Has WWE Made TNA Bigger Than AEW? AEW Dynamite Review!

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You there! Yes, you there! The one listening to this podcast! Hello, it's Luke Owen here from the WrestleTalk Podcast. Hope you're doing well. This is just a little quick plug to click the link in the podcast description because there is a survey there. The Fine Folk at Acast are looking to build a better profile for their podcast listenership, so...

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My apologies. I'm joined by Dan Layton. ma master of arts the truth uh which case then i am luke owen bsc brackets on that's right i've got a bachelor of science so i still have i don't know if it's like because m is is like bigger than b That just replaces the B. Or if I can be Dan Leighton B-A-M-A. Dan Leighton Bama is a lot more fun. B-M-A. Bama.

uh welcome to the show uh please do subscribe wherever you're finding us from whether that be on youtube apple podcast or on spotify or breaking news okay if you're going on a golf holiday like ollie davis has yeah well i've heard this i actually received a text from ollie he was on a golf holiday he was on the ninth hole and he was really struggling. He'd landed in the bunker and he was just really going at it with a...

a wedge and it wasn't working but the thing was because he'd been going at the ball so hard he'd actually like cleared out a bunch of the sand and then just buried underneath it would you believe it would you believe it a qr code yeah which he clicked and he brought him to this podcast

If you're going on a lads golfing holiday, which is what Ollie has done is why he's not here today. Oh yeah, he's gone on a golfing lads holiday. No, I mean the lads golfing. I don't imagine lads going. Well, I do, actually. They've got ginger wigs on. They're all wearing plaid shorts. I don't think it's like that. I think they're all dressed the same.

they're all wearing the same shirt yeah from a little polo shirt a little polo shirt yeah uncomfortably tight trousers yeah very clean shoes bought them all from next yeah very that okay good and they've gone on their golf holiday though i i can exclusively reveal that ollie can't really play golf at the moment because he has got legitimately golfer's elbow.

Is that a thing? I've heard of tennis elbow. Yeah, he's got a golfer's elbow and it means that he can't do the full swing and stuff. Cool. It is cool, isn't it? Well, at my graduation, I didn't want to wear a suit because suits are boring. So I was like, what am I going to wear? Whatever. And I bought a...

pair of like like high-waisted like wide leg trousers from weekday like they're kind of cool clothes and then on top i bought a top from m&s because i'm in my 30s oh that's really nice congratulations to you and also Congratulations. Not only is Dan now finished, he's officially graduated now in everything. With distinction.

With distinction. So congratulations to you. Thanks very much, mate. Very, very proud for everything that you have done. Appreciate it. Appreciate you all. And thank you for joining us as well. Do leave your comments down below. Subscribe and all that good jazz. We are kicking things off today. We will be reviewing AEW Dynamite later with the two Blood and Guts match.

and guts one was called blood the other one's called guts two and a half hours that episode three matches we'll get on to that in a little bit um but we're going to kick things off talking about jericho in a way but sort of the larger point that jericho sort of claims on his podcasts so he did i cannot believe this he did an episode of talk is jericho

Apparently it's still going. Yeah, I remember the wrestling podcast boom of 2015-16 because it also coincided with Mobike Summer. Do you remember this? I don't know if you do. Mobike Summer? Mobike Summer. It was like 2018, maybe. But like, basically... Mobike was a, they're now line bikes is the big thing. Bikes you can hire on an app. And they're not tethered to anything because of bikes. No. Because Boris bikes have stations and they're there and they're meant to be there and that's a plan.

They were the Ken Living cycles first. Well, exactly. And then Boris took them on. And now they're the... Well, they were called the Boris bikes because he finished the plan. So the Ken Living cycle... Kevin Livingston started it. Yeah. Boris...

copied and pasted and finished it and then so they're still the boris bikes but i feel bad for sadiq not having his own one do you know what i mean what what he's got is three consecutive victories hello that part now um yeah so these these bikes you just they're like linebackers that if people leave them anywhere and they're like

all over the sidewalks they are the worst things in the world but for that first summer when they came out they were the best things because i'd be cycling home from the pub and i'd be like i'll cycle home from central and i would literally be like oh my god there's buckingham palace there's big ben i'd be looking at all of these like like And in my ears is Bruce Prichard going,

Well, the thing is, I can't do it. Or Talk is Jericho. So color me shocked. It's still going. I was so surprised with it. I was like, yeah, Jericho said this on Talk is Jericho. Yeah. It looked like three days a week.

he's posting episodes well because he went through that it used to be really interesting and he'd have the great conversations i remember the john moxley one when he left and that was a really fascinating thing to listen to like i actually found them really engaging also he was the first person that i listened to do

try and organically put in their ad reads oh yes he was yeah that's a really interesting point you've made but first i need to talk about the audio quality will be different and i was like Okay, Chris. But it was a really engaging podcast. And then he sort of went a little bit off the deep end, didn't he? When he started to bring conspiracy theorists on. Conspiracy theorists. Why didn't you do a whole conspiracy theory episode with Jeff Hardy and Dean Ambrose?

I don't remember that. There was one of them that were both on. I think they were both talking about conspiracy theories. And then he brought on actual theorists. Didn't he bring on Donald Trump Jr.? Yeah, he's had politicians on and things like that. But the one that I remember the most is when he brought on someone who genuinely...

believed the mandela effect was real right and jericho did the full joe rogan thing which is just like i'm just gonna agree with everything that you say even though what you're saying is clearly not right and when you get there it's like i'm not enjoying the podcast so i stopped listening to it but obviously it

still working for a large portion of people. And hey, this is exactly what he needed because it's broken through. Exactly, because he said something on the podcast. So he did an episode with the Hardys and the Dudleys. So... I turned 40 this year, which I've mentioned on pretty much every show I have this year.

It was lovely for me because it's five guys from my era of wrestling from when I was a kid talking about and sharing stories. Also, if I may, it's got some glorious... old carny wrestler nonsense on it like matt jeff bubba ray being like oh yeah we stole the show oh yeah like we actually went back i'm not sure who followed us i don't think they could

Matt Hardy being like, it was a masterpiece of storytelling. Were they being serious? Because I've read that quote of him being like, I don't know if you could say they follow those or whatever. I thought he was just being funny. No, no, I think they were just being old wrestler Kearney style. And it's, you know what?

wonderful because we don't have enough of this anymore i miss the days of shoot interviews when you'd give kevin nash three bottles of wine he'd be like let me tell you about billy kidman yeah and it was just like it was just that running and just start telling you stories about people filmed on an entry level video camera oh yeah not good microphone quality just using the onboard mic of the camera you're using

Beautiful stuff. Filmed at a hotel room. You can hear the air con in the background. I missed, though, that time. RF shoot, wasn't it? Exactly, yeah. Can't really talk about him anymore, though. Oh, I don't actually know anything. I just remember the website. Not a good dude, Rob Feinstein. But anyway... So I loved it from that aspect of it. But the thing that Jericho said at the start, it's about seven minutes in, is they're talking about the crowd that were there.

So there was a huge audience for TNA's Bound for Glory where the Hardys and Dudleys final match took place. TNA said it was 7,794. WrestleNomics have since put out a report that said TNA sold around 5,500. tickets for the show and the turnstile count was just over 6 000 okay so they don't know where the 7 000 tickets tna have said look we tallied it it was 7 000 that's a verified number from the building um whatever it is it is a record for the building as best as can be

I have got this line. What's clear enough is that Bound for Glory was among the most lucrative events in TNA's history. The 5,554 tickets sold generated... $390,000 gate with an average ticket price of $70. Tasonga Center charged TNA a $45,000 rental fee while concession revenue likely went to the venue. Fans spent another... $122,000 on food and beverage. Right. So...

If that money goes to the venue, either way, the venue are pretty pleased. And I guess that doesn't even take into account like merch sales and things like that. That's it, which would go to TNA. TNA has said like, oh yeah, there were some suites and stuff that don't get counted in the turnstiles, which WrestleNomics was like, well, that's 200.

don't know where the other thousand people are but whatever it is tna are happy the venue is happy it is a success can i say like i've got i've got a small list of i can't with the discourse That's the title of the list. And one of them is Turns Out Count. Turns Out Count, I know. It was the whole contacting Brent Council thing. That really...

That really solidified that for me. I was like, leave him alone. I've got the exact same thing. Because when WrestleNomics posted this report with this hairstyle cat, I was like, Brandon, mate, come on. And I was like, at that point, I lived in Brent. And I was like, lads, my council tax money is paying for this frivolous email.

I don't like it. And I guarantee you it wasn't one person that sent that email. Do you know what I mean? It was a bunch of people that sent that email. We've got far bigger issues in Brent. But the point really of this is that it looked big. Because with wrestling, even if you sell 2,000 seats in a 10,000 seat building, if you get them in the right spaces and you film it right, you can make it look like there are 10,000 people there. I mean, the thing about...

You don't even need to do it with a big arena. Like, television production and camera and trickery. I mean, like, what was it? WCW and the Universal Studios create the vibe. Like, it's a tiny little venue, but as long as it looks slick, it's great. TNA in the impact zone. Exactly.

I was stunned when I learned there was only 1,000 people at TNA Impact shows. Because I would have told you, oh yeah, there was like 3,000 people in all the films. Because it felt... massive it felt like there was loads of people yeah and so jericho says this is the quote that crowd looked huge it was like a wwe level crowd i was watching this and compared it to watching dynamite when they were at the ecw arena and it looked like a tony con del

taping sorry it did tna looked like the second biggest company in the world now uh first question who is tony candelo I think everyone had that same thing. Everyone went to the same Google result. Everyone went to the same Wikipedia article. He was a Canadian wrestling promoter during the 1980s.

famously i'm going by the wikipedia article famously is playing it fast and loose he did things called death tours great which and the line that's from the wikipedia page was that wrestlers had to take one bag of food that would last them the entire tour no

hotels were booked they would sleep like uh on the sides of roads in cars or at the venues they were forming in um there was no accommodation booked for them death these and those were the death tours right and that's what jericho is comparing

Okay. You know, and it's also... I see he's being hyperbolic. He is being hyperbolic, but he's also being fairly hyperbolic when he said it's a WWE-level crowd. Completely. Yeah. Well, so the interesting thing is... If WWE sold 7,000 tickets for WrestleMania, they would be pretty...

not happy about that didn't they sell 4 000 for salt lake city smackdown the other day and like yeah it's not been a great run of form but just just to say when we're talking about like wwe level size i mean it's the same thing if you can film anything like yes absolutely my point is more this is TNA's biggest show of the year. This is their WrestleMania. That's true. So like, you know, Chris Jericho is comparing TNA's WrestleMania to...

an episode of Dynamite that was taped at the ECW arena. And the ECW arena feels like a slightly unfair comparison because it's... just a black box studio at this point. Like, there's nothing... I mean, and also, it isn't the point of the ECW arena to be... To not feel like there's a lot of people there. Exactly, and to be that kind of intimate. So it's an inelegant comparison. I would...

go so far as to say it's a bad faith comparison, but it's a bad comparison. Yeah, I don't think he's doing it in bad faith. But it is wild that Jericho is... publicly burying the company that he currently works for while putting over the wwe endorsed competition because you can say that sentence without bringing aw into it really 100 yeah you didn't need to say

made TNA look like the second biggest company on the planet. They look like a major player. When you yourself work for the second biggest wrestling promotion on the planet. So the funny stuff that's come out of this is all the comments that were like, oh, so he...

