Kenny Omega and The Elite and Will Ospreay and United Empire are both in trios action against the Don Callis Family. Plus, the Continental Cup continues. You can catch AEW Dynamite LIVE on Wednesday night at 8 p.m. ET/ 5 p.m. PT on TSN2, the TSN App, and TSN.ca.
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The Elite (AEW World Champion Kenny Omega, Nick Jackson and Matt Jackson) vs. The Don Callis Family (El Clon, “Dunkzilla” Mark Davis and Jake Doyle) (w/ Don Callis)
Before AEW’s biggest match of the year at All In, the AEW World Champion teams up with the Young Bucks (Nick Jackson and Matt Jackson) to do battle with a constant thorn in his side in the form of Don Callis’s crew. Kenny Omega and the Jacksons will take on El Clon, Mark Davis and Jake Doyle only 10 days away from Omega’s title defence against Will Ospreay. The Family is out to play spoiler on Wednesday night and will relish the role.
Omega’s history with Callis is well-documented. Both from Winnipeg, Callis was mentored by Omega’s uncle, The Golden Sheik, in the early days of his career. Callis met Omega as a child and became close with him, serving as a trusted advisor for years. In late 2020, Callis became Omega’s manager and helped lead him to his first AEW World Championship, albeit by nefarious means.
In 2023, thinking that Omega had grown soft in the years after losing his title, Callis shockingly turned on the man he’d known for decades, aligning himself with Ospreay and forming the Don Callis Family around him. In the years since, the enmity between Callis and Omega has turned hot at various times with Wednesday night being one of them. The Elite challenged any three members of the Family to a match this past Saturday night on Collision and Callis obliged.
While Callis was happy to take the match, not everybody was happy about it. The AEW World Tag Team Champions, Christian Cage and Adam Copeland, were incredulous that the Bucks would agree to this match only days before their title match at All In. Both teams have called this a dream match, which is why Cage & Cope were surprised that they would do anything to potentially compromise it. For their part, the Bucks insist they know what they’re doing.
As for the Family trio, they’re out for chaos. Clon, Davis and Doyle are out to inflict maximum damage and ensure The Elite is worse for wear heading into the pay-per-view. Davis, in particular, will enjoy himself, still furious at having lost his AEW National Championship to Andrade El Idolo at Redemption in August. He will see this match as the opportunity to put everybody with a championship, including Omega, on notice that he’s still in the picture.
Will the Family make The Elite regret making their challenge?
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United Empire (“The Aerial Assassin” Will Ospreay, IWGP World Tag Team Champion HENARE and Francesco Akira) vs. The Don Callis Family (“The Machine” Brian Cage, Rocky “Azucar” Romero and “The Murderhawk Monster” Lance Archer) (w/ Don Callis)
Heading into Wembley, Will Ospreay still considers himself a man without a country, but he managed to find some backup to take on the Don Callis Family on Wednesday night. Ospreay will team up with United Empire stablemates Aaron Henare and Francesco Akira to take on Brian Cage, Rocky Romero and Lance Archer. But the match will still be fraught with tension for Ospreay.
When Ospreay left New Japan Pro-Wrestling for AEW, the United Empire lost its leader. While TJP took the reins briefly, he couldn’t fill the shoes of Ospreay. More defections occurred from the faction with Aussie Open (Kyle Fletcher and Mark Davis) joining the Don Callis Family and Drilla Moloney joining Bullet Club. With the faction seemingly rudderless, Callum Newman stepped up. Ospreay’s protege, Newman declared himself the new leader of United Empire at the beginning of 2025 and transformed the group in his own image. A ruthless, take-no-prisoners Newman emerged and the United Empire followed suit. At Sakura Genesis this past April, Newman defeated Yota Tsuji to become the youngest IWGP World Champion in history at 23.
While Ospreay was gone from Japan, he didn’t consider himself gone from the Empire, but Newman didn’t necessarily share that view. Any time Ospreay has made an appearance in New Japan in recent months, Newman hasn’t exactly welcomed him back with open arms. And what Ospreay has seen from the Empire and their new attitude hasn’t exactly sat well with him, either.
At Wrestling Dontaku in May, things came to a head. Newman successfully defended his title over Shingo Takagi using nefarious means. After the match, Newman continued to batter the fallen Takagi with Ospreay pleading for him to stop. Instead, Newman verbally assailed his mentor, questioning his ties to the Death Riders, and goaded Ospreay into laying Takagi out with a Hidden Blade. Disgusted with himself, Ospreay stormed out of the ring.
After spurning “Hangman” Adam Page’s help weeks ago on Dynamite, Ospreay found himself turning to the Empire for help in Wednesday night’s trios match in the form of HENARE and Akira. Even still, Ospreay remains unsure that he can trust them. The match will mark the two men’s first appearance in AEW since a match in Edmonton in April.
The Callis trio of Cage, Romero and Archer are well aware of what’s happening on the other side of the ring and will undoubtedly attempt to use that dissension to their advantage. Much like their stablemates against The Elite, their approach on Wednesday night will be maximum carnage. Romero will take particular joy in facing off with Ospreay, thinking back to the time that he defected from Romero’s former NJPW stable, CHAOS, back in 2020.
Can the United Empire stay on the same page long enough to pick up a win?
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Continental Cup quarter-final match: Nigel McGuinness vs. CMLL World Heavyweight Champion Hechicero
Nigel McGuinness’s victory over Katsuyori Shibata on this past Saturday’s Collision came with a cost. It might be steep enough to derail the rest of his Continental Cup. Still, McGuinness will soldier forth on Wednesday night as he meets the Don Callis Family’s Hechicero in the quarter-finals.
