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Hello and welcome to the WrestleTalk Podcast. I'm Oli Davis. I'm joined by Luko and DAD. If you haven't already, please press the thumbs up button and give us a subscribe wherever you're consuming this. Not just on YouTube, but on podcast form in the audio land of Spotify. And I choose Apple Podcasts now. Give us a follow on both of those because you don't subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
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Today is the episode where we are going to be going through our predictions for Saturday night's main event. Yeah, we'll also be giving our review of AEW Dynamite and our predictions for Double or Nothing, which is coming this Sunday. But we will be opening with... our main topic which is
You know, maybe this is a controversial one. We've managed to beat three very controversial episodes in a row for our first three of these on Thursdays. It's very WrestleTalk. Yeah, we've done no AEW in episode one. Hugely. negative reaction to that. Sorry. We brought back AEW in episode 2 while the WWE fans were annoyed. You kowtow to them! And now, we're going all the way to the other end of the annoyance spectrum by talking about how maybe... If you go by certain business metrics.
which are highly contentious and have their own form of tribalism. Maybe WWE's a bit overexposed right now. With all the shows they've got, all the pay-per-views, all the affiliate brands, and with that increased exposure comes a... spreading thin of their top drawers. What I think is going to be sort of an interesting historical point to look at here, and I'm going to use this to put you over if you don't mind. I do not mind. Do you remember when Tony Khan bought Ring of Honor?
And everyone was mad excited about it. And then you did the WrestleTalk podcast where you said, I think this is a bad idea and it's going to distract Tony Khan from the AEW business thing and it's going to lead to a downturn. in AEW creativity and progress. And you were effectively proven right because that you can sort of... Granted, I think Brawl Out is a much bigger point to look at, which comes a couple of months later. Punk is the tip of the iceberg.
But you can make the argument that that did desaturate some of the AEW brands and Ring of Honor has become what Ring of Honor is. There are some people who really like it.
there are some people you can make the argument of well they get better attendance from a ring of honor shows than they did back in the sinclair era of ring of honor granted it is not the third most popular brand in north american wrestling but also it's a very different wrestling landscape but i think you can sort of look at wwe now in this tko period And I was listening to a podcast, Gorilla Position, which I think is a tremendous podcast here in the UK.
And the host on there, James Healer, was like, I look back at that WrestleMania 40 build and I was like, I cannot believe how excited I was as a fan in that period of time. And I compare that to how I feel about the product in the build to WrestleMania 41.
what has come post WrestleMania 41 and I don't feel that same but however you can look at ticket sales and they're all great this that and the other and my thinking on that is like yeah but it's same with AEW in 2022 they were like super duper hot and they bought um you know they bought Ring of Honor and it seemed like a really good thing But it's only in 2023 and 2024 that you really saw the ramifications of those decisions.
and with wwe being hot right now it's like it's not like they're having a lack of big time stories because We've got a John Cena heel turn. I feel like everyone's gone. Just that's been normalized very quickly. But that is one of the.
biggest things you could ever do in wrestling. I think it's because the follow-up's not been great. Yeah, and it's not been with The Rock. Thank you very much for putting me over. I think you might have retconned my Nostradamus skills too much. I don't think I ever said right in the moment that they bought a Ring of Honor that this is going to signal a downturn. I'm pretty sure I was like, I don't know, I've got a funny feeling about it. I don't know if this is a good idea.
And then like six months later, thinking about it, seeing what was happening, that's when I sort of got to that more solidified concern. And again, I don't want to stress, I think Brawl Out is a bigger moment than Tony Khan-Bai and Ring of Honor in the parking lot. But then you think like how much of Brawl Out was caused by management being split, having too many things on their plate and sort of not dealing with certain backstage issues when they should have been dealt with.
So, what I'm trying to say is, there's a lot of numbers that we can go through here, but weirdly, in this data-driven world, sometimes... It's a bit of a vibes-based thing. Yeah. And that's usually where you get the indicator first. People always point to... live ticket sales for the wrestling industry. Oh, the live ticket attendance is going down, and therefore...
In four months' time, those trends will be reflected in TV viewership as well because it's more difficult for people to go out and spend their money. do a night out on a wrestling show you won't see you know if there's a sort of a downward feeling on wwe at the moment you're not going to see the results of that next week But I always think there is a pre-Canary in the coal mine and it's the, I don't know, the What do they have canary and the coal miners are saying in the states?
is this very uh very british very british centric phrase the canary in a coal mine what i mean it's a early warning signal it's a early red flag where it's from is when people used to work down in the mines in like the 2 BC. I don't know. And they're in Wales. Yeah, I was going to say, this wasn't that long ago. Before Thatcher shut the wall down. Three millennia ago, all the trolls in Wales. They're digging, digging, digging. And you'll have a canary.
and they're put them down there because it would die. It would die first from any gas leak. That's when everyone knew the Canary stopped singing, let's get out of here. Yeah, exactly. So that's the Canary. Or the Canary keep singing. It's all fine down there. Yeah, yeah. And let those Welsh people... The dwarf Welsh that whistle while they work. This is already a contentious episode. I don't think we want to. In 2025, what could possibly be contentious about Snow White?
I don't think you want to be making fun of an entire nation of very, very proud countrymen and women. They're a different nation. I thought it was like a county of England. It's all love.
so what i was trying to get to is there is a pre-canary in the coal mine here and that's vibes and it's very difficult to see because wrestling fans generally are quite critical and negative anyway So I don't know how useful it is to just look online and go, well, people didn't like this angle or people didn't like that angle. But right now I do feel like there is quite a consistent thing, and anecdotally I feel it too, of a kind of malaise.
with WWE compared to how it was when it was super hot when I think back of Punk and the Cody, Go Home segment for Royal Rumble, and me just being on the edge of my seat every week. You get bits of that, like, oh, Bron Breaker's joined. Yeah. But then it kind of dissipates quite quickly. because you have a three-hour smackdown in between roars. Yeah, I think what, looking at sort of the feeling and the vibes on WWE is that it is not negative or critical.
