AEW Worlds End 2023: 3 Things We Hated And 3 Things We Loved
Just when you thought you had your 2023 wrestling awards ballots all filled out, AEW decided to close out the year with a brand new pay-per-view: Worlds End, the show inspired by a London pub that Tony Khan passed one time and thought had a really cool name! The event featured the culmination of the Continental Classic, the end of a historic world title reign, and the answer to a mystery that had been plaguing company storylines for more than three months now. It also featured ... a bunch of other stuff, most of which we're not going to talk about here. You can read all about it by going to our live coverage/results page, but suffice it to say that Worlds End is already being considered one of AEW's lesser overall efforts.
At any rate, the Wrestling Inc. writing and editorial staff are here once again to provide our completely subjective opinions about the show. Did we come unglued for Eddie KIngston's victory? Did we groan in disappointment at the reveal of The Devil? And most importantly, how hard did we boo Chris Jericho? Here are three things we hated and three things we loved about AEW Worlds End 2023.
Hated: Boo-das in my mind
I'm not going to comment on the stuff that's been going around on Twitter for the last 24 hours about Chris Jericho, because it's all very speculative and nobody has actually accused anybody of anything. But the fans in Long Island had sure as hell heard about it, and it dramatically affected his match at Worlds End. Like, to the extent that everyone involved would have probably been better off just staying backstage.
Obviously, that was never going to happen — AEW had just broadcast a "Dynamite" angle involving the return of babyface Sammy Guevara in an effort to salvage Jericho's previously announced Worlds End match after Kenny Omega was sidelined with diverticulitis. Unfortunately, a match that was already suffering from wrenches being thrown in the works was now made almost unwatchable due to the crowd's relentless booing of ostensible babyface Chris Jericho, even actively cheering heels like Powerhouse Hobbs when they beat Jericho up. The talent were completely thrown, the match dynamics were totally off, and the finish was marred by, of all things, a "CM Punk" chant. Not an outing any of these wrestlers would likely care to remember.
Obviously, in a live broadcast environment, you can't control the fan response. It's odd, however, that seemingly nobody in AEW saw this coming. AEW caters to an extremely online crowd — 2023 WWE might be able to get away with just rolling the match out there like nothing happened, but AEW really can't. It's surprising and a little embarrassing that they didn't anticipate a negative reaction for Jericho. I get that you don't want to just pull the match, but you might have considered doing something other than sending these eight wrestlers — including Sting, by the way — to die a slow death in front of an internet-savvy audience.
Written by Miles Schneiderman
Hated: Swerve should've dusted Dustin
Unfortunate happenstance befalls even the best of the best so with that in mind, all the best to Keith Lee, who missed out on his opportunity to face his former teammate, Swerve Strickland, tonight on pay-per-view. But the latest setback in what sure seems like way too many in Lee's AEW run didn't derail a match for Swerve, who instead got to face Lee's Naturally Limitless partner, "The Natural" Dustin Rhodes.
All due respect to Rhodes (and there's beyond plenty to be bestowed), the pre-match outside-the-ring soiree, cinder block and all, that seemed to injure him and put the match at risk, was probably more than enough to give the crowd what they wanted in seeing Swerve and also to hammer home the point that this guy is an absolute beast right now with no cap to how far he can go. Plus, all of that taking place against someone with as much equity as Rhodes only takes Strickland to the next level. And with another AEW pay-per-view card with 12 matches (including Zero Hour), it's not like they needed any more filler time.
But I'm not whining about how long this show went. It's always fun to watch what these talents can do in the ring. Hell, I'm a night owl anyway so nobody's missing any bedtimes over here or anything like that. Efficiency, however, is always appreciated and what was accomplished tonight in this impromptu matchup could have been taken care of in about five minutes or less, with more impact therefore, perhaps, than what this stretched out version ended up mustering.
Written by Jon Jordan
Loved: Eddie Kingston holds the Triple Crown
2023 has been a year of mountain climbing for Eddie Kingston. He started the year in a state of flux with AEW, brazenly quitting the promotion to go and compete in its sister brand Ring of Honor. While there he laid the foundations for a play at the ROH World title, a championship held by his real-life rival Claudio Castagnoli, but it was a mountain he failed to climb at the first time of asking at Supercard of Honor. Kingston found better luck in his NJPW excursions, where this year he not only competed in the G1 Climax tournament but also captured his first gold within the promotion, the NJPW Strong Openweight Championship.
It was with this newfound confidence and title-winning prestige that the "Mad King" went back at Castagnoli at "AEW Dynamite: Grand Slam" in front of a familiar New York crowd. Kingston stood tall with titles of NJPW and ROH, but he had yet to achieve something of merit in AEW. In step the Continental Classic, a round-robin tournament so very like the G1 Climax Kingston had been eliminated from before. One might be forgiven for hedging their bets going into their second tournament within a year. But Kingston so aptly went all in and declared that he wanted the Triple Crown, an achievement that carries such levity for a student of All Japan Pro Wrestling and the King's Road style, as Kingston is. How apropos that he should do as much tonight, coming back from a deficit in his Blue League block, overthrowing another personal rival and the world's most acclaimed grappler Bryan Danielson in the semi-finals, and then overcoming another herculean task in his best friend, AEW's "Ace", Jon Moxley. Moments make wrestling but the wrestling was also quite good. Eddie Kingston is the modern-day Triple Crown Heavyweight Champion, and that is historic.
