AEW Dynamite: New Year's Smash Leaves Fans Disappointed amid TBS Era

Rana Atef

Early this morning, All Elite Wrestling (AEW) aired its special holiday episode from its Dynamite’s shows held under the theme of “New Year's Smash.” The event left the Elite's somehow disappointed because the quality of the matches and performances were somehow lower than the previous episode.

Today's episode of Dynamite was the last episode on TNT channel before moving to TBS this January in what's called TBS era.

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The show's match card was full of stunning AEW's stars such as Jurassic Express, Christian, Lucha Brothers, Adam Cole, Kyle O'Reilly, Booby Fish, Matt Hardy, Thunder Rosa, Eddie Kingston, FTR, and Orange Cassidy. However, the episode didn't meet the expectations of the fans.

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Started with a 10-man-tagteam-match, AEW continued indirectly the ongoing opposition between Hardy and Cage, involving Hardy Family Office's Private Party, and Cage's friends, Jurassic Express (Jungle Boy and Luchasaurus), alongside employing the strife between the four teams: FTR, Lucha Brothers, Private Party, and Jurassic Express for the AEW World Tagteam titles.

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Hardy's latest appearances in Dynamite and Dark's shows got more attention from the audience due to the expected debut of Hardy's brother, and historical tagteam partner Jeff Hardy. The younger brother is still popular, and hot trending topic until now since his release from the WWE early this month.

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Although the match had no exact scenario or event, it had various enjoyable scenes due to the heavy weight of Jungle Boy, Private Party, and Lucha Brothers. However, it was lower than expected as it had two of the strongest tagteams in the promotion.

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Daniel Garcia & 2point0 vs Eddie Kingston, Santana & Ortiz was another tagteam match but it was a trio one. The match was somehow disappointing, especially the scene of the attack against Santana and Ortiz by the other team. Ironically, Christ Jericho appeared to save Kingston's allies from the attack despite his feud with Kingston!

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This scene raised questions about any upcoming conflicts between both stars.

Moving to Wardlow match against Colin Delaney, as the previous matches of Wardlow, it was so short and poor.

Regarding the semi-final of the TBS tournament, the match between Thunder Rosa and Jade Cargill was somehow better than the previous matches, and it had several impressive shots between both athletes.

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During the match, a mysterious masked person hit Rosa behind the sight of the referee which helped Cargill to win and be qualified to the final.

Moments later, the masked person revealed herself. She was Mercedes Martinez, former WWE NXT star, announcing her AEW debut. Shortly, Rosa was assisted by Ruby Soho.

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The final match was the best tagteam match, especially by the return of reDragon by O'Reilly and Fish. Also, Cassidy and Best Friends did a cool job in the match which was somehow entertaining.

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At the end of the match, the initiative signs of a feud between the Young Bucks, and reDragon were somehow teased.

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Aside the matches, there were some blowing promos during the episode such as the trending confrontation between Brandi and Dan Lambert that was somehow bold, and full of references to Cody Rhodes, and their WWE career.

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CM Punk also has good in-ring speech time, and it was highly praised by the fans, unlike MJF's one was pre-tapped. The feud between both is beautifully going to its climax.

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However, the presence of Sami Guevara was somehow strange as it was cut by ads on the TV, especially with the signs he kept moving and reading them silently. It seemed that he asked for a rematch for TNT championship.

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Finally, one of the best moments of the night is the return of Jim Ross, JR, after healing from skin cancer. The legendary commentary received huge applause from the fans.

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