AEW ALL OUT 2023
Better Than You Baybay vs. The Dark Order
Classic hot babyface opening act right here in Better Than You BAYBAY. MJF is rocking his shit wonderfully. This was a solid match - very much nothing out of ordinary, but a good-time-thing to start a show with. AEW PPV's usually get the openers right & such was the case here. FUN! ***
Samoa Joe vs. Shane Taylor
They kept this simple, just as they should have. It's two big beefy bois doing big beefy boi things in the form of smacking each other around. A solid match with the finishing sequence-destruction by Joe ruling a ton. **1/2
Luchasaurus vs. Darby Allin
This was pretty awesome. Darby's back is all banged & taped up, so naturally he takes quite a lot of punishment here. He obviously is great at that. He gets thrown around as Luchasaurus puts on a pretty nice monster performance; there were moments where he legitimately felt like a suffocating, scary monster in there. Some creative & explosive attacks by Darby in there to keep things exciting as well. It all makes for a good match. ***1/4
Miro vs. Powerhouse Hobbs
This was a HOOT. Meat forever indeed - just two big bulls colliding & not giving each other an inch. Everything was earned, hits were hard, the bombs were awesome, just a pretty darn charming deal all in all. ***
Bryan Danielson vs. Ricky Starks
A goddamn warfare. Violent spectacle. They beat the fuck out of each other with amazingly gnarly usage of the strap gimmick, amazing visuals with their facial expressions & Danielson's perfect rocking of the crimson mask. Starks had a really great showing all around with his punches n' selling as well as terrific overall heel mannerisms & swagger. A one to remember to say the least, and one of the very best of 2023. ****1/2
Claudio Castagnoli & Wheeler Yuta vs. Eddie Kingston & Katsuyori Shibata
What a line-up. It was more than surely gonna be a banger, and that's exactly what it ended up being. Loved seeing Shibata get so much time to shine - all 4 men had some great moments throughout the match, but my favorite bits definitely were the ones with Shibata & Claudio going at it. ***1/2
Kenny Omega vs. Konosuke Takeshita
This wasn't exactly my type of a match, but I appreciated some stuff in it. I really like the entire dynamic of Takeshita rising to the occasion against Omega, especially given their history & all, and the match played pretty accordingly to that, especially in the finishing stretch (which was great). Now I must say I just wasn't into the match for the vast majority of it, but even in those stretches, there was a move or 2 here n' there that I thought was neat, so I'd say this was pretty good overall. **3/4
Orange Cassidy vs. Jon Moxley
The perfect ending to Orange Cassidy's epic title reign. Against the ace of the company. The most vicious man in the company. Moxley just completely brutalizes him throughout - the blood makes for stunning visuals throughout, especially in the closing moments, and OC is wonderful eating that brutalization that is dished out on him. His comebacks are absolutely awesome too, especially the pocket-kick deal where he upped the intensity. It's just a great, storybook ending for this run of his. ****