It's apathy. It's just a lot of like, yeah, it was fun. Yeah, this is okay. a lot of like it's the wrestle it's the post wrestlemania lol which is an annual a genuine a genuine thing like interest in wrestling is from january to april and then it just dips dips dips dips until you go back to january again and it spikes back up that is funny for wwe
I think for AEW, maybe it is just more of a straight line across the calendar year. But certainly with WWE, and we see it in our numbers, January is when you see the big spike, and it continues up through to April, and that's when it starts to trail off. And that is kind of intentional. WWE literally save their biggest stars and feuds. for certain points in the calendar year. All of this debate might be...
vanished by July when we're in the build to the two-night SummerSlam. That's a huge thing. Which they will make a big deal of because it's two nights. And you'll have Cody Rhodes back. You'll have Roman Reigns back. But that is the problem right now. And we did get it a bit last year post-WrestleMania 40 when Roman wasn't around and the bloodline story was being carried by the new blood team. Yet we don't have
The two biggest draws in WWE from the last couple of years. Reigns and Cody. Yeah. And what we've got is... But we've still got draws in the sense. You've got Punk. You've got Seth. They're not on the Cody Roman level. I think Punk is... I don't think Seth is. I'm not being critical. I'm talking about mega provable. ticket shifters. You put them on a poster and they shift tickets. Whereas Seth, fantastic character. Some of these best works being done right now. Great faction with Paul Heyman.
but he isn't the mega star like Cody and Roman or John Cena. They've got John Cena, mate. so you know he's been wrestling well it feels like you know he was on backlash and he's gonna be on saturday night's main events this coming saturday like he's going to be likely on money in the bank as well like he's doing more ple and so you know these these are big shows and stuff than the world heavyweight champion Jey Uso who is a full-time roster member
He's doing more dates than he currently is. James has had two matches since he's won the World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania and he's not won either of them. So this is all vibes based anecdotal so far. But there are some numbers that potentially lend support to those feelings. Over last week or so, Raw has got its second lowest rating of the year on Netflix. And Smackdown has had its worst rating for the year.
Again, this is Backlash season. This is the period after Mania. You're almost expecting this to come. Numbers come down. Year on year, though. these numbers are about 40% down on where they were in the previous year. Some of this might not be how hot the product is. This could be purely down to the distribution platform because Smackdown was on Fox, a much bigger audience in far more homes, but now it's on USA Network. Yeah. And that has seen a 40% hit year on year. Raw.
was on USA Network, and you'd think Netflix. Surely that's more homes in the US. Incorrect. It's fewer homes. And that has led, estimated numbers here, that Raw did under a million viewers. In the 12th of May episode. Yeah. But the arguments that you can present. As the countess of that. Is like. In America. Yes. Like that is domestic numbers.
where the whole point of the Netflix platform is that you now have this global reach for Raw, which you didn't have previously. Compared to the UK, for example, and I don't know these numbers, but I'll have to look this up. But are there more homes in the UK that have Netflix than did Sky Sports or BT Sports? They're the two previous homes of Raw. So in the UK, maybe watching Raw and we also get Smackdown and NXT here on Netflix.
It is easier for us to watch those, which might mean that while US numbers are down because of the distribution platform elsewhere in the world, they are peanuts on the earth. I guess it's what TKO considers success. Is it a rising viewership base in the United States? Or is it a rising viewership worldwide? Because I think worldwide they are definitely more watched.
But just traditionally, it's always been about those US views because they are the best monetized, really, for business terms. And that's just the changing landscape of the world, right? So where I think it's interesting, is we know every year there is a lull in audience attention and WWE's own effort into its programming compared to the rest of the year.
from April to about June. We've been doing this eight years, and every year, without fail, we panic. The numbers are down. It's post-mania. That's the same every year. It's a trend. What I wouldn't do then, in that instance, is to cram loads more shows in. Yeah. And I think this is more of the, we're not saying like WWE's bad right now. It's certainly not as good as it was pre-Mania, but that's like, that's to be expected. It's the decisions to keep SmackDown three hours,
It's to run, I think, like, a show every 1.7 weeks is what I worked it out as. From Backlash through to the two-night Summer Slam. there is a main roster big event be it a ple or like a saturday night's main event under every two weeks. And that doesn't even include that big episode of Raw that's coming up on Monday 9th in Phoenix, Arizona. Shout out to my Noel fans out there who understand that reference.
They're probably going to be promoting that as a PLE-style thing, because that's got the World Heavyweight Championship match with Jey Uso and Gunther. It's also got a John Cena appearance on that show as well, so that's going to be a big newsworthy episode of Raw, presumably. So that's what you're saying there is like these like money of the bank and knight of champions and evolution 2 which is still yet to be confirmed
Two Saturday nights main events. Two Saturday nights main events. That's just those. That doesn't even include these big episodes of Raw and Smackdown that they might be doing. And what I think that this is, this is the result of you were hot the year previous. it's supply and demand last year in 2024 what people wanted was more wwe we want more shows because we are loving this right now
So a TKO can look at that and be like, man, our attendance figures are through the roof. Our revenue is through the roof. Our merchandise is through the roof. So the response to that is, do more of it next year do more shows because that is more ticket revenue that is more merchandise sales the problem that that might
become or create is that's when you become oversaturated you give the audience too much of it which means that fewer people go to those things and the demand becomes lesser and this is exactly what happened with AEW When they started, they were doing 10,000 seats every single Dynamite, more or less, you know, give or take. They were starting off super duper hot. So the following year, let's book more 10,000 seat builds.
But as that declines, all of a sudden you're getting 2,000 people in a 10,000 seat build. so now they've had to pivot to doing those smaller buildings which now make it feel more full the idea being is you rebuild to try and get yourself back to that 10 excuse me that 10 000 mark again and it also stretches your creative like there's only so many ideas or so many you know Paul of X been doing this for Two, three years solid now. Yeah. and it's only going to become more difficult.
when you have a big show that you've got to put a big match on to get people to watch again. every 1.7 weeks. It means you're gonna get a lot, I guess, a lot of repeated matches or you'll burn through rivalries.
that you would previously save for later in the year. I don't think, you know, you've got to have gears to this sort of thing. I think you're probably right. These decisions were made last year in TKO's terms. Okay, once Wrestlemania is out of the way, considering all the success we've had, Let's put loads of shows on. Yeah. If I can push back slightly on your point there. I think one of the benefits that WWE have in the Levesque creative era are those five match cards.
because you're only doing five matches on a show you are not going to burn through your big matches if you had eight match cards on all of those shows then 100% yeah which actually is what happened in the Vince era because there was a problem in the Vince era in 2006 2007.
they were doing shows all the time and the brand split like yeah yeah there was a period of time where they were doing like pay-per-views there was like a raw pay-per-view then two weeks later there'd be a smackdown pay-per-view and then a week later there was an ecw pay-per-view it's all like that december period
oh there's a joint survivor series then it's the seventh dismember then a week later it's it's armageddon So you crammed too much in and those were 8 match cards where you burnt through things.
but with a five match card you don't have to have jayuso wrestle on money in the bank because you can save that match for raw you don't have to have these tag title matches here because you can save that for saturday night's main event down the way and that means you can stretch out It's the same with Rusev, he's come back, he's had one match and three backstage segments, but it doesn't feel like we've not had Rusev on TV because you are stretching out, I think smartly in some cases.
