AEW Dark Review - February 15, 2022

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

The Dark Order (John Silver and Alex Reynolds) def. Ariya Daivari and Invictus Khash

Daivari and Khash have teamed up on one of the Dark shows before and it was more competitive than most of the squash matches we get on Dark and Elevation. I'm fine with that because Daivari is more established than most of the enhancement talent AEW uses. Silver and Reynolds are a terrific team when they're in serious mode and that was apparent here. This was a well-wrestled affair wisely positioned as the opener.

QT Marshall def. Pat Brink

I'm genuinely curious to see what will happen, if anything, with Marshall and the rest of The Factory now that Cody Rhodes is gone from the company considering they're all Cody guys. I've never cared for the faction, so if they're eventually phased out, you won't hear a single complaint out of me. That said, Marshall always does a nice job of spotlighting his unknown opponents and giving them plenty of shine before going over. It sure looks like we might be getting Marshall against Hook at Revolution.

Max Caster def. Cameron Stewart

Stewart looked like an absolute goof, so Caster was automatically the babyface here in my eyes. He has a Face of the Revolution qualifier coming up on Wednesday's Dynamite against Wardlow, so it made sense to give him a victory before then even though he has zero chance of winning. It was a basic bout that served as a simple showcase for Caster, who I believe can be a viable singles star at some point down the road after The Acclaimed has done all they can do as a tandem.

Tony Nese def. Carlie Bravo

I'm pretty sure I've said this before, but every time Nese wrestles, I'm reminded that he's still on the roster. I'm not joking. AEW has done absolutely nothing with him since he signed (he's actually competed less than he was in WWE toward the end), leaving me to wonder what the point of signing him in the first place was. Wasn't AEW teasing a match between him and Hook at one point? This felt like it existed just to get him on the show and nothing more.

Emi Sakura def. Angelica Risk

Sakura was just involved in a six-woman tag team match on Monday's Elevation that her team lost in a matter of minutes. She does nothing for me, personally, but I understand giving her the occasional win so it means more when the actual stars beat her. This wasn't the smoothest encounter and had a few awkward moments (likely due to Risk's inexperience), but at least it didn't last longer than it needed to.

MT Nakazawa def. Joey Sweets

Nakazawa has been one of the worst characters on AEW TV for the last year or two and I thought we were past the point of having to watch him wrestle on the Dark shows. Apparently not, unfortunately. This was nothing but bad comedy and would have benefited from being significantly shorter (if it even had to happen at all). This was just terrible and I have no idea what purpose this was supposed to serve.

Frankie Kazarian def. Luke Sampson

It was reported a few weeks ago that Kazarian signed a new deal following the expiration of his previous one at the start of the year, which is why it's all the more strange that his appearances have been far and few between since then. In my opinion, he can contribute more than most of the other undercard talent because he has credibility and experience. I had no issue with him squashing Sampson as quickly as he did.

Jora Johl def. Axel Rico

Johl joined The Hardy Family Office a long time ago, but he has hardly been used in the last six months. I know for a fact he's never on Dynamite or Rampage with the rest of the group, so anyone who doesn't watch Dark or Elevation probably has zero clue he's in the group. Johl is more impressive than your average enhancement talent, but he still hasn't done much to stand out and nothing I saw here from him did anything to change that.

The Dark Order (Alan "5" Angels and Preston "10" Vance) def. Chaos Project

I can't stress enough how unbearable how Luther's relentless screeching is on these shows. The guy is below-average in the ring at this stage of his career as it is, but all the noise he makes during his and Serpentico's matches makes him that much worse. It didn't help that this was around eight minutes long, but props to Angels and Vance (who always have quality chemistry as partners) for doing what they can to make it passable. This was formulaic as hell and the crowd was quiet, but it was decent enough.

Anthony Bowens def. Fuego Del Sol

I think this is the first time we've ever gotten two raps from Caster in the same show, and everything he said was 100 percent fact. I, too, forget that Fuego is still around because he's barely been used since being announced as "all elite" in the summer. I don't know if this was exactly main event material, but as a Dark main event, it was serviceable. They should've gotten more time, but they tried to make the most of the time they did received and it was one of the better bouts on the show.

Overall Show

There were plenty of people on this show that we haven't seen featured in some time, but I suppose that's the point of Dark and Elevation: to give those guys and girls more exposure that they aren't getting on the main shows. Then again, we've reached a point where people are struggling to be featured on Dark and Elevation because so many people have been signed in the last year, so that's not good. I appreciated that this was a shorter show around an hour long, but it was one of the weaker editions in recent weeks as most of the matches were mediocre. This show screamed filler to me.

SEE MORE: Dark Reviews