AEW Dark Review - July 13, 2021

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Matt Hardy def. Jah-C

Hardy beat Fuego Del Sol on Monday's Elevation and it was a fun match. This was another match designed to give Hardy an easy win before he faces Christian Cage on Night 1 of Fyter Fest this Wednesday, except not as competitive. Jah-C, who I wasn't familiar with whatsoever, had a flurry of offense down the stretch, but this was mostly about Hardy. I liked how he got more aggressive in the closing moments because Jah-C battled back. Jora Johl helped wipe off Hardy's sweat afterward as he's now a member of the H.F.O.

FTW Champion Brian Cage def. Foxx Vinyer (Non-Title)

Similar to Hardy, Cage was also in action on Monday's Elevation. I know AEW is putting these people in multiple matches a week to boost their win-loss records, but it only leads to overexposure in my opinion. Thankfully, this was kept short and sweet with Cage completely dominating Vinyer (who looked like a goof), but it was a meaningless matches that could have been cut from the card that was already too long.

The Acclaimed def. Derek Pisaturo and Roman Rozell

It was a bummer seeing The Acclaimed go from wrestling in front of that capacity crowd in Miami to then wrestling in front of the usual Dark guys and girls in the crowd at Daily's Place. Their shtick is still entertaining, but it's far better when they have fans to feed off of. Nonetheless, this was a decent match. In case you missed it, they challenged Varsity Blonds on Elevation in an attempt to climb the AEW World Tag Team Championship rankings.

Diamante def. Harlow O'Hara

I totally forgot that Diamante hasn't been around lately until I saw her in action here. Apparently she was last in action in early June. Has it really been that long? Was she hurt or something? Either way, I'm glad she's back as she was just hitting her stride before she disappeared from AEW programming. She picked up where she left off and won with relative ease. Her intensity separates her from the rest of AEW's women's division and I hope she gets more opportunities on Dynamite soon.

"All Ego" Ethan Page def. Ryan Mantell

Scorpio Sky wrestled on Elevation this week and I was wondering why it wasn't Page instead considering he has a Coffin match coming up on Wednesday. Well, it was because Page had a match of his own on Dark. Mantell wrestled once before on Dark but obviously didn't stand out enough for me to remember him. This was a fairly straightforward squash for Page before he battles Darby Allin Wednesday night.

Big Swole def. Sahara Seven

Unless I'm mistaken, Swole is another person we haven't seen in action in over a month. Why? During Diamante's pre-match promo, she challenged Big Swole to a match. Swole got on the mic after this and called her out but didn't seem to accept the challenge. Clearly, they're headed for a match against each other at some point. It'd be nice for it to happen on Dynamite, but I'm sure it will end up going down on an upcoming episode of Dark or Dark: Elevation. This was a solid showing for Swole.

Dante Martin def. RSP

RSP is short for Ricky Shane Page. I saw someone say a while ago that he could possibly be portraying the current masked man in the NWA, but I assume that's not the case if he's wrestling on Dark. He's a big dude and thus it was logical for him to take control of this match given he dwarfs Martin. Martin was barely able to escape with the win, but this was a hell of a sprint for the five or six minutes they were allotted. I'd like to see more of RSP on the Dark shows.

The Dark Order (Evil Uno and Stu Grayson) def. Sean Maluta and Papadon

I realize they're babyfaces now, but Dark Order fighting from underneath against two enhancement guys was a weird decision. Maluta has been around for a long time and I enjoy his work, but still, this should have been more one-sided in their favor. They didn't hit their usual tag team finisher for the win, but what they used instead was cool. Based on their recent interactions with The Elite, I'd like to see them be built up for an AEW World Tag Team Championship opportunity in the coming months. The fact we haven't seen Uno and Grayson against The Young Bucks straight up yet is slightly shocking.

Ryan Nemeth def. Marcus Kross

I'm sorry but Kross' wild hair is just too damn distracting. He's wrestled one other match for AEW and I've seen him a bunch in Ring of Honor and he's a perfectly competent competitor, but it's hard to take the dude seriously based on his appearance alone. This was basically every Ryan Nemeth match you've ever seen. It was serviceable but didn't stand out in any way.

Penelope Ford def. Robyn Renegade

It's funny that Ford is building more momentum now that she's on her own than she ever was with Kip Sabian in her corner. I'm a fan of the act, but this time off for Sabian has actually benefited Ford so she can find her footing and get more chances to shine. She's been improving in the ring as well. Both she and Renegade worked with a sense of urgency and had an intense three-minute match.

