For wrestling fans, the biggest story these days is unquestionably the rise of the new
promotion All Elite Wrestling.
AEW has exploded out of nowhere and seems intent on giving the WWE a run for its money.
Here's a look at the story behind AEW.
It's impossible to talk about AEW without focusing on Cody Rhodes.
Along with Kenny Omega and the tag team The Young Bucks, Nick Jackson and Matt Jackson,
he's the face of the company.
He's also carrying on the legacy of the man who is arguably the single most important
creative force in wrestling history: his father, "The American Dream" Dusty Rhodes.
In front of the camera, Dusty was a three-time National Wrestling Alliance World Heavyweight
Champion, the beloved "son of a plumber" who gave the world a strong contender for the
greatest promo of all time, the "hard times" promo.
Behind the camera, Dusty spent years working as a booker.
He was instrumental in moving pro wrestling to the modern format built around massive
"supercard" shows, and scripted some of the NWA's greatest stories, many of which revolved
around him.
Rhodes was beloved by fans and as ESPN's Brian Campbell put it, was, quote, "never afraid
to endure an incredible scripted beating" to get his opponents over as the villains.
That tendency would even lead to him being fired in 1988, when a staged attack from the
Road Warriors left him a bloody mess when bleeding was forbidden by the network at the
time.
Cody literally spent his entire life around one of the masters of the art form, watching
him work and clearly learning a lot.
"If not us, who?
And if not now, when?"
For most people today, "wrestling" is World Wrestling Entertainment.
That's not to say it's the only wrestling going on.
Independent wrestling is in the middle of a pretty incredible renaissance.
Streaming services have made it easier than ever to keep up with events that would otherwise
be local, and have enabled American audiences to follow international promotions such as
New Japan Pro Wrestling more easily than ever.
But in the broad TV landscape, WWE is essentially the only game in town, and it's been that
way for almost 20 years.
With the demise of WCW and ECW, both of which were bought by WWE in the early 2000s, WWE
has been the only wrestling promotion with a mainstream television presence.
There's Impact Wrestling, but with some shaky creative decisions, business practices like
not actually signing a top star to a contract, and moves to increasingly obscure networks,
they've never been within shouting distance of dethroning WWE.
Yet being a monopoly isn't all it's cracked up to be.
WWE once thrived on competition.
The hottest period in pro wrestling history came when the then-WWF was directly competing
with WCW for viewers in the so-called "Monday Night War."
While that was ultimately unsustainable, it's a feeling WWE has tried to recreate over the
years by splitting its own roster into brands.
WWE is in a weird place when it comes to its business practices.
It's a publicly traded company, and the target of an incredible amount of scrutiny, with
highly publicized stories of outrage about doing business with the government of Saudi
Arabia after the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi or how superstars don't get health
benefits from WWE Chairman Vince McMahon.
"The extent to which he's denied any responsibility for their welfare is astonishing."
But they have no real reason to change, since they're basically the only globally recognized
wrestling promotion.
Even if you don't like WWE's practices, there hasn't been a real viable alternative for
mainstream, American pro wrestling.
WWE also has an embarrassment of riches when it comes to talent, with a massive roster
of incredible performers.
But there's only so much screen time to go around.
WWE has signed plenty of wrestlers that could be huge stars that there quite simply isn't
room for.
And even when the shows themselves are good, as WWE's shows frequently are, stagnation
can take its toll.
That's why people on all sides of the industry are very interested in finding a viable, profitable
alternative.
While AEW has some faces familiar to WWE fans, AEW's real origins stem from something that
many casual fans never saw: New Japan Pro Wrestling's Bullet Club faction.
The Bullet Club was formed in 2013, and it was built primarily around Prince Devitt,
known today in WWE as Finn Balor, along with Karl Anderson, Tama Tonga, and Bad Luck Fale.
It would expand to include the Young Bucks, AJ Styles and Luke Gallows.
At its height, the Club had the comedic irreverence of D-Generation X, the monochromatic color
scheme and "invasion" storyline of the NWO, and the championship dominance of the Four
Horsemen.
Plus, they cheated.
A lot.
As members signed WWE contracts, other wrestlers cycled through, including Kenny Omega, Hangman
Page, and Cody Rhodes, three names that might sound pretty familiar if you've been keeping
up with AEW.
AEW maybe wouldn't be happening at all if it weren't for a YouTube series, of all things.
In 2016, after splitting off from the Bullet Club in a sub-faction called the Elite, Cody,
Omega and the Bucks launched a YouTube series called Being The Elite.
Originally designed as a sort of behind-the-scenes, road-diary series following the group on their
travels, BTE eventually became much more.
Storylines were fleshed out through the series, and it has included major announcements about
events.
"Tell 'em what happened."
"49 minutes.
We're at 49..."
"We sold out in 30 minutes!"
Being the Elite blurred the line between pro wrestling storytelling and the reality behind
it, and built a tight continuity over which the Elite themselves had complete control,
separate from any of the various promotions they were wrestling for.
It allowed them to take advantage of the platform to reach an audience that was maybe not interested
in following Ring of Honor or New Japan, but were definitely drawn by charismatic performers
like the Young Bucks doing silly things like having a living room feud with Santa Claus.