Well, there is a, I don't know if this is a dead canary or if it's like an ill canary. It's got something in its throat and it can't sing as well. And this is the NXT show that's been cancelled. So again, it's part of this TKO looking at stuff and going, well, there's huge demand here. Let's book loads of shows for six, nine months time. And presumably there'll be the same amount of demand.
This weekend, we've got Saturday night's main event. There's the NXT Battlegrounds show on Sunday. There's the Raw on Monday. And there's NXT on Tuesday. All four of those were going to take place in the same venue, the Younglings Center, which is in Tampa. Don't let Anakin Skywalker know that place. He hates you. And not the younglings, Alec. You murdered younglings. But what a film.
If you haven't seen, that's a reference to our first episode of The Rise and Fall of Nexus. I feel like we're referencing the prequel trilogy so much right now. It is living in our head ramp free. Yeah. But yet these... that they had this this wwe weekend i think it's a four day weekend where you can go every night for four consecutive nights
saturday night's main event raw sold really well like pretty much sold out ten and a half thousand seats like great sign that's great business tko success the nxt ple battleground that's done 6 000 tickets that's also really good that's nxt but the NXT on Tuesday, which will be broadcast live on the CW as normal.
has only sold 1,700 tickets, and it's a 10,500 capacity arena. So WWE have cancelled that show with a week to go. Not cancelled it, they'll probably broadcast it from the Performance Center. But yeah, it's, uh... I don't know right now whether that is just, they just got a bit too excited, and this is the annual Lull After Mania, and come SummerSlam, everything's on the up again. Or if this is the sign of TKO. rinsing
what they thought was a successful business when the demand has reduced. And, you know, you look at the ticket prices as well. Yes, that's the other side. They are squeezing every cent out of the fans right now. And it's working.
And that will work until it doesn't work anymore. That's exactly it. And that's what I'm saying. You're not going to see the results of this oversaturation, if you want to use that word, next week. You're not going to see it in two weeks' time, two months' time, four months' time. you're going to see in 2026 you're going to see in 2027 that is when you will see the effect of the business decisions they've made here in 2025, or maybe they made in 2024 to be implemented into 2025.
and that is doing more shows and with nxt they've actually stopped branding them as nxt shows they're branded as wwe shows as what led to the confusion of worlds collide people thought it was a tri-brand event of triple a nxt and wwe but it's not it is a wwe that's just they're branded as wwe NXT.
So that could be looking out as like, maybe this is not as hot of a brand as we thought. But also, they've got a history of that. Remember they did that show in St. Louis when they first went to the CW and it had Randy Orton on it. And that didn't sound particularly well either. Well, let's get on with the other brand, AW Dynamite.
I thought this episode of Dynamite that we're going to jump onto now was, and I'm going to say this the politest way I can do it, and I mean this as a huge compliment of this show. A functional go-home show for a pay-per-view. Oh, okay. I didn't know where you were going to go with that. I don't think this was a blow-away episode of Dynamite, but you can look at every segment and be like, all right, that builds the pay-per-view, that builds the pay-per-view, that builds the pay-per-view.
functional and thumbs up for that, but not must see television. there was a ricochet uh anthony bowens match and yeah it was good ricochet wins and then he goes to the the stage and mark briscoe appears behind him with a stretcher because they're having a stretcher match i was like
This is functional. Yeah. And it leads you to the spot where Mark Briscoe then puts him on the stretcher and sets up to hit the froggy bow and Ricochet gets it off because you, the consumer, now must buy the pay-per-view. Ricochet gets off. it gets off on stretches yeah and so it's Now, you as the consumer have got to buy the pay-per-view to see Mark hit that spot. They did it in the segment with Kenny Omega. Teasing the idea of doing a one-winged angel off the stage through a table.
but they get off. You don't get that spot. But if you buy the pay-per-view, you will get to see that spot. Functional go-home booking. I don't know if it was like missable as you say because the opening segment I think is one of the better promo segments of the whole year I actually did text someone this morning to be like this was one of the fine if you haven't already watched this segment I think this is the segment to watch if you haven't watched anything from Dynamite this segment is
So it's Will Ospreay and Hangman Page. They're going to have an in-ring promo and they're going to now main event Double or Nothing. They are the Owen Hart Cup. finalists winner gets a shot at Jon Moxley at All In and the security surrounding the ring you think oh is this gonna be a brawl and right away Osprey totally subverts what you'd expect from her
like a go-home promo segment. He says, listen, bruvs, go to the back. I'll make sure you get paid, but I'm not going to fight. You're going to fight hangers? Nah. And he gets some beers. Like he says, do you still drink hangman? Yeah. And everyone's like, He's got a problem. I'm not trying to make it a problem. I just wanted to ask, because I think we can have, as Julia Donaldson would write, a cat-to-cat chat. What? Have you not read Tabby McTad? Tabby McTad had a cat-to-cat chat.
No because I'm 37. Don't just read children books. The BBC iPlayer and the BBC adaptation of it is superb. Maybe I'll get to it after I've watched all series of Peacemaker and anything for adults. Yeah, I don't want to jump to the recommendations portion of this podcast. Spoiler. So, yeah, he gets bits, and they essentially have not friendly, a respectful chat between two babyfaces who want
to get the belt off Moxley. Yes. And they're like, Osprey's big point is, because Hangman's quite resistant at first, but I think he comes around to it characterically. I want to win the championship so I can go into Forbidden Door in my home 30 minutes down from where I grew up and show all the people who supported me I'm the champion. I did this for you. Thanks. But kind of more importantly...
