Paul Wight On Crafting New Gear For In-Ring Return In AEW, Upcoming Rampage At United Center In Chicago

In a recent interview with Wrestlezone, Paul Wight discussed AEW’s upcoming Rampage show at the United Center, his potential in-ring return, and much more. You can read his comments below.

Paul Wight on the upcoming AEW Rampage show at the United Center: “When you perform in front of these passionate crowds like this, they’re going to bring out a part of your performance that you’re not even aware of yet. You’re going to feel that anticipation when your music’s playing before you walk down the ramp. When you pull into the arena and the fans are backstage, there’s an energy and a hype that comes of working in these big cities and these legendary cities like Chicago and New York and LA and stuff like that. So you want to take that energy and use it to your advantage, and this is going to be an incredible experience for a lot of our talent. A lot of our talent has yet to experience a crowd of that magnitude to perform in front of, and those are the kind of experiences that you take as a talent, and over years and experience, all those situations add up. They build confidence in you, they build confidence in your character, and you build that relationship with the audience. So, having the opportunity to work the United Center on an AEW card, for our younger talent, these are going to be those moments that they’re not ever going to forget. There’s going to be shows that you’re going to have that will inspire you to work harder, that will inspire you to dig a little bit deeper in your character, dig a little bit deeper in your match psychology.

“I explain to young kids all the time that out of all the billions of people on this planet, you have worked hard, paid dues, made sacrifices, gotten lucky breaks, gotten opportunities, and there’s probably only—let’s be serious—out of all the billions of people on this planet, there’s probably only 100 talents, male and female, that are featured every week on major television networks that actually really move professional wrestling today. The needle movers, people that talk about their storylines, people talk about their characters. And that unique opportunity is something that you don’t sit back on your butt and say, ‘Oh I made it, I’m here,’ No, now’s the time you keep working hard and you apply yourself more because these are the moments that define your career and these are the moments that make your character. These are the moments in time that help forge your destiny. So for me, I’m super excited to see where a lot of our talent that have worked so hard for so many years, that have great relationships with the fans, to now get to work on it on a bigger scale with a bigger, sold-out crowd, with crowds that are enthused about your product, people are excited about the AEW product. For me, a guy that’s kind of seen it all and done it all, I’m excited for the younger generation to really take that in and embrace it. Years down the road, they can have old war stories like I have.”

On his potential in-ring return and revamping his ring gear: “The itch is definitely there…..this is the first time in, I don’t know how many years I finally get to reinvent myself a little bit. I’m trying to find updated gear that’s not so much retro, the same gear that we’ve seen me in for years and years and years. Stuff that’s more appealing for toy manufacturing for merchandising and branding, trying to experience all that and just finding a new look that encompasses who Paul Wight is, so it’s a discovery process right now. I’m driving the photo guys nuts at AEW because I’m trying to find something I like and then change my mind. So, this is the first time in—geez, I don’t know– I guess back in the Dungeon of Doom [days] since I’ve had the chance to really figure out, ‘This is what I’m going to look like, this is how I’m going to perform, this is what I’ll be comfortable performing in.’ So yeah, we’re still experimenting and still having fun, but I think I’ve got it narrowed down now. We’ve got some good options out there for a different look.”

If using any of the above quotes, please credit Wrestlezone with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.