Huge Name Makes A Surprise Appearance On AEW Collision

This wrestling icon was in action on last night's AEW Collision.

by Andrew Pollard
AEW Collision Hiroshi Tanahashi Claudio Castagnoli Daniel Garcia
AEW

As AEW continued its build to Double or Nothing later today, last night's Collision saw a surprise appearance from the legendary Hiroshi Tanahashi.

The Ace of New Japan Pro Wrestling - and these days the President of NJPW - was revealed as the mystery teammate of Claudio Castagnoli and Daniel Garcia as they took on Lance Archer and the Righteous.

While it was teased that Claudio and Red Death would face their opponents in a two-on-three handicap match, Castagnoli took a moment to pause and usher out Tana as the third member of their team. As expected, the babyfaces picked up the win here, with Tanahashi hitting the High Fly Flow on Vincent to pick up the 1-2-3.

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Interestingly, it was heavily pushed on commentary that the Forbidden Door had opened early, with that annual crossover PPV to take place on 30 June. As well as the usual AEW and NJPW involvement, this year's Forbidden Door has been rumoured to feature talent from CMLL and Stardom as well.

As for Hiroshi Tanahashi, he last competed in an AEW ring back at last year's Forbidden Door, where he lost to then-AEW World Champion MJF. The 47-year-old has three other AEW outings under his belt, teaming with Jon Moxley to defeat Chris Jericho and Lance Archer on a June 2022 Dynamite, losing to Mox at Forbidden Door later that month, and scoring a win over Swerve Strickland on an episode of Collision last June prior to that MJF loss.

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Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is co-host of the Fearless in Devotion podcast, which won the Club Podcast of the Year gong at the 2024 FSA Awards.