AEW’s Tony Khan Talks TV Future, ‘Worlds End’ & ‘Die Hard’ Family Tradition

When you’re Tony Khan, the greatest gift this holiday season is watching fans enjoy All Elite Wrestling. The founder, CEO, and overall creative visionary of the relatively young company launched in 2019. Since then it has become a popular staple of the Warner Bros. Discovery networks’ portfolio, so much so that the conclusion of A Christmas Story 24-hour marathon on TNT will lead to Christmas Collision. Santa Khan also presents Dynamite on 34th Street during Christmas Eve programming on TBS. 

The one-two holiday punch leads into AEW Worlds End, the last pay-per-view of the year. It’s set to feature the semifinals and finals of Continental Classic. A tournament carefully crafted by Khan, featuring a mix of top and emerging talent. The event has become an annual tradition. For the boss, it’s a nice way to wrap up 2025. One he’d give his trademark “justified this is awesome chants” after being dubbed “Promotion of the Year” by Sports Illustrated.

“I was so pleased that Sports Illustrated, a renowned publication I’ve been reading since I was six years old in the school library, selected AEW as 2025’s top pro wrestling promotion of the year,” Khan said. This is along with a bevy of other honors for individuals and teams and rivals.” 

This provides further motivation to deliver at Worlds End. Ahead of the show, we caught up with the head honcho.

This Continental Classic is so intricate with Blue and Gold leagues and point system. What is your approach to booking these tournaments every year? 

Tony Khan: Coming out of Wrestle Dream into Full Gear, I have thoughts about who will be in the tournament. I’m updating week to week and monitoring the injuries because it’s such a hard hitting sport. One injury could be very impactful in the planning. I put all the names in my notebook and am constantly thinking about it. I have a good plan going into Full Gear for what I want to do and coming out of Full Gear. I evaluate the health of the wrestlers and then make necessary changes to the draft I made before Full Gear in the months of October and November. I work through the scenarios. There was an injury this year that led to a lot of changes to scheduling. 

How was it having to adjust after Darby Allin got injured? 

It was a serious enough injury at the time that Darby Allin had. He is one of the toughest people in the world in my opinion and had to step out of the tournament. He didn’t want to be taken out. The doctors felt that he shouldn’t continue. It was certainly from an accumulation of injuries from all the crazy things he has done in the ring and outside the ring, ringside area and backstage and all the crazy fights we’ve seen Darby in. They take its toll. On the first night of the tournament he had a match with Kevin Knight. It was actually on Thanksgiving Eve. I always love spending time with Darby, but I hadn’t planned to spend my Thanksgiving morning in the hospital with Darby. I gave him every opportunity over the next week to get cleared. But I was very skeptical he should participate. 

I think a great choice as an alternate is “Jungle” Jack Perry, who was very eager to do the tournament. It has worked out very well…When it comes to planning the Continental Classic, I go home. I have a lot of homes. Because of filming that night, it was around Nashville, and I went home to Chicago and spread papers and ideas all over the desk or sometimes on the floor. I spread all the papers out and ran all the different combinations and scheduling. With Darby being injured, and Jack coming in, it absolutely changed the schedule around. I thought about it for months and the order of the matches, which affected all the wrestlers in the Gold and Blue leagues. One injury can change anything, but there are multiple silver linings because Darby will be okay and going to be back. We did the right thing to take him out to rest and recover in my opinion. “Jungle” Jack has been a fantastic replacement. 

What I love about this tournament is it gives young talent such as “Speedball” Mike Bailey the opportunity to break out. 

Absolutely. I was so excited to have “Speedball” Bailey and his partner Kevin Knight. Both members of JetSpeed are awesome as a tandem but also individual members. They had a fantastic match against each other in the tournament in the competitive spirit of the Continental Classic. I think AEW has had a tremendous 2025, and I think it’s very fitting we built this annual tradition in the Continental Classic tournament that fans look forward to. I hope this ends up being the best one yet. 

AEW

What are your thoughts on the developments regarding the future of Warner Bros. Discovery? How do you take in this uncertainty? 

I think we have a lot of certainty and are very excited. 2025 is the most exciting year yet for AEW and our partnership with Warner Bros. Discovery was reimagined this year and will continue for years to come. We’re locked in with TNT, TBS, and HBO Max for over two more years. The future is bright for us for years to come. The person who is making the calls and always been a believer in AEW and continues to be is [President and CEO] David Zaslav. I just got a very nice holiday from him in fact that I will be utilizing in some fun ways in the weeks to come. The man who first asked me to launch AEW Collision and bring more wrestling back to TNT along with the great Dynamite on TBS, which is our flagship show. It’s the longest running primetime professional wrestling show in the history of TBS and TNT. Turner, in my opinion, has the richest collective history of professional wrestling with a tradition that goes back on TBS to 1971. 

Then after 20 years of no wrestling on TBS we brought it back and had Dynamite become the longest running primetime wrestling show ever on TBS and TNT. Mr. Zaslav had the idea to launch AEW on HBO Max to make the pay-per-views available to its massive audience and add new fans to AEW and HBO Max. Subscribers have the extra incentive with Dynamite and Collision and the library. That deal is continuing for years to come. I know the job Mr. Zaslav has done running Warner Bros. this year that people are going to want Mr. Zaslav as a studio boss in any regime. He has been one of the most successful studio heads in the history of Hollywood. The numbers don’t lie. David Zaslav is putting out hit after hit. I’m very proud he has made the big investment in AEW. There is a lot of excitement around the future of Warner Bros. It’s certainly one of the most exciting stories on Wall Street. There are a lot of exciting things happening around Warner Bros. that I’m proud AEW will be associated with Warner Bros. 