Written by Max Everett
Hated: Here comes the money
In case you missed it, Adam Copeland won the TNT Championship from Christian Cage at Worlds End, and after the match, Killswitch ran down to cash in the anytime TNT title shot he'd earned by winning a battle royal on the pre-show. Stop me if you've heard this before.
Now yes, I do think it's likely that this was done merely as a tribute to Copeland's past (he was the first winner and first casher of WWE's Money in the Bank briefcase back in 2005/2006) and is probably not indicative that AEW is bringing in a similar concept on a regular basis. But it still hurts to see any promotion introduce it in what's very nearly 2024. Money in the Bank, specifically the "surprise" aspect where a title can suddenly, shockingly change hands, is an idea that's very much run its course at this point, as WWE has now spent almost 20 years squeezing out every ounce of juice. Utilizing it now isn't a fantastic look for a company that continues to fancy itself a "challenger brand. And if that wasn't enough, the angle cast a long shadow over what had been a very good Copeland vs. Christian match on a PPV that desperately needed one.
If Killswitch had simply cashed in his, uh ... folder? Envelope? Whatever it was, if he'd have just cashed it in and taken the TNT off Copeland, that would have been one thing. You're at least moving things forward — you're keeping a midcard title off Copeland, who doesn't need it, while still allowing him to defeat Christian, and you're kicking off a new chapter in the Christian/Killswitch story, with Killswitch again in possession of the TNT title but now perhaps more reluctant to let Christian take all the glory. That's story advancement. Instead, Christian demands Killswitch give him the title shot, and Killswitch does, and Christian wins the title back the same night he lost it. So we started the evening with Christian as TNT Champion and Killswitch being browbeaten into serving him, and we end the evening with Christian as TNT Champion and Killswitch being browbeaten into serving him. Booker of the year!
MITB is an overcomplicated concept that only works as a means of quickly and forcefully wrenching the booking in a certain direction. If you use MITB as a means of returning to the status quo, you've just done a bunch of complicated overbooking for what amounts to zero story progression, and suddenly nobody cares about the fact that the match was good. The lesson: Don't mess around with MITB if you don't know how to use it effectively, and probably just don't mess around with it at all.
Written by Miles Schneiderman
Loved: He's our scumbag
What we thought of the end result of Worlds End — the MJF loss, The Devil reveal, whether or not you think the Matt Tavens of the world are supposed to be intimidating figures, WHATEVER; it all matters not. The pre-entrance vignette for "The King of Long Island," Maxwell Jacob Friedman, was everything. From local shops and monuments, to local advocates touting his superlatives, to an old girlfriend who he ****** for however long in a car behind the wherever back in whenever, it has never been more clear than it is right now that MJF is Long Island's scumbag, AEW's scumbag, our scumbag, and sure, my scumbag too.
Full disclosure: I'm a Long Island product myself. The pride that comes from that area, I believe, can only be understood by those who have felt its soil underneath their feet from the earliest of ages. They, we, are a unique people. Hubris is commonplace. MJF exemplifies as much. Humility comes later. Max showed a bit of the latter through some of this babyface run with a heavy dose of the former always overriding it all, a quality befitting of his character and in step with what he was putting forth all the while.
That this pay-per-view emanated from the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, once dubbed "Fort Neverlose" during the dynasty run of the New York Islanders from 1980-83, is also ironic in that MJF, assuming he's staying put in AEW, will now have to battle back from the biggest loss he's suffered in quite some time. Until then, he did his fellow Long Islanders proud tonight, and throughout his title run, as he did scumbags across the globe. Where and how he proceeds from here following the post-match beating, of course, remains up in the air.
Written by Jon Jordan
Loved: The Devil reveals himself
Ever since AEW began running The Devil storyline there has been a lot of anticipation as to who would be under the mask and when they'd reveal themselves. While some will argue it took too long, and others believe it shouldn't have ended yet, the actual reveal itself ended up being excellently done. Adam Cole was the person most people wanted it to be from the start for a plethora of reasons, and Tony Khan didn't deviate even though it was the obvious answer.
It gives fans a heel Cole (which is the best version), adds real drama due to the connection he had with MJF and the manner in which fans bought into it, and creates a faction that genuinely makes sense. Seeing MJF lose the match clean was a fun twist that led to people wondering whether The Devil would be revealed, but there were enough small teases throughout the match that Cole was the man.
From him dressing in all black to fumbling around trying to get the ring for his former tag team partner, the seeds were planted. Both he and MJF did a great job when the masked men arrived, convincing people that it might not actually be Cole, to the point that when he was revealed sitting on the chair it got a major reaction from the fans. The group consisting of The Kingdom, Roderick Strong, and Wardlow provides a great balance for AEW to work with moving forward, and it gives the show a special and memorable ending.
It opens up a huge storyline for the company now, and considering how badly this reveal could have gone with certain names that were floating around in the rumor mill, it will actually be an angle audiences actively want to see. It creates a main event match down the line that doesn't even have to feature a title, and that is always a bonus for any company to have. So, while it might not have been AEW's strongest effort in terms of a PPV, when it comes to a closing moment it might be one of the best.
Written by Matthew Wilkinson