They forged a connection with die-hard fans that made the entire group even more popular
than they already were.
The popularity of the Young Bucks is pretty indisputable.
Along with Elite stablemate Kenny Omega, they're one of the few acts in wrestling so popular
that they've turned down multiple offers from WWE because they can make more money and retain
much more creative control working outside the world's most dominant wrestling promotion.
In 2017, that prompted a question posed on Twitter to Dave Meltzer, longtime wrestling
journalist and commentator, about whether Ring of Honor, a company that prominently
featured Omega, the Bucks, and Cody, was popular enough to sell out a 10,000-seat arena.
Meltzer's response was a short "Not any time soon."
This is one of those instances of someone deciding to do something entirely because
they were told they couldn't do it.
Sure enough, Cody announced that the Elite were going to promote a "supercard," putting
up their own money to prove that they could, in fact, put 10,000 butts in 10,000 seats
based entirely on their own merit.
The result was appropriately called All In, a risky venture that many fans felt had the
potential to change wrestling by showing that large-scale success was possible outside WWE.
Tickets went on sale on May 13, 2018, and despite the show only having one match announced
at the time, they sold out in half an hour.
For his part, Meltzer said he was happy to have been proven wrong.
All In was a big deal.
With its 30-minute sell-out, it became the first non-WCW, non-WWE wrestling show in the
U.S. in 25 years to sell more than 10,000 tickets, and by the time those fans were crowded
into Chicago's Sears Centre or streaming the show at home, it had turned into an international
showcase.
Not only did it feature ROH talent, the Elite also brought in talent from Mexico's CMLL
and AAA promotions, Impact Wrestling, New Japan, and the National Wrestling Alliance.
It even had a match with TV's Green Arrow, Stephen Amell.
While virtually all the matches were well received by fans and critics, the NWA World
Championship match might end up being the most important in the long run.
In addition to winning the championship that had defined much of his father's career, Cody
sported a pair of boots with "6:05" emblazoned on them.
For viewers who grew up watching World Championship Wrestling, the meaning was clear.
WCW Saturday Night, the show that Dusty Rhodes always referred to as "the Mothership," aired
for years at 6:05 PM on TBS.
It was a notable tribute to Dusty, and also a perhaps unintentional bit of foreshadowing.
On New Year's Day 2019, the Elite announced on Being the Elite not just that they'd be
running a second show called Double or Nothing at the MGM Grand Arena in Las Vegas, but the
formation of a new promotion, All Elite Wrestling.
In the days that followed, Cody and the Young Bucks were officially named executive vice
presidents and presumably bookers for AEW.
AEW announced that they'd signed a roster that included up-and-coming stars as well
as established legends like Chris Jericho.
More importantly, however, was the fact that they had the financial backing of Shahid and
Tony Khan, father and son billionaires who also own the Jacksonville Jaguars, with Tony
serving as president.
Maybe they were inspired by the impending return of the XFL to compete with WWE Chairman
Vince McMahon on two fronts?
The formation of a new wrestling promotion, even one featuring popular stars like Cody,
Kenny Omega, the Young Bucks, isn't exactly huge news.
Having financial backing that can afford top talent is a bigger deal, but if AEW really
wanted to compete with, or even provide an alternative to WWE, they needed one specific
thing: a deal with a mainstream television network.
Online streaming is great, but TV offers access to a more casual audience, which is what a
company truly needs to thrive.
And that's exactly what AEW got, in a place that's both surprising and completely appropriate.
On May 15, TNT announced that they'd be airing a weekly AEW show in fall 2019.
It's notable for a couple of reasons.
TNT is a major cable network that's available worldwide, and it has a history with wrestling.
TNT was the home of WCW Monday Nitro until WCW folded in 2001, and was where that company
had their greatest success.
The announcement included a couple of relatively subtle nods to the network's wrestling pedigree,
including a fiery background for the AEW logo that mimicked Monday Nitro.
There was an even deeper-cut in the form of a tweet that read "we're back in the wrestling
business."
That's a reference to a phone call Ted Turner made to Vince McMahon after Turner bought
WCW, telling McMahon he'd entered the wrestling business.
McMahon famously replied, quote, "I'm in the entertainment business."
But with an emphasis on "entertainment" that's led to things like running a full trailer
for The Secret Life of Pets 2 during a Raw match in split-screen, fans might just be
looking for a little more wrestling.
Only time will tell what the future holds for AEW, but with name recognition, financial
backing, a TV deal, and experienced stars at the helm, it certainly seems like they're
poised for success.
The question of what they're going to do differently than other companies, including WWE, remains,
but we have an interesting example of how they might do business.
One of the matches set for Double or Nothing was Hangman Page vs. PAC, but the match was
pulled from the card.
Rather than just not having the match, however, PAC faced Page seven days before Double or
Nothing on another show, with the entire match made available for free on AEW's YouTube Channel.
Whether this was a legitimate problem or just a story to generate buzz and get more eyes
on AEW, the fact remains that it was dealt with in a way that a traditional promotion
like WWE simply could not do, and it showed a willingness to deliver for the fans.
That's a very different approach than what we've seen before, and might just be the first
step in AEW being something very different for the future of pro wrestling.
"WWE is wonderful, but they do not own pro wrestling.
All of us own pro wrestling!"
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