We need to decide out who the best man is between us to save AEW from the Death Riders. Yeah, because I know that you, Hangman Page, can beat John Mott. I don't know if I can. but I know that you can. He said he never has. He said I've wrestled him twice and I've lost. So if I can beat you when you're at your best, when you are Hangman Adam Page,
then I'll know I can go into All-In Texas and I can win the AEW World Championship. I thought that Osprey was superb. Also, he shouted out Bethnal Green. He shouted out York Hall. He said York Hall. He said the electric ballrooms as well, which is where Progress used to run. or maybe still do in Camden. But the...
He also talked about Hangman, you know, you've got a bad side. Maybe I need that bad side, the side that... and Jack Strauss in the face maybe I need that side to be able to beat Moxley because my superhero actor being the good guy hasn't worked so far let's find out it's a clash of wrestling philosophies and it's very character based Not only is it going to be a fantastic
wrestling in-ring match they've now built this story around yeah kind of the biggest story you can tell what is the right way to be a wrestler yeah and also it makes the world title feel like yeah the most important thing in the company which it should do. And I think that is one of the things that people have sort of rallied against this Deathrider storyline is it has not made the title feel important.
You never see it. You never see it. Which is supposed to be the point. I don't think that's ever really gotten over with the crowd. But I think these two guys in this ring. And then particularly Hangman Adam Page. Because he cut this promo.
and it's one of those hangman adam page promos where you're like oh yeah you are the greatest babyface in the history of professional wrestling you are magic at this because he just is this incredible character that ties in everything that happens in ring into his personal being And it's so special when he cuts these sorts of primers.
When Ospreay said that he wants to win it to show his kid when he goes back to the UK, Hangman's like, I don't want to win it. I need to win it because my... children like they're like where's my father now the last two years been awful for him he had this line where he said um i need to win it so my wife sees the person that she fell in love with again yeah I was like, dude, have you been hanging out with the Sentry?
Again, I don't want to jump ahead to recommendations. I saw Thunderbolts last. I love the line where he said, I think back to Christmas. And my children are opening their presents and they're playing with their new toys and I'm not looking at them. I'm staring out a window looking for where the man I used to be is. And I just like, it's so good at these visual, these images. And like that there.
takes you back to when Hangman burnt down Swerve Strickland's house and he's just sat in that chair staring off into the middle distance drinking. And you're like, yeah, he probably looked like that. but it's his child that's playing with a new toy. You know, I'm not like a mental health expert or anything. I don't know if the world title will solve that. It might do. It's a great character story, but I don't...
They rarely say external prizes are what will help you internally. Or maybe if they started doing that, that is what will fix the mental health. If every, you know, Gen Z millennial won a championship belt. but they bloody tried that didn't they with all the participation trophies
Well, that's the problem, wasn't it? That'll make them feel bad. Because you just handed them out. It made people weak. It was an excellent go-home segment. I loved it. The line from Will Osprey. Come Sunday, meet me in the desert.
I'm calling you out for a shootout, bruv. Oh, and Ospreay also did say that he's the best effing wrestler in the world. Which is a swear word. It is. And I would put money on he wasn't supposed to and it's just that it's just he got excited it's just will getting excited and that is just some that is just how will talks Jon Moxley and the Young Bucks then had a trios match against Samoa Joe, Powerhouse Hobbs and Swerve Strickland.
Really good stuff, of course. Yeah, great. It was just more chaos to build at the end. So the faces won, but then the heels had a beatdown. Everyone runs down. Willow runs down. Kenny runs down. That's when he teases putting Matt Jackson through a table with the one-winged angel. But the heels scarper and Joe says, I promise you, by the end of tonight, we will kill you. We won't wait till anarchy in the arena. Okay, that's a nice little thing to start spinning.
I was a bit disappointed with the Hurt Syndicate segment. This was MJF. It was the contract signing to bring him in. And it ended up being a promo for Dustin Rhodes and Sammy Guevara. I think, my overall takeaway of MVP in AEW at the moment is that there's no script in AEW, but sometimes that means that you can just chat whenever you want. MVP's going to talk over you. Yeah, and he will just chat.
And he doesn't care what you're planning to say when you come out. He's going to have a chat. He's going to shoot on Albuquerque. While you're shooting on Albuquerque. He's going to have a cat-to-cat chat. I don't know what that is. It's no snail in the wild, but it's pretty good. What, you're just saying animals? Is that what children's fiction is? Yeah, yeah, it's just words and animals. And anthropomorphic vegetables. As long as they rhyme.
Yeah, so this was that they built up the signing. Bobby hesitated and then they signed it. And there were two lawyers then? I was like, the lawyers are there for a reason. There's going to be a secret clause in the contract. That's what I was waiting for. Especially because MVP teed up the segment with, we're going to introduce a new member of the Hurt Syndicate. And I was like, ah!
And herein lies the swerve. It's not going to be MJF. It's going to be Cedric Alexander. But no, it was just MJF. Which is grand and it's fine because that's what we have been building to. Thumbs up from me. But also, I was waiting for the shoe to drop. Is that the phrase? Yeah, and I think everyone in the crowd was as well. So they were a bit confused when Dustin Rhodes came out to cut
But to him, as always, is the promo of his life. He's given it his all. And everyone's like, well, I respect you, Dustin. And I mean, you're delivering it well, but. We were watching the MJF stuff? Yeah. We don't actually care about your tag title match at Double or Nothing. When the music hit, I think everyone thought it was like, and here's the new fourth member. And I was just...
Also, I really enjoyed Dustin Rhodes when he said, I'm going to butcher it ever so slightly, when he talked about the first Double or Nothing. He said, it was an unforgettable night. that people will always remember. That's a brilliant line. And you can see, as he started to say that everyone will always remember, he was like, uh-oh. There's no eject button for this, so I'm just going to say it.
but i'm not going to be as convincing as i was at the start of the sentence uh a card uh has been called out by speedball they'll have a match at double or nothing card had a fun backstage bit with funny doesn't care okada character work the anthony bowen's ricochet match uh which we already covered ricochet beat bowens with the scissors but then you had the stretcher angle with mark briscoe
Stokely and FTR set up a contract signing for tonight's episode of Collision. And then we got Mercedes Monet and Jamie Hayter doing their version of the Osprey. hangman promo and we have Rene in the ring to adjudicate and yeah it was it was it was good it was just like because it was so good between Osprey and hangman this one didn't feel as hot didn't feel as real This felt more scripted pro wrestling.