Frankie Kazarian def. Austin Green

Green was managed by a man named Diamond Sheik. He brought the fight to Kazarian but ultimately to no avail. He's a huge dude, so Kazarian had some trouble putting him away. He did well and held his own. Sheik never came into play at any point, so I'm not sure why he was even there. As for Kazarian, his run-ins during The Elite's matches are starting to get old. He needs to face one of them in a singles match one of these days for his pursuit of vengeance to really mean anything.

Lee Johnson and Brock Anderson def. Mark Davidson and Aaron Frye

It looks like Anderson was impressive enough in his Dynamite debut a few weeks ago for AEW to keep him around and give him more reps on the Dark shows. I'm glad he's wrestling in tag team matches along with another Nightmare Family prospect in Johnson. They made for a nice team and looked smooth while on offense. Immediately signing Anderson to a contract wouldn't have been fair to everyone else who's been busting their ass on Dark over the last year, so at least they're making him earn it.

Julia Hart def. Madi Wrenkowski

Wrenkowski usually gets an entrance but not this time. Both of these ladies are inexperienced but have plenty of potential to go far with more seasoning. Hart has already found her place on the roster alongside Varsity Blonds, while Wrenkowski has a great presence about her. If they can continue to put the pieces together, I see no reason why they can't be signed to full-time deals. This was good stuff from these two.

The Blade def. Jake Tucker

The Butcher and The Blade were never my cup of tea as a tag team, but at the very least, they had their place in the tag team division and were on Dynamite a decent amount. Blade was on Dynamite last week with The Bunny against Orange Cassidy and Kris Statlander, but he's even more boring without The Butcher around. And that's coming from someone who enjoyed his work as Braxton Sutter in IMPACT a few years ago. The best part about this was that it was under two minutes long.

Private Party def. Joeasa and Deonn Rusman

Private Party need to be focused on more as I feel like they've often overshadowed with the H.F.O. growing to be so big. I mean, Hardy's been having more matches lately than they have been. I find that to be a problem, but maybe that's just me. Either way, their tag team work is always on point and this was a short and sweet showcase for them. They're another team that should be in the tag title conversation more than they are. The heel turn hasn't helped them much in that regard, but being on Dynamite a whole bunch (even in a background role) has been something.

Powerhouse Hobbs def. Travis Titan

Hobbs must have watched Private Party's match because he too attacked his opponent before the bell, except he did it at ringside. I don't know why Hobbs had to have a second match in two days when it was exactly what we got on Elevation. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy he squashed Titan decisively and quickly (seriously, I think this was less than 10 seconds), but I don't know what purpose it served other than boosting his win-loss record. It's amazing to think that it was almost exactly a year ago that Hobbs himself was squashed in 10 seconds by Orange Cassidy. Never forget.

Gunn Club (Colten and Billy Gunn) def. The Wingmen (JD Drake and Cezar Bononi)

Where has Austin Gunn been lately? It doesn't make much of a difference, but it would help if he was around. I assume he's hurt because he isn't even coming down to the ring for Colten and Billy's matches. This was one of the longer matches on this episode, but The Wingmen are somewhat established, so it wasn't that illogical for this to be as competitive as it was. Neither of these teams overly interest me, but they made good use of the time they had.

Angelico def. Wheeler Yuta

Following Yuta's upset victory over Nemeth last week, he bumped shoulders with Angelico on the stage. He also won for his team on Monday's Elevation, so we actually got a match with an unpredictable outcome on Dark for once. Yuta gave it a hell of an effort and looked credible in defeat. This was an entertaining main event and the correct choice to close out the show. AEW should definitely bring back Yuta for more appearances as he's made the most of his opportunities thus far.

Overall Show

Much like Monday's Elevation, this show was also around two hours in length. Why? I have no idea. I was looking forward to fans returning so we could go back to having one-hour shows for Dark and Dark: Elevation (or for the first time in the case of the latter), but no such luck, at least not yet. Doing 15 matches in front of a crowd will burn them out quick, and then doing another 18 matches back at Daily's Place (I thought they were done there for now?!) in front of nobody except the enhancement wrestlers is even worse. Hopefully this is a short-lived thing and Dark will be taped before or after Rampage on Friday nights starting next month because doing it at Daily's Place with no one there reminds us all of an era we don't want to revisit. There were some solid matchups on this episode and I appreciated the attention to storyline progression, but cutting down on the meaningless matches would have been a big help.

SEE MORE: Dark Reviews