After a catastrophic, borderline preposterous exploding barbed wire deathmatch, Kenny Omega pinned Jon Moxley to retain the AEW Championship. He did so with the help of The Good Brothers, as well as an exploding baseball bat.
Both Omega and Moxley wrestled in jeans and sleeveless T-shirts. Moxley took a shot of whiskey before the bell rang, a nice touch. There are ropes on only one side of the ring: the rest were barbed wire. Tables wrapped in more wire were kept at two corners. Explosives are tied to the barbed wire, so collisions mean explosions. Both began the match by working around avoiding the wire at any cost.
It was explained that the entire ring would go off with explosives after 30 minutes, so a winner was needed by then.
The first “explosion” came when Omega blinded Moxley by throwing powdered chalk at his face then running him into the barbed-wire ropes. The “explosion” was really pyro blasting in the direction away from the ring, so it’s not as gnarly as it sounds. Wouldn’t exactly call it “safe” though.
Omega would get his, with Moxley eventually throwing him chest-first into the barbed-wire ropes for an explsion — and then shotgun drop kicking him in for another round. Amid the chaos we got some very strong wrestling, with Omega countering a barbed-wire-explosion attempt with a dragon suplex. Moxley recovered but was caught with a V-Trigger. But as the wrestling got exciting, the barbed wire came back into the equation.
Omega tackled Moxley into the ropes, causing an explosion, but something got caught in his eye in the process. The ref poured water over his eyes, and he rolled to the apron to recover. Moxley followed, and hit a Deathrider DDT off the apron onto more exploding barbed wire. As they got back into the ring, music started playing denoting there being 10 minutes remainin until explosion time.
After some more actual wrestling, Omega hit a One Winged Angel. Moxley got out of the pin not by kicking out, but by kicking nearby barbed wire to cause an explosion. The Good Brothers then interefered, but Moxley faught them off. Distracted, Omega then hit him with an exploding barbed-wire bat — for a two count.
Omega and the Good Brothers setup a chair, which Omega crashed Moxley through with a One Winged Angel for the win.
Omega and The Good Brothers continued beating on Mox after the match. They handcuffed him and knocked him out. The clock kept running down, with a timer coming up with one minute left. The trio then sped out of the ring, leaving Moxley literally to die. None other than Eddie Kingston came to try and save Moxley, but couldn’t lift him out of the ring or wake him up. Instead, Kingston covered Moxley’s body to save him.
Then, a catastrophic botch. The “explosions” went off, but it was little more than some benign looking pyro. Less pyro than you’d see during a big entrance. Moxley and Kingston they acted like they were passed out from the damage. Very unfortunate ending to an otherwise strong pay-per-view.