Forbidden Door 2025

[Doog]

Went to the show and enjoyed it, everything has been said already and i agree with the consensus, not a bad PPV per se, but by AEWs recent standards it wasn't great.

Really interested where they go now though, and a potential All Out card with the injuries etc.

Throwing it out there but I imagine, Edge and Christian v FTR, Mox vs Darby, and a main event of potentially Hangman/MJF/Briscoe?

Feels like no obvious candidate for Hangman, other than MJF 'cashing in' for a rematch but feels like there's so much going on. Hangman vs anyone else doesn't feel like a PPV main event, they could main with E&C vs FTR but having Hangman not main event two PPVs in a row undermines him a bit so im not sure.

Lots of options moving forward mind, they're in a good place but it was a disappointing show overall.

[Lorne Malvo]

They could have had Daniel Garcia stepping up on the babyface side of things, but Tony Khan has done his usual thing of forgetting he exists for 3 months at a time so he feels pretty cold at the moment.

Although if they want to reheat him in time for December, so Garcia can pull off the 'Continental Classic loser to runner-up to winner' 3-year story I was certain they were telling until recently, then all is forgiven. But yeah, this really doesn't look likely at the moment.

[Tim Healys Chutney Spoon]

Forbidden Door is on ITV4 at 9pm on Friday.

[britboy_93]

21 minutes ago, Tim Healys Chutney Spoon said:

Forbidden Door is on ITV4 at 9pm on Friday.

I Wonder if all There PPV'S Will Become the Norm to Appear on Tape Delay Via ITV like TNA used to do with there PPV'S on Challenge. I highly doubt the Casual AEW fan who attended the Glasgow and London Shows would have any idea on Where to get AEW PPVS. I assume they probably watch Dynamite and Collision on Tape Delay Via ITV.

[HarmonicGenerator]

10 minutes ago, britboy_93 said:

I Wonder if all There PPV'S Will Become the Norm to Appear on Tape Delay Via ITV like TNA used to do with there PPV'S on Challenge. I highly doubt the Casual AEW fan who attended the Glasgow and London Shows would have any idea on Where to get AEW PPVS. I assume they probably watch Dynamite and Collision on Tape Delay Via ITV.

It’s just the U.K. ones - they did the same with All In London the past two years.

[Ro_y Disco]

All Out was on ITV last month too. Maybe it's just the "summer run" of shows though. 

[Merzbow]

Even before the overbooked mess kicking in I found the Hangman vs MJF to be the most dull formulaic match, MJF can seemingly only actually wrestle a single type of match over and over again. Stuff happens, he gets some good looking shit in but has no effect on me anymore, then you add that Bryce being Bryce bullshit.

[BomberPat]

I think that match would have been much worse with anyone but Bryce - he's the only referee who has a more than two-second memory, and is really good at asking people what happened or selling that he knows he missed something, and at escalating his outrage at a heel trying to get away with cheating. But he was out for way too long for the foot on the ropes part to work, and commentary didn't do enough to sell it - something I've told other referees a lot is that if you're afraid you've fucked up a finish (and we've all got stories of when we have), is to remember that the finish isn't when your hand hits the mat, it's when you call for the bell. You could argue that Bryce collapsed on the last count and that wasn't actually him making the three count, or they could have had him notice much sooner (still have Briscoe try and call attention to it, you just don't need him entering to his music and fighting with security), or commentary could have just made the point that it's referee's discretion whether to call the match knowing he didn't have a full view of the situation and, considering he caught MJF removing Hangman's foot from the ropes, it's pretty clear that what happened. But it took too long, and commentary made no effort to satisfactorily explain it.

I normally don't like to blame a wrestler for their booking, but MJF is the common factor in all of MJF's angles being terrible. Whether it's a promo, an angle, or a match, he has to do three things when he could be doing one, and it doesn't make it more layered and more complex, it just makes it more convoluted and less focused. He's consistently my least favourite part of AEW shows, and if it weren't for the insufferable victory lap WWE would have if they signed him, I'd say better to sack him off now.

 

In general, it was a good show, but AEW's track record on PPV (and on TV lately) has been so strong that just "good" isn't good enough. My heart dropped at the Death Riders assaulting Ospreay after the match - just flashbacks to the interminable heat of PPV finishes at the height of the Death Riders angle, where every show ended with them beating up every babyface. I get the logic of getting some kayfabe blame on heels for writing him out, but it was already laid on thick that this was the last we'll see of Ospreay for a while, so it didn't need it. At this point, the Death Riders story should be on the way out, and instead it feels like we've taken five steps back to "can the babyfaces get it together to stop this reign of terror?", which is a story that should have ended at All In. 

The story now should be Darby Allin running through the Death Riders one by one, and sending them off into the sunset. Don't involve The Opps, or the Young Bucks, or Gabe Kidd, or anyone else who's been tied up in this angle forever, or else we're just running in place. Darby can send them packing, Claudio and Yuta can break off into a tag team without Mox or whatever else they'd do, and Eddie Kingston can return to feud with Moxley and ultimately make him see the light and bring him back around to a babyface run in the future. But whatever's happening, they shouldn't be the main event any more, they should be nowhere near the World Title, and they should be well into the end of their story, not getting heated back up.

