Cody/Darby -

* 6/29/19: Fyter Fest I, the second AEW PPV, Cody and Darby fought to the company's first time limit draw. This was more or less the start of what would mostly seem to be a rivalry more than a feud.

After this was the emergence of Butcher, Blade & Bunny, mercenaries hired by MJF to demolish Cody before he had any chance to get to him. After losing the first time (12/11/19) in a tag with QT Marshall (The crowd goes from chanting "CODY'S PARTNER!" to "QT'S PARTNER!" during the match when QT comes alive), Cody is met ringside by Darby. Darby extends his hand and they team up to fight B&B on 12/18/19. They, now mutually respecting the other, decide to have a rematch.

* 1/1/20: On the first show of the year, before the Crisis of Infinite Horrors got really going, Cody defeated Darby again, right at about 17 minutes. Darby doesn't take the loss well.

The next time they cross paths is in another tag match on April 1st 2020. This is Cody/Darby vs. Sammy and Shawn Spears. This is kind of a bizarre matchup, but it was part of the TNT Title thing where they had the people in those matches tag with each other, and if you want to ask "Why" it's because they needed to film like 5 weeks of shows in two days.

The episode before, Darby had beaten Kip pretty badly, so in this episode to get even, when Cody gets thrown out of the ring, Kip and Jimmy Havoc beat him up WITH A WRENCH.

Cody is basically useless the rest of the match, Darby did that crazy coffin drop off that tent pole, gets rolled up for the pin anyway, and then beats Cody up after the match out of shame/anger.

* 4/29/20: In the semi-final round of the TNT tournament, Darby and Cody face other again, for the third time. Darby is trying really hard here, but doesn't get the win, though it goes another 20 minutes, almost to another draw. Cody beats him and goes onto Lance for the TNT belt, you know the rest.

After this, Darby is selected to face the winner of the OC/Cody match(es) for a chance at the belt, and has been keeping a close eye on Cody from the stands since.

The build for this largely relies on you remembering all the matches they've had up to this point, and the struggles Darby has had with getting matches that aren't killed by COVID. If you're familiar with them, this match surely has enough going to keep you interested. If you're not, you can basically just treat it as another Cody match for the TNT belt.

Team Taz has made it clear that they have intentions of being involved in this match due to their heat with Darby. We don't really need to get into all that here, but Darby/Starks have been fighting for the better part of a quarter of a year now.

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Bucks/FTR -

(A lot of this is superfluous backstory that's more helpful for the Kenny/Omega feud to be truthful. **For the real beginning of the feud skip to Aug 12** )

* 6/3: It may surprise you considering how time has worked this year, but the Jimmy Havoc/Kip Sabian title match happened around the time FTR was settling in. It feels like he's been out of the company for a long time, but this was just back in June. In fact, this night, June third, was the first time FTR really called out the Bucks in any meaningful way. They had a sit down with Tony, who asked them what they were doing in AEW. FTR said AEW has the best tag team division in the world, and they say that they have a chance at the titles because the Bucks are kind of over rated. They say they don't want to have MoTY with them, they just want to punch them in their faces.

* 6/10: FTR had a match with B&B (Set up during the earlier interview when they were attacked). The Bucks come out after the match (along with Kenny/Page), and they have kind of a moment. FTR also stops B&B from attacking the Bucks.

They then begin feigning a friendship with Page.

* 6/17: The Bucks fight Superbad Squad (Kip/Jimmy Havoc in his last match with the company). B&B keep interfering in the match until FTR comes out to put a stop to it. They have a brawl after the match, with the then double baby face (or so it seemed at the time) FTR/Bucks coming out on top. This week, the 17th, was the same night Starks had his TNT belt fight/debut. He would be signed the same day.

Despite that setup, #SpeakingOut happened. As a result, Kip's involvement with B&B ended. As luck would have it, the Lucha Bros were able to return, and the build up with B&B/Superbad Squad was switched instead to be with the Lucha Bros-- fairly effectively, I might add. It was so smooth you almost might not recognize it happened.

