00:00 The real reason AEW have signed a WWE name An injury emergency behind the scenes in AEW
00:07 And my review of Dynamite I'm Oli Davis, and this is the WrestleTalk
00:13 News.
00:20 Late last week, it was revealed a senior member of WWE's writing team, Jennifer 'Pepper
00:25 Man' had left the company, which was their decision they weren't released. I speculated
00:30 at the time some reasons that could be. Perhaps it was a ripple effect of the UFC merger.
00:36 Or maybe The Rock just tried to take her spot too.
00:39 Turns out it's actually a case of… The Pepper Man to AEW confirmed!
00:44 Soap Opera Network, because Pepper Man is a three-time Daytime Emmy Award winner, initially
00:49 reported the story, with AEW confirming later on that Pepper Man was "All Elite as Vice
00:55 President of Content Development." Tony Khan is quoted as saying that he's
01:00 "thrilled to welcome her today and I look forward to her creativity and collaboration
01:05 with our team across the board." Pepper Man was WWE's longest tenured female
01:10 member of the writing team, where she was recently most focused on the SmackDown women's
01:15 division. Her joining AEW and another big female signing
01:19 is a heavy indicator Tony Khan has big plans for his own women's roster, because Dave
01:24 Meltzer has added a bit more context on Twitter. She just quit WWE last week, and those in
01:31 WWE believed she was AEW bound because she's very close with Mercedes Monet.
01:38 With Monet all but confirmed to debut at AEW's big business in her hometown of Boston in
01:43 a couple of weeks, it looks like she'll be keeping a close friend and writer with
01:47 her. It's unknown whether Pepper Man was a recommendation from Monet, or if AEW were
01:52 always interested in bringing her in. Once upon a time, we all hated the idea of
01:57 Hollywood writers in wrestling. You just need one booker in a room. Like the good old days.
02:02 Well, that was before AEW had to put on about 98 hours of programming each week. Hopefully,
02:08 on her first day, she does what the Wrestling Observer once reported she did in WWE.
02:14 Apparently Pepper Man bought her Emmy with her to the writers room shortly after winning
02:18 it for Outstanding Director of a Digital Drama Series, putting it on the table in front of
02:23 her. Which apparently annoyed Michael Hayes so much, he told her to put it away.
02:29 Pepper Man will join AEW's backstage creative team that's made up of people like Pat Buck,
02:34 Bill Washington, Jerry Lynn, Christopher Daniels, Dean Malenko, Jimmy Jacobs and a
02:38 recently returned QT Marshall, all of whom assist Tony Khan.
02:43 And it seems like that backstage unit has been recently tested, as Tony Khan tweeted
02:48 ahead of last night's Dynamite show, calling it "one of the most hectic weeks for injuries
02:53 and unexpected availability in AEW history." Fightful Select have reported that Kyle Fletcher
02:59 was struggling with visa issues as of late, which is why he hasn't been featured on
03:03 AEW since January 31st when he faced Chris Jericho.
03:06 Fletcher was reportedly lined up for an ROH TV title programme against Ethan Page on ROH,
03:12 but hasn't been able to wrestle in the United States for a while because he's Australian.
03:19 Been practising ahead of Elimination Chamber Perth.
03:22 There's also the ongoing injuries of Adam Cole, Bandido, Chuck Taylor, Jeff Hardy, Juice
03:28 Robinson, Keith Lee, Kenny Omega, Kota Ibushi, Karl O'Reilly, Mark Davis, PAC, Parker Baudreau,
03:35 Rey Fenix, Roosh, Stu Grayson and Wheelie Yuta.
03:39 Despite AEW's huge talent pool, it's still a sizeable chunk, including some heavily featured
03:45 performers in there too. So add in travel issues or last minute changes as well, and
03:49 that's a recipe for chaos.
03:51 And then a concerning end to last night's episode of Dynamite. Hangman Page was seen
03:56 holding his ankle after landing awkwardly off a Muscle Buster reversal. He was checked
04:01 by the doctor after the show went off air and limped to the back. Page is set for the
04:05 world title three-way main event for next Sunday's Revolution pay-per-view.
