Chair Shots With Killem Faulkner: Sting’s Final Dynamite

It was the end of an era this week as AEW’s most experienced wrestler said goodbye to the flagship TV show ahead of his retirement match on Sunday at Revolution. However, it wasn’t all sad news as AEW’s newest signing made his first appearance as a full-time member of the roster, and several of the company’s youngest upcoming stars took to the ring to show that the company’s future is still bright. Did all of these elements come together to produce a memorable night of wrestling just days ahead of a huge pay-per-view event?

Cheers

• I made no secret of the fact that I thought last week‘s Dynamite was fairly weak, and I suggested that this week’s show had a lot of ground to make up in terms of selling the pay-per-view. Well, I think AEW pretty well pulled it off. Not only was the wrestling excellent (more on that in a second) but it felt like a momentous show befitting of the go-home before Revolution. Yes, there was the obvious Sting bit (which, again, we’ll get to) but also the debut of Will Ospreay as a full-time member of the roster and a final tease for the world title match that will probably have to content itself with being in the semi-main event slot on Sunday. Let’s start with the Ospreay debut, in which he reminded us that it wasn’t really a debut considering he’s wrestled in AEW before, beating Kenny Omega, Orange Cassidy, and Chris Jericho, among others. But now that he’s done with his New Japan commitments, he’s presumably going to be wrestling in AEW a lot more going forward, starting with his match against fellow Don Callis Family member Konosuke Takeshita on Sunday. Don Callis referenced Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen going hard in practice before going on to win championships, said it doesn’t matter who wins on Sunday (nice job making this match seem important, Don) and encouraged them to shake hands, which they did as aggressively as possible to undercut the point that they’re supposed to be teammates. No one should be surprised if Ospreay wins before the Family turns on him – he seems too obviously well-liked by the crowd to stick around this group much longer – but at least we should get a banger of a match beforehand.
• The world title segment that kicked off the show was also a great way of hyping up the pay-per-view. First off, though, would it have killed AEW to keep Adam Page’s injury status unclear for a week? Like it was nice on a personal level to know that he was okay after selling an ankle injury in last week’s main event, but if they were intending for the injury to seem legit, there was far too much reporting that Hangman is just really good at his job of making people believe he’s actually hurt. But whatever, let’s pretend we didn’t all know already that he was okay. His promo was great and accomplished its purpose of drawing out Swerve Strickland for one last…um, swerve? This wasn’t Mark Henry in a salmon jacket by any means, but Page did a nice job of seeming genuine in talking about how much it meant to him to have another world title shot and how disappointed he was that he wouldn’t be able to take advantage of the opportunity. Swerve came out, took a more conciliatory tone in talking about their history together, suggesting that he wouldn’t have targeted Page if he didn’t respect his accomplishments so much, and vowed that despite Page’s bad luck, his own destiny to become world champion remained unchanged. Samoa Joe emerged to draw Strickland’s attention, questioned why these two who were willing to kill each other just a short time ago were acting so buddy-buddy now, and stated that he wouldn’t be losing on Sunday regardless of whether he has one or two opponents. Swerve began to respond, saying Joe might have to go back to doing commentary in a poncho after he takes the title away on Sunday, before *shock, horror* Page cracked him across the back with his crutch because of course he did. Now, I’m sure he’ll justify it by saying he was set off by Strickland casually mentioning the fact that he broke into Page’s home and threatened his child, and I think Hangman as a delusional heel who still thinks he’s the good guy in all of this serves the storyline well. Like…yeah, Swerve broke into his house and potentially put his son’s health and safety at risk. Swerve has tried to permanently injure or even kill him at multiple points throughout their feud. But the fans like him so we’re willing to excuse that in return for making him the first Black world champion in AEW history. (Probably by pinning Page himself, but we’ll get to Revolution predictions in a little while.) And that’s going to drive Hangman crazy the more time he has to actually think about it.
• Sting’s final Dynamite segment was pretty good overall – I have a couple of hangups about it that I’ll talk about in a minute, but the visual of Sting descending from the rafters one last time more or less justified the whole segment. It will be sad to see Sting finally retire, but it’s hard to argue that he hasn’t done everything there is to do in the wrestling business, and he’s going out in about as ideal a fashion as possible. He hasn’t been winning world titles that he doesn’t need, he hasn’t been involving himself in angles and feuds that he has no business being part of, and he hasn’t overdone it by trying to put on long singles matches that he isn’t capable of holding up his end of the bargain in. His final match will be as much about putting over his partner Darby Allin as it will be about honoring his own career. After the bummer that was Sting’s run in WWE (which I was there for the start of at Survivor Series in 2014!) it was easy to worry that he wouldn’t get a proper sendoff from the wrestling industry, so it’s great to see that those concerns were unfounded. Hopefully the tag match against the EVPs on Sunday will live up to the Icon’s legacy and serve as a fitting conclusion to a legendary career.
• Okay, we’ve talked about everything but the wrestling up to this point, so let’s talk about the matches themselves now. But I’m going to keep it short because this segment has gone on long enough and you really should just go watch the show if you want to know how these matches played out in more detail. It’s crazy that this show featured a 53-year-old Chris Jericho, 64-year-old Sting, and 75-year-old Ric Flair alongside 18-year-old Nick Wayne, 22-year-old Julia Hart, and 24-year-old Skye Blue. (I know which trio I want to see more of in the future.) Jericho’s main event against Atlantis Jr. was…okay, though the storyline outshone the match itself. Jericho facing the son of a man who he faced early on in his career as a “full circle” moment was a cool unknown benefit of the AEW/CMLL partnership. Someone (maybe Jericho himself) really did their homework in drawing this one up. Skye Blue vs. Kris Statlander was great, and it was nice to see Blue graduate from moral victories to, y’know, an actual victory. It wasn’t clean, of course, considering that she and Julia Hart are heels, but it was a win over one of the most protected members of the women’s roster. Orange Cassidy and Nick Wayne put on a fantastic showcase of both their talents, making clear that the young Wayne is going to be a star in this company fairly soon and giving OC one more impressive win before he defends his International Championship against Roderick Strong at Revolution.
• The best match of the night (which I must again emphasize I am not officially doing anymore) was the trios match pitting Eddie Kingston and FTR against the Blackpool Combat Club. We’re getting a one-on-one match and a tag match at Revolution out of this matchup, so they did have to hold a little bit back, but considering how well-established the rivalries are, it’s not like this was the first time these six men have been in a ring together. Bryan Danielson got the win over his pay-per-view opponent, which definitely bodes well for his chances becoming Continental Crown Champion on Sunday, and shockingly he didn’t even have to cheat to do so. He just hit a running knee, stomped Kingston’s head into the mat, and made him pass out in a submission hold. Jon Moxley and Claudio Castagnoli tangled with FTR just enough to build some hype for their pay-per-view clash, but with that being a non-title match, it made sense to focus on Danielson and Kingston.