* 6/24: FTR had a match with SCU that ended up with B&B stealing that shitty truck they were driving that never seemed to start or turn off when it needed to. Blade challenged Bucks/FTR to an eight man with B&B / Lucha Bros. FTR got the shit beat out of them until the Bucks made the save.

Going back to this, you really have to wonder if AEW was panicking and basically did a rescue op to get the Lucha Bros into the country for these matches, since Havoc was now in rehab and on his way out of a career. I hadn't considered it, but it's a possibility.

* 7/1: after beating Best Friends, Omega/Page get met in the ring by FTR who give them beer. Omega pours his out, and the bucks separate the teams when FTR takes great offense to this.

* 7/8: Fyter Fest Week 2. The 8 man tag, which had been made weeks earlier takes place. Ultimately, Matt Superkicks Harwood by accident, allowing the Lucha bros to get the win.

* 7/15: After beating the Lucha Bros, FTR is met by the Bucks/Omega. FTR pours their victory beers over Kenny's head, with the Bucks once again stuck in the middle.

* 7/29: Uno/Stu vs. Hangman/Omega. The Dark Order loses, but Brodie is setting up the Dark Order to attack when the Bucks/FTR come in and clean the ring.

* 8/5: Following that attack, you have Omega/Page, YB and FTR Vs. a whole lot of Dark Order. FTR bails on the match half way through because they are weenies. Brodie pins for the win despite Hangman coming back from helping FTR backstage. This puts a sour taste in everyones mouth and is basically the beginning of open hostilities.

* 8/12: Tag Team Appreciation Night. FTR are formally introduced as heels this evening as they seem to change allegiances with Arn to Tully after they get tired of everyone sucking the Bucks' dicks and take it to the Rock 'N Roll Express. The Bucks and Kenny/Adam try to stop them but FTR has made up their minds.

* 8/27: After a bunch of stuff happens with Hangman unimportant to this specifically, he comes out to deliver a fatal blow to the Bucks in the tag team gauntlet, giving FTR the win here, letting them advance to the All Out PPV and beat Omega/Kenny. No more friends are found as FTR get everything they want.

* 9/9: The Bucks kick Alex Marvez

* 9/16: The Young Bucks superkick a ref.

* 9/23: The Young Bucks break tony's phone after he mentions FTR

* 9/30: Tony talks to FTR about fighting the Bucks. FTR says the Bucks haven't done anything to earn a shot. The Bucks kick Tony. FTR is like hey, we're right here!

* 10/7: FTR beats TH2 using a Tiger Driver, which JR suggests is a dig at the Bucks. The Bucks kick a cameraman backstage afterwards. FTR is still mainly feuding with Best Friends at this time.

* 10/14: The Bucks superkick everyone in the fatal four way lottery.

* 10/21: FTR is at the booth during this fatal four way tag team match where they mostly talk about The Bucks, needling them a bit. Perhaps in retaliation for the Tiger Driver on the 7th, the Bucks try and mock FTR while pinning Private Party, costing them a 3 count. They do eventually win, however a masked Tully at FTR then lay a beat down on the bucks, nearly breaking Matt's leg.

* 10/28: Excalibur hosts an interview with FTR and YB about their title match to come at Full Gear. FTR feels like the Bucks are getting all the attention again like always and leave. Matt says the old Bucks are back because FTR ignited a fire in them. Matt, apropos of literally nothing, says they won't challenge for the belt again if FTR beats them.

* 11/4: WAY too soon for Matt's leg, YB take on Private Party. They do manage a win but Matt's leg is fucked. After the match, FTR and Tully attack again, intent this time on finishing Matt's leg off, but they're scared off by Omega/Page in a surprise to everyone.