04:10 Before then though, it's Elimination Chamber this Saturday! We're not doing live reactions,
04:14 but we will have a review here on WrestleTalk and a podcast review over on the WrestleTalk
04:19 Podcast channel. Make sure to subscribe and enable notifications to know when both of
04:23 those goes live! As well as our brand new episode of Tables, Lists and Chairs on Sunday
04:29 where we rank the top 10 best wrestling promos ever. Here's a clip.
04:34 I've gone for Dusty Rhodes' Big Heine promo. The famous line in that promo where he talks
04:41 about having a big heine. I got a big belly! I got a big heine! My belly's just a little big!
04:47 My heine's just a little big! That's what the promo's remembered for! Yeah, yeah! Nothing else!
04:51 It's yeah, he's written like the whole reach now. He's got a very tele-evangelical?
04:59 Tele-evangelist? No, no, Teletobalas was an actor.
05:03 He's like, he's reaching out, it's like, you know, all the power, all the trust,
05:14 all the belief you put in me. Put your hands to the screens! I feel your hard times! Yeah.
05:19 Yeah. It's a Tim Cote song. Yeah. My father said when I was younger,
05:23 hard times make better men. And Big Heine. That's in there as well.
05:27 Now it's Thursday, you know what that means. My review of AEW Dynamite…in about 5 minutes.
05:37 The show opened with a battle of the three letter acronyms. FTR vs the BCC, with Daxson Cash going
05:44 up against Jon Moxley and Claudio Castagnoli after Mox wouldn't stop choking out Harwood last week.
05:49 Right, ok, I'd like to make a correction for an earlier part of this episode.
05:57 FTR and BCC, they're not acronyms. They're initialisms. Because you can't say those three
06:05 letters as their own word. Like, for instance, SCUBA. Which, yeah, a lot of people, they don't
06:11 know that. SCUBA is an acronym. Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus. Which you can
06:19 say all as one word. SCUBA, when it's taken down to the first letter. Not like FTR. That's
06:25 an initialism. Oh god, I'm meant to be reviewing Dynamite! When did Cash become such a wrestling
06:31 bastard? He wrestled with far more swagger than usual, doing Claudio's taunts at him and helping
06:36 Dax cheat behind the referee's back. I haven't seen this much fire from Cash since Bret Hart's
06:40 Hall of Fame speech. After the 15 minute time call, everyone started hitting signature move
06:45 after signature move, setting 5 minutes of awesomeness to the time limit draw - just as
06:50 FTR might have been about to win with the Shatter Machine. This prompted a big pull apart brawl,
06:55 which started up again backstage after the break, setting up a match between the two teams
07:00 at Revolution. This was all fantastic. Despite having a hectic media tour in London
07:05 and a surprise appearance at the weekend's Rev Pro show, Orange Cassidy still subbed in
07:10 for his best friend Trent to take on Mike Bennett. I feel Cassidy has done more for
07:14 the ROH Tag Team Champions than the ROH Tag Team Championships have. Because just like
07:19 his fantastic main event against Taven last week, Orange let Bennett shine here.
07:23 Cassidy won with the Beach Break, but the dastardly Undisputed Kingdom attacked him
07:28 afterwards. Strong. Bennett. Taven. A heel trio so credible, they were chased off by Jake Hager.
07:37 Last seen in a storyline about his hat. Thank God the Undisputed Kingdom has Wardlow.
07:42 We like him now. Ric Flair then appeared from out at a fancy car backstage,
07:47 where he asked Rene Paquette the age-old question of many top wrestling stars - why
07:52 doesn't this major storyline have more me in? Feeling slightly jilted that he came back for
07:57 Sting's retirement to not really be involved in it so far, he revealed he's going to explore his
08:02 options whereupon he entered the Young Bucks dressing room. I mean Nicholas and Matthew's
08:08 dressing room. Please don't fire me. In a great decision by AEW, Tony Schiavone
08:13 then revealed Revolution will have Christian defending his TNT title against Daniel Garcia,
08:18 hopefully elevating Garcia with his recent momentum while also letting Copeland sell
08:23 his concerto injuries from last week. This brought out the patriarchy where Christian,
08:28 for a change, targeted Garcia's mindset in his matchbuilding promo.
