It's a huge week for All Elite Wrestling as we return to the H-E-B Center in Austin, TX, a place we've called home since February 12, 2020, and that has hosted its share of historical moments! This is where Nyla Rose captured the AEW Women's World Title from Riho in 2020, where Jon Moxley successfully defended the IWGP United States Heavyweight Title in 2021, where Hikaru Shida defended the Regina Di WAVE Title and Swerve Strickland nearly became FTW Champion in 2022, and where Orange Cassidy took down Matt Taven in a Texas Death Match in 2024 while Cope and Daniel Garcia had an unforgettable TNT Title #1 Contender's Bout rudely interrupted!
That's just the tip of the iceberg where AEW and the H-E-B Center are concerned, suffice to say it's been a wonderful Lone Star State home for us over the years, and that's why this edition of DYNAMITE presents two huge championship matches for the fans in attendance, as well as those watching around the world! The Death Riders of PAC, Claudio Castagnoli, and Wheeler Yuta will defend the AEW World Trios Championship against Undisputed Kingdom of Adam Cole, Kyle O'Reilly, and Roderick Strong while The Hurt Syndicate of Bobby Lashley and Shelton Benjamin put their AEW World Tag Titles on the line against former champions Austin and Colten Gunn, The Gunn Club! In addition, MJF will step into Dustin Rhodes' back yard for their first one-on-one encounter while “The Best Wrestler Alive”ô Max Caster holds his Open Challenge once again!
DYNAMITE comes to you from Austin's H-E-B Center starting at 8 p.m. ET/7 p.m. CT streaming on MAX, as well as on TBS, and around the world via AEW PLUS and TSN in Canada! Before the night gets underway, pay a visit to the official AEW YouTube channel to catch-up on highlights from last week's editions of DYNAMITE and COLLISION, HEY!(EW) with Glacier, and so much more! Then join us on Saturday for GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA, AEW's historic debut in Brisbane, where AEW Women's World Champion Mariah May puts her title on the line against Australia's own “Timeless” Toni Storm, TBS Champion Mercedes Moné faces Gold Coast's Harley Cameron, and AEW Continental Champion Kazuchika Okada defends his title against Melbourne's Buddy Matthews! Plus, The Death Riders of AEW World Champion Jon Moxley and Claudio Castagnoli fight “The Rated R” Superstar Cope and “Switchblade” Jay White in a Brisbane Brawl while The Don Callis Family's Kyle Fletcher and AEW International Champion Konosuke Takeshita take on “The Cleaner” Kenny Omega and “The Aerial Assassin” Will Ospreay!
AEW WORLD TAG TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH...
The Hurt Syndicate (Bobby Lashley & Shelton Benjamin)(c) vs.
The Gunns (Austin & Colten)
572 miles west and and 735 days ago Austin and Colten Gunn defeated The Acclaimed to become new AEW World Tag Team Champions. That night in El Paso, the fans were less than thrilled at the prospect of “The Ass Boys” representing the tag team division and were thus overjoyed when FTR dethroned them 56 days later on Long Island. A few weeks later, during the HOUSE RULES event in Corbin, KY, The Gunns would have an opportunity to reclaim the belts, but Dax Harwood and Cash Wheeler shut down their challenge.
Austin and Colten had an opportunity to become #1 Contenders with WRESTLEDREAM 2023's Four-Way Contenders bout, but that honor instead went to The Young Bucks, meaning that May 12, 2023 night in Kentucky was the last chance The Gunns had to challenge for the belts. They claimed both the ROH World Six-Man and AEW World Trios Championship title with “Switchblade” Jay White in 2024 before being taken out of action last fall. The last time fans saw The Gunn Club competing in the ring was the 9/12/24 edition of COLLISON, also the last time we saw Austin Gunn live in an arena, while Colton has not been seen since the October 23rd DYNAMITE, but we'd have to go back to the 5/25/24 edition of COLLISION to find the last time these two men fought in a tag team battle. The Gunns' had their focus last year so much on trios competition before they were taken out of action, but that doesn't change the fact they are a duo with a 31-9 record as well as former champions.
