This was for Moxley’s AEW World Title.
The best match in the history of the AEW World Title. The only great match in the history of the AEW World Title.
It’s the natural evolution of their matches in EVOLVE and CZW a decade ago, in a way that their WWE matches were never able to be. I liked those matches well enough for what they were, talent always finds a way and all that, but almost every WWE “brawl” feels like a put on in a way that this didn’t and lacked a sense of proper chaos like this had. It isn’t WILD in the truest sense, it’s just a brawl that gets out of control and never falls back into it, but it’s so much fun. They get to use the surroundings too, but it never feels like they need the props to make the match good, so much as that they are going to fight everywhere and these wooden casino props are heavy, so they may as well use them to try and hurt each other too. It’s an extension of the match, rather than something tacked on to try and elevate it. The match itself is delightfully uncomplicated. They want to hurt each other, they hurt each other, and Moxley is slowly overwhelmed by the size and ferocity of his old foe’s attack, before being forced to do something extraordinary that changes the match.
The most refreshing thing about it is how Brodie Lee gets to feel important again for the first time in eight years. The character sucks, his Dark Order get up is absolute trash, but underneath it all, he’s still Brodie Lee. He’s the best big man of a generation and once again walks that tightrope perfectly between being a bully and doing a lot of really cool things on offense. Moxley is a presence and certainly carries his own weight, but it felt really really good to see Brodie unleashed for the first time in such a long time.
Following the big Paradigm Shift through the small Big Ramp, Brodie is about taken out, but they make a pair of decisions that help this a lot, and make a wonderful contrast to the mistakes of Cody vs. Archer earlier in the night. Similarly here, Moxley has to unload multiple version of his finish. Brodie kicks out at one following a Paradigm Shift in the ring, leading to Moxley now attacking the cut that’s opened up. A second lifting one leads to a two count. Instead of going two in a row, it’s now two different big kickouts that maybe people didn’t expect from Brodie, given how he’s been treated elsewhere for years. Is it a little excessive? Hey, yeah. Maybe. But it’s Brodie Lee, I’m not going to get mad an attempt to elevate Brodie Lee a little bit.
Instead of simply repeating himself until it’s boring, Moxley makes another far more interesting decision that both helps the match and helps out Brodie a little more, and he chokes him out for the win. Brodie gains a little something, and Mox loses nothing, because his defining feature has always been the sort of grit that makes something like this match and this finish work so well.
Not just a great goddamned fight, but a great goddamned fight where everybody comes out looking better.
***1/4
HANDWERK 