08:32 And also his dead dad. He of course also brought up Garcia's dead dad. And at Revolution,
08:42 Christian doesn't want to be Garcia's opponent. He wants to be… his father.
08:48 Garcia had a great reply, challenging Christian to come down here so he can put him in the ground
08:54 like his dead father, and then stood tall by getting Nick Wayne in the Dragon Tamer
08:58 while Daddy Magic took out Kill Switch with a chair. This was an excellent segment to build
09:03 the TNT title match and Garcia. Tony Storm beat local enhancement talent Sidney
09:08 Winnell with Perazzo's finishing submission, leaving Deonna to beat Madison Reign with Storm's
09:13 ankle lock in the following match - although it was likely the awful looking Spike DDT into the mat
09:19 that really finished Reign off. Yes, by the way, you did hear me right. There were
09:23 two women's matches on this episode, yet still only in the same amount of time
09:28 as the average women's Dynamite match. Tony Khan scores a technical victory.
09:33 Storm attacked Perazzo afterwards, wrenching in the ankle lock for them to separate in the
09:37 fantastic in-camera trickery of making Tony's side in black and white, and Deonna's in colour.
09:43 Sting cut a measured, subtly fuming promo on the Bucks, saying how in all his years,
09:48 nobody has ever targeted his family. But the Jacksons attacked his sons, and seven days ago,
09:54 Sting's dad sadly passed away. NO QUESTION YOU'VE GOT A DIFFERENT FEUD.
09:59 It got Sting thinking about his own mortality, and at Revolution, he's going to give the Jacksons
10:05 the fight of their lives. I thought that was the best promo of a night of great promos.
10:10 And then out came Wardlow. The hometown Tulsa boy scared
10:15 Shivani out the ring with not just a fire I've never seen from him before, but also
10:19 a totally new style of delivery. He talked about how that rocket strapped to his back
10:24 several years ago must've been upside down. He said he beat the real world champion - referencing
10:29 CM Punk without saying his name - so bad his body is still falling apart. He squashed the
10:35 former champion MJF, and he choked out the current champion Samoa Joe last year. He's the best
10:40 wrestler in the world. He's better than you. But this is no longer wrestling. This is war.
10:47 I was so scared he was going to say Wardlow's World. I'm hoping this will go down as the moment
10:52 when everything Wardlow finally clicked. He's always had the look and the wrestling,
10:56 now he's got the personality. The subsequently announced Meat Madness
11:00 match for Revolution is surely a way to give him a big, meaty win.
11:04 Jey White already feels like he's trolling the Bang Bang Scissor Gang from the inside,
11:09 not picking Austin for a match. Will Ospreay get a hype package ahead of him on Dynamite next week?
11:13 Don Callis said Hobbs is going to win Meat Madness, and Sammy Guevara is a cuck.
11:18 And then we got a terrific main event six man of Hangman Page unhappily teaming with Hook and Rob
11:23 Van Dam - it literally said that on his name bar - against Swerve, Brian Cage and Joe.
11:29 It felt like a star power loaded match, with heaps of added context between all the characters
11:35 from the last month and a half of TV. Joe's interactions with Hook were loaded from their
11:39 title match, Page had once picked RVD to fight Swerve, Swerve, Joe and Hangman with the looming
11:45 three-way title fight a week away. But, as always, it was Swerve and Hangman that rose above it all,
11:51 with Page's obsession on Strictland frequently costing his team the win. Swerve accidentally
11:56 kicked Joe, seeding more tension there, but Joe got the win by choking out RVD.
12:01 This was a great match with great characters, making it a great build for the pay-per-view
12:06 what more could you possibly ask for. Well, Hangman Page not to be injured,
12:11 so fingers crossed on that. This week's Dynamite is 90%.
12:15 Now go watch us count down the best Royal Rumble matches in WWE history.
Comments