Jon Moxley

For the third consecutive week, AEW Dynamite prevailed in the Wednesday night wrestling war with a ratings win over WWE NXT.

According to Showbuzz Daily, All Elite Wrestling averaged 850,000 viewers during its two-hour broadcast on TNT, while NXT garnered 638,000 viewers on USA Network.

Dynamite largely focused on the Inner Circle's trip to Las Vegas after MJF and Wardlow joined the group last week. Chris Jericho, MJF and Co. spoofed the popular The Hangover movie franchise and put on some entertaining segments over the course of the show.

In the main event of Dynamite, Cody Rhodes and new TNT champion Darby Allin fell to Brian Cage and Ricky Starks in a tag team match. Will Hobbs seemingly ran down to save Cody and Allin from an attack to close the show, but he instead laid Cody out with the FTW title and joined Team Taz after weeks of resisting advances.

Other key moments on Dynamite included AEW world champion Jon Moxley getting laid out backstage before his scheduled contract signing with Kenny Omega. Death Triangle reformed, with Fenix and Penta El Zero M rejoining Pac, and went against Eddie Kingston, The Butcher and The Blade.

Also on AEW, The Young Bucks beat Top Flight, Orange Cassidy defeated Kip Sabian, and Serena Deeb beat Thunder Rosa to retain the NWA Women's World Championship.

NXT was highlighted by the highly anticipated return of NXT champion Finn Balor after he missed the past several weeks with a broken jaw. Balor cut a promo, only to be interrupted by Pat McAfee, Pete Dunne, Oney Lorcan and Danny Burch.

Just when it looked like the quartet was about to beat down Balor, the Undisputed Era returned after weeks on the shelf and attacked the foursome, which likely set the stage for a match at NXT TakeOver: WarGames on December 6.

The main event on NXT was one of the best television matches in recent memory, as Io Shirai defended the NXT Women's Championship against Rhea Ripley. While Ripley pushed Shirai to the limit, Io hit Rhea with a moonsault to secure the victory.

Additionally, there was a North American Championship rematch between Johnny Gargano and Leon Ruff after Ruff shocked Johnny Wrestling to win the title last week. Gargano seemed poised to win, but Damian Priest showed up and punched Ruff to intentionally get Gargano disqualified.

Also, it was announced that Candice LeRae and Shotzi Blackheart will captain teams against each other in a WarGames match at NXT TakeOver: WarGames.

Other major happenings on NXT included LeRae and Indi Hartwell beating Kacy Catanzaro and Kayden Carter, Kushida defeating Arturo Ruas, Ember Moon and Toni Storm beating Dakota Kai and Raquel Gonzalez, and Timothy Thatcher defeating August Grey before getting confronted by Tommaso Ciampa.

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AEW waved goodbye to 2020 with its last pay-per-view event of the year at Full Gear on Saturday night.

And it sure feels like it waved goodbye to a small era, too.

While AEW has always tried to walk a tightrope of veterans of other promotions like WWE and "homegrown" talent, Saturday night felt like the first time AEW-centric guys really shined brighter than most at a major event.

It started with Kenny Omega and "Hangman" Adam Page partaking in an amazing show-opening bout, the tournament finale for a shot at the company's top title. It's a gritty, personal story sending both guys off in interesting directions.

And the theme only continued with Darby Allin capitalizing on the cockiness of Cody Rhodes, earning the AEW TNT Championship as a prize.

It only escalated further from there, with The Young Bucks seizing tag team gold with a win over former WWE standouts FTR in a match where—much like Cody with AEW's top title in the past—they swore they'd never challenge for the titles again if they lost.

Why stop there, right?

MJF, who has long danced around the outskirts of Jericho's group, The Inner Circle, then took down the legend himself for the right to join that very group. One could see that leading to a long-term angle where MJF tries to assume leadership of the group by taking out its leader in a passing-of-the-torch moment perhaps, but let's not get too ahead of ourselves.

And while Jon Moxley—the man formerly known as WWE's Dean Ambrose—ended up retaining his AEW World Championship, it was very much a showcase match for the challenger Eddie Kingston and one where the spots themselves seemed to overshadow much. Moxley closing the show holding the top title was about as predictable as it gets, but it's the journey, not the destination, more often than not in pro wrestling (hence guys in certain companies losing all steam once they're not in "chase" mode).

