Chris Jericho looks set to star for AEW as they bring the legendary All In show to the UK this August.
All Elite Wrestling are coming to Great Britain for the first time on August 27th, 2023, selling over 70,000 tickets for their Wembley Stadium show.
While stars like CM Punk, Nigel McGuinness and Goldberg are all rumoured to be taking part in the event, one man who is all-but confirmed is former AEW Champion Chris Jericho.
While his opponent is not confirmed, fans are already excited to see Chris Jericho back in the UK. While he has toured with Fozzy over the last few years, Jericho hasn’t wrestled in the UK since a WWE tour in 2016, when he faced four of WWE’s top stars in one night.
Jericho is also one of the few men in AEW who wrestled on the first All In show. All In was a Ring of Honor produced show that was the precursor to AEW, and showed the apetitie fans had for wrestling outside of the WWE.
Chris Jericho had only just left WWE in 2018, having wrestled a few matches in NJPW. His appearance at All In was a shock, as nobody expected the former WWE Champion to ever wrestle in the US, aside from in WWE.
His appearance was a huge shock and had absolutely no right to happen. It went right down to the wire, and only happened because of future-AEW owner Tony Khan helping it get over the line.
Here is the tale of Chris Jericho at All In, and the comedy of errors that almost put his appearance in jeopardy.
Chris Jericho’s All In Debut
Earlier that day, Chris Jericho had a concert with Fozzy, on the other side of the country.
He was set to be finished by the time the show began, but had organised a “watch-along” party with his fans at the concert.
The chances of him appearing were slim to none. But that didn’t stop him.
With the help from Tony Khan, he borrowed a private jet and jetted over to Chicago for the historic All In show.
10,000 fans were in the arena, with not a clue that Jericho would be making his first appearance in the US, outside of the WWE, in nearly two decades.
At All In, Kenny Omega wrestled Pentagon Jr in what was then a dream match. It was the finest match of the night, and saw Omega picking up the win in front of the pro-Bullet Club crowd.
However, the lights went out after the match, and in the ring stood Pentagon Jr again. He hit Omega with the Codebreaker, before revealing himself to be none other than Chris Jericho.
Y2J had faced off against Kenny Omega at Wrestle Kingdom earlier that year, and looked set to reignite the feud before AEW had even been announced.
While logistically, everything seemed to add up, it was not quite as simple as that for Chris Jericho at All In.
Chris Jericho On All In
Chris Jericho has spoken about the logistical nightmare that was his shock appearance at All In, following the Kenny Omega vs Pentagon Jr match.
On September 7, 2018’s episode of Jericho’s Talk is Jericho podcast, Jericho spoke about his All In appearance, and everything that almost went wrong on the way to this legendary moment in time,
“I sign the release form, and then we’re hanging out in there waiting.
“Kenny comes in, who I haven’t seen for a while, and then Pentagon comes in, who I’ve never met. I think they might’ve filled him in at that point.
“They told him, ‘Please make sure that Pentagon brings an extra costume.’ What I didn’t say was, ‘Make sure he brings a costume that’s the same as the one that he’s wearing.’”
“The [Young] Bucks then were saying, ‘He probably doesn’t have two. I don’t have two of the same. Why would I?’ So we never even thought about that.
“We could have probably had another made, but here we are at like 7 o’clock, 7:10, and he has a gold costume and a silver costume. They’re not matching anyways, even in the design, but the colors are completely different.
“The idea is, once again, Kenny wins the match, Penta is selling, lights go off, lights go on, everyone is like, ‘What the hell is going on, there’s nobody in there?’ Penta’s still down, Penta gets up, attacks Kenny, bam bam bam bam, unmasks and it’s Jericho.”
Jericho continued, “So I’m looking at this costume. In the back of my mind, I’m like, ‘What the f**k are you guys thinking? Like, did nobody think of this?’ But I’m the vet. I’m the pro. I come from the Vince McMahon school of ‘Well, we better think of something.’
“So, then I started scrambling through my mind, ‘Get both your costumes, Penta.’
“He goes, he comes back. I’m looking at them, and I’m like, ‘Well, you gotta get some gold.’”
“At first, it was like gold Sharpies, gold tape, gold paint. ‘You gotta find a hardware store!’ We’re looking at like Ace Hardware stores, 50 miles away or whatever it is, and we find a Home Depot that was 10-12 minutes away.”
Jericho also spoke about Pentagon Jr’s reaction to the moment he saw Jericho, scribbling away with gold sharpies over his wrestling gear.
He revealed that he was surprisingly cool with the moment, noticing how big and important Jericho’s appearance at All In would be for the wider wrestling world.
“He was super cool. He was super cool about it. That guy was really cool. If someone took my gear and started like, basically ruining it, I’d be like, ‘Hey, come on guys!’ But he was ‘all in,’ no pun intended.
“Once again, putting it on and looking at it, you guys have no idea how close it was to just me wearing a damn silver costume.”
It all worked out in the end for Chris Jericho. All In was a huge success, and inspired Tony Khan to work with him, The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega to form the wildly successful All Elite Wrestling.
AEW have gone from strength to strength, and have recently booked the biggest show in British wrestling history – selling over 70,000 tickets to the second edition of All In, this time in Wembley Stadium.
What did you think about Chris Jericho’s All In appearance? Tell us your thoughts in the comments section down below.