And it was good. Good scripting. Jamie cut a very good promo. Mercedes cut a very good promo. I think Jamie's sort of goading her into being like, oh, you seem lighter. Does everyone else notice she feels lighter? It's because, oh, you're missing something.
you lost the New Japan Strong Women's Championship, and that led to them having a brawl. So it's good, and it's a very functional go-home segment, but it didn't have the emotion that the men's segment did with Hangman and Osprey, which it can't, really. Jamie Sutul, though. Monet jumped her and then Jamie hit her with a lariat. And then Toni Storm's music hits. I was like, oh, where's this going? Oh, she's going to be ringside for the next match, which is Mina Shirakawa versus Julia Hart. Yeah.
So a nice blend and weave of the women's division. Yeah, and also because the winner of this will likely face Tony Storm at All In Tech. And yeah, I was just really happy for Mina Shirakawa and kind of, Excited about the confidence AEW having her. Even though this didn't turn out to be the main event bit, I would argue. It got the main event spot like it finished at the... It finished on the two hour mark. The overrun was the closing angle.
But yeah, Mina Shurikau, the crowd were going crazy for her. Proper music. A This Is Awesome chant without a double down? That means it's a genuine This Is Awesome chant. So, interestingly, that Chant came after a botch. Oh, right. So Mina Shokawa went to do like a diving crucifix bomb and they kind of bollocksed it basically.
And I think that this is a very interesting AEW crowd, now they are in these smaller buildings, that I think you can compare to those WWE crowds that you had last year that were just I will cheer the babyface and I will boo the heels. I will play along because it's really fun as an audience to play along with the wrestling that you are doing, as opposed to the crowds in 2019, which is like, we don't like this show, so we're just going to have our own fun. You effed up. Yeah, exactly.
But this is a crowd that wanted this to be a good show and wants AEW to succeed. So after a moment like that, it is like, no, this is awesome. We are getting a good match here. Yeah, Mina, look. fantastic and she was so over with the crowd and i feel like yeah she's immediately a top star i hope she stays that way me too because the aw do have a bit of a track record of
Bringing in a Diona Peraza. Saying she's the biggest thing. And then, down the card. Unfortunately. Where's she been? But, yeah, she won. Julia sort of was slightly protected with her. She sold her leg off a missed moonsault. technical pin to win, then Julia Hart starts beating down Mina. Mina reverses it into a figure four. Sky Blue runs down, putting together Sky Blue and Julia Hart again after her return the previous week. Storm saves Mina.
And then they start wrestling over the belt. And I was like, is this a meta Tony Storm joke about the worst go-home segment of all time? But then it got a bit more physical and it ends with Mina putting the figure four. Through the post. Yeah. Great spot. Really enjoyed that. Because it's. What I liked about the finish of the match. Is that it's building upon. The finish of the four way last. Which is that. Mina reversed the big package. To pin Tony Storm.
And so here again, Mina reversed Hart's offense into a pin. So that's what she has over Toni Storm is her ability to reverse your moves into pinning combinations, which Toni Storm has fallen foul of previously. Tonya Stom also referenced the new music on commentary. She said, whatever happened to that song that she came out to last week? I really enjoyed it. I thought it was a really catchy beat.
So then that's two hours. It's like two hours, one minute into the show. So it's over, right? That's what the Bucks thought. The Bucks are leaving. They're like, we're going home. The show's over. Renee's like interviewing them backstage. And Matt Jackson brilliantly says, Joe promised to beat us up by the end. I guess you're a liar, Joe. And then Joe appears with all the other babyfaces and they brawl around the ring and weirdly...
AEW kayfabe-wise, a production member goes, oh, we should play the outro music. Yeah, play some and they just played the dynamite theme. while everything was going crazy. Because that's Anakin in the arena. You play someone's entrance theme or you play a song while the brawl is going on. It's the final countdown ringing out as Bryan Danielson's battering someone in the ring. And then...
That stops when Gabe Kidd turns up. They cut the music. And then the heels get on top. The Bucks do stereo elbows off the top ropes through tables on the outside with Omega and Swerve on. And, you know, exactly what you want to do. Like you said, this is a very functional, effective cell of anarchy in the arena at Double or Nothing. They didn't tease Eddie Kingston at all. Well, of course not. He's hurt.
but he might be ready yeah might is a big term he's been off for like a year and a half yeah and he's because he got really badly hurt and the report at the time was he's gonna be out for a long time and a long time is a year a year two months Surely he's okay by now? Because, of course, it only clicked with me when Gabe Kidd turned up. Who injured addict? Well, okay, so maybe he's there at Double or Nothing then. Maybe that's, you know, you've got to buy the paper to get the return of Eddie.
but they've not set that up so i think it's like if it does happen it's a surprise spot yeah but it makes total sense because it was that gabe kid match with eddie in new japan strong last january i did not because i completely wrote eddie being a part of this And I thought that actually the commentary did a very good job of convincing me otherwise. Because they were like, man, Gabe Kidd and Kenny Omega have been at a war of words over in New Japan. So that's why Gabe Kidd is here.
That is a beautiful little red herring to make me forget about Eddie Kingston. So maybe you're right. Either that or it's going to be Darby Allen has skateboarded his way down Mount Everest so he can get back in time for Double or Nothing. Well, speaking of Double or Nothing, shall we do our predictions?
You too can compete against us in wrestling predictions if you go over to wrestletalk.com forward slash league. Over there is WrestleLeague where we all enter our predictions and compete against each other. Like 8,000 people on there. Including us. And so many WWE shows coming up. There's going to be lots of points to earn from WrestleLeague. Right, so Jamie Hayter versus Mercedes-Monaise.
in the Owen Hart Cup final. Yeah, I'm a little head and heart on this one because I want it to be Jamie because I think you can then do Monet and Athena for the TBS Championship in Texas at Orlin instead. and you can do hater and storm but hater standing tall on the go home show makes me think that it's going to be mercedes mo now
I think All In, it's their biggest show this year, really. I think you finally want to do the title versus title. It's not title versus title, but it's, is Mercedes going to win all the championship belts? I'm going Monet as well. We've got the Hurt Syndicate versus the Sons of Texas, Dustin Rhodes and Sammy Guevara. A match that was set up ten days before the... Well, eight days before the pay-per-view. Yeah, I thought that they might save this match for all in Texas. But no.
