Get to Know AEW Dynamite: Holiday Bash Highlights

Early Thursday, AEW presented its Dynamite special-themed episode, AEW Dynamite: Holiday Bash. The promotion continued the excellent job they exhibited in the previous annual event, AEW Dynamite: Winter Is Coming.

Today’s episode had several interesting contests such as the fifth match of the Best of 7 Series between Death Triangle and The Elite and the first title defense for Jamie Hayter since her coronation as AEW Women’s World Champion against the iconic Hikaru Shida.

The show kicked off with Ricky Starks who was defeated by AEW World Champion and the Holder of AEW Dynamite Diamond Ring MJF in Winter Is Coming.

Starks presented a very good promo that showed that Starks would MJF’s rivalry during his title run. Starks asserted that he would have one more title shot.

The promo of Starks reflected that the push the promising star received in the past few weeks would continue, and he would have more programming time.

He was disturbed by Chris Jericho, Sammy Guevara (who was insulted by the fans without saying a word), and Daniel Garcia.

Both Jericho and Starks exchanged impressive promos which exhibited more work for the three rising stars: Garcia, Guevara, and Starks alongside the iconic Jericho.

Starks was attacked by the JAS members and was saved by Action Andretti, the jobber who defeated Jericho last week, to announce that the push Andretti received is in progress.

Moving to the fifth match of the Best of 7 Series for the AEW World Trios title, The Elite revealed, last week, that they would take the fight in a new whole direction by setting the upcoming match as a NO DQ one because Death Triangle kept using the hammer behind the back of the official.

The following match will be Fall Count Anywhere. In addition, if the Elite managed to catch the points of the upcoming two matches, the final round of the series will be a Ladder match.

So, the fifth was the No DQ match. It was nice and entertaining, in addition, it was full of spots. Once again, DT and the Elite approved one more time why they are on top of the game.

After that, Bryan Danielson stepped into the ring for addressing MJF after he ran last week from Danielson. Danielson expressed that BCC forgave William Regal, and he threatened MJF. He was cut by Ethan Page who mocked Danielson.

The exhibition of Danielson and Page revealed that the AEW is working on building several competitors for MJF, in addition, the presence of MJF as a champion would open the door for more names such as Jungle Boy, Darby Allin, and Wardlow to be in the spotlight.

Moving to, a short match for Hook against Jobber, followed by an assault by the Firm against Hook’s new partner Jungle Boy. It would be good for both athletes to be teamed up to give them more time on TV, in addition, it could present a good way for the first loss of Hook.

The following match was with Jon Moxley and Darius Martin. It was a short and cool match. It showed one more time that BCC is still united.

After that IWGP Tag Team and AAA Tag Team Champions FTR played a fantastic tag team match against The Gunns. The Gunns showed impressive performance as they seemed equal to such a great tag team FTR.

It was surprising that The Gunns defeated FTR. It seemed that AEW finally returned to build more tag teams once again.

Next came a strange segment which is the confrontation between Swerve and Keith Lee. The segment was weak, poorly organized, and poorly introduced, however, the spot of Swerve should be credited.

Finally, the main event. It’s been a long time since the women’s main evented a Dynamite episode. The return of women’s title as the main event reflected how much AEW is planning a better representation of their women’s division. The arrival of Toni Storm, Saraya, the return of Penelope Ford, the signing of Willow Nightingale, the return of Ruby Soho, the pushes of Hikaru Shida, the coronation of Jamie Hayter as AEW Women’s World Champion, and dethroning Thunder Rosa from the title enhanced Britt Baker’s efforts in building the division.

Hayter and Shida presented one of the best and toughest women’s matches of the year. In addition, both stars succeeded in attracting fans. Fans were really engaged in the match and kept cheering through it.

Hayter managed to retain her title, and after that she and Baker attacked Shida to be saved by Storm and Saraya. It seemed that Storm would have a program with Hayter. 

The episode also continued the good storytelling building for Powerhouse Hobbs, the feud between The Acclaimed and Jay Lethal and Jeff Jarret. The usage of a short rap clip was a nice addition. Finally, there was a special message from TNT and ROH World Television Champion Samoa Joe to Wardlow. 

Finally, there was an announcement for the $300,000 Three Kings Christmas Casino Trios Royale in AEW Rampage.