Say hello to Nicholas and Matthew. The Young Bucks returned to AEW this past January, making their first televised appearance since losing to Kenny Omega and Chris Jericho at AEW Full Gear in November 2023. Donning scally caps and pencil-thin mustaches, former AEW Tag Team Champions confronted Sting and Darby Allin, setting their sights on the longtime duo ahead of Sting’s retirement match at AEW Revolution in March. The Bucks followed up that show-ending cameo with a tell-all interview where they explained that they are taking their Executive Vice President roles “more serious” and are bent on taking out “yesterday’s self-serving, superficial, cancerous superstars.”
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Young Bucks Change Up Look on AEW Dynamite
Nicholas and Matthew continue to evolve their appearance.
This past Wednesday on AEW Dynamite, the Young Bucks made a brief appearance in a pre-recorded backstage segment. The two brothers arrived to the arena in a limousine, exiting the vehicle to fine an AEW employee for calling them “Nick and Matt.” The Bucks have kept the scally caps and single-colored suits but have ditched the pencil-thin mustaches in favor of goatees.
It’s possible that the Bucks pivoted from mustaches to goatees is to distance themselves from Vince McMahon comparisons. Fans initially believed that the pencil-thin mustaches were done as a spoof of McMahon, who was sporting one himself throughout 2023. Beyond that, the way the Bucks have micromanaged AEW backstage and have made last-minute changes to the televised product have led many to see this behavior as a McMahon parody.
At the end of January, McMahon was faced with another sexual misconduct lawsuit, this time for sex trafficking. The lawsuit alleged that McMahon sexually trafficked a former employee to various colleagues and had her create personalized sexual content for a “former UFC champion” that WWE was actively trying to re-sign in 2020. Shortly after the lawsuit was made public, Slim Jim briefly paused its brand partnership with WWE. This led to McMahon resigning from his position as Executive Chairman of TKO, WWE’s parent company.
“I choose to focus on the positive. Yes, there’s a negative, but I want to focus on [Royal Rumble and WWE Raw’s Netflix deal] and keep it to that,” WWE Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque said at the WWE Royal Rumble post-show press conference when asked about the allegations against McMahon.
