It’s been more than four years since All Elite Wrestling was born, and the company has already managed to accomplish quite a bit.
It’s a got lucrative national television deal and has garnered a dedicated and loyal fan base, so much so that the promotion has already sold 50,000 tickets for All In, which is set to take place in one of the most famous venues in the world, Wembley Stadium.
AEW CEO, GM, and Head of Creative Tony Khan said the event has already generated a gate of £5.2 million, which according to his tweet, is $6.5 million. It’s already shaping up to be one of the biggest wrestling shows of the year and no matches have even been announced.
I can count the number of promotions in the world even capable of selling that many tickets on one hand, let alone in such a historic venue like Wembley Stadium. AEW is firmly one of those promotions.
Khan took a victory lap on Twitter, and deservedly so. Selling that many tickets is to be celebrated, as something like this was deemed impossible just five years ago.
However, this coming summer presents a new set of challenges for the young promotion.
Before one ticket stub is scanned at Wembley in August, AEW must first deal with the return of its most notable star, CM Punk.
In case you missed it, Punk has been on an extended hiatus from the company since last September after excoriating multiple members of the roster during a press conference (after winning the world title, mind you), which forced him to have to physically fend off said wrestlers — namely Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks, who also happen to be EVPs in the company — who went looking for him after the presser.
And the timing couldn’t have been worse, as WWE was finding its footing creatively under Paul “Triple H” Levesque in the beginning of what we thought was the post-Vince McMahon era.
It’s been eight months since that occurred, and it’ll be nine before Punk is reportedly set to return to AEW on June 17. Eight days later, the promotion will host its second annual inter-promotional pay-per-view, Forbidden Door.
Because of this, it’s imperative that Khan and the other decision-makers in the promotion smooth out any tension that may still exist between the two sides, as the company can ill-afford a sequel to All Out.
Regardless of whose side you choose in the matter, AEW was the ultimate loser. Why? Because it lost the services of Punk for a nearly a year. And according to Khan himself, “no one wrestler has ever come in and made a bigger plus-delta financial difference in the history” of AEW.
Punk’s star power aside, it is also important because June 17 is expected to be the debut of another wrestling AEW television program reportedly called Collision. And because the wounds of last year’s All Out are still open for some, AEW is reportedly considering splitting the rosters between Dynamite and its newest program.
I feel like such a move is unnecessary, but if AEW deems it to be so, then it has to be done right. Don’t resort to the lazy storytelling tactics of WWE and just have wrestlers pop up on other brands just for the sake of it. Give each show its own identity, unlike WWE where the signature colors of Raw (red!) and SmackDown (blue!) are the only real differences between them.
If all goes according to plan, AEW should have a smashing success on their hands with All In at Wembley Stadium not just financially, but creatively as well.
With McMahon suspected to be back behind the controls behind the controls of creative in WWE, and the expected dip in quality that brings with it, AEW has a real opportunity this summer to flex its muscle and showcase its resiliency from a rather turbulent 2022.