This feud has been criticized I think pretty fairly. The whole thing really relies on you having some idea out of storyline about the Bucks/FTR's one sided rivalry through the years, and a lot of it is about how the heels feel slighted by the attention the Bucks get, who have also attempted to come off as heels. You're not supposed to feel like FTR is right, but they are though. In fact, since Tag Team appreciation night, it's been the Bucks acting up because they aren't getting attention basically. Is it BAD? No, there's certainly material here, and they've built a solid backstory, but it is certainly not as good as it could have been, which even FTR has talked about in interviews. Regardless of our feelings, that's the bones of it.
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Hikaru Shida / Nyla Rose

* 5/23 (Double Or Nothing 2): Rose had been on a real streak here. This was in her prime "I BREAK BITCHES" phase before she said she wanted a manager and got Vickie to talk for her. Nyla had attacked Shida previous to this and stolen her Kendo stick, and the match was called to be a No DQ. The match is really good, honestly superior to the 2/12/20 Riho match (To this day it's the only major belt exchange done on a regular Dynamite episode) where she won the title. Shida eventually gets her Kendo stick back from Nyla to win a much more physical match than we typically get from AEW's womens division. Shida even gets to say "I FOUND MY KENDO STICK, BITCH!". Honestly, shit is good.

After this, Nyla largely disappears from television. She beats Swole on 5/28, inadvertently retires Kris for the year on 6/10, Beats Kenzie Page/Kilynn King on 7/2, loses the tag team tournament in round one on 7/29, beats Tay Conti on 9/9 and then is gone from matches on Dynamite until 11/4.

* 9/9: After beating Conti, Vickie says the Vixens aren't going anywhere and Rose goes to put the work in on Tay, but Shida comes out for the save. They have a staredown.

* AEW DARK 10/13: After Rose defeats Kilynn (again), Vickie says she and Nyla, the vicious vixens, are no longer going in the ring until Shida publically accepts her challenge to the title.

* 10/28: Shida accepts Nyla's challenge

* 11/4: Nyla beats Red Velvet (Not as fast as Shida beat Velvet during her Penelope feud! She missed the Shida% speedrun by like 1:40). Vickie then taunts Shida after the match by saying Tony Khan made her accept the challenge, calls Brandi the Chief Bullshit Officer, makes a modest to mild racist gesture to Shida before Shida knocks her shit in. The women are separated.

Even for AEW Women's division standards this is fucking abysmal. After that 9/9 moment, it's a full month before anything even marginally relevant to it occurs again and it's on dark lmao. It should be noted that that 10/28 moment with Shida is I think the second time she's been allowed to hold a microphone on television since her reign as champ started on 5/23. Compare this to the Eddie/Mox story where sometimes Eddie will do one or even two promos a night every week. The build to their first fight at DoN 2 was also pretty weak tbh but it was saved by a good match and one of Shida's only really great hero moments, and Nyla's short but sweet run as the Bitch Breaker.
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Kenny / Hangman

A lot of this dovetails from the section on FTR, if you want a reminder on all that. For the purposes of this feud, I'm going to consider it mostly starting from All Out 2, where Kenny/Hangman lose to FTR. If I don't draw that hard line in the sand, this whole post is just going to be about these two people. Let me just say, if you want a primer on it, you're going to need to watch every single episode of Dynamite. At this point, Hangman is basically the main character of the show (IMO), so accept my apologies for not recapping a year of wrestling and BTE.

* 9/16: In what, in storyline, was supposed to be an SCU / Omega&Page match, Hangman alone takes on Kazarian. Omega is on commentary, burying both the tag team division and Page. After the match, Hangman, proud of his victory, looks for Omega. Omega is already gone.

* 9/23: In Evil Uno's first match, and the second intended to be tag match, Page once again triumphs. Omega is on the mic again for this match, doing much of the same thing, calling Page a "Tag Team Wrestler" repeatedly. Page does not wait or look for Omega this time.

In between this and the singles tournament, the announcers let us know that Hangman has drunkenly signed up to compete. He will face Colt Cabana.
Over the next couple of weeks, both Hangman and Omega win their matches, leading to the interviews on...

* 11/4: Both Hangman and Omega are interviewed. Omega is still kind of delivering subtle digs at Hangman, saying he kind of expected Wardlow to win and that it wasn't a given Hangman would make it to the end, but he for sure was, because he doesn't lose tournaments.

