AEW Dynamite vs. WWE NXT: Who Won the March 4 Battle of the Wednesday Night War?

The show immediately following a pay-per-view can be a tricky one for a wrestling promotion. While there are some storylines that continue forward and a handful of angles still waiting to pay off, in many ways, the creative powers-that-be are essentially hitting the reset button. 

Talent will be combined in new, exciting ways and the next set of issues that will culminate at a $50 price point emerge. This is where All Elite Wrestling found itself heading into Broomfield, Colorado, with a blank canvas waiting to be filled in vibrant color.

NXT was a very different kind of show. Raw and Smackdown are booked on one-month cycles, with major show payoffs coming every four weeks or so. NXT is a little different.

The Takeover events are spaced out a little further, which means some major feuds actually come to a head on the weekly television show. This week, it was two very personal grudges in one very steel cage.

With the two shows in different places in the creative process, we had two very distinct episodes this week. But which, you may be asking, was better. That's why we are here and that's what we'll determine by looking at what worked and what missed the mark. 

Have some thoughts of your own? Hit us up in the comments.

AEW Dynamite

Where: Broomfield, CO

Main Event: Jon Moxley/Darby Allin vs. Chris Jericho/Sammy Guevara

Match of the Night: Main event

Moment We'll Remember: Generations collided as Jake "The Snake" Roberts stood face-to-face with Cody and delivered a scathing promo that left the entire wrestling world wondering just what the heck was going on.

In the end, Roberts said you never turn your back on a man you respect or fear—then pointedly turned his own back on Cody and walked off.

It was an intense, weird segment. And while we don't know what the payoff will be yet, you can bet it's going to be good.

—After weeks of opening on exciting wrestling action, Dynamite went the opposite direction and delivered a good old-fashioned WWE Raw talkfest.

When done poorly, these segments are the worst kind of channel clickers: boring, repetitive and dull. It requires special talent to pull these off correctly, and AEW has been smart about who it's given extended time to on the mic.

In Denver it was, as you might imagine, newly crowned champion Jon Moxley and his vanquished foe, Chris Jericho, in a spirited back-and-forth best described as "delightful."

Jericho, in his dotage, can still talk circles around the best in the game, here making an intense Moxley briefly break character when he complained he'd been training for months to face a one-eyed man and Moxley's ability to see out of both eyes was "cheating."

It was absurd but only in that madcap Jericho way that makes you want to give the man a hug. 

          

—The "Exalted One" is coming. Have you heard? While The Dark Order couldn't vanquish the positive energy team of SCU and Colt Cabana, it was the talk of the wrestling internet for days as the promotion and a couple of high-profile free agents continued to drop hints about the reveal.

A few months ago, "smart fans" completely wrote this angle off after it debuted to a less-than-stellar response. To their credit, though, the creative team at AEW stuck with it. And although he hasn't made his presence felt yet, the payoff in the form of the Exalted One seems almost certain to be worth the wait.

        

—Cody is a show stealer par excellence, but not even The American Dream's son can match Jake Roberts in a microphone duel.

No man can. 

The Snake has been through everything life can throw at you and emerged to reclaim his place in the wrestling promo pantheon. No one can combine sly humor and a genuine air of menace quite like Roberts. Whoever he's representing out there is in very good hands.

         

—Death Triangle, the new triumvirate of high-flying wrestling gods PAC and the Lucha Bros, is a cool-sounding name. Even better, it pushes AEW further toward being a promotion divided by distinct factions.

This concept, where almost every wrestler essentially belongs to a posse who all help watch each other's back, gives the matches some easy narrative structure.

It's been a huge success for New Japan Pro-Wrestling and can definitely work here with the right attention to detail, a strong suit for many of the people involved in the creative process.

         

—MJF, likely somewhere giving a small child the middle finger, didn't make a live appearance on the show. But his taped segment was every bit as smarmy and gloating as you could have possibly imagined.

The highlight was either devastating or below the belt, depending on where you stand when it comes to the most controversial topic in contemporary wrestling: Cody's new tattoo.

"This is embarrassing," he said, revealing an "I Pinned Cody" T-shirt under his jacket. "Oh boy. This shirt: It's obnoxious, it's regrettable and, quite frankly, it's very distracting. Kind of like a neck tattoo."

Yikes. 

          

—Ever wonder what it was like for fans to discover a vibrant young babyface out to transform the entire industry, to see a Ricky Morton or Kota Ibushi emerge from the cosmos and implant themselves into the hearts of wrestling fans around the world? 

