19.26

Live from Baltimore, MD

Your hosts are Excalibur, Tony Schiavone & Taz

Will Ospreay & Henare & Francesco Akira v. Lance Archer & Brian Cage & Rocky Romero

Gee I wonder who’s doing the job here? Will tries a rana on Cage and that goes badly for him, and it’s over to Rocky. The Empire double-teams him with an Akira senton off Will’s back for two, and Henare comes in for a Mean Guy Showdown with Archer. We get some MEAT SLAPPING ACTION and Henare hits him with a leg lariat, allowing the babyfaces to triple-team Lance for one. Akira gets caught in the heel corner and tossed across the ring by Archer to take over and we take a break. Back with Akira making a comeback on Cage with chops, but Cage cuts off a tag attempt with an elbowdrop. Henare gets the hot tag anyway and powerbombs Cage for two. Cage hits him with an Angle slam and it’s back to Archer for a running elbow in the corner, but Henare escapes the Blackout and deadlifts him into a german suplex. Archer with a black hole slam, but Henare makes a hot tag to Ospreay and he hits Cage with the corkscrew kick to set up more triple-teaming on the human tackling dummy that is Rocky Romero. Akira tries to beat on Archer and gets nowhere, so Henare hits him with a samoan drop instead. Ospreay with a poison rana on Cage and Akira hits Romero with a springboard cutter. They all get rid of Cage and Archer with dives on the floor, and Ospreay waits for Romero to do his stupid celebration and then hits him with the Hidden Blade and pins him at 11:00. Fantastic party match opener. ****

Meanwhile, Kazuchika Okada knows that family is the most important thing, whether the International champion is himself or Kyle Fletcher. And he expects Kyle to be happy for him if he wins the title as well.

Kyle Fletcher joins Tony in the ring to let us know that he trusts Don Callis with all his heart. But he shares a hatred of Takeshita with Okada also thinks Okada is a narcissistic jerk. This brings out Takeshita and they throw down and have an impromptu match, leading to Takeshita knocking him out with the knee strike and Raging Fire before standing tall over him with the belt. You know, if Kyle wore socks with his shoes, he would have better traction and probably wouldn’t have fared so badly there.

Meanwhile, Ospreay sits down with Kenny Omega for an interview with Renee. They talk about their first meeting in 2015 and Kenny bigtimes him. They talk about wrestling in New Japan during Covid. “Even if you had fans in the arena, would they really have been that loud for YOU?” MEOW. And then they keep getting more personal as Kenny keeps taking jabs and Ospreay gets more worked up. And then Kenny condescendingly says “I forgive you” for the screwdriver shot at Forbidden Door. What a dick. And Omega keeps getting more smug and condescending while Ospreay gets angrier and declares that he can’t crumble in the pressure cooker this time and has to win the World title in England, on his own, so he can be better than Kenny. And Kenny knows that Will’s mom will still be proud of her son when he loses, but Will’s son might be looking for a new hero. DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMN.

TBS title: Maya World v. Hikaru Shida v. Kris Statlander v. Persephone

Shida and Stat slug it out to start, but Shida puts her on the floor with an enzuigiri. Persephone tries a dive and gets cut off by Stat, and Maya hits the dive on Statlander instead. That whole thing was kind of a mess. We take a break and return with Maya hitting the double stomp on Persephone and they all stack up for a superplex attempt in the corner before Statlander takes the heels down for a senton. Stat slugs it out with Maya, but Shida hits Stat with the falcon arrow for two. Shida and Persephone slug it out and Shida hits Maya with a knee strike out of the corner, leading to a renewed truce between the heels. And then Shida breaks it and they fight again. Kris hits Shida with a powerbomb to get rid of her and follows with a lariat on Persephone for two. Stat powerbombs Maya to set up Saturday Night Fever, but Maya reverses into a cradle for the pin at 9:50 to retain. Messy but energetic. ***1/4. This Maya title run continues to not really go anywhere, though.

Meanwhile, the Brawling Birds saw fear in the eyes of the champs last week.

Continental Cup quarterfinals: Jay White v. Jon Moxley

They fight for the knucklelock to start and Moxley makes White work for it to test his neck, and Jay bridges out. Mox takes him down with a hammerlock and White retreats to the floor as we take a break. Back with Mox in control and he slugs on Jay in the corner, but Jay hits him with a DDT and beats him down in the corner and takes him to the floor with a rare rana. They continue fighting out there and clothesline each other for a double down. Back in, they trade finisher attempts and White suplexes Jon into the turnbuckles for two. White with a Nagatalock on the mat, but Mox rolls into the ropes and we take another break. Back with Moxley hitting a dive onto White outside. Back in the ring, Mox misses something off the top and Jay hits him with a pair of sleeper suplexes, but Mox no-sells a third one. So Jay puts him down with a flatliner, but Mox has wrist control and rolls into the bulldog choke. So Jay suplexes him again and follows with a uranage for two. To the top and White brings him down with a superplex, but he hurts the neck on the landing. So Mox punches him in the neck and takes him down for the choke, but Jay reverses to the cradle for two. Blade Runner and Mox rolls to the floor to escape, but then suckers him into a gator roll and puts White into the choke before hitting the Death Rider for two. And it’s a rear naked choke to finally put him away at 18:46 and advance to the semifinals. Holy shit what a match this was. They had the crowd on the edge of their seat with those near-falls and false finishes at the end. ****1/2. Afterwards, Jay waits for a handshake of respect, but nothing is forthcoming, and instead the Dogs attack him and the Conglomeration has to make the save. And then Gabe Kidd returns, leaving the Dogs on top until Brodido make the save. So then Hangman issues an open challenge for the Trios title at Wembley.