Boos

• I tried to be nice to the Sting segment. I really did. But what an awkward buildup to the big moment of Sting descending to beat up the Bucks with his own black bat to counteract their white bats. It started off promisingly enough – the Bucks had been stalking the Stinger throughout the show, and there were several conveniently-placed fans in Sting masks at ringside to conceal the fact that Darby Allin was among them, ripping off his mask and jumping the barricade to attack them. But for a segment that was destined to end with Sting making the save, Darby sure got beaten down for an uncomfortably long time. And it wasn’t even Sting who broke it up – Ric Flair made his entrance, feigning that he was going to get in a few shots on Allin for…some reason. But *swerve, bro* Flair turned on the Bucks, again for…some reason, laying in some of the absolute worst punches you’ve ever seen before Nicholas hit one of the most awkward and poorly sold low-blows you’ve ever seen before delivering the tamest “beatdown” you’ve ever seen on the very, very old man who should not be anywhere near a wrestling ring in 2024. Look, I get Flair’s involvement is probably in part due to his real-life friendship with Sting, but it has been downright painful every time he shows up. If there’s one silver lining to Sting’s retirement, it’s that we hopefully never have to see Flair in AEW ever again. Of course, since we live in the worst and dumbest timeline possible, he’ll probably end up becoming Allin’s manager going forward. Because sure, let’s pair an alleged domestic abuser with an alleged sex pest. They’ll be the most popular babyface act in the whole company.