Wonder no more. You're seeing it happen in real time with Darby Allin. And it's truly spectacular.

There's something special about Allin. There are others just as quick and some with his kind of searing charisma and energy. But no one combines it with a sense of pure nihilism and self-destructive glee quite the way he does.

I'm not sure how long we'll have him, but every moment is a gift.

—I'm on the fence about whether squash matches are an effective tool for getting over a new talent in the year 2020.

Yes, Big Swole looked great demolishing the indefatigable "Librarian" Leva Bates, but how much does it mean to wreck shop on a modern-day jobber, lovable as she may be?

I suppose we'll find out. 

What pushes this into the "Missed the Mark" category is that it was too short for Dr. Britt Baker to truly wow us with her commentary before she had to exit stage left.

I'm sure she had plenty of wisdom to impart on the likes of Tony Schiavone if the match had just lasted a little longer.

Where: Winter Park, Florida

Main Event: Velveteen Dream vs. Roderick Strong (Cage match)

Match of the Night: Dakota Kai vs. Tegan Nox (Cage match)

Moment We'll Remember: Johnny Gargano's seething, unhinged sit-down interview with Mauro Ranallo was one of his best pieces of character work yet.

Ranallo, usually so over-the-top, was subtle here playing a man slowly realizing this pro wrestling interview was settling on some very dangerous ground. 

While it's not clear yet if the NXT Universe will embrace Gargano as a villain, promos like this are a good start.

—Dakota Kai, to very little online fanfare, has become one of the best heels in WWE. Not only is she a snarling presence on camera, but her ring work also leaves little doubt about who she is and what she's about.

A lot of times, especially in today's business, you'll see a wrestler try to convince people they are evil on the stick, then immediately undo all that hard work by hitting the ring like they were The Fantastics in 1985. 

Kai isn't about that life at all, homie. She's in there to hurt people and it just works. 

The finish here was particularly brilliant, with Raquel Gonzalez trapping Tegan Nox between the cage and its door to allow Kai an easy path to victory. I'm glad this feud isn't quite over yet, as these two work really well together and it feels like there's more to explore both in and out of the ring.

        

—Throw 'em up for Oney Lorcan and Danny Burch, one of the great unsung tag teams in contemporary WWE.

They took on Undisputed Era in a match that was given plenty of time to develop and felt like a real struggle. Hopefully Lorcan found a nice couch to sleep on after the show. He deserves it.

In an alternate universe, these guys, The Usos, The Revival and so many others are bringing tag team wrestling back into style. Here, on our planet and in this time, they are mostly relegated to the undercard.

But when the wrestling is this good, who has time to worry about the booking?

       

—Austin Theory and Isaiah "Swerve" Scott had your standard "indie work rate" kind of match. On a card filled with similar bouts, it's hard to stand out. But there was nothing really quite like it on this episode of NXT. And, as they are both really good at that kind of match, it worked.

Theory is getting an immediate push here and he has talent to burn. I can't help but wonder, though, if it's the wrong guy being centered.

         

—Though his name evokes the great Dusty Rhodes, there's a little of Roddy Piper in Velveteen Dream. Just when you think you have the answers, he completely changes the question.

Did you think you were watching a grudge match in a steel cage with Roderick Strong? Surprise! There are depths to Dream's mind games and tricks, as it looks like Adam Cole is soon going to discover.

—There was nothing wrong with the soft focus, humanizing feature on Rhea Ripley. If it was on the WWE Network, where fans could decide for themselves whether they wanted the behind-the-scenes look at the woman behind the wrestler, I'd be all for it.

To me, though, there was a big disconnect between the Ripley in this video and the Ripley who cuts such an imposing figure on NXT television every week.

While it's too late to put the water back in the tub, is it too much to ask for a wresting show to maintain a little kayfabe for the two hours it is on the air?

       

—Imagine being Roderick Strong right now. Velveteen Dream has spent weeks creating this very personal moment, insulting your wife and young child—all in an effort to trap Adam Cole in the ring and stake a claim to the NXT Championship.

Poor Roddy, always the proverbial bridesmaid. 

AEW: B

NXT: B

Overall: Yikes! A tie? Who books these columns?

These were two very different shows, and both were a ton of fun to watch. If you put a gun to my head (please don't) and forced me to choose, though, I'd go with NXT this week.

The opening cage match was too good to deny and, in a battle of pro wrestling shows, why shouldn't the tie go to whoever put on the best match?

Winner: NXT

Overall: AEW (7), NXT (3)