AEW Dark: Elevation, it’s STIIIIIING!

AEW got back on the road, and now Elevation gets to be on location! But it gets even bigger: Darby Allin and Sting make their Dark debuts!

OFFICIAL RESULTS

• Thunder Rosa VS “Dreamgirl” Ellie; Rosa wins.
• Matt Hardy w/ the Hardy Family Office VS Fuego Del Sol; Hardy wins.
• Riho VS Amber Nova; Riho wins.
• “Powerhouse” Will Hobbs w/Hook VS Baron Black; Hobbs wins.
• KiLynn King VS Yuka Sakazaki; Sakazaki wins.
• 8 Man Tag: The Acclaimed & Chaos Project VS Gunn Club & Varsity Blonds w/ Julia Hart; Gunn Club & Varsity Blonds win.
• Brian Cage VS Alan Angels w/ The Dark Order; Cage wins.
• Leyla Hirsch VS Kelsey Heather; Hirsch wins.
• Scorpio Sky w/ Ethan Page VS Capt. Shawn Dean; Scorpio wins.
• Tay Conti VS Labrava; Conti wins.
• Lee Johnson w/ Dustin Rhodes VS Jungle Boy w/ Luchasaurus; Jungle Boy wins.
• Red Velvet VS Leila Grey; Velvet wins.
• Six Man Tag: Jora Johl & Private Party VS Chuck Taylor, Orange Cassidy & Wheeler Yuta; Chuck, Cassidy & Yuta win.
• Hikaru Shida VS Julia Hart w/ Varsity Blonds; Shida wins.
• Angelico w/ The Hardy Family Office VS Darby Allin w/ Sting; Darby wins.

MY THOUGHTS

So I guess I look dumb for thinking they’d downsize Elevation now that AEW is on the road. But I suppose that one, going to Miami for Road Rager while they’re headquartered in Jacksonville, that’s not that bad of a drive for their wrestlers to make it for the show. And two, the live fans in Miami will want to see a lot of these other stars that weren’t part of the Road Rager special so yeah, bring a lot of wrestlers and make Elevation as big as Road Rager. But to counter all that, holy crap this is almost two hours without commercials, making it longer than Dynamite again. And again, only a handful of the matches were hard to predict.

But anyway, Thunder Rosa makes for a great opener, the fans love her. Ellie gets a strong showing but of course Rosa wins as number 3 contender who needs to stay strong while waiting for a shot at Britt Baker and the women’s title. Nice little commercial for AEW Elite General Manager the mobile game with Kenny Omega and Orange Cassidy. Hardy talking trash on Fuego before their match was good stuff, and his “Man Who Reeks of Awfulness” was a good line on Christian. Fans love Fuego, him taking the fight to Hardy was great, but of course he loses so Hardy can start building momentum towards his match with Christian.

Riho is back again, and so is Amber Nova, but it was clear Riho was going to win. Amber got a really good showing, but I’m not sure she’ll be All Elite with what was probably a Northern Lights kick-out botch. The ref looked like he had to cover for her on that and the fans could tell. Baron Black taking the fight to Hobbs only to get clobbered was a good start to Hobbs just tearing into the guy. I know that, like most wrestling promotions, AEW has Face VS Heel matches, but I would love if Hobbs took Miro on for the TNT Championship. Two behemoths battling out is always great to see, especially with two guys with such personality.

KiLynn King got a really good showing against Yuka Sakazaki, things looked a little rough at times, but the Magical Girl wins to get the momentum to take on Penelope Ford at Fyter Fest. That was a BIG 8 Man Tag with some real fan favorites and crowd pleasers on both sides. Max Caster got another great rap in, and he got some real good heat with that Miami Heat burn. It was a very fun match, everyone got a good showing. The Faces winning makes sense, it keeps the Gunns undefeated as a team, Colten undefeated period, and Blonds stay strong in the rankings. Same goes for Luther taking the pin, the Acclaimed don’t really lose anything that way. Teasing Blonds VS Acclaimed for later is great stuff, that’ll be a great 2v2 program.

Alan Angels got a good showing with Brian Cage, getting back to the Alan Angels that had a great showing with Kenny Omega, but that in itself makes Cage look like a monster as he goes into is FTW Championship match with Ricky Starks. Leyla Hirsch too legit, you just have to quit, but Kelsey got to show some good character before getting whooped. Ethan Page continues to do good on commentary while Scorpio wins in the ring. Capt. Dean had a good showing, his new tights look good, I hope AEW can find some good story for him to try in the near future. Mark Sterling having a press conference to give kayfabe reasons Jade isn’t in the ring right now was really good, as was her part in it, I wonder if TNT can actually get her something acting related for a second just to make it more real.

Conti gets going fast on Labrava, and it was good character work that Labrava just wanted to run away for the ring count. Conti gets the win as both a top contender and as another fan favorite. Dustin and Big Shotty had a solid promo, but I think Johnson could’ve benefited from getting more hyped up for taking on Jungle Boy. JB and Luchasaurus had a great promo, too, and I like that JB was humble about not being the best promo guy. Again I say about a match with Big Shotty, this is what Elevation is about and he is going to be among those future stars we’re still watching in a few years. Same goes for JB, of course. These guys could easily reach the level of a Moxley, Omega, Ospreay, Ibushi, Rollins, Kofi, etc.

In this instance, JB wins because he is a hot hand after his 50th win, making this his 51st. At a certain point, Jurassic Express has to get titles of some kind. Could JB be the one to slay Miro? We got a very good vignette from Miro to plug how he might be changing the TNT title so that it is ready for when AEW moves off TNT to TBS or whatever is happening. Velvet and Grey have a good match, Grey has nice new gear, but Velvet wins to stay in that top five. Jora Johl, aka ROBO, surprised me with both having a promo and also accepting the offer to join The Hardy Family Office! I would’ve thought he’d give that answer in person, but either way, this is quite the move.

The Six Man with Johl, Private Party, Wheeler Yuta and #GoodFriends was good stuff. Nice character detail of the HFO making Johl wear the Milwaukee Bucks jersey just to troll the Miami crowd. It was also a great story detail of Private Party leaving him out of things until they absolutely needed him. Johl and Cassidy doing almost endless standing switches was great, as was Johl not wanting to do Heel cheating tactics. That ultimately costs him but I’m sure Hardy will try and break him into being a Heel with the rest of the faction.

Shida and Julia being in the penultimate match is great stuff for Julia, as is Julia facing the former champion. That said, of course Shida wins, she’s former champ and is staying strong on the edge of the top five, almost like a gatekeeper. Actually, that could be a good story for Shida. The woman to win against Shida could get into the top five and then start to rise up towards the title. It was a good catch from commentary that Shida’s added black gloves to her attire, it could be a hint towards almost a Heel turn. Her using Numero Dos, the modified Stretch Muffler, which she calls “Full Metal Muffler,” could also be a sign of that.

Darby’s first Dark: Elevation, as well as Sting’s first anything on AEW YouTube, of course they get the main event spot and a big main event win. Angelico is another guy, who even though it’d be Heel VS Heel, I wouldn’t mind seeing against Miro for a TNT title match just to see those wrestling styles match up. Meanwhile, Darby’s Coffin Match with Ethan is going to be insane, that could steal the show for this whole week in wrestling.

My Score: 8.4/10