On the last episode of AEW Dynamite, Chris Jericho announced that after a string of high profile losses, he was ready once again to shed his skin and start anew. While the tease of another ‘new’ Chris Jericho is always exciting, there’s a more urgent reinvention for Jericho; his booking.
It’s become increasingly clear over the course of this year that Jericho wants to give back to the new generation and put talent over. He wants to get “jobber” wrestlers on the mid-card. He wants to get mid-carders to the main event and he wants to help former main event wrestlers get their momentum back into the title picture.
While it had some (massive) flaws, last year on the whole was special for Chris Jericho. After coming back from a near-fatal illness at the end of 2021, Jericho drove himself to his best year in AEW, and maybe one of the best of his career. He got into fantastic shape, created a new faction in the Jericho Appreciation Society, won his eighth world title in becoming Ring of Honor champion, and what I think might be the most important, had incredible matches with Bryan Danielson and Jon Moxley as Chris ‘Lionheart’ Jericho, his persona from the early nineties. After doing it all he went back to the start and showed the world he hadn’t missed a step. That above all felt like 2022 was Jericho’s Swanson. All that’s left now is to gracefully elevate the talent that excites him. Only problem is, Jericho has lost complete control on how to get talent over.
In mid December Jericho was scheduled to fight Action Andretti, a relative unknown making his AEW Dynamite debut. While Jericho had just lost his Ring of Honor world title, it was on a Ring of Honor pay per view. On AEW’s flagship show Dynamite Jericho had over six title defences under his belt plus a successful defence at AEW’s pay per view All Out. So while Jericho had a recent loss, it didn’t feel like it had an effect on his momentum on AEW Dynamite. Jericho at this point was a massive star.
During his promo before the match he drops a hint that he’s going to start a feud with Ricky Starks. The idea of Starks being the guy to beat Jericho on Dynamite felt tantalising, all that momentum that Jericho had built felt perfectly aligned for Ricky Starks, who after having a high profile loss to MJF could feel bigger than ever by taking down Jericho.
However, in that match with Action Andretti, Jericho losses. The crowd, the world, is stunned. It’s a massive, massive moment in AEW Dynamite’s history. Chris Jericho just lost to a jobber! So you wonder, why did Jericho hint at a feud with Ricky Starks if he’s instead having a programme with Andretti. Then next week you realise, fuck, he’s doing both.
Ricky Starks beats Jericho on Dynamite either a week or two weeks after and it means essentially nothing. Not only after Starks wins, Jericho’s JAS beat Ricky Starks up after the match so any chance of noting Jericho’s defeat, or Starks’ victory is gone. On Marc Maron’s WTF Podcast Jericho talks about this segment like it’s a success. He’s managed to get Starks over with the win, and then got his faction over with a beatdown after.
“So no the storyline is these two guys, Ricky Starks and Action Andretti are like these two partners that are thrown together just by the fact that my guys beat them both up. Right, so now they create an alliance, this guy Ricky’s getting higher up the food chain, Andretti’s getting higher up the food chain, my guys are getting some great shit, it all fuckin works together, you know?”
Problem is, when everyone gets over, no one gets over.
Andretti and Starks, two strangers united in their desire to beat Jericho, a man they had both defeated weeks prior. Strangely, the faces were revolving around the heel. The heel being the booker of the feud.
Next was Adam Cole, but before that, a key point I need to make. Due to what I can only assume is creative pushback, Jericho’s feuds against top stars are never as bad as those lower on the card he goes up against. With Adam Cole being a top tier talent who’s already been in two AEW main events the feud was a lot shorter and therefore less egregious.
Mainly the dark tone of feud not matching up with Jericho’s goofy aesthetic, and Adam Cole’s forced tough guy promo. The match itself was awful and before Adam Cole sprung back into action against MJF, many wondered if his ability had completely vanished.
Now we’re at Jericho’s fourth feud of the year against Sting. No, sorry, I mean against Sammy Guevara. Once again Jericho has left Sammy waiting like Kendall Roy begging his belligerent father to do the right thing for him and the company and step down, only to be met with a “no, in fact, I’ll feud with Sting”. This above all encapsulates the push and pull between Jericho’s focus on maintaining a starring role versus the new approach to putting the new wrestlers in the spotlight. To me, he’s failing at both.
It’s the most frustrating of all of Jericho’s messy feuds to watch because the Jericho and Sammy Guevara relationship and hopeful succession is as rich and storied as AEW Dynamite itself. These are two characters who have fought side by side countless times and I want to bang my head on the desk knowing that it’s not going to work because while I can just about trust Jericho as wrestler, appreciate him as a promo, he has no idea how to make an angle work for anyone anymore.
Jericho survived WCW’s awful booking, managed to be an incredible champ in WWE’s land of the giants and captured the NJPW/Kenny Omega zeitgeist by putting on incredible matches, pushing audacious angles, having a sharp sense of humour and generally having one of the most forward thinking minds the industry has ever seen. However, that has always been how Jericho has preserved himself. Which for the reasons I stated earlier, where necessary, but it’s now just as vital, just as necessary for Jericho to get a grip on how he gets the people he wants to push over. If Jericho can manage to do that, it might be his greatest reinvention yet.