While this theme is fun, nobody can carry a company quite like Moxley—but the point is AEW continues to smartly take its time in building up several guys capable of doing it. And with a match looming against Omega, maybe AEW fully embraces the idea at a later date with a title change at the very top.

Finally, gradually transitioning away from the former WWE base of talent now makes plenty of sense. These guys are ready to carry promotions at every level just underneath the very top. In The Young Bucks' case, sort of like Omega, they've steered away from the titles long enough.

In the case of someone like Allin, it just feels like an organic time to have him go over one of the company's biggest names and really establish himself as a headliner. He paid his dues, won over fans and now has that distinct AEW feel.

Former WWE guys carrying the company for a long time made plenty of sense, especially Jericho. His particular set of skills made him a natural champion—he wasn't exactly burning down the building with his wrestling in the ring.

But what Jericho was doing was making guys like MJF and his surrounding stable look like a million bucks. Hardcore wrestling fans knew who those guys were, but newcomers to the AEW product largely didn't.

Now, partially thanks to WWE carryovers like Jericho and mostly because of their own talents, everyone knows who they are.

Rest assured the company has to take this measured approach, too. There were some serious duds along the way while it tried to make AEW talent stand out. Think, the origins of the Dark Order and some of the stumbles the tag and women's divisions made.

The transition to the point where fans won't even make these distinctions anymore isn't so far off. AEW can stop worrying about whether fans will judge it harshly for giving Cody or Omega more title shots at the very top of the card.

Quietly, maybe this is why Full Gear felt like the best AEW pay-per-view to date. The stakes were high, titles changed hands and it's hard to even point to a bad finish. But the fact that some AEW homegrown talent really stepped up and won major matches feels like a huge deal.

In a way, it's somewhat fitting AEW used the final pay-per-view of the year to—intentionally or not—get this transition rolling in...full gear. The company will be better for it in the long term, and while the execution hasn't always been perfect, the further blurring of the lines and elevating of roster depth is what makes AEW arguably the best thing going in pro wrestling today.

Jon Moxley defeated Eddie Kingston in All Elite Wrestling's first-ever I Quit match Saturday night at Full Gear to retain the AEW World Championship.

Some highlights from the brutal bout can be found below:

Moxley ended up getting Kingston to quit after using a bulldog choke aided with barbed wire:

After the match, Kenny Omega, the next challenger for Moxley's belt by virtue of beating Adam "Hangman" Page earlier in the night, showed up ringside and talked some trash with the champion before the show faded to black:

Kingston made his AEW debut in July when he answered Cody's open challenge for the TNT Championship. Although he fell short, his pre-match promo and performance in the bout were well-received, and he was signed by the company shortly thereafter.

With a contract in hand, he went to work on building a stable, as he recruited Fenix, Penta El Zero M, The Butcher and The Blade to join him.

Kingston was the last person eliminated in the Battle Royal to determine the No. 1 contender for the AEW Championship at All Out, but he claimed he was not actually thrown over the top rope by Lance Archer and was granted an AEW world title match as a result.

That contest occurred on the Sept. 23 episode of Dynamite, and Moxley won when he forced Kingston to pass out to a rear-naked choke.

Moxley had another title defense on Oct. 14, which saw him beat Archer in a No Disqualification match. Kingston acted as though he was congratulating the titleholder afterward, but he instead ran him down on the mic and attacked him.

Kingston claimed Moxley left him high and dry when he went to "the land of sports entertainment," which was a reference to WWE. He also made it clear that he never tapped out or gave up in his title match against the champion.

With Kingston never giving up in the match and Moxley returning the favor by not tapping when his rival put him in a rear-naked choke after the Archer match, it was clear what type of contest they had to have at Full Gear.

The only way to win an I Quit match is for one combatant to say "I quit," which meant there would be no doubt about who the superior wrestler was at the end of the pay-per-view.

Moxley finally forced Kingston to quit at Full Gear, which not only settled their feud but also extended his 250-plus-day reign as AEW world champion.

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