Luke Gallows And Karl Anderson Reflect On WWE Return, Discuss Idea For AJ Styles To Appear In NJPW
The Good Brothers, Luke Gallows & Karl Anderson, open up about their return to WWE. The duo also touched upon some discussed plans for their comeback and the fear that they wouldn’t be welcomed with open arms by WWE after some of the content they produced following their exit in 2020.
Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows returned to WWE in October 2022 to re-form The OC with AJ Styles. The duo returned on October 10, 2022, helping AJ Styles even the odds against Finn Balor and Judgment Day.
Speaking on a pop-up return edition of their podcast, Talk’n Shop, Gallows & Anderson reflected on their return to WWE.
“Well, it was a pretty surreal day,” said Anderson of their WWE return. “Like we’ve said a couple of times, I think we kind of thought WWE was in the rearview mirror.”
Gallows replied, “I think we kind of thought that after our exit and some of our content and some of the things we were doing, we weren’t going to be welcomed back with open arms, but we were. It was great.”
Anderson would go as far as to say that he believes it was one of the greatest returns of all time.
“Yeah, business was business. We moved on, and we worked it all out. I think we made one of the greatest returns of all time, and you can look back, and you can see that,” said The Machine Gun.
Gallows responded, “People will debate that, and I’ve seen some really great returns, but if you go back and watch it, and you listen, it’s really hard to ‘crizzap’ on that.”
At the time of their return to WWE, Anderson was the reigning NEVER Openweight Champion in New Japan Pro-Wrestling.
Discussing some of the ideas that were pitched amongst themselves, AJ Styles, and Triple H, Anderson says there was an idea to have AJ Styles appear in New Japan and cost Hiroshi Tanahashi a match against Anderson at NJPW’s Burning Spirit event before making their return in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada on September 26, two weeks before they actually returned.
We were doing a FaceTime — it was our boss at the time, Triple H, Gallows, Anderson, AJ Styles, and we were figuring out what we were going to do. This would have probably been in September, maybe August, I don’t know, but whatever it was, we’d almost basically decided on AJ Styles coming over and helping me win that match vs. Tanahashi, and then, the very next night would’ve been Monday Raw,” Anderson recalls.
Ultimately, it was logistically not possible due to the travel that would have been required. Still, Gallows is happy that they were able to return in New York, a market that has always been good to not only WWE but the Bullet Club.
“We were happy that, logistically, with what was going on in prior commitments, it didn’t work out. Not because we don’t like Edmonton. We had a great time in Edmonton, but we knew that the New York faithful would give it to us, and I think Edmonton would have given it to us as well, but New York’s a hot place to make a comeback,” said Gallows. “We’ve been lucky with two WWE debuts together, the first being Staples Center in Los Angeles and then the return in the Barclays Center, New York City. WWE staples but kind of old-school Bullet Club staples. Maybe you call it ‘a smarter audience.’ I don’t know, but they always are welcoming and give us a little love. We love that.”
AJ Styles and The Good Brothers are on the Friday Night SmackDown roster today. They were drafted to SmackDown along with “Michin” Mia Yim, the fourth member of The OC, as part of the 2023 WWE Draft.
AJ Styles and Mia Yim recently teamed on the June 16 episode of WWE SmackDown. Get caught up with our live coverage at this link.
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