Vice officially announced today that their popular pro wrestling series “Dark Side of the Ring” will premiere on Tuesday, March 24 at 9pm ET on the network.
You can see the new season two trailer below.
The two-hour season premiere will focus on the Chris Benoit tragedy, featuring interviews with Benoit’s family and friends, including his other son David Benoit, and Nancy Benoit’s sister, Sandra Toffoloni.
The show, which was Vice TV’s most-watched show in history during the first season, will air each Tuesday night at 10pm ET. AEW star Chris Jericho will be the narrator. There will be a new show premiering each week at 11pm ET after “Dark Side of the Ring” with Chris Gethard hosting a rotating panel of guests from the worlds of pro wrestling and entertainment.
“The first season of ‘Dark Side of the Ring’ was a massive hit,” said Morgan Hertzan, executive vice president and general manager of Vice Television, in a press release. “These powerful stories transcend wrestling fandom and resonate with both fans of the sport and newcomers who were captivated by this incredible storytelling. We rise to the challenge and do not shy away from the truth. I am proud and excited to continue telling these courageous stories in season two.”
“As lifelong fans, we have always been fascinated by the behind-the-scenes, human stories of the world of professional wrestling,” said executive producers Evan Husney and Jason Eisener. “For our second season we’re going even deeper into its secretive past. Many wrestlers and family members we interviewed have never spoken out before. Our series seeks to help bring closure to their stories.”
The following topics were confirmed for season two:
* The Benoit tragedy
* The murder of Dino Bravo
* Brawl For All leading to career-ending injuries
* The career of New Jack
* David Schultz’s run-in with a 20/20 reporter
* The death of Nancy Argentino
* The story of WWE Hall of Famers The Road Warriors
* Herb Abrams’ attempt to build a wrestling empire
AEW World Champion Chris Jericho will be hosting a third cruise in 2021.
It was announced yesterday as Jericho’s “Rock ‘N’ Wrestling Rager at Sea: Part Deux” cruise disembarked for the Bahamas, that the third annual cruise has already been confirmed. The announcement was made by Jericho himself.
“Chris Jericho’s Rock ‘N’ Wrestling Rager at Sea: Triple Whammy” will sail from February 1, 2021 through February 5, 2021. The trip will go from Miami, Florida to the Grand Bahama Island, and back.
The current cruise will wrap this Friday, sailing from Miami to Nassau, Bahamas, and is sold out. You can find full details on the trip at ChrisJerichoCruise.com.
NJPW legend Hiroshi Tanahashi will get the opportunity to earn an AEW World title shot next weekend when he goes one-on-one with ‘Le Champion’ at Wrestle Kingdom 14.
Chris Jericho shared a video on Saturday morning reacting to recent comments made by Tanahashi in regards to their upcoming match.
“You said if you could beat me, that you will enter the forbidden portal and request a title shot for the AEW championship,” Chris says in the video. “I thought it’s a great idea, so ‘Le Champion’ asked the Chairman of the Board, the owner of AEW, Tony Khan, if it was okay to grant your request. And he said yes! So, if you can beat me in the Tokyo Dome, I will give you a championship match for the AEW title,” Jericho added.
Wrestle Kingdom 14 is a two-day event this year starting on January 4. The show can be viewed on NJPW World or FITE TV. The show will not be broadcast on AXS TV this year, as the relationship between the two companies recently came to an end.
Jericho vs. Tanahashi will take place on night two of Wrestle Kingdom on January 5.
Wrestle Kingdom 14 will feature Chris Jericho and Hiromu Takahashi in matches which were both setup during Saturday night’s NJPW Power Struggle event.
Jericho was the first to make an appearance at Power Struggle when a video played after Kota Ibushi and Hiroshi Tanahashi defeated Kazuchika Okada and YOSHI-HASHI.
In the video, a roomful of Tanahashi look-a-likes play air guitar before they’re suddenly all on the ground. Jericho then appears in his Painmaker getup and challenges the “Ace of New Japan” to a match on night two of Wrestle Kingdom 14.
This year’s Wrestle Kingdom will be a two-day event on January 4 and 5.
Jericho – who is the current AEW World Champion – last appeared for NJPW back in June at Dominion when he lost to Kazuchika Okada.
Later in the evening at Power Struggle, Will Ospreay defeated BUSHI in a IWGP Jr. Heavyweight title defense. He then got on the microphone and asked who would challenge him next. As he started to leave the ring, a video began to play that was similar to Hiromu Takahashi’s first “Time Bomb” vignettes. The video ends with Hiromu’s cat dolls lighting a bomb that started a timer on-screen.