As obnoxious as the pair where when they first began their AEW journey, the reception that Austin and Colten received last week n DYNAMITE demonstrated the respect they'd earned from the AEW faithful, and how eagerly anticipated their return had become. There was no question fans wanted to see them right back into the tag team championship picture, but perhaps their willingness to jump right into the mix came as a surprise to the AEW World Tag Team Champions in The Hurt Syndicate. MVP told them he appreciated their courage, but it didn't look as if Shelton Benjamin and Bobby Lashley, especially Lashley, appreciated the challenge the way MVP did.
The Gunns are brave stepping to two of the scariest competitors in the whole of All Elite Wrestling, even more so staking a claim on the World Tag Titles around Bobby and Shelton's waist, but will their courage prove foolhardy when the bell rings or will they join FTR and The Young Bucks as the only multi-time Tag Champions in AEW history?
AEW WORLD TRIOS CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH...
The Death Riders (Claudio Castagnoli, PAC, & Wheeler Yuta)(c) vs.
Undisputed Kingdom (Adam Cole, Kyle O'Reilly, & Roderick Strong)
Since September 4, 2022 there have been seven different World Trios Champions in All Elite Wrestling across eight reigns. The Elite of The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega are the only two-time champions, while The Acclaimed and Billy Gunn hold the record for longest reign at 238-days as well as for the most defenses with 11. Since ALL IN: LONDON 2024, those titles have been held in the grip of The Death Riders, specifically Claudio Castagnoli, Wheeler Yuta, and “The Bastard” PAC, and that 171-day reign currently has them in third place overall. While they started off strong with four defenses in their first two months as champions, it has now been 95 days since the last time The Death Riders have put those titles on the line but if you ask them, it's because no competition has stepped up to the challenge:
Well tonight on DYNAMITE the competition is here in the form of Undisputed Kingdom! Adam Cole, Kyle O'Reilly, and Roderick Strong have been on a tear in trios competition thus far in 2025, scoring three victories to date, one over Shane Taylor Promotions' Lee Moriarty and The Infantry, one over TNT Champion Daniel Garcia/Angelo Parker/Matt Menard, and one against both STP and the Garcia/Parker/Menard trio simultaneously! Clearly The Death Riders saw the threat that UK represents because there was no hesitation in attacking Adam Cole as soon as he pinned Carlie Bravo last Saturday night, and believing they had the upper hand in the moment.
As seen in the video embedded above, that was not the case as a flying knee from Roderick Strong and an ankle lock from Kyle O'Reilly showed The Death Riders they had a fight on their hands. That fight picks up where it left off on Saturday, only now the AEW World Trios Title will be at stake in Austin! Will The Death Riders run roughshod over Undisputed Kingdom with the belts on the line, or will we see Claudio, PAC, and Yuta be humbled for the first time since they claimed the titles at Wembley Stadium?
ONE-ON-ONE...
ROH World Tag & Six-Man Champion Dustin Rhodes vs. MJF
It's been a long time since MJF and “The Natural” Dustin Rhodes stood on opposite sides of an AEW ring (https://youtu.be/R9_4f0AJd3o?si=qxGAh4jtF9BJtvT6), just over five years as a matter of fact, but that was in a trios battle. Though that decision went in favor of Max's team, his pinfall victory was not on Dustin, but it's far from the only tie that binds these two together. Everyone who has followed the career of MJF as it pertains to AEW knows whose coattails he rode into Jacksonville and how that connects him to Dustin, but the issue that has emerged between them runs far deeper than just MJF's manipulations from a half-decade ago.
Over the course of the last few weeks, as MJF has chosen to target “The Last Outlaw” Jeff Jarrett with his vitriol, the former AEW World Champion has elected to push buttons quite close to Dustin's own story, specifically issues of abuse and recovery that both Jeff and Dustin struggled with quite publicly over the years. Neither man runs away from their demons, instead they try to show those who also suffer that there is a light at the end of the darkness, but it isn't an easy road to get there. It requires sacrifice, commitment, and dedication, and quite frankly, those are things with MJF knows very little about. He's never selflessly sacrificed anything in his life, never been dedicated to anything other than his own gains, and has only ever been committed to things that enrich his own life. He knows nothing of service, and has made a career of trying to use people's past sins against them.
