AEW Rampage: New Year's Smash Review - December 29, 2023

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Le Sex Gods Reunited

Ugh. I despised most of what we saw in that segment involving The Don Callis Family on Wednesday's Dynamite, but this was necessary in explaining why Sammy Guevara and Chris Jericho would be so quick to forgive each other after the hell they put each other through only a few months ago before they team up again at Worlds End. I just hate that Le Sex Gods are still a thing because they desperately need to go their separate ways after being joined at the hip for over four years.

Ruby Soho def. Marina Shafir

The Outcasts basically replaced Toni Storm with Harley Cameron. The Outcasts were not a good group to begin with, but that is definitely a downgrade. Apologies to Cameron, who is talented and has value to the company in some capacity, but this crap is not it. The match itself was fine. I can't bring myself to care about anything involving Shafir, so this match meant nothing to me. Nyla Rose was at ringside even though I thought her alliance with Shafir was over now that Rose is in Ring of Honor.

ROH Pure Champion Wheeler Yuta def. Matt Sydal in a Pure Rules Match

Needless to say, Sydal was no threat to the title. They had a nice little match, but this would've made more sense on an edition of ROH TV. Then again, I realize they did this on Rampage because Yuta is challenging Hook for the FTW Championship at Worlds End. Yuta has really been built up over the last year or two, so I'm interested to see if he'll lose to Hook or if he becomes a double champ (which he should, followed by dumping the FTW belt in the trash). The post-match interaction with Danhausen (a documented buddy of Hook) was effective in putting some last-minute heat on Yuta.

Action Andretti and Top Flight def. AEW International Champion Orange Cassidy and Roppongi Vice

Andretti and Top Flight already failed to win the AEW World Trios Championship, so having one of them target the AEW International Championship is the next logical step (even though they'll lose that, too). This was the battle of babyface trios and it was fun for what it was. That said, I don't know why this had to headline the go-home edition of Rampage before Worlds End unless Cassidy defending the title against one of them will be added to the card right beforehand.

Overall Show

This was your average edition of Rampage in that was an enjoyable hour of wrestling on the whole yet mostly inconsequential. The main event was entertaining, but the placement of it with this being a go-home show was questionable. The stuff with Jericho and Guevara was the only "important" thing that happened, but that doesn't make this episode worthwhile in my book, especially since it didn't do much to move the needle in terms of my excitement level for Worlds Ends (which I was already looking forward to).

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