I'm going with the Hurt Syndicate. I don't think Dustin and Sammy. There's a nice symmetry of they were on the first double or nothing while the Hurt Syndicate weren't. But I think of that syndicate. It's a story that doesn't feel substantial because MJF is with the Hurt Syndicate and he is a day one AW star. Timeless Tony Storm versus Mina Shirakawa. Can I go first?
Oh, no. You're not going to say something silly, are you? No, because I was going to say Mina Shirakawa. Why? Because she's just come in. She's, well, you know, she's been around for eight. I think she's really connecting with the crowd. I think you could make her a megastar. Tony Storm's had the belt since, what, February? Mm-hmm. Not every reign has to be three years long. No. Just put the belt on Mina. Where it falls down is... Mercedes-Benz.
versus Tony Storm. I was about to say, you literally just said your biggest show of the year, your stadium show, you want to have the biggest match, and that is Storm versus Monet. I can't have both. You can't have it both ways. Wait, wait, wait. Didn't mean a beat Monet for the New Japan Strong type. Mmm, no, I don't know. Who did win that time? Who's the New Japan Stripper? Azumi. Oh, was it? Was Shurikawa in the match?
Yes, I think she was. I think she was the person who got pinned. Because Monet's whole deal is that she's not lost singles competition because she's lost a tag match. Yes, damn it, damn it. Because you could have told the story that Mina has Monet's number, but she didn't pin her.
All right, okay. All right, you're right. Tony Storm, same with you. FTR versus Garcia and McGuinness. It's got to be FTR, hasn't it? I think so, yeah. Their new heel act is really good. Stokely as the manager, he'll likely interfere. Yeah, there's a few good moments you can do for Nigel McGuinness getting the win, but I think the smarter money maybe is the FTR win here and hit the spike pile driver on Nigel.
Mark Briscoe, Ricochet, stretcher match. Hello, Ricochet. I am going to go Briscoe. Huh. I know Ricochet's been doing all-time great heel work. But he is a goofy character. I don't think he loses anything. like it's a kind of nice receipt for the heel to get humiliated put on the stretcher true but it's mark briscoe so you know he's put in matches to be pinned so i think and actually doesn't have to get pinned here i if i may though
I hate a stretcher match. This feels so Vince-era WWE. I know they had stretcher matches before the Vince-era WWE, but it feels so... wrestling and just so like naff. A stretcher man. or something equally as nonsense. Yeah, so you've got to put them on the stretcher? Yeah, you've got to put them on the stretcher and then load them into an ambulance and the ambulance arrives away. It just feels so cartoony. But that's Ricochet right now.
Yeah, I guess, but he's also stabbing people with scissors, which does not feel that cartoony. I didn't say it was a kid's cartoon. Anarchy in the Arena, which I cannot wait for. It's Kenny Omega, Swerve Strickland, Willow Nightingale and The Ops. Joe, Hobbs and Shibata. So six person teams.
versus the Death Riders of Moxley, Claudio, Marina and Yuta and the Young Bucks. Wait, no Gabe Kidd? Well, that's it. Gabe Kidd's not in the match, but obviously... And I was surprised that Gabe Kidd was not in the match, but I think that's because... You are absolutely right. They will need someone to make... to come down to the ring to neutralize the Gabe Kidd situation.
I think you've absolutely nailed it, and I cannot believe I did not see it coming. It just came to me when I saw him come out of the crowd on this episode. I never once thought it last week when he first showed up. I'm going to go babyfaces. I think you have a babyface win, and that sets up the fall of the heels over the next couple of months. I agree, particularly if you've got the Eddie return. The babyfaces should win. I'm going team babyfaces.
okada versus mike bailey uh mike bailey no i'm kidding it's a card because you're doing a card or omega at uh all in so you okada should win It'll be interesting to see how their styles mesh. Mike Bailey who puts in a lot of effort. The main event of Hangman Page versus Will Ospreay. It's the final of the Owen Hart Foundation Cup tournament.
and the winner earns the AEW world title shot against Jon Moxley, are all in. So, you gotta think this is the person who will dethrone the Death Riders. Well, that's it. But there's always that Darby Allin. Question mark off. This whole storyline was designed to give Alan the belt. Bug off back to October 2024.
But that's what I mean, is like, are we all just moving past that? Because I feel like I have. I think I've moved past the Darby Allin. I never got on it. Well, I know you did, because you're weird and don't like Darby Allin. But like, I think it, Yeah, I think it has to be Osprey because I think having Osprey go into Forbidden Door as the World Champion at the O2 would be incredibly special. Having said that,
We also said that when Will came into the company last year before All In at Wembley Stadium. We were like, well, surely Will will have the belt going into All In at Wembley or he's going to win the belt at Wembley in All In. So is it just our country pride and the fact that we just love Will so much that makes us think it's going to be Will or is the bigger match to do the redemption of Hangman Adam Page in Texas?
In his home home. Well, basically he's from Virginia. But he feels like a cowboy. Yeah. His spiritual metaphor home is the desert, I guess. You could possibly spin it that way. I guess if you wanted to spin it anywhere you could, that is a way to do it. But I really... I said yesterday on a Patreon call that I'm going to hangman.
but now after that segment, I'm going Ospreay. I think I have to go Ospreay as well, but I genuinely don't know. I'm so torn in this match. I think it's time for him to be the top guy in a promotion, in a United States major promotion. I... I think this is my most
anticipated match of the year so far in terms of going into a pay-per-view desperate to see a match this is the one for me this year is hangman osprey it's the match out of any promotion in america and even here in the uk I've never been, I haven't felt this excited about a match on a paper. and so excited that we'll even still be excited eight hours into a pay-per-view when it finally comes on. Hey, well even told you, up front.
You know, I'm going to be following Anakin Arena. I'm going to be following three hours of wrestling because that's what I do in Will Osprey. There are two other matches that have come out of collision. so there's the Paragon versus Don Callis family in trios action I would imagine so I'll say Callis family there yeah I'll say Callis family because I can possibly sell some TNT stuff with Adam Cole And there's Penelope Ford and Megan Bane versus...
