Unpopular Opinion: AEW Dynamite Is Better Than WWE RAW And SmackDown

Written by Debottam Saha • Published Sep 11, 2025 04:30 EDT
AEW is better than WWE right now

Here’s an unpopular opinion that many online may not agree with, but AEW Dynamite is currently better than WWE RAW and SmackDown.

Here me out before you come at me with daggers and axes. Despite the accusations that AEW does not tell great stories, they actually are telling some good old stories. Actually, some of the stuff Tony Khan and his group of bookers are doing is better than what WWE is producing on a weekly basis.

I know, I know, the fashionable thing is to hate on AEW and pour acid on their “flippy” wrestling, and say, well, they suck. But in truth, they kind of don’t. They’re nowhere near perfect, please don’t get me wrong. As a matter of fact, there are several parts of their programming that I don’t like. However, that cannot take away from the fact that over the past few weeks, they have been consistent in their stories, have had better weekly content, and are far better in terms of progressing storylines than WWE.

AEW Dynamite Doesn’t Feel As Stagnant As WWE RAW And SmackDown

WWE RAW and SmackDown feel like two very stagnant shows. For the sake of long-term storytelling, it seems that some storylines don’t progress for weeks on end. The stars are there, cutting the same promos and having the same matches, before something truly engaging happens. PLEs are by far WWE’s best shows in any given month as they take the time to progress storylines and make things happen.

Apart from the occasional return and the big surprise here and there, it’s mostly just flat television that doesn’t give much to the viewer to cheer about. Truth be told, apart from a handful of superstars on both shows, such as CM Punk, John Cena, Seth Rollins, Drew McIntyre, and Cody Rhodes, the rest are just there.

The Vision has been battling Jey Uso and LA Knight for the past 18 years, Jacob Fatu fought The MFT for about three centuries, and don’t even get me started on what they are doing with Drew McIntyre and Tiffany Stratton. Both are supposed to be the top faces on SmackDown. McIntyre should easily be the company’s second biggest heel after Seth Rollins, but he lacks a lot of direction. WWE is booking throwaway matches between him and Randy Orton. Yes, I will admit that the feud was stitched together mainly because Rhodes is currently absent, but even then, there was no reason for him to team with Logan Paul at SummerSlam, as 1000 other guys could have taken the spot.

Stratton, on the other hand, should be the biggest female star on SmackDown. She is the Women’s Champion after all, but is barely getting any TV time. She has been restricted to backstage segments and in a feud with Nia Jax and Jade Cargill since what feels like the dawn of time.

On the contrary, AEW has done well to move on Hangman Page from MJF to Kyle Fletcher, a fresh match. They also added a new member to The Death Riders in Daniel Garcia. Jon Moxley vs Darby Allin has been quite an enticing rivalry in the making, while the women’s side of the roster continues to shine.

Even without some of their top stars in Swerve Strickland, Will Ospreay, Kenny Omega, and a bunch of others, Khan has shifted out the roster well and made use of whatever is at his disposal to create compelling storylines every week. Yes, they should ideally be cutting down on the goofy stuff a bit more, and could also make better use of Kazuchika Okada, but two hours of Dynamite feels like a breeze compared to two hours of SmackDown on any given day.

Only Counterprogramming AEW Won’t Help WWE In The Long Run

Even the biggest AEW fan won’t tell you that the company is anywhere close to WWE. The Stamford-based promotion is heads and shoulders ahead of AEW at this point, but does this mean Tony Khan and his group of men and women won’t ever catch up? There’s nothing that says they can’t or won’t.

Despite the miserable ratings week by week, one has to admit that WWE thinks of AEW as a threat. Otherwise, this whole counterprogramming bonanza that fans have been subjected to wouldn’t have been needed.

That said, WWE will need to pull up their socks when it comes to producing high-quality content that fans can engage with. There’s no dearth of talent on either side, but when it comes to using them, I think Tony Khan is doing a far better job than WWE.

As a matter of fact, the biggest WWE fan also won’t tell you that Triple H is doing a stellar job that needs a lot of plaudits. As much as Triple H likes to boast about the numbers and trash on the internet, all that matters at the end of the day is who is making the better product, and for now, that has to go to Tony Khan.