He's gone, gone. He is definitely... He is out the door of AEW. See you at the Rumble. When you go to his WrestleMania... His WrestleMania... His... aw roster page and he's just there going like that and it's like putting that quote underneath that it's quite funny like he's gone gone Bye. See you in Saudi Arabia. I actually think that if he is, so the story about Saudi Arabia rumble is that there might not be a lot of surprises in that rumble because they won't be able to hide them. Yeah.

because you're going to be in Saudi Arabia. So they're likely going to do a lot of rumble surprises. before the rumble so he might actually be on a raw smackdown but yeah see you in rumble season wasn't the last time he was on wb programming in the greatest royal rumble in saudi

Am I wrong about that? I think you are right. Because that would be funny. He leaves the arena. He's been there the whole time, they'll say. He's been in the back. And it was like nearly a decade ago. Yeah, literally. It's been a long time. You didn't need to say that part. Because, you know, he left the company because he saw...

uh bigger opportunities for himself working in new japan and that actually i'd say revitalized his career and it led to him being part of aew in 2019 he had a bit of a falling out with triple h no less because he wanted to have nxt talent on the talk is jericho on the jericho cruise yeah and wb said no which is why he then that's what pushed him into the arms of

new japan and the elite and that's what sort of formed their friendship and stuff but also it's like no small part to say that i mean there are so many different moving parts that make um that era of wrestling so fascinating from a historical perspective because

it's when someone the stature of Chris Jericho goes off and does something in New Japan, even though AJ Styles had been there and come to WWE, Finn Balor had been there and come to WWE, it's not like it wasn't in the conversation. But suddenly you're like...

Oh, and because NXT had been bubbling up, we were like starving for an alternative and we had the alternative in house. But then there was like, oh, there are other things as well. That all leads to the conversation about, you know, and as a part of this, try and tie it into the sort of central topic here.

impact was present would we say impact was the second company then no i think at that point i'd probably say it was ring of honor right i say ring of honor was probably because like tna yeah from like 2013 up until i would argue 2024 were a

dead company pretty much that was just on life support the entire time it was a glorified indie they were they were just bouncing around from various station to station which no one had particularly much access to they had talent that talent would come that talent would go they would do tapings they do pay-per-views would buy them. They were doing a period of time where they were airing on Twitch. And then the pandemic didn't help. The partnership with AEW...

I think did them some benefits. We can get into some numbers. Like one of their biggest buy rates they've ever had was a show where Kenny Omega was in the main event when he wins the Impact title from Rich Swann. So that kind of held. But I think...

Categorically, undeniably, this association with WWE has really raised the value and stock of TNA. For sure. But to the point you were making, I don't think it can be stated enough what an impact... pardon the pun Jericho had on the indie scene and Jericho not doing that Wrestle Kingdom show we would still have AEW but I don't think we have the same vibe that it did because like

What happens at Wrestle Kingdom sort of then leads into a bit of a rise of Ring of Honor and New Japan. And that's what leads to them doing All In. And then All In is what leads Tony Khan, who was already planning on launching a wrestling promotion, to be like, let's all come together. That's it.

That's why you can't, you can't point at any one personal thing and say, this is what it was. It's it's, but it's, but it's, you've got all of your checkpoints and you've got all of it. This is an important part on your web and the red string and the rest of it. And that was massive. So like for him to now be sitting here.

um throwing shade in a way yeah is really interesting because it feels like another one of those like you know registering moments i suppose i think it is because like i think this is this is jericho signaling to all of us I'm done. I'm not going back to AEW. I am going back to WWE. And these are five lads here who are on Team WWE talking about how great TNA is. And he made the point...

His claim is TNA looked like the second biggest company in the world. Now, important to say there, he didn't say they are. the second biggest company in the world what are you saying is they looked like the second biggest company in the world when you compare how bound for glory looked when compared to an episode of dynamite from the ecw yeah it's apples and oranges it's not it's not fair comparison stuff

So I thought, but he's not alone in thinking that. We get a lot of comments on our videos and stuff that say, TNA is dead. TNA is doomed. TNA is dying. Sorry, AEW is doomed. AEW is dead. AEW is on the outs. TNA has overtaken it. TNA is now the second biggest promotion in North America. So I thought...

Just, you know, one of the fun things done here is just like, well, let's just lay it out then and sort of determine what is the metrics of they are the second biggest promotion in the world. So if you look at it from a business standpoint. They did do, they sold 5,000 tickets for Bound for Glory. That is up from the 3,000 attenders that were done for Bound for Glory 2024. And the Slammiversary had 7,623. Two huge results for TNA there.

oddly and i think this is odd the buy rates for either of those shows has not been released which i find very perplexing i i think i don't know why they have not been released either they're not high or they're not as high as they would like them to be. Right. Because they have got the pay-per-view buy rates for their 2024 shows. Because Slammiversary 2024 got 21,000 buys.

That was their biggest since like the Spike Era. It's third behind Rebellion 2021, which is the Omega Swan match, and Hard to Kill, which had 66,000 buys. That was the one where they brought back the TNA name. Which we reviewed. yes absolutely yeah and like that is you look at those numbers there those are the sort of numbers they were doing back when tna was hot the spike era of tna when they did lockdown oh i should know this oh nine

I think it's 09. I reviewed it on Patreon. That was like their biggest buy regs. That was like 60,000 buys. So like these sort of numbers here, it's like, wow, TNA have not had this level of success since then. So yeah, I don't know why the 2025 numbers have not been released. Either way, those are great successes compared to where they were and that sort of death spiral that they were in. A weird death spiral that never had an end because the reason why it's called Hard to Kill is because...

they could not die. TNA just would. The joke always wasn't wrong with wrestling fans. Even after the apocalypse, TNA will still be running shows. Cockroaches and TNA. It'll be cockroaches and TNA. The only things that survive nuclear apocalypse.

And yeah, I think that the partnership with WWE has been huge for them. It's interesting because I feel like a lot of... There are some people who would... disagree with you and say that it's actually been detrimental to the value of the brand and it's just an exercise in WWE hoovering up talent and things like that and yet

i'm interested in watching shows that i otherwise wouldn't have watched to be honest because i'm like oh that's an interesting story beat or these people that you know i'm engaged with i know names that i wouldn't have known um I think it's made TNA an attractive prospect for talent like, I'm going to say, a Leon Slater. A great example to bring up.

you know, who is talented enough to have his pick of the bunch and sees AW kind of, sorry, sees TNA, this is too many letters, sees TNA and goes, that's an interesting one because it's a way of sort of, you know, WWE adjacent has been on WWE programming a whole bunch while still honing his craft and not being necessarily tied to WWE and things like that. It's an attractive offer. And there are so many reasons that...

A wide, varied market is important in any industry. Options are important in any industry. So as far as I can see it. It's only a good thing if that partnership keeps going. It would be interesting to see what happens. It benefits TNA. Monetarily, financially, I think it benefits TNA. It would be interesting to see what happens if it stopped, whether or not...

people would still go, oh, I'm intrigued by what they've built there, what they're going. I don't see an incentive for TNA to stop it at any point. I don't really see an incentive for WWE to stop it at any point. I see it as a massive benefit for them. Because it's... What we say about TNA now is it is developmental for the developmental. TNA is now a feeder system for NXT. In the same way that AAA will likely be a bit of a feeder system for TNA. Sorry, for NXT.

You're right, there are just too many three-letter acronyms or initialisms. This is Triple H's global localization, but under a different name.

where he wanted to just do loads of NXT brands across the world. Instead, they're just partnering with... nowhere in japan yeah uh triple a they are now owned down in mexico uh tna is a north american partner for them their partner with you know they've got relationships with gcw and all that yeah like they are more or less just feeder system but leon slater is a really good example for this so leon i think I might have my timelines run on this.

Or wrong on this. I think he'd signed with TNA before the WWE partnership had taken place. I might be wrong on that one. The only reason I think I might be wrong on that one is because he's so young. Do you know what I mean? Because he's only 19. Yeah. So there's a part of me that's like, I don't think that can be right.

So I can't quite remember, but I seem to remember Leon doing some stuff with TNA before, because he's obviously the UK connection, he's from Bradford. TNA connection before the WWE partnership officially began.

But either way, Leon Slater is now a name that, and the British indie scene, everyone knows. Everyone knows Leon Slater. Like, he is a name that is up there with your Michael Okus, your Nina Samuels, like, of the top... british indie names he's done amazing work with rev pro uh and with ngw he's done he is all over the place he is like i've spoken to promoters who've said like but saw him at a young age being like

he is the future of this industry like he these things that he can do he is the next Will Ospreay yeah now he is known much wider and that is because of WWE that is because of WWE's partnership with TNA and him he is 100% WWE bound. Yeah. The second his TNA contract's up, WWE are going to sign him. He is on NXT all the time now. Yeah, he is. It's Joe Hendry.

I don't look at Joe Hendry now and think that's TNA superstar Joe Hendry. I'm like, that's WWE's Joe Hendry. The same thing. The Jordan Grace. i was about to say jordan grace was the exact same thing the second that jordan grace came into the royal rumble she ceased being tna star jordan grace and was like you're just wwe in waiting yeah jordan grace joe hendry's the exact same thing I think Leon Slater is the next on that list. And if you...

are upset that TNA is being used as a feeder system, then yeah, I think you're welcome to be upset about that, particularly if you are a TNA diehard and you want it to be seen as a viable alternative. But at this point, I don't think it can be considered an alternative. It's not an alternative anymore. It's part of the WWE ecosystem. It's basically evolve. And to like sort of put asterisk on what I said earlier on about how it's good to have options as an industry.