Well Dustin has had enough of MJF trying to turn people's pasts (and their families) into weapons against them, and he aims to take Maxwell Jacob Friedman to the woodshed tonight in Austin! Where MJF only fights for himself, it feels as if Rhodes' is fighting on behalf of all those who Max has denigrated in such fashion, including Double J, and what better place for “The Natural” to do it than right in his home!
It's virtually impossible to shut MJF up for long, but can Dustin do the world the favor of at least smashing it closed for just one night?
“BEST WRESTLER ALIVE” MAX CASTER OPEN CHALLENGE...
So “The Best Wrestler Alive” Max Caster is holding another Open Challenge tonight on DYNAMITE despite running his mouth about “Hangman” Adam Page. After how his last Open Challenge went when “El Toro Blanco” RUSH stepped up, it will be quite interesting to see how this goes tonight in Texas. Could we see Hangman answer the call after what Caster had to say in that interview embedded above?
OPEN CHALLENGE ANSWERED!
Kris Statlander vs. Penelope Ford
It started as an open challenge laid out by Kris Statlander, a way for her to focus on herself after being rebuked by Willow Nightingale in her attempt to mend fences. It didn't take long for someone to respond to the opportunity presented by the former TBS Champion, and it came from one of Stat's main foes in here All Elite Wrestling:
Kris Statlander and Penelope Ford have gone one-on-one three times in AEW's history; way back at DOUBLE OR NOTHING 2020, on the April 28, 2021 DYNAMITE, and most recently at CHRISTMAS COLLISION this past December. All three of this matches were won by Statlander, but they aren't the full scope of the fight between these two competitors. Factor in a pair of Four-Way bouts in 2020 in which both competed, though neither won, as well as tags and trios in which they faced off, and these two women have been at odds eight times in AEW alone, saying nothing of their handful of encounters before AEW's existence.
Suffice to say this fight is about more than just tonight, and about the future of two women who've been a part of AEW as long as there has been an AEW.
So the question is, will this mark a 5th consecutive singles victory for Kris Statlander over Penelope Ford, or will “The Superbad Girl” finally get that elusive win over Stat she's been chasing for the last five years?
ALSO FEATURING:
-Megan Bayne's DYNAMITE singles debut!
-And More!
This Wednesday night DYNAMITE hails from the H-E-B Center in Austin, TX and gets underway on both MAX and TBS starting at 8 p.m. ET/7 p.m. CT! Fans around the world can also watch via AEW PLUS and TSN in Canada! Tonight we've got two championship matches on tap as AEW World Tag Champions The Hurt Syndicate defend against former champions The Gunn Club while The Death Riders put their AEW World Trios Title on the line against Undisputed Kingdom! We will also see “The Natural” Dustin Rhodes take Maxwell Jacob Friedman to task, and “The Best Wrestler Alive” Max Caster hold another Open Challenge!
Before the fights get started, be sure to visit AEW's official YouTube channel to watch all the highlights from last week's editions of DYNAMITE and COLLISION, HEY!(EW) with Glacier, and more! Then we make history Saturday with AEW's debut in Brisbane for GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA , featuring AEW Women's World Champion Mariah May defending her title against Australia's own “Timeless” Toni Storm, while Gold Coast native Harley Cameron challenges TBS Champion Mercedes Moné for her title! In addition, Melbourne's Buddy Matthews attempts to take the AEW Continental Title from “The Rainmaker” Kazuchika Okada, The Death Riders (AEW World Champion Jon Moxley and Claudio Castagnoli) meet“The Rated R” Superstar Cope and “Switchblade” Jay White in a Brisbane Brawl, and The Don Callis Family's “Protostar” Kyle Fletcher and AEW International Champion “The Alpha” Konosuke Takeshita face “The Cleaner” Kenny Omega and “The Aerial Assassin” Will Ospreay!