CM Punk's AEW Return Officially Confirmed

By Connor Casey

AEW's Tony Khan officially announced on this week's AEW Dynamite that CM Punk will be featured on AEW Collision beginning with its June 17 premiere at the United Center in Chicago. Punk had been heavily rumored to be involved in the new weekly show for months leading up to the show's confirmation at the Warner Bros. Discovery upfront presentation. However, while WBD initially named Punk as one of the headlining stars for the show in one of its emails, he was scrubbed from the official press release and poster. 

Rumors of backstage issues between AEW and Punk continued to spread after the show's announcement. But now Punk's involvement in the weekly Saturday night show is official. 

Another prominent rumor regarding Collision is that there will be some sort of brand split between it and Dynamite. Khan declined to confirm that during a recent media conference call, but did say more would be revealed soon. 

"I haven't given a lengthy explanation yet for what I'm planning regarding the future of the roster and how people will be allocated across Dynamite and Collision and our other shows," Khan said. "I can see why wrestling fans all over the world would be interested and curious about that. That's frankly by design that we want to build that curiosity in and get people wondering exactly what you're asking, 'what's the future of the AEW roster, and what does this all mean going forward after Double or Nothing?' It's a really good question and something we'll be excited to follow up on."

"The scope of the deal, as it is, the length is the same. I don't want to get too deep into those conversations, but the length of the term is the same and this is an addition to what we had already put together," Khan said elsewhere on the call regarding AEW's current TV deal. "Everybody was really excited about the success of AEW on TBS and TNT. They reached out to us and gave us a great opportunity. I think it spoke highly of AEW that this show and the idea of more AEW programming goes all the to the top to Mr. (David) Zaslav, who is one of the most powerful and intelligent people in all of media. 

"He likes what we're doing with AEW on TBS and TNT and it was literally his idea for there to be more AEW on TNT. I'm very grateful for that. We're going to do our best to make sure Collision is a great show and also maintaining a great show with Rampage and also take Dynamite to new heights. That's a great challenge for us and we're really looking forward to it," Khan continued. 

0comments

Related:

Start the Conversation

of