I am a WWE fan.
In terms of being tribal, I have chosen a side.
With that said, I enjoy checking out the competition.
For example, Will Ospreay versus Bryan Danielson could be the runaway Match of the Year of 2024. Also, Swerve Strickland deserves to win the AEW title. And in terms of characters, Timeless Toni Storm could have been big if she did this in WWE.
I HATE the Tony Khan angle.
For starters, he looked lost in that segment. Khan dropped stiffly from a gut punch. Any man would have winced in pain with a gut punch. If this was a shot in the head, then yeah, he could stay unconscious. However, you're going to feel pain with a gut punch because you're lucid.
Also, they wasted Jack Perry here. Perry versus Okada could have been a good thing, especially since if Perry wanted to move on from the backstage event, and the Bucks aired the footage without his approval. AEW is heel-heavy at the moment, and while I am not saying Perry can be their version of Stone Cold, he is above the "a-hole" gimmick of Ken Anderson.
And after getting knocked down by a stomach punch, Tony gets up without selling the punch. It felt like he had amnesia more than again, GETTING PUNCHED IN THE TUMMY!
But the "Bucks" does not stop there.
I know they re-named the finisher for Tony Khan, but they should have known that this was one of the worst moves to execute on a non-wrestler. I mean, Vince McMahon's final Stone Cold Stunner was laughable, but this move fails in comparison to when Dixie Carter was power bombed by Bully Ray to a table.
But this is not really the worst thing on the show.
The thing about the AEW World Heavyweight Title is that there's a tendency for it to get lost in the shuffle. This is why when Swerve won against Samoa Joe, the logical move was to celebrate and get interrupted by the next guys in line. Will Ospreay is the logical choice here.
However, not only was his celebration overshadowed by the downfall of The Best Friends, Chris Jericho's newest faction, and whatever crap they are doing with Sasha Banks, but they just let Swerve HAVE A MATCH WITHOUT ANY EXPLANATION. They could have had The Young Bucks power trip to arrange this scenario, but dammit, they just gave him to Kyle Fletcher.
But this is not the worst part.
They had Jon Moxley defend the New Japan title against Powerhouse Hobbs. In the previous week, Mox challenged Hobbs after getting time in the ring to say that he won the ultimate prize in a rival promotion. And yet, Swerve just waltzed into the ring, to little or no fanfare, and this sucks considering that NXT will have a party-like atmosphere for new NXT champ Trick Williams.
Swerve and Trick arguably have the same rapport with their respective audiences.
I don't know if Tony (and his dad) were just busy prepping for their televised appearance, but it felt like by concentrating on the crappy segment, they managed to churn out a crappy show.