AEW Dark Review - November 26, 2019

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Trent def. Pentagon Jr.

We got to see Fenix compete in one-on-one action for the first time in AEW last week on Dynamite and now it was Pentagon's turn on Dark. I've been a big fan of his since the start of Lucha Underground five years ago and I strongly believe he can be a top talent in AEW once The Lucha Brothers go their separate ways. As for Trent, he's a terrific talent in his own right and it's been cool to see him shine in singles competition recently. This was a pretty good match with some fun moments, but Trent going over Pentagon was definitely a questionable call.

Shanna def. Big Swole

I like that the women are getting more opportunities to showcase their skills on Dark, but neither Shanna nor Big Swole had the strongest showing here. I loved the video package for Shanna that preceded this, as it gave me more of a reason to care about her, but the actual match left a lot to be desired. The crowd sitting on their hands for most of it was hardly surprising considering neither of them are overly established yet, but they also didn't give them much to get excited about, either.

Awesome Kong def. Leva Bates

I still have no idea what Kong is wearing as her attire or what Brandi Rhodes' gimmick has anything to do with Kong's, but as I've said before, at least their pairing is keeping Brandi out of the ring. That's what I'm thankful for this Thanksgiving. In all seriousness, this was exactly what it needed to be. It was kept short and sweet with Kong decimating Bates in under a minute before cutting her hair afterward.

AAA Mega Champion Kenny Omega def. Jack Evans

Omega has been acknowledged as the AAA Mega Champion a few different times on AEW TV over the past month, but this marked the first time the title has been defended in an AEW ring. It's cool that AAA and AEW have that type of working relationship. The outcome was of course never in doubt, but they had excellent chemistry and the action was very entertaining. Evans scoring as much offense as he did before eating defeat was nice to see and Omega needed this win following his loss to Jon Moxley at Full Gear.

Overall Show

There was a ton of technical issues with this episode that included the audio of replays being heard but not shown as well as the commentators referencing Kong vs. Bates as already happening even though it didn't. Other than those things, this was a perfectly solid edition of Dark. Kong vs. Bates cemented Kong as a killer, the main event was awesome and the opener was a blast. However, Swole vs. Shanna could have been better. I still say Dark should be taped entirely before Dynamite when the crowd is at its hottest.