There's a world where that is a little bit monopoly-y. You know, I can see that argument. And yet there's the alternate... There's the other way where, like, a Nick Nemeth... who hasn't really appeared in any NXT stuff, hasn't been a part of that, but is still very much present in TNA kind of thing. Mustafa Ali had that.

The Iconics, who I will not call the inspiration because they're the Iconics and I love the Iconics and I think the Iconics got a bad rep. Sure did. I mean, but they are also the inspiration, so respect it. Respect the inspiration, whatever.

Oh my God, when that theme hit, when they came out for that showdown, I lost my mind. I know. I took issue with it. I bet you did. Well, I was like, this is such a burial of TNA. And that's fair. What you do does not matter because they're coming out to their NX.

team and that's fair but that thing slapped so hard that i needed to hear it team tna was basically it was like watching the alliance during the invasion it's like you're basically just team wwf again and i agree with that but what you're failing to really sell i think is how the iconic theme slaps it's very good Thank you. There's many ways. There's many ways it works for them.

it is inbound if you want it to be just it's it's fire alternative did you like it when it was sort of nothing and even arguably it was a great place for people like a drew galloway to go and prove himself yeah a bobby lashley A Cody Rhodes. It was a stop on their redemption tour. It was a place for them to earn money. Before going to something new.

bigger. Cody Rhodes, I think, is a harsher one because I think he was there for about two weeks. No, I know, but that's why I'm saying he's a stop on his tour. Exactly, yeah. It is, I want to do this. I can either hone my craft or, probably more importantly,

make some money make some money and build my brand and show myself as big time like i'm not saying that any of these people look to impact as like their destination destination to go that was a place where they could work for america yeah yeah

But yeah, no, I do agree with you. The argument, though, that they, by dint of being part of the WWE machine, are now the second biggest brand in America, or the second biggest company in North America, I think is as preposterous as Eric Bischoff saying that the NW... was the second biggest wrestling promotion in 1998 yeah um i mean a you're not a wrestling promotion nwo b you did an nwo pay-per-view and absolutely tanked so like it but so categorically

you could not be the second biggest North American wrestling promotion. Yeah. And I think the same can be said for TNA. Because even though AEW has not...

I think 2025 has been a great year for them. Creatively, I think they have been firing on all cylinders. I think Dynamite has been a much better show. The pay-per-views have been so much better. I think they haven't... missed with a pay-per-view this year i think 2025 has been the year that they needed to recover from i mean brawl in brawl out and brawl in so the combination of the two led to a real

downtime a down period for aew not just um business wise i just think creatively i just think like the company didn't feel it's why they went on this so you know edge doing the rah-rah speech on tv which i thought was such a mistake

airing the punk footage that was an even bigger mistake such as the cringiest things they can do but it's also why they kept on about restoring the feeling the feeling is back they've dropped all of that now and just focusing on the product so it's a much better show off the back of it yeah i mean think a lot of that as well came from um the idea that aw was the place where you'd have the dream job and you wanted to work the freedom and then that

curtain got pulled back a little bit and it wasn't that and actually you saw the limits of what freedom looks like and that that you know you're starting going who's exactly steering the ship and what's going on and things like that and that

pulled away from the mystique a little bit of that and now what then happens speaking from personal experience is i mean this is a bit contrarian of me and this is why i haven't seen stranger things but when people start digging their heels in and insisting upon you that you're that this is right this is better and this is just better

it does make you go, oh, back off. And there was something about the clinging onto the desperation of that feeling and the restore the feeling and all of that stuff. having me watch it's hard to watch a show every single week and just have these people come and tell me how brilliant the show is 100% just do the show then and there's um you know there's something about that that i'll talk about a little bit in the in when we review blood and guts a little bit later on but like

When you just focus on the work and making the quality of the programming better, look what happens. And I think that's what they have been doing to their massive credit. With AEW, well, I don't think they were firing on creative cinders.

business was pretty good for them yeah attendance was down but i think what's fascinating about aew is no matter what their attendance is for their uh building no matter what their tv ratings are which you know can drop and it can rise and it can drop again and it mostly drops more than it rises and i think with the nielsen changes as well that's only further dropping is this sort of like weird nebulous world now their pay-per-view buy rates are so strong yeah and are always strong

TNA, even in the Spike era, when they were at a peak of their popularity, and they were doing a million viewers every single week. so Ollie and I are currently covering the 2013 period of time at the moment which is the end of the Hogan era because Hogan leaves at the end of 2013

In a most perfect TNA way, Dixie Carter literally begging him to stay. And Hogan walks away with Dixie Carter holding onto his leg, begging for him to stay. This company will fall apart without you. Hogan is never seen again. And that was the only bit. of creative he would agree to when uh turned to his final appearance on what a worker even when they were doing a million viewers every single week and melt to write in the observer about around this time there could be a natural disaster

TNA would still do a million viewers. There could be nothing else on TV. TNA would do a million viewers. It was just no matter what they did, whether it was great, whether it was bad, a million people watched.

But no one bought the pay-per-views. Yeah. Their pay-per-view average was like 8,000 buys. Like 8,000 to 10,000. That's a really... quite naff conversion rates whereas you look at AEW and you look at what their TV ratings are and you know I've got some and I don't even know what their attendance are the attendance for WrestleDream in October was reportedly like 6,200

But the buy rate was 115,000 to 125,000. That is an incredible conversion rate. All Out had 12,000 people in attendance, 135,000 to 140,000 buys. Forbidden Door set an 0-2 attendance record for a wrestling show. show did 122 to 130 000 buys all in which some people say was a big failure for tna because yeah the texas one people thought it was a failure for tna because they own sorry aw sorry

What did I say? TNA. Sorry, carry on. I was up at 5am today. Everyone knew what you meant. I was just being pinnickety. I was up at 5am today to watch Blood and Gus because I was like, I have to do the nursery drop off as well. All in, which everyone says, or some people argue was a failure on a... because they only got 20,000 people into a massive stadium. Did 175,000 pay-per-view buys. That is monstrously huge.

Particularly when you compare it to TNA, who are doing like, if they do 60,000 buys, I was like, whoa. Yeah. They're back. But broadly, they're doing that sort of 20,000 by level. The levels of business there, and to me, I would argue, is fan interest. Yeah. Because that is your most dedicated... hardcore audience. A million people may have watched Impact when it was on Spike, but there was an 8,000 hardcore audience that would buy every single pay-per-view that they put on.

AEW have just got this 120,000 to 130,000 hardcore audience that will buy every single pay-per-view. And of course, those are pay-per-view buys. It doesn't include HBO Max or any other streaming service, right? So that to me... is what I would argue is why AEW are still the number two promotion in America despite the fact that TNA have got a lot of upswing

on them from the back of the wwe partnership there is still this 20 000 pay-per-view ceiling buy that i don't think they can they very rarely crack out of yeah i think it's a really uh interesting conversation the pay-per-view buy thing anyway because if i can sort of spitball a little bit i'm not fully clear on this sort of uh comparison but like

content creator if you look at like followers to non-followers and who's watching your stuff and things like that sometimes you have stuff that hits and and it and it is pushed out to non-followers and

There are people who I watch where I don't follow them necessarily, but I know there's a series in because I've engaged with a video. I've liked it. I've commented. They'll come back into the feed. I don't have to follow them. I'm still interested in the feed. With AEW, it's one of those things where like... they've they've earned enough um of a reputation of having quality wrestlers and having quality matches and you're gonna get your money's worth because there are 90 000 like

matches on this card um that i'm intrigued to watch their pay-per-views even if i'm not watching the weekly tv because yeah you're guaranteed to probably get exactly the year contender so even even within that 120 000 people buying the thing probably Harvard wouldn't even necessarily be considered hardcore they're just like wrestling and they trust that they can I used to just keep up with NXT takeovers I didn't watch weekly NXT it's the same the same kind of thing yeah maybe which I think is

a sort of credit to them also the other thing that makes them the secondary and the ends any conversation as far as i'm concerned it's a privately owned company with a billionaire so they have unlimited resource they have they have you know um i i give him for it a bunch of times but it's a billionaire son and you can go dad can i have another couple million to

buy mercedes monet yeah which he doesn't need to because he took a company and made it profitable within its first couple of years which actually beggared his own belief because he didn't think it was going to be profitable for a little while but the tv rights deal

was so much bigger than it possibly could be. And even with Warner Brothers Discovery, this is my point about it, with Warner Brothers Discovery, their business, are they splitting? Are they going to be bought by someone else? What's going on? Nobody knows. There's a lot of uncertainty.

all right well i'll just pick up and take it somewhere else because it's mine it's mine and while hbo and and the presence of hbo max and warner brothers and tnt and all the rest of it is massive in terms of being able to get that out there for people the fact that it has

It's the same thing with WC doing it, Ted Turner. As long as Ted Turner was in charge of the broadcasting network, WCW was fine. When Ted stepped away, it wasn't. Tony's got this company. As long as Tony's... like the one in charge funding the company it's fine and because of resource it's the number two company

end of end of conversation yeah like ted being forced out yeah of his position in turner and is is kind of really what did kill deficit because he was the one that was there to be like no we're keeping this on then jamie kelner steps in yeah like nope i think we're i don't like wrestling yeah but yeah you're right with tony khan while

Warner Brothers or WBD has a stake within AEW. No one's quite sure of what the percentage of that is. It is not enough to them to be the decider whether or not AEW closes. It is Tony Khan's company.

can't if wbd turned around and said like we're not putting on aw anymore then aw could just say well we'll just do on our own website yeah we're just going to do it on youtube we're going to do it on twitch we're going to do it on wherever it is we're going to go find a new partner elsewhere and we'll go but like i think

Tony seems like a fairly loyal kind of guy that he would love to stick with. Yeah, I bet so. And it's been a great partnership. It's been a great partnership. And also because he is such a wrestling historian nerd. God, the amount of bloody chat they have about wrestling on TBS.

I know. They bloody love a lot of that, don't they? They bloody love having a chat about that. So I think he... quite likes the prestige of being a part of TBS. He named two titles after the networks. Yeah, absolutely. Like, no small part. I honestly think if TBS got one viewer a week...

he would want to stay on TBS because the history books then show that he was part of TBS and that means something in wrestling history. So yeah, have WWE helped TNA become the second biggest promotion? No. And I don't think it ever will be because I think they have got a ceiling. I think that AEW will never be the number one promotion because they have a ceiling as well. I think that WWE will forever be the number one promotion. Even if TKO keep raising the prices.