Takahashi emerged when the countdown was over and tore off a neck brace before making his way to the ring. He then ran around the ring taking bumps, cut a promo in Japanese and eventually challenged Ospreay to a match on night one of Wrestle Kingdom 14.
Hiromu has been out of action for 16 months after breaking his neck taking a dragon driver from Dragon Lee during the G1 Special in San Francisco back in July.
Watch their returns below.
The Ace Hiroshi Tanahashi vs. The Pain Maker Chris Jericho at Wrestle Kingdom 14 on January 5!!
The upcoming AEW World Championship match between Chris Jericho and Cody Rhodes is set to include a panel of judges who will determine the winner should it end in a draw.
The announcement from AEW explains:
AEW today announced a new tiebreaker stipulation for its World Championship title match featuring defending champion Chris Jericho taking on “The American Nightmare” Cody at the FULL GEAR pay-per-view event in Baltimore on Saturday, Nov. 9.
In the event there is no winner at the end of the 60-minute time limit, a panel of three esteemed judges, who will be seated at ringside, must vote for a winner. In the event there is not a unanimous choice, the majority decision will be the winner. This will ensure that a draw will not be the outcome of this World Championship title match.
No word at this time on who the judges will be.
Other matches set to take place at Full Gear include Jon Moxley vs. Kenny Omega and The Young Bucks vs. Santana and Ortiz of The Inner Circle.
Comedian and multifaceted talent, Kevin Smith, recently appeared alongside Chris Jericho on The Rich Eisen Show to discuss the new Jay And Silent Bob reboot film that hits theaters next week. Smith and Jericho finally revealed the AEW World Champion’s role in upcoming film: a Grand Wizard in the Ku Klux Klan.
“It’s a road movie, so it’s Jay and Silent Bob across the country. And it’s 2019 so they encounter all sorts of different personalities,” Smith said. “At one point, they encounter the Ku Klux Klan and Chris plays the lead Klansman.”
“Grand Wizard of the selected half of the Ku Klux Klan,” Chris specified.
Smith noted how much of a departure the role actually is for someone like Jericho, however, he still jumped into it with enthusiasm. Jericho attempted to channel the spirit of Henry Gibson from The Blues Brothers when creating his character.
“Now anyone who knows this man knows that this is acting; they should give him an Oscar because he’s so far apart from it. When I asked him, ‘Can you do this?’ He said, ‘There’s nothing else in there?’ I said, ‘No’. He said, ‘Alright, I’ll do it,” Smith said.
“There was no, ‘Oh, nothing else in there’. Are you kidding me? I love that sort of stuff, like the Ku Klux Klan? I’m in! I love it!” Chris said.
“He compared it to – and I was so flattered, and that’s why I was like, ‘Oh man, he is my boy’, he was like, ‘Look, I’m Henry Gibson in the Blues Brothers just make sure you give me an outline.’ And I was like, ‘He gets it, he absolutely gets it.’ So, Chris has my favorite ad-libbed moment in the movie, ad-libbed line which we came up with on the spot because he was like, ‘You’ve got to give me an out. Give me a big line to go out in.’ And we found one, it was great,” Kevin said. “But you can’t ask many people, you know, ‘Put on a white hood and be hated’, and they’ll do it for you. Man, this sweetheart of a guy did it. We couldn’t put him on the poster because he was wearing a hood; we had to change it.”
The obvious controversy surrounding the KKK forced Smith to leave Jericho off of the movie’s trailer and theatrical poster. They went into detail about how they actually filmed the scene with the KKK, noting how surprised they were that there wasn’t more outrage while shooting the scene near downtown New Orleans.
“I was like, ‘Why am I not in the trailer?’ He’s like, ‘Dude, you’re in the KKK. We can’t put that in the trailer.’ I don’t know if we have time for this quickly but when we were filming this in New Orleans and you have fifteen guys, extras with Ku Klux Klan outfits on and there’s a cross that had lights on it that simulated fire,” Chris explained. “So, there’s a Klan rally with a burning cross under an overpass in basically downtown New Orleans. I don’t know how we didn’t get shot or have members join us.”
“On Instagram, we saw one week later of somebody [filming] us from above like as they’re driving by, going, ‘I cannot believe they’re having a Klan rally right in the open like this.’ To be fair, the Klan played as bad in the movie – they’re bad guys. Just in case anyone out there is like, ‘I’m buying a ticket!’ And we’re like, ‘We’re bad guys.’ And they go, ‘Oh, I don’t want a ticket.’ They’re bad guys,” Kevin finished.
We first reported back in March that Jericho was announced as part of the cast for the Jay And Silent Bob reboot film. Although this is the first time Jericho is appearing in a film alongside Jason Mewes (Jay), this is actually the second time that Smith and Jericho have worked on a movie together. Jericho will be a part of the forthcoming horror anthology Killroy Was Here, which was also directed by Kevin Smith and wrapped filming this month.