Meanwhile, Maya World does a promo about her victory, but Willow stops by and offers her a World title shot on Collision.

Jonathan Cruz joins us to insult Andrade in Spanish on behalf of MJF, so that Andrade will understand how little MJF thinks of him. And then Cruz goes too far and notes that Andrade is a coward who isn’t even in Baltimore, but then steals the catchphrase and discovers that Andrade is indeed in Baltimore. And as usual, Cruz gets his ass beat and pinned in seconds. And he calls out MJF, but Max pops up on the screen instead to mock the idea of coming to Baltimore. So Andrade beats up poor Cruz again and leaves. Andrade is super hot right now and he should probably be the guy to get the magic contract.

Meanwhile, Renee does a split screen interview with Willow and Mercedes, and it quickly turns into a yelling match with the ladies leaving their rooms and going to fight backstage. When they’re taking off the earrings you know it’s TROUBLE coming! So they fight down to ringside and have a huge pullapart brawl until security literally picks up Mone and carries her off to break it up. Women be crazy, am I right?

Meanwhile, Swerve has heard about the Trios title open challenge, and he might have some partners to accept it.

Continental Cup quarterfinals: Nigel McGuinness v. Hechicero

Nigel’s foot is all taped up after his first round match, so Hechicero takes him down and goes for it right away. So Nigel goes for the mask after warning him in advance. I mean, fair. Nigel retreats to the ropes on a lockup and Hech kicks him in the foot and then comes off the top rope with a clothesline for two. We take a break and return with Nigel making a comeback, but Hech kicks the foot out again and hits him with a DDT. Hechicero with a backbreaker, but Nigel tries the Tower of London and Hechicero reverses him into a choke instead. Nigel reverses out, but Hech takes out the foot again and wraps him up in a leglock on the mat until Nigel makes the ropes. Hech charges and Nigel hits him with a knee to block, and then goes into a guillotine and puts him out at 9:46 to advance. He better hope no anklelock specialists advance to the semifinals. That could be trouble for him. This one was kind of a style clash and didn’t really work very well. **. The finals are obvious but Nigel is the most British choice left I guess.

Kevin Knight joins us as we’re already into an overrun and the main event hasn’t even started yet. This quickly brings out Darby Allin, but this time it’s Darby who gets hit with a boobytrap from the pyro, and Knight hits him with the coast to coast and a chair to a face to leave him laying and taken out on a stretcher, as Steven Borden makes a cameo to help.

Kenny Omega & The Young Bucks v. El Clon, Mark Davis & Jake Doyle

Weird that they’d do a heavy heat angle like that and then just carry on with a random trios match. Also the whole arena is covered in smoke after the pyro accident and it looks terrible on TV. The Bucks clean house to start and work on Clon in the corner and then send the heels to the floor and toss Clon onto them. Back in the ring, the heels take over on Matt and triple team him in the corner and we take a break. Back with Matt making a comeback for the hot tag to Omega, and he hits Clon with a neckbreaker for two. You Can’t Escape on Clon gets two and the heels bail, setting up a Triple Terminator Dive. Back in, Clon flips out of the facebuster, but the Bucks superkick Doyle into a snapdragon, followed by a SUPERKICK PARTY. V-Trigger and One Winged Angel finish at 9:47. Just a nice little party match to finish the show. ***

And that brings out the Callis Family for the beatdown, but Cope & Cage make the save, only for the Bucks to accidentally superkick Christian and cause chaos and dissention to end the show as the screen goes black for some reason.

No wait, it’s a Return of the King deal with yet another false finish, as now Kenny is left alone after all that, and then Will Ospreay hits the ring and demands a match with Kenny right now, only for Omega to demand that security remove him. So then they get into a brawl, but Kenny hits him with a V-Trigger and then puts him through a ringside table with the One Winged Angel, having apparently gone full supervillain.

OK we done now? Any more major overrun angles? No?

An excellent show all the way up until Tony Khan decided to just throw everything at the wall after the top of the hour and kind of burned me out on it a bit. I think they should have stopped with the Darby angle and let it breathe for a week. But a great build to All In and I’m thoroughly pumped for the big show on my 22^nd birthday.