When Omega appeared on Impact and got back together with the Good Brothers, fans were wondering if the Bullet Club was actually going to come back. There was a lot of doubt in the air but that doubt cleared when Gallows and Anderson showed up on AEW Dynamite and assaulted the former AEW World Champion. What followed that brutal assault left fans shocked and amazed. The Young Bucks, The Good Brothers and Kenny Omega raised their hands and did the iconic Too Sweet signal. Now the too sweet sign isn’t an issue.
Other North American companies have used it as well. The problem is that these five wrestlers at one point were the main body of the Bullet Club. They have even name-dropped the term ‘Bullet Club’ multiple times now in AEW and BTE. This prompted Tama Tonga to take it to Twitter and claim that the AEW version of the Bullet Club is the bootleg version. That, however, didn’t stop the ‘bootleg’ Bullet Club leader Kenny Omega to show up on Impact pay-per-view Hard to Kill wearing a Bullet Club shirt. This has left the fans wondering whether New Japan would do something about it or are they in on it. So let’s analyse the situation.
New Japan is known to be very particular regarding copyright issues. They don’t take kindly to anyone using their trademarks. One recent example of this was taking down Frightful’s Stream of Wrestle Kingdom watch along even though it featured absolutely zero New Japan footage. So if they are so petty when it comes to that, why are they letting Kenny Omega, Good Brothers and the Bucks use their Trademark on national television week in and week out. Well, one leading explanation is that Omega and the band have been playing it very safe by circling it and trying to push the limit till where it’s legal. However, another rather more entertaining reason could be that New Japan is in on it.
Since Omega started his ‘Collector’ gimmick people have been fantasising about him going after the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, myself included and the circumstances seem to be favouring that. There are two cases which have sparked a bit of doubt in my mind that we might be close to a long-awaited AEW New Japan crossover.
Firstly, there was a recent change in New Japan management with the new one being more open to cross-promotional storylines. A notable point is that former IWGP Heavyweight Champion and the leading star of New Japan Kazuchika Okada recently said in an interview with Sports Illustrated “And when the world calms down, I would like to give back with other wrestling companies to all wrestling fans in the world who still support us even in this current situation”. Okada has a loud voice in the NJPW locker room and even with the management. If Okada wants it then there will be efforts made towards achieving it. Plus Omega has long been wanting to work with New Japan. It looks like their interests are aligned. Another prominent figure in this whole scenario is Jay White.
The Switchblade Jay White is the unsaid leader of the Bullet Club in Japan and he has not held back on emphasising that their Bullet Club is the “Real” Bullet Club. The forbidden door that has been brought up so often in recent days might actually be real. The Switchblade’s arrival in AEW would open up a plethora of roads that could be taken and one of them which is already taking form is the Japanese Bullet Club invasion. As mentioned before, Tama Tonga and Bad Luck Fale have not taken kindly to AEW’s rendition of the Bullet Club and if New Japan and AEW join hands, one of the things that are bound to happen is Tama Tonga leading the invasion on his former Bullet Club brethren. It would be monumental if that happens. This could also very well be a route for Omega to the IWGP Heavyweight Championship.
Now the turning point came when KENTA showed up on Dynamite. The Forbidden Door was busted open and now there are a number of roads that both AEW and New Japan can take. KENTA defeated Moxley and Lance Archer in a tag team match alongside Omega. As confirmed by Dave Meltzer of Wrestling Observer Newsletter, this was an exchange deal between KENTA and Moxley. There could be, however, a lot more to this. KENTA wasn’t the only NJPW talent to jump over to another promotion.
FinJuice, the team of David Finlay and Juice Robinson made an appearance on Impact (who are currently in partnership with AEW) and defeated Reno SCUM. This along with KENTA coming in with a lot of force convinces me that there is a lot more at play here. A very solid storyline that is present is that the AEW version of the Bullet Club needs back-up to have a full-blown war with the roster, therefore, maybe Jay White and EVIL could lead the charge from Japan or even turn on this fowl mockery of the Club as they exchange shots back and forth on social media right now. AEW might be delaying that for now since such a big moment or card needs to take place in front of an audience.
So this was some speculation on what could possibly happen in the current circumstances. Obviously, nothing can be said for sure and this all could just be another case of the wrestlers just playing with the fans but we as pro wrestling fans always love to imagine the craziest of scenarios. To be fair though, often in wrestling, reality exceeds our wildest of expectations.
While we wait for this story to develop, check out more Wrestling related news and features on www.TWM.news. Thanks for reading.