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For as successful as Tony Khan has been as booker in creating a number two professional wrestling brand from scratch, there is definitely a “more is more” quality to how he operates. Whether it’s the length of PPVs or longer matches that would better serve all involved if they were shorter, Khan is like a diner bellying up to the buffet and stacking his plate with two of everything.
Enter “Clockwork Carnage.” It’s AEW’s newest match creation, and its rules seem as complicated as they are intriguing. For those who haven’t seen it yet: It’s an eight-man match where wrestlers enter every two-to-three minutes at random. Pinfalls and submissions eliminate a wrestler during this period. However, once all eight have entered, there is a 15-minute Iron Man period where pinfalls and submissions still count but don’t eliminate the losing wrestler. At the end of the 15 minutes, the wrestler with the most falls becomes AEW Champion.
Got it? Look, I’m not against new match types. I’ve been yearning for that for years. There’s only so many Beat the Clock Challenges I can take (I covered Smackdown in real-time for 10 years so I’m quite familiar with that concept, thank you very much). But I’m reminded of the “keep it simple, stupid” method of doing business, an adage to which Khan most certainly doesn’t adhere.
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I’m sure Will Ospreay the character relishes this challenge, but there have to be fans of Ospreay asking, “Why?” How come some champions only need to defend their titles in more even one-on-one matches, while Ospreay has to defend his in something like this that, in storyline, puts Ospreay at a grave disadvantage. It almost invites the viewer to wonder if Khan has it out for Ospreay.
In some ways, this match is akin to NXT’s Iron Survivor Challenge which has its own multi-step stipulations but has been lauded by viewers of the brand. So this absolutely can work. Like my buffet analogy, it just seems like a lot to digest.
(Read Greg Parks’s feature-length weekly columns in the PWTorch Newsletter with a paper copy subscription or online VIP membership. He also reads his feature columns for his VIP-exclusive “Greg Parks Outloud!” podcast. He has contributed to PWTorch for over two decades.)
