mobanmarketPre-Show Match: The Dark Order vs. SoCal Uncensored
This one won’t be about rankings, or win-loss records, or either team trying to earn their way into a future championship opportunity. The Dark Order has been plaguing SCU since the birth of AEW Dynamite in October – even since Scorpio Sky & Kazarian put down the mysterious mob to move on and eventually become the first ever AEW World Tag Team Champions. The two groups have been relatively inseparable since.
In the midst of all of this, the Dark Order continued to grow in numbers, recruiting Alex Reynolds and John Silver, in addition to their other nameless, faceless goons. For whatever reason, however, they refuse to put their hands on SoCal’s other member, Christopher Daniels.
The mind games are real, and according to Evil Uno and Stu Greyson, the so-called “Exalted One” is near. So near that they could appear tonight at Revolution? Is it Matt Hardy? Lance Archer? Could it be Daniels himself, or a totally random surprise out of left field? We shall see.
Prediction: The Dark Order wins, but the Exalted One remains hidden.
So far AEW has done a good job of staying away from shock-and-awe booking when teasing major angles. Everyone knew that MJF was turning on Cody Rhodes from minute one, and we waited patiently and played along until the other shoe inevitably dropped. Doing something right is always better than surprise for surprise’s sake. Following that logic, the Exalted One is most likely Matt Hardy.
The word “obsolete” was very intentionally used in a promo on Wednesday night hyping this match. You could argue that the team behind Being The Elite is just taking a fun jab at the rumor and speculation, but that’s a slippery slope. If you tease Broken Matt, whatever you deliver has to be just as good, if not much better. They’d be setting themselves up to fail, unless AEW somehow has a massive ace up their sleeve that nobody has heard about.
All that being said, I’m predicting the Dark Order gets the victory to look as strong as possible going into their big reveal. This whole program got wildly out of control for a minute in late 2019, and they’ve been able to reign it back in with recent episodes of Dynamite. What they need is a strong win in a good match, and I’d like to see them actually attack Daniels this time to close that loose end. Matt’s contract expires at midnight, so we could see him as early as next Wednesday.