Redemption feels like the most underwhelming PPV of the year for AEW

So around two months ago, I wrote a column about how it was a mistake for AEW to hold a PPV in Montreal in July. I also offered some helpful advice on how they could actually make it a successful event, but I didn’t have high hopes that any of those things would actually be done.

So now we’re here. Redemption is on Sunday, and it feels like the most underwhelming PPV of the year for the company.

First, I want to start with ticket sales. From the information I was able to get, they are currently under 6,000 tickets distributed for this show. That means they would either have to give away the remaining tickets or run a flash sale to reach the 7,000-ticket mark they were hoping to hit. That’s okay, but compared to pretty much anything else that has been held at the Bell Centre, it’s not great. Most events are able to sell between 10,000 and 15,000 tickets in that arena.

Second, the lack of promotion really shows here. Unless you’re a dedicated AEW fan, there’s really no buzz in town about AEW coming to Montreal. Nobody in the mainstream media is talking about it, so most people don’t even know that AEW is coming to town on Sunday. I wish they had done more to promote the show and generate some excitement, but they didn’t. Now it’s getting lost in the shuffle with everything else happening in the city this weekend.

Third, the card really feels random. That’s the biggest problem, in my opinion. It truly feels like they just put everyone’s name into a bowl and randomly picked names to build the card.

The main event is such a random match that it makes almost no sense. Nothing against Kevin Knight, but his current story is with Darby Allin, not Kenny Omega, and nobody believes for a second that he has a realistic chance of winning the title.

I don’t know if there’s something preventing Darby from crossing the border, but if you’ve been following the programming, Knight should have been wrestling Darby at Redemption, not Omega.

Speaking of Omega, this would have been the perfect time to have Jon Moxley challenge him for the title. It would have fit perfectly into Moxley’s ongoing story with Will Ospreay while also serving as a great setup for Omega vs. Ospreay at All In.

The rest of the card isn’t much better. I’m not saying these matches won’t be great, but it feels more like a special edition of Dynamite than a major PPV event. That’s fine for fans who only care about in-ring work and don’t place much importance on storytelling, but for fans like myself, it’s really underwhelming and very skippable.

For a few weeks, I actually considered buying tickets for this show because I wanted to give AEW a second chance after how disappointing their last Montreal event was. However, I wanted to wait and see the card before making a decision, especially considering how expensive the tickets were. After seeing the lack of effort put into booking this show and how skippable it looks, I decided to pass and do something else on Sunday. I feel like a lot of other fans made the same decision.

AEW Redemption doesn’t really have a reason to exist. It feels like just another show created for the sake of having as many PPVs as WWE and TNA. For those who are watching or attending the show live, I genuinely hope you have a good time and feel like you got your money’s worth. As for me, this feels like another missed opportunity for AEW to establish a stronger foothold in a market that has long been a WWE stronghold. Because of that, I wouldn’t be surprised if this ends up being the last AEW show in Montreal for a very, very long time.