Harley Cameron and Anna Jay. Oh, that's tricky. I'll go with Bane and Ford because Bane's got bigger prospects. Oh, Harley Cameron's great, but I don't think... She needs that win. I think that'll likely be on the pre-show because you don't have three women's matches on the main card. The night before, though, is Saturday night's main event. Let's do those. There's only four matches. Jey Uso versus Logan Paul.
Jey Uso. Yeah, it's Jey Uso. CM Punk and Sami Zayn versus Seth Rollins and Bron Breaker. Seth and Bron. Yeah, it's got to be because, again, this is their first time as a team in a match. They're the new heel acts. They should be a coherent thing. They need to win that first one. John Cena, our truth? Tricky. Well, now that it's not for the title. Oh, you think truth wins? No, I don't. I think Cena wins here, but I would not be surprised if this actually isn't a match.
at all and it's just an angle and they just do like scene just has a vicious beat down angle that'd be cool to build the tag match at Money in the Bank yeah Stay tuned for our three-count Money in the Bank predictions this Sunday. We've both gone from a very similar direction of what that tag match might be.
and Damien Priest Drew McIntyre the thing I'm looking forward to most in a steel cage match and I don't know on this one either you kind of like attribute to this as a sort of a rubber match of sorts because drew won at mania and then priest stopped drew winning at backlash so maybe and this is like the final of their their trilogy i i've changed my mind i think priest wins here to set up I don't know a third
Well, that's the problem in my GM mode. The steel cage match blows it off. There's no rivalry there anymore. There is a potential. There is a worldview, to use a phrase that my wife absolutely detests, where Damien Priest wins here.
And then they're both in Money in the Bank. And Priest stops Drew winning Money in the Bank for a second year in a row. And then they have the blow-off match at SummerSlam. Yeah. That's a very Levesque booking. Yeah. So I'm going for Damien Priest here. I'm also going for Priest. Recommendations for this week. What have you got? Anything you've enjoyed this week? Well, unfortunately, the recommendation that I have to give is not widely available to watch. What a hipster. Yeah.
I'm gonna I'm working I'm gonna be messaging to try and get a match from last week's hustle show here in London. added to their YouTube channel. Ah, cool. So there was a tag match last week between Lions Pride and Tony Harlow and Neon Cassius for the tag titles. That was Such a fun match. It was so brilliant, but the reason why I want people to see this match is because
It really does show that you can build to a hot tag using very traditional methods. And if a crowd wants to see it as much as this crowd wants to see that Cassius hot tag, It was, I was speaking to some of the people that work at Hustle and I was texting them over the and they were telling me the crowd was rabid during that match. You could feel the building shake. like it was there was so many people who were desperate to see that hot tag it was Absolutely incredible.
Something about Cassius. People just want to see him wrestle. Yeah, and it's wild because you then go to Riot Cabaret where he's like one of the top heels with Nina Samuels. But I really want people to see this match because it was so much fun. So, I'm basically making it my quests now. to get hustle to add it to their YouTube channel so I can have a full recommendation for
Worthy endeavour. Everyone, get your tickets for the next Hustle show next month. Well, yeah, because it's Sid and Rain Leverkusen going for the tag titles against Lounge Pride, which I'm... They actually had a great main event as well, Rocco and Rain Levick.
You can go onto their YouTube channel and watch the Tate Mayfair's Sid Scala match. So not the street fight they had, but the first one that they had, which set up then the tag match, would then set up the big street fight they had. But that first match, that sort of half hour... like uh technical brilliant match they had go and watch that because it was an awesome awesome match um my recommendation i might have set it up earlier i saw thunderbolts last night thunderbolts
Asterix. Asterix. What a fun reveal. Asterix and obelix. Yeah. So my recommendation is the Superman trailer. from last week. That's right. I'm a DC fan. Oh, Thunderbolts is good. The feeling is back. Thunderbolts was good. I saw that movie. Battle with the Suicide Squad with James Gunn. You think tribalism in wrestling's bad? Oh, I have had 15 years of bad DC movies and marvels.
Scoring all the goals. Winning all the titles. But man, have they crapped the bed the last couple of years. So much so. Look, I actually really enjoyed them. So I think it's really, really good. but don't I'm also questioning myself because the bar is so low now is it really a good film
Or is it because I saw Multiverse of Madness? Hey, I liked Multiverse of Madness. No, you didn't. I did. No, you've kidded yourself. No, I liked it. You like good films like The Batman. And you like good TV series like The Penguin. I really liked Multiverse of Madness when they came on screen and they were like, cameos, here are your cameos. and I was like,
I was like, yeah, okay, cool. Lovely cameo. That's all it is. And I had a good time with it. Oh, look, there's Professor Xavier. And it's the X-Men theme. It's John Krasinski. It's the fan casting of Mr. Fantastic. That Robert Downey Jr is dead as Iron Man. Yay, he's back as another character. It's creatively bankrupt. And DC is going to overtake you.
DC is gonna overtake you. Superman's gonna be the best film ever made. And Fantastic Four is gonna suck my balls. Can I make a confession? Yes, please. So, when I saw Thunderbolts last week, they played the first trailer for Superman ahead of it, and I get it.
You know when we did our review of Superman 4 the quest for peace over on cutscene and I was like that sort of cheap nostalgia using the Superman theme from the John Williams score like what a cheap pop that is I saw it in a cinema with the surround sound and I burst into tears and I was on my own and I was desperately trying to hide the fact that I was in a fairly packed cinema
and I was crying because the Superman theme was playing and I was seeing Superman on the screen and I was just like, this is just the best thing ever. If you're playing the WrestleTalk Podcast drinking game at home, that is a shot. Luke has admitted to crying again. In public. There was someone in the comments who was very mad that I cried in public. Yeah. Because that's not what a man does. It's not acceptable.
He was very upset at me. I'm going to assume it was a he. Well, speaking of fan comments, I've got an email for you. So my friend Mike, who I used to work with at 4Music at Channel 4, who I've referenced quite a lot when we talk about in WrestleTalk Extra, that in that 2010-2013 period, it was me and him with the wrestling guys in the office.
But he's also very knowledgeable about music. He's got a very good blog called Traveller's Tunes if you want to go over and read his music reviews. And he emailed in Fred Worst. Am I right? you know what jams my jam limp biscuit New metal, like grunge before it, was mostly turgid. Dreary guitars. Oh, absolutely get out. Dreary guitars and subpar lyrics that somehow defined an era. Subjective, perhaps. Toxic, absolutely.
