The show kicked off with a promo from The Young Bucks. They described their struggles in the tag division but have clawed their way to a tag title shot this Wednesday. They noted that SCU are friends and will be coming for Christmas dinner and hope it isn’t awkward when the Bucks have their newly won titles on display at Christmas dinner. This was a strong promo.
Vickie Guerrero was introduced and gave the big ‘Excuse Me’ as she came out to join Excalibur on commentary.
SCORPIO SKY & FRANKIE KAZARIAN VS PRIVATE PARTY IN A NON-TITLE MATCH
Guerrero became infatuated with Private Party and showed a lot of interest in the characters and clearly did homework ahead of time regarding past wins and losses.
Quen hit a tope con giro to both, Kassidy followed with an Asai moonsault and ended with Sky yanking Kassidy to the floor to stop Silly String. Kazarian flung Quen into a cutter in the ring as they hit SCU-Later to win the match.
WINNERS: Scorpio Sky & Frankie Kazarian in 12:23
They went over the women’s rankings with Dr. Britt Baker at #1, followed by Kris Statlander, Hikaru Shida, Nyla Rose (suspended), and Emi Sakura with the top two meeting on Dynamite this week.
DR. BRITT BAKER VS MACHIKO
Joey Janela joined Excalibur and Guerrero for the rest of the show on commentary.
Machiko is a local wrestler from Dallas, Texas.
It was all Baker as she connected with a discus elbow, sling blade, swinging neck breaker and used a Russian leg sweep to set up the Lockjaw for the submission.
WINNER: Dr. Britt Baker at 3:23
It was a quick and one-sided win for Baker heading into the #1 contender’s match on Dynamite.
BEA PRIESTLEY VS KRIS STATLANDER
They had a nice match and got a good length of time. Guerrero brought up Priestley giving Baker a concussion and then they joked about the number of concussions Janela has had and he told them not to tell Nowinski.
Statlander stopped a cheeky Nando’s kick with a head stand and kick off the turnbuckle. As she was on offense, Brandi Rhodes showed up in the front row with Awesome Kong and Melanie Cruise (the woman that had her head shaved). They had signs trying to recruit Statlander with one reading ‘KS Phone Home’, very weird stuff.
Statlander used an Oklahoma Roll and a package tombstone for the win.
WINNER: Kris Statlander in 9:29
Afterward, Statlander cut a promo in a service elevator on Baker and will be her leader. Statlander looked good in the match and had the time to showcase her style effectively to newer viewers of hers.
PAC, JACK EVANS & ANGELICO VS BEST FRIENDS & ORANGE CASSIDY
Right off the bat, Janela said that Orange Cassidy is so brave that he wouldn’t back down at a Blink 182 concert and then proceeded to say that he could ‘strap a bucket of maple syrup to his bike and ride a motorbike across the great country of Canada’ as his dig on the Jim Cornette controversy from the NWA.
It was very entertaining to hear Guerrero react to the Cassidy character, which she had probably never seen prior and she seemed to love it.
Cassidy was the star of the match as they got the heat on Trent to set up the hot tag with Cassidy putting his limp hand out and the place exploded. They responded to everything Cassidy did and he is such fun to watch and super athletic. He did the limp kicks to Pac and then caught Pac with a tornado DDT and proceeded to hit a dive through the ropes to all three opponents.
Best Friends hugged Cassidy and he did the dead weight splash off the top to Angelico for a two-count. Pac sent Cassidy off the apron and was left alone with Chuck Taylor and used a German suplex to set up the Brutalizer and submitted him.
WINNERS: Pac, Jack Evans & Angelico at 13:20
This was a perfect main event for AEW Dark and Cassidy was great to watch for the time he was in there and they kept it brief but memorable.
This was hardly a must-see show, but it was a fun hour to watch and the six-man main event was great for what it was. Kris Statlander had a nice showcase match and it was easy storytelling with Statlander and Baker getting wins heading into their match on Dynamite.
Vickie Guerrero didn’t walk into this unprepared as she had stats she referenced throughout the show even if she was likely seeing some of these performers for the first time, she seemed to genuinely enjoy doing the commentary and came off like a big fan of the product.
