All in one Night
This was the first taped edition of Rampage and I thought it showed at times with the crowd. It was still a fun hour of professional wrestling, but it did lack the live energy compared to the first two episodes or even the previous Dynamite.
The opening match of the show was the Eliminator Tournament final between the Lucha Brothers against Jurassic Express. It’s amazing at how stacked the tag team division is in AEW and because of that we can at times forget the amount of teams in the division that can legitimately lay claim to being the best tag team in the world.
That was the case with the Lucha Bros. They had a really good match earlier in the night on Dynamite against The Varsity Blondes, a match that I thought was the best match the Blondes have had thus far. This match against Jurassic Express was tremendous.
Jungle Boy and Rey Fenix were made to look equal at times with both showing off their high-flying ability. There was a part in the match where both men hit tope suicidas at the same time but on opposite sides of the ring that got that story across well.
Luchasaurus looked like a monster in the match and Penta had another strong performance. But the future is bright with Ray Fenix and Jungle Boy and both men have been teased as potential opponents for CM Punk, and if the Bryan Danielson rumours are true, the matches between them and The American Dragon could steal the show.
There was a lot of back-and-forth action in the match, and it was by far the match of the night, not only on Rampage, but including the Dynamite that happened earlier. The Lucha Brothers win the match and will advance to All Out in Chicago to compete against The Young Bucks in a steel cage for the AEW World Tag Team Champions.
Speaking of the Bucks, they were again on the top of the stage watching the action and would get involved post-match to further the rivalry with the Lucha Brothers, but also to set up an eight-man tag team match with them teaming with the Good Brothers against the Lucha Brothers and Jurassic Express for next week’s Dynamite.
The Road to All Out
The middle of Rampage featured a video package involving CM Punk and Darby Allin as they comment and hype their upcoming match. I believe the video was taken from Countdown which is premiering next week. It was an enjoyable tease for what should be a captivating Countdown to All Out.
Tony Schiavone had an in-ring interview with the TNT Champion, Miro, but didn’t get to conduct his interview duties as Miro came out onto the stage dragging Fuego Del Sol. Miro viciously attacks him in the ring and disrespects the Lucha tradition by removing the mask off poor Fuego.
The music of Eddie Kingston hits and he comes out onto the stage with a mic. He doesn’t talk, instead dropping the mic and charging the ring looking for a fight. He and Miro get into a standard brawl with the referees coming out to keep them separate the two men. It’s officially announced that the match will take place at All Out.
The brawl was simple though effective, but I wonder if the placement for the match at All Out is the right choice. It’s already a stacked card with some great matches and I question if it would’ve been better served to have the TNT Title match at Arthur Ashe which would give them more time to build it up.
The Bunny defeated Tay Conti. They worked hard and the match was fine, but I think the crowd weren’t too invested in it and it was one of the times where it felt like the energy was lacking after a long taping. The Bunny got the win taking advantage of a referee distraction and using brass knuckles to knock out Tay. Penelope Ford got involved the match and aligned herself with The Bunny, with it looking more like a short-term alliance to help each other in the Casino Battle Royal.
The Main Event
Christian Cage teamed up with the Elite Hunter, Frankie Kazarian against AEW World Champion Kenny Omega and Brandon Cutler. It was a fun match with some comedy sprinkled in revolving around Brandon Cutler. Omega would pick and choose when he would enter the match as he would try to take advantage of Christian and Frankie, with also Don Callis and Michael Nakazawa shenanigans on the outside.
Christian would get the win after hitting Cutler with the Killswitch on Cutler after Omega left Brandon alone and retreated to the top of the ramp. The match basically reinforced the idea of Christian’s promos of recent about how he is in the head of Kenny Omega and how he has what it takes to take the AEW World Title away from him.
Overall, it was another solid edition of Rampage that flew by. The opening match was spectacular and might be the match of the week in all pro wrestling and if there is only one thing to check out from this show then it’s definitely that match. The rest of the show flew by even though the live energy lacked compared to previous episodes of Rampage, but each segment built to All Out and did its job.