Even if TKO shut down WrestleMania, even if TKO moved everything to Saudi Arabia, they will probably always and forever remain the number one promotion in America. And the AEW will always and forever remain the number two promotion. unless Tony decides to shut it down. And I don't think there's anything that TNA or MLW or GCW or anyone else can ever do to catch them up because they haven't got the billions to back in. I completely agree.

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Hey guys, it's Danny Pellegrino from Everything Iconic. There's an all-new season of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives now streaming on Hulu. MomTalk might have started as a sisterhood, but these Latter-day Saints are no angels. This season, there are new secrets, lies, and truths coming out, and you won't want to miss all the drama. Watch the new season of the Hulu original, The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus for bundle subscribers. Terms apply.

And speaking of the hardcore of the hardcores, that's you guys over at patreon.com forward slash rustog. We love each and every single one of you, and we want to give you a shout out on this very show, like these fine folk, the cleaner, Kenny Shah. They put the Mo in Movem.

and it is Movember currently but I've not done town so we were talking about this the other day well I have so we were talking about this the other day I suddenly realised oh it's November we've not done a moustache thing this year and all he said to me was like

yeah because your wife hated it last year and i was like that is true she did it she could not wait for november to end so i could grow back the the bottom half of my face um and he was like i just didn't think uh kate would let you do it again and i was like it's for charity though yeah and she would she good causes she did say i guess if it's for charity i'll i'll live with it but uh he was he was like your wife hated it far too much in the name of in the name of marriage it was like charity

luke's marriage yeah and my mum hated it as well uh for the record uh the british bulldog philip boy j smith jr yo adrian rocky he can last your fun longer than you in the ring starbucks stephen costa shield maiden zoise Burly Rob Burwell. Let him cook.

Alex. A pock Alex. Now, the Swiss submission machine, Andres Pulgasala. And you can look, but you can't touch Bella Pearson. Thank you all so much. Please head on over to patreon.com forward slash rest talk. They've got a bunch of exclusive bonus. content over there. We have got a TLC episode coming up next month that we filmed yesterday with a special guest. We did remotely. Yeah.

I know. We spent half an hour just trying to work out what the best way to do this technology-wise, how we're going to frame the cameras and everything. And in the end, I just stepped in and said, can we not just do this on Zoom with one laptop? Great.

producer kieran and production manager ben were sat there with like three different feeds and stuff they were using obs ollie had a laptop i had a laptop kieran had a laptop we had zoom on there and then we couldn't work out the order i was like could i do I'm just going to log in. I'm just going to log in, put my laptop here. Ollie has one of my earbuds. I have the other one. Problem solved. Great.

and this is why this place would struggle without me keep it simple head on over to patreon.com forward slash WrestleTalk and check it out which will be coming up very very soon and also there's a three count tomorrow Brand new episode of Three Count, predicting Survivor Series 2025. And over on Patreon, it'll be us reviewing Survivor Series 2001. In three words or less, slash viewer. I loved it. I was 11.

There's no account in my taste. You know, you just said that this place would fall apart without you. Can we recreate that Dixie Carter Hogan thing with Ollie grabbing his seat? Yes, that does work for me, brother. There you go. Back in 2001, WWE were worried about their pay-per-view buy rates declining. They were like, why aren't people buying pay-per-views anymore? So they came up with a genius idea.

gimmick pay-per-views. And they did Hell in a Cell 2009. Yeah, because there's no long-term consequences to that. And that featured not one, not two, not four, but... three Hell in a Cell matches on one show. And boy, let me tell you, when you get to that Triple H and Shawn Michaels versus Legacy main event, I do not want to see a Hell in a Cell match.

And it did kill the stipulation a little bit. I think some people argue the same thing about war games. There being two war games on Survivor Series. By the time you get to the second one, I'm like, I kind of had my felt. I don't think people particularly like war games that much. No, it's interesting because I like the idea of it more than I like it.

and i think i like the nxt version of it i mean i i'm not i wasn't you know i was could barely hold my own head up when it was made with the cw so like i can't claim to have seen them all but like you know i'm sure those were vintage iconic bits of wrestling yeah um but like something about the nxt the black and the black rings and the darker aesthetic kind of works with it um so i kind of enjoyed it back then i think that you know the kevin owens one or whatever now

And we're at a point where there's a level of oversaturation where I'm seeing them all. And I'm like, is it my favorite thing? I don't know if it is my favorite thing. There are many things I look forward to in the calendar. I may be getting a bit ahead of myself here. I think AEW's got a whole bunch of homegrown ones that I look forward to far more than Blood and Guts. I would actually agree with you. I like the mystique of war games.

more than actually a war games match itself it's interesting that it's become a part of the calendar i will say to the credit of wwe specifically when it comes to their version of the match um they've kind of found over the last couple of years a way of making one of them about banter and one of them about drama. So like, is Eoskai going to jump off with a bin on her head this time? Probably. What colour will the bin be? The women's matches tended to be about exploits and japes and laughter.

and hijinks and the men's matches tend to be about what's Sami Zayn going to do as part of the bloodline what's the drama of the show kind of thing so like to their credit they've sort of managed to find a way of distinguishing between the two but it does

still they're not my favorite matches because they take half an hour before the match starts yeah and i think to adw's credit they did that on this show as well i feel like i think the women's one which was my favorite match i agree i agree i liked it the most

was all about the violence. They were just there to do the big, mad, hardcore spots. There was stuff there to further storylines, but ultimately, front and center, it was about the madness and the chaos of it. Whereas the men's one in the main event was actually about Moxley.

and yeah moxley's death riders and what is the state of the death riders what is the state of the psyche of john moxley that is that was the central theme running through the main event which i did love but i didn't love that until moxley came into the match right there were elements i did like but i was i got into the match more once moxley got into it and once the match then got into the you know the match beyond part of it i

When it was Darby and Yuta, I did have a little bit of like, sorry, I've had my fill of blood and guts actually. And it was earlier in the night. And it took me a little while to get into the second one. This is going to be a really interesting show to review.

Because inherently, I think I feel quite negatively about the episode of Dynamite from a structural perspective. But there are individual moments of brilliance that I really enjoyed. And it's one of those funny things of... because you've got a three match card and a long show because it's two of the same type of match that are long that are long that are both violent like someone was bleeding quite dangerously within the first five minutes

um which i think personally was a mistake but we'll get into that um inherently you're then left with like i i just feel like as a show overall i'm quite unsatisfied by it so yeah and yeah and yeah There is lots to praise as well. So it's a weird thing to review. I think if it's not your bag, baby, this is not going to be a show for you, is it? I don't love the blood and gut stipulation.

And like when they've announced it, I was like, all right, fine. I guess we'll do this. I mean, I hate the name. Yeah. The name itself being a troll. It is. And it is a troll. It's not one of those trolls that has become like...

Yeah, we've got it. It's a troll that stays a troll now feels a bit retrograde. Yeah, it is. It'd be like naming something piss ants because that's what Triple H called them at the Hall of Fame speech. You've not reclaimed blood and guts. It's like that was funny the first year. Exactly. When you did.

it as a one-off like if it was a one-off thing we're doing war games we're calling it blood and guts because that is what vince mcmahon called aew on a uh a conference which they were right to do by the way as an aw were right to call it that yeah in that first year but it's it's six years on now yeah and it's just called blood and guts i think it's a stupid name and i wasn't really looking forward to it that said i wonder if because i had fairly low expectations going in

I actually thoroughly enjoyed myself coming out of this because I got so much out of the first one. And by the time that the second one really kicked into gear, I got so much out of the second one as well. Do I want them to do two every year though?

No, on the same show that is. And I don't. I just don't. We saw it on Raw this week that Regal comes out and yells war games in the backstage segment. And the reason that that used to hit is because it was not a thing that we already knew was in the calendar. Like, obviously... reports are and you know. I'd say even in NXT.

November is coming up. Do you know what I mean? It's more effective, though, if it organically comes. I think that when you have got a date in the calendar where we're going to have... In the name of parity, I appreciate they are doing it, but we're going to have a men's one and a women's one.

no I agree with you because I think like this year it's at a different point this year usually this comes earlier in the calendar but to your point and i what i do agree with is well you've got two concurrent storylines in two in a women's division and a men's division that's necessitated you doing a blood and guts match that then feels inorganic yeah that you you're both your divisions have come to this conclusion at the same time

which is where I feel it's a little bit clunky oh yeah clunky is the word yeah if you spread this out and you don't like it's not October it's not November it's not June we're just doing just a bit of unpredictability to your hell on a cell point isn't this like the first year there hasn't been one since like

yonks ago well i mean yeah so they did obviously hell in a cell last year with with punk and drew but even that one felt like it was the first one in ages yeah because like there was one at wrestlemania 39 39 sponsored

By Russell Crowe. That's what it's about by Russell Crowe. Edge came out to Slayer. The only thing I remember of that match is Russell Crowe and Slayer. Oh, no, but there were colorful kendo sticks. Colorful kendo sticks, that's right. There were the lightsaber kendo sticks. Depending on which team you were on.

And then there was Drew and Punk, and there hasn't been one this year. You're absolutely right, yeah. So I think that's good, because it means when you hear that, you're going to get it. But the oversaturation of... the same type of match across two companies is unfair i think for one but like

Two of these in one show and in the middle of it is a Falls Count Anywhere match where I was a little bit... You want me to take a breather and it's a Falls Count Anywhere match? I think it was too much. And then at the end of the match, you're... calling your magically summoning the cage down and then he's going and the stipulation for us is going to be a steel cage

I'm desensitized. Like I'm just, it doesn't have an impact on me. Do I want to watch that steel cage match? Absolutely. Do I think it's going to be great? Absolutely. But the moment of saying it's going to be violent. What proportion of violent is it compared to this match? That's it. Yeah, when Excalibur was like, that's one of the most violent match stipulations. I was like, dude, you're on a show that's called Blood and Guts with two of these things. Excalibur and team.

desperate to try and sell this the whole time there is this is this is the this is the confusing part of reviewing this specific show for me um is that there's mo like i say there's moments of brilliance and yet it's it's so peppered by

just desensitized and like you're trying too hard and like i can't fully sink into it i have the overall negative feeling about some things that i really enjoyed it's such a weird a weird show with all that said i thought this opening match was match of the year did you really i thought i loved Match of the year. I would have this in my conversation. I had such a wonderful time with this opening Blood and Guts match.