During the first-round match on Saturday night, Shibata looked to put McGuinness away with the Penalty Kick. In desperation, McGuinness blocked the move by kicking out his leg at Shibata’s. While he didn’t take the move to the chest, the brunt of it was felt by his ankle. The former ROH World Champion would ultimately pick up the victory when he turned Shibata’s sleeper into a pinning combination a la Bret Hart against Roddy Piper at WrestleMania VIII.
After the match, McGuinness cut a promo in the locker room in which he declared that his X-rays came back negative and that he wouldn’t be withdrawing from the Cup. Concerning, though, was that he cut the promo while in a walking boot. He is clearly very hurt heading into Dynamite.
Hechicero also punched his ticket to the final eight on Saturday night. He met Family stablemate Brian Cage in the first round. Cage controlled much of the match through his power advantage, but Hechicero showed his ingenuity to claim the victory. After slipping out of a Drill Claw, Hechicero rolled Cage up and then shifted his weight into a high stack to get the pinfall victory.
If both men were healthy, a match between McGuinness and Hechicero would be a technical classic. But because of the injury to McGuinness, that might not be possible. That won’t bother Hechicero an iota, though. The mercurial masked man will have no problem using McGuinness’s injury to his advantage and that might simply be too much for the Brit to overcome.
Will McGuinness’s dream to wrestle for a title in his hometown at All In live on or will Hechicero snuff that out?
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Continental Cup quarter-final match: AEW Continental Champion Jon Moxley vs. “Switchblade” Jay White
Jon Moxley is still the AEW Continental Champion. With every match in the Continental Cup effectively a title match for the Death Riders leader, Moxley passed his first test on last week’s Dynamite. Who meets him next is a man he knows well and doesn’t particularly like in Jay White.
On last Wednesday’s Dynamite, Moxley took on Jack Perry, who had a point to prove. The former AEW World Tag Team Champion, TNT Champion and National Champion said that Moxley was the benchmark of the entire company and wanted to show that he could hang with the only man to have held the AEW World Championship on four occasions. And hang he did.
A bloodied Perry gave Moxley everything he could handle. Perry defiantly withstood Mox’s brutality as long he could and gave back as good as he took. Ultimately, though, Moxley’s Bulldog Choke proved to be too much with Perry eventually passing out in the hold. Impressed by his opponent’s effort, Moxley was quick to offer a handshake after the bout.
White also moved on this past Wednesday night in a match against old foe David Finlay. While White and Finlay’s rivalry dates back years in New Japan, White was looking for payback for something much more recently. At Redemption in Montreal, Finlay and Dogs stablemate Clark Connors defeated the Bang Bang Gang team of White and Juice Robinson in a Dog Collar Match. In that match, Finlay spiked White on his head with a Dominator.
On Dynamite, White’s anger was palpable throughout the match and it fueled his resilience. Finlay thought he had the match won when he slipped out of a Blade Runner and hit Oblivion, but White kicked out. White would eventually land a Blade Runner to pick up the win.
In Moxley, White has an opponent he’s encountered on numerous occasions. The Dogs and Death Riders have an alliance thanks to Gabe Kidd’s association with both factions and have worked towards making the Bang Bang Gang’s life hell in recent months. They last met in a ring at February’s Grand Slam Australia when Moxley teamed with Claudio Castagnoli to defeat White and Adam Copeland.
Wednesday night’s match will be their third-ever singles encounter and the previous two have also come in tournaments. It was White who emerged victorious in both matches. The New Zealander defeated Moxley in the 2019 G1 and again in the 2023 Continental Classic in a Gold League match. But Moxley has won their two most high-profile matches. He defeated White in a three-way match that also included Swerve Strickland to advance to the 2023 Continental Classic Final and also successfully retained his AEW World Championship at Worlds End 2024 against White in a four-way match that also included Orange Cassidy and “Hangman” Adam Page.
In the 10th match of their careers, which man will reach the Continental Cup’s final four?
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TBS Championship match: “The It Girl” Maya World (c) vs. CMLL World Women’s Champion Persephone vs. Kris Statlander vs. Hikaru Shida
In a match where unpredictability mixes with bad blood, Maya World’s TBS Championship reign is in serious jeopardy. “The It Girl” will not have to be pinned to lose her title on Dynamite in a four-way match against former champions Kris Statlander and Hikaru Shida and the CMLL World Women’s Champion Persephone. A chaotic battle is likely in store.
Simply put, there are many interpersonal rivalries at play among these four women. World defeated Shida to win the title at Redemption at the end of July in Montreal. Shida had only herself won the vacant title earlier that month in a Survival of the Fittest Match, defeating Statlander, her former ally who she had turned on earlier in the summer. That victory was mostly made possible when Persephone, who had been pinned by Statlander moments earlier, decked her in the head with her belt. World then made her first defence of her championship against Persephone.
With so many moving parts and different dynamics at play, it’s difficult to identify who the favourite on Wednesday night might be. To win a match of this kind, it will call for alertness and opportunism. It might not be pretty, or even ethical, but that’s how you win a four-way match. One of your opponents has hit her finisher on another? Dump her out of the ring and steal her pin. See two women fighting on the outside? Use that as a distraction to surprise the other competitor in the ring. Any advantage is a good one.
Interestingly enough, Persephone is the only one of the four women in the match who has not held this title. Statlander held the TBS Championship before she became the AEW Women’s World Champion. Shida was AEW Women’s World Champion three times before she won the TBS title for the first time.
Can World hold onto her crown or will a new champion emerge on Wednesday night?
