AEW Dynamite: Blood and Guts Review - May 5, 2021

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Jon Moxley and Eddie Kingston def. AEW World Champion, Impact World Champion and AAA Mega Champion Kenny Omega and MT Nakazawa

For the record, I'm only going to refer to Omega as holding all of those titles whenever he comes out with them, and he did on this show. I say that because sometimes he'll come out with the AAA Mega Championship on Dynamite, but most weeks he doesn't and he's held that title for almost two years. Nonetheless, this was a perfectly fine match designed to move the story along with everyone involved. I know AEW already has too many tag teams, but Moxley and Kingston are the perfect partners and I'd honestly like to see them be the ones to beat The Young Bucks for the AEW World Tag Team Championship at Double or Nothing. Nakazawa took most of the beating here, but the babyfaces were attacked by the entire Elite afterward. Moxley vs. Omega has been done to death, but as noted, if we get Moxley and Kingston vs. Young Bucks out of this, then all of these beatdowns might be worthwhile.

Cody Rhodes def. QT Marshall

Why is Cody still coming out to the version of his theme song performed by Snoop Dogg? I thought he was only doing that to promote the show that isn't currently airing new episodes? I like Snoop Dogg, but the original is much better in my opinion. The match itself was pretty much what I expected. I've said it time and time again, but I couldn't give two craps about this faction feud. Cody and Marshall had a well-wrestled affair, but it was hardly a breakout performance from Marshall, who I'm glad was defeated decisively. On a side note, why Cody wasn't disqualified for using the weight belt and for Arn Anderson's interference at ringside I have no idea. Cody vs. Anthony Ogogo at Double or Nothing seems likely.

Scorpio Sky and "All Ego" Ethan Page Attacked AEW TNT Champion Darby Allin

Both heel promos were pretty good. I didn't know Page had history with Allin from elsewhere, so I thought that was well done, but Sky taking aim at Sting doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. Who wants to see Sky vs. Sting, anyway? I assume this is leading to Sting and Allin vs. Sky and Page at the pay-per-view, though I'm not sure where that leaves Lance Archer, who's been involved in this thing as well. As for Allin getting tossed down the flight of stairs, I don't have any complaints about how it looked dangerous because, frankly, we've seen Allin do a lot worse, so I assume this was nothing for him and that he didn't hurt himself too bad. I don't typically condone that type of stuff, but for him, it was tame (in a good way).

Britt Baker def. Julia Hart

Hart wrestled on Tuesday's episode of Dark, losing to KiLynn King. However, this wasn't about her at all. She was solely in there to take the loss and give Baker another momentum-building win ahead of her AEW Women's World Championship against Hikaru Shida at Double or Nothing. She's been firing on all cylinders lately and absolutely needs to be the one to dethrone Shida as champ. She's been ready for a while now.

SCU (Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian) def. Varsity Blonds, Jurassic Express, and The Acclaimed in an AEW World Tag Team Championship No. 1 Contender's Four-Way Tag Team Match

SCU have been saying since late last year that they'll break up the next match they lose, so it was fairly obvious they were winning here. I can appreciate them earning the title shot, though. This was fun for what it was, but it probably didn't do a ton for me because we see so many of these multi-man tag team matches in AEW almost every single week. SCU will get their title shot against Young Bucks next week on Dynamite and, needless to say, they'll lose. AEW should have done a better job of making the SCU storyline more meaningful because it's barely been mentioned on Dynamite up until recently.

Pac vs. Orange Cassidy in an AEW World Championship No. 1 Contender's Match Was Announced for Next Week; Orange Cassidy Confronted AEW World Champion, Impact World Champion and AAA Mega Champion Kenny Omega

​When a "special announcement" regarding Omega's Double or Nothing opponent was advertised for this episode, I got excited thinking it would be someone special. I don't know if Kazuchika Okada or someone along those lines would be realistic, but this is where the rankings become a problem. Yes, Pac and Cassidy have been stacking up wins recently, but I feel like few of those wins have come on Dynamite itself. Pac vs. Omega is an attraction because of their history, but it feels rushed, and that shouldn't be the case considering Revolution was two months ago. They tried to sell viewers on Omega vs. Cassidy with their confrontation here, but I'm still thinking it will be Omega vs. Pac. I'm sorry but Cassidy should not be competing for a world title on pay-per-view, especially since it feels like he's lost a lot of steam since beating Chris Jericho twice last summer. He's done some tag stuff but nothing too notable.

Miro Challenged AEW TNT Champion Darby Allin

Since breaking out on his own and ambushing Kip Sabian last week, Miro has been calling out all of AEW's champions. It made no sense for him to reenter the tag team scene, Omega is a heel, and he's not a female, so Allin was the only champion that made sense for him to set his sights on. I thought we would get it after Double or Nothing, but I assume AEW does the title change before then to free up Allin for the aforementioned tag team match. If AEW wants to make up for underutilizing Miro up to this point, they'll put the belt on him. He's stepped up his promo work and it's been nice to see.

The Pinnacle (MJF, Shawn Spears, FTR and Wardlow) def. Inner Circle (Chris Jericho, Sammy Guevara, Santana, Ortiz and Jake Hager) in a Blood and Guts Match

This felt like a WarGames match of old. I've really enjoyed NXT's version of it in recent years, but the blood is an extra element that this type of match needs to work as well as this did. The crowd being as hot as they were (despite only being at half capacity or something near there) was a huge help in giving this a big fight feel. On the whole, I though this had a strong layout, the action was entertaining, and they brought the brutality. My biggest criticism of the contest is that the commercial breaks hurt the flow. I realize that's unavoidable when you do matches like this on free TV, but maybe that's why they should have saved it for Double or Nothing. Then again, would this have been given as much time as it did if it happened then? Either way, the commercial breaks were an issue. Personally, I didn't mind Inner Circle surrendering to save Jericho, but his bump off the top of the cage looked terrible. I'm not even saying he should have fallen onto concrete or onto steel for real. Rather, the production team should have done a better job of shooting it to make it look more devastating than it did. I assume this writes Jericho off TV for a bit and we get MJF vs. Guevara at Double or Nothing.

Overall Show

Thank the lord AEW didn't devote the full two hours to the main event as originally speculated because that would have been a disaster. The way they formatted it instead was much better. The main event had a special feel to it, and aside from the ending, it delivered. The undercard was also solid and we finally have a better idea of what we're getting at Double or Nothing will look like. This was another successful TV special from AEW and I hope they get a big rating out of it. Now let's see if they can build a compelling card for the pay-per-view and not make it feel like it was thrown together at the last minute.