I'm being hyperbolic when I say match of the year. But I think this is my favorite blood and guts match that AEW have ever done. And I think it is my favorite war games match in many, many years. Many moons. Many moons.

I actually will even put it above the bloodline one where Sammy officially joins the group and Jay hugs him at the end. Because for me, that is not a match about... war games it's the drama that is the drama i was super into that as a war games match that match is broadly fine yeah uh but the drama in there is five stars yeah it's a five star angle in a two star two and a half star match whereas i thought this was just five stars in terms of just violence and chaos and madness and I adored it

in a two and a half star story match. It was the Triangle of Madness, Mercedes-Benz, Marina Shafir and Megan Bain taking on Jamie Hayter, Willow Nightingale, Harley Cameron, Marina Shirakawa, Chris Dallin and Tony Storm. too many people part one yes yes for sky and will i start this and within i don't know what's within five minutes because it was before the second person came out sky blue was busted open and boy was she bleeding she did that eddie blade job yeah

I was going to say, and like Kyle O'Reilly did one later on. Love it. I'm all in, but I'm all in on it. I think it's rad. You're a blood in your wrestling kind of person, and I'm not. And it's like, so like, you know, for those who are going to sit at home and go, well, why did you get Dan on to review this one? Blame Oli being at a golf tournament. But no, I...

Even within that, you kind of have to check your own personal things and go like, well, let's appreciate what's going on. I just thought someone bleeding within the first five minutes was like, wait.

I think it sets up the violence of the match, though. I mean, that's true. The first few spots that you do, someone is busted open and is like, well, she is one of 12 people in this match. What on earth is going to happen next? And they did do, I think, a nice escalation of... violence as they that's very true i well yeah but it was my initial reaction was but you've you got you

telling me this is the most violent match in the world and you're bleeding like that because you got pounced into the cage yeah something i've seen happen 15 million times like it's not it didn't have that kind of impact for me but you're right when you then subsequent i think the rest of the match was

the escalation was real. I mean, I figured that something bad was going to happen when all of the babyface team came out wearing white. Yeah. I was like, they understood the assignment. Julia Hart then came in for the heel team. Harley Cameron came in dressed as Tifa.

from Final Fantasy 7. Oh, is it a cosplay? Yeah, it was a cosplay. Tekla then came in who used a belt. Jamie Hayter came in with a bag of tacks that, you know, like... well you know when you get like a paper bag and you go and you make it bang that is what it felt like happened because all of a sudden there was this bang and the tags went boof everywhere and it was like well I guess that moment of me going like this is finished

Yesterday, so on Wednesdays, we record these on Thursdays. I went for a run. I just want to brag about it. I go for runs sometimes on my lunch break. I can do nuts. Yeah, I do a 5K in sub-29. Too many Ks. Yeah. I nearly did one in sub-28 the other week. But anyway, I was going for my run, right? And we've got a shower cubicle in the office that is too small. To get a shower in there and get dried afterwards, fine. But getting dressed and undressed...

tricky there's not a lot of room so i'm just going to do it in one of the bugs instead so i went into one of the the labs and i was you know getting changed and i was i put the toilet seat down and i was sat on there and putting on my my knee brace because i've got naff knees so i put my knee brace I then heard the loudest bang. And I was like, oh my god, what's happened? I stood up and looked down.

I had exploded the toilet seat that I was sat on and shattered it into three separate pieces. Just from sitting? Just from sitting on it. And I think it's because I was leaning, you know, because you've lifted my leg up, so I'm putting extra pressure on it. But it exploded and there were just shards of it everywhere.

it was in three like neat pieces but there were shards of other bits everywhere that's what happened with this tack bag yeah i was i was so surprised at this i don't think they expected it either now they don't have a toilet seat uh for the rest of this match

And Jamie Hayter's probably got a knee brace on as well. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, probably at this point. So Bane then gets in, and who I thought was awesome. Oh my god, she looked incredible. The presentation of Megan Bane in this moment was top-notch. She is great. She comes in, she's just... battering everyone and no selling offense it's awesome particularly like when the bin lid shot from from harley cameron yeah

She's not in the match yet, so I'll mention it in a second. And then Chris Statlander came in, who then wrestled the first part of this with her world title still on her. Which was lit. It was so good. We had Armand Outrun Ford, who was supposed to be in this match, but unfortunately the injury got taken out. So they then sort of like went to the back and stuff. We had then Mercedes out next, who brilliantly had no sense of urgency to get into this match. Smart.

Smart. Why would you? She reversed the Saturday Night Fever into a DDT onto the title, then posed with Hitzer to further the... Because they've got the match at full gear for the title. She then gets out of the cage and just starts handing everyone some of her other world...

titles to use as weapons I thought was fun Mina came in with a barbed wire baseball bat Chris Statlander was busted open ahead of this Marina Shafir then came out and she dragged Statlander out of the cage and pulled out the bed of nails then knocked Statlander into that bed of nails. Gnarly stuff. And then Tony came down as the last enemy for the Babyface team and she used a pearl necklace as the weapon. Yep. pearl necklace. And do you want to elaborate on why that's funny? It's a joke. Okay.

So now the match officially begins. Now we're into the match beyond. And it was... 36 minutes into the show and i loved it yeah tony storm does the taipei death match stuff she gets the tape fist with uh shards of the um champagne bold throwback to the uh the mariah may feud

I just wrote in my notes here, this feels like utter chaos. It was just, everyone was just doing stuff all the way. It wasn't like two people in the corner going, boof, boof, boof. This was just, no matter where you looked, something mad was happening.

hate a powerbomb sky blue into a table but i am the table it did not break can i just say the tables on this particular episode did not want to play their part they don't even i was like oh well it's sometimes in the women are littler and smaller women are littler and smaller Ha ha ha ha ha!

And I am only saying this because I was at an indie show recently where a tiny lad, and part of his gimmick is he's a tiny lad. Ted Saban, great wrestler, by the way. A wonderful personality to have. But he's quite small. I'm taller than him.

i'm not a tall person he's quite a light frame they did a big spot where they threw him outside onto a table to go through it and he just bounced off yeah because he's got a slight and a light frame and i was like that's just one of those things yeah they tried and they didn't do it no you then had claudio casting no

Two people to barrel through Claudio to get through that table. I was like, oh no, it's a problem with the table. Yeah, this was a table issue. It's a table issue. Matthew's going to have a hell of a time on the next Botchamania.

Harley Cameron pulled out the Mercedes Monet puppets to a massive... pop and mercedes monet freaks out she grabs the puppet off the hand but beneath the puppet was brass knucks yeah she punched me that was great great stuff hart and tecla then somehow snaked out of the cage there's They were little.

there were holes in the cage their light frames were able to get out uh technically then attacked the referee and unlocked the cage so then they started brawling outside of the cage and stuff um and we had a samoan drop off the side of the cage to mercedes monet by chris statlander through a tape Tony Storm has the shoe and there's glass and there's a DDT to Shafir. They get a mirror to do the hip attack, but Shafir just absolutely twats. Tony Storm with it. Glass goes everywhere. Great visual.

We then have Marina Shafir with a figure four with the barbed wire bat to Megan Bain. Marina Shafir with her shoeless feet, with her bootless feet, stomps her foot into the glass, then stomps that foot into Marina Sherekao to break it up. Then Shafir starts choking out Mina Shirakawa as Bane is battering her with the belt and Tony Storm is being held back by the Triangle of Madness and being forced to watch what is happening and Tony Storm to save her friend.

quits and she uh because you can only win via uh tap out or by surrender surrender she surrenders for the match to save her friend which neatly builds uh them versus marina shafir and megan bain in the tactile tournament yeah So there was a lot of bits here to further individual feuds or tag feuds. And I absolutely loved it. I thought it was really effective. I thought it was really fun.

um this is what i mean by like i'm like why are you bleeding so early on like it's just because there's now nowhere to build well i think they managed to find a way to and it's because they made it a little bit silly a little bit ridiculous and i actually think that is sort of the that's

the key to a match like this is like it's it's and and when we talk about the the men's one later on it's why certain weapons just don't do it for me because i actually love the explosion of the mirror yes i love the you know the

thing that has paint on it I love that they bring all the belts in and that's well of course you've got all these belts they're weapons you might as well use them even though I do think commentary tried a bit too hard yeah Brian Daniels because like I said I was like I mean and you know Brian Daniels who get here with the title belt that hurts just as much as weapons he said they

I wrote it down because it was so ludicrous. He said, and the commentator said a few ludicrous things. Those belts can rip and tear your flesh. Let me tell you, they absolutely can't. Like, they just can't. I thought Brian Downs went,

I mean, it depends on the belt. It depends. He fully did, because also I'm looking at these belts, and with all due respect to the independent women seen around the world, these belts aren't exactly like, you know... They're not jewel-encrusted. They're not jewel-encrusted. So, like, for... It was Megan, wasn't it, at the end? For her to be whipping, that's how you use that belt. Absolutely, that's great. That was a great visual. And that line on commentary was there as a Chekhov's gun.

for the finish when they were whipping it with him to make it like to really put over was it or was that just because they did this a lot i think it was check off i think it was happy coincidence um but like it was it was it was really effective In that regard, I don't love bed of nails. That's a personal thing. Good for your back, though. Is it? Yeah. Really? That's why a bed of nails exists. I thought it was just one of those things like, you know, snake charming. I thought it was like a...

No, it's actually good for your call. I've got a... Not a bed of... I've got a bed of nails. Just at home. But I've got a Shakti mat. I've got a reformer Pilates, the bed of nails studio. You've got a what? A Shakti mat. A Shakti mat? Yeah. So one of those things has just got like...

little mini spikes in it and stuff. And you lay out and you sort of spread your weight across it. Okay. And it's a way to sort of focus the mind. Well, there you go. My apologies to the Bed of Nails community. I think Statline had a lovely time, actually. Yeah, if anything. I mean, it's not the best way to get on it. Yeah. No, it wasn't.

