AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door Review - June 25, 2023

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Zero Hour: Mogul Embassy (Swerve Strickland and ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Champions Brian Gate and The Gates of Agony) def. CHAOS (Rocky Romero and Best Friends) and El Desperado

Strickland doesn't lose all of his matches, but he certainly doesn't win whenever it matters most. CHAOS lose far more than he does, including here and on Friday's Rampage. This was a nice sprint and never boring. There wasn't really a reason for it and probably didn't need to happen (especially when not a lot of fans were in the building yet), but I get that they wanted to get as much talent on the show as possible from both promotions.

ROH Women's World Champion Athena def. Billie Starkz in a Women's Owen Hart Cup Quarterfinal Match (Non-Title)

As the commentators noted, Starkz is amazingly only 18-years-old and is already very talented. She has a bright future ahead of her, but this was not her match to win. Athena's on another level right now and had to make it to at least the semifinals. It would have been pretty silly for her to lose her first match in nearly a year on a pay-per-view pre-show. Anyway, I liked the match and wouldn't mind seeing Starkz get another shot against Athena in Ring of Honor down the road.

Zero Hour: El Phantasmo def. Stu Grayson

As others have pointed out, Phantasmo is looking a lot like Logan Paul these days (if Paul was slightly smaller, that is). I've always enjoyed his work and I'm glad AEW and NJPW found a way to include him on Forbidden Door this year, even though this was rather random. For those not keeping up with ROH TV these days, Grayson has joined The Righteous. I assume this existed because Grayson's from Canada, and although it was fairly unnecessary, at least it was a quality contest while it lasted.

​Zero Hour: Los Ingobernables de Japon (Shingo Takagi, BUSHI and IWGP Junior Heavyweight Champion Hiromu Takahashi) def. United Empire (Jeff Cobb, Kyle Fletcher and IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Champion TJP)

Takahashi had to miss last year's installment (I believe for a health-related reason), so it was cool he was able to be included this year alongside his LIJ stablemates. This was essentially a NJPW exclusive as it had no AEW representation. That's fine as all six of these stars are super skilled and the match was a basic showcase for all involved. It was fun faction warfare and the crowd clearly knew who they were.

AEW World Champion MJF def. Hiroshi Tanahashi

Although I thought Tanahashi's Collision match with Swerve Strickland was stronger (likely due to their styles meshing a bit better), this was still a solid opener. MJF was a terrific foil for the beloved Tanahashi, who doesn't have to do much in his matches these days to get the crowd behind him (one of many similarities he shares with John Cena). MJF retaining was never in doubt, but I enjoyed this for what it was, nonetheless.

CM Punk def. Satoshi Kojima in a Men's Owen Hart Cup Quarterfinal Match

It sounded like Punk was even more hated in front of this crowd than he was on Saturday's Collision show. He had a small pocket of supporters, but the overwhelming majority were anti-Punk and it made for an electric environment. It made an otherwise average match much more interesting. I'm convinced a heel turn is coming for Punk before long and the road getting there should be a blast. Props to Koijima as well for holding his own at the age of 52 and having an admirable performance.

AEW International Champion Orange Cassidy def. Daniel Garcia, ROH Pure Champion Katsuyori Shibata and NJPW World Television Champion Zack Sabre Jr. in a Four-Way Match (ROH Pure Championship and NJPW World Television Championship Were Not Defended)

This won't be a popular opinion among many, but I thoroughly believe that Cassidy has been AEW's biggest MVP in 2023 so far, simply based on how he's been booked, how over he's been, and the consistent quality of his matches. This well-wrestled four-way was no exception. Everyone had their time to shine, and although I didn't buy into anyone taking the title from Cassidy here, the crowd was into all the action.

IWGP World Heavyweight Champion SANADA def. "Jungle Boy" Jack Perry

I commend the effort of both guys, but this just wasn't a very interesting match. Perry stood no chance against SANADA, and although MJF vs. Tanahashi also had the issue of an obvious outcome, Perry is no Tanahashi. It was well worked, but this was fairly underwhelming on the whole with a flat finish. The focus was on the post-match angle with Perry finally betraying Hook. It's been teased for a while and it was the direction they had to go in with the crowd already turning on him. It also gives Hook some much-needed direction, so I'm in full favor of their feud.