Mercedes Moné (Ricky Havlik/AEW)

This year we’ve also seen some great growth in the AEW women’s division. Talk about how you’ve made this a priority, even introducing AEW Women’s Tag Team titles and having the first women’s Blood & Guts match. 

I’m very excited about AEW women’s wrestling in 2025 and going into 2026. I think it’s the best women’s wrestling we’ve ever had. When we launched AEW over six years ago we started with a small group of wrestlers and built up our roster and built up our women’s wrestling. Our small group did a fantastic job establishing women’s wrestling in AEW. I made it a focus for years to try to accumulate the best wrestlers in the world. We had a big focus on finding the best women’s wrestlers. So many of the top stars are wrestlers we signed along the way. The tag team tournament for the Women’s Tag Team Champions is the perfect example. There is the TBS Champion Mercedes Moné, “Timeless” Toni Storm, great free agents who have signed with us along the way. They had an incredible match at All In in Texas as singles competitors, but also competed in the tag team tournament teaming with two stars that are incredible in ROH Women’s Champion for over three years Athena and Toni Storm’s partner Mina Shirakawa. 

There are also homegrown talents that have developed. The Women’s Champion Kris Statlander is someone that has been there since the beginning, but she has risen and developed to be one of the top stars as a fantastic champion. Her opponent at Worlds End Jamie Hayter was there from the beginning but was away in England during the pandemic and came back after the COVID lockdown in better form than ever. She was out with injuries for some time but came back to be a top star. I’m so excited to have two AEW originals in a division where we’ve seen great free agents coming into compete at a top level. The Women’s Tag Team Championship match at Worlds End has four stars who were not on the first AEW shows but joined us along the way with Mercedes Moné and Athena facing the “Babes of Wrath.” That has Willow Nightingale, a former TBS Champion herself and has come so far since the Daily’s Place days and risen to be a champion and now first-ever tag team champion teaming with a popular star in Harley Cameron. Harley has risen and developed and is another great example of women’s wrestling in AEW. 

MJF (Ricky Havlik/AEW)

How is it having MJF back in the fold and inserted in the AEW Championship match at Worlds End?  

As we’ve been in this holiday season there has been so much excitement and unpredictability around the AEW World Championship. Last week at the “Holiday Bash” event in Manchester, the picture looked very exciting. We’ve got the AEW World Champion, the first-ever double champion in AEW history the Word Trios and AEW World Champion now for the second time Samoa Joe. In my mind, one of the all-time great wrestlers. He had a tremendous defense of the championship at “Winter Is Coming” Dynamite in a match I always wanted to see and delivered with Eddie Kingston. Now Samoa Joe has to face two men he knows very well in the ring and also know the AEW world champion. Hangman Page, the man Samoa Joe plotted to take the AEW World Championship from after Joe was instrumental in helping him win this championship. Page is also a two-time champion. One of Samoa Joe’s greatest rivals and who has been through hell with Hangman Page and fought beside him as well, Swerve Strickland is in there, too. 

Swerve was put out for months, but returned and actually stood for the first time with his generational rival Hangman Page. Swerve returned to the picture in fine form looking better than ever. It looked to be a rematch from Revolution 2024 where we set all the records in Greensboro. Then we did see what was unexpected for many fans in the return of MJF, Maxwell Jacob Freedman who had been clinging to this opportunity that he earned in AEW All In Texas for a contract to challenge for the championship. I made it clear to properly advertise and prepare for these shows and deliver world championship matches at the highest level there needs to be and has been given proper notice. So I did know for this to be finalized.

 MJF is back and has got his own rivalries. There was the one who took the championship from him at World’s End two years earlier and holds the championship now, Samoa Joe. MJF wisely returned to a contract signing segment for AEW “Holiday Bash” this past week when there was no physicality allowed or competitors. It’s going to be a fantastic pay-per-view. I’m excited for Worlds End this weekend and thrilled about that four-way for the world championship as part of this big Christmas week. 

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Speaking of Christmas, do you have any traditions at home? 

I love to spend Christmas with my family. I end up having work to do during the day, but I still have spent every Christmas with my parents and sister. This year I’ll be watching Christmas Eve Dynamite on TBS and HBO Max with my family. I’ll have the TV going with TBS and may even put on an iPad with HBO Max. We’ll have Christmas night watching Collision on TNT an HBO Max. We’ll also watch Die Hard. Sometimes on Christmas Eve, and sometimes on Christmas. One or the other, we always watch Die Hard. We think it’s a Christmas movie in my family. It’s why we watch it every Christmas. We usually spend the holidays in Champagne, Illinois or Chicago, Illinois. That’s very appropriate because World’s End is in the Chicagoland area at Hoffman Estates just outside the city of Chicago. I’ll be spending my whole Christmas week in Chicago. It’s going to be a great one. We usually watch football, watch Diehard, and AEW. 

Die Hard does check all the boxes to be a Christmas movie. 

It’s so on the nose! It starts with Christmas music and bookends with Christmas music. It’s set in a Christmas party…”Now I have a machine gun, ho-ho-ho.” There are countless reasons why I believe in my personal opinion that Die Hard is a Christmas movie. That’s the opinion of me and my family. That’s why we watch it every year. 

AEW Dynamite on 34th Street, December 24, 6/5c, TBS and HBO Max

AEW Christmas Collision, December 25, 9/8c, TNT and HBO Max

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