But yeah, I like... it was it was i loved the the table spot i loved that we get the shot of everyone celebrating and mercedes is having a kip it was brilliant like that part of it is there's something about the high stakes ludicrosity of of it what a word i know which

well earlier on i mentioned that aw has its own homegrown things that i prefer to this match type anarchy in the arena is the example i come to or stadium stampede they're so they are themselves so big so grand so ludicrous that it's more entertaining to me yeah and i think to to the women especially this being their first one they kind of had a blank slate even though we've seen many we've seen women's matches in

wwe the aw version of this match site we haven't seen that yet they had a lot to prove i think they did a really effective job of doing it i think they sold multiple stories the stat and mercedes story was sold really well there the tag feuds were sold really well there um just

tony storm's continual being tony storm she's got a lot more character depth in there as well i think it was really effective yeah uh the reports are that um usual banged up yeah in terms of like you know they took a bit of a beating jamie had chipped some teeth Of course she did. And I think it's when she got thrown out of the cage or like dragged out of the cage. Oh yeah, she went hard way down those stairs. I think she chipped some tooths there. But yeah, I loved it. Yeah, very effective.

We got the Don Callis family attacking Jurassic Express backstage because we've got this $1 million match happening at Full Gear. And they were doing it to show to the Bucks, hey, look what happens when we work together. Like, they disrespect you. We're going to... beat them up for you you should join our crew and okada comes out with him and he's like

TikTok like you know we need a decision by next week because next week Kenny Omega is coming back and the Don Callis family said we're going to do the same to Kenny send a message we then had Hangman Adam Page taking on Powerhouse Hobbs in a Falls Count Anywhere match I don't think this needs to be as gimmicky as it was on a match that had two war games on it. That's what I mean by it being just like...

it just was there and I didn't really feel anything for it. It's the world champ in a match. And I like Hobbs as well. Like it just didn't. I like the story. Yeah. Cause he's got a match with Shibata next week. So I think there's, that's good of going through the cronies before you get to the head boss. Like I think all.

that is absolutely fine it was just because it was a false it was another hardcore match when you've got two hardcore matches that are also within cages and that to your point as well they raised down the lower down the cage um to do the sort of final promos bit as well um Hobbs looked great in this match. Paige looked awesome. They then had the finish really what you want to talk about, which is when Hobbs gets booted off the sort of like stands where the fans were. And he fell onto a...

production table that had little sparklers and stuff go off and they flickered the lights within the arena. I thought Halloween was last week. Look, you know what? For me, it's the right side of Goofy. It is Goofy. It's the wrong side of Goofy for me. The sparks love it.

But the lights going... Actually, it's the lights that sold me on it. It was like when TNA had the electrified steel cage match and they lowered the lights and stuff on every time they went into the cage. Loved it. I played a little sound of it going... I... um also it was another one of those oh god this is this is what i mean by trying too hard the whole time like sometimes you just gotta trust it sometimes you just gotta let it be like

they went hard on how heavy the flight cases are. They're like, flight cases are massive! Cut back to our production assistant and the ref just both beach balling it out of the way. That's a bit of foam. Like, that's not hurting him at all. But, like... It just frustrated me in that regard. All of the gimmicks were necessary, I think.

Afterwards, Joe and Shibata attacked Hangman Adam Page and Joe called for the war games thing to be lowered. I don't know why production did lower it. No, because it's magic. They must be, they're like, they're bringing it down. Like the dove from above. They say, yeah. I haven't thought about the double move in a long time. And then Eddie and Hook ran down to make the save, and Joe and Shibata bailed. What I did like about this is Paige saying, if you wanted a cage match...

All you had to do was ask, dumbass. Because that is how their world title feud was started, was if you wanted a world title match, all you had to do was ask. You didn't need to throw a hissy fit in order to get one. So I like there's a little bit of mirroring within a bit of callback and stuff. So I think that's nice. And a cage match between the two of them.

keep all the outside interference great stuff yeah announce that next week though um is it next week or is it the week after no no i mean announce that say like say give it the stipulation next week i just in terms of like make making the the absolute impact of that thing on this show. I would agree. I completely agree with you because then you're like, whoa, it's one of the most dangerous match types. It's like, dude, this match we're about to have has got two cages in it.

Then we had a segment with Ricky the Dragon Steamboat being brought out. This was supposed to also have Ric Flair. in it but the report is that he was too hurt to be able to do this he said he was in a ton of pain he's just had rotator cuff he's just recovered from a rotator cuff injury and so this was there because respecting wrestling history greensboro nwa wcw tbs sometimes i go to afc wimbledon um with my friend who is uh

does things with AFC Wimbledon is, you know, one of the sponsors and the rest of it. So we get hospitality. Oh, very nice. And it's lovely. And we go and have a little buffet and there's a, there's a nice drink. A bit of finger food? Well, not finger food. Full plate. Oh man. Lovely. Real nice stuff. Very nice. It's had a lovely stadium in Plough Lane. Absolutely love it. I can't believe they're just a load of finger sandwiches.

It's not finger sandwiches. It's like full on. I mean, I'm surprised it's not just fingers. No prawn cocktails there. What? I know. It's like, it's like, it's good food as well. So you want me to finger some sandwiches? Well, there you go. And while I'm eating at the tables, they wheel out.

someone from wimbledon past and they sit up there and they have a conversation and the man's like wow do you remember when you were in that match yeah against at that stadium oh huge memories and everyone in the room pretends they remember

That's what's happening here. It is a little bit like... Greensboro, North Carolina knows... wrestling history yeah the building that we're in that sign was cool and it was like you know lovely all the rest of it that fan there who had the mount rushmore sign with uh steamboat sting dusty and flare on it like it's like yeah like that fan there was having the time of his life just felt like this is this is a dark i thought this was for the national championship thing because that

is uh tony khan having a wank over wrestling history i can't dude i'm i am not gonna i will get into it a little bit later because a lot of people brought me up on the fact that i talked about aw having too many titles but i didn't mention anything else but i'll get on to that in a little bit So anyway.

He's there talking about history and wrestling and whatnot. FTR come out. They do usual heel style shenanigans with them because Dax was taught by Ricky Steamboat, but you actually taught me nothing. They tag with him in their final match, but it meant nothing to... them the only thing you taught me they kept mentioning flare as well and i had no idea that flare was supposed to be there i hadn't seen that it was advertised so until i came out late i was like

That's why they kept saying Flair's name. Right. They said, the only thing that you and Flair ever taught me was to save your money so you don't have to take bookings like this. Way to bury your own thing. Or Jericho. Exactly. And then he goes nose to nose with Ricky. Ricky's like...

I'm going to turn 73 soon. I'm just going to leave. And then, oh, FTR attack him afterwards. They're going to give him the pile driver. Brodido run down to make the save. 21 plex to cash, and then Ricky knocks down Dax, and obviously they get sent to the back. Good stuff. I think if you were there live, it'd be lovely. It's just a weird thing on this show. Do you know what I mean? It just didn't fit. I'd have had another match. Maybe.

i don't know what it was a dark segment it was i'm looking forward to the match they're gonna have oh that match is gonna be awesome you know and they showcase that so in that regard it's a success um but yeah it just happened and then we got to our main event which was the death riders versus the conglomeration and darby allen in blood and guts and yeah It took me a little while to get into this. I think that the first half of this was just stuff.

Like, you know, it was Darby and Yuta, then Orange Cassidy was in. The faces had the advantage, which, you know, traditional war games ruling says that's the wrong way to do it. Because the whole point is the baby faces should be at the disadvantage within this. But I think they worked it... well enough that the heel still felt like they had the advantage because Mark Briscoe gets taken out and it also furthers the storyline of Moxley.

because mox is the reason why the death riders didn't have the advantage because mox is in his own head and that's why he's on this bit of he's on this losing streak now without him actually having tapped out or pinned he's just he got uh he

got DQ'd against Kyle O'Reilly, got counted out, or the double count out against Kyle O'Reilly, and he got counted out again by Roderick Strong. So him being on this losing streak is what has made the Death Riders be put into this position. So I think it works in that aspect of it, and then I'm actually making it work into making it...

work within the confines of a wrestling match where the heels get the heat then you had Garcia coming in and this is where you had I think was the strongest bit of this which is the story Danielson saying on commentary this is bad strategy from Moxley I don't know why Garcia is out next. You have Claudio Castagnoli right there. He should be in this match sooner. He's your ace. Put him in.

and mark briscoe was supposed to be in next but he doesn't come out they cut back to renee and it looks like mark briscoe has been taken out he was taken out of the don callis family so um kyle goes out instead or maybe it was ruddy that went down um i think it was ruddy uh claudia then came in next um there's some fun stuff with orange cassidy kyle o'reilly came in next and then moxley i thought when there's gonna be last i think it's gonna be last and danielson again said this is bad strategy

Why is Moxley coming out now? He should be out last. He is the team captain. Why is he coming out now? And I thought Scalabre did a really good job on this. He was like, it's because the Deathriders are winning. He's glad-handing. He's doing this bit now because now he can just go in and take advantage of the work that Claudio and Wheelie Yuta and Daniel Garcia have done.

done he doesn't have to do any of the leg work he can just go in while they're on top and just reap the rewards of that which i thought was great because he's he's so he's so paranoid about his position within AEW and positioned towards the rest of the roster. I thought that was a really nice bit of detail. And then we got the countdown for the final man of the Babyface team, but no one comes out.

Because they're at a 5-on-4 disadvantage, thanks to a voice note from Rene Paquette to explain. Then we got Pac coming in last, so the match can officially begin. Mark Briscoe comes down against medical advice. He comes and he gets both. to get in um doodly doodly do they get up on top of the cage mark hits the jay driller onto wheelie utah onto a bunch of chairs on top of the cage uh gabe kid then showed up from out of nowhere and he dragged darby away and

He and Pac get Darby up onto the entrance tunnel. They set up some tables and then Gabe Kidd set those buggers on fire and Pac body slammed. uh darby allen off the entrance ramp through the flaming tables and darby allen did catch fire and i thought it was pretty cool um and then we had the bulldog choke because my mox is like look at us

All of my plans. Everyone says I'm a bad strategist, but all my plans are coming together. He is absolutely, he's cock of the walk. He's well happy with himself. And he gets the bulldog choke on Kyle O'Reilly. But Kyle O'Reilly gives him the finger.

And then all of the babyfaces just start making this comeback. And Moxley goes into panic mode. And Kyle O'Reilly gets him in the ankle lock, which Moxley wouldn't tap out to so much that he battered the referee to get himself DQ'd. And he's writhing in pain. He managed to transition to the ball.

log choke haha but Karl O'Reilly reverses again and he gets in the ankle log and he drags him through the glass that has been spread around and Moxley is screaming in agony and there's no way out for him this time he cannot get himself DQ'd He can't get himself counted out. And so he taps out. Moxley submits. I thought it was an awesome finish. I loved the storytelling. I loved the visual of everything. I thought they told a superb tale throughout this.