Parting Shots

• Taz had one of the best lines of his career when talking about Atlantis Jr, saying he didn’t approve of the second-generation wrestler getting an opportunity because he’s not into nepotism. On an unrelated note, Hook will be in the modified All-Star Scramble (which was originally billed as a Meat Madness match featuring Will Hobbs, Lance Archer, Wardlow, and presumably someone else because otherwise why are all three of them still in the scramble match if the original match had to be cancelled) on Sunday.
• Collision was also quite good this week – if you thought the slapdash booking of having Powerhouse Hobbs and Sammy Guevara in a no DQ match made no sense, just go watch the match itself and tell me the stipulation wasn’t justified. I mean, Sammy briefly joining and then leaving the Don Callis Family was pretty uninspired, but at least we got a really good TV match out of it.
• Predictions time! As always, I’m going to pick the Revolution matches that we know about so far (not speculating about any that might be added between now and then) and rank them based on how confident I am in my predictions from least to most confident, starting with…
  • Sting and Darby Allin retain the AEW Tag Team Championships against Matthew and Nicholas Jackson – I feel like this one could really go either way. On the one hand, conventional wisdom says every wrestler goes out on a loss, and Sting is an old-school guy so he might very well insist on doing just that. Ric Flair turning on the Bucks, dumb as that plot point always was, seemed to be one possible ace in the hole that is now gone. Sting’s undefeated streak being broken in his final match in the company would be a fitting end and a way of passing the torch. Heck, Darby could turn on Sting, costing his most loyal friend in the ultimate act of betrayal that would instantly make him the most hated heel on the roster. So why am I picking Sting and Darby to retain? Because nobody wants to see them lose, the Bucks don’t need to be put over, and they’re going to be in Greensboro, NC. If that match goes on last, which it should, the crowd is going to be mega-pissed if Sting loses on his way out the door.
  • Wardlow wins the All-Star Scramble match – there are two unknown participants in this match, and it’s really hard to pick a multi-man match especially when you don’t know who else might be involved, but I think the Undisputed Kingdom’s storyline is the most compelling and Adam Cole already ordered Wardlow to win the world title for him, so this would be a logical way to give him a shot at the title at some point down the line.
  • Orange Cassidy retains the AEW International Championship against Roderick Strong – it seems like capturing the IC belt is a realistic possibility for the Undisputed Kingdom and yet another step toward the group collecting all the gold possible in AEW. Cassidy has been great as champ, though, and I wouldn’t mind the UK/Best Friends feud continuing a while longer. I really don’t have a strong read on where AEW is going with this one, but my gut says Cassidy retains.
  • Christian Cage retains the TNT Championship against Daniel Garcia – another one I just can’t get a good feel for. On the one had, Garcia has never won an AEW title in his career so far – he’s been Ring of Honor Pure champion, but nothing in his home promotion – so AEW might decide to put the belt on him as a feel-good moment to end Christian’s reign with the title. On the other hand, though, Christian probably has a rematch with Adam Copeland coming in the not-too-distant future, so it makes a little more sense to keep the belt on him. (Plus “Daddy Magic” Matt Menard will likely be in Garcia’s corner, and we all know how Christian feels about other people’s daddies, so he’ll be extra motivated to retain.) It’s not quite a coin-flip for me, considering the relative lack of screen time Garcia has gotten in recent weeks, but I’m not massively confident in this prediction.
  • Will Ospreay defeats Konosuke Takeshita – I said it earlier, I think Ospreay gets the win before the Don Callis Family turn on him, but they could cheat to give Takeshita the big win and continue the beatdown after it’s over. One way or the other, I think Ospreay is out of the Family and free to be a babyface after this.
  • Toni Storm retains the AEW Women’s World Championship against Deonna Purrazzo – I think the Virtuosa gets her hands on the title eventually, but it seems a little soon to end the Timeless champion’s run. Plus I wouldn’t be surprised if Big Business in two weeks introduces a new challenger for the title, and Storm seems to be the bigger star to match that per$on up against.
  • Swerve Strickland defeats Samoa Joe and Hangman Page to become the new AEW World Champion – I was a good deal more confident in this pick a couple of weeks ago, and I still think it happens, but with Page apparently going fully heel this week, I feel like it might make sense to keep Strickland in chase mode a little while longer by having Page pin him for the belt. Or, considering Page and Strickland have been feuding for a while now, maybe they cost each other the title and Joe retains. Hard to say, but I would highly advise Tony Khan not to get too cute and just put the belt on Swerve already. He’s more than earned it with the work he’s put in over the last year especially.
  • FTR defeat the Blackpool Combat Club – seems obvious given that FTR are basically hometown boys, but given that they might give Sting and Darby the win in their match because Sting is also a hometown boy (well, in wrestling terms anyway – he’s originally from Nebraska of all places) it might be overkill to have FTR win also, especially given that nothing is on the line. Still, I think they will win because Tony Khan hasn’t shown a propensity for humiliating his employees in their hometown.
  • Eddie Kingston retains the Continental Crown Championship against Bryan Danielson – it seems too soon for a beloved babyface like Eddie to drop the belt already, and the American Dragon has shown an almost completely unselfish lack of interest in winning championship gold in AEW, so this feels like a decently safe bet to happen. Also I was lying when I said winning right before the pay-per-view is a good sign for Danielson.

That’s it for another week – really good show overall, and it got me more excited for Revolution, which is really what you want from a go-home show. I suspect we’ll get a few more matches (especially for the pre-show) announced between now and then, but the card is already shaping up to be really solid. Thank you all for joining me once again, and I hope to see you back here next week for more Chair Shots!