During the Private Party match with the Bucks, Omega and Hangman come out to defend the Bucks unexpectedly. The bucks largely ignore both of them while Omega/Hangman first exchange a fist bump then seemingly start antagonizing each other before the segment ends.

Like I said earlier, this match at Full Gear is the culmination of lots and lots of AEW storytelling, on BTE and Dynamite. There haven't been any major incidents to make this one white hot right this SECOND, but it would be foolish to say the story isn't there. Both of them very much want to win this. Hangman, to prove to himself he still has it, and Kenny for basically the same reason, though he won't admit it as easily as Hangman did.
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Jericho/MJF

This one is unique, in that it's not necessarily a feud or a rivalry, though it's kind of built like one. It's more of a courtship or a mating ritual between complete sociopathic violent degenerates.

* 11/13/19: MJF and Jericho end up in the ring after Full Gear 1. MJF flatters Jericho, and they kind of tease him joining up with IC, but the storyline kind of disappears for a long time.

* 9/9/20: A rare cold open for Dynamite has Jericho and MJF meeting for the first time since last November. They call each other losers as they walk away and the show gets rolling. Later on that night MJF fires his campaign staff from his failed bid to beat Moxley at All Out 2. Says he has to find a way to be the number one contender again.

* 9/16/20: MJF beats Shawn Dean in a Shida% speedrun attempt. He says it might be time for him to join a group.

* 9/30: MJF and WARD-DOG head to the IC locker room to give away some jackets to everyone but Sammy. They do a repeat of the bit from 11/13/19. Things get tense but ultimately Jericho says maybe MJF isn't the loser he thought he was.

* 10/7: During the thank you Jericho portion of the 30 years of jericho episode, MJF is in a video saying that Jericho is his idol. At the end of the episode, before the SNL credits, MJF gives Jericho a painting of himself, and a clown. Jericho almost kills the clown with a Judas Effect and breaks the painting over his head. It looks like violence is going to break out, but they laugh it off.

* 10/14: MJF gives Sammy his way too big IC jacket, and finally eats some of his massive pride and manages to squawk out that he'd like to join IC. Jericho says they'll have a steak dinner to hash it out.

* 10/21: Love it or hate it, it's Le Dinner Debonair.

* 10/28: In an early segment, while also bashing Wardlow for their imminent blow up, Sammy drops by to tell MJF there's no way in hell he's ever going to join IC. Later, they have the town hall where things get a little heated because of Bischoff (I love saying that in 2020). Because of this, Jericho says the only way he's getting into IC now is if he beats him at Full Gear, and Sammy/Ortiz next week.

* 11/4: MJF apologies to Jericho, who is doing an interview with Dasha. He says he didn't mean for it to get tense last week. Jericho says that he's worried MJF might just be... too soft. The crowd immediately without a seconds hesitation starts chanting "SOFT, SOFT, SOFT", and interchangeably cheering for Wardlow and booing MJF.

MJF beats Ortiz and Sammy with WARD-DOGS help, despite more SOFT chants, then MJF tackles the shit fuck out of Jericho at the announcers booth. Jericho, however, seems more pleased than angry about this, smiling when he is able to get up. Perhaps MJF is not as pathetic as he thought.

It's indisputable that this one has had some work put into it. It's not really a traditional wrestling feud, like I said earlier, so it has some interesting turns in it. MJF and Jericho are rarely without a major through line on Dynamite, so putting them together was a good idea. You can mix/max your storytelling time while also keeping some of the big names appearing together and often.
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Sammy / Matt Hardy

The genesis of this doomed, bloody, nearly deadly feud, began early in Matt's tenure with AEW where he attempted to get Sammy to leave the Inner Circle and to aspire for something better. Sammy took this poorly, and so began a lengthy back and forth from them that was interrupted periodically for various reasons, including head wounds from golf carts, head wounds from golf carts, head wounds from chairs, head wounds from falling 5 feet onto concrete, and Sammy being sidelined from the fallout of #SpeakingOut.