But boy, it took half an hour to get to that tale. Yeah. And the stuff up until then was just stuff. I think you've put it very, very well. I think that is exactly how I felt about the match as well. I think there are obviously personal things I've got there where I'm like, a fork does nothing for me. The kind of gross out part. I'm going to take this thing and I'm going to push it into you and go.

while i'm doing it i'm like all right i i there are certain wrestlers that don't connect with you moxley and derby are two of those for me um so whenever they have feuds together i'm like well i'm not this is not going to be a match for me um but like you know the the psychological narrative going on there's loads to engage with there so i really appreciate that and i enjoyed that it was

served as a massive deal. It wasn't like, you know, one of the lackeys was going to be the one to surrender on his behalf because you could use the surrender thing, but the women haven't used the surrender thing earlier on. Exactly, yeah. Or even just tapping out Wheelie Yuta. Exactly. It doesn't actually, okay, you tapped out Wheelie Yuta, what does that mean?

but Mox being the guy to submit. This is a big deal. I think that's really effective. There was more, again, with the disillusionment thing for me, there was more like... commentary that i'd need like they read so i think there was such a desperation to make the stakes feel so high that it just put me off like there are things like oh what's that in orange cassidy's back pocket i think it might be an elbow pad yeah it was

and then like oh my god is that a meat hook no it's demonstrably a carabiner like chill out like they're so desperate to get it over as that and that it's actually working against it and that's another reason that it took me such a long time to really settle into the match i also personally find how much of both of the matches to a degree took place outside yeah

this is why I mean anarchy in the arena is a far better fit for me than this because if you're going to do this surely keeping them in the cage is part of it and so that it becomes such a I remember in Foley as good uh or the other one um no it's fully good i can't remember it's one of them uh mick foley talks about how he was like gutted that no one was reacting to his oh it's his retirement match with triple h yeah

No one's reacting to the near falls. And it's because nobody expects them to not get out of the cage and climb to the roof. Because that is something that they talked about. Because that is something that has happened in previous matches. So, like, you kind of expect them to go there. There's a certain level of expectation of things that are happening. But at this point...

Ah, I'm going to make such a big deal now. The cage is locked. But in both matches, the cage locked didn't do anything. It didn't actually matter.

So the stakes of it are like, they're so much lower. I agree. The desensitization to all of the gross out weapons are so much lower because you're so trying so desperately to convince me that... metal belt is the is a cheese grater or a fork is you know something so deranged when i watch this guy try and like suffocate two different people like it's so do you know what i mean i'm just whatever um

But the narrative elements of it were so engaging. I think that's where it comes to this weird thing of like, I didn't feel positively about it, but I felt positively about it in the same breath. Which I think is completely fair.

I've got a similar vibe to it. Like I was so into the story of this one. I was so much more into the violence of the women's match than I was in the men's one. The Derby Flaming Tables Bowl is great. I think it's all to do with stakes. I think the stakes in the women's one felt lower.

Yeah, because it wasn't really for anything. There was no big overarching narrative. Bragging rights, individually one getting over each other, whatever. But in this one, it was all about the fall of the Deathriders, and in particular, the fall of Moxley, who was on this losing streak. And not just like...

in terms of in ring, this mental losing streak that he's on as well, where he is just falling apart as a character. And I think that is so much more interesting than him stabbing someone with a fork.

Or even actually Derby going through the Flaming Table, which I thought was a cool spot. It was a cool spot. But, you know, it's like Derby would have done that in a singles match. That part. It would need to be blood and guts for that sort of... Or if it was anarchy in the arena, which I completely agree with you here. but why are we doing war games because of wrestling history yeah

And it's TBS. And we're in Greensboro. And we're in Greensboro, North Carolina. So it's a WCW hotbed. So we're going to do the WCW, the NWA thing. Just for me, it's the thing of like, okay, well, if you're going to do Blood and Gods, if you're going to do War Games, do it. Stop. doing it and breaking the rules of it to you know because otherwise what have i got to buy into yeah and that's that's a you know or i would argue sorry i'm going to cut you off there but or do it in one yeah

Do it in one of them when they get out of the cage. Don't do it in both of them when they get out of the cage. Yeah, I agree. That's a good point. So yeah, I enjoyed the episode of Dynamite overall. It's still not going to make me look forward to Blood and Guts next year. No. But I will say, I do think the women's one was probably the best Blood and Girls match they've done. But did it make me go, Fulk is worth checking out? Yes. So in that regard, success. Sold you on now. There you go.

Right. Lastly, we're going to get into your comments from last week's video and actually some of your ultra chats. Hello. Because we made the announcement on Tuesday's episode of Raw, the podcast that we did, that we're doing a bit of an experiment until the end.

Well, we do, because you're always going to be adapting with the ever-changing landscape of YouTube's algorithm. What we have found is that live streaming shows doesn't get surfed out afterwards as... much as pre-recorded stuff so if you do a live stream it might get pushed out at the time but it's then not pushed out post it going after seeking it and the majority of the views for a live stream a live stream podcast that we did came post

in being live you know 3 000 people will watch it out during while the show is on but then there's 25 000 people that watch it afterwards so you're like 20 000 people that watch afterwards so you've got to like You've got to show yourself those masters instead. So we're doing this thing. We found that the numbers have gone up since we have put them as pre-recorded podcasts.

It means that we don't get the interaction and stuff, so we're working out ways to get around that. The hilarious knock-on effect is that by putting up a second pre-recorded video, it hurts the news. So it's a real tricky balance that we're trying to figure out. and YouTubes just not helping.

whatsoever um but it means that we can do the ultra chats and people were sending in ultra chats ahead of the stream so we're very sorry that uh those didn't get it right out but i am going to read them out here so you did your money was well spent um this is from sydney in oz who said i don't think gunther should be

Cena's last match. He gets nothing from it. It's not a versus career match. You win, but you don't retire Cena. He is leaving win or lose anyway. Cardona, Rusev, Barrett, Sheamus, IT titles are better stories to right wrongs.

I loved the choice to put the belt on Cena. I think there's something so interesting. I think it instantly makes the tournament more interesting. I mentioned to a friend of mine, I was DMing with like... you know Seamus it instantly gives Seamus an extra goal to really go for it rather than just be like oh I could have the final match with having the final match with Johnny not there to retire him you're there to be the person who had John Cena's last match that in of itself is an accolade

there's a belt at the end of it even better and i think that like you know i'm a young nxt upstart and i'm gonna try and try and get one in i'm gonna go nuts and fantasy book like somehow they finally become friends and triple h and tony can't agree that edge can show up for one of the matches obviously it's not gonna happen but like edge is like i'm gonna get it and then out

comes an NXT star and takes over whatever I think like there are so many different fun things that can happen um as a result of it um that it instantly for me was like oh this is suddenly more fun Yeah. But I don't mind it being Gunther. Sorry, that was from Pat the Booker as well, not Cindy in Oz. Apologies. But I don't mind it being Gunther.

Also, I think Gunther needs a bit of a character reset anyway, and I think him winning the IC title, that belt that he actually did, his run made feel like an important belt again, I think kind of might be what he needs. And then they can do Gunther and Seamus for the Intercontinental title. You know what? I don't hate it at all. Thank you.

Carlos here says, I'm falling out of love with wrestling. I blame TKO and Triple H. Greed and ego have taken over. I've turned my wife into a new fan, her favorite CM Punk, and it broke my heart that we couldn't afford tickets in Utah to see him win the world title live.

yeah i mean this is we've spoken about it on this podcast i did with ollie a couple of uh weeks ago businessman well it is business and hangman page did an interview ahead of blood and guts where he was talking about how um like the

The prices to get into Blood and Guts in Greensboro were $30. Yeah. It was like $29 a ticket. Yeah. But then he said, what a great family event. Yeah. Well, that was an interesting choice. Yeah. I mean, look, Hangman, I appreciate you trying to tell people that as a family, you can go out and... tickets and as a family that is an affordable ticket price i don't think i would say that blood and guts was a family friendly event we so we were a forbidden door

And there was, we met this couple who came to this little meet and greet and they were there with their 10 year old. And I was there being like, I mean, I know what the main event of this is. It's an unsanctioned cage match that's got Darby Allin and Jon Moxley in it. It's going to be absolutely mad. And we bumped into them at the end of the show as well. And the kid went...

Of course they did, because that's what 10-year-olds do. But I said that to my wife. She was like, you're never taking our child to a wrestling show like that. Yeah, I think what I would say in regards to that, if I could, because I think this is I see this in a lot of different things. Take your vengeance at TKO and make it wider.

Because it's not just TKO. TKO are operating as a corporation, as a business, in an environment, in a capitalist society that they are in, a late-stage capitalist society, where... you know, and this spreads wider to, like, Spotify. Yeah, it's everything. Everything. It's engineification, man. Engineification, it's...

We can raise the prices because people will pay for it. And as long as there are people who are willing to pay £20,000 for a ringside seat, they'll charge £20,000 for a ringside seat. They'll charge £25,000 a week. I was reading an article this morning about artists coming together and trying to...

push the government to fight back against like ticket touts and things like that who raise the they take inflated prices and then they do even even more inflated prices and things like that things like um what is it called when like uh it's the price pricing that one yeah Bullshit.

Take it up with the people who can make a difference. TKO are just operating in an environment that they're operating in. On that note, though, you know, because people kicked off Ticketmaster with the Oasis thing during the summer, but the dynamic pricing. But Oasis signed off on doing it.

it's like these ticket companies aren't doing it behind their back like i so i and i i did kick off a little bit about this in my my personal life i can't go see radio heads um ollie's friend managed to get us tickets for it it was really hard to get tickets for the radio head show and he messaged me ollie messaged me being like good news we've got tickets

Bad news is we are right at the back, touching the wall levels at the back. Further bad news, they are 140 quid each. And I was like, I just cannot justify spending 140 quid. No. to have bad seats at a gig. I just can't afford that at the moment. So I had to turn that ticket down. We sold it to a friend of ours instead. But I'm genuinely annoyed at that. And the reason why, because those tickets were originally £60.

