AEW: Ranking every 2020 Pay-Per-View from worst to best

3. Double or Nothing

Now that we’ve got that depressing thing out of the way, let’s get into seriously good territory. This is AEW Double or Nothing 2020.

Best Friends beat Private Party in the pre-show and the main card opened with the Casino Ladder match for a future opportunity at the AEW title.

It was an entertaining match with a Royal Rumble like stipulation. A whole lot of crazy spots, lazy Orange Cassidy, and reckless Darby Allin later, Brian Cage made his AEW debut as the joker. Cage destroyed everyone, and then everyone destroyed Cage. There were great mini-matches between Cage and Luchasaurus and Marko Stunt and Cassidy. Cage then placed Darby on a ladder and threw him into another ladder on the outside. It was a sick, sick bump. Cage then retrieved the “chip” to win the match.

The second match was a bout featuring two of the brightest young stars in AEW, MJF and Jungle Boy. This match was excellent, both men really know how to work. There were Canadian Destroyers and top-rope powerbombs. Jungle Boy even hit a Poison Rana on the apron. MJF rolled Jungle Boy up for the sneaky win.

And then, it was time for Mike Tyson to crown the first-ever TNT Champion. Cody vs. Lance Archer. While people may have not liked the title belt itself, this match was really intense. Archer ragdolled Cody for a long stretch of this match, threw him around, and bullied him. Cody made his comeback, Arn Anderson was kicked out, Mike Tyson scared Jake Roberts off, and Cody hit two Cross Rhodes to win the title. Although many people initially thought Archer should’ve won, this decision has aged well considering Cody’s two excellent reigns with the belt.

Then there were two nothing singles matches. The first one being Kris Statlander vs. Penelope Ford, who was a replacement for Britt Baker. They didn’t have a story and just had a short match. After that, Dustin Rhodes stripped Shawn Spears of all his clothes except his underwear which had a picture of Tully Blanchard on the front for some reason. Rhodes beat Spears in about three minutes.

Then, we get to the AEW Women’s title match, a No DQ match between Hikaru Shida and Nyla Rose. It was an entertaining and hard-hitting affair, both women worked well together, and in the end, Shida pinned Nyla to become the new champion, which I’d say was the right finish.

And we finally get to the main event, well, the in-ring main event. The AEW World Championship match pitting the challenger Mr. Brodie Lee against the champion Jon Moxley and this match was absolutely brutal. It was two big, burly, and scary men going against each other, and beating the hell out of each other.

Everything at ringside was destroyed. Despite being a normal, in-ring match, it was more brutal than many stipulation matches. And the finish dialed up the intensity to 100. Moxley hit Brodie with the Paradigm Shift on the outside and they broke the ramp and created a sort of crater.

Back in the ring, Moxley hit Brodie with another Paradigm Shift and Brodie kicked out at 1, Moxley then hit the elevated version of the move, Brodie kicked out again. So, Moxley choked him out to get the win. Simple, yet brilliant.

And then the Stadium Stampede, what a match.

This has to be one of my favorite cinematic matches of all time, it might even be the favorite. It has so many iconic moments.

The entrances, Adam Page on a horse, Matt Jackson’s insane Moonsault off of the goal post, Matt Hardy’s reincarnations, Jake Hager and Adam Page in a bar fight, Kenny Omega drinking milk, Matt Jackson’s non-stop Northern Lights Suplexes to Sammy Guevarra across the whole field, the Judas Effect to Jaxson de Ville, Jericho’s witch impression, Nick Jackson’s run-up in the stands for a splash on Jericho, the line marker on Jericho, and so many more. Finally, Omega hits the highest ever One-Winged-Angel on Guevarra for the win. Just do yourself a favor and watch this match if you haven’t already.

Thus, barring a few odd matchups, Double or Nothing 2020 was a success.