Sammy, despite being effectively beaten following the horrible nightmare that was their blowoff at All Out 2, decided he wasn't quite through with the feud.

* 9/9: After getting cheers from a live crowd for the first time really since starting at AEW, Hardy announces he's taking time off to get well. He says he's sorry the match with Sammy was scary and unsatisfying. He effectively agrees that his feud with Sammy may have been cursed but its over.

* 9/16: Matt is attacked backstage while he was prepping for Private Party's match. His leg was taken out. Sammy is still out "Injured" following the All Out 2 match.

* 9/23: Matt comes out limping, talking about the injury last week and says no shit its probably stupid ass Jericho that fucked up his leg. By mentioning the devil, he reappears, and says he didn't do shit. Sammy is back too. Isiah steps up to the plate to defend Matt, and in an almost exact remake of the 11/20/19 bit with Scorpio but done worse, Isiah says he'll make Jericho his "Le Champion Bitch". He does not.

* 10/14: Hardy is finally cleared to start wrestling again and is giving a promo about it when Sammy interrupts him with a video, saying it was him that tried to break Matt's leg, and that he's not quitting with Matt until Matt doesn't come back. He's gonna finish what he started at All Out. Matt says he had given up on Sammy, but this time he'll finish it.

This one's tough-- while before the incident at All Out where we almost saw Matt Hardy die live on television, this thing was glowing with heat. It's now kind of just trying to cap off the old story without doing much in the way of new stuff. It's been so long since this really began that most people probably forgot why it started (Sammy proving he was loyal to Jericho). Everyone, including Matt on the show, had kind of accepted it just wasn't gonna happen, but now it is anyway. While there's no doubt the cinematic match will be entertaining, it's not exactly at the top of everyone's wish list. Hopefully everyone survives it and this long stalled out story can finally pull into the station with a good ending.

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John Silver / Orange Cassidy

* 9/23: OC challenges for the TNT belt for the first of nearly 3 consecutive times (He will lose them all). In this one, John Silver does a run in on OC and eats the Orange Punch for Brodie like a fucking bullet and Brodie is able to do his lariat and kill OC. Dark Order rushes for the beatdown but then **Big Titty Goth GF Cody** shows up to stop it.

* 9/30: OC fights ten and kills John Silver, who did the BF hug with 5 and Alex. It was very cute. OC beats ten and then this whole thing goes away so **Big Titty Goth GF Cody** can go back to regular mid-card final boss Cody and can beat Brodie.

* 10/14: In OC's second TNT belt attempt, Dark Order tries to interfere but gets soundly ejected from the arena. OC loses in a time limit draw.

* 10/28: OC's third TNT belt attempt, in a lumberjack match. OC is finally about to get the win here but FUCKING JOHN SILVER interferes in the match, resulting in Cody getting the win and retaining Mid Card Final Boss status.

I mean you either watch BTE and want this match to be like a BEYOND show or you don't like either of these guys and don't want the match at all. idk what to tell you, I want a BEYOND show match here so I like it. I also think it would be funny for OC to dismantle Dark Order completely by accident.
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Moxley / Kingston

Honestly dude just watch the promo from Wednesday. Seriously, just watch it again. It's the whole thing, in a box with a cute little bow on top. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_x3TNEN51s . It's all you need. If you're not pumped to see it after that promo you're not going to change your mind.

Here's the jist: Eddie feels like he should have the belt because he worked his whole life to have it, and Mox thinks it's Eddie's own fault that he's burned every bridge he's ever had built for him. Watch the promo.

The build for this has been ever present and in almost every single show since Lance Archer got beat, sometimes MULTIPLE times. Of all the builds, this one is the most well rounded. Eddie laid one beat down on Mox after the Lance match and ever since then it's just been one kick ass promo after another. As Simon Miller says, Eddie Kingston has NO IDEA that wrestling is a work because no one has ever told him otherwise.