Grunge had Cobain and Nu Metal had Jonathan Davis saving its soul. Durst, at best, was a skid mark that even Blink-182 thought Juvenile. His music was an ever-ending kidney stone. And then he tossed him piles and a stomach ulcer by helping sign Stained and Puddle of Mud in his job as a record label stooge. He thought Puddle of Mud was going to be the next Nirvana.
If dressing like Poochie and behaving like a Bang Bros dropout counts as punk rock, then sure, Judgment Day might be the most compelling dysfunctional family since Succession. That's Mike. He disagreed with your Limp Bizkit chat on Tuesday. There was someone in the comments on our podcast that thought I was gatekeeping music. because I very jokingly refer to calling $3 bill y'all the hipster choice of best limb biscuit album.
I... I think... gatekeeping and the word gaslighting get banded about these days. when what you're saying is, no, I don't. But what they want to say is, no, I disagree with you. But they, again, weaponise it and say, no, you're gatekeeping. Well, here's the thing. So I think where your chap here is going to fall down in terms of the feedback that this comment section might give here. is that I think there would have been a good 90% of people that would have agreed that Nu Metal was trash.
Because it was. But that's what the beauty of Nu Metal was. And a lot of people... Do you know what the best thing about Nu Metal music was? Every Nu Metal artist did interviews where they said we're not a new metal band, we don't like new metal music. That's the best thing about new metal. It was an era-defining, terrible genre of music that I have got so much nostalgia and love for.
and it takes me back to a time that, and it is bad music, but I love it because it, and a lot of the times, Cold Chamber in particular, when they release their first album,
knew that this was a bad genre. They wrote a song called Big Truck. It's a song about a big truck. They knew exactly what they were doing with that first album. And a lot of bands lent into the sillier aspects of it. And that's what makes it a wonderful genre of music. Limbiscuit being... know certainly a big part of that but where your chap is gonna fall down is he's badmouth grunge so I'm
of this audience will agree that new mail was trash 100% will not tell you that grunge was a bad genre of music because grunge is beloved uh yeah i believe mike you have wandered in with a couple of vinyls of Frank Turner, whatever drivel it is you listen to. And it does sound like... And you've come into someone else's home turf. You're probably with plain white tees. I'm probably thinking, you're winning this war, and I think you bad-mouthing.
the genre of grunge is gonna do you no favors whatsoever. But not all the comments are aggressive. We set a task, as we have done for each episode so far. If you make it this far into the nonsense, you get a little secret code word that you slip into a comment and You put it in there to prove to everyone else that you made it that far. The people who know, know. And last week's word was rice, after my rice cooker kind of thing that I've got. Nicholas Milton was probably my favourite.
I was listening to this podcast in my car, while next to me at a stoplight, Rice Rice Baby was being played on. I immediately knew today was going to be a good day. Yeah. Anytime you can shout out Vanilla Rice, who himself released a new metal album. Vanilla who? Vanilla Rice. Thank you. He released a new metal album, which has a new metal cover of Ice Ice Baby, a song called Too Cold, and it is... Superbly terrible. and it was also we remembered some boo
And we asked people to send in their memories of Cebu. And PK Star Punk wrote, Back when my dad was around, they were doing the first ECW one-night stand in WWE. My dad, an ECW fan, was the most excited for Cebu. and I had no idea who any of these people were, but it was the most excited I've ever seen my old man get for a wrestling show. I just re-watched his match against Cena at Vengeance 06 the other day. There really was something captivating about him. He's simply awesome.
RIP Sabu. Thanks for the memories to share with my dad and thanks boys for the pot. Rice. perfect is the perfect is the absolute perfect thing to do because you know we try to try and cleverly sneak it in but when you can just just say it at the end of a really sincere heartfelt story i had to click read more What's our word for today's hipsters going to be? I can't even try and do something about grunge.
Grunge. Oh no, because you don't want to get that mixed up in the actual debate. I think the people who sat through the grunge chat are still here now. For sure they are. So I think grunge is a good idea. They're not even listening to this bit as well because they're furiously typing their comments in. Grunge. Yeah, just grunge. Yeah. A grunge and a big truck.
Try and get a big truck. Oh, that's tough. That's tough. But that's where you've got your smarts in to try and get big truck into your comments. Well, big truck is your word of the episode. Don't talk about the coal chamber track. Talk about anything that's not related to that cold chamber track and get Big Truck in. I was at home for my mum's birthday over the weekend and my sister said they're doing this big American thing at Brands Hatch. Should we go?
They've got classic American cars. They've got fireworks display. And they've got monster trucks. And my mum looked at me and went, Chappie, the monster trucks. And I was like, I actually want to see them. They go vroom vroom. They go vroom vroom. Can I give one last recommendation? Yeah. There's a superb podcast out there called Guy.
which is hosted by Brian Quimby, who actually also does a new metal podcast, the PODcast, which is very, very good. But he's got a show called Guys that is about guys and he just takes a certain subject of guys and there's a whole show about them so he's done wrestling guys um simpsons guys south park guys that's what he did monster truck guys as an episode recently and it is
It bypasses every part of my hippocampus and goes straight to the core of my brain. Yeah. What you might find if you listen to Monster Truck Guys is that monster trucks just ain't what they used to be. Really? They've gone woke? Apparently, yeah. Some people might say, it's just not as great as it once was. It's not as great as it once was because you're not eight anymore. I said the only way that I'll enjoy it as much as I did as a kid, because I reckon it's quite boring.
get hammered. Anyway, thank you very much for joining us here today. Please subscribe. We've got Rastor News tomorrow. We've got Brain Busters. Look at that camera. It's not on. It's this one right here. I was working the hard cam. This is your hard count. That's what they taught me to do down in developmental. Yeah, we've got restaurant news tomorrow. We have...
Brain Busters our new game show launching on the WrestleTalk YouTube channel on Saturday and three count Money in the Bank predictions will be live on Sunday and if you go to our Patreon you can get us Doing a three count for Money in the Bank 2020. The greatest Money in the Bank match ever. Staged. Filmed. Innovated. But for now, I've been Oli Davis. That's been Luke Owen, D.A.D.