But because of the dynamic pricing, by the time that Graham was in the queue to get them, they were 140 quid or whatever it was. So I got screwed by dynamic pricing. I'm angry at Ticketmaster. I'm equally as mad at Tom York and Radiohead because they agreed to do it. And, you know, FIFA doing it with the World Cup as well. This is a...

society-wide thing, really. I mean, it's frustrating as hell for us as the consumers, and ultimately, as with everything, we're the ones who will end up losing. Like, as we...

always do is the consumers who are going to be the ones who end up losing out on this yeah so uh i agree with you completely and i'm sorry it's disillusioning you as a wrestling fan take it up with people who can do something about it well that's it yeah it's like when um because it's worth it's a worthy thing to get my wife was saying

to me the other day that there are parents who get really angry at schools for being fined for taking kids out of school to go up on to cheaper holidays um but the reason they do that is because it's too expensive to get a holiday during the school holidays because the holiday companies

have put the prices up yeah and my argument to that was like well don't be angry at the school then yeah they're not they are bad in what they've done there but that is as a direct response to this bit over here these are the people you need to be angry at yeah

It's targeting your anger in the right directions. A Ninja says, genuinely F this company. You take one of the biggest angles of the year and put it on ice for two weeks as being Brom Breaker. Right. Just to have scammer Logan Paul joined them and he's the first challenger for Punk's title reign. This new land.

Windscape sucks. Okay. And Johnny Buster over here says, Hi, lads. Not sure why it's not letting me put... All of these have got commas in between the wires. Great. Hi, lads. Not sure why it's not letting me put spaces in. And it's a bit off topic. But I met Tony Khan at my work the other day, and he was absolutely lovely. What a Rusev, hey.

which is a lovely throwback. So we used to have a segment on the podcast called Rusev Hay, which is when you'd meet a wrestler and you then send us an email being like what your interaction was. Very nice. So yeah, thank you, Geordie Bus Driver Harry, for your comments on last week's episode. This is why I wanted to... So RuneVV. I don't quite understand the general consensus that AEW has too many belts when WWE has more, not even counting NXT.

AEW now has four men's singles titles, two men's tag titles, two women's singles titles, and one women's tag titles over a total of nine different titles. WWE Raw and SmackDown have four men's singles titles, two men's tag titles, four women's singles titles, two women's tag titles on a total of...

of 12 different titles. I think their numbers are slightly off there because they... They only have one women's tag titles. They only have one women's tag titles and AEW only has... one men's tag titles they're the trios i suppose if you count that as tag i guess yeah um sure if they keep adding more then it's silly but as of now it's a completely fine number there were so many comments of

Luke's really angry that AEW have got too many belts, but didn't mention WWE. And this is the classic internet nonsense. Well, what about? I like the color blue. Oh, so you hate red, do you? I didn't mention this. I wasn't talking about WWE introducing another belt. I was talking about AEW introducing another belt. If WWE introduced another belt on the same show in that same week... I talk about how they have too many belts. But that wasn't the topic of conversation we were having. Yeah.

I'm happy to talk about the Women's United States title, which doesn't seem to have any logical booking to it. It's adding nothing to the show. But the titles over on Raw, I'm going to say that both the Intercontinental belts have played really big...

I think what Becky's done with it over the year has been fantastic. I think Cena winning it has made it a big statement. I think Dom having it for the year did a fantastic job. It's about what you do with the titles. And I think what makes specifically the addition of the national championship... so irritating is that you had a belt that did that in fact you still have a belt that does that it's just also combined with another belt which is separate and has its own lineage and and

But it can be defended separately or it can be defended together. And what happens if you... Yeah, because it's now a unified championship. And yeah, exactly. There's no logic to any of this. So like, why are you doing this? And that's the issue. far more than are there too many belts and things like that um if you've got enough programming you've got enough wrestlers and you can make them feel like they're worth something then do it but for the sake of clarity

I think WWE has too many belts as well. That's fair. I think they have too many belts. I think AEW have too many belts. I think the most belts in most wrestling companies are props. Oh yeah. Effective props when they're used well. Yeah, and oftentimes I don't think they are. I agree. And our last one here comes in from...

Aspen Follinson. Nice to see Gabby's Dollhouse movie get some love. I had low expectations when I took my girls to see it, but I think it's genuinely the ideal version of what a Gabby's Dollhouse movie could be. If you made it a better movie, it would start becoming a worse Gabby's Dollhouse movie.

And I completely agree with you. I thought it was a really good write-up of that film. Have I fallen asleep? What are you talking about? That was my recommendation on last week's podcast. Gabby's Dollhouse. Gabby's Dollhouse, the movie. You've seen Gabby's Dollhouse? I mean, you probably haven't. Stop saying the words Gabby's Dollhouse, first of all. I pinch on my left, pinch, pinch on my right. Grab Penny's hand and hold on tight. No, it's water. I'm not drunk. It's a Netflix show for kids.

There's a lot of those. Arguably as many Netflix shows as there are AW titles. I'd rather watch Gabby's Dollhouse than Coco Melon. Honestly, Coco Melon can get in the sodding bin. But anyway, or actually binging it in the bin more than anything. You should be better, BBC. That's actually your bigger national scandal that's going on at the moment. It's constantly putting bing on TV. But yeah, that was my recommendation of last week. It's a kid's show on Netflix. Got it.

i enjoy well my kid enjoys the very least uh but anyway do you have any recommendations for this week um so i went to see titanic uh in the west end which is a little bit uh area specific absolutely exceptional. In the meantime, and I'm sorry that this is musical theatre-y, but hello, I've been watching Smash on Amazon Prime. It was a show that came out in 2011-12.

I watched it at the time and it's about Steven Spielberg it's a great concept so basically the concept was they're going to do the show about the making of a Broadway show and at the end of the series they'll make the broadway show right so they'll take the right they write bombshell it's a marilyn monroe musical and then they would produce bombshell on broadway so you go to and then the next season will be about a new show and then that would be produced um this show

is abysmal and i love it like it's so good but it's really bad at the same time it's one of those shows um there's no there's some brilliant behind the scenes stories about the production of this show that is absolutely insane but when you just sit down on as i have been doing and i've been

Just wanted to go home and just put the telly on, to be honest with you. It's a fantastic way to spend 45 minutes. And it's one of those before times shows where it's like you had to hustle to get this on air. And it's still like that. And there are too many episodes and I love it.

It's great. Great. I have got... I'm going to do two recommendations. I'm just going to do the one, I think, actually, because I can't remember what the other one was. Oh, that was going to be the other one. Lego have got a Game Boy set. Yes, they have. I saw you do it. Man, it's so good. It's one of my favorite Lego sets I've ever built. It is satisfying because the buttons and the D-pad...

Are they operational? Not like obviously working. Can you press them? No, but like Ash Millman sent me a message being like, oh my God, that's so cool. Does it work? And I was like, no, but check this out. And I sent her a video of the on-off switch. and it has got I kid you not the exact same sound that the original Game Boy had not through electronic stuff just the way that plastic clicks against each other

And she was like, oh my god, the ASMR of that was absolutely perfect. Do you know what I mean? Also, I saw a reel of someone getting out. People are going back to the 90s and putting big tellies in their kitchen.

This is a Martha Stewart thing. Yeah, and I'm all about it. Me too. I'm actually buying one from a local seller. I was like, I might just go to a British Heart Foundation electrical shop and see if they've got one. You would struggle. The Facebook marketplace is actually the place to go.

plugged in someone put in a gilmore girls uh which is warner brothers like home entertainment and it had that and i was like ascending oh wonderful stuff yeah no we have talked about things used to be good we've talked about it recently because i have it kind of uh sort of snapped me into focus

It was previously, but this weekend in particular really was. We went to stay. Very fortunate. My in-laws have got a flat down in Hastings a second home. They're going to get rid of it because they can't afford to keep it on anymore, but we're going to use it until they've got it. But they don't have the internet. down there what they have got is a projector and like a dvd player so we took down like a bunch of our dvds and we sat there but my kid was just she you know she's four

Anna's grown up in a world where she can just watch anything she wants at any time. So it really was like a bit of a gear shift for her to realize, oh, I can only watch a certain number of things and I've got to choose which one I want to watch. So I kind of want to like... make sure that she doesn't get too like disillusioned with film right and like just the like i think if you have just got anything at any time it's just it does become just content and that's i'm devaluing art

yeah yeah and i think it is devaluing about it for too many years so i and i i we were talking about this before the flat anyway because martha stewart did this thing about how like tvs and kitchens are coming back the 90s kitchen is coming back uh and i so i

I am going to buy a TV video combo and there's someone on Facebook marketplace and I go there that's just selling like a load of VHSs. Yeah. Cause you can't get them in, um, uh, secondhand shops either. Cause I was buying them, but they'll come back. Um, But my actual recommendation for the week is Squid Game The Challenge on Netflix. Great, okay. I quite enjoyed the first season of it. And my wife and I started watching...

We were going to watch one episode the other night. We ended up watching three episodes in a row and had another bottle of wine because we actually did get a little bit too into it.

um it's just like i think that the way the show is structured and the way that they leave on cliffhangers is so compelling love mark shout out mark um one pretty one of the best tv characters on anything in all of 2025 uh i've been really i've been really enjoying it um i say this with all the love in the world there are too many americans on it

And what I mean by that, there are too many Americans who are into sports. Got it. And they then bring that energy to the show, which I find quite cringey. So there's a little bit too much of that. Maybe it's why I like Mark. But yeah, I'd recommend it. I think it's pretty good. There you go. And that's going to do it for this show. It's a me and Dan show, hour 35, longer than normal. I follow your lead. I don't know what you're saying.

Yeah, with Ollie's here, it's a tight one. It's a tight one hour. Yeah. No, no. Actually, the first challenge on that Square Games, this is why. This is why. This is why. This is why. First challenge is that you have to press a button.

after 456 seconds because there's 456 players great so like the closest to 456 seconds gets it and they go around trying to find musicians and i said to kate i was like i wouldn't be looking for musicians that's a good second option looking for a comedian or a wrestler i was like ollie davis i was like if you find a comedian or a wrestler yeah and say like give me a tight seven yeah

They will be able to give you the closest possible. That's like the Whitney Houston game on TikTok. Oh, with the and? Yes. Which, by the way, I nail every time. Well, of course you do. I watched a Slipknot tribute band doing it on Instagram the other day. Anyway, so thank you so much for watching this podcast. We'll see you on Tuesday next week for the Raw review as we head towards Survivor.

series and it'll be full gear next weekend as well which means we'll have a bonus podcast the following monday uh please do subscribe wherever you find your uh details from details where you find your podcast from thank you very much dan for stepping in for the shoes love doing a show with me And we will see you next time. Jam that jam.

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