Because the more dominant the make the Death Riders again now, the more inevitable it becomes that Mox should be getting title shots, and he should be nowhere near the World Title right now. Hangman's beaten him in such a significant way, that story is done. The problem is that Hangman also just beat the closest thing to a top heel after the Death Riders, and we know there's going to be more contract bullshit with him too. Hangman needs a heel factory to beat in a long title reign, but there's not many people believably in that spot.

On the flipside, AEW need people to step up into top babyface spots vacated by Swerve and Ospreay - particularly in Ospreay's case, he's so good at the rabble-rousing babyface promos, and they need to find someone to do that in his stead; the obvious answer is for Hangman to do a lot more of that. There are plenty of people that could be pushed into those spots, but AEW have never been great at consistently booking people to have those break-out moments - Daniel Garcia is on his seventeenth mentor and twentieth break-out performance by now. Takeshita has a babyface turn and a feud with the Callis Family and Okada coming - possibly while IWGP Champion - and that will be great, but it's not the Ospreay spot.

One of the early promises of AEW was that it would be a promotion where tag team wrestling could main event as credibly as singles wrestling. If they had laid the groundwork to actually establish that, then in the short-term a Cope & Christian reunion run could have main evented a PPV or two - them vs. FTR in Toronto could be a credible main event, and built well enough you could then get a Young Bucks match and a Tag Title match out of them too - but outside of maybe Toronto, that's just not viable, between where Cope is as a performer, where the company is at with tag wrestling, and having already set the expectation of C&C tag matches as a feel-good opener more than as a must-see attraction.

[Ironic Indie Lad]

Crowd just absolutely ruined this for me. 

Honestly what is that all about? Are people so embarrassed to be fans that they need to try be funny with their songs and chants? Just so everyone knows they don't take this seriously at all.

Not sure if its better or worse than those just there to cry or do youtuber shocked faces at everything. 

 

[Hannibal Scorch]

1 hour ago, Ironic Indie Lad said:

Crowd just absolutely ruined this for me. 

Honestly what is that all about? Are people so embarrassed to be fans that they need to try be funny with their songs and chants? Just so everyone knows they don't take this seriously at all.

Not sure if its better or worse than those just there to cry or do youtuber shocked faces at everything. 

 

I mean do you want crowds who try and be funny but are also loud and enthusiastic or crowds who pop for entrances and the 3 count and sit there silent for the rest of it?

Edited August 26, 2025 by Hannibal Scorch

[Snitsky's back acne]

7 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

I mean do you want crowds who try and be funny but are also loud and enthusiastic or crowds who pop for entrances and the 3 count and sit their silent for the rest of it?

There is a happy medium between the two options you have presented - a regular wrestling crowd who react to things. Boo, cheer, heckle.

I am watching some old NWA from 1986 and the crowds react to everything - there are obviously moments where they are louder than others but they are always engaged and react, even to the underneath matches. Those are the best crowds, in my opinion. They weren't there to make themselves a part of the show, they were there to enjoy the show. 
 

[JLM]

Whataboutism is silly. I want the crowd to engage with the show they’ve paid to see. The crowd in Scotland for the TV tapings largely managed this. The crowds at the EVE shows I’ve been to did it as well. The odd silly chant isn’t a crime, but people seemingly spending hundreds of pounds to watch a show ironically is so weird and it can massively detract from the viewing experience. If people had been doing that during Swerve/Danielson last year I’d have been gutted. 

[Hannibal Scorch]

8 minutes ago, Snitsky's back acne said:

There is a happy medium between the two options you have presented - a regular wrestling crowd who react to things. Boo, cheer, heckle.

I am watching some old NWA from 1986 and the crowds react to everything - there are obviously moments where they are louder than others but they are always engaged and react, even to the underneath matches. Those are the best crowds, in my opinion. They weren't there to make themselves a part of the show, they were there to enjoy the show. 
 

Where does one see a regular wrestling crowd? Most UK indies have the same vibe. Remember most of the crowd culture in the UK stems from football and rugby, especially football. Which is why the Americans love when wrestling comes to Europe because their crowds for everything are lame.

[DavidB6937]

12 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

Where does one see a regular wrestling crowd? Most UK indies have the same vibe. Remember most of the crowd culture in the UK stems from football and rugby, especially football. Which is why the Americans love when wrestling comes to Europe because their crowds for everything are lame.

People are allowed to find things annoying about AEW.

If someone didn't enjoy the crowd then just let them. It's okay. The world won't end 

[Ironic Indie Lad]

42 minutes ago, Hannibal Scorch said:

I mean do you want crowds who try and be funny but are also loud and enthusiastic or crowds who pop for entrances and the 3 count and sit there silent for the rest of it?

Are those the only crowds?