During this same interview Smith revealed that WWE cancelled a scheduled appearance at last week’s Friday Night SmackDown because of his close ties to AEW and Chris Jericho.
“Me and Jay were lucky enough to be involved, Chris invited us to be involved with the debut match on TNT,” Smith said. “We were supposed to go do WWE, me and Jay, the very next day, which was Friday. Was it Friday? SmackDown. And then the morning after… because we were on the AEW show, it trended, like, there was a lot of coverage and stuff. So, the next morning we were told that WWE was like, you can’t come on anymore, and they canceled us. They kicked me and Jay off the show, but not in a crazy way.”
Source: Wrestling Inc. with credit to The Rich Eisen Show
The company Bubly is capitalizing off Chris Jericho’s viral moment last month by sending “Le Champion” a little bit of the bubbly.
The current AEW World Champion shared photos on Instagram of the free sparkling water they sent him on Thursday along with a banner that says “Chris Jericho’s *a little bit of the bubly* bag.”
“Thanks to [Bubly Water] for sending me #ALittleBitOfTheBubbly…. albeit of a different kind,” he captioned the post on Instagram.
In case you missed it … Jericho uttered the phrase after winning the AEW title in a post-show segment. Since then, he’sformed a faction in AEW named “The Inner Circle” consisting of Jake Hager, Sammy Guevara, Santana and Ortiz.
On this Wednesday’s AEW Dynamite, it will be The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega vs. AEW World Champion Chris Jericho and two mystery partners.
AEW announced that Jericho’s partners will be revealed on tonight’s Countdown to AEW Dynamite at 8 pm ET on TNT. In the video below, Jericho called for his partners, but both were blurred out, although they did look like Santana & Ortiz (fka Impact Wrestling’s LAX).
Earlier this month, Jericho mentioned that he filmed some segments with Santana & Ortiz, following All Out, adding to speculation that they will be Jericho’s mystery partners.
Below is the current lineup for AEW’s TV debut:
* Adam Page vs. PAC
* Jon Moxley appears live
* Cody Rhodes vs. Sammy Guevara
* The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega vs. AEW World Champion Chris Jericho and two mystery partners
* Nyla Rose vs. Riho to crown the first-ever AEW Women’s Champion
* MJF vs. Brandon Cutler
Matt Hardy took some time out of his date night with wife Reby Hardy to parody what happened to AEW Champion Chris Jericho. As it was noted earlier this week, the AEW Championship was stolen on Sunday while Chris Jericho was eating at a LongHorn Steakhouse in Tallahassee, Florida. The title was later found along the side of the road.
Matt Hardy posted the above video on his YouTube channel. In the video, Hardy walks out of a LongHorn Steakhouse restaurant with a missing belt.
“Just had a wonderful date night with my beautiful wife here at a very classy restaurant as you can… Hold up (runs back inside the restaurant and grabs his belt) that son of a b—- tried to steal my belt. Reby, where’s our limousine?”
He also posted that he wasn’t teasing Chris Jericho, just the situation. Hardy wrote on Twitter, “For the record, I am not making fun of Chris Jericho. I just saw an opportunity to make a cute parody of last week’s wacky events & remind people of how entertaining I can be. Chris is a great friend & is an industry master of evolution & reaction. ENJOY!”
For the record, I am not making fun of @IAmJericho. I just saw an opportunity to make a cute parody of last week’s wacky events & remind people of how entertaining I can be. Chris is a great friend & is an industry master of evolution & reaction. ENJOY! https://t.co/bQyJvPaQrlhttps://t.co/nLaXkiOTPb
Chris Jericho will face-off against Cody Rhodes at Full Gear and AEW President Tony Khan says the challenger earned the opportunity due to his win-loss record.
Sports Ilustrated broke the news for AEW, with Khan telling the publication:
“Cody’s outstanding record in singles competition has secured him the number one contender ranking, and he will be challenging AEW world champion Chris Jericho in the first ever pay-per-view defense of the championship on November 9 in Baltimore at Full Gear.”
“Cody earned this opportunity over the summer as he remained unbeaten in singles bouts, scoring pins on a pair of proven veterans, defeating his older brother, the legendary wrestler Dustin Rhodes at Double or Nothing, and beating bitter rival and former partner Shawn Spears at All Out—and battling to a draw with the exciting upstart Darby Allin at Fyter Fest.”
AEW execs have heavily stressed that the promotion will focus on wins and losses mattering. This is the first indication of how that will play a part going forward.
“Full Gear” will also feature Jon Moxley vs. Kenny Omega.
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