Written By Gino Lewis
Location Scotiabank Arena, Toronto Canada
Here is a quick recap of Forbidden Door. I’m now covering Collision for tjrwrestling.net! With that said, I’m not going to write as much for the time being. I do still plan on covering Dynamite again. It will probably be in a few weeks or maybe longer. I’ve been doing a lot of writing lately. Now that I have a platform at tjrwrestling.net, I’m going to take a bit of a break here and focus on that. I was hyped for Forbidden Door! I know a lot of people think the stories were weak going into it. I don’t agree with that. It’s kind of like an all-star show. I don’t think you need long storylines for something like that. You probably really can’t have long drawn-out storylines when the wrestlers work for different companies. I still think they did an excellent job putting the show together. Here was my preview for Forbidden Door that I wrote for TJR at the end of my Collision review.
In closing I wanted to write a short preview for Forbidden Door. To me the card is about as good as it gets! Bryan Danielson vs Okada is almost as big a dream match as you can get. Possibly the one dream match that would be bigger is Will Ospreay vs Kenny Omega. However, that is a rematch from Wrestle Kingdom 17 about 6 months ago. If I were rating matches back then, I would have rated it 5 stars. I expect just as good of a match this time around. The 4 way, MJF vs Tanahashi, Sanada vs Jungle Boy and Adam Cole vs Tom Lawler should be great matches. The multi person battles pitting Le Suzuki Gods vs Sting/Darby/Naito and BCC vs the Elite should be fun chaotic brawls AEW fans love.
I can understand why most wrestling fans might not be as excited for the show as me. Knowing all the wrestlers on the card makes it more intriguing. I know I’m in the minority there. Even a lot of die-hard AEW fans don’t know the entire New Japan roster. The card probably feels random and thrown together unless you’re a big AEW and New Japan fan. That said, I think AEW did a tremendous job building the card even though they basically did piece it together in 3 weeks. The wild brawl ending with Ospreay taking out Omega and the face to face between Danielson and Okada were absolutely the right ways to end the last 2 Dynamites. AEW doesn’t always get it right going home to a PPV. I think they did this time. My excitement level for the show is a 9.5.
Zero Hour
I missed half of the opener that was Mogul Empire defeating Chaos (Best Friends). The last 5 minutes or so were pretty good.
Athena def Billy Starks – This was a first-round match in the Women’s Owen Hart Tournament. Really good match. Athena works so stiff. She’d probably be the last person I’d want to face on the roster man or woman. Starks has a really bright future. She took a beating in this one. Rating 3 ¼ *
El Phantasmo def Stu Grayson – Great match between 2 Canadians that I would have preferred as CM Punk’s opponent over Kojima. ELP is brilliant. One of my favorites. I’m glad he got the win. Rating 3 ½ *
Los Ingobernables de Japon (Shingo Takagi, Bushi & Hiromu Takahashi) def United Empire (Jeff Cobb, Kyle Fletcher & TJP) – Awesome spot-fest! Everything looked so fast and crisp. There was no selling or psychology. It didn’t matter to me. The action was amazing. There were so many counters. This was a perfect match to hype up the crowd before the main card. Rating 3 ¾ *
Main Card
MJF vs Tanahashi, AEW World Championship – A lot better than I thought it would be. This had tons of psychology and really worked the crowd. MJF carried Tanahashi to a really good match. He cheated to win of course. For someone that claimed to not want the match, MJF sure put on a good performance. Rating 3 ½ *
CM Punk vs Kojima – WOW! I hated this matchup when it was announced. I was wrong. This turned out to be excellent. Punk sold his ass off for Kojima. I’m not sure if he’ll do that for everyone. Punk advances in the Owen Hart Tournament. Rating 3 ¾ *
Orange Cassidy def Zach Sabre Jr, Shibata & Daniel Garcia – This was on its way to being an all-time classic. It felt like it ended abruptly. Like it was the middle of the match. I wish this would have gotten more time. I wonder if they were having timing issues. The action was still awesome! Rating 4 *
Sanada def Jungle Boy, IWGP Heavyweight Championship – Tough act to follow the 4-way. They couldn’t do it. This match also seemed to be cut short. We found out why after the match when Jack Perry turned on Hook. The turn was fantastic but the match was average. Rating 2 ¾ *
The Elite (Hangman Page, Young Bucks, Eddie Kingston & Ishii def Blackpool Combat Club (Jon Moxley, Claudio Castagnoli, Wheeler Yuta, Takahashi & Shota Umino – Holy shit! What an out-of-control masterpiece! A lot of people probably didn’t like this. This is the kind of wrestling I love. It was crazy that the moves looked so good at the pace they worked. I certainly didn’t expect Ishii to get the pin. Can’t complain about that. The crowd popped for it. Rating 4 ½ *
Toni Storm def Willow Nightingale – Hate to say it. I needed a break. I used this match for that. It shows that AEW books the women’s division poorly. I like both performers but this match had no sizzle headed into it. What I saw was pretty good.
Will Ospreay def Kenny Omega, IWGP United States Championship – This is what’s it’s all about it. It doesn’t get better than this. I can say now this will be my match of the year. I’d be shocked if there were a better match even if I rate other matches 5 stars. This was as 5 stars as it gets. Better than their match at Wrestle Kingdom 17. These are my 2 favorite in ring performers in the world. They showed why! This definitely should have been the main event. Rating 5 *
Sting, Naito & Darby Allin def Chris Jericho, Sammy Guevara & Suzuki – This had one of the better stories headed into the match. It ended up being filler. A little disappointing. The crowd wasn’t that into it. I do think the match served a purpose of giving the crowd a rest. The 2 matches before this were insane so they needed a break. Rating 2 ½ *
Bryan Danielson def Okada – Outstanding match. Shouldn’t have been the main event as it wasn’t close to the level of Ospreay vs Omega. The ending was awkward. We found out at the media scrum Danielson wrestled the last 10 minutes of the match with a broken forearm. Ouch, that’s damn impressive and explains why the match wasn’t quite what most expected it to be. It was smart for the AEW guy to win. I think they might be doing CM Punk vs Bryan Danielson at All In. A loss here for Danielson would have hurt the story for that match. Rating 4 ¼ *
Closing Statement
Forbidden Door was such an awesome show! It was the best PPV in a long time. Maybe since before Covid. This show is why I’m an AEW fan. I also enjoy New Japan. Like I said earlier, it was like an all-star game only one where the results actually matter. I initially rated the show 9.5/10. That is a bit too high. I think the beers might have had something to do with it lol! I was on a high after the show. It was the most I’ve enjoyed wrestling in a long time. With all that said, it wasn’t quite a perfect show. There were 3 average matches and it was a very long night. I do need to factor that into my rating.
Overall Rating 9/10
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