Episode Details

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This week, Wrestling Tonight heads to Chicago for a massive preview of AEW All Out and WWE x AAA Worlds Collide, two major shows running the same day in the same market. AEW returns All Out to the NOW Arena in Hoffman Estates, while WWE brings Worlds Collide to the nearby Allstate Arena in Rosemont with Chicago native CM Punk positioned prominently on the card.

For AEW, this is a genuine homecoming. All Out returns to the building connected to the independent All In in 2018 and some of the biggest moments in AEW history, with Will Ospreay defending the AEW World Championship against Jon Moxley in a main event that feels like a confrontation between where AEW has been and where it wants to go next.

We break down the entire eleven-match All Out card, including Cage and Cope defending against FTR and The Young Bucks in a three-way ladder match, Swerve Strickland and The New Level battling "Hangman" Adam Page and Brodido, Thekla facing Willow Nightingale, Kazuchika Okada defending against Tommaso Ciampa, Andrade El Ídolo facing PAC and Darby Allin teaming with Steven Borden. With seven championships involved, there is plenty beyond the main event that could reshape AEW heading into the fall.

Then attention turns 20 minutes down the road, where WWE x AAA Worlds Collide has become something considerably bigger than another crossover show. WWE finalized its acquisition of AAA last year, WWE talent and AAA championships have increasingly crossed between the two brands, and this third Worlds Collide since June 2025 arrives with the relationship more integrated than ever.

We preview La Catalina against Roxanne Perez for the AAA Reina de Reinas Championship, the Lucha Brothers reuniting against Los Perros del Mal, Las Tóxicas against Fatal Influence, Dragon Lee against Jack Cartwheel, the AAA World Cruiserweight Championship contender match and the Relevos Atómicos de Locura. We also look at the larger question surrounding AAA under WWE ownership: can WWE expand AAA's reach without gradually turning the promotion into another extension of the WWE machine?

That question leads into WWE's much longer history of working with the outside wrestling world. From the NWA, NJPW, AJPW and SWS to Smoky Mountain Wrestling, ECW, Michinoku Pro, AAA, TNA and NOAH, WWE has opened its doors plenty of times before, usually when the company on the other side offered something WWE wanted. The difference in 2026 is that WWE no longer simply has a working relationship with AAA. WWE owns it.

And then there is CM Punk. Punk teams with Rey Mysterio and El Grande Americano against Omos, Dominik Mysterio and JD McDonagh, while teasing callbacks to his past with his old lucha mask and "This Fire Burns." Putting one of wrestling's most famous Chicago stars at the Allstate Arena while AEW runs All Out nearby gives this match a significance that goes well beyond what happens between the ropes.

There is also an incredible reversal in Punk being on this side of the fence. For years, Punk carried the aura of somebody connected to the cool-kids side of wrestling outside WWE's corporate bubble. Now he is one of WWE's biggest stars as the company brings an event built around its newly acquired wrestling promotion into Chicago opposite AEW. We get into that irony, what Punk represents on this particular weekend and why WWE's version of the "Forbidden Door" has always been more complicated than simply opening itself to the rest of professional wrestling.

It is AEW All Out against WWE x AAA Worlds Collide, two buildings, two very different wrestling shows and one enormous Saturday in Chicago. We preview every match, make our predictions and examine the history and business sitting underneath