Tomohiro Ishii, Eddie Kingston and The Elite ("Hangman" Adam Page and The Young Bucks) def. Blackpool Combat Club (Wheeler Yuta, ROH World Champion Claudio Castagnoli and Jon Moxley), Konosuke Takeshita and Shota Umino

Complete chaos are the two words that best sum up this match to me. It was exactly the non-stop action you'd expect from an Elite match and everyone's enjoyment of it will vary. I wouldn't have been opposed to them slowing down a bit, but it did stand out from everything else on the show. It didn't matter which team won, but I was surprised to see Ishii pick up the victory for his team. He's lost a majority of the matches he's had in AEW, so at least this gave him some credibility with AEW fans who don't watch his NJPW work.

AEW Women's World Champion Toni Storm def. NJPW Strong Women's Champion Willow Nightingale (NJPW Strong Women's Championship Not Defended)

These two have worked together twice before on AEW TV, so it was hardly a surprise that they'd work well together. Nightingale is a total star and I was happy she was made to look credible in defeat here. They had a very good match. I didn't think Nightingale would become a dual champ here, but it's still possible that she dethrones Athena for the ROH Women's World Championship after beating her in the semifinals of the women's Owen Hart Cup.

Will Ospreay def. Kenny Omega to Win the IWGP United States Heavyweight Championship

They had the tall task of trying to top their outstanding encounter from Wrestle Kingdom 17 back in January and you can absolutely argue that they did. I prefer their first match solely because it didn't have such excessive outside interference (Don Callis' role in this was understandable but it should have been drastically curtailed), but this was without a doubt one of the best bouts of the year. Both men rose to the occasion once again and had another instant classic. They were a little overboard with some of the kickouts in the final few minutes, but that's merely nitpicking on my end. The near-40 minutes flew by and had the crowd captivated from start to finish. I expect Omega to shift his focus to Takeshita coming out of this event, but a rubber match at All In (this time in Ospreay's home turf of England) isn't out of the question.

Tetsuya Naito, Darby Allin and Sting def. Le Suzuki Gods (Minoru Suzuki, Chris Jericho and Sammy Guevara)

It's wild to think half of these guys are over the age of 50, and even wilder to think Sting is almost 10 years older than Suzuki. Both guys can go, though, so I can't complain too much. Interestingly, this ended up being the weakest match on the main roster. Had this happened earlier in the evening, it may have been better and the crowd likely would have been livelier, but there were a lot of messy moments and it never clicked. I really don't think Sting needs to be going all out the way he does in some of these matches, even if is winding down soon. I understand this was supposed to serve as a buffer before the main event, but it was definitely disappointing.

Bryan Danielson def. Kazuchika Okada

God bless Tony Khan for landing the rights to "The Final Countdown" by Europe for Danielson's entrance, even if it was meant to be a one-off. That added to the atmosphere before the bell even rang. At any rate, this was very much the opposite of Okada vs. Ospreay and I mean that as a compliment. There weren't a ton of kickouts or high-risk moves, but the hard-hitting style they worked was a treat and it delivered as the dream match it was billed as. What's wild is that I'm sure they're capable of even better, as it felt like the crowd was waiting for them to hit that next gear. Even wilder, we found out during the post-show press conference that Danielson fractured his forearm early on and he wrestled the rest of the time at less than 100 percent. I could have done without the fake convulsing from Danielson, but other than that, this was a tremendous main event with a shocking clean win for Danielson. Will they run it back in the Tokyo Dome at Wrestle Kingdom 18 in January?

Overall Show

How the hell would they have fit Adam Cole vs. Tom Lawlor into this jam-packed card if he was cleared to compete? Four-hour pay-per-views have been the norm for AEW for a long time now, but they're still not any easier to sit through, no matter how great the wrestling is. The crowd was clearly exhausted by the end and the main events always suffer. With all of that said, this was an excellent event and even better than last year's installment. This would have been a thumbs-up show for the top two matches alone, but the undercard delivered and the hot Toronto crowd helped. Needless to say, this was a massive upgrade over Double or Nothing last month.

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