10 Things AEW Wants You To Forget About 2023
7. The Attendances
In virtually every city or town AEW ran in 2023, fewer people attended than they had in prior years. This was a bleak, sobering trend, particularly when you consider what happens in 2024. The company isn't getting hotter, put it that way.
Certain gates - not all, mind you - bordered on the humiliating.
In 2021, as fans returned, those packed, more intimate buildings were ablaze with heat. Brightly lit and throbbing, you could see every, up-for-it face. 2023 feels different.
AEW often runs huge, cavernous arenas that could in theory hold close to 15,000 people. Collision - which has not remotely helped, and indeed dilutes interest among the ticket-buying public - often attracts punters in the 3,000 range. The lack of interest filtered into the atmosphere. It sounded and just felt empty, bleak, a visual and aural reminder that AEW simply wasn't as hot as it once was.
If you go to watch a Raw taping, you're all but guaranteed to see each of the top stars wrestle, or certainly the majority of them. AEW's rotating cast policy means you might not see one of Jon Moxley, Bryan Danielson, Kenny Omega, MJF, Chris Jericho...
Is that the primary reason? Or was AEW just generally flat creatively?
Ticket prices didn't help, but be real: if AEW was at its absolute best, the punters would flock to it.