AEW Dark Review - December 7, 2021

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Lee Moriarty def. Misterioso

Moriarty has been killing it against a variety of opponents since coming to AEW. I'm glad Tony Khan sees the upside in him the same way many others do. I'm not too familiar with Misterioso, but I thought he stood out as much as Moriarty did. This was an enjoyable opener that allowed Moriarty to bounce back from his loss on last week's Dynamite against CM Punk. Hopefully he can settle into his first feud soon.

Lio Rush def. Rayo

This marked Rush's Dark debut. He's only wrestled three other times in AEW (including the Casino Battle Royale at Double or Nothing in May), so hopefully we get to see him wrestle more consistently going forward. Rayo was a good opponent for him as their styles complimented each other nicely. They had a fun, fast-paced match and Rush got to build momentum heading into the Diamond Dozen Battle Royale on Wednesday's Dynamite.

Brandi Rhodes def. Angelica Risk

We had to know this was coming after Brandi was shown training for an in-ring return on her reality show. She's an awful wrestler, but to her credit, considering she hasn't competed in well over a year, she didn't look half bad in this match. It was passable and I applaud her effort. As for Risk, we just saw her in action against Riho on Monday's Elevation and she impressed in defeat. She sold as well as she could for Brandi's offense here. This wasn't as much of a disaster as I thought it might be.

Emi Sakura def. Ryo Mizunami

We've seen these two have so many tag team matches that I never thought we'd actually get to see them one-on-one. I'm not saying I was looking forward to it, but I figured they were doomed to face each other in tag team action forever. In all seriousness, this was better than I expected it to be, though I probably should have expected it to be a quality contest given both women are skilled. Sakura cheating to win will probably lead to a rematch at some point.

Anthony Ogogo def. Baron Black

Black was one of the people on the team that The Factory beat in the eight-man tag team match on Elevation. He's been one of the go-to jobbers on Dark throughout the pandemic period, but I really wouldn't have had him last as long as he did against Ogogo. Maybe the idea was for Ogogo to work off more of the ring rust, but I would've preferred Ogogo just destroying him in a minute or two instead. What happened to that devastating gut punch of his?

The Pinnacle (Shawn Spears and Wardlow) def. Jay Marte and Richard King

This followed the same formula as most of the matches Spears and Wardlow have been having together lately in that Wardlow dominated a majority of the match and Spears stole the win in the end. They've been doing that for a while now, but it was a bit more apparent here. Does that mean the inevitable babyface turn is coming sooner rather than later? This did what it needed to do and I'm curious if it will play into MJF's feud with CM Punk at all.

Fuego Del Sol def. Luke Sampson

I'm curious if we've seen the last of Too Fast Too Fuego, it's been a few weeks. Even on his own, Fuego works wonderfully from underneath, especially when he's facing the bigger guys. I don't think I've ever seen Sampson before, but I was fine with him getting so much offense over Fuego because of the size dynamic. This was a well-worked match to give Fuego a rare singles win.

Team Taz (FTW Champion Ricky Starks, Powerhouse Hobbs and Dante Martin) def. Kekoa, Omkar and JT Dunn

I'm still not convinced Martin is in Team Taz for the long run. I could totally see him and Rush revealing it was a ruse the whole time and eliminating Team Taz from the Dynamite Dozen Battle Royale. His offense just screams babyface, which was evident in this match when the crowd continued to cheer him. I also tend to believe that Starks' neck injury is still lingering seeing as how he's been protected in tag team matches recently. This was a solid showcase for Team Taz and I liked the verbal exchange between Starks and Rush afterward. More of JT Dunn, please!

Thunder Rosa def. Sofia Castillo

This marked Castillo's AEW debut. I don't know what her experience level is, but she did well against the tremendously talented Rosa. They had a nice little match in the three minutes they had here. Rosa and Jade Cargill had the chance to further their feud afterward with Mark Sterling distracting Rosa while Cargill attacked her. They'll face off in the semifinals of the AEW TBS Women's Championship Tournament, and although the story seems to point to Rosa winning, I think it makes more sense for it to come down to Cargill and Ruby Soho in the finals and Cargill suffering her first loss there.

John Silver def. Aaron Solo

Silver has a big match coming up on Dynamite in his hometown on Long Island against Bryan Danielson, so this served as a warm-up for him before then. Solo is a perfectly competent competitor, so this was as well wrestled as you'd expect. They're probably capable of more together, but I was fine with this being what it was because the focus should be on Silver ahead of his outing with Danielson. I find the guy hilarious, but I don't think this was the time for him to be cutting a goofy promo. He should be taking this more seriously seeing as how it's the biggest match of his career.

Overall Show

This was a much more tolerable show than what we've been getting from Dark in recent weeks. As opposed to being around 90 minutes and featured roughly 15 matches, it was just over an hour and featured 10 matches. You could have trimmed another two or three matches over and it would have been even stronger, but this was still a solid show. We got more post-match promos than usual and a lot of them had to do with what we have coming up on AEW programming, making this episode a bit more meaningful than normal. None of the matches stood out, but I'd argue that isn't what this program is for and thus I wasn't disappointed by that.

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